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Michael Barone is a Fox News Channel contributor and co-author of The Almanac of American Politics. He is Senior Political Analyst for the Washington Examiner and a Resident Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a Fox News Channel contributor and co-author of The Almanac of American Politics.
Michael Barone was formerly a senior writer with U.S. News & World Report. He grew up in Detroit and Birmingham, Mich. He graduated from Harvard College (1966) and Yale Law School (1969), and was an editor of the Harvard Crimson and the Yale Law Journal.
Barone served as law clerk to Judge Wade H. McCree Jr. of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit from 1969 to 1971. From 1974 to 1981, he was vice president of the polling firm of Peter D. Hart Research Associates. From 1981 to 1988, he was a member of the editorial page staff of The Washington Post. From 1996 to 1998, he was senior staff editor at Reader's Digest.
Barone is the principal co-author of The Almanac of American Politics, published by National Journal every two years. The first edition appeared in 1971, and the 17th edition, The Almanac of American Politics 2004, appeared in July 2003. He is also the author of Our Country: The Shaping of America from Roosevelt to Reagan (Free Press, 1990), The New Americans: How the Melting Pot Can Work Again (Regnery, 2001) and the just-released Hard America, Soft America: Competition vs. Coddling and the Competition for the Nation's Future (Crown Forum, May 2004).
Over the years, Barone has written for many publications, including The Economist, The New York Times, The Detroit News, the Detroit Free Press, The Weekly Standard, The New Republic, National Review, The American Spectator, American Enterprise, The Times Literary Supplement and The Daily Telegraph of London. He is a contributor to the Fox News Channel and has appeared on many other television programs.
Barone lives in Washington, D.C. He has traveled to all 50 states and all 435 congressional districts. He has also traveled to 37 foreign countries and has reported on recent elections in Russia, Mexico, Italy and Britain.
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Michael Barone (Dec 29, 2011)
"A 2008 election widely regarded as heralding a shift toward the more government-friendly public sentiment of the New Deal and Great Society eras seems to have... more
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Michael Barone (Dec 26, 2011)
The world usually turns out to work differently from what American presidents expected when they were campaigning.
Franklin Roosevelt campaigned on domestic issues in... more
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Michael Barone (Dec 22, 2011)
LACONIA, N.H. -- Three weeks out from the New Hampshire primary, and voters in the Granite State don't seem to have settled firmly on one of the Republican presidential... more
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Michael Barone (Dec 19, 2011)
It's highly unusual in a presidential debate for two Republican candidates -- the two leading in current national polls -- to heap praise on a liberal... more
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Michael Barone (Dec 15, 2011)
MANCHESTER, N.H. -- "We're not going to lose in New Hampshire." So says Mitt Romney's state coordinator, Jason McBride.
Stuart Stevens, the Romney campaign's TV ad-maker,... more
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Michael Barone (Dec 12, 2011)
It was a week of risk-taking in the 2012 presidential race.
Barack Obama, his job approval languishing in the low 40s, delivered a much heralded speech in Osawatomie,... more
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Michael Barone (Dec 08, 2011)
Has Barack Obama's Democratic Party given up on winning the votes of the white working class? Thomas Edsall, the longtime Washington Post reporter now with The Huffington... more
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Michael Barone (Dec 05, 2011)
Here are a couple of things to keep in mind about Newt Gingrich, as he leads in polls for the Republican presidential nomination nationally and in Iowa and South Carolina,... more
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Michael Barone (Dec 01, 2011)
One question I sometimes have been asked in this presidential campaign goes something like this: Why does Mitt Romney sound so corny?Actually, phrasing it that way suggests... more
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Michael Barone (Nov 28, 2011)
What should be done about income inequality? That basic question underlies the arguments hashed out in the supercommittee and promises to be a central issue in the... more
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Michael Barone (Nov 24, 2011)
We are in the midst of the 11th presidential nominating cycle since party commissions and state laws made primaries the predominant method of choosing national convention... more
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Michael Barone (Nov 21, 2011)
Supercommittee members Sen. Pat Toomey and Rep. Jeb Hensarling are taking flak from some conservatives for proposing a deal including increases in "revenues,"... more
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Michael Barone (Nov 17, 2011)
The election of Barack Obama, we were told, would bring new respect and friendship for America in the world.No longer would we be led by a Texas cowboy ignorant of and... more
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Michael Barone (Nov 14, 2011)
It irritates members of both groups when I note the similarities of the tea party movement that swept the nation in the 2010 election and the peace movement of the late... more
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Michael Barone (Nov 10, 2011)
Some of my friends in the conservative blogosphere have been ridiculing a New Yorker named Joe Therrien. I want to put in a good word for him.
