[Free Beacon] Former United Nations Ambassador Samantha Power's involvement in the unmasking by former Obama administration officials of sensitive national security information is raising red flags over what insiders view was an attempt by the former administration to undermine President Donald Trump and key figures on his team, according to current and former U.S. officials familiar with the situation.
Power appears to be central to efforts by top Obama administration officials to identify individuals named in classified intelligence community reports related to Trump and his presidential transition team, according to multiple sources.
The names of Trump allies in the raw intelligence reports were leaked to the press in what many in Congress and the current administration claim is an attempt by Obama allies and former officials to damage the White House.
The House Intelligence Committee, which is spearheading the investigation into these efforts, has issued subpoenas for Power and other top Obama administration figures, including former national security adviser Susan Rice, as part of congressional efforts to determine the source of these leaks.
Power's role in this unmasking effort is believed to be particularly questionable given her position as the U.N. ambassador, a post that does not typically require such sensitive unmasking activities, according to former U.S. officials and other sources familiar with the matter.
"Unmasking is not a regular occurrence--absolutely not a weekly habit. It is rare, even at the National Security Council, and ought to be rarer still for a U.N. ambassador," according to one former senior U.S. official who spoke to the Washington Free Beacon.
"It might be defended when the communication in question relates directly to U.N. business, for example an important Security Council vote," explained the former official, who would only discuss the matter on background. "Sometimes it might be done out of other motives than national security, such as sheer curiosity or to defend a bureaucratic position. Or just plain politics."
The Intelligence Committee's focus of Power and other key Obama officials is a prime example of the Obama administration's efforts to spy on those close to Trump, according to sources familiar with the ongoing investigation.
"The subpoena for Power suggests just how pervasive the Obama administration's spying on Americans actually was," said one veteran GOP political operative who has been briefed on the matter by senior Congressional intelligence officials. "The U.N. ambassador has absolutely no business calling for the quantity and quality of the intelligence that Power seems to have been asking for."
The source questioned why Power would need to uncover such classified intelligence information in her role at the U.N.
#4
Power appears to be central to efforts by top Obama administration officials to identify individuals named in classified intelligence community reports related to Trump and his presidential transition team, according to multiple sources
I'll argue that the practice went on long before that: 2009 or so.
[JSONLINE] Timm Kopp is a letter carrier from Marshfield and a whistle-blower who will take center stage Wednesday in Washington, D.C., at a hearing on political campaigning by postal workers.
Kopp's complained that certain postal workers were taking leave without pay to work for union political campaigns and that the absences caused operational problems. That prompted an investigation by the U.S Office of Special Counsel.
The counsel concluded that the U.S. Postal Service was in violation of the Hatch Act, which restricts political activity of federal employees while on the job. The investigation found that the Postal Service did not take political sides but sought to maintain good relations with the union.
"I didn't expect it to get to this point," Kopp told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. "All I wanted was an explanation on a few things. This needs to be fixed and needs to be taken care of so the Post Office does not look biased."
Kopp will testify to the Senate Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs Committee chaired by Republican U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin.
The counsel's investigation found the Postal Service and National Association of Letter Carriers had a long-standing practice of letting workers take "union official" leave without pay.
The union provided to a USPS labor relations official lists of letter carriers to participate in the AFL-CIO's Labor 2016 program. That program sought to "elect Hillary Clinton ... former first lady, former secretary of state, former presidential candidate, sometimes described by her supporters as the smartest woman in the world, usually described by the rest of us as a crook... and pro-worker candidates across the country."
The lists were sent to USPS middle managers, who interpreted them as directives, the investigation found. Despite objections by some local postal supervisors, the mid-level managers instructed those on the lists be allowed to take a leave.
Ninety-seven carriers participated in the program, mainly in six states, Wisconsin, Florida, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania. Letter carriers were reimbursed for the leave by the union's political action committee.
Kopp, a union member, said he was concerned that his office in Marshfield would be short-staffed when a fellow employee announced he was going to take a leave for five weeks to do union activity. Kopp said a supervisor told him that he was going to deny the request because of staffing issues. Later, Kopp said the supervisor told him that "people higher up the chain" gave instructions to let the employee take a leave.
Kopp said he made calls to union officials, expressing his concerns.
