Jeryl Bier

Tolerating scoundrels is a bipartisan weakness.

Really.

Merch.

Louis Farrakhan isn’t the only radical lurking in the background of the No. 2 official in the DNC.

A new round of demonstrations against the regime launched over the weekend.

The Nation of Islam's Louis Farrakhan continued his pattern of fighting fire with fire this week, striking back at his perceived enemies in a scorching, three-hour sermon entitled "Unmasking Satan" at the Mosque Maryam in Chicago. "[Y]ou and I are going to have to learn to distinguish between the…

The organization that says it’s disinterested in its clients’ reproductive choices has almost no information on its website about adoption, for some reason.

The SPLC’s haphazard reporting.

The D.C. Council member passed out copies of the Nation of Islam’s publication featuring 9/11 truther theories.

It doesn’t look that way.

The Trump era has been very good for the group’s fundraising efforts.

Federal authorities seized and shutdown Backpage.com

Early in March, the Congressional Progressive Caucus met in Baltimore for its Strategy Summit 2018. Participants came from a wide range of liberal, progressive, and left-leaning groups and included individuals such as House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Women's March co-founder Linda Sarsour,…

Two days after tweeting a link to an uplifting story in the New York Times about experimental prenatal surgery to treat a baby boy for spina bifida, Planned Parenthood of Maryland deleted the tweet. The article about the "small person who had surgery before he was even born" was a follow up on an…

As the deadline draws closer for the Trump administration to decide whether or not to certify Iranian compliance with the 2015 nuclear deal and another decision on sanctions, U.S. aerospace giant Boeing will be watching with extreme interest. The outcome has the potential to scuttle a pair of…

The new year is less than a week old, and so far, the U.S.-led coalition against ISIS is reporting there have been no strikes against the terrorist group ISIS in Iraq. A single strike on New Year's Eve day near Bayji, Iraq was the last such attack. The four days with no strikes matches a previous…

The Trump administration stumbled a bit out of the gate with its response to the ongoing anti-government protests in Iran, but quickly recovered with strong expressions of support for peaceful protesters and condemnation of the Iranian regime. After a day of silence on Friday, a State Department…

When the Congressional Accountability Act (CAA) passed in 1995, the vote was 98-1 in the Senate and 390-0 in the House. However, in light of recent allegations of sexual misconduct against Rep. John Conyers and a settlement with at least one former staffer, the "accountability" promised by the…

Longtime congressman and civil rights icon John Conyers is under fire for a previously undisclosed settlement with a former staffer who claimed she was fired for rejecting Conyers's sexual advances. Buzzfeed broke the story that after the woman was fired in 2014, she filed a complaint with…

In the wake of the New York City truck attack that killed eight and for which ISIS claimed responsibility, President Donald Trump tweeted that "the Military has hit ISIS 'much harder' over the last two days." However, there is no direct evidence of a spike in anti-ISIS strikes, and the broader…

The man in charge of internal security of the nation's intelligence services says there is so much leaking of classified information right now that "we’re not dealing with it." Bill Evanina, the director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center made the admission in a recent…

The Southern Poverty Law Center invests almost 20 percent of its nearly $320 million endowment fund in offshore equities and other investments. The 2016 annual report of the Alabama-based civil rights organization reports $69,093,576 of "non-U.S. equity funds" among the assets comprising the total…

Several websites pushed out a fresh accusation of plagiarism against First Lady Melania Trump—and once again, the alleged source for the supposedly ill-gotten words is former First Lady Michelle Obama.

Two U.S. Army soldiers were killed and another five injured in Iraq Sunday while "conducting combat operations" according to a U.S. Central Command news release. A CENTCOM official told THE WEEKLY STANDARD that the Army artillery unit was engaged in a "counter-fire mission against an ISIS mortar…

President Trump has made no secret of his plans to dramatically reduce both the budget of the State Department and the size of its workforce. The department is now preparing for those eventualities with some innovative and unconventional ideas, including "crowd sourcing... via the Internet" and…

Planned Parenthood has long been known for its frank, scientific, and matter-of-fact advice on how parents should talk to their kids about their bodies and sex. But the organization's recently revamped website has scrapped biological explanations for male-female distinctions in favor of a…

On Monday, the Trump administration issued a warning to the Syrian regime. If Syria conducted another chemical weapons attack, the regime would "pay a heavy price," the White House said. It was a sign that President Trump intends to enforce the "red line" President Obama threatened Bashar al-Assad…

On Monday secretary of Defense James Mattis appeared to break with the Obama administration's position of the preceding eight years that there is "no military solution" to the conflict in Afghanistan. At an appearance with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and the Defense and Foreign ministers of…

Thursday on Facebook, cartoonist Berkeley Breathed (of Bloom County fame) posted a letter purportedly from President Donald Trump's New York attorney, Marc E. Kasowitz, taking Breathed to task for disseminating "flagrantly altered photos [of the president] wearing apparel featuring your artwork."…

Michael Flynn appears destined to spend much more time in the spotlight than he spent working at the White House, where he served as President Trump's National Security Adviser for three and a half weeks. On Monday, the AP reported that Flynn's lawyers told the Senate intelligence committee that…

Soon after President Trump issued his executive order on "Promoting Free Speech and Religious Liberty," which includes potential "conscience protections" for those with religious objections to certain health insurance mandates, Planned Parenthood issued a press release noting that some "faith…

As the Trump administration scrambles to tamp down reports (via the New York Times) that the National Security Council and the State Department were caught flat-footed by President Trump inviting Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte to the White House, details included in the State Department's…

This week, the State Department released an annual report on compliance with the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). The most notable findings in the report, which covers Russia, Iran, and Syria, not surprisingly relate to Syria. The report states unequivocally that the "United States assesses that…

In the aftermath of the chemical weapons attacks in Idlib province and the subsequent response of cruise missile strikes on a Syrian airbase authorized by President Trump, both National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson have asserted that the Syrian government has…

Despite repeated public pronouncements from President Obama, Susan Rice, and others in the Obama administration that a 2013 deal with Russia and Syria had "eliminated Syria's declared chemical weapons program," the evidence from continued attacks increasingly and overwhelmingly contradicts this…

While reports Monday said the Pentagon delivered plans to President Trump with options to ramp up the war against the Islamic State, an escalation of sorts is already in motion during the latter half of February. Information from U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) concerning coalition air strikes in…

As the Trump administration rolled back President Obama's guidelines to public schools regarding transgender students' access to the bathroom of their choice, a new rule from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has taken effect to ensure that transgender individuals have full…

In the final week of the Obama administration, the Treasury Department made unannounced payments totaling $375 million to Dow Chemical and Boeing to reimburse the two Department of Energy (DOE) contractors for judgments awarded in the 2016 settlement of a lawsuit dating all the way back to 1990. A…

Monday morning, Stephen Hayes broke news of Republican accusations that Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer went back on a promise to allow an Inauguration Day vote on the confirmation of Rep. Mike Pompeo to head the CIA. Witnesses told of an angry exchange between Senator Tom Cotton and Schumer…

A file consisting of over 500 pages of heavily reacted documents was posted to the FBI's Freedom of Information Act website Wednesday. The subject of many of the documents is a mystery due to the redaction, but the investigation into Bill Clinton's pardon of Marc Rich and a 2006 incident involving…

As John Kerry wraps up his tenure as secretary of state, he seems determined to defend his and President Obama's legacy regarding the conflict in Syria. At this week's U.S. Institute of Peace's conference, Judy Woodruff asked Kerry about the perception that U.S. leadership could not be relied on…

Just days after the U.S. military confirmed the existence of an Islamic State (ISIS) drone factory in Iraq, the coalition targeted four more "unmanned aerial vehicle [UAV] construction facilities." The first drone factory was located near Mosul, while the more recent targets were closer to Tal…

To promote Barack Obama's final public address as president Tuesday in Chicago, the White House invokes a tradition established by the Father of Our Country, President Washington. "Since George Washington, U.S. presidents have often delivered a final address to the American people," the White House…

The United States military has confirmed what previously was only hinted at: the Islamic State, otherwise known as ISIS, is producing its own drones—and they are weaponized. A "rocket and unmanned aerial vehicle factory" was among the many targets hit by the coalition near Mosul, Iraq this week.

In President Obama's first inaugural address in January 2009, he declared, rather grandly, "We'll restore science to its rightful place..." The president has often prided himself on his devotion to science, and earlier this year the White House posted "100 Examples of Putting Science in Its…

President-elect Trump is set to take office on January 20th. This week, the website of the city of San Francisco's Bay Area Rapid Transit system listed an event marking the inauguration of the soon-to-be 45th president. The event is entitled "Inauguration Day P*ssy March."

President Barack Obama's administration has indisputably done more to advance the LGBT agenda than any prior administration. Ending Don't Ask-Don't Tell for the military, vigorous support of gay marriage, and bathroom choice for the transgendered are only a few of the boxes checked off the LGBT…

In the first reported strike of its kind, U.S. Central Command (CENTOM) targeted an Islamic State (ISIS) drone facility in the ongoing offensive against the terrorist organization. The attack on the "unmanned aerial vehicle [UAV] facility" near Mosul, Iraq was listed among other routine targets in…

As Barack Obama's tenure as president comes to a close, his administration is not backing off the apocalyptic climate-change rhetoric. The same week that the president used executive action to ban new offshore oil and gas drilling in federally controlled areas of the Arctic and and Atlantic oceans,…

The U.S. State Department updated its travel warning for Ukraine this week, backing off a recommendation that U.S. citizens currently in Crimea and the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk leave the area. The warning posted Wednesday advises U.S. citizens "to avoid all travel to" those regions of…

As Bashar al-Assad's government in Syria celebrates the retaking of Aleppo amidst a horrific humanitarian disaster, President Obama and his administration are increasingly taking heat for ineffective action in the face of the crisis. But just a month ago, the president seemed to suggest that if it…

The White House Monday is going directly after the couch-sitting, video-game-playing consumer in an effort to boost Obamacare sign-ups before an enrollment deadline later this week. The Obama administration recruited Shaquille O'Neal, retired NBA center, to play point for the first-ever "White…

Keith Ellison, currently the most prominent name being floated as the next head of the Democratic National Committee, has long faced criticism for his connections to Louis Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam, as well as other anti-Semitic individuals. Recent scrutiny of Ellison's past associations…

An unadvertised (so far) sale is underway at the Hillary Clinton campaign store, including the "Woman Card" the campaign issued in April to tweak Donald Trump. When the card was introduced, the campaign wrote:

As more and more of Hillary Clinton's emails come to light, previously obscure connections with and influences on Clinton during her tenure as secretary of state have also arisen. The latest batch of emails revealed one such case involving Clinton's daughter Chelsea and, by extension, the Clinton…

One of the more humorous aspects of the Hillary Clinton email kerfuffle has been the former secretary of state's penchant for asking various staffers to print out her emails (the federal government's Paperwork Reduction Act notwithstanding) with the short instruction "Pls print." A search for the…

A computer-related "theft of information" at the Clinton Foundation, confirmed by United States Secret Service personnel but so far denied by the Foundation, is prompting new questions about the Clintons' use of public resources for Hillary Clinton's private email server. The cyber crime committed…

When long-time Hillary Clinton aide and confidant Huma Abedin came under fire in 2012 for alleged links to a radical Islamic group, the legendary Clinton damage-control squad sprang into action, with one member of the unofficial team telling another, "We don't f*ck around when it comes to Huma."

The Obama administration has tried to put a good face on the news this week that Obamacare premiums are spiking an average of 25 percent for 2017. The department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced the increases under the heading, "More Than 70 Percent of Consumers Can Find Marketplace…

Despite Hillary Clinton's repeated assurances that her use of a personal email account and server was not an issue in the security and preservation of her correspondence as secretary of state, evidence continues to pile up to the contrary. Not only did Secretary Clinton use her own personal…

As recently as last month, the White House insisted that illegal immigrants are "are not eligible to collect benefits associated with the Affordable Care Act." But undocumented immigrants accessing the Obamacare website, Healthcare.gov, could be forgiven if they thought otherwise.

New figures released by the Census Bureau Thursday show undergraduate and graduate enrollment at colleges and universities dropped 1.2 million—or 6 percent—from 2010 to 2015. The drop accompanies an overall decrease in school enrollment at all levels from 78.6 million to 77.1 million during the…

A Secret Service agent assigned to protect former President Bill Clinton performed "network assessments" and information technology troubleshooting for the Clinton Foundation and also provided research on security issues for Bill and Hillary Clinton's email server in Chappaqua, New York. These…

John Kerry painted a dire picture of impending climate doom Friday in Kigali, Rwanda. At a meeting of parties to the 1987 Montreal Protocol, an early climate agreement, the secretary of state said in part:

Just a few weeks ago, Secretary of State John Kerry admitted that "one of the most successful environmental agreements in history" was actually now a huge driver of climate change. Late last week, Kerry went further, saying that "HFCs [hydrofluorocarbons], which was supposed to be the solution,…

The federal government's National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is hosting a series of three "Edit-A-Thons" to "improve Wikipedia entries related to gender equality." The collaboration is part of NARA's "Amending America" initiative celebrating the 225th anniversary of the Bill of…

The Russian government's alleged involvement in disrupting or influencing the 2016 elections in the United States is one factor that prompted the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to offer cybersecurity services to state, county and local election agencies. Just a month out from the elections,…

In Donald Trump's "apology" for his vulgar and sexually-charged "locker room" comments caught on tape in 2005, the Republican nominee for president asserted that his opponent's spouse, Bill Clinton, "said far worse to me on the golf course—not even close." At least one other golf partner of the…

"You put the 'B' in LGBT"—these lyrics from a song performed in the White House last week encapsulate the message of the third annual Bisexual Community Briefing hosted by the Obama administration.

On July 28, 2009, newly elected President Obama made a "guarantee" during an AARP town hall pushing the then-newly introduced Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare:

As reported, the White House Friday struck "Israel" from a press release concerning the location (Jerusalem) of the memorial service for former prime minister Shimon Peres. But the White House has not always been so successful in "correcting" what it apparently believes is an error. A July 2015…

Now that Secretary of State John Kerry has the Paris Agreement on climate change under his belt, he has set his sights on amending the 1987 Montreal Protocol that phased out "ozone-depleting substances" (ODS) such as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and halons to help close the ozone hole over the…

In keeping with Hillary Clinton's quest to attract Millennials, her campaign store now offers an adult coloring book for sale for $15. Although the description reads "For Hillary supporters of all ages," the coloring book is clearly in the style targeted at post-adolescent amateur artists.

Secretary of State John Kerry addressed fellow world leaders Wednesday at an "Entry into Force" event for the United Nations Paris Agreement on climate change with a salutation that sounded like a throwback to 1970s Saturday morning cartoons: "Thank you, warriors for the planet," he praised the…

The words President Obama used to sell his signature initiative, Obamacare—"if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor"—may end up the most memorable of his eight years in office. But according to information posted on Healthcare.gov, this "guarantee" from the president was wholly without…

Last Friday's document release by the FBI revealed a stark contradiction between then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's signed Classified Information Nondisclosure Agreement and her July statements to FBI agents, as THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported. Clinton told the FBI that she could not recall…

Either Hillary Clinton lied to the FBI or she lied on a State Department form as she began her tenure as Secretary of State. This conclusion appears inescapable after Friday's FBI document release related to the Clinton email investigation.

During Secretary of State John Kerry's first official visit to Bangladesh, he met with top Bangladeshi government officials and held a press conference at the Edward M. Kennedy Center in Dhaka. In light of recent terror attacks in that country, Kerry addressed the problem of terrorism, including…

The phrase "Lock her up" has become a common chant at Donald Trump campaign rallies when the Republican nominee talks about his opponent Hillary Clinton, but generally Trump and other speakers have tried to redirect supporters to "beat her" in November.

"If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor" was President Barack Obama's signature catchphrase he used to sell the Affordable Care Act to the American people. Now Obamacare's flagship website, healthcare.gov, no longer even addresses the issue.

Secretary of State John Kerry, in Nairobi, Kenya for discussions on regional security and counterterrorism issues, made a "birther" joke about President Obama during a joint appearance with the Kenyan foreign minister Monday.

Less than two months after Iran received $400 million in foreign currency in January, the world's top state sponsor of terror acquired another $1.3 billion in cash from the United States, based on statements of U.S. government officials.

For months, Donald Trump has been talking about how the political system in the United States is "rigged." Now his campaign is looking for "election observers" to prevent "Crooked Hillary Clinton" from "rigging the election" in November.

