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(Newser) – It's time to get past the incessant partisan potshots being taken at President Obama and forge some progress, Colin Powell told Face the Nation today. "I don’t think the country will be well served if the next three years are attempts to bring him down and destroy him as a political figure," said the Republican, who added that "Americans will want to see some progress" and said he doesn't regret voting for Obama in 2008. Powell also dismissed Dick Cheney's suggestions that the country was less safe under Obama as bunk: "To suggest that somehow we’ve become much...

Of course not....Powell on Face the Nation asked if he as regrets, Schieffer: "Now Barack Obama who came to Washington, promised to change things, not much has changed, Congress is in a total mess now, in total gridlock, his critics are having a field day. Any regrets about endorsing Barack Obama?"

Former Secretary of State General Colin Powell said Sunday he had no regrets about endorsing Barack Obama during the 2008 presidential campaign, but that the president "put too much on the plate for the American people to absorb at this time." "I think he was the right choice when the nation voted for him," he told "Face the Nation" moderator Bob Schieffer, adding that "he has done some things that help the country a great deal." Powell noted that "our financial situation is secure now," considering the country was in a recession when the president took office. "Slowly but surely...

Daily Beast columnist Christopher Buckley has clearly inherited his late, great father’s razor-sharp wit and gift for eloquence, but his political sensibilities fell considerably farther from the tree—so much so that he voted for Barack Obama, based on personal disappointment with John McCain, animosity towards Sarah Palin, and the certainty that Obama was too smart to actually believe all the left-wing baloney he espoused. Well, after a year of Hope n’ Change, we all know how that turned out. And it’s been enough to make Buckley redirect his pen in The One’s direction, penning a satirical early draft of this...

Last January, several Republican legal stars wrote a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee supporting Eric Holder's nomination to be attorney general. Now, in light of Holder's decision to grant 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed full American constitutional rights and try him in federal court in New York, some of those veteran lawyers are having second thoughts. The January letter called Holder an "extraordinary lawyer" of "unfailing integrity" who is "superbly qualified" to lead the Justice Department and whose appointment as the first African-American attorney general "should be hailed as a milestone." "From his experience Eric fully understands and appreciates...

The backlash against politicians at town halls is a bipartisan phenomenon. Both Republicans and Democrats have been feeling the heat from a very upset American public. This was shown very clearly at a recent town hall event for Senator John McCain, who opposed President Barack Obama in the 2008 elections. At this town hall, McCain was booed as he expressed that he "sincerely" trusts that Obama believes in the Constitution. McCain should realize there is no upside to standing up for Obama. In fact, this was a huge strategic mistake during the 2008 election. During the early stages of his...

Is he still confident that Obama will govern from the economic center as he stated in his self-congratulatory "apology" to Mum and Pup before the election? Update: A comment on this post led me to find this from Buckley: Much as I admire President Obama, I believe with something approaching certainty that his spending will bring this country to its knees. "Sustainability" is all the rage as a buzzword, but a $3.6 trillion budget is not "sustainable." Doubling the national debt is not "sustainable." Inaction in the face of $77 trillion in unfunded liabilities (Social Security, Medicare, entitlements) is not...

ormer Secretary of State Colin Powell says President Obama's agenda may be too ambitious, and costly. "One of the challenges that President Obama has now is that he's got so many things on the table, and these are issues that the American people find important, health care and so many other issues," said Powell in an interview slated to air Sunday on CNN's "State of the Union with John King." "But I think one of the cautions that has to be given to the president -- and I've talked to some of his people about this -- is that you...

WASHINGTON (AP) - Colin Powell worries that President Barack Obama is trying to tackle too many big issues at one time. In an interview to be aired Sunday on CNN, the former secretary of state says he's worried about the huge national debt that's piling-up. Powell says that while the needs of the people must be met, the size of the government, and the tax burden, need to be kept as small as possible. He says the president has to start taking a "very, very hard look" at the cost of all he wants to do and at whether the...

Former Vice President Dick Cheney on Sunday took a shot at former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell by accusing him of turning his back on Republicans, adding that conservative broadcaster Rush Limbaugh is a more loyal party member than the retired Army general. "If I had to choose in terms of being a Republican, I'd go with Rush Limbaugh," said Mr. Cheney on CBS' "Face the Nation." Mr. Powell recently said that Republicans need to move to the center politically and said that Mr. Limbaugh's conservative rhetoric is polarizing and hurts the party's image. The radio talk-show host fired...

