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President Obama took aim at Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham today at his White House news conference. In recent days, some reports have speculated that Obama will pick U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice to succeed Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State. Rice made headlines after the Sept. 11 attack in Benghazi by going on several Sunday talk shows and blaming an anti-Islam video for the situation. Her account turned out to be false, with the White House later admitting it was a planned terror attack on the U.S. Consulate. Earlier today at a news conference on the Benghazi investigation,...

It probably wasn't happenstance that California's historic – good or bad, it's historic – experiment in greenhouse gas regulation was delayed until after an election in which voters would be deciding on new taxes. California's utility costs are already among the highest in the nation. The Public Utilities Commission staff and the utilities themselves have warned that the transition will sharply increase bills. Californians also pay more than most other Americans for gasoline and diesel fuel, thanks to our unique refining requirements, and the Air Resources Board is pushing refiners to go even further toward "clean fuels," which will be...

It is a different world, and a different America. Obama is part of that different America, knows it, and knows how to tap into it. That is why he won. the most charitable way of explaining the election results of 2012 is that Americans voted for the status quo – for the incumbent President and for a divided Congress. They must enjoy gridlock, partisanship, incompetence, economic stagnation and avoidance of responsibility. And fewer people voted. But as we awake from the nightmare, it is important to eschew the facile explanations for the Romney defeat that will prevail among the chattering...

Russian president Vladimir Putin claims President Barack Obama is planning to visit Russia, the outlet RIA Novosti reports. "US President Barack Obama has confirmed plans to visit Russia at the invitation of his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, the Russian president’s spokesman said on Tuesday," the Russian outlet reports. "Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Obama made the statement when Putin called a second time to congratulate the US president on his reelection." RIA Novosti quotes Putin's spokesman as saying, "Obama thanked [Putin] for the congratulations and the invitation and confirmed his readiness to come to Russia at a date to be agreed...

November 14, 2012 RNC chairman calls for full recount in West-Murphy race Alexandra Jaffe Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus is echoing Rep. Allen West's (R-Fla.) call for a full recount of early ballots in his race, offering a rare show of support for a Republican lawmaker still locked in a yet-undecided race. "The voters of Florida's 18th Congressional District deserve to have their ballots counted properly. Congressman Allen West has asked election officials in St. Lucie County to count all early voting ballots, and I strongly urge them to do so in order to erase any existing concerns about...

Rep. Allen West released this statement today, vowing his support for Israel as she defends herself from radical Islamic terrorism and also calls out Egypt’s government for supporting Hamas: “I fully support the Israeli military strike that killed the Hamas military wing chief, Ahmed Jabari. Hamas is a known Islamic terrorist organization and clearly states in its charter the aim to destroy the modern day State of Israel. Mr. Jabari has been responsible for countless rocket and missile attacks originating from Gaza Strip into Southern Israel. I have personally seen the destruction this causes, and visited the City of Sderot...

The Legacy Lives On! Mark’s Lost Dog & Cat Rescue Foundation “Conservatism is the antidote to tyranny precisely because its principles are the founding principles.” --Mark Levin in Liberty and TyrannyWelcome to “The Levin Lounge”… Step in and have a virtual FRink.Taking the country by storm, one radio station at a time – and kicking the BUTTS of the competition! Welcome all, to the most FUN LIVE THREAD on FreeRepublic.com! You can call Mark’s show: 1-877-381-3811

WASHINGTON—Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid on Wednesday opposed a request by Republican senators for a new Senate select committee to investigate the Sept. 11 U.S. consulate attack in Benghazi, Libya. "No," said Mr. Reid (D., Nev.), when asked if he favored creation of such a committee.

PARIS — Some of the culprits in an attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, had links to al-Qaida’s North Africa arm, a top U.S. military official said Wednesday. Gen. Carter Ham, the head of the U.S. military’s Africa Command, said some of the attackers had ties to Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, which was built on the remains of a former Algerian militant group.

A Key West resident who police say was distraught over the presidential election results and worried about his business has apparently killed himself. Police say they found Henry Hamilton's body in his bedroom Nov. 8, along with a living will with handwritten words “Do not revive! (expletive) Obama!” Two empty prescription empty pill bottles were in the dining room. Hamilton's partner Michael Cossey told Key West police he last saw Hamilton when they watched the election results together. According to the police report, Hamilton was upset and said, “If Barack gets re-elected, I'm not going to be around.” Cossey says...

