bill clinton cartoon

Donald Trump blasts Bill Clinton as 'one of the great abusers of the world'

Donald Trump launched new attacks against Bill and Hillary Clinton Wednesday as the war of words between both campaigns heated up.
The GOP hopeful told about 2,000 supporters in Hilton Head Island, S.C. that he was forced to fight back against the Clinton camp after the Democratic frontrunner accused him of displaying a "penchant for sexism."
Trump blasted the former president, saying, "And [Hillary] wants to accuse me of things. And the husband's one of the great abusers of the world. Give me a break. Give me a break. Give me a break."
"She came out saying [Trump] has a ‘penchant for sexism’… now she is playing with that card,” Trump explained. "I had no choice, but I had to mention her husband's situation," a reference to Bill Clinton’s previous extramarital relationships.
On Tuesday, Trump told reporters that Bill Clinton's past is in play during the election.
“Hillary brought up the whole thing with [calling Trump] sexist," he said. "She’s got a major problem [that] happens to be right in her own house. We'll go after the ex-president … it’ll come out well for us”.
Trump also acknowledged that his own personal "indiscretions" — including an affair with Marla Maples, who later became his second wife — were fair game.
The Clintons and the Trumps had been on friendly terms for years. The Clintons attended Trump's wedding to his third wife, Melania, and the couples' daughters, Ivanka and Chelsea, are friends. Trump came to Bill Clinton's defense when the Monica Lewinsky scandal was unfolding, calling efforts to impeach him "nonsense."
But in recent days, the rival campaigns have become increasingly hostile.
Trump first stirred controversy during a Michigan rally on Dec. 21, when he claimed Clinton got "schlonged" in the 2008 Iowa caucuses by Barack Obama. Clinton made her "penchant for sexism" claim in response to the real estate mogul's statement, but Trump said his remark was not meant to be vulgar.
Clinton's deputy communications director Christina Reynolds said Monday that Clinton "won't be bullied" by Trump and plans to "stand up to him, as she has from the beginning of his campaign" when he insults women and other groups.

In an effort to shape Clinton's image with the electorate Wednesday, Trump called the former secretary of state "low-energy", a label he has previously reserved for former Florida governor Jeb Bush.
He went further suggesting "no women" want to vote for Clinton in 2016. This drew loud cheers from the crowd.
”She won't win," said Trump, who added that he would "love, love having a woman president " — just not Hillary Clinton, whom he described as "horrible" and hard to listen to.
"I just have to turn off the television so many times. She just gives me a headache," he said.
Clinton leads Trump 46.3 percent to 41.3 percent in the latest Real Clear Politics average of recent polls.
Trump has predicted that a general election matchup with Clinton could lead to one of the largest voter turnouts in recent history.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Push for convention to amend Constitution energized by Rubio backing

