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BERKELEY, Calif. — Delivering a rare speech for a Republican at this bastion of liberalism, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul on Wednesday was given multiple standing ovations by the left-wing audience after railing against government surveillance and warning the students: “Your right to privacy is under assault.” “I am here to tell you that if you own a cell phone, you’re under surveillance,” he told the crowd. Paul’s address at the Berkeley Forum on the campus of the University of California at Berkeley focused on the National Security Agency’s collection of telephone metadata and the debate over privacy.

I’m up in New Hampshire this weekend, attending the 2014 Northeast Republican Leadership Conference, and thus far it’s been pretty rocking event. One of many dignitaries appearing at the gathering is Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, who has been hitting multiple events here, ranging from a St. Patrick’s day themed breakfast, a cocktail reception and a speaking engagement at dinner. Is he planning a run at the White House? Like every other potential candidate at this point, he’s not coming straight out and saying it, but he certainly has the look. (And why else do you come to New Hampshire?) I...

Sen. Marco Rubio said the government surveillance programs that leapt back into the news this week are subject to "intense congressional oversight," and represent a difficult balance of privacy issues and national security interests. He also suggested they are here to stay. "Much of what that program involves is classified," Rubio said in an interview Thursday with Florida reporters, referring to the report about NSA phone monitoring. "I'll tell you that program is part of intense congressional oversight. It's a program members are aware of and they get to review from time to time and see how it's being applied."...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A misfired email from a U.S. Internal Revenue Service employee in Cincinnati alerted a number of Washington IRS officials that extra scrutiny was being place on conservative groups in July 2010, a year earlier than previously acknowledged, according to interviews with IRS workers by congressional investigators. Transcripts of the interviews, reviewed by Reuters on Thursday, provided new details about Washington managers' awareness of the heightened scrutiny applied by front-line IRS agents in Cincinnati to applications for tax-exempt status from conservative groups with words like "Tea Party" in their names

I’m not talking about conservative publications either, but outlets that normally would allow Barack Obama and his team the benefit of the doubt. Bloomberg starts us off with a straight report on the changing explanations:

The Internal Revenue Service official in charge of the tax-exempt organizations at the time when the unit targeted tea party groups now runs the IRS office responsible for the health care legislation. Sarah Hall Ingram served as commissioner of the office responsible for tax-exempt organizations between 2009 and 2012. But Ingram has since left that part of the IRS and is now the director of the IRS’ Affordable Care Act office, the IRS confirmed to ABC News today.

VATICAN CITY — For the first time since the election of Pope Francis two days ago, the Vatican on Friday formally defended him from accusations that, decades ago, in the so-called Dirty War in his home country of Argentina, he knew about serious human rights abuses but failed to do enough to halt them. ... “The accusations belong to the use of a historical-social analysis of facts for many years by the anticlerical left to attack the church and must be rejected decisively.”

MANILA, Philippines -- On the face of it Philippine Cardinal Luis Antonio "Chito" Tagle has a lot going for him as a contender for pope. He's young: At 55, the second youngest of the cardinals. He sings and preaches on television, and has 120,000 followers on Facebook. The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) has named him among the three "least worst" papal candidates because of the way he has spoken out on sex abuse by members of the clergy. He speaks fluent Italian, English and Tagalog, and his French and Latin are said to pretty good too....

Republican Kevin McCarthy of California, the House majority whip, first met Paul Ryan more than a decade ago, when McCarthy was a staffer for congressman Bill Thomas, the former chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. Even then, McCarthy recalls, he was impressed with Ryan’s grasp of complicated fiscal issues. Ryan was only in his early 30s, and he looked even younger, but he had the knowledge of a senior member and none of the usual swagger. .... “He has been a teacher to so many others,” McCarthy says. “During the listening sessions, he sketched out how the entire...