General David Petraeus is arguably the most consequential and renowned American military leader since World War II. His resignation because of an extramarital affair with his biographer, Paula Broadwell, has shocked Americans. L’affaire Petraeus has two parts that must be separated: his sexual relationship with Broadwell itself, and the link between the timing of the announcement of his resignation and the Benghazi attacks on September 11.Here I will focus on the former. What led a successful general at the height of his power and influence to have an affair that undid all he had accomplished?In 1993, Dean Ludwig and...

A week before the election, an FBI whistleblower went to a Republican member of Congress with explosive details about a national security scandal that could have stopped President Obama’s re-election campaign dead in its tracks. But the potentially devastating “October Surprise” was hushed up by Republicans. Although all the details are not yet available and new disclosures are coming every day, it appears that the scandal involves the CIA director leaking classified information to his mistress and the FBI not holding David Petraeus accountable for his immoral and illegal conduct. In short, it is the worst scandal of the Obama...

Here's the essay.

The most successful Republican presidential candidate of the past half century— Ronald Reagan, who was elected and reelected with landslide victories— bore little resemblance to the moderate candidates that Republican conventional wisdom depicts as the key to victory, even though most of these moderate candidates have in fact gone down to defeat. One of the biggest differences between Reagan and these latter-day losers was that Reagan paid great attention to explaining his policies and values. He was called "the great communicator," but much more than a gift for words was involved. The issues that defined Reagan's vision were things he...

By the midterm elections in 2014, Julián Castro's memoir will be on bookshelves nationwide. New York-based Little, Brown and Co. will announce today that it has acquired the rights to publish Castro's yet-to-be-written book in English and Spanish as well as an audio version. The memoir will be published in 2014, the publishing house says. Since delivering the keynote address on the opening night of the Democratic National Convention, Castro has become a national figure, and widely discussed as a future president. “We think Julián has a very universal story, filled with drama, struggle and achievement and it will appeal...

It's barely been a week since President Obama's re-election, and some people can't believe, truly can't believe, that things didn't go their way. As of Wednesday morning, 37 states had posted petitions on the White House website to secede from the United States of America. (Some not-so-brilliant citizens of Georgia and South Carolina actually have two different secession postings each, but I'm counting those knuckleheads only once.) I'm sorry to report that this not-so-illustrious group includes California, where nearly 7,000 citizens have signed a petition quoting the Declaration of Independence and insisting on the right to set up their own...

President Obama, irritated by Republican pledges to prevent Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice from receiving a promotion, said that Rice’s critics “have a problem with me.” “When they go after the UN ambassador apparently because they think she’s an easy target, then they’ve got a problem with me,” Obama told reporters today. “And should I choose — if I think that she would be the best person to serve America in the capacity of the State Department [head] then I will nominate her, but that’s not a determination I’ve made yet.” Obama was responding to a press conference...

"It's been aggressive and strong and fast and robust and a lot of people have been helped because of it," Obama added. "That's a pretty good metaphor for how I want federal government to operate generally, and I'm going to do everything I can to make sure it does."

Syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer on Tuesday said the White House used David Petraeus’s affair to get the CIA director to give testimony about the attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, that was in line with the administration’s position on the matter.... KRAUTHAMMER: I think the really shocking news today was that General Petraeus thought and hoped he could keep his job. He thought that it might and it would be kept secret, and that he could stay in his position. I think what that tells us is really important. It meant that he understood that the FBI obviously...

This will boggle your mind. Barack Obama lost independent voters to Mitt Romney in every swing state except North Carolina and still won reelection. President Barack Obama won a second term by taking the majority of swing states. But a closer look at exit polling data shows Obama lost the independent vote in most of those states over the last four years. Independents, who do not align with one political party or another, make up a fast-growing and coveted voting bloc.

SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. -- When this sun-drenched exurb east of Los Angeles filed for bankruptcy protection in August, the city attorney suggested fraudulent accounting was the root of the problem. The mayor blamed a dysfunctional city council and greedy police and fire unions. The unions blamed the mayor. Even now, there is little agreement on how the city got into this crisis or how it can extricate itself. "It's total political chaos," said John Husing, a former San Bernardino resident and regional economist. "There is no solution. They'll never fix anything."