Therrien appears in the lead... more
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Michael Barone (Nov 07, 2011)
Herman Cain, beleaguered by charges of sexual harassment, was all over Washington last week -- an odd choice of venue, considering that the Iowa precinct caucuses are now... more
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Michael Barone (Nov 03, 2011)
Washington was all a-Twitter (literally) Monday over Politico's story about the sexual harassment charges against Herman Cain -- and about Cain's serial... more
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Michael Barone (Oct 31, 2011)
The argument is being made in some quarters that, however unsuccessful Barack Obama's domestic policies have been, his record in foreign policy has been... more
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Michael Barone (Oct 27, 2011)
At the moment, national polls show Herman Cain leading or tied for the lead in the race for the Republican presidential nomination. This, despite the fact that he has never... more
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Michael Barone (Oct 24, 2011)
Religious faith is a source of strength in many people's lives. But religious faith when taken too far can prove ludicrous -- or disastrous.
On Oct. 22, 1844, thousand of... more
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Michael Barone (Oct 20, 2011)
We've been hearing a lot about immigration on the campaign trail, most of it based on outdated assumptions and echoing the arguments made when Congress was considering... more
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Michael Barone (Oct 17, 2011)
Napoleon is supposed to have said that the quality he most valued in his generals was luck. In the current race for the Republican presidential nomination, Napoleon's... more
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Michael Barone (Oct 13, 2011)
Dead. Kaput. Through. Finished. Washed up. Gone-zo. That, I think, is a fair description of the Obama administration's attempt to build high-speed rail lines across America.... more
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Michael Barone (Oct 10, 2011)
President Barack Obama obviously is scrambling in his attempt to win re-election. He has proclaimed himself the underdog and has given up his pretense of being a... more
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Michael Barone (Oct 06, 2011)
Leadership, said New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie in his press conference Tuesday announcing he would not reverse his decision not to run for president, is something you can't... more
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Michael Barone (Oct 03, 2011)
Is Herman Cain a serious contender for the Republican presidential nomination? It's a question no one in the pundit world was asking until the past week.
Cain has... more
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Michael Barone (Sep 29, 2011)
Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels did not attract as large a crowd when he spoke at American Enterprise Institute (where I am a resident fellow) earlier this week as he did when... more
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Michael Barone (Sep 26, 2011)
The spotlight was hottest on Rick Perry, the frontrunner in national polls since he announced his candidacy in Charleston, S.C., on Aug. 13, the same day that Michele... more
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Michael Barone (Sep 22, 2011)
As Barack Obama huffs and puffs about his tax plan, which is unlikely to pass in the Democratic-majority Senate much less the Republican-controlled House, Robert Zoellick,... more
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Michael Barone (Sep 19, 2011)
Barack Obama has been at pains to convince voters that he cares about jobs. It seems to be a hard sell.
But he certainly can demonstrate that he cares about certain... more
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Michael Barone (Sep 15, 2011)
One factor favoring President Obama's re-election, according to a recent article by political scientist Alan Lichtman, is the absence of scandal in his... more
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Michael Barone (Sep 12, 2011)
What is there to say about Barack Obama's speech to Congress Thursday night and the so-called American Jobs Act he said Congress must pass? Several thoughts occur, all... more
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Michael Barone (Sep 08, 2011)
The race for the Republican presidential nomination finally seems to be gelling. On Wednesday night, candidates debated at the Reagan Library in California -- the first of... more
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Michael Barone (Sep 06, 2011)
I can't remember a more stunning rebuke of a president by a congressional leader than House Speaker John Boehner's refusal to agree to President Barack Obama's demand -- er,... more
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Michael Barone (Sep 01, 2011)
In the glossy pages of The New Yorker, in graceful prose and with good reporting, the dreams and nightmares of the admirers of Barack Obama and his policies lie exposed.The... more
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Michael Barone (Aug 29, 2011)
Some of society's most intractable problems come not from its failures but from its successes. Often you can't get a good thing without paying a bad price.
