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President Barack Obama on Friday blamed dysfunction in Congress on a Republican Party he said is captive to an ideologically rigid, unproductive and cynical faction, urging like-minded Democrats to show up for November's midterm elections. Addressing Democratic donors at a fundraiser in Rhode Island and another in New York, Obama said Republicans had realized that blocking all progress led Americans to become cynical about government. Republicans consider that "a pretty good thing" because they don't believe in government to begin with, Obama said. "It doesn't have to be that way," Obama said during a barbecue in Purchase, New York. "There...

And What if Obama is a Marxist? WHAT IF HE IS MARXIST? Ken Blackwell 2/14/2014 Editor's Note: This column was coauthored by Bob Morrison. http://townhall.com/columnists/kenblackwell/2014/02/14/and-what-if-he-is-a-marxist-n1795046/print Well, what if the President is a Marxist? Stanley Kurtz was one of those cooler heads in 2008 who rejected the claim that Barack Obama was a Marxist, a socialist. Then, he researched the record and wrote Radical-in-Chief. Kurtz’s book is a long, detailed, and very carefully researched analysis of the Obama record. Kurtz finds Obama acknowledging in his own words, in Dreams from my Father, that he was mentored as a teen growing up...

Kerry: 'Root Cause of Terrorism' Is Poverty 'In many cases...' Jeryl Bier January 15, 2014 7:12 AM Secretary of State John Kerry covered a broad range of topics with his counterpart Pietro Parolin at the Vatican in Rome on Monday. Besides Syria, the Middle East peace process, Sudan, and Cuba, the subject of poverty came up during their discussions. In remarks following the meeting, Kerry linked poverty not only to terrorism, but to the "disenfranchisement of millions" [emphasis added]: We talked about the common interest of Pope Francis and President Obama in addressing poverty and extreme poverty on a global...

There isn't a majority that opposes the Affordable Care Act because it's too liberal, in fact, a good number of Americans don't think it's liberal enough. Today’s CNN poll (PDF) on the Affordable Care Act seems like a blow to supporters of the law. When asked if they “generally favor or generally oppose” the president’s health care overhaul, only 35 percent say they “favor.” The large majority—65 percent—say they “oppose.” For Republicans who have staked their entire message on opposition to Obamacare, this looks like vindication. Not only was the rollout a disaster, but now, the public has turned decisively...

These days the word is particularly toxic at the White House, where it has been hidden away to make the Affordable Care Act more palatable to the public and less a target for Republicans, who have long accused Democrats of seeking “socialized medicine.” But the redistribution of wealth has always been a central feature of the law and lies at the heart of the insurance market disruptions driving political attacks this fall. “Understand this is not a redistribution argument,” the president told his audience then. “This is not about taking from rich people to give to poor people. This is...

Obama Calls It 'a Cliche' to Say We're 'the Greatest Country on Earth' May 14, 2013 By Craig Bannister It's "a cliché" to say that America "is the greatest country on Earth," Pres. Obama told a DNC event in New York City on Monday. "And more than anything, what I will be striving for over the next three and a half years is to see if that spirit that I saw in Boston and West, Texas, if we can institutionalize that, if we can create a framework where everybody is working together and moving this country forward. "Now, the good...

How many times have you read financial-advice stories lecturing you to max-out on your IRA, save as much as you can in your 401(k), and even pay taxes now to change your regular IRA into a Roth IRA that will be tax-free until you die? Well, be careful how much you save. That's the message in President Obama's budget for fiscal 2014, which for the first time proposes to cap the amount Americans can save in these tax-sheltered investment vehicles. The White House explanation is that some people have accumulated "substantially more than is needed to fund reasonable levels of...

In the wake of the Daily Caller’s release of President Obama cheering Rev. Wright and invoking the race card in various ways, our friend Morgen Richmond decided the time was right to release some little-known Obama video of his own. He authorized me to release the video here first. The following clips are from 2002. Obama is speaking in a church at a 2002 Martin Luther King Jr. Day memorial service. The full speech is here, and by and large it is a nice speech by a rising politician. Obama speaks about the need for empathy in society, about taking...

By any objective standard, the only debate McCain won in 2008 was the "Joe the Plumber" debate. Why not revisit Joe the Plumber tonight and see how the average Joe is doing now compared to 4 years ago? I think it would be a good idea to inject him somewhere in the conversation.

The Obama campaign has launched its “For All” campaign, encouraging supporters to take pictures of themselves with their hands on their hearts and a note explaining why they support President Obama. Actress Jessica Alba uses the Pledge of Allegiance as an example of the campaign in an email to supporters. “Growing up, my classmates and I started every day with a ritual: We’d stand up, put our right hand over our hearts, and say the Pledge of Allegiance,” explains Alba. “To me, that gesture was a promise. A promise to be involved and engaged in this country’s future. A promise...