A Key West resident who police say was distraught over the presidential election results and worried about his business has apparently killed himself. Police say they found Henry Hamilton’s body in his bedroom Nov. 8, along with a living will with handwritten words “Do not revive! (expletive) Obama!” Two empty prescription empty pill bottles were in the dining room. …

The immigrant community in the Phoenix area is preparing to live another four years with Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who over the past few years has intensified his fight against undocumented migrants. Arpaio, 80, was reelected Tuesday to a sixth consecutive term with 53 percent of the votes. The controversial Republican sheriff received another mandate despite several pending federal lawsuits accusing his office of engaging in racial profiling against Hispanics. "Unfortunately, we still have part of (state immigration law) SB 1070 in force in Arizona, which is the 'show me your papers' provision, and now we're going to continue...

The First Lady of the United States (FLOTUS) is not an elected official. The title doesn't come with a paycheck. Michelle Obama, however, has turned it into an exercise in imperial excess, spending taxpayers' dollars as though the Treasury were her cookie jar. There was an old radio spot that ran in the South, when I lived there some 20 years ago. The commentary always started with, “Ya know what makes me sick?” That’s probably not a great way to grab a breakfast-time audience, but ya know, I’m almost there with the FLOTUS. I am simply tired of the First...

Governor Sarah Palin posed the question “Who is running our country?” in her latest Facebook note: Who is running our country? We’ve got a CIA Director sharing security info with his mistress using an unsecure gmail account. We’ve got the delusional Susan Rice blaming the death of an ambassador on a Youtube video. We’ve got Iran firing on one of our drones a week before the election. We’ve got the White House either ignorant of or covering up all of this. Who is minding the store? Everywhere we look we see the rank incompetence or corruption of the people who...

The president is scheduled to do his first press conference in months on Wednesday, at 1:30 p.m. EST in the East Room.

In 2008, long before stress tests and Dodd-Frank, then-Senator Barack Obama excelled in the rich enclaves where much of New York’s financial class lives. Obama made staggering gains among one-percenters in the wealthiest areas of western Connecticut, where as many as one-quarter of adult males work in the financial sector. In New Canaan, where Brian Williams owns a home and the median income exceeds $175,000, Obama lost by just 6 points after Kerry lost by 22 points four years earlier. Nearby Greenwich, where you can find Mel Gibson, Regis, and Madoff's kids, voted for Obama by 8 points. ..................................................... The...

The federal government is tightening its control over the 50 states and the lives of every American. The U.S. Constitution, however, says states are supposed to be equal partners with the federal government. State sovereignty — allowing each state to control its own affairs — is the cornerstone of that equal partnership and critical to protecting Americans' freedom. Below are 10 ways local policymakers and citizens can restore that balance of power and do what's best for the people of your state. (Click the infographic for larger, 8½x11" PDF version.)Read Federalism DIY: 10 Ways for States to Check and Balance Washington...

Most likely ending speculation Eric Holder started last week when he announced he may not stay on for a second term, the New York Post reported today that the attorney general will remain on the job at the request of the president. Gun Rights Examiner raised troubling concerns that the floated resignation could remove Holder as a subject for further investigation into Fast and Furious gunwalking, and also raised the alarm that potential replacements being discussed in the press must be vetted with the gun issue being a non-negotiable litmus test. Holder’s reported decision not to resign now means he...

President Obama is taking a tough opening stance in talks over deficit reduction, pushing Republicans to accept a plan that calls for $1.6 trillion in new tax revenue over the next ten years, according to reports. The figure is double the $800 billion last discussed by the White House and House Speaker Boehner (R-Ohio) during their 2011 negotiations on raising the debt-ceiling limit. The president’s plan is based on his most recent budget proposal, which sought the $1.6 in new revenues by targeting the wealthy and corporations. The president and congressional lawmakers are set to meet at the White House...

John Boehner has been willing to throw his conference under the bus repeatedly. We know from the Bob Woodward book that he was willing to raise taxes. We know he cut a deal with Barack Obama without consulting the rest of his conference. We know it blew up in his face. We know he now doesn’t even want to fight Obamacare, calling it the “law of the land.” We know he only walked back that statement because of the outrage that ensued. We know he wants to start putting moderates into leadership positions like Cathy McMorris Rodgers instead of Tom...

Since the DemRats do not wish to abide by Constitutional principles and government if someone knows how to and would create a Petition to Expel the Democrats and/or the Blue states from the Union online I'm sure it would quickly pick up team .