Under the category "with friends like these," Jack Moss, founder of the Black Hat and DefCon hacking conferences, called Hillary Clinton "the devil we know" while headlining a Las Vegas fundraiser for the Democratic candidate for president Wednesday night. Moss's comments echoed remarks Donald…

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the transfer of $400 million in cash for Iran in January coincided with not only the implementation of the Iran nuclear deal but with the release of American detainees as well. The cash came not from sanctions relief, but from the settlement of a…

The Hillary Clinton campaign released revised versions of four campaign pins that had been quickly withdrawn from sale late last week apparently due to inadvertent offensive messages. As THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported Friday, Clinton's online store introduced a collection of pins created by…

The Hillary Clinton campaign is holding a fundraiser in Las Vegas this week during the annual Black Hat "global information security event." The announcements says that participants include Jeff Moss, the founder of Black Hat; Michael Sulmeyer, who, according to CSO Online is the Clinton campaign's…

The same day the Hillary Clinton campaign store introduced a new collection of pins designed by various artists and graphic designers, The Forty-Five Pin Project, the collection is already one short. Within hours of listing the collection Thursday, the pins designated by Polish artist Agniezka…

As Hillary Clinton prepared this week to become the first woman in U.S. history to be nominated for president by a major political party, her campaign reposted a video ad on Twitter originally produced by the Hillary for President campaign late in 2015. The ad, titled "44 boys is too many",…

Former President Bill Clinton spoke Tuesday evening at the Democratic National Committee Convention in Philadelphia, the same night his wife Hillary received the Democratic nomination for president. Around that time or shortly thereafter, the Donald Trump campaign website briefly added a press…

Last Thursday, Secretary of State John Kerry met in Washington with leaders of forty-five nations to discuss the Islamic State, which he calls "ISIL," and terrorism. Refering to that meeting, Kerry said Friday during a remarks at the Vienna International Center in Austria that working on climate…

Secretary of State John Kerry met with Russian President Vladimir Putin Thursday in Moscow, a meeting that stretched to one in the morning, according to Kerry. Although the session centered on Syria and restoring the "cessation of hostilities", spokesperson John Kirby noted that Kerry also raised…

Thursday marks the one year anniversary of the Iran nuclear deal with China, Russia, Germany, France, Great Britain, and the United States. The deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), has been controversial since its inception. Critics say that the deal gives Iran far too…

The New York Times reported this week that the Democratic super PAC American Bridge had discovered plagiarism in a real estate investing publication produced and used by Donald Trump's Trump Institute in 2006. While Alan Garten, Trump's attorney, said that "obviously" Trump was not aware of the…

FBI Director James Comey delivered a litany of damaging findings Monday from the bureau's investigation of Hillary Clinton's use of personal email while serving as secretary of state. Not only did Clinton violate numerous security protocols, but many of the statements made by Clinton and her…

Donald Trump is no stranger to conspiracy theories. Mother Jones recently reported some of Trump's thoughts on asbestos. The toxic material "got a bad rap," Trump wrote in his 1997 book The Art of the Comeback, adding that he believed the mafia was behind the asbestos removal frenzy because…

President Obama hosted the 2015 WNBA champion Minnesota Lynx at the White House on Monday for the third time in five years. As the president wound down his remarks praising the players for the examples they set for young people, he quoted one of the Lynx's players, Maya Moore:

The State Department just released a "guide for educators to create gender-inclusive classrooms" for use by teachers and schools around the world. While the document is titled "Creating Supportive Learning Environments for Girls and Boys," the wording sometimes attempts to take into account recent…

On May 18, the Department of the Interior announced a contract award of $329,042 for Tonkawa Indian Casino Hotel parking lot project. The casino, located in Tonkawa, OK, is owned and run by the Tonkawa tribe. Although the money comes from federal highway funds, the tribe has the discretion to use…

Secretary of State John Kerry and Secretary of the Treasury Jack Lew are in China for two days of talks on a variety of issues with his Chinese counterparts. In his opening remarks for the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue, Kerry said the Americans and the Chinese are increasingly anxious…

Celebrating the start of National Ocean Month Wednesday, Secretary of State John Kerry spoke to students at Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, Maryland. The group he addressed included the Chesapeake Bay Regional Champions of the Ocean Science Bowl, as well as the winners of the…

While Secretary of Veterans Affairs Bob McDonald is under fire for comments minimizing the impact of wait times for veterans seeking care at veterans' health care facilities, over the past eight years the VA has spent upwards of $2 million to building "smoking shelters" at various VA locations…

Politico, the Virginia-based media organization, launched subscription-based Politico Pro in 2011. In the intervening years, the federal government has increasingly come to rely upon Politico Pro as the go-to publication to keep abreast of information and developments relating to a wide spectrum of…

Most students headed to college in the fall have applied for financial assistance via the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). The process can be complicated and confusing for high school seniors who may be thinking about paying their own bills for the first time, but the government…

Secretary of State John Kerry took part Monday in a multilateral meeting on the future of Libya, a country perennially riven by war, crime, and terrorism. The nations represented at the meeting gathered to show support for the Government of National Accord currently attempting to establish order in…

Earlier today Secretary of State John Kerry addressed the staff of the U.S. Embassy in Vienna, Austria, where much of the work on last year's Iran nuclear deal took place. Kerry often addresses the embassy staff as he travels from country to country, thanking them for their behind the scenes work…

At an Anti-Corruption Summit in London recently, Secretary of State John Kerry lumped in the U.S. electorate along with others around the world who are "angry" because of a "sense that the system is rigged." Kerry said that the "extremism that we see in the world today comes in no small degree from…

Secretary of State John Kerry recently spoke at the Oxford Union and addressed a range of issues from climate change to extremism to political corruption. During the question and answer after Kerry's remarks, one audience member asked the secretary of state to name the "proudest achievements of the…

The Maryland Health Connection is the state's Obamacare Marketplace. Monday, an agency press release noted that Maryland "has cut by 40 percent the number of Marylanders who were eligible for private insurance coverage when the state marketplace began three years ago." However, the breakdown of…

Global Engagement (formerly known as Think Again, Turn Away) is the State Department's anti-terrorism communications division specializing in social media messaging to dissuade would-be terrorists from joining ISIS or similar groups. Tuesday, the Global Engagement Twitter account tweeted a link to…

The State Department announced Monday that the agency found no emails to or from Bryan Pagliano, Hillary Clinton's IT specialist, while Clinton was secretary of state.

Tuesday the Washington Free Beacon reported that the Hillary Clinton campaign paid Nevada-based American Document Destruction $187 for document and/or computer hard drive destruction. The payments are reported on documents filed with the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) by the campaign.

During the final days of Ted Cruz’s now defunct campaign, the GOP's presumptive nominee Donald Trump repeatedly raised and amplified a largely debunked story in the National Enquirer linking Cruz's father Rafael to John F. Kennedy's assassin Lee Harvey Oswald. The story is based on a photo…

Donald Trump created a stir in Indiana Thursday by touting an endorsement by boxing legend (and convicted rapist) Mike Tyson (via the IndyStar):

While announcing new humanitarian aid for Iraq, the Obama administration has acknowledged that nearly 10 percent of the Iraqi population, or 3 million people, is living in territory controlled by ISIS (or ISIL).

Responding to a journalist's inquiry at a press availability in Bahrain with Bahraini Foreign Minister Sheikh Khalid bin Ahmed al-Khalifa, Secretary of State John Kerry said that, based on the nuclear deal struck with Iran, "now there is no path to the nuclear weapon."

The COP 21 climate conference held in Paris in December was no low-budget affair. Two different expenditures for hotels alone for the gathering came to over $2.5 million. A single contract alone came to almost $2 million. That contract involved five different hotels and totaled and estimated…

At least since President Obama referred to the Islamic State (ISIS/Daesh) as a "JV" team, his administration has been criticized for approaching the rapidly expanding terror organization with a lack of seriousness. Especially in light of last week's San Bernardino slaughter, the State Department's…

The Pentagon Friday announced the death of Master Sgt. Joshua L. Wheeler, a soldier who had been serving in Operation Inherent Resolve in Iraq. He died of wounds received during a hostage rescue mission. But in keeping with the Obama administration's insistence that the president ended combat…

Secretary of State John Kerry spoke Wednesday at a Department of Energy event at the U.S. Navy Heritage Center in Washington, D.C., where he noted the official implementation of the nuclear deal reached with Iran this summer. Throughout the negotiations with Iran, that country's religious leader,…

In May 2014, French foreign minister Laurent Fabius declared during a joint appearance with Secretary of State John Kerry that "we have 500 days to avoid climate chaos." Late last week, time ran out. Fabius's original remarks were as follows:

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) confiscated a record 67 firearms located in passengers' carry-on baggage during the week of September 11, 2015. On September 11 alone, ten guns were found. Out of the 67 firearms found during the week, 56 were loaded and 26 actually had a round…

The latest official report of a drone in the possession of the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) is tucked in an August 3rd press release from U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), the overseers of the air campaign in Syria and Iraq against the terrorist organization. 

Secretary Kerry passed up the opportunity this week to recognize one of the most important holidays on the Jewish calendar, Rosh Hashanah. In recent weeks, however, Kerry took time to recognize the Independence/National Days of Guatemala, Papua New Guinea, and Andorra, among others. He also issued…

Weekend remarks concerning Russia's current activities in Syria by Gen. Philip Breedlove, commander of U.S. European Command and NATO's supreme allied commander, are far from reassuring. Speaking to reporters after NATO's Military Committee Conference in Istanbul on Saturday, Breedlove…

In a tweet calling for a constitutional amendment to reverse the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision, Hillary Clinton inadvertently invited supporters to "Stand with Hillary and overturn Planned Parenthood." While the main part of the tweet (archived here) says "Overturn Citizens United", the…

In the 1990s, Hillary Clinton famously accused a "vast right-wing conspiracy" of trying to bring down her husband, President Bill Clinton. Emails from Mrs. Clinton's tenure as secretary of state demonstrate that the specter of a conspiracy of some sort continued to haunt her years later.

Details of President Obama's travel to Warren, Michigan this Wednesday intended only for the press are revealed in an apparent inadvertent posting of a media advisory on the White House website over the weekend. The posting, which includes a reminder that "MEDIA LOGISTICS BELOW ARE FOR PLANNING…

On Wednesday, according to a report by WJLA in Washington, "Barvetta Singletary, a White House staffer, resigned today following assault charges." This dramatic news, however, received scant coverage in the major media. As of Thursday morning, only The Hill and Roll Call had covered the…

Presidential candidate and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton finds herself under growing scrutiny over the classified contents of dozens of emails (perhaps hundreds once the State Department finishes releasing them all) she sent and received as head of the State Department. As it turns out,…

StemExpress is the bio-medical company featured in a number of the undercover videos released by the Center for Medical Progress in connection with its Planned Parenthood exposé on fetal organ and tissue harvesting. StemExpress made several changes to its website last week, some cosmetic but others…

In apparent retaliation for Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush's statements critical of Planned Parenthood, the Democratic party has launched an attack on crisis pregnancy centers. A blog post on Democrats.org said that crisis pregnancy centers "have zero understanding of what women’s…

President Obama spent two days in Ethiopia on his recent four-day trip to Africa. To house the president and his entourage during their stay, the government required four hotels costing over $1.3 million. 

Advertisements in Japanese for handbags, backpacks, running shoes, and more began showing up on the website of the U.S. National Archives this week. Hackers managed to compromise a subdomain of the site, eisenhower.archives.gov. Below are screen captures of just two of the unauthorized pages:

Since news broke of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server, Mrs. Clinton and her campaign have sought to downplay the significance of using non-government equipment to conduct electronic correspondence as the nation's top diplomat. During her first press…

Hillary Clinton may be looking to tweak her opposition, or perhaps just to turn the page on her infamous 1992 campaign comment, "I suppose I could have stayed home and baked cookies and had teas" with the latest item for sale in her campaign store. A cookie cutter in the shape of Mrs. Clinton's…

Last week, THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported on a $412,000 contract for 1,280 sleeping room nights at the Hilton Hotel in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital. However, at least two other hotels were booked for the visit, and a fourth hotel was also used, although no contract has yet been posted. The new…

The websites of several federal government agencies, including the National Weather Service (NWS), are unprotected from scammers looking to exploit a security weakness to fool potential victims. The sites in question allow what are known as "unvalidated redirects." An unvalidated redirect is a link…

President Obama visited Kenya and Ethiopia during his recent trip to Africa, and the hotel bill for the president and his entourage totaled approximately $412,390.86 for the Ethiopia stay alone. A contract with the Hilton in the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa was posted online recently:

While cyber security incidents and computer system breaches such as the recent Office of Personnel Management (OPM) hack grab the headlines, a recent government reports shows that more mundane non-cyber incidents have skyrocketed as well. A graphic in a recent Government Accountability Office…

The federal agency that oversees individuals on probation, parole or supervised release in Washington, D.C., is looking to expand options for "counseling and behavioral interventions" for offenders under its charge. The Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency for the District of Columbia…

Although Planned Parenthood's most recent controversy revolves around "fetal tissue" trafficking, the organization is no stranger to eyebrow-raising activities. A recent solicitation for participants for Planned Parenthood's Sexual Health Evaluation (SHE) study promised at least $70 with a chance…

When the president of the United States travels, the White House and the Secret Service bring along a tremendous amount of communications equipment. Not only does the Secret Service set up a command post to coordinate communications for the visits, but secure connections are also needed for the…

When Hillary Clinton first launched her campaign in April, THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported that her website was asking for donations up to $2,700 on the English version of the site, but only up to $250 on the Spanish language version. Within hours after the story was published, the…

The State Department will hang the Cuban flag in the lobby of the State Department building on Monday in recognition of the imminent reopening of the communist nation's embassy in Washington. The AP's Matt Lee reports:

In the midst of revelations about a massive data breach at the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the agency awarded a $4.3 million two-month contract extension to Northrop Grumman for the OPM's Data Warehouse Program (DWP). According to the award documents, the follow-on contract includes…

As he has for much of his post-presidency, Bill Clinton was on the road again in June, traveling to Europe at the end of the month for various conferences and other public appearances. After a few days in London, the president popped over to Paris for a day or two to shop at Hermès, a well-known…

 The Iran nuclear talks deadline was recently extended for a week until July 7 according to the Associated Press. This extension could conceivably raise the already enormous financial cost of the diplomatic home-stretch effort even higher. Even before the extension was granted, contracts for…

Although President Obama has not yet fulfilled his promise to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the population there is gradually shrinking as detainees are repatriated or released into the custody of foreign governments. The Miami Herald noted recently that of 116 remaining…

Justice Anthony Kennedy, while dictating one of the most sweeping social changes in history in his opinion in the Obergefell v. Hodges case that legalized same-sex marriage across America, waxes magnanimous towards foes of the expansion of the millennia-old definition of marriage. He said those who…

If the world is looking for a go-to expert on links between Twitter and heart health, the University of Pennsylvania might just be the place. Earlier this year, The Telegraph reported on a study entitled "Psychological Language on Twitter Predicts County-Level Heart Disease Mortality" conducted at…

A top commander in southwest Asia reminded U.S military personnel stationed in Muslim countries in the Middle East of the restrictions placed on them during Ramadan. According to a report by the U.S. Air Forces Central Command Public Affairs, Brig. Gen. John Quintas, 380th Air Expeditionary Wing…

Bill and Hillary Clinton vacationed in the Dominican Republic around New Years, visiting at least two exclusive resorts, Punta Cana and the Casa de Campo. The once-and-possibly-future first couple spent the week, of course, under the watchful eye of the U.S. Secret Service, but the security…

According to National Security Council (NSC) chief of staff Suzy George, the NSC is "downsizing," but not "for its own sake." George calls it "right-sizing," a way for the White House to "align our staffing with our strategic priorities." 

Hillary Clinton is offering a chance for one lucky person and a guest to join her for dinner. The campaign is inviting supporters to "chip in" to be automatically entered in the contest, although no contribution is required:

Neil S. Rodgers, a former D.C. government official, was sentenced Tuesday for his role in the misappropriation of $110,000 earmarked for D.C.'s Children at Risk and Drug Prevention Fund to cover a deficit for the 51st State Inaugural Ball for President Obama's inauguration in 2009. Rodgers, found…

A review of $2.8 billion in subsidies paid to health insurers on behalf of Obamacare enrollees during the early days of the program could not verify the accuracy of those payments. The Office of the Inspector General found that during January through April 2014, the Centers for Medicare and…

Hillary Clinton will certainly have supporters at Sunday's rally in Des Moines at the Iowa State Fairgrounds, but could face some stiff competition from another event: the final day of a three-day gun show. The show is one of six being held during 2015 at the fairgrounds, and one of more than a…

A $100,000 donation given to a New York Times charity campaign in 2008 by Bill and Hillary Clinton's family foundation is not included in a Times list of large gifts from various other foundations, such as George Soros's charitable foundation.

The Centers for Disease Control recently announced the availability of $76 million in grants for the National HIV Behavioral Surveillance (NHBS) program. This program is designed to "monitor the HIV epidemic" and detect changes in HIV-risk behaviors among high-risk population groups with an eye…

First, Imagination Playground fell victim to Hillary Clinton's re-announcement of her presidential campaign on Roosevelt Island in New York City this Saturday. Now, comes a second casualty: yoga. Four Freedoms Park has posted notices on its website that the Kids & Family Yoga class scheduled…

A review conducted by the Office of the Inspector General for the Department of Homeland Security found that two and a half years after a scathing report on the state of intra-agency communications in the event of an emergency, "DHS components’ inability to communicate with each other persists."…

Even as diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Russia remain decidedly chilly over the Ukrainian conflict, the State Department is reaching out to "up-and-coming" Russian journalists. A recent $150,000 grant offering from the U.S. embassy in Moscow seeks to establish a program to give Russian…

The Hillary Clinton campaign is looking for some Everyday Americans willing to open up their homes to strangers. On a webpage entitled "Host a Hillary for America Volunteer," the campaign asks for name, email address, phone number and home address for those willing to host a fellow Clinton…

The Obama administration has not been shy about partnering with religious leaders on issues such as poverty, HIV/AIDS prevention, Obamacare, and even climate change. Now the White House is soliciting nominations for an upcoming Champions of Change ceremony to "honor faith leaders who are making a…

President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry both spent two days in April at the Summit of the Americas in Panama, but hotels and transportation for the entire delegation for the conference topped $1.4 million. An estimated total of 3,889 room nights were split between two hotels:…

Bill Clinton, no stranger to controversy, raised eyebrows again with a Clinton Global Initiative gathering last month, as ABC News put it, "at a five-star luxury hotel in Morocco [hosted] by one of the world's most controversial mining companies, criticized for 'serious human rights violations' by…

The speed with which the transgender agenda is moving may end up making the same-sex marriage debate look slow and deliberative by comparison. And now Scholastic, the children's publisher that specializes in distributing and selling books through schools, is poised to bring the issue to a middle…

As former Maryland governor Martin O'Malley emerges as perhaps the most significant threat to Hillary Clinton in her quest for the Democratic nomination for president, the Bill, Hillary, and Chelsea Clinton Foundation may be trying to downplay O'Malley's connections to the organization. At the…

Disclosure forms filed with the Federal Election Commission by Hillary Clinton provide fascinating details of the remarkable money-making machine that is the once-and-possibly-future first couple. Between January 2014 and the filing of the forms on May 15, 2015 (up to and including a speech by Bill…

As the 2016 Hillary Clinton campaign closed the books on its first month of operations, campaign manager Robby Mook emailed supporters with a rather remarkable claim: Hillary Clinton "didn't have a lot of the usual resources that other candidates might have" to launch a campaign. Tellingly, Mook…

As federal, state, and local governments continue to expand their laws and regulations regarding gender identity, conflicts over religious objections are sure to grow. Judging by an item on the website of the Department of Health and Human Services, one flash point could well be foster parenting.