Marco Rubio is getting behind a state-based effort to amend the Constitution with term limits and other restrictions on the federal government -- energizing the movement as the Republican presidential candidates try to woo Tea Party-aligned voters. 
The Florida senator joins a handful of other GOP candidates in backing the push, an against-the-odds campaign being waged by conservative advocacy groups and state lawmakers. He went all in at a campaign stop Tuesday in Iowa, where caucus-goers will decide the first-in-the-nation nominating contest in roughly four weeks.
“My first day in office I will announce I am a supporter,” said Rubio, after months of expressing tepid support.
In doing so, he is lending his name to a grassroots movement seeking what is essentially a national convention to amend the Constitution. Various groups have various goals, but Rubio specifically supports using the process to impose a congressional balanced-budget amendment and place term limits on Supreme Court justices and members of Congress.
He vowed if elected to “put the weight of the presidency” behind the effort.
Americans frustrated with what they consider Washington morass, insularity and gridlock point out that Article V of the Constitution says Congress must call a convention when two-thirds of state legislatures file an “application.”
The minimum 34 states appear to have given some measure of support. But the effort has been delayed for years over such issues as rules for a convention and how the petitions were approved and worded to meet varying agendas.
Rubio -- in third place in most national polls behind front-runner Donald Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz -- is not the first 2016 GOP White House contender to champion the effort.
Fellow candidates including Ohio Gov. John Kasich, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson have also expressed some level of interest or support.
But the backing of a top-tier candidate like Rubio appears to have ignited some in the GOP base.
“I’ve never been more excited about our prospects for achieving real governmental reform as I am right now,” Mark Meckler, co-founder of the Convention of States Project and president of Citizens for Self-Governance, said Wednesday.
“It is gratifying when a national-level leader like Sen. Marco Rubio acknowledges that it is imperative for the citizens to act to take power away from Washington, D.C., and return it to the people.”
Kasich is arguably the GOP candidate at the forefront of the effort. And as a fiscal conservative, he wants to use the effort expressly to force Washington to pass balanced budgets.
Though Rubio appeared Tuesday on stage to endorse the idea, he had expressed concerns earlier about state delegates uniting at a convention to rewrite the Constitution, which could jeopardize closely held First and Second Amendment rights.
After the rally, he also suggested that Congress doesn't have the will to impose term limits or pass a balanced budget amendment. As for how a convention might play out, he told reporters his campaign is “looking” at the specifics.
Concerns about rewriting the Constitution are not unfounded.
The Constitutional Convention, held in Philadelphia in 1787, was purportedly to revise the Articles of Confederation. But the roughly four-month-long meeting resulted in George Washington and other organizers drafting the Constitution.
Rubio also said he’s following the lead of former Oklahoma GOP Sen. Tom Coburn, who joined the effort after retiring last year from Congress.
“Marco Rubio knows that the answers to American’s lack of confidence in Washington can only be fixed through an Article V,” Coburn said in a statement. “He also knows that Washington will not fix itself.”

Brawl breaks out in GOP race, below the Trump tier

A nasty battle has broken out in the Republican presidential field, and it doesn’t involve Donald Trump.
As the calendar draws closer to the Iowa and New Hampshire contests, the second tier of GOP candidates – along with the super PACs supporting them – are unloading on each other in a blitz of ads, videos, tweets, stump speeches and interviews. The acrimony is at a level until now unseen, in a race dominated by vitriolic squabbles between Trump and whichever candidate of the moment displeases him.
Now, with Trump training his focus on Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton, the rest of the pack is fighting to rise above. The latest round involves Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Ohio Gov. John Kasich and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.
The super PAC backing Bush is out with a new ad blasting Rubio for missing a Senate meeting after the Paris terror attacks – and another contrasting Bush’s gubernatorial record against those of Christie and Kasich.
“Politics first, that’s the Rubio way,” the first ad says, slamming Rubio for fundraising while missing meetings and hearings on the Hill.
Rubio has long battled criticism of his attendance record in the Senate. In 2015, he has missed about 35 percent of roll call votes, according to GovTrack.us. That's more than any of the other senators running for president.
“Dude, show up to work,” Christie told a crowd in Iowa Tuesday, ribbing Rubio for missing a spending bill vote.
Rubio, speaking with Fox News, defended his missed votes on Wednesday. He said Washington is “completely broken” and “more than half the things that happen in Washington are just for show or for talk.”
As for Christie, he said, “He’s never in New Jersey. He’s gone half the time.”
On Tuesday, Rubio also fired back against the pro-Bush ad, charging that Bush is getting “increasingly negative in his attacks.”
Right to Rise USA, the pro-Jeb Bush super PAC, is spending $1.4 million on the ad buy which begins airing this week in the Hawkeye State.
While these fights are playing out in Iowa, many of these candidates are fighting even harder for New Hampshire.
Right now, Trump and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz are jockeying for the lead in Iowa, with the rest of the field far behind. But while Trump also leads in New Hampshire, five candidates – Rubio, Christie, Cruz, Kasich and Bush – are tangled up in a close race below him in that state. Candidates like Christie and Kasich especially, who have struggled to gain traction elsewhere, are banking on a breakout performance in New Hampshire to gain momentum in the race.
This could explain why Kasich’s campaign and its aligned super PAC are firing back hard at Bush.
In response to the latest ad, Kasich press secretary Rob Nichols said: “The latest ad from Jeb’s team forgot to check the box for ‘Which governor is living in the past because he has no new ideas for fixing anything?’ You only attack those you fear and who’s beating you, so this latest attack by Jeb on Gov. Kasich only reaffirms the governor’s strength in New Hampshire. It’s actually flattering.”
The Kasich campaign also put out a cheeky video casting Bush as out of touch with the times.
“Jeb loves the good ole’ days,” the video declares, before showing vintage footage of things like Sony’s Betamax and the “Macarena,” the 1994 hit by Los Del Rio.

