Ed Kilgore

A pretty lively week, I’d say, and next week we’ve got another GOP candidate debate. Looks like another heavy Wednesday night. Here are some remains of the day: * Justice Dept. clears IRS and Lois Lerner of any criminal violations in dealing with political non-profit status applications. * At College Guide, Daniel Luzer examines BB&T’s […]

I’ve been writing here for a while about the apparent disconnect between presidential candidates who are spending early money on TV ads and how they seem to be doing in the Invisible Primary. Now thanks to NBC News and its ad-tracker SMG Delta, we have some numbers to work with. Mark Murray has the story: […]

Yes, animals, it’s time for another Friday afternoon thread wherein we share info about the cool tunes on our devices and in our heads. Go to it, please; I’ll ask the Stones to warm us up.

At TNR today, Suzy Khimm has an illuminating article on how Reddit–a social medium that has been central to the organizational and fundraising efforts of the Bernie Sanders for President campaign–has more recently begun to reflect the less productive impulses of a political insurgency. That was particularly evident immediately after last week’s Democratic candidate debate, […]

I’m wondering if the people who watched the entire Benghazi! Committee hearing yesterday have recovered. I expect I’d be ready for a non-political weekend. Here are some midday Friday news/views treats: * Dr. Ben Carson seems to suggest the “secular progressive movement” might want to bump him off because he’s an “existential threat” to its […]

The first step towards replacing absentee governor Bobby Jindal takes place tomorrow, when Louisiana holds it’s non-partisan “jungle primary” for state offices. National Journal‘s Karyn Bruggeman has a good summary of the race. But the fascinating development down the stretch has been the very real possibility that U.S. Senator David Vitter, the presumed favorite for […]

As part of the continuing response to Matt Yglesias’ alarm-bell column about Democratic downballot losses (my initial response was here), the Plum Line‘s Greg Sargent conducted an interview with Democratic Governors Association executive director Elisabeth Pearson about future prospects for gubernatorial gains. Pearson made this important point about the impact of governors on redistricting for […]

Rise to Rise director and overall Team Jeb strategist Mike Murphy may be perfectly happy with how the Invisible Primary is proceeding, but if you work for the actual campaign, you got some bad news today, per Politico‘s Isenstadt and Stokols: Jeb Bush on Friday ordered across-the-board pay cuts to his struggling presidential campaign and […]

With the highly reputable Ann Selzer weighing in with a new Iowa poll, it’s pretty clear this week’s earlier Quinnipiac poll of likely GOP caucus-goers in Iowa wasn’t an outlier: Ben Carson has moved past Donald Trump into the top horse-race spot, with incredibly high approval ratios to boot. The two polls have a lot […]

It’s not that big a deal when a presidential candidate with no money and virtually no support drops out, but you’d have to say Lincoln Chafee’s withdrawal from the 2016 race today represents a nice little cherry on top of the sundae of Hillary Clinton’s perfect week. That’s because Chafee’s only real significance in the […]