Twitter

Is anyone fit to host the Oscars?

The retiring senator is threatening to block advancement of judicial nominees.

You've been bamboozled.

Ian Buruma hoped to stimulate discussion about #MeToo.

That means you, Marco Rubio.

A case study in how the country creates, disseminates, and consumes information.

Time for Republicans to pull up their big-boy pants.

Plus, who owns a Twitter account?

Former New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani, now much in the news as the president’s legal counsel, recently gained attention (as if he needed more) by tweeting a single word: You

In this latest episode, the Substandard takes on Mission Impossible: Fallout. The cohosts rank the M:I series (they all agree on what's the worst). JVL returns from San Francisco, Vic's Bachelor Week comes to an end, and Sonny appears on another podcast. Plus love from the fans, a spirit of the…

Facebook and Twitter suffer blows while the rest of the tech market strengthens.

It’s the telecoms who are invading our privacy.

Trump's most popular tweets are written by his staff.

An old rumor finds new life.

Nearly every news cycle in the Trump Era contains at least one predictable part—the Trump Tweet. Whether the news cycle is about a policy debate, a political scandal, a cultural fight between Trump and a celebrity—or something else entirely—the president almost always tweets something.

Sexism, however we define it, is still a problem. And we reckon it always will be, in a fallen world. Still, a great variety of metrics show that women in America are now doing better than men in an impressive range of areas, from educational achievement to career success. But we’ve tended to…

A plaintiff complained that being unable to mock the president's tweets affected her "as a public intellectual."

Once Utah high-schooler Keziah Daum tweeted several charming pictures of herself on prom night, it was just a matter of time until the grievance and outrage industry found out about it. When it did find out it dealt with her in the usual way. Miss Daum’s offense? Her outfit: a high-necked,…

Charlie Kirk and Candace Owens of Turning Point USA, the influential conservative student group with more than 350 chapters on college and high school campuses nationally, canceled a speaking engagement hosted by students from Virginia Tech and Liberty University because of unforeseen travel…

Be careful what you wish for. Comedian Owen Benjamin spent yesterday on Twitter saying very not-nice things about one of the survivors of the Parkland school shooting. I won't link to them here because this is a family-friendly newsletter, but part of his schtick was taunting that he can't be…

Today on the Daily Standard Podcast, Charlie Sykes talks to deputy online editors Jim Swift and Chris Deaton about the president's Easter message ("NO MORE DACA DEAL!") and advertiser boycotts.

In the course of a week in early March, one of President Trump’s longest-serving aides, Hope Hicks, resigned. One of the president’s most capable economics advisers, Gary Cohn, threatened to resign—and soon did. Son-in-law/presidential adviser Jared Kushner had his security clearance downgraded,…

Outgoing Secretary of State Rex Tillerson apparently became the first American Cabinet secretary to be fired over Twitter on Tuesday, when President Donald Trump announced the former ExxonMobil CEO’s impending departure at 8:44 a.m. Tillerson later said during a press conference that he received a…

Trump-supporting Twitter users the world over logged on Wednesday morning to find their follower counts diminished. Appearances suggest the targets of this so-called Twitter "purge" were suspected bot accounts, and unverified users whose tweeting patterns reflect those of Russian bots: Locked out…

Donald Trump spent a big chunk of the Sunday before Presidents Day tweeting—about the Mueller investigation, the “fake news” media, and NASCAR. But in one tweet, Trump highlighted new poll numbers. And they weren’t even his own!

Have a question for Matt Labash? Ask him at askmattlabash@gmail.com or click here.

A story for our times: It took place, of course, on Twitter, though it was first written up in the trade publication Inside Higher Ed.

If former FBI honcho James Comey’s Twitter feed is anything to judge him by, perhaps President Trump was right to can him—on the basis of his grating social media persona alone.

