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Subscribe to RSSThe New York tabs are all over the military scandal. The New York Daily News: “In the line of booty.” And if this scandal weren’t Soap Opera enough, now there’s a twin! The New York Post: “Sister Act: Petraeus helps whistleblower’s twin in custody fight with hubby.”
“Even as senior members of Congress from both parties raising questions about the Petraeus and Allen disclosures and scheduled hearings, Obama yesterday pressed ahead with a planned meeting with labor leaders and Democratic-leaning activists.
It was the first in a series of stakeholder sessions the president has set regarding the fiscal cliff,” Bloomberg writes.
Obama holds his first press conference since winning reelection today at 1:30 pm ET.
Politico: “This is not what the White House wanted for President Barack Obama’s first news conference of his second term. He won’t be able to dwell much on his stronger-than-expected victory or even press his agenda for the next four years. Instead, he’ll be diverted by a Washington sex scandal.”
“President Barack Obama will begin budget negotiations with congressional leaders Friday by calling for $1.6 trillion in additional tax revenue over the next decade, far more than Republicans are likely to accept and double the $800 billion discussed in talks with GOP leaders during the summer of 2011,” the http://bbc.in/T0f65v">Wall Street Journal reports. “Mr. Obama, in a meeting Tuesday with union leaders and other liberal activists, also pledged to hang tough in seeking tax increases on wealthy Americans. In one sign of conciliation, he made no specific commitment to leave unscathed domestic programs such as Medicare, leaving the door open to spending cuts….”
“Although major business groups remain allied with Republicans and firmly opposed to tax rate increases sought by the president, the administration can hope to pick up support from a few individual executives for what Obama calls a ‘balanced approach’ to reducing the budget deficit and heading off the sweeping tax increases and automatic spending cuts scheduled to begin Jan. 1,” Roll Call writes. “Obama plans to sit down with a dozen chief executives to hear their ideas about how the nation can avoid the tax increases and program cutbacks known as the fiscal cliff.”
USA Today lays out the stakes: “A compromise portends discomfort, most likely in the form of reduced paychecks, jobless benefits and business tax breaks. And a stalemate means higher taxes and reduced federal spending across the board, including at the Pentagon. That last scenario has Main Street and Wall Street worried.”
They go through three scenarios of what could happen: (1) A hard landing: “As Obama demands higher tax rates for the wealthiest and Republicans insist that won't happen, the two sides could go briefly past Jan. 1 without a deal on most of the expiring tax breaks”; (2) A soft landing: “This most likely scenario includes extending most if not all of the Bush tax cuts and making a down payment on spending cuts. The payroll tax cut and extended jobless benefits could expire; the AMT could be patched. A timetable for actions on spending and income taxes would be created”; (3) A safe landing: “The least likely scenario is the opposite of going over the cliff: striking a ‘grand bargain’ during the lame-duck Congress and outlining how to get $3 trillion or more in deficit reduction over the next decade. … [T]here are dangers to agreeing on too much, too soon. It could trigger a European-style recession, which could turn policymakers back toward stimulus spending and tax cuts, such as those enacted in 2009.”
The Boston Globe lists potential candidates if John Kerry’s tapped in the second Obama administration: “Among the high-profile Democratic officeholders who are expressing interest are three of the state’s congressmen: Edward J. Markey of Malden, the 66-year old dean of the congressional delegation; Michael E. Capuano of Somerville, who ran second to Martha Coakley in the 2009 Senate primary; and Stephen F. Lynch of South Boston, a conservative Democrat who won his seat in a 2001 special election in which several liberals divided the vote on the left. US Attorney Carmen Ortiz, who has gained the attention of the political world by prosecuting former speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi, has also been mentioned as a potential candidate, despite her lack of electoral experience. But those hoping for a rematch between Coakley and Brown could be disappointed. Coakley has not ruled out a run, but insiders said she would not be a Democratic favorite after her poor performance in the 2010 special election.”
The Globe also looks at how Gov. Deval Patrick might act.
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Is there anyone (except blind Obama-followers) who really believe that the President was NOT informed of this investigation by the FBI of the head of the CIA last summer when it got rolling? This is not Hoover's FBI..... And why are the reporters asking questions just blindly following along with this story that everyone was led by the nose, that the WH was 'let into the loop' only after the election??
C'mon, there were too many people who were being investigated, too many people talking for it to have not been reported, and the fact that the American people are willing to be led like sheep just shows how idiotic most of them are.
I would rather have a President who listens to the FBI and CIA. Let's them do their jobs, give their reports, and then decides.
Much better than President Bush and VP Cheney who told the CIA they wanted them to find WMD. When the CIA issued hundreds of reports saying their are no WMD, he ignores them, and went to war. Costing thousands of American lives, hundreds of billions of dollars, and made the world realize he and his party lied repeatedly. The same President and his party said "deficits don't matter", "Americans should go shopping", and Americans should buy houses to "become part of the great ownership society". All resulting in the greatest US economic collapse since his party's President Hoover.
Why did Rep. Reichert and Rep. Cantor sit on the information they had before the election?
Let me explain something to you...General Petraus is a Republican, in fact, he would be the dream presidential candidate for the Republican Party in 2016.
From a political point of view, it would benefit any Democrat to tarnish his image...but, the Democrats didn't. The investigation was leaked to a Republican Congressman in order to tarnish Obama. Which was stupid, because it didn't tarnish Obama. it only deprived America of the services of a brilliant leader.
More proof: Republicans want to harm America.
Why is it that FBI Director Robert Mueller has'nt been brought into All this?
From all i've seen about this matter is that a GOP leaning FBI agent wanted to stir up some trouble about a GOP leaning CIA Director in the HOPE that it would Tarnish the Democratic President Obama!
