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Washington (CNN) – There is no daylight between his vote against raising the debt ceiling as a senator in 2006 and his call for Congress to increase the limit in the next 10 days, President Barack Obama said Wednesday. “Nothing has changed,” Obama told WFLA in an interview. “I voted against a debt ceiling increase at the time because I had some concerns about what President (George W.) Bush was doing.” The president said he has “no problem” if members of Congress choose to vote against raising the legal borrowing limit now, but took issue with House Speaker John Boehner’s...

Psst. Anic-Pay! Bloomberg‘s Megan McArdle (who has been on an incredible roll lately**) takes issue with the idea that the Obama administration needn’t panic about Obamacare, as long as it can get its glitch-plagued health care exchanges up and running by the end of the year. Wrong, she suggests. It’s time to panic. Now. Why? Because the exchanges are the way to sign up young, healthy people and prevent the fabled “death spiral,” in which only older, sicker people sign up for insurance, causing rates to rise and healthier people to drop out, causing rates to rise even more, etc....

<p>SELBYVILLE, Del. (AP) — Delaware officials are celebrating the state's first health insurance exchange enrollee.</p> <p>Department of Health and Social Service officials have declared 59-year-old Janice Baker of Selbyville the first confirmed resident to enroll in the marketplace. It opened Oct. 1 as part of the roll-out of the Affordable Care Act.</p>

If you've tried to sign up online for health coverage under the problem-plagued Obamacare exchange, our sympathies. Many people have tried to create accounts and shop for insurance under the new law. Few have succeeded. Those that have enrolled have found that the system is prone to mistakes. Some applications have been sent to the wrong insurance company. Wait. It gets worse. Those who have managed to browse the marketplace have often been hit by sticker shock. Take Adam Weldzius, a nurse practitioner and single father from Carpentersville. He sought the same level of coverage on the exchange as he...

After months of anguished debate over mass shootings, gun control and Second Amendment rights, the Justice Department finds itself on the defensive after a training manual surfaced that suggests federal agents could face a firing squad for leaking government secrets. The online manual for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives — complete with a photo of a turn-of-the-century firing squad — was obtained by The Washington Times from a concerned federal law enforcement official, and it immediately drew protests from watchdogs who said it showed a lack of sensitivity to gun violence and the continuing hostile environment toward...

BOZEMAN — The number of Montana residents with concealed weapons permits has more than doubled since 2008.

A New York Times investigative article based on two dozen interviews with industry insiders and confidential Obama Administration documents reveals that the catastrophic $500 million Obamacare rollout "has deeply embarrassed the White House" and has the technology companies involved "publicly distancing themselves" from the Obamacare fiasco. "These are not glitches. The extent of the problems is pretty enormous," an insurance executive who participated in Obamacare conference calls told the Times. "At the end of our calls, people say, 'It's awful, just awful.'"

(CN) - Concerns that a limitation on concealed-carry permits in Orange County, Calif., amounts to an all-out ban did not seem to resonate with the 9th Circuit. A three-judge panel with the federal appeals court met this week to consider a 2012 lawsuit challenging Orange County Sheriff Sandra Hutchen's policy of "denying law-abiding, competent adults ... state-required licenses to carry handguns in public for the purpose of self-defense." The policy requires gun owners to prove to the sheriff that they have a valid reason to carry their gun for self defense.

Some tasks are occasionally necessary, though unpleasant. (Oops. My mind just drifted to that plastic bag you must carry with you when walking your dog.) Hunting down that roach your wife is just absolutely certain she saw scampering across the bedcovers would be one; talking to Harry Reid might be another. I’ll leave the roach to you. That’s what the Yellow Pages are for. Unfortunately the Yellow Pages are going to be of no help if you find yourself trying to make sense out of, or talk sense into, Harry Reid. Now Harry likes to throw around a lot of...

Nothing is more important for a startup burning through cash than winning customers and revenue. So problems with the Affordable Care Act’s online marketplaces, also known as exchanges, aren’t just an inconvenience. They’re a threat. Nobody is pushing the panic button. March 31, the end of enrollment, is several months away. Co-ops are well financed with federal loans. Evergreen holds enough capital to be in good shape even if it doesn’t reach what Beilenson calls “self-sustaining” membership of 15,000 or 20,000 in the first year, he said. But with few confirmed customers so far and no revenue, Evergreen and its...