Two days after tweeting a link to an uplifting story in the New York Times about experimental prenatal surgery to treat a baby boy for spina bifida, Planned Parenthood of Maryland deleted the tweet. The article about the "small person who had surgery before he was even born" was a follow up on an…

Today is the March for Life, the annual pro-life demonstration that takes place around the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision. In a first, President Trump addressed the rally via satellite from the Rose Garden. (George W. Bush addressed the group over the phone.) It's worth considering Trump's…

Imagine being repudiated by Stephen Bannon, the most repudiated man since Rasputin. Any ordinary person would feel obliged to slink off to the remotest mountains of Madagascar, never to be heard from again. But Milo Yiannopoulos, the Breitbart News blogger whom Bannon disowned as a colleague 15…

It should have been a simple vote to reauthorize an important law, but ideologues allied with exhibitionists to turn it into a circus. Throw in a badly informed Trump tweet, and we had a carnival of folly—which is to say, an ordinary day on Capitol Hill.

A tweet from President Donald Trump Thursday morning sowed confusion about the White House’s position on a key intelligence program and imperiled the already shaky efforts to renew the federal government’s ability to monitor the communications of terrorists and other threats.

C is for Crazy Children's Books. There's a new book project being hawked on Kickstarter called C is for Consent: "a board book for babies, toddlers, and thoughtful parents." Consent is important, but is this really an appropriate concept for babies and toddlers? Especially given that the term…

On Wednesday, January 3, Donald Trump tweeted:

Let's not kid ourselves: It’s a weird time in our nation’s capital.

There was a moment at the end of 2017 when, if you squinted hard enough, it seemed as though the Trump presidency might be approaching normal.

Republican senators on Wednesday night brushed off President Donald Trump’s tweet threatening North Korean leader Kim Jong-un with the size and power of his “nuclear button,” the latest in a series of heated exchanges between the two leaders.

Media critics and anti-Trump skeptics are charging that President Trump may have violated Twitter’s terms of service Tuesday evening for initiating a nuclear button-measuring contest with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un. “I think they're trying to decide if this kind of tweet—referring to a…

How will tax reform impact you? It hasn't passed just yet, but it just might! The New York Times has a basic calculator worth checking out. And Maxim Lott has one that's a little more advanced. Neither are perfect, but worth examining to get a broad sense of how the tax reform bill might benefit or…

In its early, scrappy days, Twitter captured the hearts of Americans with a seductive promise: famous celebrities tweet, you can tweet back at them, and if you’re lucky, they might read your tweet. Such interactions seemed to offer a peek behind the curtain into the world of Hollywood spangle. We…

Ranking the best national chains. Tom Sietsema, the Washington Post's food critic, spent some time at D.C.-area chain restaurants. His rankings are as critical as they are for D.C.'s finest food purveyors. Biggest loser? Buffalo Wild Wings. Biggest winner? Cracker Barrel. Sonny Bunch's favorite,…

Today on the Daily Standard Podcast, White House Watch columnist Michael Warren talks with host Eric Felten about the President's latest problematic tweet.

This should have been a terrific week for Donald Trump. The Senate, even with its slim and quarrelsome majority, appears ready to pass the major tax overhaul the president has been pushing for. An attempt by a rogue federal agency to forestall the president’s appointment of a new director was…

This week on the Daily Standard Podcast, deputy online editor Chris Deaton talks with host Eric Felten about today's presidential Tweetstorm.

President Trump retweeted three incendiary videos from a fringe far-right British activist, called for a boycott of CNN, floated the firing of NBC executives for propagating “fake news,” and suggested an investigation into the 2001 death of an aide to then-Rep. Joe Scarborough: a matter the far…

President Trump retweeted three incendiary videos from a fringe far-right British activist, called for a boycott of CNN, floated the firing of NBC executives for propagating “fake news,” and suggested an investigation into the 2001 death of an aide to then-Rep. Joe Scarborough: a matter the far…

Longtime Today host Matt Lauer was fired Wednesday morning after a complaint of sexual misconduct, the latest public figure to fall from grace during a remarkable moment of cultural reckoning. As NBC is one of President Donald Trump’s favorite punching bags, he wasted no time crowing about it.