Hillary Clinton wants you to wish her a Happy Mother's Day -- and maybe send a few dollars her way, as well. Often, organizations that support politicians or candidates (such as the Democrat or Republican National Committees) will solicit such greetings for holidays and special occasions. But in…

In an editorial for the new issue of THE WEEKLY STANDARD, Bill Kristol notes the "ludicrous" "guarantee" Secretary of State John Kerry made last week regarding Iran's so-called breakout capacity towards nuclear weapons. Kerry told Israelis:

Rural Alaska is well known for its wolves, bears, and moose, but the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has set its sights on a considerably smaller creature: the bed bug. The EPA is prepared to award a grant of up to $100,000 to help Alaska Native Village communities to right bed bug…

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) isn't just about hard hats and safer machinery anymore. The federal government agency charged with regulating workplace conditions has formed an "alliance" with a "national social justice advocacy organization for transgender people"…

Most American wouldn't know a donkey drop from a paddle scoop, but nevertheless, half a million taxpayer dollars will be going to support a cricket league in Afghanistan. The current grant opportunity looks to  build on what was considered a successful 2014 program. The plan is for at least five…

The State Department, through the U.S. Mission to India, is offering a $35,000 grant to develop a workshop for "sharing ideas on the role of editorial cartooning in India and the United States in creating public dialogue" with "print and broadcast journalists, bloggers, citizen journalists, and…

When President Obama visited Jamaica in early April, he held a town hall meeting with "Young Leaders of the Americas" at University of the West Indies in Kingston, Jamaica. The president made remarks and took questions for only about 75 minutes in the Assembly Hall building on the Mona campus of…

Inevitability is said to be one of Hillary Clinton's hinderances in securing the Democratic party's nomination for president, that she must earn the nomination rather than claim it as a right. But to listen to Mrs. Clinton's recent videotaped message to the South Carolina Democratic Party's…

Shortly after Hillary Clinton announced her candidacy for president, the Clinton Foundation announced: "In light of Secretary Clinton’s decision to run for President, Secretary Clinton has stepped down from the Clinton Foundation board." While Mrs. Clinton was removed from the board (she no longer…

Although neither the White House nor the State Department released statements or posted greetings on the 67th Independence Day of the nation of Israel last Thursday, Vice President Joe Biden did attend the annual Israeli Independence Day Celebration at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium in Washington…

A year after news broke of the waiting list scandal at the Veterans Affairs medical facility in Phoenix, Arizona, President Obama finally visited the facility in March. And while they didn't quite roll out the red carpet for the president, they did clean the floors -- and spent $5,000 to do it.

Despite issuing statements commemorating the National Days or Independence Days of nearly 170 countries in the past twelve months, Secretary of State John Kerry allowed the 67th anniversary of the establishment of the nation of Israel to pass without comment. This is the third year in a row Kerry…

Speaking Tuesday at the 45th Annual Washington Conference of the Council of the Americas, Secretary of State John Kerry said that "countries are far more likely to advance economically and socially when citizens have faith in their governments and are able to rely on them for justice and equal…

As Earth Day approaches, the White House is once again pushing action on climate change, presenting a rather stark contrast between action and inaction on carbon emissions. On Monday, the following graphic appeared in a White House tweet, presenting an almost night-and-day difference between the…

Bloomberg's Eli Lake reports Tuesday that the Obama administration kept secret until the beginning of April Iran's two to three month breakout time for a nuclear weapon, saying "the administration only declassified this estimate at the beginning of the month, just in time for the White House to…

The U.S. State Department is looking to design and facilitate a media ethics course for journalists in India, and has even proposed appropriating the name of Robin Thicke's 2013 hit "Blurred Lines" as a title for the course. The U.S. consulate general in Hyderabad, India is looking for a non-profit…

The system of federal and state "exchanges" or "marketplaces" that offer health insurance through the Affordable Care Act lean heavily on "navigators" to guide consumers in their choices. Organizations such as community health centers, legal aid societies, social service groups, church groups and…

Although "life-sized roaring, breathing dinosaurs" may not typically be found at a Presidential Center, visitors to the Clinton Presidential Center will soon find not just one but thirteen of the prehistoric creatures as part of Dinosaurs Around the World, which runs from April 25 to October 18 at…

Every year since 2011, the White House has used tax time to post a "Federal Taxpayer Receipt" showing taxpayers how their federal tax dollars are being spent. President Obama introduced the concept in his 2011 State of the Union address, and Wednesday the White House posted the fifth installment so…

In recognition of Equal Pay Day Tuesday, Betsey Stevenson, a member of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, wrote an entry on the White House blog entitled Five Facts About the Gender Pay Gap. While touching on a number of factors influencing the "gender pay gap," Stevenson cites…

The brand new 2016 presidential campaign of Hillary Clinton will embrace "small donors in early fundraising," according to a Monday Politico story. The second-time presidential candidate wants to "make even small-dollar donors feel like they are part of the inner circle." Based on the campaign's…

Secretary of State John Kerry has often spoken to the Muslim world during his tenure, particularly during the past year as negotiations with Iran have intensified and conflict with the Islamic State has escalated. But what Kerry has not said during the past twelve months is also significant. A…

President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are no longer "broke" if their choice of holiday destinations is any indication. A short article at DominicanToday.com colorfully reports that the famous couple was in the Dominican Republic to "hobnob with tycoons at Dominican…

Citing a lack of cooperation from the Secret Service, Chairman Jason Chaffetz of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform issued subpoenas for two Secret Service agents to testify to the committee about recent security breaches and other disfunction at the agency. Chaffetz said that…

Less than four months ago, Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the Department of Justice had concluded that the transgendered are among the classes of persons protected, unbeknownst to the framers of the legislation at the time, by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Tuesday's press…

During President Obama's tenure, religious Americans have been increasingly marginalized by an administration that can be intolerant or at least unaccomodating of beliefs that conflict with its policies, regulations, or legislative goals. Perhaps most notably, President Obama campaigned by…

Since Politico, a politics-focused website and newspaper, launched its subscription-based news service Politico Pro in 2011, government agencies have increasingly turned to the service to keep abreast of the latest developments in their spheres of policy. Government records show fiscal year 2011…

A pair of statements about an hour apart on Monday by two top Obama administration officials give a clear if jarring look into the funhouse mirror that is current U.S. policy towards Iran and Israel. The two comments are recorded by CNN senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta on his Twitter…

Since Benjamin Netanyahu's victory in Israel's recent elections, the Obama administration has made its displeasure with the results abundantly clear. To help justify changes in its posture towards Israel, the White House appears anxious to point out what it sees as "divisive" rhetoric and attitudes…

When President Obama attended the G-20 summit in Brisbane, Australia last November, the entire delegation required over 5,000 room nights at five different hotels over the course of the summit, costing $2.1 million. Transporting all those people around Brisbane was not cheap: the State Department…

Sunday night, Stephen Hayes noted (via Twitter) a Times of Israel article that the 2015 Worldwide Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Communities delivered annually by Director of National Intelligence James Clapper to a Senate committee had "removed Iran and Hezbollah from its list of…

While addressing the press during a visit to Egypt, Secretary of State John Kerry spoke about the ongoing negotiations with Iran over that country's nuclear programs. As he and President Obama have several times in the past, Kerry cited a report that Iran's "Supreme Leader" issued a "fatwa" against…

Secretary of State John Kerry spoke at the Atlantic Council Thursday morning as part of the Road to Paris Climate Series and he compared the certainty of human-caused climate change to the law of gravity and to the temperature at which water freezes. He also questioned the right of anyone to…

Plans for a one million dollar granite sculpture for the new U.S. Embassy in London have been scrapped because the sculpture was too heavy for the planned site. As THE WEEKLY STANDARD first reported in December 2013, the State Department awarded a $1 million contract to Irish-born American artist…

During her press appearance today, Hillary Clinton acknowledged that about 60,000 emails, including sent and received, went through her home email server that she used during her tenure as secretary of state. About half of those, she said, were work related. UPI reports:

Tacked onto the end of the daily press release from U.S. Central Command (Centcom) Monday is a report that coalition aircraft bombed the "Khorasan Group" near Aleppo, Syria. Centcom describes the group as a "network of veteran al Qa'ida operatives." The coalition has targeted the group at least…

Last week, THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported that, based on 2013 tax filings, men made up the top eight most highly compensated employees at the Clinton Foundation, and that key women earned 63 cents for every dollar key men made. Friday, the Clinton Foundation responded to a Washington…

In late February, Hillary Clinton, a self-proclaimed champion of women's rights and gender equity, came under fire for a Washington Free Beacon analysis that showed women on Mrs. Clinton's staff during her tenure in the Senate were paid an average of 72 cents on the dollar compared to male staff.…

Hillary Clinton is under increasing pressure for her exclusive use of a personal email address during her four years as secretary of state. In October 2011, Mrs. Clinton was interviewed by Savannah Guthrie of NBC's Today Show, and Guthrie asked about her personal email address. While Mrs. Clinton…

In spite of the Friday night passage of an eleventh hour, one-week stopgap spending bill to continue funding the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the department posted a lapse-of-funding notice and shut-down procedures on its website apparently intended if the last minute efforts failed.…

Usually when the Obama administration is discussing doctors and health issues, Obamacare is on the table. Thursday, however, the White House threw a curve by linking health to climate change. In a new blog post, the White House declares that "7 out of 10 Doctors [say] Climate Change Is Already…

Amid reports that a nuclear deal with Iran may freeze that country's ability to produce nuclear fuel for only ten years in exchange for sanctions relief, President Obama appeared to soften his words on the Iran negotiations if not his position. Following a meeting with the Amir of Qatar earlier…

The Obama administration in recent weeks has been trumpeting the number of signups for health insurance through the Obamacare marketplaces for 2015, but at least 90,000 consumers who had coverage last year are losing it. In this week's Affordable Care Act open enrollment report, the Department of…

The same day the White House renewed a push to increase the federal minimum wage, an announcement appeared on the White House blog for the Summer 2015 White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders [AAPI] Internship Program -- all unpaid positions. Even in prior administrations,…

Secretary of State John Kerry continued to beat the drum on the dangers of climate change Friday, noting that "there is no Planet B." The secretary made the remarks at the swearing-in ceremony for Ambassador-at-Large for Religious Freedom David Saperstein. He drew a religious connection to the…

While answering questions from service members in Kandahar, Afghanistan, newly sworn-in Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter revealed that he is "open-minded" about transgendered individuals serving in the military, adding, "I don't think anything but their suitability for service should preclude…

A former IRS tax examiner was indicted Friday along with three conspirators for filing false tax returns and making false claims for lost income related to the 2010 BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The IRS worker, Jimmie McCorvey of Pensacola, FL, helped the other three obtain $95,200 from…

Just weeks after announcing a program to make two years of community college free to all, President Obama has doubled down on "free" by introducing a plan to give all fourth-graders and their families a year of free access to all national parks. The "Every Kid in a Park" initiative, introduced to…

In conjunction with the White House Summit on Countering Violent Extremism, Secretary of State John Kerry has written an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal where he argues that when a government provides basic needs and a "chance at a better life," people are much less likely to "strap on an AK-47…

In an effort to sign up as many consumers as possible for insurance under the Affordable Care Act (or Obamacare), the Obama administration has gone to extraordinary lengths to partner with churches and other faith-based groups, even publishing sample church bulletin inserts, flyers, and scripts for…

Vice President Biden spent about a day and a half in Belgium in early February to meet with various European leaders, but his entourage, security team and other delegation members required up to 209 rooms for up to three weeks surrounding the visit. While the estimated tab was $690,507, this cost…

In a recent interview with BuzzFeed, President Obama mistakenly gave Vladimir Putin a promotion in the Russian president's previous career in the KGB, saying that Putin "ran the KGB."

In January, the State Department signed contracts for an estimated $1,690,000 million for hotels for President Obama's trip to India. Two of the contracts were for the New Delhi stay, and another two were for Agra, the location of the Taj Mahal. That latter leg of the trip was cancelled when…

Since Politico, a politics-focused website and newspaper, launched its subscription-based news service Politico Pro in 2011, government agencies have increasingly turned to the service to keep abreast of the latest developments in their spheres of policy. Government records show fiscal year 2011…

On February 4, we reported that U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) was continuing to suggest that the United Arab Emirates (UAE) was "conducting airstrikes" in Syria against the Islamic State (ISIL) despite an apparent suspension of flights by that country since late December. After a Jordanian…

Although the White House has declined so far to release the names of the "Muslim leaders" who met with President Obama at the White House Wednesday, according to comedian Dean Obeidallah, he and Farhana Khera, a lawyer and executive director of Muslim Advocates, were two of the fifteen.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) suspended participation in coalition airstrikes in Syria against the Islamic State in December after a Jordanian pilot was shot down and captured, the New York Times reported Tuesday. The Defense Department, however, continues to include the UAE in its daily report on…

Even as a report has come out that "talks about talks" are taking place with North Korea regarding denuclearization, recent remarks by Sung Kim, the U.S. State Department's Special Representative for North Korea Policy, seem to back up that assertion. 

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is working on a solution to a problem faced by a growing number of Americans as the population ages and relies more on prescription drugs: "What is this pill?" Much in the way a Google image search looks for similar images in Google's vast caches, the…

Along with the individual mandate to buy insurance, the employer mandate has been one of the more controversial aspects of Obamacare. Implementation of the employer mandate has been delayed twice, and other aspects of the law are being phased in, with "transitional relief" to help businesses cope.…

Vice President Joe Biden kicked off 2015 leading a presidential delegation to Brazil for the inauguration of Dilma Rousseff as president of that country. The vice president was only in the country on New Year's Day, for the inauguration and an hour-long meeting with Rousseff before returning to St.…

Ever since March 2014 when President Obama referred to Russian aggression against Ukraine as an "invasion," administration officials have avoided that word in conjunction with the ongoing conflict. In fact, U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey R. Pyatt's declared on April 29, 2014, that "Russian…

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator Gina McCarthy took to the EPA and White House blogs Wednesday to declare that "We Must Act Now to Protect Our Winters." McCarthy was in Aspen, CO, last week, the famous ski destination and home to an X-Games venue, and she warned that without…

The U.S. embassy in Baghdad, Iraq, the largest and most expensive in the world, cost at least $700 million to build by the time of its completion in 2009. Several years later in 2012, the embassy was scheduled for a $115 million upgrade as the Washington Post reported at the time. However, in spite…

The White House launched a new campaign this week to build support for President Obama's executive action on immigration. Although the campaign is to feature state-by-state advantages weekly over the new few months, one of the purported nationwide benefits of the president's actions is what amounts…

Obama administration officials have been effusive in their praise for late Saudi King Abdullah Bin Abdul-Aziz who died last week at the age of 90. Now comes word that chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin E. Dempsey is establishing a "research and essay competition" at the US…

 Late Thursday, the White House released via Twitter President Obama's annual statement commemorating the anniversary of the Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade. As he has in several previous statements, the president cast the decision as critical in "ensuring that our daughters have the same…

Secretary of State John Kerry met with EU High Representative Federica Mogherini at the State Department Wednesday and afterwards addressed the press and took some questions. One question from a French reporter concerned problems with Muslim integration in Europe and the potential terrorism…

Just before his election in 2008, candidate Barack Obama declared that "we are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America." From the closing lines of Tuesday's State of the Union address, it appears that a little more than six years later, now President Obama thinks…

Capitalizing once again on Vice President Joe Biden's infamous hot-mic gaffe from 2010, a White House video promoting President Obama's Tuesday night State of the Union speech closes with "IT'S A BFD." 