Many people criticize President Obama for spending too much time campaigning, traveling or on the golf course. They are wrong. He spends too much time in a far more removed and unique place: Wonderland. Indeed, he seemingly lives in Wonderland. The problem is that the rest of us live in the real world. Over the last five years it has becoming increasingly clear that Barack Obama and his crew of handpicked officials see America and the rest of the world in ways at variance with reality.

Dan Pfeiffer’s fingerprints are all over the White House’s strategy of not negotiating with congressional Republicans over the government shutdown and debt ceiling. The senior adviser to President Obama has been plotting the White House’s every move, and is described by some within the administration as the “relentless guardian” of Obama’s no-negotiations stance. “He’s been the most ferocious on that principle,” one senior administration official said. “He was quite adamant and relentless about this. And on the face of it, it’s not an easy argument to make.” Even before the shutdown began on Oct. 1, Republicans had turned their fire...

Good morning Free Republic and good morning to the GREAT STATE of NEW JERSEY! Get up and go to you polling place!! VOTE FOR STEVE LONEGAN TODAY!! And with that -- I am off to do my civic duty and to make America proud!! (hope this isn't a repeat thread!)

Consider for a moment what will come next for Obamacare, in the context of Ezra Klein’s five thoughts on the disastrous launch of the program – a bellwether of sorts for how the administration failed to live up to the expectations it sold to the law’s supporters and opinion leaders. There are a few different directions it can go from here, but the worst case scenario hasn’t really entered people’s consciences yet, in part because the insurers are staying quiet at the moment. The reality now is that the system is at least a month from actually working, and likelier...

Dear John: If you were hoping to have a quick "date" with the woman standing on the street corner in Sanford, you may want to think again. Starting this week, the Sanford Police Department will send "Dear John" letters to registered owners of vehicles spotted lingering in areas known for prostitution. (snip) Sanford police said Monday that letters will only be generated when an officer is confident the driver is circling the block looking for a prostitute, and not, for example, driving around lost. Automated license-plate readers placed on patrol vehicles will be used to capture images of the suspect...

ABERDEEN, MD (WJZ/CNN) – Police in Maryland arrested a suspect who allegedly tried to carjack the mother of baseball Hall of Famer Cal Ripken, Jr. The incident occurred on Tuesday outside of a bank in Aberdeen, MD, north of Baltimore. Police say a man with a handgun approached 75-year-old Violet Ripken and demanded her car. Ripken pressed the panic button her key ring, setting off the car's alarm and scaring the man away. He was later captured by police.

Tbilisi (AFP) - French authorities have detained a former Georgian defence minister wanted in his homeland on corruption charges, a police source said Tuesday. Davit Kezerashvili, a close ally of outgoing president Mikheil Saakashvili, was detained Monday at the Nice airport just before 1:00pm (1100 GMT), as he was trying to board a flight to Tirana, the capital of Albania, the police source said. "He was stopped by border police during an identity check. The police realised that he was the target of an international arrest warrant," the source said. Kezerashvili will now face an extradition hearing to determine whether...

".......A day that was supposed to bring Washington to the edge of resolving the fiscal showdown instead seemed to bring chaos and retrenching. And a bitter fight that had begun over stripping money from the president’s signature health care law had essentially descended in the House into one over whether lawmakers and their staff members would pay the full cost of their health insurance premiums, unlike most workers at American companies, and how to restrict the administration from using flexibility to extend the debt limit beyond a fixed deadline.............."

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court seemed prepared Tuesday to uphold a voter-approved ban on taking account of race in college admissions. The court heard arguments over a 2006 change to the state constitution to prohibit the University of Michigan and other state schools from any consideration of race when they decide whom to admit. The justices' focus was more on whether they could craft a narrow ruling to uphold Michigan Proposal 2 or would have to overrule earlier cases that protect minorities' rights to participate in the political process. Affirmative action supporters say the amendment itself is a form of...

The irony is rich. President Obama told Maryland college students just days before the launch of his healthcare “marketplace” that it would take just a few keystrokes to compare prices and policy details. “Don’t take my word for it, go on the website,” Obama told a crowd at Prince George’s Community College in Largo, MD, five days before the launch. “See for yourself what the prices are. See for yourself what the choices are and then make up your own mind. That’s all I’m asking.” But the bureaucrats in his administration clearly weren’t listening. They created a website that is...

