Essential Reads
Essential Reads is your one-stop source for the top stories of the day as reported by your favorite Washington Week panelists. It's a simple way to save time and stay informed about the news you need to know. Check it out every day!
Apr 17, 2012
-
Secret Service Scandal: By the Numbers
With Julianna Goldman, Bloomberg NewsBloomberg's Julianna Goldman reports on the taxpayer costs involved in the scandal involving Secret Service members and now military personnel involving prostitution in Colombia before President Barack Obama arrived for a summit, an incident that the top armed forces commander said left the service “embarrassed.”
Watch Video -
The Bubble Wars
By John Dickerson, SlateOne way to think about the 2012 presidential campaign is as a battle between two houses: Barack Obama's White House and Mitt Romney's San Diego house. The Romney campaign would like to make Obama a prisoner to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., turning every perk and privilege of the presidency into a sign that he is far removed from the people he is supposed to lead, especially anyone struggling in this economy.
Read More -
Cybersecurity Bills Compete For Attention
By Tom Gjelten, NPRCybersecurity will get a lot of attention on Capitol Hill in the coming weeks, with several competing bills up for consideration. The most stringent proposal mandates minimum cybersecurity standards and requires companies to notify the government when their networks have been breached. White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan says it is essential that the federal government take steps to better prepare the country for devastating cyber attacks.
Apr 16, 2012
-
Lead-up to Labor Day May Determine Winner of Presidential Race
By Dan Balz, Washington PostThe intensity of the initial skirmishes in the campaign between President Obama and Mitt Romney underscores a new reality about presidential politics. What happens in the months before Labor Day and the candidates’ debates in the fall will shape the race and, if history is a guide, determine who wins in November.
Read More
Mitt Romney on the campaign trail (CNN, File Photo) -
A Presidential Hangout: Inside the World's Most Exclusive Clubhouse
By Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy, TIMEYou would never take a second glance at 716 Jackson Place if you were strolling through the neighborhood around the White House and Lafayette Park in Washington, D.C. But the unmarked, four-story, white-painted townhouse with brown sandstone steps is easily the most exclusive club on the planet. You have to call the White House for reservations — and at the moment, only four men are eligible to use it.
Read More -
Secret Service Scandal: Agents Solicited Prostitutes?
With Pierre Thomas, ABC NewsEleven agents have been suspended for allegations involving prostitutes.
-
Americas Meeting Ends With Discord Over Cuba
By Jackie Calmes and William Neuman, New York TimesA summit meeting of Western Hemisphere nations ended without a final statement of consensus on Sunday, after the United States and some Latin American nations remained sharply divided over whether to continue excluding Cuba from such gatherings.
Read More -
Obama Adviser Plouffe Presses Romney on Release of Old Tax Files
By Mike Dorning and Julianna Goldman, Bloomberg NewsDavid Plouffe, a senior adviser to President Barack Obama, said Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney should release decades of back tax returns, framing the issue of as one of “transparency and trust” that will help define the choice for voters in November. “If he’s got nothing to hide, then there’s nothing to lose,” Plouffe said in an interview on Bloomberg Television’s “Political Capital with Al Hunt” airing this weekend.
Read More -
Whistleblower Controversy
With Eamon Javers, CNBCCNBC's Eamon Javers reports the IRS Whistleblower program is running up against a brick wall.
Apr 13, 2012
-
North Korean Missile Launch Raises New Questions About Path Forward
By Yochi J. Dreazen, National JournalThe roots of the growing tensions between Washington and Pyongyang over North Korea’s controversial missile launch Thursday trace back to a set of closed-door talks in February—and the sharply differing conclusions each side drew from the negotiations.
Read More from National Journal
The North Korean Rocket Prior to Launch (CNN) -
World Economy Highly Unstable
With David Wessel, Wall Street JournalThe IMF is raising its forecasts for global growth from levels it expected in January, but there is still a "high degree of instability" in the world economy, Managing Director Christine Lagarde says in an interview with the WSJ's David Wessel.
-
Obama: Candidates' Wives Should Be "Off-Limits"
By Alexis Simendinger, RealClearPoliticsThe wives of presidential and other political candidates should be "off-limits," President Obama said Thursday during interviews at the White House with anchors from television stations in four key battleground states.
Read More -
Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy Discuss 'The Presidents Club'
With Michael Duffy, TIMENancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy discuss the surprising ways that current and former presidents depend on each other.
-
White Males Fading Among House Democrats
By Susan Davis, USA TODAYHouse Democrats will make history in the 2012 election, sending to Congress next January the first minority-majority party faction in U.S. history. A new analysis by the Cook Political Report reveals a further progression of white flight from the Democratic Party, which is increasingly represented by women and minorities, while the GOP remains a party dominated by white men.
Read More -
The Umbrage Wars
By John Dickerson, SlateWednesday was a big day for political umbrage taking. It started with a conference call hosted by Mitt Romney's campaign in which his advisers were unable to give an immediate answer to the candidate's position on the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. The Obama campaign issued a statement from Ms. Ledbetter saying she was “shocked and disappointed.” (A couple of hours after the Romney campaign was struck mute, it issued a release saying President Romney wouldn’t seek to repeal the law.)
Read More -
North Korea Missile Launch Failure: New Threats?
With Martha Raddatz, ABC NewsMartha Raddatz on this embarrassing failure for the North Korean government.
-
North Korea Missile Launch Failure: New Threats?
With Martha Raddatz, ABC NewsMartha Raddatz on this embarrassing failure for the North Korean government.
Apr 12, 2012
-
Barack Obama vs. Mitt Romney: Self-Restraint in an Age of Rage
By John F. Harris, PoliticoAmerican politics has become so angry and divisive that it favors candidates who appeal to extremists and eccentrics, and even are extremist and eccentric themselves. The nonstop circus of modern campaigns, meanwhile, has left the county’s most accomplished and capable people on the sidelines, with scant interest in running for office. Or so the argument goes. But something strange—or rather something normal—is happening in 2012.
Read More -
Romney Rebuts Claims that He, GOP are Anti-Women
By Charles Babington, Associated PressPresidential candidate Mitt Romney intensified his efforts Wednesday to rebut claims that he and fellow Republicans are insufficiently supportive of women, or even hostile to them. For the second straight day, the presumptive GOP nominee campaigned at a female-owned work site, and denounced Democrats for saying his party is waging "a war on women."
Read More
Mitt Romney speaks in Warwick, RI (CNN) -
How the World's Most Exclusive Club Was Born
By Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy, TIMEIt was one of those moments that, in a mere second or two, changed American history: On January 20, 1953, at the inauguration of President Dwight Eisenhower, Harry Truman greeted Herbert Hoover on the platform. "I think we ought to organize a former presidents club," Hoover suggested. "Fine," Truman replied. "You be the President of the club. And I will be the Secretary." Up to that moment, the Presidents Club was more an idea than an institution.
Read More