A... more
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Michael Barone (Aug 25, 2011)
Not long ago, I wrote about how the private sector outraces and laps government. While governments dither and dispute, the private sector discovers. The example I mentioned... more
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Michael Barone (Aug 22, 2011)
One of the few issues on which opinion has moved left over the last few years is same-sex marriage. In 1996, Gallup found that Americans opposed it by a 68 percent to 27... more
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Michael Barone (Aug 18, 2011)
Pundits lately have been comparing Barack Obama to Jimmy Carter, suggesting he is a likely loser in 2012. But my American Enterprise Institute colleague Norman Ornstein,... more
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Michael Barone (Aug 15, 2011)
AMES, Iowa -- This has been quite a week or 10 days for Republicans. As this is written, down in South Carolina Rick Perry has just announced he's running for... more
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Michael Barone (Aug 13, 2011)
Never before has there been a televised presidential candidates debate so short a time before the Iowa Republicans' Ames straw poll. Last night's debate, co-sponsored by The... more
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Michael Barone (Aug 11, 2011)
Why Iowa? It was the 29th state to be admitted to the Union, it is the 30th state in population, it has given the nation Grant Wood's "American Gothic" and Meredith Willson's... more
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Michael Barone (Aug 08, 2011)
Why aren't voters moving to the left, toward parties favoring bigger government, during what increasingly looks like an economic depression? That's a question I've asked,... more
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Michael Barone (Aug 04, 2011)
Leading from behind." That's what an unnamed White House aide told the New Yorker's Ryan Lizza that Barack Obama was doing on Libya. It's an apt description of Obama's... more
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Michael Barone (Aug 01, 2011)
Everyone seems pretty cross at this juncture in the fight over raising the debt limit. As this is written, the House has just passed the bill that Speaker John Boehner... more
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Michael Barone (Jul 28, 2011)
Most presidents affect the standing of their political parties. Ronald Reagan advanced his party's standing among young voters. So did Bill Clinton.
In his first term,... more
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Michael Barone (Jul 25, 2011)
Those who consider themselves constitutional conservatives should take care to consider not only the powers that the Constitution confers on the different branches of... more
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Michael Barone (Jul 21, 2011)
When governments want to encourage what they believe is beneficial behavior, they subsidize it. Sounds like good public policy.
But there can be problems. Behavior... more
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Michael Barone (Jul 18, 2011)
It's hard to keep up with all the arguments and proposals in the debt limit struggle. But what's at stake is fundamental. The bedrock issue is whether we should have a larger... more
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Michael Barone (Jul 14, 2011)
The United States is a country that has been peopled largely by vast surges of migration -- from the British Isles in the 18th century, from Ireland and Germany in the 19th... more
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Michael Barone (Jul 11, 2011)
Some of us called it the man-cession. In the deep recession that lasted from December 2007 to June 2009, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research, many more men... more
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Michael Barone (Jul 07, 2011)
It's racially discriminatory to prohibit racial discrimination. That's the bottom line of a decision issued last Friday, just before the Fourth of July weekend, by the U.S.... more
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Michael Barone (Jul 04, 2011)
One of the interesting things about our country, the independence of which the Founders declared 235 years ago today, is that we have been a property-holders' democracy. This... more
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Michael Barone (Jun 30, 2011)
What's the fair way to run a large organization? That's a question that is squarely, and interestingly, raised by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's dissenting opinion in Wal-Mart... more
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Michael Barone (Jun 27, 2011)
Which past leader does Barack Obama most closely resemble? His admirers, not all of them liberals, used to compare him to Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt.
Well,... more
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Michael Barone (Jun 23, 2011)
When I was growing up, it was widely believed that colleges and universities were the part of our society with the widest scope for free expression and free speech. In the... more
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Michael Barone (Jun 20, 2011)
Two years ago, in June 2009, the American economy emerged from recession, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research. But as this week's Economist noted,... more
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Michael Barone (Jun 16, 2011)
Barack Obama did not watch the Republican presidential candidates' debate in Manchester, N.H., on Monday night, we are told. He was busy addressing a campaign fundraising... more
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Michael Barone (Jun 13, 2011)
Exit Newt Gingrich. Well, not quite yet, officially. On his Facebook page, Gingrich says he will endure "the rigors of campaigning for public office" and... more
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Michael Barone (Jun 09, 2011)
There's an awful lot that's stale in the debate on government energy policy.
