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It's about 40 minutes to his second hour. Says if Romney loses Michigan, no one gets 50% of delegates. Says Jeb Bush will be in the room when McConnell/Christie team is picked ...

Barack Obama rolls out his new budget today, one that includes a $1.39 trillion on-budget deficit in the fourth budget year of his presidency despite an election-campaign pledge to cut deficits in half by this time. The FY2008 budget, the last one signed by a President other than Barack Obama, had a projected deficit of $239 billion and an actual deficit of $641 billion, just for comparative purposes. Even if we don’t give Obama credit for the FY2009 budget which Democrats refused to pass while George Bush remained in the White House and completed in an omnibus bill signed by...

“I was invited to speak with two investigators from the Office of Inspector General regarding the gunwalking scandal and general abuses of the ATF and DOJ,” Mike Detty, a central figure in Operation Wide Receiver due to his work as a confidential informant has told Gun Rights Examiner. “Eager to help I met with them and also provided all copies of recordings, journal entries, photos etc. I was determined to see justice done.” “Imagine how surprised I was when one of the investigators informed me that my materials had all been turned over to Laura Gwinn at DOJ-one of the...

House Speaker John Boehner, hoping to spare fellow Republicans a second embarrassing defeat over payroll tax cuts, is prepared to navigate around rebellious Tea Party-aligned lawmakers to get a deal, according to congressional aides. Republicans in the House of Representatives got a public drubbing from critics within and outside the party in December for initially refusing to approve a Senate plan to extend the tax break for 160 million Americans through February.

“For Bob McDonnell, VP Talk Won’t Go Away,” a November Roll Call headline declares. “GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney…may choose Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell…as his running mate if he secures the nomination next year,” the accompanying photo caption reads. But why settle for Number Two? There’s a “Draft McConnell” website (the site owner behind the move is masked by proxy domain registration) claiming: We Don't Have to Settle A recent report by Rhodes Cook, Senior Columnist at the Center for Politics, shows that it's not too late for a Republican to enter the 2012 Presidential race. Bob McDonnell has a...

For years I have asked myself: how is it that the RINOs (Republicans In Name Only) -- the "elite," big-government statists -- control the Republican Party? In the 1992 election, George H.W. Bush, Reagan's successor , blew away any prayer of his re-election by reneging on his now-infamous promise, "read my lips: no new taxes." But he was a kinder, gentler conservative -- in other words, a RINO. And the country got Bill Clinton. In 1996, the Republican RINO elite anointed the colorless Robert Dole to be the party standard-bearer. Dole was a dull speaker who had the awkward rhetorical...

Freshman Tea Party Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) is incensed that Republicans caved in the payroll-tax debate, and is putting the blame squarely on Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). “I don’t think there’s a revolt with respect to Speaker Boehner,” Gowdy said Thursday night on Fox’s "Your World With Neil Cavuto." "I think the license tag of the truck that just ran over us has Kentucky license tags. For the life of me, I cannot understand when the Senate is going to find something they care enough about to stand on policy and principle.”Last week, the Senate overwhelmingly passed a...

In session for a whopping 1 minute, 28 seconds, the Senate today passed by unanimous consent the updated, slightly tweaked version of the two-month payroll tax cut extension. Hailing this as a “new day,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., celebrated and then appointed, as the compromise called for, his designees for the conference committee to negotiate a year-long payroll tax deal. The appointees are: Sens. Max Baucus, D-Mont.; Ben Cardin, D-Md.; Jack Reed, D-R.I.; and Bob Casey, D-Pa. ,,,,, Reid left with departing messages to Republicans: His message to the Republican leader in the Senate should really be interpreted...

A lot of this interview is par for the course, where West defends the leadership in this current crisis and also explains what he doesn’t like about this deal. But when Greta starts complaining that the House waited until the last minute to get this done, just to create another extension because they always disagree, West said this: Well I tell ya Greta, give me the opportunity to be in leadership in Washington DC and I think you’d see something different. Because coming out of the military, we didn’t go home until the mission was complete. So maybe that’s what...

The standoff over preserving a tax break continued as House Speaker John Boehner showed little sign of reversing course despite sustained criticism from his own party and President Obama. Boehner assembled his top negotiators for a second day at an otherwise empty Capitol, but their position is being overpowered by the risk of a looming tax hike on Jan. 1. Obama planned to showcase stories of workers who will lose $40 a paycheck later Thursday at the White House.  “We’re fighting to do the right thing,” said Boehner, who wants to launch formal negotiations with Democrats to resolve differing approaches...