President Trump tweeted Saturday night a link to a sycophantic website that traffics in conspiracy theories and has aligned itself to the alt-right and white nationalist movements. Here’s the Trump tweet, which promotes MAGAPILL.com’s “President Donald Trump Accomplishment List”:

Democratic senators grilled a federal judicial nominee, known as Texas’s witty “Tweeter Laureate,” on Wednesday over his past tweets about bacon and Alex Rodriguez. Seriously.

Consider this imaginary situation: A new chief of staff can organize President Trump’s harum-scarum White House operation into a crack, disciplined, and loyal team, or he can stop the president from tweeting. eThe catch is he can do one of these but not both. Which should he choose?

Last week’s Senate hearings on Russia-linked social media accounts inciting political animosity gave us a vivid picture of one way in which the Russian government is making trouble in America. You don’t have to believe that Russian social media “bots” and “trolls” stole the election from Hillary…

Toothpaste, a 7,000-year-old product, is rarely a leading indicator. But the world’s top purveyor of the stuff—along with laundry detergent, dish soap, diapers, and other sundries—made a decision earlier this year that could portend a big shift in the advertising industry.

Well-known tech companies are surpassing analysts’ expectations in reporting earnings this week, the latest sign that tech companies are increasingly finding ways to take in more money as we live more of our lives online.

The three technology media giants absorbing most of the spotlight for Russian influence in 2016 election on their respective platforms are poised to testify in open hearings next week before Congress.

After two weeks of dormancy, President Donald Trump’s ugly spat with Tennessee senator Bob Corker flared up again Tuesday after Corker insulted the president on the morning news, saying Trump was “unable to rise to the occasion” of his office and that he should “step aside” on tax reform and…

Iraqi prime minister Haider Al-Abadi took to Twitter on October 13 to dispute rumors that his forces were mobilizing to take over areas under the control of Iraqi Kurds, particularly the oil-rich city of Kirkuk. “The fake news being spread has a deplorable agenda behind it,” he wrote. As with most…

Have a question for Matt Labash? Ask him at askmattlabash@gmail.com or click here.

On Tuesday morning, Patrick S. Tomlinson, an author of science fiction and fantasy novels and contributor to the New York Times, tweeted out a challenge to the “pro-life crowd,” a challenge that, to Tomlinson’s satisfaction, demonstrates that these people pay mere lip-service to the idea that life…

President Donald Trump and outgoing senator Bob Corker of Tennessee got into an unexpected and personal Twitter fight Sunday morning, the nastiest public conflict yet between the White House and Senate Republicans.

Today on the Kristol Clear Podcast, editor at large Bill Kristol talks with host Eric Felten about everything from Twitter's new logorrhea to the civil war in the Republican party.

On September 22, ex-CIA agent Valerie Plame tweeted out a link to an Internet article written by another notorious ex-CIA agent, Philip Giraldi. The article was headlined “America’s Jews Are Driving America’s Wars.” The article appeared on the Unz Review website, a dumping ground for anti-Semitic…

Thanks to the success of book series such as Harry Potter and The Hunger Games, the young adult, or YA, fiction market has become lucrative and culturally influential. With that in mind, New York magazine recently did a feature on the bevy of online critics whose opinions can make or break authors…

President Donald Trump announced the latest White House shakeup via Twitter on Friday afternoon, tweeting that John F. Kelly would replace Reince Preibus as White House chief of staff.

Journalist Rebecca Buckwalter-Poza has earned a coveted place in the annals of silly lawsuits. She covers “Trump and the law” at the magazine Pacific Standard and is currently suing the president for blocking her on Twitter.

Winnie-the Pooh has found himself engulfed in controversy far beyond the confines of the Hundred Acre Wood, this time seemingly due to his resemblance to Chinese president Xi Jinping.

In the run-up to the Iraq War, a Bush White House official explained to me that 9/11 had changed the way we read national security intelligence. There was a relaxed way to read intelligence, he said, and there was an alarmed way to read intelligence. Sept. 11 proved that we had to read intelligence…

The heads of the House Intelligence Committee’s Russia probe are threatening to use their subpoena power if the White House does not respond “appropriately and fully” as to whether it has documentation of conversations between the president and fired FBI director James Comey.