US reportedly preparing fresh sanctions over Iran ballistic missile program

The U.S. is preparing to impose financial sanctions on Iran for the first time since this past summer's agreement on Tehran's nuclear program, according to a published report. 
The Wall Street Journal, citing U.S. officials, reported that the sanctions would be aimed at companies and individuals in Iran, the United Arab Emirates and Hong Kong for their alleged role in developing Iran's ballistic missile program.
The sanctions would forbid U.S. or foreign nationals from conducting business with the blacklisted firms, as well as freeze any assets the companies or individuals hold inside the American financial system.
The Wall Street Journal reports that part of the justification for the sanctions is ongoing ties between Iran and North Korea, including the alleged purchase of components from a North Korean firm and the dispatching of Iranian technicians to North Korea since 2013 to develop a rocket booster.
According to the Journal, if the Treasury Department goes through with the sanctions, it would do so in the face of defiance from Iran, which claims that any new sanctions would be viewed by the country's supreme leader as a violation of the nuclear deal. For its part, the Treasury says it retains the right to punish Iranian entities allegedly involved in missile development, international terrorism, and human rights abuses.
A senior U.S. official told the Associated Press that Congress is being informed about deliberations over whether to impose sanctions.
The report on the planned sanctions comes one day after U.S. defense officials slammed Tehran for conducting what it called a "highly provocative" rocket test near two U.S. warships last week in the Strait of Hormuz.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, responded to Saturday's incident with renewed criticism of the nuclear agreement.
"A rush to sanctions relief threatens to embolden an increasingly aggressive Iranian regime that has no intention of normalizing relations with the West or of retreating from a malign policy intended to destabilize the Middle East," McCain said in a statement released Wednesday.
In the months since the deal was agreed to this past July, Iran has conducted missile tests criticized by the U.S., as well as aired footage on state television of an underground missile base.
Iran has claimed its ballistic missile program is for defense purposes only and doesn't violate international law.

Gov. Terry McAuliffe Cartoon

Former NY Gov. George Pataki announces he will end 2016 GOP presidential bid

Former New York Gov. George Pataki announced late Tuesday he is suspending his bid for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination
"While tonight is the end of my journey for the White House as I suspend my campaign for president, I am confident we can elect the right person. Someone who will bring us together and who understands that politicians including the president must be the people’s servant and not their master," Pataki said in a video announcing his decision. "I know the best of America is still ahead of us."
 