Some stale arguments are nevertheless valid: It's dangerous to depend heavily on Middle... more
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Michael Barone (Jun 06, 2011)
Last week, I noted that various forms of the word "unexpected" almost inevitably appeared in news stories about unfavorable economic developments. You can find them again in... more
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Michael Barone (Jun 02, 2011)
Defense Secretary Robert Gates leaves office this month as widely respected as any public figure in America today, appreciated for his willingness to return to public service... more
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Michael Barone (May 30, 2011)
Unexpectedly!
As megablogger Glenn Reynolds, aka Instapundit, has noted with amusement, the word "unexpectedly" or variants thereon keep cropping up in... more
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Michael Barone (May 26, 2011)
Question: What do the following have in common? Eckert Cold Storage Co., Kerly Homes of Yuma, Classic Party Rentals, West Coast Turf Inc., Ellenbecker Investment Group... more
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Michael Barone (May 23, 2011)
"The State Department is a fitting venue," declared Barack Obama at the beginning of his speech on the Middle East last Thursday.
That's curious because in... more
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Michael Barone (May 19, 2011)
Exit Mike Huckabee. Enter Newt Gingrich. Exit Donald Trump. It's been a busy week in the race for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. A few questions remain to be... more
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Michael Barone (May 16, 2011)
Barack Obama's immigration speech in El Paso May 10 was an exercise in electioneering and hypocrisy. Hypocrisy because while Obama complained about... more
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Michael Barone (May 12, 2011)
When you get into discussions about the Middle East with certain people, you start hearing that the great mistake was the partition of Palestine and the creation of the state... more
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Michael Barone (May 09, 2011)
Some years ago, the columnist and editor Michael Kinsley sponsored a contest to come up with the most boring headline. The winner was, "Worthwhile Canadian Initiative." Well,... more
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Michael Barone (May 05, 2011)
Let's cheerfully and ungrudgingly give credit to Barack Obama for approving the military operation that resulted in the death of Osama bin Laden.
In my column last Monday,... more
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Michael Barone (May 02, 2011)
Sometimes a sympathetic and perceptive journalist paints a more devastating portrait of a public figure than even his most vitriolic detractors could. A prime example is... more
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Michael Barone (Apr 28, 2011)
Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour's abrupt withdrawal from the race for the Republican presidential nomination -- after hiring a topnotch New Hampshire campaign manager and... more
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Michael Barone (Apr 25, 2011)
The defined benefit is dying. Barack Obama is struggling to keep it alive, but it's apparent that it's something that even as bounteously rich a society as ours can't... more
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Michael Barone (Apr 21, 2011)
Did Barack Obama take Tax 1 in law school? I did, and I remember the first day of classes, when mild mannered Professor Boris Bittker asked a simple question, "What is... more
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Michael Barone (Apr 18, 2011)
Barack Obama is a politician who likes to follow through on long-term strategies and avoid making course corrections. That's how he believes he won in 2008, and since then... more
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Michael Barone (Apr 14, 2011)
Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank attracted some attention when he promised not to mention Sarah Palin for a month. He kept his promise. The republic and the Post... more
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Michael Barone (Apr 11, 2011)
One of the things that fascinate me about American politics is how the voices of the voters as registered in elections and polls are transformed into changes in public... more
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Michael Barone (Apr 07, 2011)
"My worst experience was the financial crisis of September 2008," responded House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan yesterday to a reporter's question about Democrats'... more
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Michael Barone (Apr 04, 2011)
Are whites on the verge of becoming a minority of the American population? That's what some analysts of the 2010 Census results claim. Many go on, sometimes with relish,... more
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Michael Barone (Mar 31, 2011)
Has the wind gone out of the sails of the smaller government movement? Is the tea party movement going through a hangover?
