Emanuel says Limbaugh GOP leader, Cantor rejects ‘fail’ remark  —  WASHINGTON (CNN) — White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel said Sunday that Rush Limbaugh is the face of the GOP.  —  “He is the voice and the intellectual force and energy behind the Republican party …

U.S. Is Said to Offer Another $30 Billion in Funds to A.I.G.  —  The federal government agreed Sunday night to provide an additional $30 billion in taxpayer money to the American International Group and loosen the terms of its huge loan to the insurer, which is preparing to report a $62 billion loss …

Durbin: Race factored in Burris seating  —  Sen. Dick Durbin, who advised Sen. Roland Burris last week to step down from the Senate, acknowledged today that racial considerations were at play in the decision by majority Democrats to seat Burris.  —  U.S. Sen. Roland Burris (center) …

Covering Obama, Pushy Jake Tapper Presses His Points  —  One year after joining ABC News, Jake Tapper kept pushing his bosses — “annoyingly, irritatingly, incessantly,” he says — to let him cover the unfolding 2004 presidential campaign.  —  “I might not have been ready,” he admits now.

Gates calls Pakistan ‘most worrisome’  —  WASHINGTON (CNN) — The “most worrisome” part of the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan has become the havens the Taliban and other insurgents have carved out in neighboring Pakistan, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said.

The Obama Administration Double-Deals On Israel  —  Anti-Semitism, ‘Islamophobia,’ Durban II and the U.N.  —  Barack Obama just added double-dealing to his foreign policy repertoire.  On Friday, administration officials led many Jewish leaders to believe that the president had decided …

Revenge of the Glut  —  Remember the good old days, when we used to talk about the “subprime crisis” — and some even thought that this crisis could be “contained”?  Oh, the nostalgia!  —  Today we know that subprime lending was only a small fraction of the problem.

Iran, the Jews and Germany  —  So a Jerusalem Post article says that I'm “hardly the first American to be misled by the existence of synagogues in totalitarian countries.”  —  The Atlantic Monthly's Jeffrey Goldberg finds me “particularly credulous,” taken in by the Iranian hospitality and friendliness that …

Hey, Bailout Snivelers: Hush.  You Don't Need It.  —  In his first address to a joint session of Congress, President Obama declared that he was going to “speak frankly and directly.”  —  That's what I want to do as well.  I want to speak frankly and directly to the many people who have written …

New ‘Iron Curtain’ will split EU's rich and poor  —  Eastern European countries gave an apocalyptic warning yesterday of hordes of unemployed workers heading west as a new Iron Curtain divides rich from poor inside Europe.  —  Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall …

EXCLUSIVE: Sen. Hatch's secret drug firm links  —  Drugmaker money to Utah senator's charity escaped disclosure  —  The pharmaceutical industry that long has benefited from Sen. Orrin G. Hatch's legislative efforts has directed large sums of money to a charity he helped found …

Obama faces test on gay military ban  —  It is precisely the sort of knife fight no president wants to get into, especially in his first 100 days.  But it seems that President Barack Obama is about to get dragged down the same dark alley as Bill Clinton when he was forced to confront …

Snow Blankets Washington Area  —  Region Braces for What Could Be Largest Winter Storm in Three Years  —  A significant winter storm shuttered schools, disrupted train and bus service and left thousands of people without power in the Washington area this morning, as hundreds of plows struggled …

Obama kicks up White House entertaining  —  WASHINGTON (AP) - The White House is the place to be on Wednesdays.  —  Since the presidency changed hands less than six weeks ago, a burst of entertaining has taken hold of the iconic, white-columned home of America's head of state.  Much of it comes on Wednesdays.

How Washington can prevent ‘zombie banks’  —  Beginning in 1990, Japan suffered a collapse in real estate and stock market prices that pushed major banks into insolvency.  Rather than follow America's tough recommendation - and close or recapitalise these banks - Japan took an easier approach.