"I was told that this was how it's always been done and we are trying to get people in office who will help the Postal Service get favorable legislation passed," Kopp said in written testimony.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/20/2017 00:00 ||
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#1
Another great reason to live in the country: No one has ever knocked on my door to ask / coach me on my voting. I guess us redencks just ain't worth the trouble. Hell, the Jeehovah's Witnesses find time to knock on my door...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
07/20/2017 6:53 Comments ||
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#2
the Jeehovah's Witnesses find time to knock on my door
Just tell them you're late for Mass (that's what I used to do in Los Alamos)
#3
If they took leave without pay it's really nobody's business what they did on that leave. It's the bosses fault for not ensuring everyone left at the same time so that the workload wasn't covered.
#4
If they took leave without pay it's really nobody's business what they did on that leave.
EXCEPT - someone else had to do the work. That meant 'overtime'! So instead of getting paid time, someone is getting double pay. So someone got paid, while the work still got done at the party headquarters.
[FOXNEWS] The former head of the Democratic Party who lost her post in the fallout from a massive email breach is expected to start cooperating with federal Sherlocks in a separate cybersecurity case, after months of apparent stonewalling. Finally got it scrubbed, huh?
Fox News has learned that Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz ...Congresswoman from Florida, the abrasive chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee. She has been a politician since 1992, and prior to that was in training as a political science major. Her primary accomplishment seems to be that she's Jewish... plans to allow federal Sherlocks to scan a laptop belonging to her as part of a complex probe into allegations of computer theft, over-billing and possible email hacking.
U.S. Capitol Police have had the laptop for months and until now had been unable to get access. It's unclear why the Florida politician and ousted Democratic National Committee chairwoman had been battling law enforcement over the computer; however, her counsel began negotiating this week with Capitol Police in connection with the probe.
At least five IT contractors who worked for dozens of House Democrats including Wasserman Schultz purportedly took hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of computer equipment and potentially hacked into the politicians’ email accounts.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/20/2017 00:00 ||
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Excerpt:Wasserman Schultz has refused to fire Imran even though he’s been banned from the House network, and he’s been seen in the Capitol complex since the ban, sources told TheDCNF, raising questions of whether he could tamper with evidence.
Soon after Imran began working for Wasserman Schultz in 2005, four of his relatives — including younger brothers Abid and Jamal — appeared on the payrolls of other House Democrats at inflated salaries, adding up to $4 million since 2009.
#11
"God's" term limits. It's a symptom of the death of the old republic when those in office have to literally die off to allow the orderly transfer of power.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
07/20/2017 10:46 Comments ||
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#13
If it really is glioblastoma, then he's dead. Just a matter of time, and not much time at that. The question is whether he will resign, or hold onto his seat until the icy hand of death wrenches it from his white-knuckled grip.
#17
Damn, he must have pissed off God to get the Ted Kennedy treatment going out.
Posted by: Charles ||
07/20/2017 12:13 Comments ||
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#18
If I ever contract glioblastoma I hope I am a U.S. Senator.
Posted by: regular joe ||
07/20/2017 12:31 Comments ||
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#19
Copied:
Medical professional here. Really sad to hear he has GBM. Here's a quick run-down:
1) Occurs most often in old people, but can happen in younger people. Prognosis is worse in the elderly (>65), McCain is 81. Median survival with treatment is ~12 months in the latest studies (I earlier reported some data from a couple years ago that was lower). More on that below if you find that kind of stuff interesting.
2) We've got no real idea how to treat this well. Old people sometimes get less aggressive treatment, which perhaps contributes to their worse prognosis. Most common option is just to throw things at it: Surgery to remove the cancer, then followed by radiation and/or chemotherapy. In the elderly the radiation/chemo is sometimes not done because the toxicity is high and the added benefit is less. There are new clinical trials being tested, nothing has been promising so far but sometimes if you have a specific mutation in your cancer you can get lucky.
3) Really rough disease, recurrence is extremely common and occurs within a year. Patients have seizures, headaches, nausea. As it progresses you'll get incontinence, increased falls, and eventually delirium.
My heart goes out to his family. :(
Edit: There's been debate about the prognosis, I'm including this here from a comment I made:
Which study are you seeing 17 +/- 5 months in? I'm no GBM specialist by any stretch, but the data I've seen is <12 months median survival with full treatment.
1) Rusthoven et al (2016) did a large retrospective study (n = 16,717) and Overall Survival was 9.0 months with combined therapy. Granted "combined" included patients who only received 2 combinations, but still I haven't seen great numbers for older patients with GBM.
2) Babu et al (2016) got 12 months, up to 14.1 in those with gross total resection. But this was looking at only 120 patients.
3) Franceschi et al (2016) got 11.1 months, though a subtype with MGMT methylation got up to 17.2. But this was even smaller (N <30) and done in italy.
