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Politico reports that conservatives like Mort Kondracke and Thomas Mann are not thrilled about Sarah Palin and the Tea Party's effect on Senate races this week. "The people who got slapped the hardest in this election -- besides Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama -- are Jim DeMInt and Sarah Palin," (said Kondracke, a FOX News contributor). "Jim DeMint and Sarah Palin are responsible for the fact that the Senate did not go Republican. They're the ones who are responsible for Christine O'Donnell. They're the ones who are responsible for Joe Miller in Alaska. They're the ones who are responsible for...

New Washington insider wisdom: If you have the courage of your convictions and support those who do likewise, then you’re not to be taken seriously. At an event at the Ronald Reagan Building hosted by Roll Call/CQ in Washington, D.C. on Nov. 4, Roll Call Executive Editor Mort Kondracke, also a Fox News contributor took a few shots at the political leadership of Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. ...more (w/video)...

Is the day of the strong, self-reliant American over? Have we turned into a bunch of Euro-weenies looking to government for our every need? A recent Fox News poll makes one wonder. [snip] Along the way, the guys displayed a recent Fox News poll. There was some good news and some very bad news. On the one hand, 76% think Americans are starting to rely too much on government. But when it got down to specifics, way too many Americans think it’s government’s job to do way too many things. The most depressing/disturbing poll result: a majority think it’s the...

Mort Kondracke got one thing right: Rush Limbaugh would go Krakatoa . . . The resident moderate of The Beltway Boys has counseled John McCain to offer the VP slot to Christie Todd Whitman. Mort made his move during the show-ending "Buzz" segment. MORTON KONDRACKE: Two new McCain Veep ideas: first, he should offer the Vice-Presidency to Colin Powell, who may well not take it. If not Powell, then Christie Todd Whitman, former governor of New Jersey. Rush Limbaugh would go Krakatoa but independents will like it, women will like it, and so will African-Americans, the whole package.

FNC's 'Beltway Boys' Call GOP Anti-Illegal Immigration Stand 'Dumbest Move' of 2006 Posted by Tim Graham on January 3, 2007 - 14:59. Just to prove that Fox News Channel doesn't live up to the liberal stereotype of Music to Conservative Ears, angry E-mailers are demanding someone denounce Fred Barnes and Morton Kondracke for slamming conservatives who staunchly oppose illegal immigration. In their year-end Beltway Boys "awards show" this weekend, there was this clip of agreement: Kondracke: "Our 'Dumbest Move' award of the year is Republicans trashing immigrants. And this - this has disastrous consequences for the, in the election. The Hispanic...

Enough already! It's harmful enough that ideological conflict and partisan politics are preventing this country from solving its long-term challenges on health care, fiscal policy and energy. Now it's threatening our national survival. I do not exaggerate. Bush hatred has reached such intensity that CIA officers and other bureaucrats are leaking major secrets about anti-terrorism policy and communications intelligence that undermine our ability to fight Islamic extremism. Would newspapers in the midst of World War II have printed the fact that the United States had broken German and Japanese codes, enabling the enemy to secure its communications? Or revealed how...

Enough already! It's harmful enough that ideological conflict and partisan politics are preventing this country from solving its long-term challenges on health care, fiscal policy and energy. Now, it's threatening our national survival.I do not exaggerate. Bush-hatred has reached such intensity that CIA officers and other bureaucrats are leaking major secrets about anti-terrorism policy and communications intelligence that undermine our ability to fight Islamic extremism.Would newspapers in the midst of World War II have printed the fact that the U.S. had broken German and Japanese codes, enabling the enemy to secure its communications? Or revealed how and where Nazi spies...

I think this has been a disastrous week for the Democrats across the board. When they're not incoherent, then they're defeatist.... And then we have John Kerry who's back in the picture. Made another speech today... He comes up with this agenda, which sounds exactly like the Bush agenda... He pretends as though Bush is doing nothing to foster democracy around the world, somehow, Jordan...Bahrain...Qatar...Egypt -- are moving toward democracy, he says, as if it's on their own. And the Bush Administration has had nothing to do with pushing it.

It’s hard to tell who’s in worse political shape right now: President Bush or Congressional Democrats. Polls show deep skepticism with Bush, but it’s not clear that Democrats can take advantage.Historically speaking, the 2006 midterm elections should be a bonanza for Democrats. Since World War II, the party out of power has picked up an average of 34 House and five Senate seats in a president’s sixth year in office.Polls indicate that Bush is now presiding over an unpopular war, and that’s almost always bad for the incumbent party.An early August Gallup poll showed that, by 54 percent to 44...

