The fight for the Senate gives every indication that it will go down to the wire, with enough races still in play in late October so that neither party can feel completely confident about its prospects. Right now, control of the Senate appears to rest on the outcomes in five states – four of them held by Democrats…
Claire McCaskill (D) remains the Senate’s most endangered incumbent, but the Missouri Democrat’s prospects appear to have improved slightly on Tuesday after learning she’ll face Rep. Todd Akin (R) in the fall. Akin’s come-from-behind win seemed unlikely only months ago, though Republicans never had a particularly strong field that remained highly fluid until the end. Wealthy businessman John…
Former state Solicitor General Ted Cruz won an upset victory over Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst in the Texas GOP Senate runoff Tuesday, signaling a major shift not only in the Lone Star State but for the makeup of the incoming Senate as well. Though he began as a near-political unknown, Cruz harnessed tea party and conservative support to…
Today’s Texas Republican Senate runoff between Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and former state Solicitor General Ted Cruz is more than a mere primary. The winner, after all, is certain to win the seat of retiring Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R) in November. But even more, the result will say something about the state of the GOP, and it…
Those of us who have been reporting on and discussing politics for the past few decades have come to expect rough-and-tumble campaigns. As Chicago writer Finley Peter Dunne once observed: “Politics ain’t beanbag.” But the nature of the 2012 presidential campaign so far raises questions about how, or even whether, the eventual winner will be able to govern.…
Rarely a day goes by without some journalist noting that another Member of Congress is passing up the very forgettable opportunity of attending his or her party’s convention later this summer. The list of media outlets to report on this “development” is long and getting longer: the New York Times, CBS News, USA Today, CNN, ABC News, NPR…