Mark Herring explains gay marriage shift  —  New Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring says his decision to challenge his state's ban on gay marriage, rather than defend it on behalf of the state, is part of an evolution in his views on the subject.  —  Herring announced his decision to side …

Watchdog Report Says N.S.A. Program Is Illegal and Should End  —  WASHINGTON — An independent federal privacy watchdog has concluded that the National Security Agency's program to collect bulk phone call records has provided only “minimal” benefits in counterterrorism efforts, is illegal and should be shut down.

Schumer seeks to poison Tea Party  —  Sen. Charles Schumer (N.Y.), the Senate Democrats' political guru, has a plan to poison the Tea Party by driving a wedge between its rich funders and its blue-collar rank and file.  —  Schumer, one of the Democrats' most influential strategists …

Can Anyone Stop Hillary?  Absolutely  —  Time magazine's cover this week asks, “Can Anyone Stop Hillary?”  The answer to that question is yes, but you'd never know it judging by the overwhelming belief among Democratic insiders that the party's 2016 presidential nomination is simply Hillary Clinton's for the asking.

The Heritage Foundation Might Be Shedding Some Of Its Crazy Soon  —  2013 wasn't exactly been a banner year for the Heritage Foundation, Washington's most well-known and influential conservative think tank.  —  In its first year under former senator and tea party godfather Jim DeMint …

Obama State of the Union to focus on income inequality  —  President Obama will try to pump some vitality into a lackluster second term on Tuesday when he delivers his State of the Union address.  —  The address will include a “healthy dose” of the income inequality message the White House …

Shell's Arctic Offshore Drilling Ambitions Stymied In Appeals Court  —  Royal Dutch Shell drilling rig Kulluk aground off a small island near Kodiak Island.  —  CREDIT: U.S. Coast Guard  —  Shell's ambitions to drill for oil off the coast of Alaska received another blow Wednesday …

Gregory Hicks: Benghazi and the Smearing of Chris Stevens  —  Shifting blame to our dead ambassador is wrong on the facts.  I know—I was there.  —  Last week the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence issued its report on the Sept. 11, 2012, terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya.

GOP House Candidate Says God Created Autism, Dementia And Tornadoes To Punish Gays  —  An Illinois Republican running for Congress believes God unleashed debilitating disorders and destructive natural disorders because he is so upset with the growing support for same-sex rights marriage.

Antiabortion movement faces a cold reality  —  James Dobson's Focus on the Family asked Christians to pray for rain to fall on Barack Obama in 2008 when he accepted the presidential nomination.  Various religious conservatives have said that hurricanes, earthquakes and other meteorological phenomena …

Upward Mobility Has Not Declined, Study Says  —  The odds of moving up — or down — the income ladder in the United States have not changed appreciably in the last 20 years, according to a large new academic study that contradicts politicians in both parties who have claimed that income mobility is falling.

Poll: United we stand on wealth gap  —  INCOME INEQUALITY AND THE GOVERNMENT'S ROLE  —  A USA TODAY/Pew Research Center Poll explores attitudes toward income inequality and poverty in the United States.  —  RICH GETTING RICHER? HOW AMERICA WORKS GOVERNMENT ROLE  —  POVERTY  —  RICH VS. POOR

Leaning Right in Hollywood, Under a Lens  —  LOS ANGELES — In a famously left-leaning Hollywood, where Democratic fund-raisers fill the social calendar, Friends of Abe stands out as a conservative group that bucks the prevailing political winds.  —  A collection of perhaps 1,500 right-leaning players …

Angry Geithner once warned S&P about U.S. downgrade - filing  —  Former U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner angrily warned the chairman of Standard & Poor's parent that the rating agency would be held accountable for its 2011 decision to strip the United States of its coveted “triple-A” rating, a new court filing shows.

‘US perceives Israel as encouraging anti-Obama backlash among Jews’  —  Israeli diplomats tell Israel Radio: Netanyahu government seen by Obama, Kerry as encouraging US Jewish leaders to criticize White House.  —  A US official close to President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry …

Poll Shows Most Republicans Think People Are Poor Because They Don't Work Hard Enough  —  Whether you're rich or poor, Republicans believe that's on you.  —  New findings released Thursday by Pew showed that most Republicans think rich people are largely responsible for their socioeconomic status.

Senate 2014: A Coin-Flip  —  Political news in the opening weeks of 2014's midterm year has been dominated not by the upcoming national election, but instead by the one coming after it, in 2016.  The year's biggest political story is Gov. Chris Christie's (R-NJ) bridge controversy …

What Obama's Next Three Years Will Look Like—for Better or Worse  —  Imagining the best- and worst-case scenarios for the rest of the president's term  —  On the cusp of his 2014 State of the Union message, President Obama is not exactly floating on air.  —  His fifth year …

Hoboken Mayor Is Said to Have Told of Threat  —  Federal authorities in New Jersey have interviewed several witnesses who said the mayor of Hoboken told them in May about a state official's threat to withhold hurricane recovery funds if the mayor did not support a development project favored by the governor …

Hannity to attend State of the Union with Rep. Gohmert, may run for office in Texas  —  Sean Hannity on Fox News, Jan. 21, 2014  —  WASHINGTON — The guest list for President Obama's upcoming State of the Union address just got more interesting.  —  Yesterday, Sean Hannity said he'd be attending as a guest of Rep. Louie Gohmert.