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Mort Kondracke
Mort Kondracke is the Executive Editor of Roll Call, the newspaper of Capitol Hill since 1955. © 2007 Roll Call, Inc.
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Recent Articles
- Economy Is Weak, Voters Are Angry -- Time for Third Party? - November 20, 2009
- ‘The mood of America is glum. Two-thirds of the public is dissatisfied with the way things are going in the country" and voters' anti-incumbent mood is approaching...
- GOP Ducks Role As 'Party of Yes' On Health Reform - November 6, 2009
- Late in the game, Republicans are proposing alternatives to Democratic health care reform, but they're certainly not being bold. If they were, they'd follow the lead of...
- Congress Should Find 'Third Way' on Legal Reform - October 30, 2009
- There's an important task that Congressional moderates can perform on health care reform besides fighting the public insurance option and containing costs: find a middle...
- Party Polarization Menaces Efforts To Control Debt - October 23, 2009
- Suddenly, it's occurred to liberals as well as wonky budget hawks that the nation's fiscal future is "unsustainable," but the chances of action - short of a crisis - are...
- Vast Differences Must Be Bridged on Healthcare - October 15, 2009
- Having let Congress have its way in writing health care reform legislation up to now, President Barack Obama needs to weigh in heavily if he wants to sign a bill by...
- Obama May Stick to Current Afghan Strategy -- a Loser - October 8, 2009
- More and more, it looks as if President Barack Obama is going to adopt a "split the difference" policy on Afghanistan that will basically continue current strategy - and...
- Will Reform Cut Health Care Costs? Don't Bet on It - October 2, 2009
- The good news about health care reform is that, if it passes, the ranks of the uninsured will be reduced. The bad news is that reducing the surging cost of health care...
- Congress Should Advance the Notable Success in Pakistan - September 18, 2009
- From China to Russia to Afghanistan and Iran, it's a time of woe for U.S. foreign policy. But there's an exception - Pakistan - and Congress can keep the progress...
- Health Reform Should Include Diabetes 'War' - September 12, 2009
- It would be entirely fitting for Congress to rekindle the "war on cancer" in response to the death of Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.), but another disease worthy of a war...
- Dems Shouldn't Push Through a Partisan Bill - September 3, 2009
- Among the most common themes in the tributes paid to the late Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) was his willingness to negotiate across party lines and achieve his liberal...
- Sportscasters, Airlines, Telecoms, Automakers -- Here's How to Do Better - August 21, 2009
- I'm taking my annual one-column breather from the nation's political storms to promote not-exactly-earthshaking ideas that have been bugging me and, maybe, you. This...
- GOP Has Health Care Ideas but Prefers Attacks on Obama - August 13, 2009
- There's no question that Republican criticism has helped undermine support for President Barack Obama's health plan. But it hasn't done much to help Republicans. That's...
- Obama Must Get Liberals to Support Senate Health Plan - August 7, 2009
- "Too big to fail" is the tagline that health lobbyist Fred Graefe applies to the health care reform effort, and he's got it dead right. The failure of an overwhelmingly...
- Obama Unfairly Targets Insurance as Enemy of Reform - July 31, 2009
- For one supposedly dedicated to bringing parties together for health care reform, President Barack Obama shows unremitting hostility toward one of them: the health...
- Obama Unfairly Targets Insurance Industry - Roll Call - July 31, 2009
- For one supposedly dedicated to bringing parties together for health care reform, President Barack Obama shows unremitting hostility toward one of them: the health...
- Obama, Congress: Take A Look at the Swiss Answer to Health Care - July 23, 2009
- If Congress and the Obama administration aren't too far down the road to big-government health care to rethink, they ought to read "Who Killed Health Care?" by Harvard...
- Who Will Congress Put First? Children or Teachers Unions? - July 17, 2009
- If any story this year deserved Page One coverage - but didn't get it - it was Education Secretary Arne Duncan's challenging speech July 2 to the nation's largest...
- Sarah Palin (Gulp!) Still Could Become GOP 2012 Nominee - July 9, 2009
- It used to be easy to predict who the next Republican presidential nominee would be. It was decided by primogeniture: The next oldest guy in line got to be the...
- 'Reconciliation' to Pass Health Bill Won't Work - July 2, 2009
- Liberal health reform advocates have talked about ramming a reform plan - including a Medicare-like public insurance option - through the Senate with only 51 Democratic...