It’s been a stressful week for Donald Trump. Diplomacy with China is going nowhere fast. His party’s Obamacare replacement is floundering in the Senate. The constant irritation of a hostile press is rankling more than ever.

Today on the Daily Standard podcast, senior writer Michael Warren joins host Eric Felten to discuss the lack of response by President Trump regarding the terror attack in London on Sunday night.

President Donald Trump on Friday confirmed that he is the subject of an investigation by special counselor Robert Mueller in a tweet was inflammatory even by Trump standards.

President Trump has three rules for operating in the world of government and politics. Time learned of them from a White House official and describes them this way: "When you're right, you fight. Controversy elevates message. And never apologize."

President Trump has three rules for operating in the world of government and politics. Time learned of them from a White House official and describes them this way: "When you're right, you fight. Controversy elevates message. And never apologize."

A Donald Trump tweet is the reason we have a special counsel investigation into Russia's attempts to influence the 2016 election and possible collusion between Trump associates and Russians, according to testimony from former FBI Director James Comey.

Today on the Daily Standard podcast, our new national correspondent, Peter J. Boyer, talks with host Eric Felten about how the Trump team, in the face of a special counsel investigation, is trying to de-Twitterfy their boss.

In the world of politics, perception becomes reality. But when it comes to the prevailing wisdom about the 2016 presidential elections and their likely impact on the 2018 mid-term elections, perception more closely resembles fake news.

The news that former national security adviser Susan Rice was responsible for "unmasking" the identities of associates of President Trump in government surveillance reports sent shockwaves through Washington. But almost as newsworthy was the identity of the man who got the scoop: vociferous Trump…

President Trump has provided his opponents abundant material with which to criticize him. His Twitter feed as commander in chief is similar to what it was when he was a candidate: an early-morning soapbox about cable news and what bothers him. It often gets him into trouble. So do his policy planks…

On this latest mini-episode, the Substandard tackles the Wendy's Nuggets Guy—you know, the one who asked for the free "nuggs" and was told by Wendy's that he'll need 18 million retweets. He's not even close, and that's a good thing.

Lost in the hysterical overreaction to the Trump Administration ordering government agencies to suspend Twitter and Facebook communications until the new administration's policies could be fully laid out is the disturbing fact that the U.S. government appears to have a social media footprint any…

The first Twitter transition, it seems, while seamless at the top-level @POTUS account, isn't so among the many hundreds, if not thousands, of Twitter-verified executive branch accounts.

Donald Trump is in the rare position of loathing the media and dominating them—simultaneously. What more could a president-elect want as he enters the White House? Not much.

During Monday's edition of Andrea Mitchell Reports on MSNBC, THE WEEKLY STANDARD editor at large Bill Kristol sided with CIA Director John Brennan's assessment that President-elect Donald Trump "[did not have] a full appreciation of Russian capabilities … intentions and actions." Trump tweeted his…

Donald Trump is in the rare position of loathing the media and dominating them—simultaneously. What more could a president-elect want as he enters the White House? Not much.

Comedian Rob Schneider decided to make paella, and got himself into a paella pan of hot water thanks to the culinary-correctness police.

Donald Trump gently criticized the House Republican conference Tuesday for approving a rule change that would curb the powers of an independent ethics office in Congress. Taking to Twitter, the Republican president-elect said Congress should focus instead on taxes and health care first.

The latest Fox News poll shows that Donald Trump has been growing on people since the election:

Among the many offenses that modern architecture has committed against Pennsylvania Avenue in downtown Washington—America's main street, we like to call it—is a glass 'n' stone 'n' steel box that houses a museum about news gathering called, unfortunately, the Newseum. Funded by the New York Times,…

Among the many offenses that modern architecture has committed against Pennsylvania Avenue in downtown Washington—America's main street, we like to call it—is a glass 'n' stone 'n' steel box that houses a museum about news gathering called, unfortunately, the Newseum. Funded by the New York Times,…

In this episode of THE WEEKLY STANDARD Confab, Fred Barnes joins host Eric Felten to talk about Donald Trump's politically transformative use of Twitter technology. What promises will a President Trump be in a position to keep? Tod Lindberg tells us. And then Michael Warren Skypes in to talk about…

A majority of Americans—59 percent—want Donald Trump to stop tweeting and close his Twitter account now that he's been elected president. This is advice Trump is likely to ignore, and should.

