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Sunday, March 1, 2015

a Cpac lesson: How Rand Paul could be like Reagan

President Barack Obama's effort to bridge the trust deficit between African-Americans and law enforcement, the money wars heading into 2016, a little CPAC history and a "do not reply" mandate fill our Sunday trip around the "Inside Politics" table: Rand Paul won his third consecutive CPAC presidential straw poll this weekend, and most political journalists yawned -- and understandably so. There have been 20 previous CPAC straw polls, and only in four of those cases has the winner ended up as the Republican presidential nominee.

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Top conservative says Boehner's job is safe

Rep. Jim Jordan, the Ohio Republican who chairs the hard-line House Freedom Caucus, said Sunday that Boehner's decision to advance a one-week measure to keep the Department of Homeland Security funded without including the attack on President Barack Obama's immigration actions that the right wanted -- but that the Senate couldn't pass -- won't cost the speaker his job. Jordan's comments come amid reports that Boehner's allies are afraid he'll face a challenge from his party's right flank after he agreed to drop the attack on Obama's move to forestall some deportations in order to forestall a looming DHS shutdown.

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Interior secretary signs water agreement for northern Nevada

Interior Secretary Sally Jewell has signed an agreement to end longstanding water disputes between the federal government and the Shoshone-Paiute Tribes of the Duck Valley Indian Reservation on the Nevada-Idaho border. The agreement signed Friday by Jewell guarantees water rights for the tribes while providing certainty for upstream water users of the East Fork of the Owyhee River.

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Boehner allies downplay GOP rift

House Speaker John Boehner and his top lieutenants are downplaying the rift among Republicans that was exposed during last week's intense wrangling over funding for the Department of Homeland Security. "We have 435 members.

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White House vows to veto bill mandating congressional review of Iran deal

The bill, which was introduced Friday by leading senators from both parties, would keep the president from suspending sanctions on Iran for 60 days while Congress considers any deal. "The president has been clear that now is not the time for Congress to pass additional legislation on Iran," Bernadette Meehan, the spokeswoman for the National Security Council, said in an email.

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Real TIME: Rand Paul Wins CPAC Straw Poll

Rand Paul won the straw poll at the Conservative Political Action Conference for the third year in a row on Saturday. The Senator from Kentucky won with 26% of the vote.

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Washington tensions rise ahead of Netanyahu's speech

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prayed at the Western Wall in the Old City of Jerusalem just before departing for his trip to the U.S., where he will deliver a controversial speech to a joint session of Congress. Tensions ahead of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Tuesday speech to a joint session of Congress appeared to mount Sunday, with a top Senate Democrat calling the premier "arrogant" for his planned address.

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Wisconsin's Walker admits flip on immigration

Gov. Scott Walker once envisioned a world where the 11 million immigrants living in the country illegally could embark on a path to citizenship. "I don't believe in amnesty," Walker told "Fox News Sunday."

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Reaping the Whirlwind

President Obama has been opposed almost entirely down the line by Republicans ever since their leaders met at the high-dollar Caucus Room restaurant the night of Obama's inauguration on Jan. 20, 2009, to plan their opposition. Over steaks and cocktails, they pledged to use every parliamentary trick to deny the new president any accomplishments.

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Republicans' fast-shifting presidential horserace

In the space-time continuum of U.S. presidential politics, a year can be an eternity. Ask the guys who delivered speeches at a just-concluded annual gathering of conservatives.

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Dianne Feinstein hopes "some diplomacy can prevail" with Putin

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-California, discusses the assassination of Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov and what it means for the region.

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Boehner: U.S. is just "poking [ISIS] in the nose"

Although he said he tries to support President Obama on foreign policy, House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio didn't hold back on criticism of the president's strategy to defeat the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria in an interview on CBS' "Face the Nation" Sunday. "These are barbarians.

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Rand Paul defies foreign policy critics at CPAC

Speaking at CPAC on Friday Republican Senator Rand Paul defended his foreign policy views, which are at odds with the more hawkish stand of most of his potential 2016 rivals. Press CTRL+C (Windows), CMD+C (Mac), or long-press the URL below on your mobile device to copy the code

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GOPer who spoke to white supremacists: Republicans 'continue to ...

House Majority Whip Steve Scalise insisted on Sunday that Republicans were building relationships with the minority communities after the news broke that he had once spoken to a white supremacist group founded by former Klu Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke. Late last year, a Washington Post report revealed that the Louisiana Republican had attended an event in 2002 for the European-American Unity and Rights Organization , which has been classified by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a "hate group."

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Upscale NY suburb embroiled in a wily debate over coyotes

This well-heeled hamlet north of New York City is embroiled in an increasingly nasty debate that seems oddly out of place amid the stately homes and tony boutiques: What should be done about coyotes? Self-styled coyote spotters in and around Chappaqua have counted 160 incursions into backyards and streets over the last two years and at least 10 recent attacks on pets. That's been enough to stir animal passions among residents over the question of when and if a coyote deserves to be killed.

