Republican Takes Lead in Massachusetts

Republican candidate Scott Brown has taken the lead over Democrat Martha Coakley in the race for the Massachusetts Senate seat formerly held by Ted Kennedy, the latest poll shows.

The Suffolk University/7News poll showed Brown leading Coakley by 4 percentage points. Brown had 50 percent, Coakley had 46 percent and independent candidate Joseph Kennedy, who is not related to the late senator, had 3 percent.

The race is still within the 4.4-point margin of error, but David Paleologos, the university's political research center director, said in a statement that the survey shows Brown has "surged dramatically."

Polls of the Massachusetts race have shown the race tightening over the past several weeks, but most have shown Coakley in the lead. With the election set for Tuesday, both candidates have brought out heavy hitters to campaign for them. The race has taken on outsized importance, since a Brown win would break the Democrats' 60-vote, filibuster-proof majority in the Senate.

Former President Bill Clinton and Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., are headlining a rally for Coakley Friday afternoon in Boston. Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani is campaigning with Brown in Boston Friday.

The Suffolk poll of 500 registered voters in the state was conducted Jan. 11-13. - FOX News

Democrats Rush to Pass Health Care so they Start Healing the Damage Back Home

Democrats moved closer to a final deal on health care reform Thursday — and for some vulnerable members, the end can’t come soon enough.

In an emotional talk with other Democrats on the Ways and Means Committee this week, North Dakota Rep. Earl Pomeroy said the protracted debate is hurting him so badly back home that he might as well retire if it drags on much longer.

A Democrat who attended the Ways and Means session said Pomeroy was “very angry” as he spoke about the delay. “Other folks were upset, but he was the maddest by far.”

“I believe Congress needs to resolve fairly quickly this protracted health care debate,” Pomeroy told POLITICO on Thursday. “We have a number of other issues that haven’t been able to get enough attention, because health care is taking up all the floor time, all of the attention. We need to move on.”

Pomeroy is hardly alone.

Rank-and-file members throughout the House Democratic Caucus are anxious to get past the health care debate — whatever the outcome — so that they can turn their attention to less polarizing issues that could help them win reelection in November. - Politico Story

AMAZING!!!! This bill has Reps worried for their job, yet they are going ahead and passing it just to keep their party leadership happy. Is this really the kinds of people we want in charge in Washington?

Haiti Still Waiting on Help

(CBS) "Where we are, the cavalry has not arrived," reports CBS News correspondent Jeff Glor from Haiti's beleaguered capital city Friday morning, four days after a massive earthquake brought the nation to its knees.

Glor gave a harrowing account of how, in some neighborhoods, bodies of the estimated 45,000 to 50,000 victims are piled high in the streets. "No one should ever have to see this."

Desperation and lack of any sort of official presence have led Haitians in Port-au-Prince to start converging on makeshift camps - one of them on a soccer field just a couple minutes walk from the airport. - CBS News Story

Obama is finding that all the criticism that he through at President Bush for his handling of the Katrina crisis is now going to be sitting on his door step.

In a Natural Disaster it is almost impossible to make things happen fast. You can fast track through some of the red tape, but you just can't fast track Mother Nature.

The aid is available and ready, as it was with Katrina. Just like Katrina you just can't get it in to the people who need it most.

Obama is learning a lesson that Bush learned during Katrina. You can want to help all you want. You can rally the troups and get the supplies, you just can't get it in to the people who need it in a timely manner.

Governors Complain about Lack of Transparency

Twenty Republican governors and governors-elect are accusing the White House of providing too little transparency on health care, causing worry that “deals” are being cut without their input.

In a letter sent Wednesday to the Congressional leaders of both parties, the governors wrote that they are “disappointed with the lack of transparency” as health care moves forward.

“We urge you not to circumvent the normal committee process and to conduct an open, fully-bipartisan negotiation,” the governors wrote. “It is time to slow down and pass meaningful health care reform, not hastily prepared partisan legislation which omits reform and saddles American taxpayers for generations to come.”

The letter comes, in part, as a response to the Obama administration’s move to bring in Democratic governors to stump for the bill ahead of its expected passage.