Meeting with Italian defense officials in Rome Monday, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey said that the threat to the world from Islamic terrorism is "probably a 30-year issue." The Army News Service reports:

Throughout his presidency, Barack Obama has repeatedly said he isn't set on just implementing his own agenda -- if other people have ideas, he wants to hear them. In fact, the day after the 2014 elections when Republicans expanded their majority in the House and took control of the Senate, the…

"Abortion stops a beating heart" has long been a poignant rallying cry for the pro-life movement. Abortion rights advocates often characterize the unborn as an impersonal "clump of cells" that a woman may choose to do with whatever she wants. But even as the House of Representatives plans a January…

In April, the Obama administration announced plans for financial aid, advisers, and 'non-lethal' security assistance for Ukraine in its struggle against Russian encroachment on its territory. Eight months later, citing the "urgent and compelling need to establish security and stability," the White

The White House branched out into yet another social media venue Tuesday. Upworthy, the popular you-won't-believe-what-happened-next site, was given an exclusive White House video of President Obama discussing the executive action he plans to take to improve Internet speeds in U.S. cities. In true…

The Pentagon called the hacking of the Central Command's (CENTCOM) YouTube and Twitter accounts Monday "cyber vandalism" in a letter to service members and their families to allay concerns about the incident. General Lloyd Austin said that the FBI is investigating the "alleged breach" of the two…

President Obama honored the NBA champions, the San Antonio Spurs, at the White House Monday, but joked that he almost sent in the second team, Vice President Biden, to host the event to keep himself "fresh for the State of the Union." The president said he would have been just following Spur's…

While the attention of much of the world Sunday was focused on the massive unity rally in France in response to the recent terror attacks in that country, Secretary of State John Kerry was in India for a "global business" summit where he spoke of, among other concerns, the "one enormous cloud…

 Previewing an item from his upcoming State of the Union address, President Obama announced a "Free Community College" plan Thursday evening for "anyone who's willing to work for it":

Pentagon press secretary Rear Admiral John Kirby, when asked Tuesday about the number of Islamic State (ISIL/ISIS) fighters killed in ongoing coalition strikes in Iraq and Syria, gave a rather colorful response: "[W]e don't have the ability to -- to count every nose that we schwack." Kirby said…

Pentagon spokesman Army Col. Steve Warren addressed reporters Monday about the start of the U.S. military training mission of Iraqi and Kurdish forces in Iraq. According to Nick Simeone of DoD News, the Defense Department's own media unit, Warren said that "four battalions of Iraqi security forces…

The year began on a rough note for the U.S. State Department's Think Again, Turn Away anti-terror program. On January 1, the State Department used the program's official Twitter account to tweet a photo collage accompanied by the message, "Entering 2015, taking time to honor some of terror’s many…

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is looking for vendors to run its "National Data Warehouse," a database for "capturing, aggregating, and analyzing information" related to beneficiary and customer experiences with Medicare and the federal Obamacare marketplaces. Although the…

While the controversy surrounding House GOP whip Steve Scalise continues to simmer, a 2002 press release (first uncovered by John Sexton) by the European-American Unity and Rights Organization (EURO) promoting the May 17-18 "workshop" to "train future civil rights activists" fails to mention…

For at least eight months in 2013 and 2014, letter carrier Devona Charley of Washington, D.C., delivered more than just letters and junk mail. The twenty-seven year old now-former U.S. Postal Service employee was sentenced to a year and a day in prison plus 6 months of home detention, part of three…

With the announcement Monday of a five-year, $563 million contract award to Accenture, the Healthcare.gov contractor that rescued the Obamacare marketplace after 2013's disastrous launch, the total cost of the site will well exceed $2.2 billion. The new award is on top of the $1.7 billion in…

Just two days before Christmas, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) took the first step to prepare for a possible "surge" of unaccompanied minors in 2015. HHS posted a "Sources Sought" notice to gather information on "options for contract surge capacity to shelter and care" for…

Secretary of State John Kerry used the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the devastating earthquake and subsequent tsunami in the Indian Ocean region as a reminder about climate change. The earthquake released huge walls of water that inundated a number of coastal regions in both Asia and Africa…

Secretary of State John Kerry, who wrote an op-ed for the Miami Herald along with Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker and Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew, evoked Ronald Reagan's timeless challenge to Mikhail Gorbachev at the Berlin Wall in 1987, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall." In reference to…

The State Department's Rose Gottemoeller, under secretary for arms control and international security, spoke at the Brookings Institution Thursday where she reaffirmed the United States' "unassailable" commitment to putting the nuclear weapons genie back in the bottle. Gottemoeller told the…

In John Kerry's statement on President Obama's Cuba policy changes, the secretary of state doesn't simply suggest the policies in place for five and a half decades are outdated. He seems to be suggesting they were a failure from the start. And in doing so, he apparently misstates his own age at the…

When President Obama visited Brisbane, Australia in November for the G-20 summit, the large U.S. delegation required multiple hotels and thousands of "room nights" for the length of the stay, though the president himself spent only one night in his hotel. Initially, as first reported by THE WEEKLY…

Deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources Heather Higginbottom joined former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg in New York Monday for a Data2X event to "promote gender-sensitive data." Data2X is a United Nations Foundation sponsored…

Outgoing Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel recently reported on the efforts his department has made against sexual assault within the ranks of the military. A year ago, President Obama directed Hagel to conduct a full review of progress being made, and while Hagel reported a decrease of twenty-five…

In the last five years, the Department of Defense (DOD) has spent over $130 million to store unused satellites from eight different satellite programs, and plans to spend another $206 million on storage over the next five years. Storage costs for individual pieces of equipment range from $40,000 up…

Along with the primary goal of expanding the availability of health insurance, the Affordable Care Act aims to make the use of Electronic Health Records (EHR) universal. This plan actually began with the 2009 stimulus (the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act), which included the Health…

President Obama stayed only one night in Australia for the G-20 summit, but the entire presidential delegation required over 4,000 rooms costing in excess of $1.7 million for the entire stay. Rooms at three different hotels were reserved for the U.S. delegation, and due to the large number of…

General David M. Rodriguez of the U.S. Africa Command updated reporters Wednesday on the Defense Department's efforts to assist the response to the Ebola crisis in West Africa. However, later in the briefing, the general addressed questions on other topics as well. Several reporters inquired about…

Secretary of State John Kerry has often spoken with some degree of optimism about the chance for peace between Israel and its neighbors in the Middle East. Wednesday, however, in remarks after a meeting with European Union representative Federica Mogherini in Belgium, Kerry acknowledged that the…

Less than four weeks before the launch of 2015 open enrollment for Obamacare, the government agency that runs Healthcare.gov suddenly realized the Marketplace site was heading for a repeat of last year's debacle. Documents show that on October 19, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services…

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently solicited quotes from contractors to recruit minors ages sixteen and seventeen to purchase "regulated tobacco products" on the Internet. The purchase attempts must be made from a facility located in Virginia and shipped to a P.O. Box provided by the…

Vice President Joe Biden just returned Sunday from a three-nation trip that concluded with a 48 hour visit to Turkey. The vice president, his wife, and his entourage arrived in Turkey via Ukraine Friday evening around 7:30 local time for meetings with President Erdogan and other government…

In a 2011 blog post titled "There's a New Sheriff in Town," the White House announced that Vice President Joe Biden was spearheading a new "effort to root out wasteful spending at every agency and department in the Federal Government" called the Campaign to Cut Waste. As if to emphasize the urgency…

The U.S. State Department recently awarded a contract worth $541,250 to a foreign research firm to conduct public opinion surveys as part of an "Arab omnibus study" in at least eight foreign countries beginning this month. Significant portions of the justification documents were redacted, including…

Director of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson will head for the Texas-Mexico border town of McAllen, Texas Friday in the wake of President Obama's announcement regarding his immigration executive order. Johnson will be meeting with DHS employees for "workforce engagements," presumably to discuss and/or…

Even as word is leaking out that President Obama will announce his long-awaited executive action on immigration this week, House Speaker John Boehner has posted a summary of previous presidential statements admitting the limits of executive power. Boehner's communications advisor Matt Wolking…

Contradicting reports that Secretary of State John Kerry has delayed a trip to Vienna to join the nuclear talks with Iran, State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki tweeted Wednesday that the State Department "never set a specific day" for Kerry to be in Vienna. 

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), the 2007 brainchild of now-Senator Elizabeth Warren, was formed in 2010 as part of the Dodd-Frank Act. An annual audit by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) for the year ending September 30, 2014 found that the fledgling agency is continuing…

On the heels of an Associated Press report over the weekend that the State Department's unclassified email system was taken offline due to a suspected hacking attack, the main State.gov website is down Monday morning. Multiple attempts to access the site have failed, and the…

New and returning customers to Healthcare.gov this year will have one less option if they run into difficulties. In the run-up to the initial launch in 2013, the Obamacare website promoted a "live chat" feature in addition to the toll-free phone number to be available 24/7 to answer questions:

In the "Great Hall of the People" in Beijing, China, President Obama appeared with China's current president Xi Jinping at a joint press conference Wednesday. During his remarks as he noted the 35th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the U.S. and China, President Obama recalled a saying of…

As 2015 open enrollment for Obamacare nears, Healthcare.gov has been telling consumers that "plans and estimated prices for 2015 coverage will be available in early November." Although signup is not possible until November 15, the website promises this "window shopping" experience will come sooner:

During the first Gulf War in the early 1990s, the U.S. military used a new generation of technological weapons that left the rest of the world far behind. But according the Frank Kendall, the Pentagon's undersecretary of defense for acquisitions, technology, and logistics, that advantage is…

Even before President Obama declared that all his "policies are on the ballot" in Tuesday's midterm elections, he told Chuck Todd in September's Meet the Press appearance that "if democrats hold the Senate," Republicans should get the message that "their strategy of just obstructing and saying…

While the nation was focused on the mid-term elections Tuesday, Secretary of State John Kerry spoke at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies regarding U.S.-China relations. As he often does, Kerry brought up the subject of climate change, which he asserted is happening "faster…

The Justice Department's Bureau of Prisons (BOP) recently committed $830,160 to purchase Protective Stab Vests for use by employees in federal prison facilities. The contract was awarded on a sole-source, no-bid basis because the need was determined to be of an "urgent and compelling nature."…

Just five days out from Election Day and Vice President Joe Biden is again campaigning for Iowa's Democratic Senate candidate Bruce Braley -- but not in Iowa. Thursday afternoon, Biden heads to the 8th Floor in New York City according to the official White House schedule for a 6:00 p.m. event:

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) recently suspended all background investigations on current and prospective Customs and Border Protection (CBP) employees due to security concerns over Personally Identifiable Information (PII). The information is revealed in newly released documents…

As the American public is still learning about the Ebola threat and how it may affect their lives, at least one reporter has apparently just about hit her limit. At the end of a Centers for Disease Control (CDC) conference call on Monday, Delthia Ricks, Newsday's senior health writer and medical…

The American public has resisted the metric system for decades, but that has not discouraged the Commerce Department's National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) from sinking $37,950 into two more episodes of a "motion-comic" video series called "The League of SI Superheroes." (SI stands…

While some in Congress have warned that Russian involvement in Ukraine portends a "looming" new cold war, Obama administration officials have for the most part brushed off the comparison. The president himself flatly said in July in response to a reporter's question regarding the Ukrainian…

Healthcare.gov continues to prepare for open enrollment beginning on November 15, hoping to avoid a repeat of the disastrous launch in 2013. Apparently the preparations include extra "scheduled" maintenance. Wednesday morning, the site displayed a message reading, "The system isn’t available right…

President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama have made increasing the federal minimum wage one of their marquee issues during campaign appearances leading up to the 2014 elections. After pushing for an increase to $9.00/hour up through 2013, the president moved the bar up to $10.10/hour in his…

Hospitals seeking guidance from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) on clothing and equipment to use to protect health care workers dealing with known or suspected Ebola patients may have to wait another day for official recommendations. As THE WEEKLY STANDARD noted this morning, hospitals are…

A day after President Obama appointed Ron Klain as Ebola czar to deal with the potential spread of the virus in this country, the Centers for Disease Control updated its website that contains recommendations for hospitals dealing with known or suspected cases of Ebola. In place of detailed…

Some American and Iranian diplomats have been spending so much time together lately that they're beginning to crack jokes with one another. Even though the subject matter of the talks, Iran's nuclear ambitions, is quite serious, a senior state department official shared a lighter moment with…

Rear Admiral John Kirby appeared at a joint press briefing with spokesperson Jen Psaki at the State Department Thursday and addressed the ongoing airstrikes against the Islamic State (ISIL) in Iraq and Syria. As a number of Pentagon officials have done in recent weeks, Admiral Kirby downplayed the…

In speeches designed to fire up Democrats to vote in midterm elections, President Obama has at times described voters in his party as having a "congenital defect." Wednesday, First Lady Michelle Obama suggested the problem might just be that they're sleepy.

While the rise of the barbarous Islamic State and the spread of the modern day plague of Ebola has many concerned about the state of civilization here on earth, some at the White House are turning their attention beyond our planet. A Tuesday entry on the White House blog solicits ideas for…

Following the lead of Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, Secretary of State John Kerry Sunday began using the Arabic acronym "Daesh" at times when referring to the Islamic State (ISIL or ISIS). Kerry was in Egypt for a meeting with Egyptian foreign minister Shoukry, and spoke extensively about the…

Congressman Mike Honda (D-CA), 13 fellow members of Congress, and over 20 organizations sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in late September urging officials to make sure that schools and libraries receiving federal funds do not block or limit access to websites with…

Clothes may not make the woman, but according to First Lady Michelle Obama, they don't hurt. Mrs. Obama hosted a "Fashion Workshop" for students and fashion industry representatives at the White House Wednesday, something she said had been a "dream" of hers:

The State Department this week posted a notice that applications are being accepted for Foreign Service Security Protective Specialist positions in the State Department's Bureau of Diplomatic Security to provide a "variety of personal protective services to Department officials and employees at…

Those looking for good news on the fight against Ebola will not find much encouragement from Marine Corps Gen. John F. Kelly, the commander of the U.S. Southern Command. As Jim Garamone of Department of Defense News reports, Kelly told an audience at the National Defense University in Washington,…

President Obama may not be, in his words, "on the ballot" this November, but that doesn't mean he's not on the campaign trail. Between the president and Vice President Joe Biden today, the two will be attending no fewer than six Democratic campaign events per the official White House schedule, and…

When Joe Biden addressed the John F. Kennedy Forum at Harvard's Kennedy School in Boston last Thursday night, he said that the "international order that we painstakingly built after World War II and defended over the past several decades is literally fraying at the seams right now." Thanks to some…

Speaking at the John F. Kennedy Forum at Harvard Kennedy School in Boston, Massachusetts last night, Vice President Joe Bidengave an extensive rundown of foreign policy challenges and crises that the world and the Obama administration are facing today. Although the vice president expressed…

The Ebola outbreak has grabbed the attention of the country if not the world in recent days, but the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is also concerned about a more mundane, but still potentially deadly problem: the flu. Thursday, the agency began seeking sources for "Medical…

After nine years and $247 million, the Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA) new high-tech disaster relief system may not work as intended, according to a new report by the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Not only is the system unable to…

At the White House Wednesday for bilateral talks with President Obama, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu rather publicly reminded the president of how seriously Israel takes the threat of a nuclear Iran. President Obama spoke first at a joint press appearance, and said that he and the prime…

Visiting Canada for the first time as Department Homeland Security (DHS) chief, secretary Jeh Johnson addressed the Canadian American Business Council on Wednesday. His remarks focused on existential threats in the world today, particularly in relation to the United States and Canada and the…

In what might possibly be an attempt to relive the success of Hillary Clinton's "Russian reset," the State Department recently awarded a $22,116 contract for "Red Switch Equipment." Which sounds a lot like the device Clinton famously presented to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in 2009 to…

Even before the Healthcare.gov website disaster unfolded in October 2013, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) had been looking to the future. HHS announced in June of that year that Hewlett-Packard would be replacing Terremark, a Verizon subsidiary, as the main contractor hosting the…

President Obama was counting strokes on the golf course at Fort Belvoir in northern Virginia last Saturday, but the day before a $91,318.76 contract was awarded to count something quite different at Fort Belvoir: bats. The Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation will conduct the "Bat…

When the Affordable Care Act, Obamacare, was signed into law in March 2010, one of the Act's stipulations was that CMS (Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services) educate consumers about how the law would work. In September 2011, CMS awarded a three year contract to the popular medical…

The Rio Grande Valley sector of the U.S. Border Patrol (USBP) is looking to buy 40,000 emergency Mylar blankets. The silvery, polyester blankets are often used in detention facilities where those caught illegally crossing the border into the United States are held. A number of photos of children in…

These days, mentioning birth control and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in the same sentence will likely draw some strong reactions. But a recent contractor inquiry by HHS for its National Institutes of Health (NIH) campus in Bethesda, Maryland adds a new wrinkle. This time, the…

"Mother Nature ... is screaming at us about" climate change, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry told the crowd at the opening event of Climate Week NYC 2014. While Kerry used a more measured tone than that which he attributed to Mother Nature, the apocalyptic nature of his warnings were in keeping…

Although President Obama has been unequivocal that US forces will not return to Iraq for "boots on the ground" combat, some in his administration (Gen. Martin Dempsey, John Kerry, Joe Biden) have dropped hints that future events may change that. Friday, Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno joined…

Secretary of State John Kerry spoke at U.S. Aid's 2014 Frontiers in Development Forum Friday and gave a stark warning about "500-year" drought conditions around the world that he says are a result of climate change. He went so far as to say that "[t]here are people killing each other over water in…

Director of National Intelligence James Clapper peppered his Thursday speech to an intelligence community summit with humor, drawing laughter from his audience nearly a dozen times. Clapper began his talk to the Intelligence National Security Alliance (INSA)/Armed Forces Communications and…

President Obama addressed troops at MacDill Air Force Base in Florida on Wednesday regarding his strategy to "degrade and destroy ISIL," but also reminded the audience about his plans for the U.S. military in Afghanistan [emphasis added]:

Though he didn't say it in so many words, President Obama came out today personally opposed to Scottish independence, which is set to go to a vote tomorrow. Wednesday afternoon, the president took to Twitter with this message:

Secretary of State John Kerry said Monday that to counter the ideology of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and its claim of a "religious foundation" for its actions, part of the strategy of the international coalition he is attempting to assemble must be to "begin to put real Islam…

The banner, featuring a cartoon condom with a smiling face, reads: "I am Mr. Condom. Use me whenever you want to have sex. I will protect you from STDs, early pergnancy [sic], and unwanted pregnancy." Across the top of the banner are the words "I took the condom pledge," the slogan from which the…

Hillary Clinton is widely considered, should she enter the 2016 presidential race, the Democratic front runner. But the former secretary of state is shrinking rather than building an already limited website presence. 