You can find some evidence for these... more
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Michael Barone (Mar 28, 2011)
The Census Bureau last week released county and city populations for the last of the 50 states from the 2010 Census last week, ahead of schedule. Behind the columns of... more
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Michael Barone (Mar 24, 2011)
Let's imagine that all goes well in Libya. The rebels, protected by air strikes, recapture lost territory and sweep into Tripoli. Moammar Gadhafi and his sons one way or the... more
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Michael Barone (Mar 21, 2011)
One thing on which there seems to have been agreement during the monthlong debate about how the United States should respond to the uprisings in the Middle East -- in... more
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Michael Barone (Mar 17, 2011)
The weakest part of our political system is the presidential nomination process. And it's not coincidental that it's the part of the federal system that finds least guidance... more
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Michael Barone (Mar 14, 2011)
In the Illinois legislature, state Sen. Barack Obama voted "present" 129 times. Today, he seems to be voting present on two major issues, Libya and the budget. National... more
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Michael Barone (Mar 10, 2011)
What do they put in the water cooler over at NPR? First, they fire Juan Williams in October for comments he made on Fox News Channel -- and Vivian Schiller, the CEO of public... more
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Michael Barone (Mar 07, 2011)
The labor union movement is in deep trouble. Only 6 percent of private-sector employees are union members. Voters are beginning to realize, thanks to governors like Chris... more
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Michael Barone (Mar 03, 2011)
Sometimes you get an idea of the way opinion is headed by the phrases you don't hear. Case in point: In all the discussion and debate these past weeks about a possible... more
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Michael Barone (Feb 28, 2011)
It's a question that puzzles most liberals and bothers some conservatives. Why are so many modest-income white voters rejecting the Obama Democrats' policies of economic... more
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Michael Barone (Feb 24, 2011)
Everyone has priorities. During the past week, Barack Obama has found no time to condemn the attacks that Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi has launched on the Libyan people.... more
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Michael Barone (Feb 21, 2011)
As congressional Republicans mull whether to address the government's long-term fiscal problems -- House Republican leaders are being pushed by the 87 freshmen to do so,... more
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Michael Barone (Feb 17, 2011)
One way to judge the merits of the budget Barack Obama unveiled this week is by the comments of his political allies. "It's not enough to focus primarily on the non-security... more
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Michael Barone (Feb 14, 2011)
It looks like 2/11/11 will go down in history with 11/9/89, not 6/4/89. 6/4/89 is when the Chinese military obeyed orders to massacre protesters in Tiananmen Square; 11/9/89... more
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Michael Barone (Feb 10, 2011)
Political pundits of a certain stripe have been lamenting the disappearance of Republican moderates for years. It's time now to lament the disappearance of moderate... more
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Michael Barone (Feb 07, 2011)
Most campaign rhetoric and political punditry is underpinned by an assumption that perfect solutions are possible, if only people would have the good sense to adopt the... more
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Michael Barone (Feb 03, 2011)
Barack Obama, like all American politicians, likes to portray himself as future-oriented and open to technological progress. Yet the vision he set out in his State of the... more
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Michael Barone (Jan 31, 2011)
Numbers can tell a story. Looking back on Barack Obama's second State of the Union message, and looking forward to the congressional session and the 2012 elections, they tell... more
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Michael Barone (Jan 27, 2011)
The weakest part of our political system, by a considerable margin, is the presidential nominating process. It tends to exclude from consideration those with the... more
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Michael Barone (Jan 24, 2011)
Last Thursday was the 50th anniversary of John F. Kennedy's inaugural speech, and while the anniversary did not go unmentioned, it got less attention than I expected. I... more
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Michael Barone (Jan 20, 2011)
Where can the new Congress start cutting spending? Here's one obvious answer: high-speed rail. The Obama administration is sending billions of stimulus dollars around the... more
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Michael Barone (Jan 17, 2011)
In his superb speech in Tucson, Ariz., Wednesday evening, Barack Obama did great service to the nation. He put to rest the libel that political incivility is responsible for... more
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Michael Barone (Jan 13, 2011)
The steam seems to be going out of the move to "deftly pin this" -- the shooting of Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and 13 others -- "on the tea partiers," as one... more
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Michael Barone (Jan 10, 2011)
"He possesses a deep understanding of how jobs are created and how to grow our economy." That's what Barack Obama said as he announced the appointment of his new chief of... more
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Michael Barone (Jan 06, 2011)
Curious fact, unearthed by Gerald Seib of The Wall Street Journal. The average age of Republican House members in the new Congress convening this week is 54.9,... more
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Michael Barone (Jan 03, 2011)
Consider one conundrum in American politics. Income inequality has been increasing, according to standard statistics. Yet most Americans do not seem very perturbed by it.... more