The Democratic Governors Association held a conference call Jan. 7 with White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius in which some of the governors pledged to be clearer in their support for health reform and others aired their issues with the bill. - Politico Story

Reid vs. Lieberman Fight Goes On and On

Harry Reid put out a polite 34-word statement about Joe Lieberman on Thursday in the hopes of quelling the controversy over a report that Reid had accused Lieberman of double-crossing him on health care.

But Lieberman had other ideas.

Forty minutes after Reid’s e-mail hit reporters’ inboxes, Lieberman blasted out a message of his own. While Reid had said only that he enjoyed an “open and honest” relationship with Lieberman, the Connecticut independent went further — claiming that Reid had denied a New York Times account of a private conversation in which Reid allegedly accused Lieberman of betrayal.

But Reid’s staff has neither confirmed nor denied the Times’s account, despite requests for comment by POLITICO.

And so instead of closing the book on the episode, the senators’ dueling declarations served only to keep it alive another day — and to underscore the fact that Reid and Lieberman, who have one of the more unusual symbiotic relationships in a chamber defined by odd couples, can’t quite get on the same page.

On Wednesday, just as the uproar over Reid’s racially charged remarks about then-candidate Barack Obama was flagging, The New York Times Magazine posted a preview of Sunday’s profile on Reid that quoted the Nevada Democrat as saying Lieberman “double-crossed” him by suggesting he’d support a Reid-brokered compromise that he later opposed.

The story cited unnamed associates of the majority leader who said Reid was so enraged he briefly considered scuttling the whole bill before consenting to Lieberman’s demand.

Lieberman’s staff pushed back hard on that account — providing POLITICO with a private letter he wrote Reid in early December, setting out his concerns over a Reid-brokered expansion of Medicare three days before he aired those concerns on national TV. - Politico Story

Democrats Pulling out Big Guns in Special Election

Bill Clinton is going, but is President Obama far behind?

Secret Service agents have been spotted in Massachusetts, according to The Boston Globe, raising the possibility that Obama could make a late appearance to boost Democrat Martha Coakley's bid for U.S. Senate.

Heavy-hitting officials and interest groups on both sides of the aisle have gotten involved in the suddenly competitive race. Clinton, who receives Secret Service protection, plans to campaign for Coakley on Friday afternoon, but the Democratic state attorney general has apparently suggested Obama do the same.

Coakley told the Boston Herald on Wednesday that she hasn't heard from the White House, but that she would welcome any public support from Obama.

"I welcome his support, but we've got a lot of support here in Massachusetts (and) I think he's got a lot on his plate in Washington," she told the paper.

Polls indicate Republican Scott Brown, a state senator, and Coakley are locked in a virtual tie to fill the late Sen. Ted Kennedy's Senate seat. A Rasmussen poll released Wednesday found that 49 percent of likely voters prefer Coakley, while 47 percent back Brown.

A BMG/Research 2000 poll of likely voters released Thursday showed Coakley with a 49-41 percent lead. But The Rothenberg Political Report, a leading political forecaster in Washington, on Thursday declared the Massachusetts race a "toss-up." The special election is Tuesday. - FOX News Story

Dems Looking for Obama to Help Massachusetts Race

Republican Senate candidate Scott Brown issued a stern warning to President Obama, cautioning him to "stay away" from Massachusetts as he battles Democratic rival Martha Coakley in a heated race, the Boston Herald reported.

"He should stay away and let Martha and I discuss the issues one on one," Brown told the Herald. "The machine is coming out of the woodwork to get her elected. They're bringing in outsiders, and we don't need them."

Polls indicate Brown, a state senator, and Coakley, Massachusetts' Attorney General, are locked in a virtual tie to fill the late Sen. Ted Kennedy's Senate seat. A Rasmussen poll released Wednesday found that 49 percent of likely voters prefer Coakley, while 47 percent back Brown.

Coakley's campaign is now scrambling for a last-minute boost from Obama before Tuesday's election, the newspaper reported. - FOX News Story

Democrats Expecting Heavy Losses in House and Senate

Top Democrats are willing to concede that the 2010 midterm election isn’t going to be a picnic. It’s been years since the party has faced a landscape this tough, and they know it. But lose the House majority? Please.

