Opinion - Richard Reeves

THE TEA IS GETTING WEAKER
Richard Reeves - Wed, May 16, 2012
LOS ANGELES -- Uh, oh! Some people are looking over the right shoulders of the Republicans who rode into the House of Representatives on the tea party wave of 2010. And they don't like what they're seeing.The Club for Growth is fundamentally a conservative lobbying and research group pushing for lower taxes and reduced government spending, which positions itself well to the right of Republican elected officials and even to the right of tea party rhetoric. The club's basic goal is a flat tax to replace graduated income taxes or a national sales tax. ... More »THE TEA IS GETTING WEAKER
THE REPUBLICAN CIVIL WAR
Richard Reeves - Wed, May 9, 2012
NEW YORK -- After Richard Mourdock defeated Sen. Richard Lugar by 20 points in last Tuesday's Indiana Republican Senate primary, he called, more or less, for one-party government. Asked by CNN's Soledad O'Brien his definition of "compromise," he answered:"What I've said about compromise and bipartisanship, I hope to build a conservative majority in the United States Senate so bipartisanship becomes Democrats joining Republicans to roll back the size of government, reduce the bureaucracy, lower taxes and get America moving again. ... More »THE REPUBLICAN CIVIL WAR
BRIGHT IMMIGRANTS PROMISE BRIGHT FUTURE FOR AMERICA
Richard Reeves - Thu, May 3, 2012
GRANADA HILLS, Calif. -- In 1921, Lincoln Steffens, among the greatest of American journalists, visited the new Soviet Union and came back to the United States to say, "I have seen the future and it works."He was of course, quite wrong. I may be, too, after chronicling the triumphs of Granada Hills Charter High School here in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles. For the second straight year, it has won the National Academic Decathlon. ... More »BRIGHT IMMIGRANTS PROMISE BRIGHT FUTURE FOR AMERICA
THE NEXT REPUBLICAN PARTY
Richard Reeves - Fri, Apr 20, 2012
LOS ANGELES -- Once upon a time there was a political tribe called "liberal Republicans," led by chieftains named Nelson Rockefeller, Jacob Javits, Mac Mathias and others. They were generally liberal on social issues and relatively conservative on fiscal issues.They are extinct now. They were caught in a kind of pincer movement between conservative Republicans demanding ideological purity in their own party and more liberal Democrats, who were able to replace them by attacking them for not being liberal enough, particularly on issues like Vietnam and welfare. ... More »THE NEXT REPUBLICAN PARTY
THE QUIET CAMPAIGN: VOTER SUPPRESSION
Richard Reeves - Thu, Apr 12, 2012
LOS ANGELES -- The 2012 presidential election is not only about who votes for Barack Obama and who votes for Mitt Romney. It is also about who votes.In a national campaign that does not get much national publicity, at least 41 states have passed laws or are considering new laws making it more difficult to vote in November, or legislation designed to discourage people from even trying to cast ballots, according to a study by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law. ... More »THE QUIET CAMPAIGN: VOTER SUPPRESSION
ROMNEY AND LOSE-LOSE POLITICS
Richard Reeves - Thu, Apr 5, 2012
LOS ANGELES -- If Mitt Romney had walked by a room called The Forum at the University of Southern California last Wednesday, he would quit his presidential race right now.The speakers were a retired but still partisan Democratic political consultant, Robert Shrum, and his wife, Marylouise Oates, who describes herself as "a recovering journalist. ... More »ROMNEY AND LOSE-LOSE POLITICS
HEALTH CARE: WE'RE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER
Richard Reeves - Wed, Mar 28, 2012
LOS ANGELES -- I went into teaching not because I enjoy it -- though I do -- but because I needed a health plan. I was a lucky man to have skills, particularly writing, that were in demand at universities.For years as a freelance writer, that is, working for myself, I carried only "catastrophic" coverage with a large deductible. I figured I was a pretty healthy young guy who could handle the bills that came with the ordinary maladies of the day. Also, for years, because my wife has Irish citizenship, we lived outside of the United States. ... More »HEALTH CARE: WE'RE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER
ODE TO THE ROAD