A largely overlooked posting on the White House's Twitter account the very day of the assault on the U.S. diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya in 2012 is a painful symbol of the president's portrayal of the world versus reality. Two hours after word first reached the White House, around the time…

Secretary of State John Kerry addressed the press in Baghdad, Iraq today before rushing off to a meeting in Amman, Jordan for "bilateral meetings with counterparts to discuss regional issues and the current situation in Iraq." Kerry said that tonight, President Obama "will lay out with great…

The "busiest land port of entry in the Western Hemisphere" is getting an upgrade, and according to the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA), about a half a million dollars worth of new artwork will be part of the package. The San Ysidro Land Port of Entry, the border crossing facility for the…

In July, a hacker gained access to a computer server used to test code for the federal government's Obamacare website HealthCare.gov, according to a Thursday report by the Wall Street Journal's Danny Yadron. Although the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) stressed no data was taken and…

Secretary of State John Kerry's speech at the groundbreaking ceremony for the U.S. Diplomacy Center in Washington, D.C. Wednesday included an intriguing aside that appeared to reference the upcoming 2016 presidential election. Kerry spoke after remarks by each of the five former secretaries of…

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is joining five of his predecessors on Wednesday at a groundbreaking ceremony for the United States Diplomacy Center, a new 40,000 square foot facility dedicated to "bringing the story of American diplomacy to life." The "state-of-the-art museum and education…

President Obama addresses the "people of West Africa" in a video posted Tuesday by the U.S. State Department regarding the growing threat of the Ebola virus, which Centers for Disease Control director Tom Friedman just declared on CNN "completely out of control" in Africa (via HotAir). The…

In 2014, President Obama has made much of his pen-and-a-phone strategy to accomplish his goals in the face of what he calls an "unprecedented pattern of obstruction" from Republicans in Congress. Apparently the president's supporters are on board with the idea of unilateral executive action. At…

John Kerry chose the third anniversary of U.S. citizen Amir Hekmati’s "detention on false espionage charges" during a visit with his family in Iran in 2011 to "respectfully" call on the government of Iran to release Hekmati and several other U.S. citizens held or missing in that country. Saeed…

Josh Earnest appeared on MSNBC's Morning Joe Friday in damage-control mode after President Obama's "we don't have a strategy yet" remark during his press conference on Thursday. Almost immediately after the president made the comment in response to a question by Chuck Todd, Earnest took…

Less than a week before President Obama and other NATO leaders gather in Wales for a two day summit, NATO is accusing Russia having "well over 1,000 troops" in Ukraine where Russian-backed separatists continue to skirmish with Ukrainian forces. This latest development underlines a statement on the…

The Immigration & Customs Enforcement agency renewed its search this week for "Transportation Services for Unaccompanied Children" crossing the border into the United States. An earlier notice posted in January of this year seeking "escort services" for an estimated 65,000 unaccompanied children…

The Department of Health and Human Services is looking to school the entertainment industry media when it comes to reporting on substance abuse and mental health disorders. In a notice posted this week on behalf of HHS's Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), the agency…

The federal government issued sixty contracts from 2009 to 2014 in efforts to build Healthcare.gov, the federal insurance marketplace. According to a report issued today by the inspector general (OIG) of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the government had already paid out just…

Ever since President Obama pulled forces out of Iraq, he has been unequivocal in his statements about "boots on the ground" in that country. As recently as August 7, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said that the "President has also made clear that American military action in Iraq would not…

Negative employee feedback has prompted a division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to seek development of a training program for supervisors on having "difficult conversations." In response to focus groups, the National Ocean Service's (NOS) 200 supervisors will be…

Healthcare.gov has had its share of problems over the ten months since its launch, but those looking for information about appealing a Marketplace decision are facing a brand new one: nonsense. The inquiry How to Appeal a Marketplace Decision is answered with, "Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet,…

As part of the U.S. Crisis Support Package for Ukraine announced by the White House in April, the State Department awarded a $435,000 contract to B.K. Engineering System in Kyiv for razor wire to help "defend the newly imposed borders between Ukraine's mainland and the Crimean peninsula." The…

Fresh off a trip to India and Australia, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel addressed a group of Marines in San Diego, California Tuesday, and may have delivered a line that will show up in Republican campaign ads this election cycle. After updating the troops on some issues in the Pacific region and…

Besides centrifuges, uranium enrichment, and sanctions, this month the State Department turned to sets, digs, and spikes in diplomatic efforts with Iran. Samuel Werberg, a press and public diplomacy officer in the U.S. State Department, invoked the spirit of Jesse Owens to tout the Obama…

As the date for the Obama administration's scheduled end of the war in Afghanistan draws near, the U.S. government is arranging security for U.S. personnel who will remain in the country. One agency, the State Department's Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL),…

Vice President Biden's trip to Brazil in mid-June for the USA versus Ghana World Cup game and meetings the following day with the president and vice president of Brazil required rental of vehicles for Biden and his entourage costing over $900,000. Added to the $2.2 million cost of hotels we…

Nobel Peace Prize recipient Jimmy Carter takes to ForeignPolicy.com to argue that the key to ending the current war in Gaza is "recognizing Hamas as a legitimate political actor." Writing along with fellow "Elder" Mary Robinson (part of an "international group of elder statesmen"), the former…

The government looks inward at times. The Office of the Inspector General recently posted a solicitation for credit card sized audio recorders to be disguised as Department of Defense (DoD) ID cards. 

First Lady Michelle Obama created buzz with her remark at the recent Summit of the Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders that "the blood of Africa runs through my veins." But later in her speech, she had some observations about the country of her birth as well. Mrs.…

Vice President Joe Biden inadvertently may have produced the worst public service announcement for a state since  Maryland's Governor William Donald Schaefer referred to the Eastern Shore of his state as the "[outhouse]" of Maryland. Biden recently recorded a White House White Board video to boost…

Each year the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requires all federal agencies and departments to file reports detailing FOIA requests submitted by the public. Each report contains statistics on requests submitted, processed, granted (full or partial), and denied, in addition to current backlogged…

Vice President Biden and his entourage visited Brazil in mid-June to attend the USA versus Ghana World Cup game, a trip that also included meetings with both the president and vice president of Brazil. Although the vice president spent only one night in Brazil before moving on to Colombia, the…

The threat to the U.S. government and U.S. businesses from foreign hackers, especially from China, has been increasingly in the news in recent months. In a little noticed WTOP interview last week, recently installed National Counterintelligence Executive William Evanina expressed the threat in…

Martin Luther King dreamed that one day his children would "be judged on the basis of the content of their character, not the color of their skin." This week, the current head of the Justice Department said that "given the disparities that still afflict and divide us," that dream will have to wait.

As John Kerry travels from country to country on various diplomatic missions as secretary of state (almost half a million miles so far), he often addresses the staff and their families at the U.S. embassies in the countries he visits. Remarks at these informal gatherings are often more casual than…

At the same time the Obama administration once again renewed its Equal Pay push, the White House released salary figures for White House staff. Upon analysis, the Washington Post, among others, concluded that the gender pay gap (as defined by the White House) that has existed since President Obama…

Twice in the past week, President Obama has needled Republicans in the House of Representatives by saying that while he's doing his job, the GOP House is "not doing anything." The first time was when he was in Minneapolis to spend a "day in the life" of Rebekah, a mother concerned about making ends…

The Department of Health and Human Services recently recognized the RISE project (Recognize, Intervene, Support, and Empower) in Los Angeles County for its work to fight "anti-gay and anti-transgender bias" in the child welfare system in the county:

Labor Department Secretary Tom Perez has taken the occasion of the final day of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride Month, as proclaimed by President Obama, to clarify that his department provides the "full protection of the federal non-discrimination laws that we enforce to transgender…

Writing on the White House blog, Ambassador Susan Rice, the president’s national security advisor, accuses the Senate of harming national security by not confirming more ambassadorial nominees. Rice contends that the current backlog of forty-eight is unnecessary and harmful:

In spite of a string of worrisome human rights and freedom of expression violations, the Obama administration is holding out hope that Egypt's government lead by President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is still headed for democracy.  State Department official Richard Stengel, under secretary of state for…

In June 2013, even before the launch of Healthcare.gov, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) awarded a contract to Hewlett-Packard to replace Verizon's Terremark subsidiary as host for the Obamacare website and related Data Services Hub (DSH). However, as the March 31, 2014 date for…

With much of the Obama administration's foreign policy in tatters, John Kerry is clear on at least one goal he hopes to achieve by the end of his time as secretary of state: having lesbian, bisexual, and transgender ambassadors representing the United States.  In remarks to a GLIFAA (formerly Gays…

Vice President Joe Biden was in Brazil Monday for a meeting with Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff and to attend the USA's World Cup game versus Ghana. The following day, Biden addressed the staff of the U.S. embassy in Brasilia and related an anecdote from the World Cup game to illustrate what…

In line with President Obama's official proclamation of June as "Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride Month," the banner headlining the website of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) Wednesday proclaims the agency's celebration of the same, noting, "It’s also about…

The results of a Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) audit released Tuesday found that "[w]hile the IRS is complying with GSA requirements to recycle or donate used information technology (IT) equipment, TIGTA found several areas for improvement." The IRS got rid of more than…

The U.S. Postal Service is seeking a company to help develop a program called the Internet of Postal Things. The Risk Analysis Research Center (RARC), part of the Postal Service's Office of the Inspector General (OIG), is looking for a supplier "who possesses expertise and critical knowledge of the…

Hillary Clinton raised eyebrows recently with her assertion that the five Taliban commanders transferred to Qatar in exchange for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl are "not a threat to the United States." John Kerry, in remarks Thursday to the U.S. Embassy staff in London, seemed to take issue with Clinton's…

A Government Accountability Office (GAO) report published a month ago but just publicly released on Monday found that while the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has taken steps to see that ineligible beneficiaries do not receive reduced-price or free school meals, oversight still needs to be…

As the situation in Iraq continues to deteriorate, President Obama's Iraq policy is coming under increasing scrutiny.  On the Senate floor today, Senator John McCain even said: "It's time that the president got a new national security team." But the White House website's page on Iraq continues to…

In late March of this year, President Obama stayed in Brussels, Belgium for about 24 hours on a weeklong trip through Europe. Lodging at The Hotel in Brussels cost $1.5 million, as we reported in April, including rooms for the president and his entourage, as well as for the advance team in the…

The FBI announced Tuesday in Savannah, Georgia that eighty-eight people have been charged in "one of the largest federal food program frauds ever prosecuted." Fifty-four of the defendants were charged with conspiring to open "purported grocery stores" specifically for the purpose of defrauding…

Time magazine is reporting that during an interview about the deal to trade Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl for five Taliban detainees from Guantanamo, when "[a]sked whether the Taliban would be inspired by the exchange to kidnap others, a commander laughed. 'Definitely.'" The response should not come as a…

The administration for children and families, part of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), issued guidance in a memo on Wednesday regarding application of the federal government's policy on same-sex spouses/marriages to all Head Start and Early Head Start programs.  

Addressing a Center for Strategic and International Studies forum earlier this week, Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Michael G. Vickers detailed a laundry list of national security threats that the United States faces today, the American Forces Press Services reports, including:

At the White House press briefing Monday, Jay Carney was not asked directly about his statement from June 2013 that "we would not make any decisions about transfer of any detainees without consulting with Congress and without doing so in accordance with U.S. law," as we reported yesterday. However,…

In May, the Office of the Federal Register (OFR), part of the National Archives, hosted an "editathon" to "focus on improving Wikipedia entries related to government publications." The event was promoted on the websites of both Wikipedia and the OFR. Two OFR officials attended the meeting (David…

Among the questions being raised about this weekend's exchange of  Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl for five top Taliban commanders held at Guantanamo is why Congress was not informed of the move ahead of time. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said on Meet the Press on Sunday that concerns over the health and…

A report released this week by the inspector general for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) found that "inappropriate scheduling practices are systemic throughout VHA." But as recently as September 2013, Stephen Warren, the executive in charge for information and technology for the VA, said…

In October 2013, as the nation was focused on the deeply flawed rollout of the Healthcare.gov Obamacare marketplace, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) awarded $3 million in prizes to three participants in the agency's Medical Appointment Scheduling Contest. The contest was announced in 2012…

President Obama is delivering the commencement address at the Military Academy at West Point on Wednesday where he is expected to detail future plans for the U.S. military in Afghanistan. The president laid out the basic outline in a Rose Garden appearance on Tuesday which calls for an almost…

The Department of Veteran's Affairs (VA) posted three notices on fbo.gov in 2013 regarding the agency's intent to purchase appointment scheduling software to correct problems with preparation and delivery of appointment notices to veterans for the VA's compensation and pension clinics. The…

The same day President Obama held a press conference about the growing scandal at the Department of Veterans Affairs, Secretary of State John Kerry faced the press in Mexico at a joint appearance with Mexican foreign secretary Jose Antonio Meade. Kerry was in the country to discuss trade, economic…

Secretary of State John Kerry recently told the graduating class of Boston College that climate change is threatening "nothing less than the future of the entire planet."  Now another State Department official is asserting that even if the planet dodges the climate change bullet, the earth may be…

Just a day after House Republicans introduced legislation to roll back some Department of Agriculture (USDA) regulations on school meal programs, the USDA announced some flexibility would be granted to some schools for the coming school year when implementing the new policies:

Secretary of State John Kerry did not shy away from pejorative language when addressing "climate change" in his commencement speech at Boston College on Monday.  Kerry referred to those skeptical of the Obama administration's climate claims as "members of the Flat Earth Society" who are "risking…

The American Military Partner Association (AMPA) held its first National Gala Dinner in Washington Sunday, and the Department of Defense used the opportunity to tout the rapid advances the military is making in erasing gender distinctions in policies regarding military spouses and partners. As…

President Obama has painted a bleak portrait of cooperation in Washington in several recent speeches, charging that Republicans say "no to every proposal that we know could make a difference in the lives of hardworking Americans," and that "Washington doesn’t work" because we have a "party on the…

In London Thursday for a meeting with the foreign ministers of the nations of the London 11, the "Friends of Syria," Secretary of State John Kerry revealed that “raw data that suggests there may have been” chlorine-based chemical weapons used by the Assad regime in Syria:

Secretary of State John Kerry, in the United Kingdom for a meeting of the nations of the London 11, spoke to the press at the Foreign Commonwealth Office in London.  While the gathering was principally to address the military conflict and humanitarian crisis in Syria, the secretary commented on the…

The official White House schedule says President Obama was in the Philippines for less than 24 hours, but the estimated cost of the hotel and vehicle rentals in support of the trip topped $1.1 million. The hotel contract (Sofitel Luxury Hotel) provided for up to 3,600 room night plus various…

Secretary of State John Kerry welcomed French foreign minister Laurent Fabius to the State Department in Washington on  Tuesday to discuss a range of issues, from Iran to Syria to climate change. Or, in the words of the foreign minister, "climate chaos." Kerry and Fabius made a joint appearance…

On Sunday, the White House blog declared that Obamacare made this Mother's Day "particularly special."  On Monday, the Obamacare website Healthcare.gov got into the act, suggesting that "Health insurance with Medicaid is the perfect Mother’s Day gift":

Given the lack of foreign policy success with "red line" threats of military force, the Obama administration has apparently broadened the definition of "use of force" to include financial threats of red ink against Russia for recent actions in Ukraine. U.S. ambassador to the U.K. Matthew…

Rahm Emanuel famously declared early in the Obama administration that "you never want a serious crisis to go to waste." Apparently the White House feels the same about holidays.  On Sunday, a blog post appeared on the official White House website entitled "Happy Mother's Day, from the ACA":

Boko Haram, the militant group responsible for the recent kidnapping of 276 girls in Nigeria, was not designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) by the State Department until November of 2013 despite a long record of violence. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has now come under…

Secretary of State John Kerry spoke to the U.S. embassy staff in Luanda, Angola on Sunday as he continued his visit to the continent of Africa.  A portion of his remarks seemed to reflect the secretary's awareness of the somewhat precarious position he may be in owing to numerous volatile…

During a talk to the U.S. embassy staff in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia at the first stop on his trip to Africa, Secretary of State John Kerry remarked about what he called the "different cross-currents of modernity" and the challenges they present on the African continent. The comments contain a veiled…

Secretary of State John Kerry addressed the staff of the U.S. embassy in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on Thursday as part of a seven-day trip through Africa.  During his remarks, Kerry recognized the work of the foreign nationals employed by the embassy, and he singled out two nationals who recently…

In October 2013, as the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), a division of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), was launching Healthcare.gov, CMS also launched a quieter initiative. As part of Ignite, an internal HHS program designed to spur innovation, a team within…

Michelle Obama wrapped up her March visit to China with a stop in Chengdu, arriving on March 25 and departing for the United States on the following day. But that one leg of the trip alone required about 900 room nights, ranging from 21 rooms beginning on March 13 for the advance team to a peak of…

President Obama spent only one night in Japan last week on his current swing through Asia, but the State Department estimated total "lodging nights" required by the president and his entourage could run around 2,172, and the use of "functional rooms" (presumably conference rooms and the like) could…

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is looking for custom-made chairs, but not just any chairs. Although the notice uses the euphemistic term "Non-Human Primate," the intended occupants are monkeys, baboons, or other primates used in the "ongoing behavioral experiments" the NIH is conducting.…

A study by the National Institute on Drug Abuse found that "[m]arijuana use makes tobacco use more pleasurable and may increase the user’s risk for becoming addicted to nicotine." Experiments involving rats found that those animals exposed to THC, the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana,…

Vice President Biden addressed Ukrainian legislators Tuesday in a committee room of the Rada, the Ukrainian parliament, where he began his remarks by thanking the legislators for "making me feel relevant again." Biden is in Ukraine to show support for the Ukrainian government as that country faces…

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) will spend the four days leading up to the Boston Marathon conducting a helicopter-based survey to measure naturally occurring background radiation in a ten square mile area west of downtown Boston.  The measurements are being taken to "establish…

Four years after Obamacare became law, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is notifying Medicare providers and suppliers of new fingerprint-based background checks.  Eventually, all individuals who hold a five percent or greater stake in a Medicare supplier or provider that is…

The first official word from the Obama administration on Kathleen Sebelius's resignation as secretary of health and human services is a retweet by the official White House Twitter account of a tweet by Vox.com's Ezra Klein:

While crises continue in Ukraine, Syria, Iran, and the Central African Republic, the United Nations turned its attention to a different kind of crisis on Thursday: the "global road safety crisis."  The U.N. General Assembly held a session on Improving Global Road Safety in which the United States…

Despite the Obama administration's insistence that everyone -- the government, insurance companies, doctors, medical providers, and consumers -- will reap benefits from Obamacare, a recent grant proposal by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) suggests that the agency does have…