As Democratic leaders see things, the economic situation is going to look a lot more promising in the fall than it does right now. And once you factor in the deeply tainted Republican brand and drill down and look at the 435-seat map on a district-by-district basis, the chances of waking up Nov. 3 to a Republican majority in the House are virtually nil.

“We’ve been saying this would be a tough election year, but it’s a hallucination for Republican leaders to think they’ll take back the House — this is not 1994 déjà vu,” Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Chris Van Hollen told POLITICO. “They have to persuade the American people to hand them over the keys, to the same folks who drove the economy into the ditch and now run away from the scene of the accident. All the proposals, the same proposals that got us into the economic mess we’re in.”

While party strategists are, at least privately, steeling for moderate-to-heavy losses in 2010, the range is nowhere near the 40 seats necessary for the GOP to return to power in the House. And that’s an assessment that many nonpartisan analysts seem to share — not to mention Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele, who recently conceded the same.

When asked last week if GOP will retake the House, Steele responded: “Not this year.”

What follows is the Democratic case for how and why they’ll hold the House (The accompanying story explains why Republicans think otherwise.) - Politico Story

Total Failure by Obama Administration - "Green Jobs, Red Ink, Pink Slips"

The “New Socialism” – as columnist Charles Krauthammer adroitly calls the global governmental power grab and wealth redistribution schemes lurking beneath the “green economy” – has kicked into high gear in Washington, D.C. already this year.

Struggling to respond to a surprisingly bad December jobs report – and struggling to explain the clear failure of President Barack Obama’s massive bureaucratic bailout to stimulate the economy – U.S. government officials are turning to a familiar refrain, “green jobs.”

Of course, this familiar song and dance ignores the fact that a huge chunk of the failed “stimulus” went to fund these jobs in the first place.

Undeterred by this lack of stimulation – as well as the ongoing unraveling of the climate change myth – Obama’s “solution” to this crisis is apparently to continue doing what hasn’t worked.

In fact, the red ink had yet to dry on the Department of Labor’s latest disappointing employment data before Obama was in front of a Teleprompter announcing that the U.S. government was going to spend another $2.3 billion on tax credits for “green jobs.”

He also challenged the U.S. Congress to approve $5 billion worth of additional “green manufacturing” tax credits. - Rasmussen Reports

Race Tightens in bid to Replace Ted Kennedy

It’s all about health care.

The race to replace Ted Kennedy in the U.S. Senate has come down to one issue, and it’s not Sen. Ted Kennedy’s “legacy.” It’s the misshapen health-care bills that have scared the bejesus out of an ever-growing majority of American voters, even in this bluest of states.

Asked his view of the bill, the Republican candidate, state Sen. Scott Brown, says succinctly: “It kinda stinks.”

A month ago, he was 30 points behind his Democratic opponent, the don’t-make-no-waves attorney general, Martha Coakley. She was cruising, playing the one card she never leaves home without - the gender card.

Then the specifics of ObamaCare started leaking out. The cuts in Medicare - $500 billion, or as Brown prefers to say, “half a trillion dollars.” Then the state’s union members began to hear about the president’s insistence on a 40 percent tax on their “Cadillac” health care plans.

Overnight, the old dichotomies, Democrat-Republican, red-blue, lost their resonance. This has become a struggle for self-preservation - medical and fiscal. As the old folk song goes, Which side are you on?

“This race affects everyone - everyone,” Brown says over and over again. “Forget about the letter after my name. If I win, this broken health-care bill goes back to the drawing board.” - RCP

Why is Health Care Passing?

There is only a single poll out there that shows support for Health Care Reform Bill. See RCP

That poll is the Gallup poll that shows it 49-46 in favor. I don't understand where they did their poll unless it was on Capitol Hill. Every other poll shows the Bill behind anywhere from 7-23 points.

So again, I will ask why is the Democrats so hell bent on passing it? Aren't they suppose to represent the will of the people? Are they really that far out of touch with their constituents?

I don't think that the people that are in Washington right now really understand the dynamic of America at this point. Obama rode into Washington not so much with a mandate as he thought, but an anti-Bush sentiment in the Country.

His numbers have plummeted in his first year and we have seen a lot of talk with very little action. Every action that has been taken has either driven up the National Debt, broken a promise of his campaign or went against conventional wisdom of the American People.