The White House suggested that an old tape of President Obama endorsing 'redistribution' is an attempt by Mitt Romney's campaign to change the subject. "I would say that all of us who follow politics and policy, whether we're on this side or your side of the podium have seen circumstances like this were a campaign is having a a very bad day or a very bad week," White House press secretary Jay Carney told reporters Wednesday. "In circumstances like that, there are efforts made, sometimes desperate efforts to change the subject," he said.

On her MSNBC program this afternoon, NBC News' Andrea Mitchell said the network would not air the clip of then-State Senator Barack Obama endorsing redistribution in 1988 because the network could not "authenticate" the clip. "Let's explain this redistribution issue because we have not authenticated this 14-year-old tape from Loyola College when Barack Obama was a state senator. So because we have not independently at NBC news and MSNBC authenticated it, we're not airing it," Mitchell said. "But the basic issue is they're accusing President Obama, as John Sununu said to be yesterday, of class warfare. That is trying to...

The official theme of the GOP convention Wednesday night was "We Can Change That," but that didn’t stop several of the speakers from revisiting Tuesday’s theme, the base-rallying battle cry: “We Built It.” The message: The righteous exploitation of President Obama’s “You Didn’t Build That” gaffe isn’t going away. Ever since the president stood before a crowd of supporters in Roanoke, Va., on July 13 and, while explaining why the wealthy should pay more in taxes, uttered the infamous words “If you've got a business—you didn't build that. Somebody else made that happen,” conservatives have hammered him for his disregard...

Guys, I have to let you in on a little secret: the election is already over. No, I haven’t got crazy (yet) and realize that election day is more than two months away. However, after watching the last six weeks of this trainwreck of a campaign, it is impossible to believe that Romney has any chance to win. He doesn’t, and Obama will be reelected. We can make such bold predictions by reviewing a few pieces of evidence. Romney’s campaign: These guys don’t have a clue, do they? Like most members of the observing public, I assumed that the Romney...

British MP George Galloway has created controversy in the UK for comments made about rape during a British radio broadcast. Galloway was discussing the sexual allegations against WikiLeaks mastermind Julian Assange in an episode of his "Good Night" podcast published on August 18th. The New Statesman has transcribed the controversial comments: Let's take woman A. Woman A met Julian Assange, invited him back to her flat [apartment], gave him dinner, went to bed with him, had consensual sex with him. Claims that she woke up to him having sex with her again. This is something which can happen, you know....

New Delhi: The Left may have staged protests during his visit but US President Barack Obama was "glad" to meet an Indian communist leader last evening. "I am glad to meet an Indian communist. I am told that communists have been part of the (Indian) political mainstream," Obama told CPM Politburo member Sitaram Yechury at the Rashtrapati Bhawan banquet as they were introduced and both shook hands. Yechury told Obama that the Indian communists have been in the political mainstream "throughout". Marking a departure from their past practice, leaders and MPs of the CPM and CPI, known for their anti-US...

MSNBC's Touré Neblett just can't resist tossing out the race card whenever possible. On Thursday's The Cycle, Touré accused presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney of using what he called "niggerization" against Barack Obama (video follows with transcript and commentary): KRYSTAL BALL, CO-HOST: So in addition to Romney’s whiteboard Medicare antics, he's also out with a new attack line on the President that he's been reiterating. Let's take a listen. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MITT ROMNEY: His campaign and his surrogates have made wild and reckless accusations that disgrace the office of the presidency. This is what an angry and desperate...

Now that President Obama and his apologists have spent a few days insisting – with increasing panic and desperation – that he didn’t say what he clearly said in Roanoke, Virginia, the spin itself has become a negative reflection on the President. He’s basically demanding that his supporters abandon their own senses, and the most elementary understanding of the English language, to un-hear his words, forget his contempt for individual achievement, and swallow him as a champion of the entrepreneurial spirit. “You didn’t build that” has become a sort of litmus test for pure, blind, unwavering faith in Barack Obama....

One month to the day after his infamous ‘you didn’t build that’ speech, President Obama’s description of wealthy people did not include “smart” or “hardworking,” as he instead ascribed their success to good luck. “If you’re lucky enough, and fortunate enough, and been blessed enough to be in the other two percent, the top two percent, you still get a tax cut for your first $250,000 of income,” Obama said during a campaign stop in Council Bluffs, Iowa. “All we’re saying is after that, maybe you can do a little bit more to help pay down this deficit and invest...