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Russian troop presence in Crimea compared to what Germans did in Sudetenland in 1938 Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird has compared Russia's troop presence in Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula to Hitler's invasion of Sudetenland, a part of the former Czechoslovakia, in 1938. Baird, speaking to host Evan Solomon on CBC News Network's Power & Politics, accused Russia of invading and occupying Crimea, a part of Ukraine. "If it's not war, it's akin to war," he said. At first, Baird said the situation was "right out of the Cold War." When Solomon pointed out Putin claims he is protecting Russian rights in...

President Barack Obama challenged Russian President Vladimir Putin’s defense of his involvement in Ukraine, arguing Tuesday that there is widespread consensus that Russia is violating international law and urging Putin to agree to talks to de-escalate the situation. “There is a strong belief that Russia’s action is violating international law,” Obama said at an elementary school in the District of Columbia after introducing his proposed 2015 budget. “President Putin seems to have a different set of lawyers making a different set of interpretations. I don’t think that’s fooling anybody.”

After dropping his push on immigration, Rubio is seeking to rehabilitate his image with much of the GOP base by falling back on his staunch conservative ideology while engaging in a calculated effort to broaden his domestic and foreign policy portfolio. He’s becoming a regular fundraising presence on the campaign trail and plans to play a big role in a handful of key midterm races this fall. A contingent on the right will never forgive him for backing a bill offering a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, and his critics say he jettisoned the plan strictly to preserve his...

Maybe the Obama administration is taking the Budapest Memorandum more seriously than we imagined — or at least want Russia to think we are. Secretary of State John Kerry told ABC’s This Week that “all options are on the table” for a response to Vladimir Putin’s Crimean invasion, including military options: Secretary of State John Kerry said that “all options are on the table” when it comes to steps the U.S. can take to hold Russia accountable for its military movements in Ukraine, including economic sanctions and potentially military action. In an interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos today on “This...

Senator Ted Cruz (R., Texas) may be the brightest light to adorn the Republican party in many years. He knows how to make the case for conservative ideas, pointing, for example, to the contrasting fates of Detroit and Houston to illustrate the superiority of conservative policies. So it’s particularly galling to see that rather than train his fire at Obama and the liberal machine that cocoons him, Cruz has become a one-man wrecking ball against Republicans. His most recent foray into sabotaging his colleagues concerned the debt-limit increase. Because Speaker Boehner sent over a “clean” debt-limit bill, Republican senators had...

When I give speeches around the country, I often get asked whether it’s time to give up. More specifically, has America reached a tipping point, with too many people riding in the wagon of government dependency and too few people creating wealth and pulling the wagon in the right direction? These questions don’t surprise me, particularly since my speeches frequently include very grimBIS, OECD, and IMF data showing that the long-run fiscal problem in the United States is larger than it is in some nations that already are facing fiscal crisis. But that doesn’t mean I have a good answer....

Former Vice President Al Gore raised eyebrows last week when he suggested that “fertility management” was the key to fighting global warming and promoting economic development in poor countries. Gore’s comments drew criticism from free-marketeers who said his remarks amount to “eco-imperialism.” “Gore’s agenda for saving the world from global warming has always included population control,” Myron Ebell, director of global warming and international environmental policy at the free-market Competitive Enterprise Institute, told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “Advocating population control specifically for Africa is just another form of imperialism. Gore’s eco-imperialism is uncomfortably close to the original racist goals...

President Obama will use his State of the Union Address on Tuesday to outline “concrete, real, practical proposals” — even if Congress isn’t on board with each of them. Dan Pfeiffer said Mr. Obama’s go-it-alone message isn’t meant to be confrontational and that the president is willing to find common ground with Republicans, where possible. In two days, Mr. Obama will address Congress with his popularity numbers in negative territory. Read more: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jan/26/white-house-state-union-focus-action-obama-may-go-/#ixzz2rWzl278i Follow us: @washtimes on Twitter

WASHINGTON (AP) — The president's advisers are warning that if lawmakers won't work with the White House, the White House will go around them. President Barack Obama makes his State of the Union address on Tuesday. Top White House aides say Obama will try to work with Congress where it's possible. But press secretary Jay Carney and senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer say the White House will take action with executive orders if needed. On ABC's "This Week," Carney says the White House will "bypass Congress where necessary." Pfeiffer tells "Fox News Sunday" that Obama, quote, "has a pen, and he...

By REBECCA KAPLAN January 16, 2014 Sen. Feinstein: Hillary Clinton Isn’t To Blame For Benghazi Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., has come to the defense of Hillary Clinton against Republicans who she says are trying to inflate the former secretary ofstate’s role in the Sept. 2012 attacks on the U.S. diplomatic facility and CIA annex in Benghazi, Libya. Feinstein, the chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, and vice chairman Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., led the committee’s review of the attacks that werepublished in a bipartisan report that was declassified Wednesday. Though their the report faults the State Department for failing to sufficiently...