A majority of Americans—59 percent—want Donald Trump to stop tweeting and close his Twitter account now that he's been elected president. This is advice Trump is likely to ignore, and should.

Donald Trump's unconventional candidacy has dragged together a ragtag band of boosters, a new celebrity subclass born out of online obscurity. Bill Mitchell, online radio upstart and Trump's unofficial Twitter mascot, is its king.

It's going to get worse.

In Federalist 10, James Madison argued that the soon-to-be-ratified Constitution would serve as an effective bulwark against what John Adams, amongst others, called "the tyranny of the majority." The Founders believed this danger arose chiefly through democratic government. But John Stuart Mill…

In Federalist 10, James Madison argued that the soon-to-be--ratified Constitution would serve as an effective bulwark against what John Adams, amongst others, called "the tyranny of the majority." The Founders believed this danger arose chiefly through democratic government. But John Stuart Mill…

Jerusalem

Have a question for Matt Labash? Ask him at askmattlabash@gmail.com or click here.

The way John Kerry sees it, there is no joy when the president goes on The View.

Have a question for Matt Labash? Ask it here.

Mike Pence said Wednesday that Twitter doesn't "matter a hill of beans" in shaping voters' preferences for the presidential candidates, even as the man for whom he's campaigning has used the social media utility to dictate news cycles—often to his detriment—since entering the race last year.

Excluding the foundations laid in Jerusalem and Athens, we’d hazard that no country's contribution to the causes of liberty and justice for all has been greater than England's. It was English barons at Runnymede who demanded their rights be protected from royal usurpation in the Magna Carta. It was…

New media and the old are at war. A new MSNBC promo features a direct attack on Twitter.

Twitter, like any social network that allows a degree of anonymity, has its problems with trolls and people who spout hateful rhetoric. However, there have also been a number of incidents that have led users to suspect Twitter is lumping mainstream conservative voices in with those who are…

As a committed, long-standing Twitter detractor, I’ve exhaustively bashed the social networking site for all imaginable crimes, and even unimaginable ones.  But through the gift of hindsight, I admit giving Twitter short-shrift in one department: it tends to work like they say old age does,…

I first learned of Texas Supreme Court Justice Don Willett on Twitter—fittingly—in 2013, when he asked me for a copy of my then-Twitter header image of the U.S. Supreme Court justices holding Care Bears (except Justice Scalia, who is photoshopped holding broccoli). Since that time, I've had the…

In a tweet calling for a constitutional amendment to reverse the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision, Hillary Clinton inadvertently invited supporters to "Stand with Hillary and overturn Planned Parenthood." While the main part of the tweet (archived here) says "Overturn Citizens United", the…

If the world is looking for a go-to expert on links between Twitter and heart health, the University of Pennsylvania might just be the place. Earlier this year, The Telegraph reported on a study entitled "Psychological Language on Twitter Predicts County-Level Heart Disease Mortality" conducted at…

Several months ago, comedian Patton Oswalt, theretofore a favorite among the bien pensant Internet types, angered the online left with a plea for satire over self-victimization. After being accused of all manner of horribles, from “victim-blaming” to “victim-shaming,” he attempted to win back his…

Matthew Continetti, writing at the Washington Free Beacon:

The Pentagon called the hacking of the Central Command's (CENTCOM) YouTube and Twitter accounts Monday "cyber vandalism" in a letter to service members and their families to allay concerns about the incident. General Lloyd Austin said that the FBI is investigating the "alleged breach" of the two…

Central Command has been hacked by ISIS, according to messages posted on CentCom's Twitter page:

Rick Perry met with Henry Kissinger to talk foreign policy, the Texas governor announced on Twitter. 

