Archive - Mar 10, 2007 - Blog entry

Date

Old-Fashioned Politicking

Posted March 10, 2007 - 11:26am by Kate

Mary Ann Akers of The Washington Post has this small but interesting article.

The article is about John Boehner and his smoking habit. It appears that the nearest smoking venue to the Capitol is the National Democratic Club. The Capitol Hill Club, which is where Republicans usually hang out, did not get an exemption to the D.C. smoking ban. Hence, John Boehner has been hanging out with Democrats in order to smoke conveniently, mostly with Democratic lobbyists, but also with Democratic representatives, according to Ms. Akers.

Jonathan Rauch: A Stephen F. Douglas for our time

Posted March 10, 2007 - 11:16am by Joseph Knippenberg

Since NLT is down, I've been inficting my opinions on folks at the obscure Knippenblog site. Early this morning, suffering from insomnia induced by my coughing son and my barking dog, I wrote about Rauch's same-sex marriage federalism (most recently expressed in the April, 2007 ATLANTIC MONTHLY, and available for free at Rauch's personal site). Here's the post:

"Jonathan Rauch, that assiduous advocate of gay marriage, offers up a contrast between the development of abortion politics and how he'd like to see the politics of same-sex marriage proceed. If you hadn't noticed, he says he's a fan of state-by-state political debate, which he thinks in the long run will produce a healthier politics (and probably greater acceptance of the result he favors).