I've seen some good looking stuff with bevacizumab, supposedly Babu got patients median survival of 20 months with bevacizumab + XRT + surgery, but I haven't seen numbers that good anywhere else so I'm not sure if its consistent with the other data. One can speculate that it's higher but I err on the side of conservatism and would want to see better data before making that claim.
#21
#14 Been reading comments from around the Interwebs. Nobody likes the guy. How did he keep getting elected?
McCain leveraged his POW experience in the Hanoi Hilton to the max in his campaign. Made it sound what he endured then was extremely patriotic, a real tear jerker messaging campaign. His campaign people honed that message to a T. Tried to make you feel like a slob for not voting him.
#25
Cranston - dead
DeConcini - alive
McCain - alive
Glenn - dead
Riegle - alive
Different set of laws for Senators as opposed to the rest of us - very alive
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
07/20/2017 18:04 Comments ||
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#26
What I'm really looking forward to is Meggie Moo's matriculation at Smoking Gun once her 15 minutes are up.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
07/20/2017 18:12 Comments ||
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Is 78-year-old "Auntie""Mescaline" Maxine Waters seriously going to make a run for the White House in 2020?
Speculation is increasing as it’s revealed the California congresswoman and darling of Trump haters nationwide will be making an appearance in the early presidential primary state of New Hampshire on Sunday.
"According to an invitation, obtained by WMUR from Democratic sources, Waters will be in the state on July 23 for the picnic to be held at the Miller Farm in New Durham," WMUR reports, where she will hobnob with the Strafford County Democratic Committee.
President Trump has been a favorite punching bag for Waters, who seems to spin a new conspiracy theory about his administration and aides every few days.
Waters has been intentionally antagonistic towards the president’s supporters, as well.
During a screed on the House floor in March, Waters played the race card and the patriotism card against supporters of the president.
Bring...it...on...PLEASE
Posted by: Vast Right Wing Conspiracy ||
07/20/2017 08:24 ||
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#1
Maxine, Camela, Kasick, 5 or 6 dem senators who are afraid they won't get re-elected. Game of clones...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
07/20/2017 8:57 Comments ||
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[Washington Examiner] Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein suggested Wednesday that former FBI Director James Comey broke agency protocol by leaking memos to the press about his meetings with President Trump.
"As a general proposition, you have to understand the Department of Justice. We take confidentiality seriously, so when we have memoranda about our ongoing matters, we have an obligation to keep that confidential," Rosenstein said on Fox News after being asked if it would ever be proper for an FBI director to take notes on a meeting with the president and then leak them to the press.
Rosenstein stressed he wouldn't answer direct questions about Comey. But when asked if he would approve of Comey's leak, he reiterated the duty of offiicals to keep things confidential. "I think it is quite clear," he said. "It's what we were taught, all of us prosecutors and agents."
The second-highest justice official defended special counsel Robert Mueller, who he appointed to oversee a probe of possible collusion between Trump's campaign associates and Russia. Rosenstein indicated the appointment was not a conflict of interest to that investigation.
[Hot Air] Ohio Gov. John Kasich wants Congress to "fix" Obamacare’s insurance exchanges with more federal spending, he explained in a New York Times op-ed.
"Congress should first focus on fixing the Obamacare exchanges before it takes on Medicaid," Kasich wrote, insisting that the federal government "provide adequate tax credits" to prop up the failed law.
Kasich has criticized the House’s American Health Care Act (AHCA) and the Senate’s Better Care Reconciliation Act (BCRA) at every step in the legislative process, penning opinion columns and making TV appearances to demand more spending and a slower phase-out of Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion.
When AHCA took shape as a package of delayed health insurance reforms well short of a full Obamacare repeal, Kasich attacked it from the left. Even as it became clear that BCRA was in some respects less ambitious than AHCA, Kasich attacked it from the left, too.
#1
Of course he thinks so. He expanded Medicaid in Ohio with federal Obamacare funds -- against the shrieks of the financial conservatives, as I recall, but he is so clever he ignored them -- and now he is looking at the funds drying up while the responsibility remains.
#2
He was at the far lower end of the 17 presidential candidate losers, 17th I believe. Appears he's still holding steady at number 17. Whiny bastid. Never liked him, never cared for him either.
#5
Never get tired of remembering angry readhead guy in parking lot who said "People who died on 9-11 got what they deserved." Typical buckeye, Kasick voter most likely...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
07/20/2017 9:10 Comments ||
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#6
Long ago as a congressman, then a talking head, Kasich posed as a conservative (balanced budgets, etc.) Then last year he demonstrated his room-temperature IQ in his presidential/vice-presidential campaign. He's now dropped the mask to reveal just another RINO libtard toad.