Unfortunately, as in Most cases, it has Stirred up a Hornets nest among the Military Elite!
I am anxiusly(SP) awaiting the remaining segments of "The Real HouseWives of Centcom" episode 3:
The POwer of the COOTER!
You Betcha!
Occupy SoggyBottom!
Amy,
And yet that Republican leader didn't say anything before the election...What does that tell you? The immediate fallout would have hit Obama with literally only hours before the election and would have been a goldmine for Romney. So again WHY wouldn't a Republican have not released it before the election? Republican or not, he is part of Obama's administration. He was hand picked by Obama.
Debbie,
You might want to check out all the Democratic leaders that swore up and down that there were WMD in Iraq. It would be a nice change if could actually focus on the current president and his shortcomings rather than someone who hasn't been in office for the last four years. It always amazes me when the left compares Obama to someone that they vilify in an effort to show that Obama is supposedly better.
Maybe because they were reading a report prepared for Congress by the Bush Whitehouse?
Oh please, Frank, there were several sources for the WMD claim other that the Bush White House. Of course, the Democrat leadership and some of the most powerful Democrat members of the House and Senate may have been tricked into making strong public statements about Iraqi WMD -- you know those Republicans are always putting words into Democrat mouths!!
.... nailed it Amy ....
Amy nailed it -- what are you smoking? She's totally confused or maybe deliberately misleading in her comments. Any "Republican" who serves a Democrat President in a high Administration position has the proverbial snowball's chance of gathering sufficient support to become the Republican presidential candidate. Withholding the revelation of the affair benefitted President Obama by not being a distraction as the election drew near. Also, some voters; perhaps Hispanic Catholics, might have been persuaded to vote differently because of the sex scandal. Ultimately, no one knows what would have happened, but keeping a lid on it until the election passed was helpful to Democrats, not Republicans. Finally, news stories indicate that the Republican politician knew of the investigation before the election but said nothing about it at the time. Not very good timing if he wished to "tarnish" President Obama.
Spend more time talking about the sex lives of the military; less time about Benghazi. What a joke.
four lives lost, or maybe given up to save an image, but continued discussion on sex.
Republicans seem to have a pre-occupation with sex.
Especially pre-occupied with everyone else's sex lives but their own.
They most certainly are afraid of the very thing. Corporate media = conservative media, they only have themselves to blame for this scandalous sidetrack away from their precious @!$%#ing Benghazi.
Teaching abstinence and then scratching their heads at a high teen pregnancy rate.
Quit carving peepholes into everyone's bedrooms and we might get some work done.
PS: It's disgusting Republicans still want to politicize the deaths of 4 Americans. Get off your pedestal.
1funnygirl, (who really isn't funny)
Were you this anal retentive on the original 9/11 when Dubya and his motley crew dropped the ball and ALLOWED it to happen giving him an easy excuse to go after his nemesis Saddam Hussein who had NOTHING to do with the plane crashes?
How so there Rainbow boy? Sure would love to hear your uberliberal argument on this.
@baldeagle - Anal retentive on the original 9/11? So how did Bush drop the ball? You can't have all your brain cells if you actuall believe Bush allowed the plane crashes to happen so that he could go to war with Hussein.
Better take that tin foil hat from your head. You are losing it.
Now why don't you also provide a detailed message on how Bush accomplished this. D!ckwad!
When it really gets bad for those liberal leftists with no class, why do they always refer to anal locations? Is this where to look for liberal brains? Liberals like anus baldeagle? Or perhaps, just you.
The election is over and you lost. Stop thinking about other people's rear ends. You are not funny and not a girl.
Canter knew that a Petraus disclosure would have focused the election on the Bush wars! The GOP was already faced with Sandy!
Do you mean you, or the storm Sandy. Would really like to hear more on your post -- sounds like you might have some interesting perspective!!
I thought maybe the politicians got the point during The Clinton era, that the people of this country are concerned more about a person's job performance than their sex life. Isn't there a country anywhere in the world made up of people who would do their best, as a politician, to follow the the will of the people who elected them. If so, we could "offshore" our government to them!
No, obama does not want to talk about "sex" scandals! He is afraid that his whores, and prostitutes in Colombia will start to expose their involvement with this "worthless" so-called president! Who, knows, his involvement with the stripper in Florida, making $85,000+, was on obamas welfare and food stamp program. She had $9,000 of "enhncements" done on the taxpayer dollar, and stole 0ver $24,000 from the Obama programs. JUST HOW MANY MORE OF "LOVE SHACKS DOES THIS IDIOT HAVE AROUND THE COUNTRY? I guess that this is just the tradition in whatever country that he came from! **I think Moochelle is going to have this worthless piece of crap neutered, so he is not so frisky!
You are a real dandy with your fox fiction.
Dandydon1, you make no sense at all. Typical of right wing Tea Party nutcases! LMAO....
Why is it that Democrats resort to name calling, talking over opponents, and generally trying to trash anyone who disagrees with their postion?
No one who is investigating a crime leaks out information about what they are investigating! Neither Presidential candidate, should gain an advantage in an election by the outcome of an investigation of this nature: each candidate, did have ample time to put their talking points on the table before the election! The country heard both of the candidates plans, and ideas. They voted for the candidate of their choice! The election is over, lets move on! President Obama is the President for the next four years, He is a two term President and the only President the country has to work with for the next four years!
Make love not war
Exactly as Obama fails to even mention Benghazi while he and the useless turds in both parties still can't agree on the a "fiscal cliff" deal. As a reminder Obama owns the last four years and the next four more so deflecting to Bush's WMD's has become impotent BS. This Prez said the buck stops with him and his owns his Benghazi Failure.
let the country dive off the ciff and see what consequences our turds in office will face poitically and finnacially. Bet they chicken out and reach a deal to save their own skins.