Pataki, who led New York through the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, failed to gain traction in a crowded field of candidates during an election season that has so far favored outsiders like billionaire businessman Donald Trump.
"If we're truly going to make America great again, we need to elect a president who will do three things: Confront and defeat radical Islam, shrink the size of Washington, and unite us again in our belief in this great country," Pataki said.
GOP presidential candidate and Texas Sen. Tex Cruz said in a statement Tuesday night he was "grateful" for Pataki's service to New York, particularly while serving as Governor on Sept. 11th.
"He brought experience and knowledge to the race for the Republican nomination, and as a result, helped prepare our eventual nominee to win in November and take back the White House," Cruz said.
Bruce Breton, a local elected official and member of Pataki's New Hampshire steering committee, told the Associated Press that Pataki called him Tuesday afternoon to say he'd be exiting the race. Breton said Pataki's campaign struggled to raise money and garner media attention.
"He said he couldn't get any traction. He worked hard, it's just a different type of year," Breton said.
Pataki had hung his hopes on doing well in early-voting New Hampshire, but he has barely registered in state or national polls.
He also never made it onto a main GOP debate stage.
In November, Pataki told USA Today that he would drop out if another candidate who could unite the party emerged.
"If someone emerged who I believe could unite the party and lead the country and win the election, then there's no need to run," he said.
Pataki announced his candidacy by video in May.
"America has a big decision to make about who we're going to be and what we're going to stand for. The system is broken," he said then. "The question is no longer about what our government should do, but what we should do about our government, about our divided union, about our uncertain future."

Va. lawmaker wants to defund Gov. McAuliffe's armed guards over gun dispute

A Virginia state senator has thrown down the gauntlet with Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe in a brewing battle over gun rights -- pushing to defund the governor’s armed bodyguards unless he revokes an order that banned firearms in most state buildings. 
“It’s easy for someone who is surrounded by armed state policemen to tell someone else they can’t carry a weapon to protect themselves,” Republican state Sen. Charles W. Carrico Sr. told FoxNews.com.
“It’s just equal treatment, that’s all I’m saying.”
McAuliffe signed Executive Order 50 in October that says “open carry of firearms shall be prohibited in offices occupied by executive branch agencies, unless held by law enforcement, authorized security, or military personnel authorized to carry firearms in accordance with their duties.” He also called for new regulations to extend that to concealed weapons.
In response, Carrico drafted a budget amendment that would strip the funding for the governor’s armed protection unit.
Republican lawmakers, including Carrico, also are working on legislation that would counteract a separate decision from the state's attorney general.
Virginia Attorney General Mark R. Herring announced last week that the state would no longer recognize concealed carry permits from 25 states. He claimed those states had looser rules, and called the decision a “common-sense step” to make Virginia safer, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported.
The GOP legislation being drafted would require Virginia to recognize concealed carry permits from all states.
“I’m not a seasoned politician, I’m just an individual who cares about my constituents,” Carrico said. "I spent 15 years as a state trooper protecting their rights, and I am very concerned about the liberal left going after these constitutional rights and it concerns me that we have people who are in the position Governor McAuliffe is in, and using his executive powers to take those away.”
McAuliffe’s office responded sharply to Carrico’s move, calling it a “reactionary temper tantrum.”
“Reactionary temper tantrums may play well on right-wing blogs, but they don’t make anyone safer,” McAuliffe spokesman Brian Coy told FoxNews.com. “Governor McAuliffe has worked with local, state and federal law enforcement officials to keep guns out of dangerous hands by better enforcing Virginia gun’s safety laws, a common refrain of gun advocates.”
Coy went on to say that Carrico’s attitude is an example of the lack of willingness from Republicans to work with the governor on issues related to gun safety.
“As a gun owner himself, the governor is ready to work with the General Assembly on common sense steps like universal background checks. Unfortunately, Mr. Carrico’s quote is a good representation of the interest he and his colleagues have shown in productive work on this serious issue so far,” Coy said.
Carrico, however, remained unmoved.
“I may not have a lot of power, but I'm going to use the power I have to protect constitutional rights of individuals in my district. These are the people I represent, the 230,000 I represent, I’m going to fight for them regardless if you’re President Obama or Governor McAuliffe. The one thing they’ll tell you is I’m not afraid to fight.”

