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This week the world received a wake-up call when the Islamic State seized control of Ramadi and Palmyra in Syria. Obama’s so-called JV team just made military forces abandoned the capital of Iraq’s largest province handing a defeat to team Obama’s strategy to defeat the extremist group. Not stopping to celebrate victory, ISIS forces are heading east to attack retreating Iraqi forces. While Iraq talks about gathering pro-government forces the Islamic State is heading to Fallujah to set up a launching point for Baghdad. The world was shocked when the Islamic State militants captured the ancient Syrian town of Palmyra....

On Friday, President Obama spoke at a Jewish American Heritage Month celebration being held at the Adas Israel synagogue in Washington, D.C. Wearing a yarmulke, Obama addressed his Jewish gravitas, citing his two Jewish former chiefs of staff, saying he has been called America's "first Jewish president" by Jeffrey Goldberg, who recently interviewed him for The Atlantic. Goldberg was in attendance.

Deep into the seventh year of his tenure, Barack Obama is thinking about his post-presidential legacy. We know this because he’s telling us so. In an interview this week with The Atlantic about the potential deal with Iran regarding its nuclear program, the president sought to use the fact of his relative youth and his consciousness about how history might judge him to his advantage: “Look, 20 years from now, I’m still going to be around, God willing. If Iran has a nuclear weapon, it’s my name on this. I think it’s fair to say that in addition to our...

Ireland became Saturday the first country in the world to legalize same-sex marriages by popular vote. Within the U.S., Maine, Maryland and Washington in 2012 were the first states to legalize such unions through popular votes. Meanwhile, 37 states and the District of Columbia recognize same-sex marriages, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. A measure to legalize such unions via popular votes could be added to the ballots in the 13 other states during the 2016 general elections, when it conceivably could have the support of at least one presidential candidate, as IrelandÂ’s action motivated one White House...

Ed Morrisey already highlighted some of the early news coming out of the first round of Hillary Clinton emails released by the State Department and there will no doubt be plenty more to come. But as the media covers these new “revelations” (such as they are) there seems to be a fresh narrative emerging. I noticed a few examples of this in the last 24 hours, one of them being the early morning show on CNN today, where weekend anchor Christie Paul was asking yet another guest for commentary about some of the Benghazi news which was showing up...

I love the RATATAT of the sound of guns in the morning!Think Hillary! Think!Vince said the metal box with the papers were under the rock where we buried the guy.And he said, if we don't go after the box, the box will come after us!Oh! Vince! Why did I do that to you?? Darn! I distinctly remember burying the murder weapon HERE! where the heck is it???

US and Hizballah coordinate spy drone flights over Qalamoun, share US combat intelligence Another strange pair of bedfellows has turned up in one of the most critical Middle East battlefields: the United States is helping Hizballah, Iran’s Lebanese surrogate, in the battle for control of the strategic Qalamoun Mountains. ...a US special operations unit, stationed at the Hamat air base on the coast of northern Lebanon, is directing unarmed Aerosonde MK 4.7 reconnaissance drone intelligence-gathering flights over the Qalamoun Mt arena, 100 km to the west. However, it turns out that the data the US drones pass to Lebanese army...

A rare glimpse into Hezbollah's underground tunnels was provided on Friday by Lebanese publication As-Safir, which is associated with the militant organization. The report praised Hezbollah's activities and painted it as a strong army ready for battle. While it is difficult to verify the claims in the article, it contained a rare discussion of the tunnels by Hezbollah members. The reporter wrote that in order to meet Hezbollah fighters near the Israeli border in southern Lebanon, he travelled from the city of Tyre and was required to stop at a house known to locals as a Hezbollah headquarters, where he...

Friday at the 2015 Southern Republican Leadership Conference in Oklahoma, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations under President George W. Bush, John Bolton, said former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is “responsible for the tragedy of the murder of U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans,” in the 2012 terror attack in Benghazi Libya. Bolton said, “I think the most telling information that we have seen in this limited number of emails is that there are repeated examples of Secretary of State Clinton being told in 2011 and 2012 that the security situation of our personnel in Tripoli...

From the first sudden, and quite dramatic, appearance of the fanatical Islamic group known as ISIS which was largely unheard of until a year ago, on the world's stage and which promptly replaced the worn out and tired al Qaeda as the world's terrorist bogeyman, we suggested that the "straight to beheading YouTube clip" purpose behind the Saudi Arabia-funded Islamic State was a simple one: use the Jihadists as the vehicle of choice to achieve a political goal: depose of Syria's president Assad, who for years has stood in the way of a critical Qatari natural gas pipeline, one which...

