Free Republic

A bad week for Democrats compounded by an awful moment for Barack Obama. President Obama didn't wait long after Tuesday's devastating elections to give critics another reason to question his leadership, but this time the subject matter was more grim than a pair of governorships. After news broke out of the shooting at the Fort Hood Army post in Texas, the nation watched in horror as the toll of dead and injured climbed. The White House was notified immediately and by late afternoon, word went out that the president would speak about the incident prior to a previously scheduled appearance....

Obama reaches out and touches O'Reilly's knee during the Ayers interview segment on the O'Reilly Show (7:05 mark)

CHRIS MATTHEWS: Anyway, thank you Roger, thank you. What a night! I'm getting giggles! It's so exciting here -- Chuck Todd, Andrea Mitchell -- because there's news in the air.

But it does allow Obama to use what his Harvard Law School classmate Ken Mehlman, soon to be chairman of the Republican Party, calls his "star power" to work with the GOP on bridging Red-Blue divisions and getting some things done. The son of a black economist from Kenya and a white teacher from Kansas might be uniquely qualified to nudge the country toward the color purple. "One party seems to be defending a moribund status quo, and the other is defending an oligarchy," he says coolly. "It's not a very attractive choice." Obama's a Blue State Democrat, all right,...