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CNN anchor Chris Wallace said during the network’s coverage of the first hearing of the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, that he is “skeptical” of what the committee might produce during the primetime proceeding. “I’m kind of skeptical about what we’re going to see tonight and over the next couple of weeks,” Wallace said on CNN minutes before the hearing was set to begin.

On Friday’s “PBS NewsHour,” New York Times columnist David Brooks said that Strategic Petroleum Reserve releases “never” work and he is “guardedly skeptical” that President Joe Biden’s plan to release from the SPR “is going to do much” to lower gas prices.

Meghan McCain is relying on her family’s lengthy military history to weigh in on yesterday’s announcement that President Biden would bring troops home from Afghanistan. On today’s episode of The View, the conservative co-host, who explained that “the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been omnipresent in me and my family’s lives,” gave her own take on the withdrawal news during this morning’s Hot Topics.

Advisers to President-elect Joe Biden signaled Tuesday they were privately skeptical of Democrat chances in winning the Georgia Senate runoff election. “Privately, Biden’s team does not expect to win the races, according to Democratic officials,” Politico reported, but clarified that they were “more optimistic about their chances than they were weeks ago.”

In a lengthy profile of former President Barack Obama about what role the “most popular Democrat in America” would play in the 2020 presidential race, Politico’s Ryan Lizza shares what Obama and his advisers think of the candidates. Two of the candidates seem to be the ones whose campaign promises imply Obama didn’t do enough to advance progressivism while in office — Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT): Publicly, he has been clear that he won’t intervene in the primary for or against a candidate, unless he believed there was some egregious attack. “I can’t even imagine with...

Americans should be "deeply skeptical" of government power, says FBI Director James Comey, adding that law enforcement should be able to access someone's telephone only with a court order, "I believe that Americans should be deeply skeptical of government power," Comey told CBS News' Scott Pelley in an interview for "60 Minutes" that will air on Sunday. "You cannot trust people in power. "The Founders knew that," he said. "That’s why they divided power among three branches, to set interest against interest." Comey, 53, who became FBI chief in September 2013, cautioned that courts must grant law-enforcement agencies permission to...

Barack Obama vetoed a plan for stealth bombers to blow up Osama Bin Laden's compound in March so special forces could get DNA evidence to confirm he was dead. The U.S. President gave the all clear for an air strike on the 54-year-old's hideaway - but backed out. Military leaders were going to drop 2,000lb bombs from two B2 stealth bombers on the secure site yards from Pakistan's military academy, sources revealed. But Obama told the military to hold off, and instead an elite team American forces killed the terrorist during a firefight. The President vetoed the original plan so...

Congressional Budget Office (CBO) Director Douglas Elmendorf recently spoke at the University of Southern California about the economic impact of Obamacare. He predicts that Obamacare will further depress the nation’s employment picture. CBO’s analysis of Obamacare predicts that it will reduce the amount of labor being used in the economy by roughly half a percent. Elmendorf states that this impact will be small, but in reality the impact is small only in relative terms. For instance, a half-percent loss in jobs in the American economy today would translate into about 750,000 additional Americans losing work.

Reporting from Sacramento - Backers of an overhaul of California's government, who hope to leverage disgust with Sacramento into support for changing how the state raises taxes and spends money, have a difficult path ahead, according to a new poll of California voters. Major segments of the electorate see the state's problems as the product of unrestrained lawmakers driven by special interests to waste taxpayer money, and reject arguments that structural issues with the state's Constitution and government institutions are to blame. Voters don't want the tax code overhauled in the ways that many fiscal experts promise would tamp down...

A man watched the launch of the space shuttle Discovery in America from his allotment in England. Donald Lyven, 53, saw the spaceship lift off in Florida on his television just after 5am, then amazingly spotted it in the skies near his home just 20 minutes later. The decorator even captured the Nasa craft on camera as he saw it fly past overhead. The fainter trail from the spacecraft is from the main fuel tank, which is ditched during launch. 'It was an absolutely magnificent sight and I don't think many people would have known about it and seen it,'...

Reporting from Washington -- Sen. Arlen Specter's defection from the Republican Party drew cheers Tuesday from President Obama and other top Democrats. But some key players in the party base viewed the move with suspicion -- demanding that if Specter wants to call himself a Democrat, he had better start acting like one. As a moderate Republican, Specter maintained friendly relations with Pennsylvania's powerful labor unions, which were glad to have him on their side on many issues. Now, if Specter hopes to win next year's Democratic primary and retain his seat, that will not be enough. "As of now,...

When Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger proclaimed a statewide drought in June and then urged passage of a $9.3 billion water bond, Democrats and environmental critics became suspicious. They still are. “Last year we did have record low rainfall, but whether or not there is a drought is somewhat debatable,” said the Sierra Club’s Jim Metropulos. “The governor calling it a drought--that carries no legal significance. It’s interesting he calls for a drought, and couple of weeks later, he calls for a water bond.” The Republican governor proposes a $9.3 billion dollar water bond for the November ballot, arguing that passage of...

Expert sceptical of sacred Roman cave By Silvia Aloisi in Rome November 24, 2007 A LEADING Italian archaeologist said that the grotto whose discovery was announced this week in Rome is not the sacred cave linked to the myth of the city's foundation by Romulus and Remus. The Culture Ministry and experts who presented the find said they were “reasonably certain” the cavern is the Lupercale - a sanctuary worshipped for centuries by Romans because, according to legend, a wolf nursed the twin brothers there. But Adriano La Regina, Rome's superintendent of archaeology from 1976 to 2004, said ancient descriptions...

WASHINGTON - Skeptical congressional Democrats said Sunday the Bush administration should move cautiously before accusing Iran of fomenting a campaign of violence against U.S. troops in Iraq. The members of Congress spoke on the morning talk shows as the U.S. military said it believes orders came from the highest levels of the Iranian government to send components for sophisticated roadside bombs in Iraq. The military told reporters in Baghdad that between June 2004 and last week, more than 170 Americans had been killed by the bombs, which the military calls "explosively formed projectiles." Those weapons are capable of destroying an...

SACRAMENTO — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger described his agenda this week as a litany of things all Californians want: affordable health insurance, clean air, snarl-free highways. But he may have to battle his fellow Republicans to get them. Outlining that vision ... , Schwarzenegger was interrupted 21 times by applause, nearly all of it from Democrats. --snip-- Republicans were noticeably less enthusiastic, and afterward expressed deep concern about the huge amount of money the governor wants to borrow, and his willingness to levy businesses, to achieve his goals. They are a minority party in the Legislature, but Republicans will be needed...

'People are definitely sceptical' When the government announced last Thursday that it had foiled a massive terror plot, broadcasters and newspapers were barraged with a wave of sceptical views from listeners and readers. Nearly a week on, are people still so distrustful? Patrick Barkham takes to the streets to find out Wednesday August 16, 2006 The Guardian (UK) Police officers outside the Masjid-E-Umer mosque in Walthamstow. Photograph: Toby Melville/Reuters It was not in horror or panic that thousands of ordinary people contacted the BBC or posted points on the Guardian's Comment is Free website in the hours after last week's...

The names in the American pantheon of black civil rights leaders is long. It stretches from Crispus Attucks, a slave of black and American Indian parents who was killed in the 1770 Boston Massacre by British soldiers, to Andrew Young Jr., a 1960s civil rights leader and later Atlanta mayor. Now there's an effort to add a new name to the list: Minutemen. The lawn-chair brigade, which appointed itself border guardians last year, has now taken it upon itself to become guardians of black America. The Minutemen, lead by cofounder and failed congressional candidate Jim Gilchrist of California, launched a...

Fringe activists held a midnight kabbalistic ritual in an ancient cemetery calling for angels of death to kill Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and thwart his Gaza withdrawal plan, participants in the ceremony told WND. The same individuals used the ritual against Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin one month before his assassination in 1995. The activists said they performed a 'Pulsa Dinura' – a kabbalistic ceremony in which God is asked to curse a sinner, usually an enemy of the Jewish people – and prayed for a death curse to be placed on Sharon. They argued Sharon's Gaza evacuation will "destroy...

ROCKLIN, Calif. - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger distanced himself Tuesday from a measure that would limit the use of union dues for political purposes, just one day after his chief strategist said the governor was considering campaigning for its passage. The Legislature's Democratic majority considers the dues initiative the most threatening of the Republican-backed measures that could be put before voters in a possible special election this fall because it would effectively dry up a major source of their campaign money. The governor has until mid-June to decide whether to call the election but has said he would rather work out...

I am as pleased as anyone with Condoleezza Rice’s initial performance as Secretary of State. She’s a smart, articulate, passionate defender of America and George W. Bush’s foreign policy vision. But all the excited talk about “Condi for President” is wildly premature, and even dangerous to the conservative cause. For all her virtues and strengths, and she has many, Rice simply is not presidential material. This is not a criticism. Plenty of highly accomplished, successful people are not made out to be President. Rice is an outstanding cabinet official and a shining star in the Republican firmament. But she lacks...