Richard Reeves - Thu, Mar 22, 2012
LOS ANGELES -- Doyle, how could you?Doyle McManus of the Los Angeles Times, one of the best political reporters around, wrote a column last Thursday, beginning with this lead:"We in the mainstream media harbor a dirty little secret: Most of us are rooting for Rick Santorum. It's nothing personal, although Santorum is a reasonably appealing guy. And it's not ideological; most of us aren't yearning for Bible-based social conservatism to become the law of the land. It's worse than that. We're just hoping to see the gaudy spectacle of this primary campaign continue as long as possible. ... More »ODE TO THE ROAD
THE FRACKING OF AMERICAN POLITICS
Richard Reeves - Thu, Mar 15, 2012
LOS ANGELES -- In the 1980s, I lectured on American politics at Sciences Po (l'Institute d'Etudes Politique) in Paris, the elite French school of political science. When the time came for questions, the first one from students was always the same: "How can you tell the difference between Democrats and Republicans in the United States?"I would answer that Republicans smell better.A joke, rather than an answer.To the French students it was barely possible for them to see the difference. ... More »THE FRACKING OF AMERICAN POLITICS
SEX AND THE SIXTIES
Richard Reeves - Wed, Mar 7, 2012
LOS ANGELES -- Odds are that Mitt Romney will still be the Republican nominee for president, but you have to feel sorry for him because he clearly has no idea what his party stands for and is running against. His principal opponent, Rick Santorum, does understand and has been able, so far, to hang in there against all of Romney's money, breeding and accomplishment.Santorum can be called a nut, legitimately, but he knows what he and the party are running against: sex and the Sixties. Quotes from former senator Santorum: -- "Woodstock is the great American orgy. ... More »SEX AND THE SIXTIES
ROMNEY AND SANTORUM: THE WARMONGERS!
Richard Reeves - Thu, Feb 23, 2012
LOS ANGELES -- If this was the last Republican debate, or the last important one, it was as entertaining and revealing as most of the previous 19. And scary.Politically, Mitt Romney did what he wanted to do. With help from cranky old Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich, who seemed engagingly detached from the whole thing, Romney hung Washington, the Republicans' favorite punching bag, around his new principal opponent, Rick Santorum. ... More »ROMNEY AND SANTORUM: THE WARMONGERS!
COMES THE REVOLUTION
Richard Reeves - Thu, Feb 16, 2012
LOS ANGELES -- Andrew Breitbart, the publisher of Breitbart.com and a couple of other popular websites, set the tone for a program at the University of Southern California last Wednesday by calling George Stephanopoulus of ABC News, a little rat with a runny nose. He continued by equating mainstream newspapers and television news, National Public Radio, Hollywood and American universities with totalitarians around the world, citing Joseph Stalin, Hugo Chavez, Fidel Castro, cultural Marxism and storm troopers.He was joined by Jon Fleischman, founder of FlashReport. ... More »COMES THE REVOLUTION
ROMNEY THE WINNER? NOT YET!
Richard Reeves - Fri, Feb 3, 2012
LOS ANGELES -- Now that Mitt Romney has about wrapped up the Republican nomination for president ... What? He hasn't? They changed the rules?The Republican Party, which did indeed change its nomination rules and has had to try to deal with new campaign finance circumstances, is a classic example of being careful what you ask for -- or is it unintended consequences? By the old rules, Romney would be a lock. Now, he will still probably win, but the party may be the focus of weeks or months more of the ugliness many of us have enjoyed watching through these past months. ... More »ROMNEY THE WINNER? NOT YET!
THE SAYINGS OF CHAIRMAN BARNEY
Richard Reeves - Thu, Dec 1, 2011
WASHINGTON -- I first met Barney Frank in 1979, when he was a state legislator in Massachusetts. We spoke the same language, Jersey cynical, because we grew up a couple of miles from each other. He was from Bayonne and I was from Jersey City, the jewel of Hudson County.He got to Boston by way of Harvard and Harvard Law School, but he always sounded the same."Who runs Massachusetts?" I asked that day."The businesses who threaten to move out of the state," he said. "They have a chokehold on us. ... More »THE SAYINGS OF CHAIRMAN BARNEY