In late March, President Obama took a week-long trip through Europe which included a stop of less than 24 hours in Brussels, Belgium for meetings with the European Union and NATO. The president stayed at The Hotel, a twenty-seven story hotel in the center of the city. The estimated cost for the…

In the months and weeks leading up to March 31, the Obama administration pushed the message through press releases, tweets and blog posts that the last day in March was the final opportunity to get health insurance in 2014.  A White House blog post on Monday is typical, beginning with the words,…

 In the midst of the Obama administration's latest push to increase the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) has released an analysis showing the the percentage of hourly workers earning at or below the minimum wage is down to 4.3 percent, or 3.3…

Millions of individuals who recently entrusted personal, medical, and financial information to the federal government while enrolling in Obamacare via Healthcare.gov may find a recent trend reported by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) rather unsettling.  The number of security breaches…

A few weeks ago during a Congressional hearing, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told Congress regarding Obamacare, “We have implemented a number of changes in the way the law was written to ease the transition into the marketplace.” This week, her department has done the same…

The office of the inspector general (OIG) for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has uncovered seventy-nine "high-risk security vulnerabilities" in the information processing systems of ten state Medicaid agencies that "raise concerns about the integrity of the systems used to…

Despite the Russian troops massing on the Ukainian border and Russia's "illegal and illegitimate" actions so far, Secretary of State John Kerry told the press in Paris last night after talks with Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov that, according to Lavrov, "Russia wants to support Ukraine in its…

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released details of the latest contract with Terremark Federal Group covering "open market items" required for the ongoing operation of Healthcare.gov. The documents include an itemized list of computing and network services, fees, licenses and…

For the latest installment in the Department of Health and Human Services' Obamacare "My #GetCovered Story" series, HHS has borrowed a line from the traditional wedding vows: "In sickness and in health."  In a blog post of that title, a "theater artist" from Chicago tells the story of how her own…

When the Affordable Care Act was passed in 2010, one provision was a new 3.8 percent Net Investment Tax effective in 2013. Although the tax will generally hit high-end taxpayers (threshold is $250,000 for married and $200,000 for single), because of the way many parents choose to report their…

The White House has been tight-lipped about the cost of First Lady Michelle Obama's trip to China, but based on the choice for lodging, it could be considerable. Mrs. Obama and her entourage, which numbers seventy according to the Washington Times (including her two daughters and her mother),…

The professional press corps has been frozen out of Michelle Obama's swing through China. But the White House has partnered with CNN to bring in amateurs. Katie Hawkins-Gaar, a CNN editor, coordinated the effort to solicit and accumulate submissions from "iReporters" interested in asking questions…

Healthcare.gov has eliminated the web chat customer service option. Sometime around the beginning of March, the online chat feature that has been present since Healthcare.gov was launched disappeared.  Although previous posts on the Healthcare.gov blog still refer to the "live chat" feature, the…

When Michelle Obama celebrated the fourth anniversary of "Let's Move," her White House initiative on fitness and healthy eating, she cited a recent study by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) showing a remarkable 43 percent drop in obesity rates among children ages 2-5.  Mrs. Obama brought…

The Obama administration has been under heavy criticism from foes and even some friends for selective enforcement of laws.  Executive orders and executive actions have contradicted, delayed, or otherwise modified laws regarding same-sex marriage, immigration, and, most controversial in the last…

Testifying Wednesday before the House Ways and Means hearing on the Health and Human Services (HHS) budget, Kathleen Sebelius was bombarded with questions about implementation of the Affordable Care Act. She was asked to provide details on the administration's claims about current enrollment…

In testimony before the Senate Appropriations Committee Thursday, Secretary of State John Kerry made the point that his department is not just concerned with foreign affairs.  The State Department tweeted the following comments of the secretary at the hearing:

As sequestration bore down in February 2013, the threat of furloughs for thousands of government workers was a common refrain from those warning of the dire effects of the across the board budget cuts. Janet Napolitano, then-head of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), told Rep. Bennie…

For now, the "one-stop shopping" experience at Healthcare.gov repeatedly promised by President Obama is still at least one stop short of the goal.  In early January, news reports revealed a glaring shortcoming at Healthcare.gov: no function existed to report "life events," such as the birth of a…

Less than a month after the exposure of a widespread vulnerability on government "open data" websites, another perhaps even more insidious opening for abuse of government websites has come to light. The problem is known as an "unvalidated redirect," and has been found on the websites of the…

Close on the heels of an Obamacare-related "off the record" conference call hosted by Vice President Biden, President Obama will host one of this own on Monday, March 10 with "faith leaders."  According to the announcement, the president "wants to thank all of the faith and community leaders across…

Even as the situation in Ukraine has some talking about the possibility of a new cold war with Russia, Secretary of State John Kerry issued his first Policy Guidance since assuming his position a little over a year ago. The subject: Climate change.  In a blog post entitled "We Need To Elevate the…

Late last year the Wall Street Journal reported that Hewlett-Packard was replacing Verizon's Terremark subsidiary as the host of the federal government's Obamacare website, Healthcare.gov, when Terremark's contract expired in March 2014.  However, the Department of Health and Human…

The semi-annual report on "Re-engagement of Detainees Formerly Held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba" was released on Wednesday by the Director of National Intelligence (DNI). Out of a total of 614 former prisoners (up from 603 six months ago), intelligence has confirmed that 104 (up from 100) have…

Here's a rather harsh assessment of the last four years under the Obama administration's economic policies:

The state agency in charge of Maryland's beleaguered Obamacare Marketplace, the Maryland Health Benefit Exchange (MHBE), is looking to establish a standing advisory committee to provide the board of the MHBE advice and input on a "broad range of policy issues."  The MHBE sent out a letter to…

The March 31, 2014 deadline for Obamacare open enrollment has been widely publicized since Healthcare.gov launched in October 2013, but, until recently, information about purchasing coverage outside of the open enrollment period was ambiguous at best.  For most of February, a page on the federal…

President Obama spoke to the Democrat National Committee's winter meeting in Washington, D.C. on Friday and addressed the minimum wage increase that he recently proposed, comparing it to the minimum wage in Ronald Reagan's time.  According to the White House transcript, and the C-Span video, the…

Tuesday, Secretary of State John Kerry was joined in the Benjamin Franklin Room at the State Department in Washington, D.C. by Catherine M. Russell, ambassador-at-large for global women's issues, and British Foreign Secretary William Hague for a "Discussion on Ending and Preventing Sexual Violence…

News broke this week that under a plan released by Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, the United States Army will be reduced to its smallest force since before World War II.  Though not directly related to that plan, another announcement this week by the Defense Department gives, perhaps, a taste of…

Details of the Healthcare.gov rescue in the fall of 2013 continue to dribble out via months-old contracts and modifications posted online.  The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) exercised two contract modifications in quick succession in October/November to increase the cloud…

The Obama administration is wasting no time in showing support for the new government forming in Ukraine.  The State Department has announced that Deputy Secretary of State William Burns will visit Kiev, Ukraine on a February 25 to 26 trip that will include a stop in Istanbul, Turkey, as well.…

Former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg met with U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon at United Nations headquarters today for Bloomberg's new role as United Nations special envoy for cities and climate change.  At the photo op, the secretary general was effusive in his praise of Bloomberg, even…

A recently released Department of Agriculture (USDA) report on the "Food Assistance Landscape" for the fiscal year 2013 shows that for the second year in a row, participation in the federal government's SNAP (food stamps) program has increased despite a corresponding drop in the unemployment rate,…

At first glance, a page on the Health and Human Services (HHS) website seems to be giving that agency's official advice on the "The Health Benefits of Nootropics," a classification of purportedly memory-enhancing drugs.  The page is found on the website's subdomain of the Assistant Secretary for…

As the clock ticks down toward the end of Obamacare's first open enrollment period on March 31, the White House continues to invest considerable resources in publicizing the president's signature domestic program.  On Thursday, Vice President Biden will host a 30-minute "off the record" conference…

The Department of Defense (DOD) has just announced that the public will be invited to vote in a video competition called "Fight the Enemy."  In this case, the enemy is tobacco.  The innovation office of the military's assistant secretary of defense for health affairs is sponsoring the competition…

The White House is recognizing President's Day 2014 with a blog post entitled "Dive into the Presidency for President's Day."  The post features a biography of Thomas Jefferson, a high-definition photo of a painting of George Washington, a special interactive gallery that includes "pages from…

The website of the U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) was repeatedly hacked on Monday and Tuesday this week by an online drug retailer. A Tuesday Google search of the site, www.globalchange.gov, revealed dozens of pages hawking everything from Xanax to Levitra to Ambien. A partial list is…

New IRS commissioner John Koskinen is beginning his tenure with some blunt words: If you need IRS help on the telephone, be prepared to wait -- a long time.  The IRS posted a YouTube video of the commissioner's message to taxpayers as the pace of the 2014 filing season picks up.  The commissioner…

A post Monday on the White House blog announced that two paintings by American artist Edward Hopper have been added to the wall of the Oval Office, while a rare copy of the Emancipation Proclamation signed by Abraham Lincoln was removed.  The copy had been there since Martin Luther King Day in 2010…

Nearly two months after Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced that her agency would create a new Chief Risk Officer (CRO) position to prevent a repeat of the Healthcare.gov debacle, the position is apparently still unfilled.  HHS, however, has continued to solicit…

Documents recently released by the government show that the value of hotels and local transportation contracts for the U.S. delegation to Nelson Mandela's funeral in December were considerably higher than previous estimates.  On December 19, we first reported the cost at about $11 million. However,…

In an interview on Wednesday, CNN's Jake Tapper questioned Secretary of State John Kerry about Iran, the security of the Sochi Olympics, and Syria. On the latter issue, Tapper asked the secretary point blank if the Obama administration's Syria policy had failed:

The State Department is presenting a global webcast on February 4, titled "From the Street to Mainstream: The Evolution of Rap/Hip Hop Music."  The host of the webcast, rapper and State Department Music Ambassador Toni Blackman, will be joined by Pras Michel, a founding member of the hip hop group…

President Obama called for a minimum wage hike in his State of the Union Address, but to hear Washington state Democrats tell it, wages aren't the main concern: The real problem is the modern American workplace itself. The minimum wage in Washington state is already $9.32 an hour, more than two…

Monday morning, the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) blog at Whitehouse.gov published an entry titled: "Support for National Association of School Nurses' [NASN] Position on the Legalization of Marijuana." However, the original link for the post is now meet with a "Sorry, the page…

In a stunning admission, a recently released government document reveals that the original contract for Healthcare.gov contained no "specific concurrent user performance requirement." The federal government's online marketplace was plagued from the outset, in part due to the lack of ability to…

President Obama made a rather sweeping statement in his weekly address as his administration launches the White House Task Force on Protecting Students from Sexual Assault.  In a show of support to victims of assault, the president said:

A security expert who has testified before Congress and spoken to the media about vulnerabilities of the Healthcare.gov website has weighed in on the website's latest security issue, which was first reported Thursday by THE WEEKLY STANDARD. David Kennedy, the CEO of TrustedSec, an information…

At least three marketers of health-related or insurance products and services have taken advantage of the "data-set" feature at Healthcare.gov to give themselves a virtual presence on the federal government's Obamacare site.  The ability to use a web address containing "healthcare.gov" may lend…

Vice President Joe Biden addressed the North American International Auto Show in Detroit on Thursday and reminisced about the state of the industry before and after the Obama administration came into office.  He observed that the steep decline in auto sales during President Obama's first year in…

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) recently announced that Accenture Federal Services would be taking over for CGI Federal as the main contractor for Healthcare.gov.  CMS documents reveal that without the new estimated $91.1 million contract, the government could end up making…

Did Michelle Obama attend an encore presentation of a classified Presidential Daily Briefing this past December?  According to the official White House schedule, it would appear so. The schedule for December 18, in addition to listing the Presidential Daily Briefing at 9:45, includes a 2:05…

The office of the Director of National Intelligence released its interactive 2014 Counterterrorism Calendar this week on the website of the National Counterterrorism Center.  The map provided with the calendar contains an embarrassing error, misspelling the name of the U.S.'s closest ally in the…

The EPA awarded $461,368 in grants this week for various environmental projects along the U.S.-Mexico border.  About half of the funds went to projects in Calexico, CA and Phoenix, AZ, but the remaining $230,000 went to two cities on the Mexican side of the border, Nogales and Ensenada.  The…

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.  

Yesterday, the Obama administration announced an agreement regarding Iran's nuclear program had been reached.  But a statement about the enforcement of the deal made by a senior administration official during a background briefing on Sunday, however, is likely to further worry critics of the deal.…

The federal agency that oversees the Voice of America is seeking someone to produce a TV entertainment show to be broadcast in Iran in the Farsi language that includes "Hollywood news" and "other interesting aspects of life on the West Coast of the United States." The Broadcasting Board of…

The Obama administration has come under fire for weeks now for selectively releasing "enrollment" data for Healthcare.gov and the state exchanges.  The latest figure of 2.1 million was met with skepticism by many observers, even some who are sympathetic to the administration.  However, based on…

In November, the Obama Justice Department dropped a lawsuit aimed at stopping a school voucher program in Louisiana. The Louisiana Scholarship Program is intended to give students in failing public schools a chance to attend better schools, including private ones. Justice tried to block the program…

On Wednesday, Education Secretary Arne Duncan and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder are scheduled to make a joint appearance at Frederick Douglass High School in Baltimore, MD.  The purpose of the visit is to hold a roundtable with students on "Solutions to Enhance School Climate/Improve Discipline…

On New Year's Eve day, a Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) rule correction was entered in the Federal Register related to an Affordable Care Act rule that had been finalized two months earlier.  The published version of the rule entitled (in part) ‘‘Patient Protection and Affordable…

Six days into the new year and fourteen days after the extended December 23 deadline, the federal Obamacare website Healthcare.gov is still holding out hope of coverage beginning January 1 to some consumers.  The notice, which first appeared on December 24, advises consumers who had "problems" with…

The Food and Drug Administration is seeking a small business to potentially supply the federal agency with a chewing gum tester.  Despite the frivolous sounding nature of the announcement, the search is a serious one, and apparently a growing need.  Chewing gum-based pharmaceuticals (such as…

The contractor building the financial management system for Healthcare.gov is being blamed by a Houston hospital for delayed Medicare reimbursements that have caused the hospital to miss payrolls for weeks. Novitas Solutions is the federal government's new Medicare payment processor for the…

As the full breadth of the Healthcare.gov debacle became apparent, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) turned to the architect of the Federal Data Hub to lead the team of contractors to fix the woefully inadequate website that had disastrously launched just weeks before.…

State Department contract awards were posted this week for "Transportation services in support of Mandela Funeral" and "Accommodation in support of the Nelson Mandela funeral in South Africa."  The accompanying Justification and Approval documents estimated the cost of transportation at a maximum…

The Healthcare.gov website has been plagued with problems since the October 1 launch.  As web programmers often do, the designers of the federal government's flagship health care website have a test version of the site, spa.healthcare.gov, to help work out the kinks before implementation on the…

Two days before Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Kathleen Sebelius announced on December 11 that she was ordering a comprehensive investigation into the reasons behind the Obamacare launch debacle, HHS announced an upcoming Contracting with CMS Conference with topics such as "The Good,…

A Request For Information by the defense department's Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) in July 2011 culminated this month in contract awards to seven different companies worth up to $4 billion over the next ten years.  The contract awards, posted in a notice entitled Combating Weapons of Mass…

Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius's agency announced grants of $58 million to 1,157 community health centers to allow them to "expand their enrollment assistance efforts as more Americans enroll in affordable health insurance coverage." These grants come on top of $150…

The Obama administration began emphasizing the option of applying for insurance through the Obamacare Marketplace with a paper application ever since it became apparent that the online process at Healthcare.gov was riddled with problems.  More recently, however, the administration began to shift…

The White House has not even officially introduced the 2013 White House Holiday Card yet  and already Monday night copies were listed for sale on eBay for as much as $200.  The card is quite elaborate based on the standards of previous years.