It is almost laughable to see those meat-heads in Washington when they try to blame misinformation for people being angry with them. Hello! You idiots are the ones with the misinformation. You are passing bills that you really have no idea as to what is written in them. You are bribing each other to get a vote.

The real shame is that it is US!!!! We the American People that are to blame for this colossal mess in Washington. For it is a collective WE that have sent this morons there. It is WE who continue to allow them to do this. It is WE who can't get past the R or D behind their names to pick the best person for the job. It is WE that won't stand up and fight for this Country.

The next time that you complain about what is happening in Washington DC maybe you should take a long look in the mirror, then look around you. These people didn't just walk in there and start doing this. WE ELECTED THEM!!!!

One Year Later - Obama Has lost Hope and Had no Change

Barack Obama came to town a year ago to change the way politics worked, and Organizing for America was to be his instrument. The successor to his campaign organization, with the largest e-mail list in America, was poised — many observers thought at the time — to bring the campaign’s movement fervor and Web-centric tactics to pushing Obama’s legislative agenda through Congress.

A year later, politics is working pretty much as it always did, and it’s Organizing for America that’s on defense.

With little public profile and a difficulty in pointing to concrete accomplishments, OFA, as it’s known, has faced criticism on many fronts: Progressives blast OFA as a soulless, top-down machine that’s alienating the base, even as some state party officials complain that the group is stepping on their toes. Conservative Democrats, too, grumbled over the summer when OFA ran mild, campaign-style ads in their districts backing health care reform, a violation of political etiquette the group hasn’t repeated after complaints from congressional leadership.

Perhaps most troubling for the party, former Obama aides and other Democrats say, OFA simply hasn’t been as effective as they had hoped. And as 2010 shapes up to be a difficult year for Democrats, the quiet hand-wringing among party officials over the organization’s capacities has been matched by a new public hand-wringing among Democratic activists, with both struggling to diagnose the ills of the group that was meant to change the game. - Politico Story

Democrats Reforms May Rest in Massachusetts

It’s hard for some Democrats to believe that the candidate running to replace Ted Kennedy is being attacked over health care reform — in one of the bluest states in the union, no less.

But Republican Scott Brown has got Democrats nervous — not just for his opponent Martha Coakley but about the fact that a loss in Massachusetts would be a body blow to Democratic reform efforts in Washington.

Republicans are watching public approval of reform continue to tank while their candidates’ poll numbers rise. And they still view the bill’s Medicare cuts, tax increases and lack of transparency as key to a 2010 message that voters should bring GOP checks and balances to a Democratic-run Washington. - Politico Story

Pass Health Care at All Cost

Massachusetts Republicans say they fear that if their candidate for U.S. Senate scores an upset victory in the special election next week, Democrats in the state and in Washington will drag out the certification process just long enough that he won't be able to block health care reform.

State Sen. Scott Brown, who is challenging Democratic Attorney General Martha Coakley for the seat once held by Ted Kennedy, is sounding the loudest alarm over that possibility.

Recent polling suggests Brown is closing in on front-runner Coakley. And if he does what once seemed impossible -- beat a Democrat for the bluest of blue Senate seats -- he is vowing to be the critical 41st vote against health care reform.

That means Brown could prevent Democrats from breaking a Republican filibuster against the overhaul and, in his words, "send it back to the drawing board."

Brown told Fox News on Tuesday that he's concerned Democrats will stall the certification process if he wins, so that the U.S. Senate can approve the health care reform bill before he gets there.

"When I heard ... the machine, not only locally but nationally, is trying to manipulate the process and make sure that if I'm elected, a duly elected senator, I can't be seated in an effort to vote on this important piece of national legislation, it made me almost sick to my stomach," Brown said.

The Boston Herald reported over the weekend that, according to a source, Secretary of the Commonwealth William Galvin's office plans to wait until Feb. 20 to certify the race.

"Everything I've heard right now I don't like very much," said Massachusetts Senate Minority Leader Richard Tisei, noting the secretary is signaling he will "drag his feet" if Brown wins. - FOX News Story

Chamber of Commerce President attacks Obama Agenda

Chamber of Commerce President Tom Donohue gave a scathing assessment of the Obama administration’s business agenda on Tuesday — and delivered a clear threat to Democrats running for election in 2010.

