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Despite recent setbacks, there’s reason to believe that the gun-control movement is growing, and holding politicians accountable for their ‘no’ votes: “But then something unexpected happened. Some of the senators who’d voted ‘no’ faced furious voters back home. Even before Erica Lafferty, the daughter of murdered Sandy Hook Elementary principal Dawn Hochsprung, confronted New Hampshire […]

Phil Busse stole McCain lawn signs in Minnesota during the 2008 presidential campaign. The prank made him infamous: “Within hours, I received several hundred angry emails and phone calls, including three death threats. A man in Michigan yelled at me over the phone, calling me ‘sick’ and ‘demented,’ and informing me that he was going […]

How a get-tough law in California led to life sentences for petty thieves and drug offenders—and how support for its repeal came more from Republicans than Democrats: “Like wars, forest fires and bad marriages, really stupid laws are much easier to begin than they are to end. As the years passed and word of great […]

Campaign aides on both sides deconstruct where the Republican candidate went wrong: “It was two weeks before Election Day when Mitt Romney’s political ­director signed a memo that all but ridiculed the notion that the Republican presidential nominee, with his ‘better ground game,’ could lose the key state of Ohio or the election. The race […]

How the Mitt Romney campaign, its supporters and the media addressed the candidate’s Mormon faith: “On the night of the South Carolina Republican primary in January, I sat near the front of a dark campaign press bus and listened to reporters talk about Mitt Romney’s underwear. “Earlier in the day, one of them had happened […]

A Muslim-American’s history with the Republican Party—and how they lost him: “Newt Gingrich, who also ran for President, introduced an angle that I – and presumably every American of sound mind – had never considered before. Speaking at a Texas church in March, 2011, Gingrich brought up his grandchildren to the audience, and then said, […]

Elizabeth Warren has energized Democrats in Massachusetts during her 2012 Senate race against Republican incumbent Scott Brown, but has also faced many difficulties as a first-time candidate. The race remains very close: “Lydon brought up an anecdote he’d heard: Warren, while she served on the bankruptcy panel during Clinton’s presidency, had known the first lady, […]

How the 42-year-old Wisconsin representative (and now Mitt Romney VP pick) took a leading role in the Republican Party’s budget battle with President Obama: “Three days later, the White House started a livelier debate with Ryan. In a press briefing, Peter Orszag, the budget director at the time, dismantled Ryan’s plan, point by point. Ryan’s […]