When CNSNews.com asked Rep. John Fleming (R-La.) if he had read all of the 10,535 pages of final regulations published by the administration to implement Obamacare in the Federal Register, he said he had not and described them as “incomprehensible.” “Well, of course, I voted against [Obamacare], and I have not read all the rules and regulations,” Fleming told CNSNews.com earlier this month at the Capitol. “They’re extremely complex. An average person even with a law degree or a medical degree like me can’t understand them,” Fleming said. “They’re incomprehensible.” When asked if he was surprised by the large number...

As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, the Republicans DID compromise to avoid a shutdown. They were going to keep the government open, but asked that Obamacare be delayed. Yes, even Planned Parenthood would get their annual funding from the government. Senate Democrats under Harry Reid said no. … Given how the president’s approval rating has sunk to historic lows, this shutdown gives Obama a way to re-energize his stalled legislative agenda. He wasted the most precious moments of his second term on a gun control push that was never going to pass, and he was stuck in neutral until the...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)Walmart has no regrets about allowing a wild shopping spree at two of its Louisiana stores when an electronic glitch lifted the spending caps on the cards of food stamp recipients. "We know we made the right choice," Walmart spokesman Kory Lundberg told ABCNews.com today. The chain has no regrets even though Louisiana's Department of Children and Family Services said food stamp recipients should have been limited to $50 each during the emergency and that Walmart will have to pay the difference. Lundberg declined to comment about how much the company may have lost or why it did not follow...

CNN senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen has been trying for two weeks to sign up for ObamaCare. Unfortunately as she reported on Monday's New Day, despite trying for fourteen days including at hours that were claimed to be "off peak," she still hasn't been able to establish an account (video follows with transcript and absolutely no need for additional commentary): Read more . . .

Obtaining health care is no laughing matter. Yet the only way to cope with practical implications of the Democrat-sponsored Affordable Care Act is comic relief. Would Democrats rather commit political suicide than try to fix massive flaws in a bungled rollout of a mangled law? Forget about delaying Obamacare for a year, perhaps we should delay it until Democrats can pass a critically scored sanity check. A divisive law, that few read, and that a thin majority shoved down our throats deserves the date it will eventually get with the electoral version of “death panels”. It is a monstrosity which...

House Republicans on Tuesday narrowed their attack on Obamacare to the issue of fairness, insisting that President Obama and his top political appointees all have to buy their insurance through the Affordable Care Act’s exchanges as part of a new bill to end the government shutdown and extend the federal debt ceiling. GOP leaders hope to put the bill on their chamber’s floor for a vote later Tuesday, with little time to spare before the Thursday deadline the Treasury Department has set for when it will run out of maneuvering room under the current $16.7 trillion debt ceiling. The new...

http://youtu.be/6dxpiO2Chc0

<p>Klein — who wrote a provocative biography about Obama last year entitled “The Amateur” — said White House insiders refer to Jarrett as “The Night Stalker” because she is the only presidential aide who frequently spends time in the family quarters and dines with the Obamas.</p>

This is very funny. A Daily Kos regular gets his Obamacare premium notice and is shocked to learn that as young, healthy people, he and his wife will pay twice as much! "My wife and I just got our updates from Kaiser telling us what our 2014 rates will be. Her monthly has been $168 this year, mine $150. We have a high deductible. We are generally healthy people who don’t go to the doctor often. I barely ever go. The insurance is in case of a major catastrophe. Well, now, because of Obamacare, my wife’s rate is gong to...

There is nothing more pernicious than the illusion of liberty surviving, or even flourishing, alongside growing government power. It doesn’t work that way, not once you get past the transition from anarchy to lawful government. Personal liberty does not exist in a state of anarchy, because individuals can be defrauded, robbed, and killed at will by lone predators and organized gangs. Some degree of government power must clearly be exercised to secure liberty. But when a government the size of America’s federal system grows larger, it occurs only at the expense of liberty, and the contraction of the private sector....

Attorney: Divorce rate likely to rise under Obamacare SAN DIEGO — The Affordable Healthcare Act could make health coverage more affordable for some, but it may have other side effects, like an increase in the divorce rate. heart healthFamily practice attorney Myra Fleischer stressed how healthcare costs carry a heavyweight when it comes to those considering calling it quits on their marriage. “The middle class is what this is supposed to help and most divorces are middle class,” said Fleischer. “We look at those numbers and they choose to stay in the marriage,” said Fleischer who explained how that may...