“We are not in presidential politics,” said Donohue. “But we’re going to be in a lot of politics in the House and the Senate and the judicial politics in this country.”

Donohue criticized proposals to reform health care, overhaul the financial system and cap the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, saying the Democratic agenda will undermine private industry and eliminate jobs.

“Congress, the administration and the states must recognize that our weak economy simply could not sustain all the new taxes, regulations and mandates now under consideration,’ said Donohue. “It’s a sure-fire recipe for double-dip recession, or worse.”

The Chamber plans to dramatically expand its $100 million campaign for free enterprise — a lobbying effort that was harshly criticized by the administration.

And it plans to organize the largest, most aggressive election campaign in its history.

“The Chamber will highlight lawmakers and candidates who support a pro-jobs agenda and hold accountable those who don’t,” said Donohue. - Politico Story

Clinton Believes Obama Stole the Election? ACORN?

A new book is out with a highly critical but unsourced portrait of Hillary Clinton. This familiar occurrence — it’s happened too many times to count over the years — has usually been greeted with an equally familiar response: A fast and furious counterattack from the Clinton inner circle.

What’s notable about the highly publicized release of “Game Change,” however, is the virtual silence from the Clinton camp. The lack of public outrage seems to mark the sputtering end of what was once known as the Clinton political machine and underlines a fact that onetime Clinton loyalists acknowledge: The book’s primary sources about the former candidate and current secretary of state are her own former staffers and intimates.

As a result, there is no campaign of veteran Clintonites spinning the press corps and trying to pre-emptively discredit the book’s scathing depiction of Hillary Clinton as a rudderless candidate and a cheerleader for vicious tactics against eventual winner Barack Obama. There is no team of Clinton proxies going on cable television to denounce authors Mark Halperin and John Heilemann as scurrilous and unworthy of belief.

This time, Bill and Hillary Clinton are virtually alone.

While the low-key response to a brutal portrayal of Clinton in part reflected a decision to keep a prominent face of the Obama administration’s foreign policy above the fray, it was also a recognition of reality: The same senior aides who had leaked damaging gossip could hardly be expected to rebut it.

These people have violated the Clinton world’s final taboo: After savaging one another in the press for more than a year, the former aides finally turned on the principals.

“Game Change” peels back a decade of careful renovations off Hillary Clinton’s carefully constructed public face, casting her in the terms that defined her at her lows in the mid-1990s: scheming, profane, sometimes paranoid, often tone-deaf.

The authors report that Clinton and her aides plotted behind allies' backs to enter the 2004 presidential contest and that Clinton herself favored some of the nastiest tactics, such as suggesting that then-Sen. Barack Obama had been a drug dealer, in the 2008 campaign. And she continued to believe — without evidence, and long after her concession — that he had, in effect, stolen the Iowa caucuses by importing out-of-state voters. - Politico Story

Obama Has Lowest Polling Numbers - CBS Poll

President Obama's job approval rating has fallen to 46 percent, according to a new CBS News poll.

That rating is Mr. Obama's lowest yet in CBS News polling, and the poll marks the first time his approval rating has fallen below the 50 percent mark. Forty-one percent now say they disapprove of Mr. Obama's performance as president.

In last month's CBS News poll, 50 percent of Americans approved of how the president was handling his job, while thirty-nine percent disapproved.

Analysis: The Irony Behind Obama's Poll Numbers

Mr. Obama still receives strong support from Democrats (eight in ten approve of his performance), but his approval rating among Republicans is only 13 percent. More importantly, Mr. Obama's approval rating among independents has declined 10 points in recent months – and it now stands at just 42 percent.

Domestic issues – and not his response to terrorist threats - appear to be driving the president's approval rating downward.

Just 41 percent now approve of his handling of the economy, which Americans say is the nation's most pressing issue. Forty-seven percent disapprove. The president's marks on handling health care, with reforms still under debate in Congress, are even lower – just 36 percent approve, while 54 percent disapprove. Both of these approval ratings are the lowest of Mr. Obama's presidency. - CBS News Story

Obama Preparing to Levy Tax on Banks to Cut Deficit

Targeting an industry whose political deafness has vexed his administration, President Barack Obama is weighing recovering tax dollars from government-rescued financial institutions with a levy.