Iranian rocket passes within 1,500 yards of US aircraft carrier

Iranian rockets passed within 1,500 yards of a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier in the Strait of Hormuz last week, a senior defense official confirmed Tuesday to Fox News.
Cmdr. Kyle Raines, a U.S. Central Command spokesman, said in a statement to the Associated Press early Wednesday that Iranian Revolutionary Guard naval vessels fired "several unguided rockets" after giving only 23 minutes' notice over maritime radio that a live-fire exercise would be carried out. The incident was first reported by NBC News.
Raines described the Iranian fleet's actions as "highly provocative".
"Firing weapons so close to passing coalition ships and commercial traffic within an internationally recognized maritime traffic lane is unsafe, unprofessional and inconsistent with international maritime law," the spokesman said.
While the United States has complained previously about other Iranian war games and maneuvers there, Saturday's incident comes after a series of weapons tests and other moves by Tehran following this past summer's nuclear deal.
In the time since, Iran has conducted missile tests criticized by the U.S., as well as aired footage on state television of an underground missile base. Iran also sank a replica of a U.S. aircraft carrier in February near the strait. It seized a Marshall Islands-flagged cargo ship and later released it in May after earlier surrounding U.S.-flagged cargo ship transiting the strait.
Iranian media and officials did not immediately discuss the tests Wednesday.
In addition to the Truman, the destroyer USS Bulkeley and French frigate FS Provence were in the area, as was commercial sea traffic.

A U.S. military official told The Hill newspaper that the Iranian ships approached the Truman and other vessels before announcing it was setting the live-fire exercise in motion and requesting nearby vessels to keep clear.
Minutes later, the Iranians repeated the warning and the rockets were launched. It was not immediately clear how many projectiles were fired. The Hill reported the ships departed the area after the launches.
Officials said the rockets traveled in a direction taking them away from the Truman and other shipping traffic in the strait, which conncts the Persian Gulf to the Arabian Sea and is the route for nearly a third of all oil traded by sea.
The Truman recently arrived in the Persian Gulf to provide a launching point for airstrikes against the ISIS terror group in Iraq and Syria. It replaces the USS Theodore Roosevelt, which departed the Middle East this past October. The French aircraft carrier Charles De Gaulle is also in the Gulf to perform similar functions.
The Strait of Hormuz is only about 21 miles wide at its narrowest point between Iran and Oman. Ships traversing the chokepoint have even less room to maneuver. The shipping lane in either direction is only 2 miles wide, with a 2-mile buffer zone between them.

The U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet is based in nearby Bahrain, on the southern coast of the Gulf. It conducts anti-piracy patrols in the greater Gulf and serves as a regional counterbalance to Iran.

While the U.S. didn't retaliate to Saturday's rocket test, the Strait of Hormuz has been the scene of a battle between the two countries' navies. On April 18, 1988, the U.S. attacked two Iranian oil rigs and sunk or damaged six of its vessels, including two naval frigates, in Operation Praying Mantis. That came after the near-sinking of the missile frigate USS Samuel B. Roberts by an Iranian mine.

A few months later, in July 1988, the USS Vincennes in the strait mistook an Iran Air flight heading to Dubai for an attacking fighter jet, shooting down the plane and killing all 290 passengers and crew onboard. The shoot-down of the jet came shortly after the U.S. vessel reported coming under fire from Iranian speedboats.