#7
He was the darling of the NeverTrumpers after Bush and Rubio went by the wayside in the 2016 primary. I remember how he kept campaigning long after it was clear to everybody that he didn't have a chance. I always thought he was Jeb Lite as if Jeb wasn't milquetoast enough.
No, John. We don't want to squander even more trillions of dollars on this failed monstrosity. We are not Sweden. We don't want to be Sweden or England or Cuba. Let it die.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
07/20/2017 11:00 Comments ||
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#8
He kept campaigning to prevent Cruz from getting the nod. Worked about as well as everyone not in DC, Cali, or NY thought it would.
Posted by: Charles ||
07/20/2017 12:20 Comments ||
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#9
I thought he was campaigning to keep Trump from getting the nod. Anyway, what a tool.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
07/20/2017 14:28 Comments ||
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#10
#5 Never get tired of remembering angry readhead guy in parking lot who said "People who died on 9-11 got what they deserved." Typical buckeye, Kasick voter most likely...
Posted by M. Murcek
---
Our alternative was Ted Srickland.
What choice did we have? Other than moving out of state - which is what many of us do after retirement.
[THEHILL] Rep. Elijah Cummings ...Representative-for-life from Maryland, representing half of Baltimore City, which makes his district ultra-safe, and most of Howard County, which is out-populated by the city. Cummings' politix are so liberal they're tedious... (D-Md.) slammed President Trump's voter fraud panel on Wednesday, arguing that the real motive behind the presidential commission was to "suppress the vote."
In a series of tweets, Cummings went after the commission for not investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election and accused the panel's vice chairman, Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, of not respecting voters' personal information.
"How can you investigate 'election integrity' w/o investigating voter suppression & Russian interference in the 2016 election?" Cummings tweeted.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/20/2017 00:00 ||
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#1
We need another watermark: Liar
he knows there was no collusion, or interference, he knows it will not suppress the vote (in fact it will do the opposite -and that terrifies him!).
He is deliberately, and with full knowledge, telling a falsehood. Lying.
[FREEBEACON] Former Vice President Al Gore Former Vice President, Nobel Prize winner, and crazed sex poodle Al Gore told a crowd at Borough of Manhattan Community College on Tuesday night that he would like to see a single-payer health care system implemented in the United States.
Gore was speaking at an event to promote his new climate change documentary, but went off-topic to discuss health insurance companies and how they have failed to offer cost-effective coverage to Americans, according to HuffPost.
"The private sector has not shown any ability to provide good, affordable health care for all," Gore said. "I believe we ought to have single-payer health care."
Gore's statement makes him one of the first prominent Democrats to publicly support the so-called "Medicare-for-all" plan that Sen. Bernie Sanders ...The only openly Socialist member of the U.S. Senate. Sanders was Representative-for-Life from Vermont until moving to the Senate for the rest of his life in 2006, assuming the seat vacated by Jim Jeffords... (I., Vt.) has been publicly advocating. Gore's call for a single-payer plan came after Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) was unable to pass the Republican health care bill to replace Obamacare ... aka the Affordable Care Act, an ineptly designed and worse executed piece of legislation designed to bring 17 percent of the U.S. economy under the direct control of the government. The previous iteration, known as Hillarycare, was laughed out of Washington. This stinker was passed on a party-line vote without being read... this week.
McConnell could not rally enough Republican senators to pass the bill. With Senate Republicans lacking the votes to repeal Obamacare without a replacement, President Donald Trump ...New York real estate developer, described by Dems as illiterate, racist, misogynistic, and what ever other unpleasant descriptions they can think of, elected by the rest of us as 45th President of the United States... suggested on Twitter that they should just let Obamacare fail on its own terms.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/20/2017 00:00 ||
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#1
I call on Al Gore to start a shotgun tasting business!
#4
Extortion funded treatment rationing is the worst system funded in the worst way.
The only reason for it is to try and buy the votes of the staff who'll now have sinecures.
What you saw happening in universities with actual learning for students becoming an irrelevance will happen in healthcare where the staff will ration out the minimum treatment they can get away with while virtue signaling on the taxpayer's dime.
#8
How about all former and current and future government workers lose their high-end, fat-cat, one-percent nearly-free health care and fall into the same system as the rest of us?
Is that what they mean by "single payer"? Why not push "Al's Single Plan"?
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/20/2017 11:39 Comments ||
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#9
He's alive? I thought ManBearPig killed him years ago.