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Congress' dysfunction not limited to Homeland Security fight

Congress' dysfunction isn't limited to the struggle to keep a Cabinet department running without interruption. Lawmakers couldn't finish their work last year and it's showing now.

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Quote of the Day: Secret Scheming Places of Tea...

From Republican Rep. Devin Nunes, on the tactics of tea partiers who are holding up the DHS funding bill over their increasingly pointless insistence that it include a provision repealing President Obama's immigration program: While conservative leaders are trying to move the ball up the field, these other members sit in exotic places like basements of Mexican restaurants and upper levels of House office buildings, seemingly unaware that they can't advance conservatism by playing fantasy football with their voting cards. Get Mother Jones by Email - Free.

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Obama invoking civil rights struggles past and present

In the first week of March Obama plans to ... WASHINGTON - For President Barack Obama, it's a week to invoke America's civil rights struggles from past to present. The nation's first black president plans a speech Saturday from the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, the site of one of the movement's stirring moments, and will refocus on last year's fatal shooting by a white police officer of a black 18-year-old in Ferguson, Missouri.

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Kerry asks for benefit of the doubt on Iran nuclear talks

Secretary of State John Kerry on Sunday tried to calm tensions with Israel before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's congressional address, yet insisted the Obama administration's diplomatic record with Iran entitles the U.S. to "the benefit of the doubt" as negotiators work toward a long-term nuclear deal. Kerry said in an interview broadcast before he left for more talks in Switzerland with Iran's foreign minister that Netanyahu was welcome to speak in the U.S. and that the administration did not want the event "turned into some great political football."

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Inside Texas Politics

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick talked tax cuts and transportation this morning. Increasing the homestead exemption to reduce property taxes hasn't happened in Inside Texas Politics Lt.

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Calling a political opponent 'unpatriotic' is unpatriotic: Christine M. Flowers

When I was about 11 or 12, I saw a made-for-television movie called "The Man Without A Country." It was based on a short story written by Edward Everett Hale, and told the story of a man who - angered at being tried for treason against the United States - spouted out in the middle of the trial, "I wish I may never hear of the United States again!" In punishment, the astounded judge grants him his wish: He is found guilty and sentenced to spend the rest of his life on U.S. Navy warships.

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Shocking Report: Obama Threatened To Shoot Down Israeli Jets Targeting Iran

In a shocking report, a Kuwaiti newspaper is claiming that President Barack Obama once threatened to shoot down Israeli jets if they went through with a plan to target Iranian nuclear sites. Citing "well-placed sources," Al-Jarida claims that sometime in 2014, the Israeli government made plans to attack Iran when they heard that the United States and Iran were on the cusp of striking a secret nuclear deal behind Israeli's back.

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GOP Blocking DHS Funding Is 'Delusional,' Rep. King Says

House Homeland Security Committee member Rep. Peter King today called some members of his Republican caucus "self-righteous and delusional" for opposing a bill that would fund the Department of Homeland Security. "I said the other night, when I was at the Republican meeting, that they are self-righteous and delusional," King said on "This Week" of the Republican contingent holding up the bill because of their opposition to President Obama's executive action on immigration.

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a Cpac history lesson: How Rand Paul is like Reagan

GOP pushes budget plan, contentious issues in Legislature

Republican lawmakers who have firm control on the Statehouse are pushing ahead with a series of contentious issues as they head into the second half of the legislative session. Lawmakers appear determined to allow the replacement of Democratic schools Superintendent Glenda Ritz as the state Board of Education's leader.

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Faulconer gets high marks

A new U-T San Diego/10News poll asked 501 registered voters in San Diego for their views on Kevin Faulconer after a year in office.

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Wisconsin's Walker: Sure, Obama loves his country

Gov. Scott Walker still hasn't spoken with President Barack Obama about the president's love for America, but the possible contender for the Republican nomination now has an opinion on the subject. Wisconsin's governor tells "Fox News Sunday" that Obama or "anybody else who is willing to put their name on the ballot certainly has to have the love for country to do that."

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Cartoon - Making Netanyahu Uncomfortable

A tag is a way to search for this diary. If someone is searching for "Barack Obama," is this a diary they'd be trying to find? Use a person's full name, without any title.

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File under: It almost makes sense

Last week, two alcoholic bears who have been living in squalor for 20 years next to a bar in Sochi were ordered by a Russian court to pack up and go into rehab. A place in central Transylvania -- one that has a lot of experience with retired boozing circus dancing bears, of course -- stepped up and offered to put the duo on a 12-step regimen.

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Sierra Leone VP Quarantined for Ebola Virus

In case you were wondering, Ebola is still a thing, and it's still tearing West Africa apart. The latest manifestation of this is the Vice President of Sierra Leone putting himself in voluntary quarantine after one of his security guards died of Ebola .

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