It didn’t take long for Mitt Romney to hit the hanging curve Barack Obama threw earlier today in his press conference. Speaking in Iowa, a key swing state in the election, Romney asked whether any American President has been more out of touch with economic reality

Remember way back when Romney led Santorum by 16 points in Gallup’s national tracking poll? That was … four days ago. Today: Romney 32, Santorum 30, Gingrich 16. Mitt’s lucky that there’s a nice long break between Santorum’s three wins in the midwest last week and the next key primaries in Arizona and Michigan. If there wasn’t, I don’t know if even a flurry of negative ads from the Romney Super PAC death star would be enough to snuff Santorum’s momentum in time. Santorum had been planning a slow-and-steady-wins-the-race plod through the primaries, but according to Politico, he’s now thinking...

Earlier today, I said that only Mitt Romney could derail Mitt Romney this month. Did my prediction come true already? The media and Romney detractors have jumped all over this statement to CNN in which Romney says that he is “not concerned about the very poor,” but that slice of Romney’s statement is entirely misleading — although it’s certainly not adept for a front-runner:

Capitalism made America great -- free markets, innovation, hard work -- the building blocks of the American Dream. But in the wrong hands some of those dreams can turn into nightmares. This film is about one raider and his firm and how they destroyed that dream for thousands of Americans and their families - Mitt Romney and Bain Capital.

Here’s the national poll from Gallup confirming everything you thought you knew about the race. Most of Cain’s support did indeed go to Newt, and Newt continues to crush Romney among tea partiers and seniors. Intriguing data, but not nearly as important as state polls in Iowa and New Hampshire for the simple reason that national polls will move dramatically after those states vote.

Although I understand why Cain supporters feel let down and disappointed, I don't understand those who are thowing up their hands, conceding the election to 0bama, and declaring the end of the Republic. Where was there any evidence that Cain had capabilty and experience to lead the Nation? Did he have years of fighting the good fight with the scars to prove it? No. Compare the battles Sarah Palin fought even before 2008. Since he is a radio commentator, was he a leading voice of conservative thought? No. If you want a radio host with a thorough understanding of the...

Via Political Wire, what’s the most depressing thing about this? The fact that it grossly distorts support for a lower long-term capital-gains rate generally into some sort of sinister plutocratic carve-out for millionaires specifically? (Contra the ad, you too can avail yourselves of the magical “millionaire rate” by buying stock and then selling it after a year, kids.) Or the fact that it reminds us we’ll be spending most of 2012, in all likelihood, doggedly riding to the defense of … Mitt Romney? Fully 52 percent of tea partiers already say they’ll vote for him if he’s the nominee. More...

Via Greg Hengler and Guy Benson, if this answer doesn’t destroy him, nothing will. I get the sense watching it that he’s so unsure of how to answer this exceedingly easy question that he defaults to Netanyahu’s position on the assumption that prisoner swaps must always be the wise, statesmanlike, conservative thing to do. The alternative, that he knows what he’s talking about yet is still sincerely inclined to release the guy who planned 9/11 plus dozens upon dozens of other jihadi fanatics in exchange for one G.I., is even worse. I’d bet 95 percent of people asked on the...

We already knew that people in the White House were rushing OMB in August 2009 to approve Solyndra’s half-billion-dollar loan so that The One could get his all-important green jobs/stimulus photo op at the plant. Some OMB analysts complained at the time, in fact, that the time pressure might affect the diligence with which the loan was being reviewed. Oh well. What we didn’t know was who in the White House was pressuring them. Over to you, WaPo:

Nothing’s set in stone up north, but Florida officially moved its own primary to January 31st today so the early-state dominoes are about to fall. Here’s the first domino, already wobbling. New Hampshire’s potentially much more of a Christie state than a Palin state, so of the two late entrants, this would hurt him more than her. But of course, if New Hampshire moves up to December, Iowa’s going to move too to retain its pride of place. And Iowa’s probably a must-have for her if she gets in. This year, it’s a Christmas caucus! New Hampshire Secretary of State...

I know, I know: It’s a Zogby poll. But c’mon. I had to blog it. Just because I knew that headline would rock your world. He’s not leading by this much. But he is leading, comfortably.