[1]The Goldberg interview with Obama reads like a conversation with an idiot. Actually make that two idiots, both of whom are also compulsive liars.One of the highlights of their insane exchange is when Obama tries to insist that Iran won’t be more dangerous if it gets another $150 billion. Obama: The question is, if Iran has $150 billion parked outside the country, does the IRGC automatically get $150 billion? Does that $150 billion then translate by orders of magnitude into their capacity to project power throughout the region? So Obama brings out the math, and by math, I mean...

Bill Clinton won the presidency in 1992 by running as a different kind of Democrat from previous nominees. Hillary Clinton, Anne Gearan of The Washington Post reports, is hoping to win the presidency in 2016 by running as the same kind of Democrat as the current incumbent. There's a certain logic in that. President Obama did win twice, while the five pre-Clinton Democratic nominees lost five of the six previous elections. But maybe it's too logical. There's also magic to presidential elections, something no arithmetic formula can capture. It's not clear that a 69-year-old Hillary Clinton in 2016 can inspire...

Judicial Watch announced today that it "obtained more than 100 pages of previously classified "Secret" documents from the Department of Defense (DOD)and the Department of State, revealing that DOD almost immediately reported that the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi was committed by the al Qaeda and Muslim Brotherhood-linked "Brigades of the Captive Omar Abdul Rahman" (BCOAR), and had been planned at least 10 days in advance." Judicial Watch added what has been proven and obvious for years—that "Benghazi attack" was "not about a response to an anti-Muhammad video" or was it "the protests at the U.S. Embassy in...

Tom Cotton, the Iraq war veteran from Arkansas turned Republican senator, has a message to fellow soldiers: "We should not be ashamed of the war we conducted in Iraq." Leading Republicans are sticking by the Iraq war, declining to follow the Democrats into full retreat and regret. Cotton, while conceding that there are lessons to be learned from the conflict and that it might have been handled differently in retrospect, maintains that President George W. Bush made the best decision he could at the time based on the available intelligence about Saddam Hussein's presumed stockpile of weapons of mass destruction....

One of the most vulnerable Democrats in the Senate my have just gotten more vulnerable. In an interview aired Wednesday morning on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., said his GOP opponent, Rep. Tom Cotton, feels entitled to the seat because of his service as an Army infantry officer in Afghanistan and Iraq. "There's a lot of people in the Senate that didn't serve in the military. ... I think it's part of this sense of entitlement that he gives off — almost as like 'I served my country, therefore elect me to the Senate.' That's not how it...

WASHINGTON — While a soldier in Iraq and Afghanistan, Tom Cotton wielded some of the military’s most sophisticated firearms. Today it’s letters that appear to be Sen. Cotton’s weapon of choice. Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2015/03/12/259577/fallout-from-senators-iran-letter.html#storylink=cpy

It's a showdown. On one side of the ring, it's Barack Obama. On the other side, it's Tom Cotton. Cotton has been called a "traitor." Pretty strong stuff for a war hero. So now it's Cotton vs. Obama. Let's have a look at the tale of the tape. Tom Cotton: Born in Arkansas Barack Obama: Hawaii? OK, if you say so. Tom Cotton: Educated in US schools by his parents Barack Obama: Educated in Indonesia, abandoned by Mom, raised by typical white folk. Tom Cotton: You can see his school records Barack Obama: You can't. Tom Cotton: Earned admission into...

Hundreds of Hillary Clinton‘s emails were released today, something Clinton herself said she wants, but Charles Krauthammer doesn’t really buy this is some great victory for transparency and disclosure. “There isn’t a shred of evidence,” he said, “because she shredded the evidence. This whole release is a farce.” He pointed out that it’s not like every little email Clinton ever sent will be released to the public, only the ones ‘scrubbed and cleansed and decided upon, chosen by her own people, acting in her own interest.” And, Krauthammer added, it’s working, because the media is eagerly looking through “pre-scrubbed material”...

29:00 [click on picture then click on red dot to listen]

Tourism Minister Yariv Levin (Likud) responded sharply after US President Barack Obama continued his condemnation of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s pre-election comments, in which he said a Palestinian state would not be established on his watch and warned of massive Arab voter turnout. Striking back at Obama’s criticism of Netanyahu’s remarks, Levin said, “We have much appreciation and respect for the president of the United States, but there’s no place for statements which constitute interfering in the internal affairs of Israel.” The minister continued, “The time has come for leaders of the West to open their eyes and take care...