The State Department has released a statement that is favorable to the Keystone XL pipeline...

Forget the Presidential race. We can get back to it another day. This is the most important fight for the conservative movement in America right now and it happens next week. Well, it was going to happen in January. But conservatives started gaining momentum. Naturally, Mitch McConnell had to go try to pull the rug out from under conservatives. Far be it for fresh ideas to enter into the hallowed corridors of Senate Republican power. I’m talking about the Senate Republicans’ leadership fight for Vice Chairman of the Republican Conference. There is an election to fill that seat. The election...

WASHINGTON, Nov 29 (Reuters) - Republicans in the U.S. Congress on Tuesday threw their support behind a payroll tax cut extension, trying to blunt charges ahead of 2012 elections of favoring wealthy Americans over middle-class workers. Until Tuesday, Republicans had been lukewarm on extending President Barack Obama's payroll tax cut for workers, indicating they were open to negotiating it but never explicitly backing a measure, which the White House says will boost the country's sputtering economic recovery. (snip) "In all likelihood we will agree to continue the current payroll tax relief for another year," Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said...

Session host: Stephen K. Bannon and Guest Host Peter Schweizer | Session guest: Keith Appell, Peter J. Boyer, Andrew Breitbart, ** Victory Sessions Special: “Crony Capitalism: How It Has Destroyed America’. At times explosive, this evenings show highlights the crimes on Capitol Hill — Democrats and Republicans included. “Throw Them ALL Out’s” author Peter Schweizer drills down on the outrageous behavior of our Congressional Representatives. We think this evenings show will blow your mind! LISTEN HERE ### Congress is getting rich off Wall Street and Peter Schweizer won’t stop until everyone knows it. Plus Peter Schwiezer on how Obama donors...

Senate Republicans blocked a $60 billion infrastructure bill Thursday, making the bill the second piece of President Obama’s jobs proposal to be voted down in the Senate. Republicans and a few Democrats filibustered the broader $447 billion jobs bill last month. The vote came is a scripted floor exchange, with Democrats expected to quickly defeat an alternative GOP infrastructure funding bill. The bill garnered 51 votes--not enough to overcome the 60-vote cloture threshold. The Democratic bill, which includes a $10 billion national infrastructure bank, is funded by a 0.7 percent surtax on incomes of more than $1 million a year....

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, in an attempt to pluck an arrow out of President Obama's rhetorical quiver, tried to get the Senate to vote on the president's $447 billion jobs bill Tuesday -- presumably to test whether Democrats have the votes to pass it. But while Obama repeatedly has called on Congress to pass the bill right away, Democratic Leader Harry Reid shot down the effort, accusing McConnell of pulling a political stunt. "I am disappointed that he would play games with this important legislation," Reid said, pledging to take up the bill later on in the session. The...

President Barack Obama hit another American city today claiming to care about the nation's unemployment crisis but showing his real concern is for his own political future. His chosen backdrop of the Brent Spence Bridge which links Ohio and Kentucky was the perfect setting for an attack against two of his political opponents House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky). But his usual mixture of sarcasm and lies were no match for the truth Senator McConnell ably delivered from the Senate floor.

Dear Chairman Bernanke, It is our understanding that the Board Members of the Federal Reserve will meet later this week to consider additional monetary stimulus proposals. We write to express our reservations about any such measures. Respectfully, we submit that the board should resist further extraordinary intervention in the U.S. economy, particularly without a clear articulation of the goals of such a policy, direction for success, ample data proving a case for economic action and quantifiable benefits to the American people. It is not clear that the recent round of quantitative easing undertaken by the Federal Reserve has facilitated economic...

President Obama’s widely anticipated speech before a joint session of Congress on Thursday stunned and amazed his erstwhile political opponents. “Until I heard it from his own lips I never realized how mistaken the GOP plans to tear up all the roads and burn down all the schools were,” said House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va). “And now that I know the President’s jobs plan is endorsed by the Teamsters’ Jimmy Hoffa and the AFL-CIO’s Richard Trumka, well, let’s just say that my eyes have really been opened.” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) admitted that he was skeptical at...

The U.S. Senate, in an unusual procedure, cleared the way Thursday for the U.S. to lift its borrowing authority by $500 billion to $15.19 trillion, enough to keep the support federal government borrowing through late January or early February. The action came under an unusual legislative procedure spelled out under the August agreement to raise the U.S. debt ceiling and avoid a U.S. credit default. In a 52-45 vote, the Senate blocked an attempt by Republicans to slow down the process that will result in the $500 billion debt-ceiling increase. The increase stems from a deal between Congress and the...