US spying on Israel reportedly ensnares members of Congress

The National Security Agency's effort to eavesdrop on communications between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his aides reportedly also captured private conversations involving U.S. lawmakers and members of American Jewish groups.
The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday that the NSA's monitoring of such exchanges raised fears that the Obama administration would be accused of spying on Congress, with one official calling it an "oh, s--- moment".
According to the paper, the enhanced monitoring of Netanyahu began, with the assent of lawmakers from both parties, late in Obama's first term out of concerns that the Israeli leader would pursue a preemptive strike against Iranian nuclear facilities.
The sweeping up of conversations between Israeli officials and U.S. lawmakers began in earnest earlier this year, ahead of a March visit to Capitol Hill by Netanyahu to speak out against the developing Iran nuclear deal, and continued through this past September, when the deadline for Congress to block the deal passed.
The Journal, citing U.S. officials, reported that Netanyahu's office repeatedly attempted to learn details about changes in U.S. positions during the sensitive nuclear talks. Israel's ambassador to the U.S., Ron Derner, was described as coaching unnamed Jewish- American groups to press members of Congress, especially Democrats, to oppose the deal.
A spokesman for the Israeli Embassy in Washington described the U.S. claims as "total nonsense."
The White House, reportedly wary of the political fallout if the spying on Netanyahu was to become public, allowed the NSA to determine what conversations should be disclosed to Obama administration officials and what should be kept secret. The Journal reported that the NSA removed the names of U.S. lawmakers from the intelligence reports it shared, and also redacted any criticism of the Obama administration.
The Journal also reported that Obama left Netanyahu off a list of world leaders who would be exempt from NSA activities after the president vowed to curtail eavesdropping on friendly heads of state in January 2014.
Among the world leaders who made the so-called "protected" list was German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande, and most leaders of NATO nations, with the notable exception of Turkey.

cake for gay wedding cartoon

New Iran sanctions fight looms in 2016

Despite President Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran that provides a gradual easing of decades of crippling economic sanctions, senators are fighting to renew a vital law that would preserve the sanctions option should Iran renege on its end of the bargain.
The Hill reports that senators plan to move soon on a proposal to extend what’s known as the Iran Sanctions Act, which is set to expire next year. Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md., top Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, told the newspaper his colleagues have floated the possibility of tackling the issue in January or February.
But the debate could put the Obama administration in a tough spot.
Iran already is on high alert over any U.S. moves that could be perceived as a violation of the nuclear agreement – which trades sanctions relief for steps to roll back Iran’s nuclear program.
Iran surely would howl at any congressional attempts to keep broad sanctions legislation in force, even if specific sanctions are being lifted. But U.S. lawmakers say it’s vital for the U.S. to retain the leverage to re-trigger those sanctions if Iran cheats – and that would mean extending the sanctions law.  
In a letter earlier this month to President Obama, Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J. – who along with Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., introduced the Iran Sanctions Relief Oversight Act of 2015 -- warned that Iran will “continue to test the limits of international order.”
Their bill would extend the Iran Sanctions Act of 1996 for another decade.  In the letter to Obama, Menendez said that “lending” his support to the legislation would be a “good start.”
While facing congressional pressure to get tough on Iran, the Obama administration is working on a separate track to assuage Iran’s concerns over a separate set of visa restrictions approved by Congress.
That controversy stems from tightened security requirements for America’s visa waiver program, which allows citizens of 38 countries to travel to the U.S. without visas. Under changes in the newly signed spending bill, people from those countries who have traveled to Iran, Iraq, Syria and Sudan in the past five years must now obtain visas to enter the U.S.
Top Tehran officials complained the changes violate the terms of the nuclear deal, which says the U.S. and other world powers will refrain from any policy intended to adversely affect normalization of trade and economic relations with Iran.
In response, Secretary of State John Kerry assured the Iranian government that the changes will not interfere with the implementation of the nuclear deal, and suggested the administration could simply bypass the rules for Iran. 
Kerry’s letter drew a rebuke from GOP lawmakers who accused the administration of trying to “placate” the regime.
Meanwhile, lawmakers from both parties have approached the administration with concerns about Iran’s compliance in the wake of Iran firing a medium-range ballistic missile in October, in apparent violation of U.N. sanctions. Iran also reportedly launched another ballistic missile in November.
Cardin and 20 other Democratic senators voiced concern about those tests – and the lack of action from the U.N. Security Council -- in a letter to Obama on Dec. 17.