In the East Room of the White House Sunday night, President Obama hosted the Kennedy Center Honors Reception to recognize five American artists: Martina Arroyo, Herbie Hancock, Carlos Santana, Shirley MacLaine,  and Billy Joel.  The president gave a brief synopsis of each artist's career, including…

Concerns have increased over the security of personal information collected by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as the volume of personal data has multiplied dramatically with the implementation of Obamacare. Security experts have testified before Congress about flaws they have…

Vice President Joe Biden's $585,000 hotel bill for a Paris visit early in 2013 focused a lot of attention on the issue of the high cost of VIP travel.  Even as Biden is currently on a swing through the Far East, the State Department has posted a $583,000 contract with the Shangri-la Hotel in…

With all the other problems experienced by consumers at Healthcare.gov, actually making payments for plans selected has gotten relatively little attention until recently.  As the end of the year draws closer, however, the importance of making a payment to secure coverage by January 1 has increased.…

At the end of September, the federal government's fiscal year was drawing to a close, the threat of a shut down was increasing, and the State Department was shopping for art.  Four contracts were awarded in the last two weeks of September, including $1,000,000 for a granite sculpture by Irish-born…

In an interview with Barbara Walters on Friday, President Obama again acknowledged problems with the roll out of the Obamacare website Healthcare.gov. At one point, the president referred to Healthcare.gov as "my website" (via CNN):

Last week, the Obama administration announce its intention to delay next year's open enrollment period for individual insurance coverage from October 15, 2014 to November 15, 2014 with the closing date moving from December 7, 2014 to January 15, 2015.  Although the change moves the beginning date…

Though news of a one year delay in the online Small Business Health Options Program (SHOP) marketplace just broke early Wednesday afternoon (via Politico), Healthcare.gov wasted no time in updating the page on the website dealing with online functions of SHOP, though there is no notation that the…

The Internal Revenue Service is conducting a pilot program allowing IRS employees to use personal smart phones to access government email accounts and other work related information.  The program is known as Bring Your Own Device (BYOD), and the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration…

Remember the old song, There's No Place Like Home for the Holidays?  The federal government has a rewrite in mind for this Thanksgiving: "I met a man who lived in Tennessee and he was heading for Pennsylvania and some homemade pumpkin pie a big bowl of fresh fruit." At least that's the implication…

At a stop in San Francisco on a three-day fund raising swing along the West Coast, President Obama said during a speech that "sometimes people forget I'm not running for office again."  The president was talking about Republicans in Congress and the immigration reform that he is trying to get…

The terrorist attack against the U.S. diplomatic post in Benghazi, Libya on September 11, 2012, awakened renewed interest in the security of overseas consulates and embassy facilities. A recent report by the State Department's Office of the Inspector General spotlights some major concerns regarding…

Though the Obama administration has been promoting the benefits of Obamacare for several years now, one perk of coverage through the exchanges that has gone largely unnoticed is a mandated three-month grace period for unpaid premiums.  The rule, however, only applies to those receiving subsidies…

On Thursday, a scathing article by Ron Fournier titled, "Obama’s Image Machine: Monopolistic Propaganda Funded by You, at National Journal, took the White House to task for shutting out press photographers from presidential events in favor of official White House photos taken by White House…

Even before the October 1 launch, concerns were mounting over the ability of the government to handle the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare. Though many expressed those concerns publicly, insiders at the White House, Health and Human Services, and the contractors hired to…

The Department of Health and Human Services revealed on Wednesday a plan to spend up to $7 billion to find ways to reduce spending under the Affordable Care Act while maintaining or improving the quality of health care.  The solicitation for bids for this wide-ranging project appeared today on the…

When the Obama administration launched the Healthcare.gov website on October 1, the president and his officials focused on the coverage that would now be available to the uninsured as of January 1, 2014.  However, with the recent flood of cancellations of those who were told they could "keep their…

In mid-October, the Maryland Health Benefit Exchange quietly postponed all of the forums it had scheduled to inform small businesses about the Small Business Health Options Program (SHOP), as we reported.  Now, in a Friday press release, the Maryland board overseeing the state's Obamacare website…

In a November 8 letter to Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) warned that a contractor that had been identified with the insurgency had been granted access to a Coalition facility last November, and that the threat of further access…

The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) reported last week that in 2011, the IRS paid out $3.6 billion in fraudulent refunds on tax returns filed by identity thieves.  Even that amount was an improvement over the previous year when the total fraud was $5.2 billion.  However,…

A report issued in September and released this week by the IRS's Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) found continuing problems with the agency's Volunteer Program, which provides free tax preparation and electronic filing for "low- and moderate-income, elderly, disabled, and…

The White House is ramping up a new push for the president's version of comprehensive immigration reform. In an opening salvo, White House advisor on Violence Against Women Lynn Rosenthal wrote a blog entry titled, "Comprehensive Immigration Reform: Survivors Can’t Afford to Wait," saying that…

In a continuing crackdown on the federal government's Lifeline program, sometimes known as "Obama phones," the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has revealed that fraud and abuse in the program exceeded two million subscribers. New rules were established after it became clear that subscribers…

Stepping into the controversy over the team name for the Washington Redskins in early October, President Obama said in an interview with the AP:

Although CO2 is considered a "greenhouse gas" that contributes to climate change, if the Energy Department (DOE) finds partners to capitalize on the research of one of its laboratories, someday cars might run on sunshine.  Technically, cars would run on the product of sunlight, CO2, and water using…

When Kathleen Sebelius testified at a congressional hearing on Wednesday, she acknowledged the presence of a worrisome statement included in the source code of Healthcare.gov and promised that work was already underway to remove it.  A search of one portion of the code later on Wednesday revealed…

President Obama attended a Democratic fund raising event in Weston, Massachusetts Wednesday night at the home of Alan and Susan Solomont.  Among the 60 attendees were a number of high-profile Democrats, according to the Boston Globe:

A new audit by the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) released on October 24 found that while the IRS has improved the timeliness of scanning taxpayer correspondence into its Correspondence Imaging System (CIS) since a previous audit six years ago, the accuracy rate has apparently declined…

Last Thursday, representatives from four of the main contractors working on various aspects of the implementation of the Affordable Care Act testified at a Congressional hearing.  The contractors were hired by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), the division of the Department of…

Beginning with a speech last Thursday, President Obama is seeking to rejuvenate his administration's push to alter immigration laws and perhaps draw some attention away from the Obamacare launch debacle that has been dominating the headlines for much of October. The day following that speech, a new…

A week after THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported that the Obamacare website Healthcare.gov was using a copyrighted web script without attribution, the lines have been quietly added back to the code. In a tacit admission that the lines should not have been omitted, the full attribution now appears at the…

The Obamacare website Healthcare.gov has been grabbing all the headlines lately, but another aspect of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) may come under increased scrutiny in the weeks and months ahead: Electronic Health Records (EHR).  The ACA requires medical providers to transition to electronic…

A recent report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) recalls the 1980s stories of $640 toilet seats and $500 hammers.  In a report primarily addressing the construction of a hospital in Afghanistan that is two years behind schedule, SIGAR also found…

"Bullying doesn't just happen on the playground," so begins an article in an online Health and Human Services (HHS) publication called Let's Talk. The HHS's Federal Occupational Health agency cites a recent study finding that more than a third of Americans report being bullied at work, though only…

The state of Maryland has been front and center on the launch of open enrollment through the new Obamacare insurance marketplaces on October 1. The week before the launch, President Obama joined Maryland governor Martin O'Malley in Largo, Maryland to boost public awareness of the marketplaces, and…

In light of the beating the Obama administration is taking over the ignominious launch of the Obamacare insurance marketplaces, it makes sense that the White House would be looking for good news to share.  The White House Twitter account attempted to provide a boost on Thursday with the following:

Healthcare.gov, the federal government's Obamacare website, has been under heavy criticism from friend and foe alike during its first two weeks of open enrollment.  Repeated errors and delays have prevented many users from even establishing an account, and outside web designers have roundly panned…

The past two weeks have been filled with stories of government offices, agencies, services, workers, monuments, websites, memorials, and parks that have been closed, suspended, furloughed, and even barricaded.  Perhaps the most notorious of the actions taken has been the barricading of the open-air…

On October 8, THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported that the privacy policy of the Maryland Health Connection (MHC), the state's Obamacare insurance marketplace, included a statement that the marketplace "may share information provided in your application with the appropriate authorities for law enforcement…

The launch of federal government's Obamacare insurance exchange, Healthcare.gov, has been plagued with delays, errors, and poor website design, even prompting USA Today to call it an "inexcusable mess" and a "nightmare".  Now comes another example of why the website's reputation is in tatters.…

A week before the government shutdown began, the State Department awarded a $130 million contract to design and build a new embassy compound in the city of NouakChott in the West African nation of the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, which lies between Mali and the Atlantic Ocean. The contract went…

Tuesday morning, THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported that the doctor search feature on the Maryland Health Connection Obamacare insurance exchange was not yet operational and returned a "no doctors are found" message.  A reader from Minnesota points out that MNsure, the Minnesota exchange, has not…

Maryland's Health Connection, the state's Obamacare marketplace, has been plagued by delays in the first days of open enrollment.  If users are able to endure long page-loading delays, they are presented with the website's privacy policy, a ubiquitous fine-print feature on websites that often go…

"If you've got a doctor that you like, you will be able to keep your doctor," President Obama assured the public as he worked to sell Obamacare in 2010.  However, in July 2013, visitors to Healthcare.gov received a less confident "you may be able to" in answer to the question, "Can I keep my own…

Just a week before the government shutdown kicked in on October 1, the State Department awarded a five-year, maximum $5 million contract for custom handcrafted crystal stem and barware, according to a report in the Valley News, an online news site in Vermont (via Charlie Perkins).  Valley News…

A notice posted on the website of the Small Business Administration (SBA) warns furloughed employees that it is a "criminal offense" to use federal resources during the furlough period, including accessing government email accounts. Although the notice is directed to SBA employees, presumably the…

A portion of the website of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) was apparently hacked as long as two months ago.  SAMHSA is an agency of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). HHS also runs the new Obamacare insurance marketplace, Healthcare.gov.  

In an attempt to dramatize the effects of the federal government shutdown, Washington state Democrats may have revealed more about their state and about the state of the economy under President Obama than they intended.  The Advance, official blog of the Washington state house Democrats, posted the…

Sometimes timing is everything. Yesterday was day one of the federal government shutdown, and one of the biggest stories of the day was the barricading of the World War II memorial in Washington, D.C., nearly preventing a group of 92 veterans from Mississippi who had been flown in on an Honor…

On the very day the Obamacare insurance marketplaces opened for business, a new topic appeared on the HealthCare.gov website:

Monday morning, White House senior advisor Valerie Jarrett tweeted (and the White House retweeted) the following:

One day away from the launch of the Obamacare marketplaces, the question most on the minds people visiting the Healthcare.gov website is not about coverage, but rather about avoiding the penalty, or tax, for not having health insurance. As of Monday morning, here is how the website listed its "Most…

Even as President Obama and his administration are making a last minute push to encourage enrollment in Obamacare, a quiet change was made on the Healthcare.gov website regarding those who will still not be able to afford coverage after the program kicks in. From at least June 26, 2013 to as…

Speculation ran high at the United Nations this week about whether or not President Obama and Iranian president Rouhani would shake hands.  Ultimately, the two leaders did not as the gesture was deemed “too complicated” for Iran at this time, “given their own dynamic back home.”

As full implementation of Obamacare draws near, some aspects of its operation have received relatively little attention. The October 1 launch of the marketplaces, or exchanges, is less than a week away, but outside of supposedly offering a Priceline-like shopping experience for health insurance,…

President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle attended the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation Phoenix Awards Dinner at the Washington Convention Center Saturday night.  While extolling the benefits of Obamacare less than 10 days before the opening of the new health insurance marketplaces,…

Occasionally the White House conducts "background briefings" for reporters, often in the form of a conference call in which "senior administration officials" participate. The officials, though known to the reporters, are not to be named by the reporters in their stories; hence the term…

In 2009, the Obama administration made news with an $18 million, five year contract to redesign Recovery.gov, the website the government set up to allow taxpayers to track the stimulus spending enacted by the president and Congress soon after President Obama took office.  On Wednesday, notice of…

Wednesday Nancy Pelosi spoke at the Center for American Progress to help mark the launch the organization's new initiative called “Fair Shot: A Plan for Women and Families to Get Ahead.”  In her remarks, Pelosi referenced the Republicans' plan to scale back the food stamp program, the cost of which…

The White House released a Presidential Memorandum today entitled "Presidential Determination on Traficking [sic] in Persons."  The memo relates to funding provided or denied to foreign governments in accordance with the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000.  According to the memo, the U.S.…

Tuesday morning, Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Kathleen Sebelius announced on Twitter:

In August, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (HHS/CMS) quietly awarded a maximum $11.6 million contract to Novitas Solutions of Camp Hill, Penn., already a CMS contractor, for financial management services related to the…

With the launch of the Obamacare Health Insurance Marketplace less than three weeks ago, one of the only functions consumers were already able to access, creating an account, has been taken "offline" for "upgrading."

At 8:46 a.m. on September 11, 2001, American Airlines Flight 11 was crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City by terrorists.  Eleven years later on September 11, 2012, events unfolded in Benghazi, Libya, that would ultimately leave a U.S. diplomatic facility gutted and…

Since the 2010 elections, President Obama has often expressed impatience with Congress, and at times has said that he would not wait for Congress, did not need Congress, or has simply acted without Congress.  At one point, the White House developed an entire We Can't Wait campaign to emphasize the…

A few hours before midnight in Iraq as September 11 approached, the U.S. embassy in Baghdad posted an "Emergency Message" warning "U.S. citizens against all but essential travel to Iraq."  Although the notice referenced the anniversary of 9/11, the main reason for the warning is apparent threats…

Although the White House posted its annual Presidential Proclamation of National Days of Prayer and Remembrance commemorating September 11th, 2001, there is no mention of the Benghazi attacks of 2012.  One day before the 12th anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks and the first anniversary…

An unclassified version of a September report from the Director of National Intelligence reveals that another five former Guantanamo Bay detainees have either been confirmed as reengaging in terrorism or are suspected of doing so.  The report comes just as a judge in Algeria has approved parole of…

The New York Times reported on September 5 that the United States is widening plans for proposed strikes on Syria to punish the Assad government for its alleged chemical weapons attacks.  The plans now reportedly include the use of aircraft in addition to cruise missiles:

The National Security Agency (NSA) is broadening its recruiting efforts for future cyber experts.  An announcement on Wednesday named four new schools chosen to participate in the NSA's "Cyber Initiative."  The press release explains the program:

David Simas, a White House staffer, tweets (and the White House retweets) a link to an article and adds, “More good ACA [Obamacare] news. 21% savings on premiums for Ohioans who buy their own health insurance because of the ACA.”

The state of Alabama received bonus payments from Medicaid for 2009 and 2010 that were a stunning 13 times higher than the state was eligible for.  So says the inspector general (IG) for Health and Human Services in a report released on Wednesday.

Even as United Nations personnel are in Syria trying to investigate chemical weapons claims that have further exacerbated that country's bloody civil war, U.N. secretary general Ban Ki-moon was incongruously tasked with the celebration of the centennial of the Peace Palace in The Hague. After…

President Obama and Attorney General Holder met with a group of 18 mayors at the White House on Tuesday afternoon.  The meeting was billed as a discussion "with mayors from cities around the country to discuss reducing youth violence." And although Republicans hold about a quarter of mayoral…

A Census Bureau report released on Tuesday says that the number of households with children under 18 with at least one unemployed parent increased by 33 percent between 2005 and 2011 from 2.4 million to 3.2 million.  In addition, home ownership among households with children under 18 declined by 15…

If overworked employees are more likely to commit errors, then the consumers who ended up with the meat inspected by one particular Department of Agriculture (USDA) food safety inspector may have cause for concern.  A recent audit found one Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) employee…

Newly appointed United Nations ambassador Susan Power's absence from an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council on the alleged chemical weapons attack in Syria has raised eyebrows and questions.  When pressed on the matter at Thursday's press briefing, State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki…

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, on Air Force One en route to New York for the president's education bus tour, had some strong words to say about the prospects of those who don't graduate from high school, and also about those who complete high school but do not go on to college.  While…

The White House released a photo of President Obama in the Situation Room on Wednesday with Kathleen Sebelius and other officials and advisors participating in a videoconference on Obamacare.

This week, the State Department announced that, in "an important symbol of our enduring friendship with Benin," construction has begun on a new $178 million embassy complex in the small West African nation, a neighbor of Togo and Nigeria.  As is often the case in the construction of new U.S.…

The State Department Wednesday issued a security message warning U.S. citizens in or traveling to Cuba about an outbreak of cholera:

Despite a law passed 15 years ago, some Internal Revenue Service employees continue to use the designation "Illegal Tax Protester" and other similar designations in their case narratives, according to an audit just released by TIGTA (Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration). While the IRS…

As Obamacare's launch on October 1 draws closer, the Obama administration is trying to reassure the public that the program is going to deliver on the promises of the last four years. On Tuesday, White House Deputy Senior Advisor for Communications & Strategy David Simas tweeted (and the White…

The latest sequester victim: lawyers. As of September 1, court-appointed panel attorneys for the federal defender program will be hit with a $15/hour reduction in compensation.  The following announcement appeared Monday on the United States Courts website:

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) released a report on Thursday regarding illegal trafficking in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), more commonly known as food stamps. The report showed that the rate of trafficking rose from 1 percent of total benefits in the last study…

As questions remain about the security of the Federal Services Data Hub to be used in conjunction with the Obamacare marketplaces beginning October 1, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has agreed to a settlement with the not-for-profit Affinity Health Plans, Inc., for the company's…

Sequestration has been blamed for everything from cancelled White House tours to military cutbacks that threaten national security to government worker furloughs. The latest victim of sequestration, however, might have a more difficult time garnering sympathy: corporate tax credits.  The Internal…

In a report to the United Nations Committee Against Torture, the Obama administration unequivocally denies the existence of secret detention facilities operated by any part of the U.S. government. The document is a response to "55 questions prepared by the Committee and transmitted to the United…

The U.S. Energy Information Administration reports today that sales of fossil fuels produced on federal and Indian land continue to decline, dropping 4 percent in fiscal year 2012.  The slide continues a decade-long trend that accelerated in 2010, as the chart accompanying the report shows:

Back in January 2012, Bill Kristol wrote, “Cancel the competition. Mark Steyn has already won the 'best-article-not-in-THE-WEEKLY-STANDARD-to-appear-in-2012' award” for a piece called "The Sinking of the West."

A recent audit by the Office of the Inspector General for Health and Human Services found that in four out of five cases when elective surgeries were cancelled for one reason or another, Medicare still paid even though the claims submitted by the hospitals failed the "reasonable and necessary"…

News broke Wednesday that, even as the October 1 deadline for Obamacare "marketplaces" approaches, training requirements for Obamacare "navigators" were being scaled back by one-third. With less than two months remaining, the Obama administration is also facing increasing pressure to make sure data…

Details of President Obama's West coast trip this week, information usually reserved for pre-screened media outlets, were apparently inadvertently posted on the White House website for about 24 hours this weekend before being abruptly removed without comment on Monday morning.