I am working off of a cell phone so I don't have a link but according to the WSJ's Washington wire, the debt ceiling was raised another $500 Billion by the Senate under that super deluxe debt ceiling package last month. Seems that the stupid provision about having a vote of disagreement included by Harry Reid's good friend Mitch McConnell has been used against McConnell already. So the question has to asked, "Why do Mitch McConnell and John Boehner still have jobs? Despite what they or the LSM says, the deal antomatically give Obamalamadingdong the upper hand on the till...

In a 45 to 52 vote on Thursday night, the Senate failed to advance a resolution that would have disapproved of a pending $500 billion increase in the nation's debt ceiling. Under the debt-ceiling agreement reached in early August, the Obama administration was authorized to immediately raise the debt ceiling by $400 billion. Another $500 billion increase was authorized this month, although that could have been blocked if both the House and Senate approved resolutions expressing disapproval. Earlier in the day Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) threatened to hold the Senate open for up to ten hours on Friday...

LOUISVILLE, KY – U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell Wednesday announced his appointments to the 12-member Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction tasked with reducing the deficit by $1.5 trillion more than the cuts already identified in the Budget Control Act. McConnell appointed Sens. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), and Rob Portman (R-Ohio). “Chronic joblessness, out-of-control deficits and debt, and an unprecedented credit downgrade represent an historic challenge but also an historic opportunity for lawmakers in Washington to show they can work together on a plan that puts America back on the path to prosperity. All three of these...

LOUISVILLE, KY – U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell Wednesday announced his appointments to the 12-member Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction tasked with reducing the deficit by $1.5 trillion more than the cuts already identified in the Budget Control Act. McConnell appointed Sens. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), and Rob Portman (R-Ohio). “Chronic joblessness, out-of-control deficits and debt, and an unprecedented credit downgrade represent an historic challenge but also an historic opportunity for lawmakers in Washington to show they can work together on a plan that puts America back on the path to prosperity. All three of these...

MAYFIELD — Republican U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell gave Kentucky Republicans a preview of next year’s presidential race and how his party will run against incumbent President Barack Obama at a pre-Fancy Farm breakfast of Republicans here.... McConnell didn’t directly address his part in negotiating a last-minute deal in the federal debt limit standoff, but he thanked his party for helping him rise to the position of Republican leader in the U.S. Senate, a position from which he helps decide some of the country’s most important debates.

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) was the steadying hand that helped President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) strike a deal to raise the debt ceiling. At a time when Boehner faced repeated insurrection from Tea Party-affiliated freshmen, McConnell calmed financial markets by declaring from the outset that GOP leaders would not allow the nation to default on its debt. Over the weekend, he helped seal a bipartisan deal to raise the debt ceiling and avert the danger of missing the Aug. 2 deadline set by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. McConnell’s actions have won plaudits from Democrats, but...

Monday, August 1, 2011 Everything Is OK Now Date: August 1, 2011 To: The Hubbard City Cafe From: Mitch McConnell and John Boehner (Your leaders in Washington) 1. We made an agreement with Obama, Biden, Reid, and Pelosi and avoided financial catastrophe by raising the debt ceiling beyond the 2012 Election. Don't worry. Everything is OK now. 2. OK, we agreed to gut the military with large spending cuts in the first phase of the agreement and with even larger cuts with the triggers in the second phase, but don't worry. We never follow through on our promises to cut...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Racing the clock to avoid a government default, President Barack Obama and Republican congressional leaders reached historic agreement Sunday night on a compromise to permit vital U.S. borrowing by the Treasury in exchange for more than $2 trillion in long-term spending cuts.

With the prospect of a government default just three days away, the White House entered intense negotiations with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on Saturday in a last-ditch bid to forge a bipartisan agreement to raise the federal debt limit.Shortly after 10 p.m., Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) announced that talks between McConnell (R-Ky.) and Vice President Biden had made significant progress, prompting Reid to delay a vote that had been scheduled for 1 a.m. Sunday on his own debt-limit measure.“There are negotiations going on at the White House to avert a catastrophic default on the nation’s debt,”...

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Saturday he and Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) are fully engaged with the White House on a debt deal and expressed optimism an agreement will be reached.  “I’ve spoken with the president and the vice president within the last hour and a half," McConnell said at a press conference with Boehner shortly after the House rejected Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's (D-Nev.) debt-ceiling plan.  "We are now fully engaged with the one person … who can sign a bill into law,” McConnell told reporters.  Fewer than three days before the Aug. 2 deadline for...

