Obama Got Discount on Home Loan - Joe Stephens, Washington Post
Shortly after joining the U.S. Senate and while enjoying a surge in income, Barack Obama bought a $1.65 million restored Georgian mansion in an upscale Chicago neighborhood. To finance the purchase, he secured a $1.32 million loan from Northern Trust.
(tags: obama 2008 housing)

U.S. candidates’ health plans diverge - Nicholas Timmins, Financial Times
The US is unique in tying health insurance for working age adults to their jobs. In countries with social insurance systems such as France and Germany, employers make contributions to the insurance pool. But the cover is not linked to the workplace.
(tags: health_care obama mccain 2008)

McCain’s [...]

Very Retiring Republicans - Fred Barnes, Weekly Standard
Democrats John Conyers, John Dingell, and Charles Rangel were in the wilderness from 1994 to 2006, the years of Republican rule of the House of Representatives. They endured the shame of being in the minority.
(tags: congress republicans)

PG’s Male Athlete of 2007-08: Terrelle Pryor - Mike White, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Maybe [...]

Barack Zelig - Peter Wehner, Commentary
Charles Krauthammer has a typically insightful column on “the ever-malleable Mr. Obama.” The earth’s landscape is now littered with former Obama commitments and his embrace of the conservative court’s views on the child rape and second amendment c
(tags: obama 2008 conservatism)

Housing bill provision rattles privacy groups - Linda Rosencrance, IDG [...]

Obama: Change agent goes conventional - Kenneth P. Vogel, Politico
Barack Obama has crafted an image as an unconventional candidate, a change agent and a post-partisan politician who represents a dramatic break from the status quo.
(tags: obama 2008)

Dumb Laws - Andrew Roth, Club For Growth
We’re launching a new blog series today that is plainly, but appropriately, [...]

Proliferation of New Media, Not Obama and McCain Campaigns, Is Engaging Young Internet Voters
Waggener Edstrom Worldwide (WE) today released groundbreaking research on how young Internet voters (those 18 to 25 years old) are using digital communications to gather information on the 2008 U.S. presidential election.
(tags: internet politics technology)

Fighting Al Qaeda With YouTube - Daniel Kimmage, [...]

N.Y. Senate Majority Leader Bruno to Retire - Reid Wilson, RealClearPolitics
Joseph Bruno is not a household name anywhere outside political circles in New York, but the Senate Majority Leader, seemingly the last barrier standing in the way of total Democratic control, has been a major factor for more than three decades.
(tags: new_york republicans)

‘Deficit hawks’ revive [...]

The FHA Time Bomb - Editorial, Wall Street Journal
Well, this certainly is embarrassing. The Federal Housing Administration – the very agency the Bush Administration and Congress trumpet as the solution to the mortgage crisis – has announced that it suffered a $4.6 billion loss last year.
(tags: housing congress)

A Choice for D.C. Children - Editorial, Washington [...]

The Beltway-Blog Battle - James Poniewozik, Time
When Tim Russert died suddenly on June 13, it was, for the political press (to draw an analogy to his beloved Buffalo Bills), like losing a star quarterback before halftime of the Super Bowl.
(tags: journalism media citizenjournalism blogging)

First Obama attack book in the works - Jonathan Martin, Politico
The same [...]

Most back McCain on offshore drilling - Foon Rhee, Boston Globe
A poll done last month suggests that whatever the merits of the idea, most Americans agree with Republican John McCain about ending the federal ban on offshore oil drilling.
(tags: mccain 2008 oil energy)

Offshore Oil Drilling Debate Could Hurt Obama - Kenneth T. Walsh, U.S. News [...]