The New Republic

Gerald Seib pinpoints the cause of President Obama's summer polling collapse: To grasp the importance of the summer's debt negotiations—which produced a plan to cut the federal deficit by at least $2.1 trillion over the next decade just in time to avoid a default by the federal government—look at both how the deal affected Americans' confidence, and how it is judged by them in a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll. READ MORE >>

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Via Alexander Burns, a new poll has him trailing in Nevada, a heavily Mormon state previously viewed as a firewall: READ MORE >>

I have a column in this weekend's New York Times magazine arguing that the criticism that Obama did too little on the economy is overstated and counterhistorical: READ MORE >>

When a politician writes an op-ed, it's usually death. Barney Frank, on the other hand, is unusually interesting for an elected official, and his op-ed today is worth your time: READ MORE >>

The Republican Party desperately needs to change its image among Latinos, who remain a bulwark of strength for the Democrats as as their numbers collapse among whites. But conservatives keep trying to force their candidates to talk tough on illegal immigration: READ MORE >>

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Michael Scherer, via Mike Allen, reports that the White House is listening to cheerful historical analogies: READ MORE >>

Shelby Steele today has an extremely amusing broadside against President Obama. The general flavor is captured well in its opening: If I've heard it once, I've heard it a hundred times: President Obama is destroying the country. Some say this destructiveness is intended; most say it is inadvertent, an outgrowth of inexperience, ideological wrong-headedness and an oddly undefined character. READ MORE >>

Rick Perry's platform may consist of great heaps of terrifying reactionary obscurantism, but it also features a couple nice little dollops of reassuring liberal reform. Here's one of them: READ MORE >>