10:56am | Good Saturday morning. The House and Senate will convene at 1pm today. The House will likely go out of session after a vote on the Reid plan to raise the debt limit, while the Senate will stick around until 1 am Sunday to vote to end debate on the plan. Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/live-coverage-congressional-debt-ceiling-showdown-2011-7#ixzz1TbPkr4wi

MajoratNJ Boehner 2 of 2: "We are dealing with reasonable, responsible people who want this crisis to end as quickly as possible and I think we will.” 33 minutes ago

The Senate adjourned late Friday night without an agreed-upon framework for raising the debt limit. Shortly before this, a source passed to TPM a blueprint of what Democrats hope will be the way out of this imbroglio. It's a copy of what could be Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's final offer to Republicans in the debt limit standoff. The gist: Reid hopes to entice Republicans to support his plan in two ways. First, with slightly deeper cuts. Second, by adopting an idea, first proposed by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, that would delegate the authority to raise the debt limit...

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has revised his plan to raise the debt limit in a last-ditch bid to attract Republican support. The biggest change is that Reid would give the president almost unilateral power to raise the debt limit, borrowing an idea introduced by Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). Reid would have President Obama request a $2.4 trillion debt-limit increase in two installments of $1.2 trillion each. The requests would be subject to congressional resolutions of disapproval, but these would do little to restrict the president.

Shortly before the Senate adjourned late Friday without an agreed-upon framework to raise the debt limit, a source passed to TPM a copy of what may be the way out. It's a copy of what may be Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's final offer to Republicans in the debt limit standoff. The gist: Reid hopes to entice Republicans to support his plan in two ways. First, with slightly deeper cuts. Second, by adopting an idea, first proposed by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, that would delegate the authority to raise the debt limit to President Obama -- and give Congress...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: So this Politico piece. Maybe it's an opinion piece. I said it was a news story, because it's bylined. But it may well be a column. The headline is "The Tea Party's Terrorist Tactics." Before I get to this, let me show you what a coordinated thing this is. We have a media montage of Democrats (no media in here) talking about the Tea Party. Listen. STENY HOYER: (rotunda noise) The Republicans are holding hostage the credit of the United States of America. DEBBIE "BLABBERMOUTH" SCHULTZ: ...our Republican colleagues to hold our economy hostage. DINGY HARRY: The...

Let's not lose sight of anything here, the #1 prize for the Democrats is to get the debt ceiling where it doesn't have to be dealt with till after the 2012 election. That is what they want and what they're angling for. Enter Senator Mitch McCongame. As many have stated, his plan to give President Fool Sucka debt ceiling increase authority has sold us down the river. Why? Because Reid can use that and the weak tea Boner bill to come up with a compromise that basically cuts little to nothing and pushes the ceiling fight till after the election....

[Snip] The smart money in Washington continues to be on some hybrid of the Boehner/Reid/McConnell plans. If I had to place a bet now, I’d say the final deal looks something like this: Cuts: $1.2 trillion in discretionary spending cuts, with somewhat more of the total falling on defense spending than in Boehner’s bill and somewhat less of the total falling on defense spending than in Reid’s bill. Committee: The bipartisan “Supercommittee” will be formed and charged with developing a plan that cuts the deficit by $1.8 trillion or more. Unlike in Boehner’s plan, future debt-ceiling increases will not require...

The Washington Post's Jennifer Rubin reports that President Obama nixed a bipartisan debt agreement that was forged by leaders of the House and Senate over the weekend. If Jen's sources are correct, this would be a genuine political jaw-dropper: A Republican aide e-mails me: “The Speaker, Sen. Reid and Sen. McConnell all agreed on the general framework of a two-part plan. A short-term increase (with cuts greater than the increase), combined with a committee to find long-term savings before the rest of the increase would be considered. Sen. Reid took the bipartisan plan to the White House and the President...

First came the Biden talks. When those blew up, the Obama-Boehner talks took center stage. And when that failed, the McConnell-Reid talks looked promising. And after they faltered, the Obama-Boehner talks tried to find a new life. Now it’s all come down to the Boehner-Reid-Pelosi-McConnell talks to solve the debt crisis. Notably absent? The president. That’s not to say Saturday’s congressional takeover went well. In a frantic bid to avoid causing a worldwide economic disruption, debt negotiations have shifted wholly to Capitol Hill, as a frustrated President Barack Obama has taken a step back and allowed House and Senate leaders...