Obama Aides: He Didn't Know Extent of NSA Surveillance "I think it was disturbing to most people, and I think he found it disturbing.” President Obama doesn’t merely claim ignorance of the IRS’ targeting of politically conservative groups or the Department of Justice’s targeting of journalists: according to The New York Times, Obama was also ignorant of the extent of NSA surveillance. According to the Times, “aides said Mr. Obama was surprised to learn after leaks by Edward J. Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor, just how far the surveillance had gone.” David Plouffe, Obama’s advisor, said, “Things seem...

The US military has suspended 34 officers in charge of launching nuclear missiles for cheating on a proficiency test, Air Force leaders said Wednesday. The scandal at Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana marked the latest in a series of damaging revelations dogging the country's nuclear force,including a separate probe into illegal drugs that came to light last week. "There was cheating that took place with respect to this particular test," Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James told a news conference. "Some officers did it. Others apparently knew about it,and it appears that they did nothing,or at least not enough,to...

President Barack Obama announced Friday that John Podesta, his new "counselor" and the political operative responsible for creating the institutional left in Washington, will be the appointed "to lead a comprehensive review of big data and privacy" in the aftermath of revelations about the National Security Agency's electronic spying programs. When he joined the White House last month, Podesta's focus was said to be "climate change." The president's speech contained little news. It was a classic Obama set-piece, designed to demonstrate that he understands both sides of a complex argument, while delegating

Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates should have waited to publish the memoir in which he harshly criticized President Obama's leadership in the war in Afghanistan, two top Republican senators said  Sunday. "I would have waited, but as far as waiting until it's over in Afghanistan, I wouldn't have done that," Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said on CNN's "State of the Union," though he was quick to praise the former defense secretary. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), a potential 2016 presidential contender, made similar comments on CBS's "Face the Nation." "My preference would be that people would refrain from writing these sorts...

So who really controls the world? The Illuminati? Freemasons? The Bilderberg Group? Or are these all red herrings to distract your prying eyes from the real global elite? The answer, like most topics worth exploring, is not quite so simple. Have no doubt, there are secretive global powers whose only goal is to keep and grow that power. But it really may not be as secretive as you would think. And that is what makes it even more nefarious. But don't take my word for it, we have both science and insider testimony to back it up. We are going...

Though Democrats have railed against the influence of money in politics after the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling, liberals have accounted for 70% of the so-called "dark money" that has been spent this year. According to Open Secrets, "liberal dark money in 2013 makes up 70 percent of all the dark money spent so far. At this point in 2011, liberal money accounted for less than 6 percent of the dark money spent, and in 2009, the total was a little higher, at 6.5 percent." Open Secrets describes "dark money organizations" as "501(c)(4) and 501(c)(6) nonprofits that don't have to disclose their donors."...

Apparently not satisfied with just setting fire to the 4th Amendment, NSA boss Keith Alexander's next target is the 1st Amendment. In an interview with the Defense Department's "Armed With Science" blog , it appears that Alexander felt he'd have a friendly audience, so he let loose with some insane claims, including suggesting that the government needs to find a way to "stop" journalists from reporting on the Snowden leaks . As noted by Politco, General Alexander isn't a fan of journalists doing anything about these documents: "I think it’s wrong that that newspaper reporters have all these documents,...

<p>CEOs are on an elite list of 11 tax-exempt charity chiefs who command a staggering seven-figure salary, according to the 2013 “Charity CEO Compensation Study,” which analyzed the 2011 IRS returns of 3,929 US-based charities that rely on public support.Charity Navigator noted that the country’s highest-paid CEOs oversee multi-million dollar operations, with the largest nonprofits having expenses of more than $13.5 million. But it termed some of the salaries “excessive” and “outrageously high.”</p>

I was listening to Attorney Joe DiGenova this morning on WMAL and he pointed out how the DOJ had recently sent a letter to universities telling them they could ignore the June ruling by the Supreme Court on using race in admissions. The Supreme Court, in a nearly unanimous ruling, said that universities could use race in admissions but not as a dominant factor. But in this letter the DOJ is instructing universities to continue with the same racial preferences that the Supreme Court had just barred them from using: WSJ – Obama Administration regulators have made a specialty of...

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said Monday that President Obama is putting the economy at risk by refusing to negotiate with Republicans over spending and the debt ceiling. "The president's refusal to negotiate is hurting our economy and putting our country at risk," Boehner said on the House floor. Boehner expressed disbelief at reports that Obama would rather see a debt default than talk to Republicans. "This morning, a senior White House official this morning said that the president would rather default than to sit down and negotiate," he said. "Really?" "The American people expect when their leaders have differences, and...