Low-polling GOP candidates insist there’s time for a turn-around

The GOP presidential field that rolled into the 2016 election cycle like a crowded bus already has dropped a few passengers, but the remaining 13 appear committed to staying on board at least through the next debates and the first two contests.
Just three of them have double-digit numbers in an average of national polls, with front-runner Donald Trump gobbling up more than a third of primary support. On the other end, candidates such as Rick Santorum and George Pataki have failed to garner even 1 percent.
Though Santorum has never been among the 2016 front-runners and did not compete in any of the five prime-time debates, he indicated Monday he’s thinking back to his 2012 performance – when he won the Iowa caucuses – as he approaches the same contest on Feb. 1.  
“I feel like I did four years ago,” the former Pennsylvania senator told FoxNews.com. “We’re headed to Iowa tomorrow to make contact with as many people as we can. … I don’t think that many people have made up their minds. We’re at a point now where serious people are going to make decisions about serious candidates.”
Santorum also said he’s on all the state ballots, has a solid national organization and a “good slate of delegates” across the country.
“I feel better about this year than I did at this time for 2012,” he said.
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee is in a similar situation -- having won Iowa in his 2008 presidential bid. But this time Huckabee, a social conservative like Santorum, is polling at about 2 percent, according to the RealClearPolitics average.
“Not one person in all of America has even voted,” Huckabee said Sunday, amid speculation over whether he and other low-polling candidates might drop out before the Iowa caucuses – or even the next GOP debate, set for Jan. 14 and hosted by Fox Business Network.
Huckabee, too, drew some inspiration from Santorum’s 2012 Iowa finish.
“Santorum won. He was in … sixth place out of the seven candidates, five days out from the caucuses,” he told “Fox News Sunday,” while pointing out that he still has campaign operations in all 99 Iowa counties. “This idea that this is all sewed up or fixed, I've been in that state enough to know it's just not quite like that yet.”
Still, Huckabee and many other candidates are essentially caught in the Trump vortex -- continuing to cede poll numbers to the media-savvy billionaire businessman, which forces them into the lesser-watched, second-tier debates, erodes their name recognition and diminishes fundraising power.  
The criteria for who gets onto the main stage in the upcoming FBN debate is based on national polls as well as polls in Iowa and in New Hampshire, which on Feb. 9 holds the second primary of the cycle.
The debate, sanctioned by the Republican National Committee, will be in South Carolina’s North Charleston Coliseum and Performing Arts Center and will focus on economic, domestic and international policy issues.
The prime-time debate will feature candidates who by Jan. 11 place in the top six in national polls or in the top five in Iowa or New Hampshire polls.
The remaining candidates will be invited to the early debate.
Kentucky GOP Sen. Rand Paul, who has been in all of the televised, main-stage debates but continues to drop in the polls, says he will not participate if forced into the early Fox Business debate.  
GOP candidate and Ohio Gov. John Kasich suggested Sunday that his strategy is to have a respectable showing in Iowa, where social conservatives do well, then finish high in New Hampshire, where voters are more closely aligned to his moderate positions.
“I have to do well enough there,” he told ABC News. “And I think I will … catch fire. And if I catch fire, I think the sky is the limit.”
Poor showings in both or either of the first two primaries can doom a campaign.
Trump insists he’ll fight to the finish.
"I will never leave the race," he declared to The Washington Post earlier this month.
Trump is closely followed in the polls by Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, who leads slightly in Iowa, and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.
Both appear to have enough voter support and money to extend their campaigns well beyond New Hampshire, which is followed by the South Carolina and Nevada contests and then a swing across the South, where Cruz appears to be plotting a surge.
Cruz has about $65 million in campaign and outside money, compared with Rubio who has about $33 million in combined funds, according to OpenSecrets.org.
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who was the early GOP favorite, now has roughly 4 percent in the national RealClearPolitics average. However, he leads the entire 2016 presidential field in fundraising -- $103 million in campaign money and $24.8 million in outside money, the OpenSecrets site shows.