- Obama Rides High at Five Months, but Clouds Gather - June 26, 2009
- The political verdict on President Barack Obama's first five months in office has to be "so far, so good," but it also must include trepidation about clouds on the...
- Obama Rides High, But Clouds Gather - Roll Call - June 26, 2009
- Iran Elections Make Nuclear Talks Harder - June 18, 2009
- President Barack Obama went easy on Iran in his big June 4 speech in Cairo so as not to become an issue in last weekend's elections. Some good it did. The ruling powers...
- Medicare Drug Plan Ought to Be Model for Health Reform - June 11, 2009
- As they work on comprehensive health reform, Congress and President Barack Obama ought to look to the most successful model yet: the 2003 Medicare prescription drug...
- Obama Confronts Bush's 'Axis of Evil' - Can He Do Better? - June 5, 2009
- The Obama administration is confronting what's left of the "axis of evil" this week, with the president in the Mideast talking about Iran and top aides in the Far East...
- Congress Should Aid 'Good Death' Like My Mother's - May 28, 2009
- My mother died this month at age 95. This column is a tribute to her example of living - and also a public policy tribute to the manner of her death, in hospice...
- Future Prosperity Depends on 'New Contract' for Kids - May 21, 2009
- President Barack Obama plans to tackle, one by one, the biggest problems threatening America's future prosperity, but he needs to fashion nothing less than "a new social...
- Hurting, Not Dead, GOP Is Working Up Alternative Ideas - May 15, 2009
- With as few as 20 percent of voters identifying themselves as Republicans in major polls, the GOP is in a bad way, for sure. But is it dead? No way. While former Vice...
- Democrats Should Reform Medicare, Not Universalize It - May 8, 2009
- If President Barack Obama really is a pragmatic problem solver and not a liberal ideologue, he will stop pushing for a government-run insurance plan as part of health...
- Obama Should Halt Democrats' 'Torture' Frenzy - May 1, 2009
- If President Barack Obama really meant what he told CIA officers on April 16 - "this is a time for reflection, not retribution" - then he needs to snuff out the...
- Obama, Duncan Need to Succeed on School Reform - April 24, 2009
- President Barack Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan are dedicated school reformers, and two new reports show how urgent it is that they succeed. The reports, by...
- U.S. Should Help Pakistan's Zardari Become a Maliki - April 17, 2009
- As the peril in Pakistan deepens, the United States has little choice but to bolster that country's weak democratic government to the max. Pakistani President Asif...
- The World Loves Obama, but Does He Get Respect? - April 9, 2009
- Even though every slight and slap at Bush was interpreted by some conservative commentators as Obama's denigrating the United States itself, some of it was legitimate....
- A Three-Way Fix For Health Reform That Saves Money - April 3, 2009
- But, second, "quality of life" treatment should be means-tested, with richer people paying more than poorer people for services such as joint replacements, plastic...
- Will Obama Match Bush for Fiscal Irresponsibility? - March 26, 2009
- Walker said he trusts the Congressional Budget Office's just-issued estimates of deficits and debt more than those from Obama's Office of Management and Budget.The CBO...
- 'Post-Partisanship' Isn't Dead Yet -- but It's Very Close - March 19, 2009
- And he isn't alone. The Senate's No. 3 GOP leader, moderate Sen. Lamar Alexander (Tenn.), told me in an interview that, after being one of a handful of Republicans...
- Pakistan Must Be Obama's Leading Foreign Priority - March 13, 2009
- Protecting Afghanistan from Taliban advances is important - and U.S. troop commitments there will be a major domestic concern - but preventing chaos in Pakistan is vital...
- Can Congress Pass All Obama Wants -- and Should It? - March 6, 2009
- He wants Congress to give him -- this year -- a new financial regulatory system so that collapses like the current one don't happen again.It's not remotely clear that...
- Obama Has Good Idea: a Bipartisan Health Summit - February 27, 2009
- To prevent scare tactics and suspicion from torpedoing health care reform before it gets launched, it's a good idea for President Barack Obama to convene a...
- Obama Shouldn't Stick to 16-Month Iraq Pullout Plan - February 20, 2009
- Fred Kagan, the American Enterprise Institute scholar who advocated and helped design the surge, told me that, of 140,000 troops in Iraq now, "as few as possible" should...
- Believe It or Not, Rush Limbaugh Was Right on Stimulus - February 12, 2009
- Which was: President Barack Obama won 53 percent of the two-party vote last year and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) won 46 percent, so Obama would dictate the contents of 53...