Over at the New Atlantis, Alan Jacobs has a post arguing that Twitter has changed in a fundamental--and fundamentally unpleasant--way. A sample:

NBC news reports that:

The administration has found at least one fight it is willing to make right to the end. Whatever that end should be. The first lady is rallying supporters to:

"Nigerian girls inspire international action,” reads the headline on the front page of the May 7 Washington Post. But nowhere in the story will you learn of any action actually being taken to rescue the 276 Nigerian girls abducted over three weeks ago by the Islamic terror group Boko Haram. You…

His promising career in politics having come to an inglorious – and no doubt temporary – end, Anthony Weiner has turned to punditry.  In his first column for Business Insider, his subject is the controversy over the Tesla automobile and the campaign by its maker to sell directly to the consumer…

The government of Turkey has pulled the plug on Twitter and the White House is not happy.  As Mario Trujillo of the Hill reports:

In his celebrated Thanksgiving proclamation, Abraham Lincoln struck his customary note of hope tinged with a kind of fatalistic melancholy.  

Stalin once asked sneeringly (that was his style) “how many divisions” the Pope had.  The answer, of course, was “none.”  But, then, Uncle Joe never had 10 million Twitter followers.  That’s almost as many people as the Big Evil killed.

In his Wall Street Journal column, Daniel Henninger makes a strong case that: 

An essential tactic in the shutdown is, it seems, to  deprive people of things that they need or badly want.  Make them pay.  And when their suffering is no longer bearable, they will come back, chastened and grateful for the blessings government bestows upon them … something like that, anyway.

An essential tactic in the shutdown is, it seems, to  deprive people of things that they need or badly want.  Make them pay.  And when their suffering is no longer bearable, they will come back, chastened and grateful for the blessings government bestows upon them … something like that, anyway.

Paul Hitlin and Nancy Vogt of Pew Research report that:

The process of bringing what was then called "Red China" into the light and joining it with the rest of the world began with ping pong.  Some seem to think Twitter will be the agent that accomplishes the same thing with Iran.  As Nathan Olivarez-Giles at The Verge reports:

Michelle Obama will not be tweeting as frequently, due to the federal government shutdown. The announcement was made today on ... the first lady's Twitter account. 

There is much to lament about the rise of social media and the damage it has done to ordinary human activities and interactions.  And now we learn that it is leeching away the loyalty of American college students for their football teams.  Attendance in the student section is down in, of all…

David Simas, a White House staffer, tweets (and the White House retweets) a link to an article and adds, “More good ACA [Obamacare] news. 21% savings on premiums for Ohioans who buy their own health insurance because of the ACA.”

Renee Ellmers, a sophomore Republican congresswoman from North Carolina, has criticized a conservative group's campaign to get congressional Republicans to support defunding Obamacare by way of the continuing budget resolution.

At 5:09 pm on August 21, Samantha Power, the United States ambassador to the United Nations, tweeted this:

Social media resembles the halls of high school in many ways.  Not least, according to a recent study (and what would we do without studies?), in the transitory effects on your mood. As Geoffrey Mohan writes in the Los Angeles Times:

There are senators, it seems, who tweet. And it probably isn't a bad discipline for those accustomed to writing legislation that runs to the thousands of unread and incomprehensible pages to have to restrain themselves to a mere 140 characters. But, of course, several senators release 140…

“The Machine,” they exclaimed, “feeds us and clothes us and houses us; through it we speak to one another, through it we see one another, in it we have our being. .  .  . [T]he Machine is omnipotent, eternal; blessed is the Machine.” —E.M. Forster, “The Machine Stops” (1909)

Warren Buffett has joined Twitter:

Anthony Weiner, who resigned as a member of Congress after getting caught sending lewd pictures of himself on Twitter, is back ... on Twitter:

A website that places a "value" on Twitter accounts has increased the estimated value of suspected Boston bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's from $37 to more than $37,000 as of late Friday afternoon due to the tens of thousands of new curious followers.  Multiple news organizations reported the existence…

Cardinals will not allowed to access their Twitter accounts during conclave, according to Catholic News Service. This restriction is applicable to the 9 cardinals who have Twitter accounts. In all, there are "117 red-vested princes of the church who are eligible to vote for a new pope."