The number of visitors to the federal government’s HealthCare.gov Web site dropped 88 percent between Oct. 1 and Oct. 13, according to a new analysis of America’s online use, while less than half of 1 percent of the site’s visitors successfully enrolled for health insurance the first week. The new numbers on the new health-care law — released by Kantar US Insights and based on an assessment conducted by the nonpartisan research firm Millward Brown Digital — provide a partial snapshot of how the federal health-care exchange has fared since it launched at the start of the month. Of the...

The Maryland State Police sharply rebuked Attorney General Douglas F. Gansler on Tuesday after he called a veteran police commander a “henchman” for having documented allegations that Gansler ordered troopers assigned to him to regularly speed and run red lights even to routine appointments. In a television interview, Gansler strongly denied the allegations and said the accusations were part of a campaign of “dirty politics” by Lt. Gov. Anthony G. Brown, Gansler’s chief rival for next year’s Democratic nomination for governor. In a news release, the leadership of the state police called Gansler’s comments “unseemly and unacceptable” and said he...

EXCERPT:North Carolina has become the first state to cut off welfare benefits to poor residents in the wake of the partial federal government shutdown, ordering a halt to processing November applications until a deal is reached to end the federal standstill.

Just when you thought the news from Washington couldn’t get any worse, a reader who is well connected on the Hill writes: We have it on good authority that Congressmen Cantor and Ryan are determined to pivot to immigration just as soon as a budget agreement is reached. It will be a short-term budget agreement, so if Republicans and conservatives are smart, they can achieve a double-whammy by avoiding default yet keeping the focus on Obamacare and the budget (where we can win) while simultaneously preventing action on immigration that could lead to disastrous policy changes. Well, that’s the optimistic...

Many tea party Reps want big/immediate change in DC. But the Constitution doesn't allow for rapid/big change - unless you win elections.T Party ideas about smaller gov are good, but their ideas won't be achieved if they don't change tactics.Nominating candidates who allow Ds to keep Senate seats is bad tactic #1.Picking fights that can't be won while empowering Ds is bad tactic #2.Diverting attention away from the failures of Obamacare is bad tactic # 3.Overreach is bad tactic #4. Big gov wasn't build (sic) in a day. It will not be turned around overnight. This is a long term...

A New York Times investigative article based on two dozen interviews with industry insiders and confidential Obama Administration documents reveals that the catastrophic $500 million Obamacare rollout "has deeply embarrassed the White House" and has the technology companies involved "publicly distancing themselves" from the Obamacare fiasco.  "These are not glitches. The extent of the problems is pretty enormous," an insurance executive who participated in Obamacare conference calls told the Times. "At the end of our calls, people say, 'It's awful, just awful.'" The Times says those closest to the three-and-a-half year-long building of Obamacare, like embattled Health and Human Services Secretary...

President Barack Obama said on Tuesday the frantic stop-and-go effort in Congress to avoid a debt default and end a government shutdown is "a mess" as a gloomy mood descended over the White House with time running out to a Thursday deadline. Obama, who is to meet Treasury Secretary Jack Lew on Wednesday, and his Democratic backers stressed there is still time to avoid a historic default even as efforts to reach a deal in Congress floundered on Capitol Hill. "My expectation is that it does get solved, but we don't have a lot of time," Obama told WABC in...

President Obama's concession in the current budget negotiations may be that he will enforce his own health care law. Meanwhile, Republicans have shied away from trying to repeal a tax on big business because the party's base doesn't see it as a priority.It's an odd time in Washington.To the perpetual irritation of presidents, the Constitution vests the power to make laws solely in Congress. Like his predecessors, Obama bends laws and stretches executive power in order to seize some legislative power for himself.Most egregiously, Obama has expanded, contracted, twisted, and amended his 2010 Affordable Care Act many times.Obama in early...

PAYSON, AZ - Republican Rep. Brenda Barton of Payson compared President Barack Obama to Adolph Hitler on her Facebook page Monday in a post urging county sheriffs to revoke authority from the National Parks Service “thugs” who are enforcing the federal shutdown on national parks lands. “Someone is paying the National Park Service thugs overtime for their efforts to carry out the order of De Fuhrer… where are our Constitutional Sheriffs who can revoke the Park Service Rangers authority to arrest??? Do we have any Sheriffs with a pair?” she wrote. Fuhrer is a German term for leader that is...

Argument: Hillary Clinton’s security staff get into a row with a traffic warden whilst waiting for her in London. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton attended an event in London on Saturday. Parking her car in a bay on St. James’ Square, Clinton was required to pay the same £3.30 per hour fee that everyone else is required to pay for the privilege to park there. She did not. When the traffic warden tried to issue a parking ticket the Secret Service agents went nuts. But, waving their arms and flashing their badges didn’t impress the traffic marshal. He...