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Nate Silver has gotten a lot of press for his near perfect election night predictions. In 2008 Silver gained popularity and influence after he called 49 out of 50 states. Many pundits were predicting that Silver would crash and burn in 2012. Instead, he outperformed his 2008 predictions and now that Florida has been called for president Obama, Silver can tout a perfect record 50 out of 50 states called correctly.How did Silver do it?Only Likely Voters Matter: This is one obvious reason SilverÂ’s method outshines everyone else. Anything other than likely voter models is useless information. This is key....

Note to Chris Matthews: when seeking to slam Republicans for their supposed ignorance of science, try not to expose your own. On Tuesday's Hardball, Matthews—mocking the Republican congressmen vying for the chairmanship of the House Science Committee— committed this whopper: "As we all learned in grammar school—young people watching—trees absorb carbon monoxide." Uh, no, Chris. As even an MSNBC host might know, carbon monoxide is a toxic gas produced when there is insufficient oxygen to permit complete oxidation. Think running car in closed garage. Trees absorb carbon dioxide. Perhaps it was just a slip of the overworked Matthews' tongue, but...

Sanjay Sangohee has by all accounts enjoyed great success since coming to America. His Huffington Post biography makes that abundantly clear: "Sanjay Sanghoee is a banker and the author of Merger, a fast-paced financial thriller published by Forge Books and reviewed by Chicago Tribune, BARRON’s and others - available on Amazon. . . . He has more than a decade of experience in banking, ranging from Mergers & Acquisitions at Lazard and Dresdner to the investment side at Ramius, a multi-billion dollar hedge fund." One might expect that such prosperity would have inspired some gratitude for the system of government...

The Republican Party went into the 2012 elections with a number of handicaps. One of the biggest of these handicaps was that it genuinely believed in a single country defined by the American Dream of family values, hard work and national greatness. The Democratic Party, which scored decisive victories across the country, never believed in any such thing, though its leading lights, like Obama, occasionally paid lip service to the idea as a sop to older white voters who would have been turned off by the 2012 version of Obama sounding like the 2002 version of Obama. Where the Republican...

President Obama's re-election team has already been lauded for its mastery of data and organziation, but a feature in today's The New York Times looks at another secret, and more subtle, weapon: Behavioral science. Reporter Benedict Carey talks to some of the members of the campaign's "COBS" team, an informal group of unpaid advisors who shared their knowledge on the latest academic research and theories on how to influence the public's knowledge behavior. Publicly, the group—which it gave itself the name of "consortium of behavioral scientists"—where just friendly volunteers offering advice. None of the social scientists and psychologists who took...

The 2012 election certainly didn’t end as planned for the GOP, which failed to win the presidency and lost seats in both chambers of Congress. Nonetheless, Republicans found a silver lining in the fact that they maintained control of the House, having won at least 233 seats as of Tuesday — 218 are needed for a majority. Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) argued on MSNBC’s “Rachel Maddow Show” that the election was a clean sweep for Democrats. He said the GOP wouldn’t have retained control of the House if it wasn’t for questionable redistricting by Republicans. The Brennan Center for Justice...

The St. Lucie County Supervisor of Elections is admitting that mistakes were made on election night When uploading results from the last three days of early voting, Gertrude Walker blames human and machine errors, telling TC Palm "i'm not perfect, neither is my staff". 40 of 94 precincts, mostly in Fort Pierce, weren't counted at all and another 54 precincts were counted twice. In total ballots, more than 3,600 in St. Lucie were counted twice, while 1,953 were not scanned at all. Walker says a retabulation on sunday corrected the error, and she claims she's confident that every vote has...

Pelosi Presser now on. Pelosi is surrounded solely by women. "It took millions of women to reelect Obama. You are looking at the future of America – women. Diversity. The DLC now has a majority of women and minorities. We now have our own gavel. We have something more glorious – unity. I come here with my sisters – when I came to Congress 25 years ago there were 23 Dem women. Today we have over 60 House Dem women. Not enough, but more. We took early responsibility to increase the number of Dem women. Two of our women have...

