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By David M. Drucker
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
The six Senate Finance Committee negotiators reconvened Monday with an eye toward meeting a mid-September deadline for a health care reform deal while their respective party leaders sought to frame the debate on the issue heading into the August recess.
By Kate Ackley and Anna Palmer
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Though medical groups are still under orders not to blast attack ads as they wait for a Senate Finance Committee health care reform bill, trade groups and corporate players are nonetheless ratcheting up their messages over the August recess.
By Emily Pierce and Tory Newmyer
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Washington loves a good fight, and Democrats have been giving the media plenty of fodder lately as moderates and liberals battle over the various bills the party has been waiting for decades to enact.
By Jennifer Yachnin
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Nearly two months after the House ethics committee acknowledged it is investigating lawmakers’ ties to the PMA Group — a statement made in the wake of demands for public accountability — little is known about the inquiry because the panel is using a process that limits the amount of information it has to release.
By John Stanton
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
The full Senate will finally take up the nomination of Supreme Court hopeful Sonia Sotomayor today, as lawmakers begin a highly orchestrated floor debate expected to be long on political posturing but short on substance or suspense.
By Emily Heil and Elizabeth Brotherton
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Dennis Hof, the proprietor of Nevada’s famed Moonlight BunnyRanch brothel, thinks Sen. John Ensign’s highly publicized affair was completely unnecessary.
By Emily Yehle
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
House office buildings will soon get
$34 million of energy-efficient upgrades, with the private sector covering the up-front costs.
By Jessica Brady
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Two of the Senate’s more vocal critics of the popular “cash for clunkers” legislation switched gears Monday in favor of the plan, but it remains unclear when the measure will come to the floor this week.
By Jackie Kucinich
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Lula Young, the wife of Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), died Sunday of natural causes. She was 67.
By Don Wolfensberger
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
When the House of Representatives debated the statutory pay-as-you-go bill July 22, no one questioned its constitutionality. Yet for those who labored on the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985, only to have it overturned by the Supreme Court a few months later, there are eerie echoes of GRH in PAYGO.
By Stan Collender
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Two news items last week once again drove home the extreme difficulty in doing anything about the federal budget deficit.
By William Maurer
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
The House Administration Committee heard testimony last week on a plan to pay politicians to run for Congress. Dubbed the Fair Elections Now Act, the scheme represents a serious expansion of the government into the conduct of our elections with little chance of fulfilling the reformers’ stated goals.
Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
The latest cartoon from R.J. Matson.
Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
The latest cartoon from Mike Mikula.
By John McArdle
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Six months into the 2010 election cycle, Republican Senators are outpacing their Democratic counterparts in leadership political action committee fundraising, contributions and cash-on-hand totals, according to recently filed reports with the Federal Election Commission.
By Shira Toeplitz
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
While national Republicans are quickly falling in line behind former New Hampshire Attorney General Kelly Ayotte, several local party activists said they are still unsure what kind of candidate she will be in the Granite State’s 2010 Senate race.
By John McArdle
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Last week, Maryland state Sen. Andy Harris was tapped as one of the 13 inaugural members of the National Republican Congressional Committee’s revamped “Young Guns” program, which aids the party’s top challenger and open-seat candidates.
By John McArdle
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
It appears that accountant Doug Hoffman, who was passed over by local GOP leaders for the Republican nomination in the upcoming 23rd district special election, will be on the ballot anyway after earning the backing of the small but influential New York Conservative Party.
By Lauren W. Whittington
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
The State Department has requested that state Sen. Mark DeSaulnier (D) remove all references to his endorsement from former Rep. Ellen Tauscher (D) from his campaign material.
By John McArdle
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
The list of Republicans running in the 9th district open-seat race got even longer last week when state Sen. Lee Hawkins released a statement announcing that he will seek the GOP nomination next year.
By Lauren W. Whittington
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Rep. Joe Sestak (D) will officially launch his long-awaited Senate bid today with an initial kickoff event in his 7th district followed by two days of stops around the state.
By Lauren W. Whittington
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
State Sen. Dan Kapanke (R) announced last week that he plans to challenge Rep. Ron Kind (D) next year, a move that could produce the seven-term Democrat’s most competitive re-election race to date.
By Shira Toeplitz
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
State Sen. Michael Bond (D) has dropped out of the race for Rep. Mark Kirk’s (R) open House seat, leaving behind a competitive primary featuring two well-known local Democrats.
By Lauren W. Whittington
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
State Senate Minority Leader John McKinney (R) announced last week that he will not challenge freshman Rep. Jim Himes (D) in 2010.
By Tricia Miller
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Reading Sen. Barbara Boxer’s (D-Calif.) first novel, “A Time to Run,” is a game. Trying to figure out which characters and circumstances she drew on from real life keeps readers hunting for details in the story of Ellen Fischer, a young woman who is elected California’s new Democratic Senator after her candidate-husband dies in a car accident.
By Jeremy B. White
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Despite the way that Barack Obama’s election prompted observers to repeat the phrase “post-racial America,” America’s issues with race are far from settled. If anything, the significance placed on the fact of an African-American’s claiming the highest office in the land reflects the tenacity of race in a country whose treatment of minorities has often seemed at odds with its governing principles of equality and justice.
By Ben Geier
| Aug. 4, 2009, Midnight
Anyone who’s ever taken a college political science class knows that the academic study of politics and the world of professional politics often don’t mix well.