(CNN) — John McCain’s general election campaign began as “the strategic equivalent of throwing a football through a tire at 50 yards” – and was doomed weeks before Election Day, his former chief strategist said Thursday. “We were running a campaign under extra difficult circumstances — the state of the Republican Party, the president’s unpopularity, the economy — a lot of issues that were not John McCain’s fault, but were John McCain’s problem in this race,” Schmidt told an audience at the University of Delaware, according to Politico. “When Lehman Brothers collapsed in the fall I knew pretty much right...

On the night of Jan. 3, 2008, little more than two weeks after the Steelers were beaten up at home by Jacksonville and little less than two days before they were to confront the Jaguars again in the first round of the National Football League playoffs, the club's normally unruffled chairman found himself unable to sleep. Around midnight, Daniel M. Rooney picked up the phone and rang his son Jim. "This is the greatest speech I've seen since John Kennedy," Dan said into the phone. "This guy connects with people like no one I've seen since John Kennedy. He convinced...

THE MORE I LISTEN TO AND READ ABOUT “the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate,” the more I like him. Barack Obama strikes a chord with me like no political figure since Ronald Reagan. To explain why, I need to explain why I am a conservative and what it means to me. ---SNIP--

Sigh! Attention all you liberal journalists out there including Timothy Egan blogging at the New York Times; you really do need to come up with a better descriptive term than "lifelong Republican" which is the most obvious "tell" of all that the person in question is not quite what they claim they are. In the case of Egan, trying very hard to project "Republicans" as drifting away from John McCain, he used that overused description in his most recent blog entry: My friends: it’s not good for Senator McCain.“As a small business owner, it’s very hard to watch a lifetime...

CQ TODAY ONLINE NEWS Sept. 23, 2008 – 8:35 p.m. Republican Gilchrest Makes It Official: ‘I’m Voting For Obama’ By Jonathan Allen, CQ Staff Barack Obama has officially picked up the support of a Republican congressman who had backtracked after appearing to endorse the Democratic presidential nominee in a radio interview last week. “I’m voting for Obama,” Maryland Rep. Wayne T. Gilchrest told Congressional Quarterly Tuesday night. Gilchrest, who lost a tough Republican primary in February, also has endorsed the Democratic candidate vying to succeed him next year.

My party has slipped its moorings. It’s time for a true pragmatist to lead the country. THE MORE I LISTEN TO AND READ ABOUT “the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate,” the more I like him. Barack Obama strikes a chord with me like no political figure since Ronald Reagan. To explain why, I need to explain why I am a conservative and what it means to me. In 1964, at the age of 16, I organized the Dallas County Youth for Goldwater. My senior thesis at the University of Texas was on the conservative intellectual revival in America....

THE MORE I LISTEN TO AND READ ABOUT “the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate,” the more I like him. Barack Obama strikes a chord with me like no political figure since Ronald Reagan. To explain why, I need to explain why I am a conservative and what it means to me. In 1964, at the age of 16, I organized the Dallas County Youth for Goldwater. My senior thesis at the University of Texas was on the conservative intellectual revival in America. Twenty years later, I was invited by William F. Buckley Jr. to join the board of...

The state headquarters of Barack Obama’s campaign sent out a list Thursday of nearly 50 Virginians, including three from Lynchburg, who it said were Republi-cans supporting the Democratic presidential candidate. The Obama staffers failed to check closely enough with Steve Bozeman, whose name was on the list. Bozeman said he plans to vote for John McCain, Obama’s Republican opponent. “No one got my permission” to list his name among Obama supporters, said Bozeman, a retired Marine and Vietnam veteran who led the Pledge of Allegiance at Obama’s Lynchburg rally Aug. 20. “I was honored to do that,” Bozeman said. “Unfortunately,...

Former State GOP Chairman Forms Group To Support Democrat PORTLAND, Maine -- Maine's Sen. Barack Obama campaign has announced the formation of a group calling itself "Maine Republicans for Obama." The group is headed by former Maine Republican Party Chairman Robert Monks and former Republican state Rep. Sherry Huber. At a press conference Wednesday in Portland, Monks and Huber spoke in support of Obama in his campaign against Republican John McCain. Maine GOP Chairman fired back at Monks. He said Monks has a long history of attacking Republicans including Margaret Chase Smith. He said that if the Obama campaign wants...

You may remember Barney Smith from Fairmount, Indiana. He spoke at the Democrat National Convention Thursday night and was one of the people who introduced Barack Obama. He will be remembered for the line “I want a president who cares more about Barney Smith than they do about Smith Barney.” A great well-written line that many people remember. On Thursday night in Denver, when he introduced Barack Obama, he claimed to be a “lifelong” Republican. But it looks like the Democrats lied about his affiliation, or at minimum never took the time to check him out. You would think that...