The proposed levy could put Obama on the popular side of public opinion that is decidedly against Wall Street and angry over shortfalls in a $700 billion bank bailout fund.

A senior administration official said Monday that Obama would seek modifications to the law that sent billions in bailout money in 2008 and 2009 to a flailing Wall Street that was approaching collapse. The government official spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the president's thinking.

The idea received an early boost from Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the top Democrat in the House, where there have been calls for a hefty tax on bank bonuses.

"While we have not seen any specific language from the administration, Congress will certainly examine any serious proposals to lower the deficit and recoup even more of the TARP funds for the taxpayers," said Nadeam Elshami, a spokesman for Pelosi, D-Calif.

The 2008 law that created the Troubled Asset Relief Program requires the president to seek a way to recoup unrecovered TARP money from financial institutions, but five years after the law was enacted. It does not specify how the money should be recovered. - ABC News Story

First of all, if the law was created in 2008 then it has only been 2 years and not 5.

Second, what is this tax really going to do for us? Sure the Government will get more money to fund the cash for shoes or some other stupid program. I don't really foresee it cutting any deficit with the way they are spending money in Washington these days.

Lastly, this is just an all around bad idea. If you tax the banks do you really think this is going to affect their bonuses? My guess is no. They will raise fees and interest to recoup the money and improve their net so that they can still get their comfy bonuses. This is just another way Obama and the Dems will damage the economy even more.

Unions vs Obama on Health Care Tax - Broken Promises

WASHINGTON - President Obama told labor leaders in a tense two-hour closed door tussle over whether to tax health care benefits that he backed the tax, which labor leaders vehemently oppose, but also supports efforts "to protect working men and women."

Their problem? Labor leaders say you can't have it both ways. Some now openly accuse Obama of doing that and violating one of his most important early promises in the health care debate: that if you like the coverage you have, you will be able to keep it.

Obama did not attend all of the meeting held in the Roosevelt Room, but, according to an official who spoke on the condition of anonymity "reiterated his support for the excise tax but also reiterated his commitment to protect working men and women."

Obama's top health care adviser, Nancy-Ann DeParle led the meeting in the president's absence, the White House said.

The "excise tax" refers to the Senate attempt to slap a 40 percent levy health insurance benefit plans valued at $8,500 for individuals and $23,000 for families (for high-risk occupations like law enforcement and firefighting the levels are $9,850 and $26,000).

Some have dubbed these plans "Cadillac" coverage because of their generous array of benefits. Labor leaders say the better moniker is "Chevy" because, they say, the tax would also hit union and non-union families. The tax applies to the accumulated value of standard health insurance, secondary plans that cover dental and vision expenses and flexible spending accounts.

But labor leaders, led today publicly by AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, call the Senate tax an assault on middle-class familes and a sop to American "elites." Trumka and other union leaders favor the House-passed 5.4 percent surtax on individuals making more than $500,000 and couples who earn more than $1 million. - FOX News Story

Simon Cowell Leaving American Idol

Simon Cowell has officially announced that this is his final season of "American Idol."

Cowell says he will instead serve as executive producer and judge on the American version of his hit UK show "The X-Factor," which will begin filming in 2011. The show will run on the Fox Network.

"I'm thrilled that we have put a date on the launch of the U.S. version of 'The X Factor' and delighted to be continuing to work with Fox," Cowell said via statement. "We have a fantastic relationship, a great team and are all very excited about this.

"We have had a very successful relationship with Simon Cowell for many years," says Mike Darnell, President of Alternative Entertainment, Fox Broadcasting Company. "And we're absolutely delighted to continue our relationship with him. 'The X Factor' has been a massive success around the world, and we can't wait to bring it to the U.S. in 2011.'"

"There's been a lot of speculation partly because we didn't have an agreement. We reached an agreement at half past 10 this morning. Where we have come to is 'X Factor' will launch in 2011 with me judging and producing the show. So this will be my last season on 'American Idol,'" Cowell said at a press event in Los Angeles Monday, Deadline.com reported.

