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Shouts & Murmurs - Portman Opens Door, G.O.P. Follows
WASHINGTON—Just after Senator Rob Portman of Ohio said having a gay son had caused him to reverse his opposition to gay marriage, Portman’s Republican colleagues began changing their positions on a variety of issues when they discovered that they, too, have families.
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and Speaker John Boehner said they realized they had wives and daughters, leading them to rethink their views on the Violence Against Women Act. “Having women in my life,” said Boehner, who has been married for thirty-seven years, “puts this thing in a whole new light.”
Continue reading: http://nyr.kr/10ROA0p
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Cartoon by Tom Cheney. For more from this week’s issue: http://nyr.kr/T6MyJh
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The Big Story: Fixing Health Care→
How can America improve its health-care system? Is the Affordable Care Act a step toward a remedy? Tonight, Malcolm Gladwell will talk with David Goldhill, the author of the new book “Catastrophic Care,” about these issues and more. Follow this link to watch the live stream of the event now: http://nyr.kr/SxsCiB
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Cartoon of the day by Zachary Kanin. For more from this week’s issue: http://nyr.kr/UsTXDl
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"Perhaps Romney thought that it would be rude, or unpleasant, to tell people directly that he was going to hurt them—and kinder to act like it would all be fine. That might be in character, though someone has to tell Romney that promising people that they will still have coverage when they won’t is not as acceptable as telling someone she looks nice in a dress when she doesn’t."
— Amy Davidson on Mitt Romney’s remarks to David Gregory on “Meet the Press” about healthcare reform and coverage for those with a pre-existing condition: http://nyr.kr/PiuZ6j(Source: newyorker.com)
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Both sides have said that the election is going to be close, and there is no reason to doubt it. For now, though, the momentum is running in favor of Obama, who is taking a few days off before embarking a bus tour of Ohio and Pennsylvania. His victory in the high court buoyed the spirits of everyone in Democratic Party, and it wasn’t the only good news that last week brought him. A number of opinion polls taken before the Supreme Court’s decision suggested that his campaign’s Plan B, which was adopted in wake of the economic slowdown earlier this year, is starting to bear fruit.
John Cassidy on how Obama’s Plan B is paying off: http://nyr.kr/MR3Egf
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Follow the link for the story behind this week’s cover, “In Good Health” from artist Bob Staake, and for a slideshow of New Yorker covers that capture other Obama milestones: http://nyr.kr/N3Vdaq
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To Your Health→
This week in Comment, Jeffrey Toobin looks at the Supreme Court’s decision to uphold the Affordable Care Act: http://nyr.kr/MGD4gB
“One hopes, then, that it is not too churlish to point out that this should have been an easy case.”
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Bernanke's More Important than the Supreme Court→
With much of the media obsessing about the Supreme Court’s imminent decision on Obamacare, there was news today that is quite likely to have more impact on the outcome of the election: Fed chairman Ben Bernanke said that unless the jobs market picks up soon, he and his colleagues will take more action to boost the economy.
- John Cassidy on Election Influencers: http://nyr.kr/M6liVo
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In this week’s issue, Ezra Klein considers why politicians sometimes drastically reverse their policy opinions, and why party members usually follow suit in support of such changes. Klein writes,
…as we’re increasingly able to choose our information sources based on their tendency to back up whatever we already believe, we don’t even have to hear the arguments from the other side, much less give them serious consideration.
