In Tax Fight, Republicans Seeking Fallback Position  —  WASHINGTON — With President Obama insisting on higher tax rates for affluent Americans and winning public support for the idea, Congressional Republicans find themselves in an increasingly difficult political spot and are quietly beginning the difficult search for a way out.

Hillary Clinton Wins High Popularity, Majority Support for a 2016 Bid  —  Carried by a new high in personal popularity and broad approval of her work as secretary of state, Hillary Clinton closes out her diplomatic career with majority support as a candidate for president in 2016.

Jazz pianist Dave Brubeck dead at age 91  —  Arts critic  —  Dave Brubeck, a jazz musician who attained pop-star acclaim with recordings such as “Take Five” and “Blue Rondo a la Turk,” died Wednesday morning at Norwalk Hospital, in Norwalk, Conn., said his longtime manager-producer-conductor Russell Gloyd.

Cuomo: Mainline Democrats “squandered the opportunity”  —  In an op-ed that will also be published in tomorrow's Times Union, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo weighs in on the state Senate coalition deal.  —  By Gov. Andrew Cuomo  —  Elections often clarify political situations, but sometimes confuse

Detroit councilwoman to Obama: We voted for you, now bail us out  —  DETROIT (WJBK) — The city of Detroit faces a major financial crisis and one member of city council thinks President Barack Obama should step in and help.  —  City Council member JoAnn Watson said Tuesday the citizens support …

Vote: Worst Political Prediction of 2012  —  We have narrowed down our list of the best & worst political predictions this year and would like your help in making the final call.  —  Here are our three final candidates for the Worst Political Prediction of 2012

A losing GOP hand  —  O holds all the fiscal-cliff cards  —  Republicans have a bad hand to play when it comes to the “fiscal cliff” coming up Jan. 1, when taxes will rise automatically on everyone and whopping defense cuts will be imposed automatically.  —  Did I say a bad hand?

Fox News Puts Karl Rove on the Bench  —  The post-election soul searching going on inside the Republican Party is taking place inside Fox News as well.  Fox News chief Roger Ailes, a canny marketer and protector of his network's brand, has been taking steps since November to reposition Fox …

Anguished fotog: Critics are unfair to condemn me  —  Ki Suk Han, 58, of Queens frantically tries to climb to safety yesterday as a train bears down on him in Midtown.  He was fatally struck seconds later. … I was on an assignment, waiting for a train at the 49th Street subway platform, when I suddenly heard people gasping.

Ryan, Rubio plot GOP's path  —  Paul Ryan took an unmistakable shot Tuesday at Mitt Romney's assertion that 47 percent of Americans would never vote Republican because they are too dependent on government.  —  “Both parties tend to divide Americans into ‘our voters’ and ‘their voters,’” …

Obama to Request $50 Billion for Sandy Relief  —  For a Congress spending every waking minute talking about deficits, they sure know how to spend gobs of money above and beyond requested budgets - as long as it goes to the hands of defense contractors.  The Senate version of the defense authorization bill costs $631 billion.

Ohio Senator Confronted By Constituents Over Support For Medicare And Social Security Cuts  —  Ohio Senator Rob Portman (R) was one of a handful of Washington, D.C lawmakers and policy experts invited to participate in a panel discussion on the fiscal cliff on Tuesday morning …

Marco Rubio Clarifies The Earth's Age: It's ‘At Least 4.5 Billion Years Old’  —  Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) turned heads last month when he told GQ Magazine that he didn't know the age of the earth and sparked speculation that he is laying a foundation for a 2016 presidential run.

Democrats to Obamaland: Share your data  —  The hottest property to emerge from Barack Obama's lopsided victory over Mitt Romney is not the president's much lauded campaign team.  Nor is it the shrewd turnout operation that catapulted him to victory.  —  It is something far more valuable that's …

The 60 Best Conservative Blogs For 2012 (6th Annual)  —  60) The Mental Recession (No link because I am getting a virus warning when I go there today) 59) Polipundit 58) Jihad Watch 57) This Ain't Hell 56) Hugh Hewitt 55) Patterico's Pontifications 54) Moe Lane 53) Counter Cultured 52) Wizbang!

Global Warming Is Behind The Real War On Christmas  —  It's that time of year when Fox News and other conservative media outlets revive their imaginary “War on Christmas.”  But the actual threat to one Christmas tradition comes from something more insidious than Fox's perceived attacks …

Sununu: Democrats won election by turning out voters who are dependent on government  —  Former governor, John H. Sununu, right, was one of three former Republican governors of New Hampshire to attend a discussion at the Josiah Bartlett Center for Public Policy's second sponsored dinner …

How The Voter ID Crusade Backfired On Republicans  —  The Republican push to make it more difficult to vote this year — seen by many as a racially tinged attempt to keep Democratic turnout down — could not have failed more spectacularly, a top African American activist told a left-leaning think tank Tuesday.

Taking the Threat of Default Out of the Debt Limit  —  On Sunday, December 2, Secretary Geithner appeared on NBC's Meet the Press, CBS' Face the Nation, ABC's This Week, FOX News Sunday, and CNN's State of the Union and made the case for the Administration's balanced approach to reducing the deficit and strengthening economic growth.

French sperm count ‘falls by a third’  —  Chemicals, diet and lifestyle may lower sperm count  —  The sperm count of French men fell by a third between 1989 and 2005, a study suggests.  —  The semen of more than 26,600 French men was tested in the study, reported in the journal Human Reproduction.

Biggs and Richwine: The Underworked Public Employee  —  The cliché is true: Government workers do tend to take it easier than their private counterparts.  —  With state and local governments struggling to balance budgets in a still sluggish economy, government employment has fallen …

Sheldon Adelson: 'I'm Basically a Social Liberal'  —  In a three-hour interview with The Wall Street Journal, casino mogul Sheldon Adelson excoriated President Barack Obama, Democrats and unions, as one would expect of a top donor to conservatives and Republican causes in the 2012 election.