The Republican establishment, consultants, and talking heads should all just take a deep breath. Yes, we have a serious problem with Hispanics. It’s a problem conservative Hispanics have been trying to tell the GOP leadership about for many years with little or no response or action. But the quick-fix immigration solutions now being offered by the likes of Charles Krauthammer and other establishment-elites figures are an over-correction, do not actually address the root of the problem, and, frankly, may even accelerate our losses in the crucial Hispanic demographic. Here’s Krauthammer’s analysis: “It requires but a single policy change: Border fence...

The conservative Gotterdammerung is finally here. "Like dazed survivors in a ravaged city, America's conservatives are wailing and beating their collective breasts," opines the Economist's "Lexington" columnist. "A leading conservative thinker," asked by the Economist to "list today's conservative ideas, laughs bitterly and replies, 'Are there any?'" Former Reaganite Rep. Vin Weber (R-Minn.) laments in the conservative journal Policy Review, "I have never been so concerned about the future of conservative ideas." A Washington Post columnist announced that "the long descent of the Republican Party into irrelevance, defeat, and perhaps eventual disappearance" has finally begun. William Kristol of the Weekly...

O'REILLY: "Watters' World" segment tonight. As we told you in the "Talking Points Memo," some far-left elements in America now running wild after the re-election of President Obama. So, we sent FACTOR Producer, Jesse Watters, to check out the situation at a Bill Maher show in New York City.(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

Liberals do not grasp the distinction between Ronald Reagan and (either) George Bush. This blind spot creates a massive confusion and hazard to their ambitions. Obama defeated neither the Reagan Narrative nor Team Reagan. Team Bush appropriated, and then marginalized, both. Obama beat Team Bush, not Team Reagan. The implications are huge. There was a touchy relationship between President Reagan and his Vice President George H.W. Bush. They were rivals during the primaries. Bush attacked the Reagan economic agenda as “voodoo economics.” Bush served faithfully as VP for eight years but Reagan and Bush never warmed to one another. There...

President Barack Obama invited MoveOn to a meeting with him at the White House on Tuesday just weeks after the liberal group threatened Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney with violence. The invitation came as part of Obama’s ‘fiscal cliff’ series of meetings this week with Congressional leaders, business leaders, and unions and left wing supporters. MoveOn’s executive director Justen Ruben attended Tuesday’s White House meeting alongside leaders of the Center for American Progress, the SEIU, AFL-CIO, NEA, AFSCME and others. Days before the presidential election MoveOn released a video ad produced by the leftist filmmaker Michael Moore that called for...

President Obama is taking a hard line with congressional Republicans heading into negotiations over the year-end fiscal cliff, making no opening concessions and calling for far more in new taxes than Republicans have so far been willing to consider. Obama plans to open talks using his most recent budget proposal, which sought to raise taxes on corporations and the wealthy by $1.6 trillion over the next decade, White House press secretary Jay Carney said Tuesday. That’s double the sum that House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) offered Obama during secret debt negotiations in 2011. Obama has been pressing to let...

What does Barack Obama’s re-election as President mean for the future of the United States and for the President’s place in history? Both liberals celebrating his electoral victory, and conservatives who fear for the future of the country, may be surprised by the thoughtful, serious and provocative answer to this question in: I Am the Change, Barack Obama and the Crisis of Liberalism by Charles Kesler, best known as the editor of the Claremont Review of Books, but also a professor of government at Claremont McKenna College and a Senior Fellow at the Claremont Institute. Full disclosure, this columnist is...

Politico is peddling a misleading liberal-media attack on Dick Morris. Item from Politico's "Morning Score" today [emphasis added]: "DICK MORRIS, who has not been taken seriously by serious people for a very long time, confessed on Fox News yesterday that he deliberately misled viewers: 'I think that there was a period of time when the Romney campaign was falling apart, people were not optimistic, nobody thought there was a chance of victory and I felt that it was my duty at that point to go out and say what I said.' There's just one problem. As Professor William Jacobson has...

- FrontPage Magazine - http://frontpagemag.com - Valerie Jarrett’s Radical RootsPosted By John Perazzo On November 14, 2012 @ 12:45 am In Daily Mailer,FrontPage | 3 Comments It was recently revealed that for several months, President Obama’s closest and most trusted advisor, Valerie Jarrett, has been leading secret negotiations with representatives of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, in an effort to develop normalized relations between the U.S. and Iran. Hallmarks of such a relationship would include the commencement of direct airline flights between American cities and Tehran; the granting of entry permits for citizens of each country to visit the other;...