The announcement comes a day before the ratings juggernaut begins its ninth season. Talk show host and comedian Ellen DeGeneres will debut Tuesday as the fourth judge, replacing Paula Abdul. Producer Kara DioGuardi joined the judging panel last season to mixed reviews.

But Cowell, with his caustic commentary, has long been seen as the big star of "Idol." - FOX News Story

Leading UN Scientist - Much of Global Warming Due to Natural Cycles

From Miami to Maine, Savannah to Seattle, America is caught in an icy grip that one of the U.N.'s top global warming proponents says could mark the beginning of a mini ice age.

Oranges are freezing and millions of tropical fish are dying in Florida, and it could be just the beginning of a decades-long deep freeze, says Professor Mojib Latif, one of the world's leading climate modelers.

Latif thinks the cold snap Americans have been suffering through is only the beginning. He says we're in for 30 years of cooler temperatures -- a mini ice age, he calls it, basing his theory on an analysis of natural cycles in water temperatures in the world's oceans.

Latif, a professor at the Leibniz Institute at Germany's Kiel University and an author of the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, believes the lengthy cold weather is merely a pause -- a 30-years-long blip -- in the larger cycle of global warming, which postulates that temperatures will rise rapidly over the coming years.

At a U.N. conference in September, Latif said that changes in ocean currents known as the North Atlantic Oscillation could dominate over manmade global warming for the next few decades. Latif said the fluctuations in these currents could also be responsible for much of the rise in global temperatures seen over the past 30 years.

Latif is a key member of the UN's climate research arm, which has long promoted the concept of global warming. He told the Daily Mail that "a significant share of the warming we saw from 1980 to 2000 and at earlier periods in the 20th Century was due to these cycles -- perhaps as much as 50 percent." - FOX News Story

Sweeping Ethics Changes - Not on Pelosi's Watch

WASHINGTON — Nearly three years after Congress approved sweeping ethics rules to "drain the swamp," as incoming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi put it, no member of Congress has been punished for wrongdoing.

In that time, allegations of sexual misconduct and financial impropriety have been lodged against lawmakers. The most serious rebuke in the past year: a "letter of qualified admonition" to Sen. Roland Burris, D-Ill., after the Senate ethics panel concluded he misled lawmakers and inappropriately offered to raise campaign funds for then-governor Rod Blagojevich as Burris sought the Senate appointment. "Three years later, it's the same old, same old," said Melanie Sloan of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. - RCP Story

Union Leaders Struggle with Supporting Health Care Bill

The presidents of about a dozen labor unions will meet with President Barack Obama on Monday to push him to limit the scope of a proposed tax on high-cost insurance plans.

Labor sources acknowledge they will not succeed in completely eliminating the tax, but they hope to raise its threshold so that fewer labor households feel the impact.
“At the end of the day there’s going to be a compromise,” said a labor official.

Andy Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), told The Hill on Friday that the final bill would likely include some form of the excise tax.

“When you have a president who says he wants to incorporate it and a Senate that says it wants to incorporate it and some in the House who say they want to incorporate it, it’s hard to look that in the face and say we can just win this outright,” Stern said.

Obama will meet on Monday with Stern and the heads of several other powerful unions.

Other attendees include Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO; Gerald McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME); and Larry Cohen, president of the Communication Workers of America.

The Senate bill would raise about $150 billion from 2013 to 2019 by taxing employer-provided health plans costing more than $8,500 for individuals and $23,000 for families.

Labor officials, citing an analysis by the Joint Committee on Taxation, claim this would hit nearly 31 million households by 2019. -RCP Story


This is a great story. Everyone should read it and understand just how this whole Health Care Bill will impact you.

Obama's First Year of Foreign Policy - "Bumble, Stumble and Skid"

If the first year of President Barack Obama's foreign policy were a law firm in Charles Dickens's London, it would have a name like Bumble, Stumble and Skid.

It began with apologies to the Muslim world that went nowhere, a doomed attempt to beat Israel into line, utopian pleas to abolish nuclear weapons, unreciprocated concessions to Russia, and a curt note to the British to take back the bust of Winston Churchill that had graced the Oval Office. It continued with principled offers of serious negotiation to an Iranian regime too busy torturing, raping and killing demonstrators, and building new underground nuclear facilities, to take them up. Subsequently Beijing smothered domestic coverage of a presidential visit but did give the world the spectacle of the American commander in chief getting a talking-to about fiscal responsibility from a Communist chieftain.

