Obama Cites ‘Systemic Failure’ in U.S. Security  —  HONOLULU - President Obama on Tuesday blamed a “systemic failure” in the nation's security apparatus for the attempted bombing of a passenger jet on Christmas Day and vowed to identify the problems and “deal with them immediately.”

Rove granted divorce in Texas  —  Karl Rove, former senior adviser to President George W. Bush, has been granted a divorce in Texas after 24 years of marriage, a family spokesperson said.  —  Dana Perino, the spokesperson, said: “Karl Rove and his wife, Darby, were granted a divorce last week.

A Less Than Honest Policy  —  There is a middle-class tax time bomb ticking in the Senate's version of President Obama's effort to reform health care.  —  The bill that passed the Senate with such fanfare on Christmas Eve would impose a confiscatory 40 percent excise tax on so-called Cadillac health plans …

Obama greater than Jesus  —  The U.S. president - the practical saviour of our times  —  He is provocative in insisting on an outstretched hand, where others only see animosity.  —  His tangible results in the short time that he has been active - are few and far between.

Power of Attorney  —  Your new book, “Crisis and Command,” is an eloquent, fact-laden history of audacious power grabs by American presidents going back to George Washington.  Which president would you say most violated laws enacted by Congress?  —  I would say Lincoln.

Skittish Democrats Refuse To Defend Obama On National Security  —  Are Democrats so cowed by Republican attacks on Obama's foreign policy that they're unwilling to defend him?  —  It's now been five days since the attempted bombing of Flight 253 in Detroit, and Congressional Democrats …

Move Your Money: A New Year's Resolution  —  Last week, over a pre-Christmas dinner, the two of us, along with political strategist Alexis McGill, filmmaker/author Eugene Jarecki, and Nick Penniman of the HuffPost Investigative Fund, began talking about the huge, growing chasm between …

Election 2012: Nebraska Senate  —  Health Care Vote Puts Nelson 30 Points Down in Reelection Bid  —  The good news for Senator Ben Nelson is that he doesn't have to face Nebraska voters until 2012.  —  If Governor Dave Heineman challenges Nelson for the Senate job, a new Rasmussen Reports …

Who's running the TSA?  No one, thanks to Sen. Jim DeMint  —  WASHINGTON — An attempt to blow up a trans-Atlantic flight from Amsterdam to Detroit on Christmas Day would be all-consuming for the administrator of the Transportation Security Administration — if there were one.

Ex-Gitmo goons did it!  —  Freed Qaeda creeps hatched undie-cover plan to blow up Christmas jet  —  A Yemeni al Qaeda faction — whose masterminds had been released from Guantanimo Bay — claimed responsibility yesterday for orchestrating the bungled Christmas Day terror attack aboard a Detroit-bound jet.

Where is the national GOP in the Massachusetts special election?  —  Normally, when a special election occurs to fill a seat in Congress or especially the Senate, the national parties throw resources and attention onto the race.  The lack of competition for attention allows the national parties …

Terrorism Still Less Deadly in US Than Lack of Health Insurance, Salmonella  —  Since we still seem to be having a national freakout over some loser who got on a plane with a bomb in his underwear, which was apparently worthy of a presidential address, it might be a good idea to put …

Ten Things to Watch in the Health-Care Reform Conference  —  It's not just about abortion and the public option.  Every decision Congress faces while merging the Senate and House health bills will give it the opportunity to make reform better.  —  Schoolhouse Rock undersold the excruciating difficulty involved in making a bill a law.

Medicare vs. Medicaid: A Stark Warning About Having States Execute Reform  —  Political map of the United States, ca.  2002 (source: Univ. of Texas at Austin)  —  The Social Security Act of 1965 created two public insurance programs, Medicare and Medicaid.  One proved to be a big success, and the other, not so much.

Five steps to recovery for Dems  —  You wouldn't know it by listening to many Democrats, but the last time I checked, the party still controls the White House, the U.S. Senate, the House of Representatives and 26 governor's offices across the country.  And while they could be heading …

Source: ‘False’ report led to Capitol lockdown  —  UPDATE 2: A false report of a man wielding a machine gun near the Capitol led to a nearly one-hour lockdown of the sparsely populated complex on Tuesday afternoon, a highly placed law enforcement source tells POLITICO.

U.S. plane bomber wanted to study sharia in Yemen  —  ABUJA (Reuters) - A Nigerian man charged with trying to blow up a U.S. airliner told his parents he wanted to study Islamic sharia law in Yemen shortly before cutting off contact with them, the Nigerian government said on Tuesday.

Published Document States Khamenei Is Planning to Escape to Russia ...Update: Khamenei's Jet Put on Standby  —  A letter published on the Iranian websites claims that Ayatollah Khamenei is planning a possible escape to Russia.  —  There were rumors floating around yesterday that Ayatollah Khamenei was preparing to flee Iran.