A House Republican who is in leadership called me tonight. He said what we are hearing about — the two tier plan — is “sh*t” and he’s blaming Boehner. He agrees that Boehner is getting nervous and wants a deal. But this two tier plan seems to be the Republicans’ initial offer. Harry Reid is headed that way. Many Democrats want more. So keep in mind for purposes of negotiations, House Republican leadership members are already referring to the starting point as “sh*t” and it will only get worse from here.

Walsh suggests that the success of his effort could have prompted the Gang of Six to unveil their proposal when they did as “a last-ditch effort to delay,” once it became clear that McConnell-Reid could not possibly pass the House. Beyond that, he says of the Gang’s plan, “I don’t think there’s anything there.”

Most Voters Fear Debt Deal Will Raise Taxes Too Much, Cut Spending Too Little Friday, July 22, 2011 While Washington wrangles over how to avoid defaulting on the government’s massive debt load, voters are worried the final deal will raise taxes too much but won't cut spending enough. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 62% of Likely U.S. Voters are worried more that Congress and President Obama will raise taxes too much rather than too little in any deal to end the debt ceiling debate. Just 26% fear they’ll raise taxes too little. Twelve percent (12%) aren’t...

A large umbrella group for Tea Party activists targeted Republican leaders Tuesday for what they called caving in on the deficit talks. The Tea Party Nation put House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on notice "for betraying the movement that put Republicans in charge of the lower chamber last year." In a press release, Tea Party Nation founder Judson Phillips drew a hard line for the Tea Party position. Phillips warned that his organization is on the lookout for Republicans voting to give away "more borrowing authority to President Obama" without also ensuring spending...

Congressional leadership reacted on Friday after House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio., ended debt limit talks with the White House.House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va.:"Tonight, months after we had begun negotiations with President Obama, Vice President Biden, and the Administration, Speaker Boehner and I are ending discussions with the White House and beginning conversations with Senate leaders in the hopes of finding a solution to the debt limit debate in order to avoid default. Throughout the months of discussions, we have worked to identify real spending cuts, binding budget reforms, structural changes to save our entitlement programs, and significant debt reduction....

Senator Mitch McConnell’s original suggestion for solving the nation’s debt ceiling dilemma outraged many of his fellow conservatives and would, if enacted in its initial form, have probably produced deep disgust in the public at large. After the angry immediate response from the GOP base, the Senate minority leader began re-tooling the scheme to make it far more viable and substantive, with the important addition of at least $1.4 trillion in budget cuts (over the next ten years) and a potentially promising mechanism for getting clear-cut, up-or-down votes for even more significant savings in the future. Most small government advocates...

A backup plan to raise the U.S. debt ceiling and avoid default could still lead to a negative outlook on the country's ratings, Moody's said, highlighting the plan's failure to substantially reduce the deficit. The back-up plan offered by Senator Mitch McConnell would avoid any immediate downgrade of the coveted U.S. triple-A rating, Moody's analyst Steven Hess told Reuters in an interview, bringing relief to investors who fear an imminent downgrade of the coveted U.S. triple-A rating. "But the numbers that are being discussed in terms of any possible deficit reduction coming out of this plan don't seem to be...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Republicans are showing far more flexibility than their tea party-backed House colleagues as Washington policymakers seek to steer the government away from a first-ever default on its financial obligations. As the House doubled down on a symbolic vote to condition any increase in the government's borrowing authority on congressional passage of a balanced budget constitutional amendment and a fresh wave of spending cuts, the warm reception by many Senate Republicans to a new bipartisan budget plan revealed a thawing in GOP attitudes on new tax revenues.

House Dem opposition rises against McConnell fallback planBy Mike Lillis - 07/20/11 11:29 AM ET House Democratic leaders are attacking Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (R-Ky.) debt-ceiling fallback plan, characterizing it as a political ruse intended to scapegoat Democrats and taint them at the polls. “I’m not a fan of the McConnell proposal,” Rep. Chris Van Hollen (Md.), the senior Democrat on the House Budget Committee, said Tuesday during a press briefing in the Capitol. “It’s designed to protect mostly Republican members of Congress from taking responsibility for votes that they’ve already made.” Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and...

President Barack Obama said Tuesday that a proposal offered by Republican and Democratic senators is “a very significant step” that represents “the potential for bipartisan consensus” on resolving the impasse over cutting the deficit and raising the debt ceiling. In an appearance in the White House briefing room, Obama urged congressional leaders to embrace the “Gang of Six” proposal, which would slash the deficit by $3.7 trillion over 10 years, in part by raising about $1 trillion in new revenue. We have a Democratic president and administration that is prepared to sign a tough package that includes both spending cuts,...