Political moderates predominate in the U.S. electorate, but the two parties are increasingly captives of their extremes. Will the moderates ever rise up and assert themselves? In the Republican Party, they ought to do so by defending Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (Tenn.) against right-wing attacks for bucking President Bush (and Christian conservatives) over embryonic stem-cell research. Republican moderates also ought to start speaking up for "emergency contraception" before the right makes banning it a litmus test of party loyalty. Someone in the GOP ought to tell Bush that "intelligent design" is not a true scientific theory on a par...

Judy Woodruff and Bob Novak, appearing on CNN's Inside Politics, just mentioned that the wife of Mort Kondracke passed away today from Parkinson's. Kondracke is a frequent panelist on Fox News and co-host of Fox's "The Beltway Boys" with Fred Barnes. She had been severely disabled by it for some time. I believe Kondracke actually wrote a book about the experience. I'm sure all FReepers join in expressing our sincere condolences.

(CBS TV movie; airing March 13, 2005) Bruce Greenwood and Madeleine Stowe star as two real people - political journalist Morton Kondracke and his activist wife Milly, whose love affair and ultimate marriage was drastically altered when she was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease in 1987. Morton Kondracke is the executive editor of Washington, D.C.'s Roll Call, and the film will chronicle his battle with alcoholism, and how his wife's illness turned him around into a supporting spouse and caretaker, as well as an outspoken political advocate. Michael J. Fox will be appearing as himself in an epilogue to the film,...

There's something strange about seeing a 35-year marriage — your own 35-year marriage — condensed into a 90-minute movie for the television screen. Political pundit Morton Kondracke will experience that on Sunday when CBS televises "Saving Milly," a movie based on the struggles of Kondracke and his wife with her Parkinson's disease. Kondracke, executive editor of Roll Call and a frequent commentator on Fox News Channel, was an ambitious young journalist in Chicago when he met liberal activist Milly Martinez. It wasn't the type of woman he envisioned falling in love with, but he did. Their life together changed in...

It’s amusing how the liberal politicians and media are wracking their brains in an endless quest to figure out why their man lost and President Bush won re-election. A popular focus of their post-election depression study has been the evangelical Christian vote, a topic addressed by Mort Kondracke, the left side of “The Beltway Boys”, in his column “Democrats Need to ‘Get Religion’.” In the article, Kondracke suggests that Democrats must attempt to “understand” the evangelical Christian faith in order to succeed politically. He offers the typical liberal tongue-lashing at the conservative positions on pro-life and marriage protection. I used...

I have to admit: I didn't realize the Beltway Boys were so popular! The Fox News tag team of Mort Kondracke and Fred Barnes earned more viewers than any other cable news program on Saturday, October 2 -- 1,356,000 from 6 to 6:30pm. Other shows get more promotion, but two D.C. vets comparing notes pulls in the viewers...

NPR's Juan Williams doesn't see any liberal bias in the media and, damning with faint praise, insisted: "I think the New York Times is mainstream American journalism." Williams made his remarks during a Fox News Sunday panel segment devoted to the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press survey which found that amongst national media outlet reporters, editors, producers and executives, five times more, 34 percent, identified themselves as liberal than the piddling 7 percent who called themselves conservative. Williams, a senior correspondent at NPR and a former Washington Post reporter, countered that somehow advertisers prevent any liberal...

The American establishment, led by the media and politicians, is in danger of talking the United States into defeat in Iraq. And the results would be catastrophic. The media - unperturbed by mistakenly likening both the Afghan war and last year's invasion of Iraq to Vietnam - focuses overwhelmingly on the bad news coming out of Iraq. There is plenty of bad news - but there is also much good, and it is being almost completely ignored. Some Members of Congress - either out of a passion to defeat President Bush, pique at not being listened to by the Bush...

December 12, 2003 Gore, Dean Form 'Anti-Clinton' Party, Well Left of Center By Mort Kondracke"We need to remake the Democratic party," former Vice President Al Gore declared Tuesday in endorsing former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean. What did he mean by that? Judging by where Al Gore has been and where he's heading, "remaking" the party means tearing it away from the winning formula established by his old mentor, President Bill Clinton. Clinton was a "new Democrat," a "triangulator," a centrist who could steal issues from the Republicans and appeal to Southerners and moderates as well as the traditional Democratic base...

To observe this Sept. 11, 2001, anniversary, I urge critics of Attorney General John Ashcroft - especially the Democratic presidential candidates - to read the article "The Falling Man" in the current Esquire. A photo on page 176 shows the article's subject plunging headfirst from the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Taken by celebrated Associated Press photographer Richard Drew, the picture was printed once in various newspapers - then banned by the U.S. media as too awful for public consumption. The riveting article, by Tom Junod, chronicles the search to identify the "falling man," but the larger point...