The lovely town of Copenhagen staged not one, but two humiliations: the first when the Olympic Committee delivered the bad news that the president's effort to play hometown booster had failed utterly, before he even landed back in the U.S.; the second when the Chinese once again poked the U.S. in the eye by sending minor officials to meet with Mr. Obama, as they, the Indians and Brazilians tried to shoulder him out of cozy meetings aimed at sabotaging his environmental policy. Even smitten foreign admirers—in the case of the Nobel Prize, some addled Norwegian notables—managed to make him look bad.

It was nonetheless a year of international displays of presidential ego, sometimes disguised as cosmic modesty ("I do not bring with me today a definitive solution to the problems of war"), but mainly of one slip after another. The decision to reinforce our military in Afghanistan came after an excruciating dither that undermined the confidence of our allies. Mr. Obama's loose talk of withdrawal beginning in 18 months then undid much of the good in his decision to send troops. - RCP Story

President's Hope and Change Bad for Economy, Bad for America

So, despite all the money spent on stimulus, the economy continues to lose jobs and unemployment remains at a staggering 10 percent. That grim news appeared to catch the Obama administration by surprise last week -- but it shouldn't have.

The number-crunchers at the Treasury Department have been celebrating what appears to be the end of the Great Recession as told through rising GDP, higher business profits and a buoyant stock market. But owners of small businesses -- the usual engines of economic growth -- are still refusing to hire back workers as they normally do when the economy turns up from a sharp decline.

Talk to them, and they'll gladly tell you why: Having weathered the recession, they now fear the administration will choke off the nascent recovery and increase their costs through higher taxes to pay for the myriad of programs President Obama has in store for us, including the hyperexpensive health-care overhaul.

If the president wasn't so busy looking to score cheap political points when he met with the heads of the big banks last month, he'd have listened to their warnings on this very issue. At one point, JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon politely interrupted Obama's monologue on how the banks should be lending more to small businesses to explain that many businesses simply don't want to borrow to expand their operations and hire more workers.

"Jamie basically said the demand for loans is way down because businesses, particularly those that are making money and can qualify for loans, simply don't want to borrow," said one person with direct knowledge of the conversation.

And they're not borrowing because they don't know just how high their tax bills will be when the president gets done implementing all his "hope" and "change." - RCP Story

Democrats Race to Save Senator Reid

Democrats are preparing to throw the race card back in the laps of Republicans as part of a counterattack designed to help save Harry Reid’s political career.

First, Reid’s allies plan to distribute the NAACP vote ratings of Republican senators who have scolded him. The data will be made available to editorial boards, cable programs and the blogosphere — including votes on minimum wage, community-oriented policing, education funding and HIV/AIDS programs.

Separately, the Congressional Black Caucus plans to issue a new statement Monday, defending Reid and brushing back Republicans.

“Senator Reid’s record provides a stark contrast to actions of Republicans to block legislation that would benefit poor and minority communities – most recently reflected in Republican opposition to the health bill now under consideration,” CBC Chairwoman Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) said. “I look forward to Senator Reid continuing to serve as Majority Leader to guide this important agenda through the Senate.”

These moves to turn the race issue back onto Republicans is risky, yet it shows how Reid and his allies are ready to pull out all the stops to help the majority leader recover from his disastrous comments about Barack Obama being “light-skinned” and having no “Negro dialect.” The comments were revealed in the book “Game Change” by journalists John Heilemann and Mark Halperin. - Politico Story

Double Standard Between Dems and Repubs when it comes to Race?

A double standard? Republicans seeking Sen. Harry Reid's resignation as majority leader over racial remarks he made about Barack Obama say yes — that Reid should be held to the same standard as former GOP Sen. Trent Lott, whose own racial gaffes cost him the Senate leadership in 2002.

Democrats say no, that Reid's comments — while unfortunate — were nothing like Lott's.

Reid apologized to Obama and a handful of black political leaders after a new book reported that he was favorably impressed by Obama during the 2008 presidential campaign and, in a private conversation, described the Illinois senator as a "light-skinned" African-American "with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one." - ABC News Story