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) said Tuesday he would vote for a “clean CR” to end the government shutdown. “I’ll vote for a clean CR," Issa told CNN’s “The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer. “Republicans in the House have always been for a clean CR increase if it meant we began the serious negotiations on the kinds of reforms that need to happen…entitlements as a shortcut for it. That's what the deal is about right now.” Democrats have pressed Republicans to bring a continuing resolutio to the floor that funds the government and does nothing else for weeks. GOP leaders have...

Authorities in Pennsylvania are to file criminal charges against three students involved in a brutal beating on a school bus on Wednesday - and the bus driver who did nothing to stop the attack and didn't allow the two victims to flee from the vehicle. Police in Chester acted after they viewed video posted onto Facebook that shows one student on the Delaware County Alternative High School bus allegedly hitting 17-year-old Dylan Fonner in the face repeatedly. The grainy video which shows Fonner's face being bloodied, lasts seven minutes and was posted on the Facebook page belonging to one of...

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Tuesday took some indirect swipes at Vice President Joe Biden at an off-the-record gathering, a state representative in attendance told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “I know she’s running for president now, because toward the end, she was asked about the Osama bin Laden raid. She took 25 minutes to answer,” George State Rep. Tom Taylor told the newspaper. “Without turning the knife too deeply, she put it to [Vice President Joe] Biden.”

A New Jersey judge’s contorted and nonsensical decision that the state is responsible for the federal government’s failure to recognize same-sex marriage highlights the irrationality that permeates the campaign for “marriage equality.” One of the most striking features of the campaign for same-sex marriage has been the prominence of its assault on reasoning itself. The logical relations of legal categories with one another, as those categories represent persons, their interactions, and their rights and duties, are at the heart of all legal decision-making and ideally inform legislative and administrative policymaking as well. But the impulse to redefine marriage so that...

Defense: The firing of two nuclear commanders in a week adds to a body count that suggests we have either the most corrupt and incompetent general staff in history or our military is being reshaped for other purposes. The Obama administration, which has fired no one over scandals such as its Fast and Furious Mexican gun-running operation, its criminal negligence in the terrorist attack on our Benghazi diplomatic mission, or the use of the IRS to target and intimidate political foes, seems to have a curious obsession lately about ethics and competence in the U.S. military. Last week the Air...

----"Plan B" and fiscal cliff vote, redux. Having hammered out a deal to shoot back to the Senate tonight -- with most Republicans reportedly on board -- House GOP leadership has been forced to delay or cancel those votes after support among conservatives collapsed in the early evening hours. The rules committee meeting, which would have formally drawn up the bill and advanced it to the full house, has been postponed indefinitely. The reason is simple. They don't have the votes: What happened? The counter-offer's broad outline, which I've been following all day, seemed to be on track. Then the...

After a year of traveling, I had planned a last, short trip. I was going to take the train from Montreal to New Orleans. The travels I had been undertaking earlier this year had brought me to places that were meant to form the background of my second novel... First, he saw my Sri Lankan stamp. The customs officer raised his eyebrows. "Sri Lanka, what were you doing over there?" "Surfing. Traveling. My best friend lives there. He is an architect." The officer flipped on, seemingly satisfied. Secondly, he found my stamps from Singapore and Malaysia. "What were you doing...

Heritage Action For America, an influential conservative group, on Tuesday urged House Republicans to vote against their leaders' latest bill to fund the government and raise U.S. borrowing authority. The private group said that the legislation, which was scheduled to be voted on late on Tuesday, fails to "stop Obamacare's massive new entitlements from taking root." The group is warning lawmakers that it will look at their positions on this legislation in considering whether to encourage candidates to run against them in Republican primary campaigns next year.

Above: Maria Marroquin: Illegal alien...and ObamaCare "Navigator"- by John HillStand With ArizonaAmericans were outraged after the Obama Administration denied access to the WWII memorial for veterans  - but allowed illegal aliens to hold a rally for amnesty on the "closed" National Mall. Americans were also angered last week after the Healthcare.gov ObamaCare website, which cost $634 million to build (half a billion dollars over budget), utterly failed to work. Now it has emerged that an illegal alien in New York is serving as an Obamacare navigator, according to the Center for Immigration Studies. According to the CIS report, Maria Marroquin — identified as an illegal...