President Obama recently told the New Republic magazine, "Up at Camp David, we do skeet shooting all the time." Today, after some suggested the president's claim might not be true, the New Republic tweeted a picture supposedly proving that Obama has gone skeet shooting:

The president of the United States tweeted a picture of an 8-year-old's letter pleading for gun control to rally support for the initiatives he rolled out today at the White House.

According to Twitter, the official White House Twitter feed is similar to those belonging to the Washington Post, blogger Andrew Sullivan, liberal New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, NBC, and Chris Cuomo (the brother of New York Democratic governor Andrew Cuomo).

The pro-Israel group Christians United for Israel (CUFI) is circulating a petition asking Twitter not to allow the terrorist group Hamas to use its social media platform.

More than a dozen Twitter accounts that were used as a medium to publically threaten Republican candidate Mitt Romney’s life after the second presidential debate remain active, nearly two weeks later. This news comes after the Secret Service told this publication that it was “aware” of these very…

The official Twitter account of the United States Army sent out a message to its more than 186,000 followers recognizing the 47th anniversary of the "first public burning of a draft card." Here's the tweet:

According to the Sunlight Foundation, the White House retweeted a message that stated, "@HildaSolisDOL WE NEED NATIONAL WORKERS UNION! LABOR LAWS 2 FEW 2 WEAK! WORKING PEEPS SLAVES 2 WALL ST! #HappyLaborDay #un ..."

At a fundraiser in Maryland this afternoon, President Obama criticized Republicans, saying that "you can pretty much put their campaign on, on a tweet and have some characters to spare.”

Steve Hayes reported Saturday on President Obama's refusal to get his hands dirty—or even to get Air Force One's wheels dirty—by landing on the soil of the great state of Wisconsin prior to Tuesday's recall election between Scott Walker and Tom Barrett.

Maryland governor Martin O'Malley, a rising Democratic star who has generated some 2016 presidential buzz, published a photo on his Twitter feed this afternoon of New Mexico's Republican governor Susana Martinez, along with a delegation of visitors from the southwestern state. O'Malley's message,…

Robert Kagan: "America has made the world freer, safer and wealthier."

The case of Hamza Kashgari, the 23-year-old ex-columnist for the Saudi Arabian daily newspaper Al-Bilad (The Land), has exposed the convoluted internal situation in the desert kingdom. The controversy began on the birthday of Muhammad, when Kashgari wrote an imaginary dialogue with the Muslim…

Robert J. Samuelson: "Bye-bye, Keynes?"

Jim Geraghty: "Obama Uses Some of that Political Rhetoric Left Outside the Door"

President Barack Obama hosted the White House’s first-ever Twitter town hall meeting Wednesday afternoon in which he answered questions on the American economy and jobs. All questions, submitted via Twitter, where answered in a live forum to a small audience. Many of the questions were preselected.

If commenters on the Daily Kos website are an indication of how the left wing will respond to Anthony Weiner's admission of guilt in sending lewd pictures to women, it won't end well for the New York congressman, who was once considered a rising star in the Democratic party. Here are a few choice…

With the popular uprising in Syria completing its first month, protests against Bashar al-Assad’s regime have spread to encompass most Syrian regions and cities, including now the capital, Damascus. On Friday, April 15, crowds from surrounding suburbs swarmed the city, heading downtown to…

The New York Times has an interesting article today about the use of social media like Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter by museums to foster online communities built around common interest in art:

Uh oh. Even the "No Labels" crowd has turned against public sector unions.

Some reassuring news for Republicans, in a piece in Roll Call today:

Jerry Brito, director of the technology policy program at the Mercatus Center, notes that the unrest in Libya could have an effect on the rest of the world, too -- at least that part of it that participates in social networking. Writing at time.com, Brito notes that Twitter's default URL shortening…

Andy Ferguson on Twitter in this month's issue of Commentary:

Maybe you've noticed: These political blogs can be so gabby. Yap yap yap. You go to some website--democretin.com, republicreep.net, whatever--and there will be a new post for you to read, and the blogger goes on for one, two, sometimes three paragraphs, and each paragraph is a huge heap of…