Posted by: Charles ||
07/20/2017 12:22 Comments ||
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#10
Al.
Go.
Away.
Now.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
07/20/2017 12:53 Comments ||
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#11
He's got a $ angle somewhere
Mullah, that's why he won't go away. Unfortunately.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
07/20/2017 14:31 Comments ||
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#12
Consider that this jewel of an a$$hole was almost President, and consider the gems we have been offered by the Democrats over time, Hildabeest, Champ, WillieBoy, Carter, and then the forecast for whats ahead, McAwful, Princess Fauxcahontas, the California Viper, .... how can anyone with an IQ above room temp vote for these people.....oh wait, its about OPM (other people's money)!
[TheFederalist] In a recent interview with Rolling Stone magazine, tech millionaire turned LGBTQ activist Tim Gill said he’s aiming to punish Christians who don’t want to participate in same-sex weddings.
For more than two decades, the software programmer has poured an estimated $422 million into various gay rights causes. After the Supreme Court ruled gay marriage legal in all 50 states in 2015, Gill turned his attention and resources to targeting Christians.
The election of Donald Trump, who claims to support gay rights but stocked his administration with anti-LGBTQ extremists, has only emboldened those looking to erase the gains of the past decade. Gill refuses to go on the defense. ’We’re going into the hardest states in the country,’ he says. ’We’re going to punish the wicked.’ Might want to be a little careful with that, Bub.
Allow me to add some context. After the Obergefell ruling in 2015, which forced all 50 states to perform same-sex marriages, several state legislatures passed protections to ensure that those who object to participating in a same-sex wedding for religious reasons have recourse when hauled into courts or extralegal commissions for this belief. It’s these state laws that Gill and his various nonprofit entities have decided to go after -- and persecute Christians along the way.
Here’s how Rolling Stone -- a magazine with a history of throwing journalistic ethics and pesky things like truth and accuracy out the window to advance a narrative that fits their agenda -- describes religious freedom restoration acts (RFRA): "Under the guise of right-to-worship protections, these bills offer legal cover for individuals and businesses to deny service or otherwise discriminate against LGBTQ people," Rolling Stone’s Andy Kroll wrote.
Except that’s not at all what religious freedom restoration acts are. For one thing, religious Americans still serve gay customers in myriad capacities, just as they do every other customer. Their objections are to being forced to use their artistic talents to proclaim particular speech they find fundamentally false or to be required to participate in a religious ceremony that conflicts with their consciences. As Sean Davis has explained, these laws simply ask that judges use a simple balancing test when ruling on cases involving a person’s religious freedom.
...
Last year, the Gill Foundation set up a group to wrangle corporate support in going after religious freedom proponents in Georgia. Called "Georgia Prospers," the fake grassroots effort organized protests against a religious freedom restoration act that passed the state legislature. The pressure from the corporate-backed endeavor dissuaded Georgia’s governor from signing the bill -- a victory for the wealthy activist.
The group also opposed North Carolina’s bathroom bill, which barred cities from passing laws that would force businesses to allow customers and employees to use restrooms that are not consistent with their biological sex.
Along the way, Christian business owners have been maligned and demonized for not wanting to participate in a same-sex wedding. In Colorado, a cake baker was forced to change his company’s policies and provide training to staff after he objected to baking a cake for a gay couple. A Christian couple was slapped with a $13,000 fine for refusing to host a same-sex wedding on their property. People threatened to burn a pizza shop to the ground after its owners answered that they would happily serve gay customers, they just wouldn’t want to cater a gay wedding should they be asked to do so. So, if a Lib doesn't agree with conservative traditions it is now "wicked"? Any dissension, of course, is anti-LGBTQXYZ....
Posted by: Vast Right Wing Conspiracy ||
07/20/2017 00:00 ||
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#1
He's probably marching right now
for the gay Nazis or something.
#3
It is miraculous how the conquerers of the Christian faith end up completely conquered. Case and point: the Romans crucified Christ himself. However, what city has been the world headquarters of the Catholic Church for a millenia since that day? Rome.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Hillary Clinton
[Washington Examiner] Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein suggested Wednesday that former FBI Director James Comey broke agency protocol by leaking memos to the press about his meetings with President Trump.
[Hot Air] Ohio Gov. John Kasich wants Congress to "fix" Obamacare’s insurance exchanges with more federal spending, he explained in a New York Times op-ed.
[THEHILL] Rep. 
Former Vice President, Nobel Prize winner, and crazed sex poodle Al Gore