During his visit to Pakistan on Thursday, Secretary of State John Kerry gave several TV interviews including one to Hamid Mir of Geo TV.  Mir's first question for Kerry concerned Egypt. The Obama administration has resisted referring to the military action in Egypt as a coup, but in this interview,…

Secretary of State John Kerry gave several TV interviews while in Islamabad, Pakistan on Thursday, including one to Mariam Chaudhry of Pakistan TV.  One question related to the drone policy of the United States, which is extremely unpopular in Pakistan.  In his answer, Kerry seemed to suggest the…

Thursday morning, the White House announced a new website to answer questions from businesses about Obamacare.  Valerie Jarrett wrote about the launch in a blog post titled, "A One-Stop-Shop on the Health Care Law for Businesses Big and Small." However, within two hours, the website had crashed,…

Wednesday, Alan Krueger, chairman of the White House's Council of Economic Advisers, wrote on the White House blog about revisions to economic statistics by the Bureau of Economic Analysis going all the way back to 1929.  Krueger largely interpreted the news as good, noting that the revisions…

A strange story today via a Portland, Oregon police press release:  NBA Houston Rockets player Terrence Alexander Jones was arrested early this morning after allegedly stomping on a homeless man's leg:

While furloughs of civilian employees of the Defense Department have not lived up to the pre-sequester billing, the Pentagon is doing what it can to ease the pain for those who will be taking involuntary time off.  The American Forces Press Service is reporting that the director of the Pentagon's…

When the Affordable Care Act passed in 2010, one provision that kicked in immediately was a Small Business Health Care Tax Credit.  The IRS explains how the fairly generous credit works:

Throughout his time as president, Barack Obama has often been the subject of criticism from both sides of the political spectrum for not engaging enough with Congress, Republicans in particular, to solve problems and work through legislative issues.  However, during a press gaggle today aboard Air…

Washington D.C. is big on tradition, and one of those traditions involves official portraits of top government officials.  The Defense Department just awarded a $31,200 contract (frame included) to Portraits, Inc. for an official portrait of former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta:

As Obamacare was being pushed through Congress in 2010, the Obama administration and its allies were unequivocal in two claims: If you like your doctor and you like your current health care plan, you can keep them both.  HHS Secretary Kathleen Sibelius and then-House speaker Nancy Pelosi backed the…

Secretary of State John Kerry is currently in Jordan for talks with area leaders and a meeting of the Arab Peace Initiative Follow-Up Committee.  After a meeting with Jordanian foreign minister Nasser Judeh, Kerry made some rather sweeping remarks about the role the Palestinian-Israeli conflict…

Vice President Biden spent only about 20 hours in Trinidad and Tobago on his recent six day trip through South America and the Caribbean, but the hotel bill for the vice president, his entourage and the advance team came in at about $245,000 for an estimated 1,134 room nights.  As is typically the…

Despite an admission by the Department of Transportation (DOT) that the Federal-aid Highway Programs under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) are "susceptible to significant improper payments," the DOT Inspector General (IG) has terminated an audit initiated in April "due to other…

The Labor Department announced Monday the awarding of $64 million in grants to help unemployment insurance recipients find work more quickly.  The funds will be divided up between thirty-eight states, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and the District of Columbia. Acting Labor Secretary Seth Harris…

Nine months after the terror attacks at a U.S. diplomatic post in Benghazi, Libya, an audit of five "selected high threat level posts" of the State Department by the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) reveals cause for concern.  The report found that the facilities in question failed to comply…

As the Department of Labor (DOL) celebrates the 75th anniversary of the Fair Labor Standards Act this year, the department is sponsoring a Smartphone app contest to help consumers identify businesses who treat "their workers fairly and lawfully."  The DOL requests [emphasis added] that contestants:

While the Bureau of Labor Statistics jobs report released this morning showed unemployment unchanged at 7.6 percent, the broadest measure of unemployment, the U-6 rate (seasonally adjusted), jumped to its highest level since February 2013, from 13.8 percent to 14.3 percent.  

At a pre-Independence Day naturalization ceremony at the Treasury Department Wednesday, Treasury Secretary Jack Lew used about one-third of his address to a roomful of newly sworn-in citizens to criticize the America’s immigration system and plug the current immigration legislation. According to…

Aetna, the third largest provider of medical insurance in the country, has mailed a letter to at least some customers this week warning that the "Affordable Care Act (ACA) is changing health insurance" and that "many people will pay more for their health insurance coverage in 2014 than they do…

The Washington Times reports that the cost of Obama's Africa trip, estimated as high as $100 million, is overshadowing President Obama's agenda. If past VIP trips are any indication, lodging and local transportation would represent only a fraction of the $100 million, yet those costs would likely…

In a mid-year report to Congress, National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson weighed in on the controversy surrounding the IRS's review of exempt organization (EO) applications. The Taxpayer Advocate Service (TAS) "is an independent organization within the IRS and helps taxpayers resolve problems…

As President Obama and his family continue their tour of Africa, the White House put out a Fact Sheet entitled "U.S. Support for Strengthening Democratic Institutions, Rule of Law, and Human Rights in Sub-Saharan Africa." One of the first items highlighted by the White House is a $53 million…

The State Department yielded to pressure from a coalition of Seattle and Washington state politicians, community groups, and advocacy organizations and agreed to withdraw at least one ad in the department's Metro bus ad campaign in Seattle promoting the “Rewards for Justice” campaign. The program…

In connection with the observance of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) Pride Month, the Administration for Native Americans division of Health and Human Services is hosting an online seminar ("webinar") on Thursday. The focus of the seminar is concept of the "Two Spirit" individual in…

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) website Healthfinder.gov even has a selection of over 100 eCards that can be sent to friends and family to encourage them to lose weight, quit smoking, get screened for various diseases, and even stop bullying.

While Daniel P. Schrag, White House climate adviser, tells the New York Times that "a war on coal is exactly what's needed," so far the Obama administration has been a boon for U.S. coal exports.  Last week, the Department of Energy reported that coal exports have more than doubled during President…

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Thursday published the results of a study on the effects of nutrition labeling on fast-food menus from 2005 to 2011.  Researchers were interested in the impact of locally instituted regulations by various states and municipalities, including New York…

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) put out a press release today promoting the savings to consumers from Obamacare in 2012.  The department claims that the average consumer receiving a refund will get about $100 as a result of rules on how insurers must spend premium dollars. The…

The Food and Drug Administration's Office of Criminal Investigations is soliciting bids for "Data Mining and Targeting Software" to help in its efforts to combat illegal trafficking in cigarettes and other tobacco products.  The announcement appeared Monday on the federal government's fbo.gov…

On Tuesday, National Security Council spokesperson Caitlin Hayden moderated a conference call with two unnamed senior administration officials to provide background for reporters on today's transition in Afghanistan handing over the lead on security in the country to the Afghan National Security…

The House of Representatives is scheduled Tuesday to consider a bipartisan bill to add new seasonal flu vaccines to the IRS definition of taxable vaccines.  The Senate has already reached an agreement to vote on its version of the bill without further debate if the House passes an identical…

The message regarding terrorism from the Obama administration over the past few years has been that al Qaeda is on the run, its core leadership has been "decimated," and that the face of the "war on terror" is changing for the better.  In his recent speech on U.S. counterterrorism…

The White House announced the opening of a new government supercomputing center in northern Maryland this week.  Patricia Falcone of the White House Office of Science & Technology Policy (OSTP) attended a ceremony to mark the occasion along with Maryland Senator Ben Cardin and various army…

As the IRS scandal grows, the Department of Health and Human Services today published a blog post titled "Health Datapalooza IV Tops Off a Huge Year in Data Liberation":

Thursday, at the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, U.S. Chargé d’Affaires Gary Robbins delivered another response to the "many concerns" expressed by Russia about the ongoing hunger strike by many of the terrorist detainees at the Guantánamo Bay facility:

Secretary of State John Kerry, speaking at the General Assembly of the Organization of American States in Guatemala on Wednesday, reminisced about his first trip to Latin America as a U.S. senator back in 1985:

The State Department announced Monday a total of up to $23 million in rewards for information on terrorists in West Africa, the first time the Department's Rewards for Justice program has offered rewards in that part of the continent. Although the Obama administration has repeatedly insisted that…

On Monday, CNBC reported on a new survey that found that two-thirds of Americans currently without health insurance don't know if they will purchase coverage by the deadline, the first day of 2014.  The survey was released by InsuranceQuotes.com, a company that offers comparison shopping for…

Reprising the "Don't Double My Rate" theme used during the 2012 presidential campaign, the White House is pushing a plan by President Obama this week to prevent interest rates on some student loans from doubling effective July 1.  However, the savings for most borrowers is rather less significant…

The State Department released its annual Country Reports on Terrorism 2012 survey on Thursday. The section on the Middle East and North Africa includes a report on terror attacks in Libya.  All told, there were eleven terrorism-related attacks last year in Libya prior to the 9/11 attack in Benghazi…

On Thursday, the White House's administrator for federal procurement policy, Joe Jordan, wrote on the White House blog about a legislative initiative that President Obama is sending to Congress next week "to stop excessive payments to Federal contractors."  Jordan continues:

Today, President Obama personally became re-involved in his former campaign organization's new incarnation Organizing for Action.  On the same day he is scheduled to appear at two DCCC fundraisers in Chicago, the president of the United States sent the following email to OFA's mailing list, signed…

The Internal Revenue Service has come under heavy criticism from both Republicans and Democrats in recent days after an inspector general's report detailed "inappropriate criteria" used to identify certain applications of mainly conservative organizations for special review resulting in long delays…

Congressional hearings over the last two weeks have been filled with stories of misconduct due to incompetence and inexperience among certain IRS employees. Both Republicans and Democrats have leveled the accusations, and Internal Revenue officials testifying before Congress have admitted as much.…

Today, the Government Accountability Office issued a report of preliminary finding on the progress the Department of Homeland Security has made in its efforts to reduce the backlog of immigrant visas. Although almost 863,000 records were "closed" in the last two years, the backlog of potential…

The show will go on.  Sequestration may have cost Washington D.C. tourists a chance to tour the White House, but the Independence Day fireworks will go off as planned.  A contract was awarded yesterday to Garden State Fireworks of Millington, NJ for $221,819.77.  The listing for bids on the…

Last week, a contract totaling more than $378,000 was awarded to develop and manufacture signs for Civil War-era cemeteries, including "18 unique interpretive signs for Confederate lots."  The contract was awarded by Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).

Last week, the Benghazi talking points took center stage in the ongoing investigation of the 9/11 anniversary attacks in Libya.  Jay Carney came under intense questioning at Friday's White House press briefing as he struggled to justify a dozen iterations of talking points before Susan Rice used…

Saturday, the White House retweeted a link to an OregonLive.com story on competition among healthcare insurers purportedly instigated by Obamacare:

Just this week, news broke that the "world’s first entirely 3D-printed gun" was successfully built and test-fired by an engineer in Texas.  The technology involves a special printer that uses melted polymers to generate plastic components for a variety of uses, now including working firearms.…

The congressional hearings on the 9/11 Benghazi attacks this week will likely focus on the classic questions often asked on such occasions: what did those involved know, and when did they know it?  Not only will the post-attack words and actions of government officials come under scrutiny, but…

As the White House first announced in March, Barack Obama is scheduled to visit Mexico and Costa Rica later this week. The trip is billed as "an important opportunity to reinforce the deep cultural, familial, and economic ties that so many Americans share with Mexico and Central America." And at…

Congress is preparing to take action on a bipartisan proposal to raise taxes on flu vaccines. This is not a tax on the wealthy, but rather on a broad swath of Americans, or at least those who choose to be immunized against the flu.

A website that places a "value" on Twitter accounts has increased the estimated value of suspected Boston bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's from $37 to more than $37,000 as of late Friday afternoon due to the tens of thousands of new curious followers.  Multiple news organizations reported the existence…

In what may be just an eerie coincidence, the Defense Department posted a contract award notice today to Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts for research into "Methods for Explosive Detection at Standoff." Of particular concern are Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) that have become a…

Jeff Zients, the acting director of the Office of Management and Budget, recently wrote an op-ed that appeared in newspapers around the country, and was also reproduced on the White House blog.  Zients touts the 2014 budget belated released last week by President Obama:

In his State of the Union Address, President Obama proposed raising the minimum wage to $9.00 per hour. In support of this initiative, the White House has blogged about it and published a "fact sheet," as well. Acting Secretary of Labor Seth Harris has even conducted a "minimum wage tour" to draw…

Last week, the U.S. embassy in Macedonia hosted a fashion show "with a goal of supporting Macedonia’s economic development, the fashion and textile sectors, and youth entrepreneurship."

When the monthly employment report came out Friday morning, Alan Krueger, Chairman of President Barack Obama's Council of Economic Advisers, quickly commented on the White House blog.  He began with the observation that "more work remains to be done":

At a Democratic National Committee fund raising event in Atherton, California Thursday morning, President Obama declared that the United States government still needs to get its fiscal house in order:

Wednesday night, President Obama spoke at two Democratic party fundraising events in California. A common theme was the challenge he faces in working with Republicans in Congress. At the home of Tom Steyer and Kat Taylor, the president gave Republicans a rather backhanded compliment:

As the sequester bore down on Washington, the dire warnings from the Obama administration gave the impression that wild horses couldn't drag another dime out of the treasury for a whole host of vital government services. Aircraft carrier refueling, the Head Start program, and White House tours were…

After two items last week on the cost of lodging for Vice President Joe Biden's early February trip to Europe, other news organizations began to investigate further.  Wolf Blitzer's show The Situation Room on CNN uncovered a contract apparently also related to the same visit to Paris:

As it turns out, Vice President Joe Biden's London stay in February was not the most expensive part of his trip. A government document released on February 14, 2013 shows that the contract for the Hotel Intercontinental Paris Le Grand came in at $585,000.50.

Vice President Biden and his entourage spent a little time in London in early February during his first foreign trip of the second term of the Obama administration.  A document released today revealed that the cost of lodging in London alone was close to half a million dollars. The contract was…

Acting Labor Secretary Seth D. Harris addressed the Annual Legislative Conference of the International Association of Firefighters (IAFF) on Monday. As part of a scathing attack on attempts to reform public employee labor unions, Harris told a joke that he said was “making the rounds a few years…

President Obama has often talked about the need to reduce the budget deficit. Before his run for the presidency, Senator Obama was rather harsh in his criticism of George Bush's deficits. And in July 2011, during the debt ceiling crisis, the president even addressed Congressional leaders in a talk…

Preparations continue for Barack Obama's first visit to Israel as president.  The U.S. embassy in Israel, through its American Center in Jerusalem, is planning "the Obama-ba Festival," which will run all this week, preceding the president’s visit later this month.

Earlier this week, a listing entitled "Parking Spaces at Democracy Blvd." appeared on the Federal Business Opportunities website. The contract was awarded on February 19th before the sequester took effect, but the timing could still prove embarrassing for the Obama administration.  

The world continues to experience much turmoil and angst over the possible proliferation of nuclear arms, particularly relative to North Korea, Iran, and even Russia.  Just today comes word that North Korea made its most provocative statement yet, threatening a preemptive nuclear strike on the…

In the days leading up to sequestration, President Obama and other administration officials often singled out Head Start as one of the vital programs that would be severely impacted by the automatic spending cuts. Phrases like "70,000 kids get thrown off of Head Start" and "70,000 young children…

Secretary of State John Kerry announced on Sunday the release of a quarter of a billion dollars in aid to Egypt. The Associated Press reports:

First Lady Michelle Obama is continuing her road trip celebrating the 3rd anniversary of her “Let's Move” initiative, appearing on Good Morning America with Robin Roberts on Tuesday and at an event with Rachael Ray on Wednesday. The initial press release last week gave “Let's Move” credit for…

Although most of Washington is focused this week on the upcoming vote on Chuck Hagel's nomination for Secretary of Defense and the rapidly approaching sequester deadline, the latest press release from the White House concerns ... recipe sharing:

Today the White House credited Michelle Obama's three-year-old “Let's Move” initiative with halting and even reversing a thirty year trend of increasing childhood obesity, a trend that has led to what the Centers for Disease Control has called an epidemic. A press release from the Office of the…

Josh Earnest, a White House deputy press secretary, answering a reporter's question aboard Air Force One on Friday, inadvertently painted with a broader brush than he intended. The reporter asked why Republican senators were linking Chuck Hagel's nomination for defense secretary with a bid to…

Despite assurances to the contrary, the former website of Obama for America, now Organizing for Action (OFA), continues to be used to promote Democratic party causes and candidates. Two weeks ago, an event for the Terry McAuliffe campaign for governor in Virginia was listed for several days before…

Obama for America (OFA) has transitioned into the apparently independent 501(c)(4) non-profit Organizing for Action. The group has retained Obama’s original website (BarackObama.com) and Twitter account (@BarackObama).  And although the president's role in this new organization is not clear, his…

The State Department this week announced more than $18 million in awards to provincial governments in Afghanistan in the fight against the illicit opium industry in that country.  The award comes after news this past November that countrywide there was an "alarming" 18 percent increase in 2012 in…

It's Valentine's Day, and today the Republicans heard President Obama say those three little words they never thought they'd hear: "out of money." While speaking on early childhood education in Decatur, Georgia, the president said, according to the White House transcript:

With President Obama's State of the Union Address coming up to night, the Washington Post's David Ignatus is wondering:

After dodging the question just a week ago, White House spokesman Jay Carney's hand was forced today by a statement Nancy Pelosi made yesterday on Fox News Sunday:

Obama for America continued its metamorphosis this week into Organizing for Action (OFA), an independent organization that will advocate for various "progressive" causes, including immigration reform and gun control. The BarackObama.com website, home of the presidential campaign of Barack Obama,…

On January 23, news broke that outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta had issued a directive that the military's ban on women in combat would be lifted. The New York Times reported that his decision was in response to unanimous agreement among the Joint Chiefs of Staff as expressed in a letter to…

According to an annual report for 2012 just released by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), DHS processed a total of 205,895 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests during the year. The report, presented by Acting Chief Freedom of Information Act Officer Jonathan R. Cantor, shows that DHS…

Ever since outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced a week ago that the U.S. military would lift its ban on women in combat roles, the debate, which has been simmering for decades, boiled up again. Much of the argument has centered on cultural, social, and morale-related effects that such…