White House Gives In On Bush Tax Cuts  —  WHAT'S YOUR REACTION? … WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama's top adviser suggested to The Huffington Post late Wednesday that the administration is ready to accept an across-the-board continuation of steep Bush-era tax cuts, including those for the wealthiest taxpayers.

Kentucky Republican Senator-elect Rand Paul is already making waves in Washington, D.C. with plans to organize either a Senate or bicameral Tea Party Caucus.  —  Paul said he's been chatting with several people from Kentucky about laying down a communications blueprint to keep …

Nostalgic for George W. Bush  —  I miss George W. Bush.  —  I don't miss him in the sense that I wish he were still president.  If he were, we might be at war with Iran and North Korea by now, and perhaps Portugal.  Neither do I miss the endless debates over waterboarding and the Iraq war …

98 percent of write-in votes go to Murkowski  —  SPELL CHECK: Despite objections from Miller's team, most Murkowski votes are being accepted.  —  scockerham@adn.com  —  JUNEAU — Almost 98 percent of write-in ballots opened Wednesday went to Lisa Murkowski on the first day of a count meant to decide Alaska's U.S. Senate race.

Sources: Pentagon group finds there is minimal risk to lifting gay ban during war  —  A Pentagon study group has concluded that the military can lift the ban on gays serving openly in uniform with only minimal and isolated incidents of risk to the current war efforts, according to two people familiar …

Grassley: 2012 GOP candidates face blank slate with Iowa voters  —  Republican presidential candidates face a blank slate with Iowa voters heading into the 2012 cycle, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said Thursday.  —  Grassley, the long-serving dean of Iowa's congressional delegation …

Nancy Pelosi faces new resistance from Democrats  —  Nancy Pelosi is struggling to stand her ground as the effects of last week's Democratic debacle shift the political earth beneath her feet.  —  Pelosi announced Friday that she's running for minority leader in the new Congress, and her election still seems on track.

Being a Tutsi  —  I just watched Glenn Beck's program “the Puppet Master” about the nefarious, money-changing, New World Order, self-hating Jew conspirator, George Soros.  I don't think I could do it again.  —  I listened to an hour or so of Limbaugh and had to turn it off, when I heard this line …

Possible Rival Says He Has No Confidence in RNC's Steele  —  Connecticut GOP Chairman Chris Healy is strongly considering a bid to replace Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele, and on Wednesday he unleashed a scathing critique of Steele's leadership.

The Establishment candidate  —  John Thune's presidential hopes got a gorgeous rollout in the Weekly Standard in September.  The piece begins, vividly, with Thune in a small plane, looking down at his South Dakota hometown, Murdo.  —  “If he wins the nomination, it will be because he is …

The Onion Strikes Comic Gold With Biden Spoofs  —  Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. has never smashed a Whac-A-Mole game in a drunken fit.  He has never invoked Freedom of Information laws to find out a female federal employee's work schedule.  And to the best of anyone's knowledge …

Christine O'Donnell considers reality show  —  The Tea Party favorite who may have cost Republicans a Senate seat won't rule out another run for office.  —  Christine O'Donnell won't rule out making another run for office.  The former Delaware Senate candidate told Jay Leno during an appearance on the …

The Reign of Right-Wing Primetime … I'll name a hit TV show, and you guess if it's more popular among Republicans or Democrats.  —  First, NCIS — investigating military crimes on CBS.  Safe bet conservatives love it, right?  —  How about ABC's Desperate Housewives — a racy soap, female audience.

Bam AWOL on Vets Day  —  Tweet  —  WASHINGTON — Today is Veter ans Day.  Do you know where your president is?  —  With his feeble flame of “hope” thoroughly doused here in the United States by last week's elections, President Obama has set out around the globe in search of throngs still enthralled by his flowery rhetoric.

U.S. Tweaks Message on Troops in Afghanistan  —  WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is increasingly emphasizing the idea that the United States will have forces in Afghanistan until at least the end of 2014, a change in tone aimed at persuading the Afghans and the Taliban …

Jefferson's Army of Nation Builders  —  THIS Veterans Day, a great debate is going on in the American military.  On one side are the traditionalists who believe that our armed forces should continue to maintain as their core mission waging conventional state-on-state wars, like the first Persian Gulf war.