Chicago mayor cuts Cuba vacation short to address weekend police shooting

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced Monday he plans to cut his family vacation in Cuba short and return to the city to work on reforming the Chicago Police Department in wake of another deadly police shooting in which one person was killed by accident when police responded to a domestic disturbance call.
Kelly Quinn, a spokeswoman for the mayor, said in a statement to the Chicago Tribune Emanuel left for Cuba on Dec. 18 and wasn’t’ expected to return until Saturday but decided to return on Tuesday after officers responding to a domestic disturbance shot and killed Quintonio LeGrier, 19, and Bettie Jones, 55. Police said Jones was “accidentally” shot.
While Mayor Emanuel has been in constant contact with his staff and Interim Superintendent (John) Escalante, he is cutting his family trip short so that he can continue the ongoing work of restoring accountability and trust in the Chicago Police Department," Quinn said in a statement.
The shooting deaths take place days after the Justice Department opened a civil-rights investigation into Chicago police practices. It was the first deadly police shooting since the release of the video footage showing Officer Jason Van Dyke shooting and killing 19-year-old Laquan McDonald in 2014.
The pressure has increased on Emanuel ever since the release of the McDonald video. Protests calling for his resignation have occurred daily since November, with critics alleging that Emanuel didn’t release the video over political reasons. McDonald was reelected as the city’s mayor in April.
The mayor has responded with a flurry of activity to stem the outcry, mixing short-term changes and long-term promises, according to The Wall Street Journal.
“The changes we have made in recent weeks are just a beginning—not an end,” Emanuel has said.
One of the most vocal critics of Emanuel has been Rev. Al Sharpton who said it was “unbelievable” that Emanuel didn’t return immediately to Chicago after the most recent shooting this past weekend.
“I think he’s gone beyond the point where he can even govern with the trust of the people,” Sharpton said on MSNBC’s “The Morning Joe.” Sharpton also called for Emanuel’s resignation, echoing almost daily protests around the city.
In the last month, Emanuel has fired his police chief and the head of the group that investigates police shootings in Chicago and formed a group to look at how to reform the department.
Emanuel, in all likelihood, will have three more years to get things right in Chicago, despite the out pour of anger in the city. The Wall Street Journal reported the city doesn’t have a process to recall him.
The mayor’s former political director, Thomas Bowen, told the Journal Emanuel is responding to the growing concerns of residents and people see him taking action.
“They see their political figures responding to the problem,” Bowen added.

Oregon bakery owners pay more than $135G in damages over refusal to make cake for gay wedding

The owners of an Oregon bakery who denied service to a same-sex couple have paid more than $135,000 in state-ordered damages – months after refusing to do so – according to state officials Monday.
Aaron Klein, co-owner of Sweet Cakes, by Melissa, dropped a check off for $136,927.07, according to the Bureau of Labor and Industries. The payment includes interest. Klein also paid $7,000 earlier this month.
Damages were award in July for emotional suffering caused by the bakery which refused to make a wedding cake for Laurel and Rachel Bowman-Cryer more than two years ago. The bakers said they refused to make the cake because of their religious beliefs.
The dispute goes back to January 2013 when Bowman-Cryer came into the shop with her mother for a cake-tasting appointment. However, Aaron Klein told the women that the bakery didn’t do cakes for same-sex weddings. The women filed complaints with the state and triggered a national debate over claims of religious beliefs against anti-discrimination laws.
Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian awarded the damages nearly six months ago, saying the owners had violated the women’s civil rights by discriminating on the basis of their sexual orientation. They were also slapped with a gag order that prohibited them from speaking publicly about their refusal to participate in or bake wedding cakes for same-sex marriages.
Aaron and his wife Melissa filed an appeal of the ruling and were defying the order to pay the damages before Monday. Tyler Smith, an attorney representing the Kleins, told The Oregonian that his clients have not abandoned their appeal of Avakian’s order. Smith said it was in their clients’ best interests to pay now rather than wait for the appeal date, which is slated for next year.
The Oregonian reported the state has received a total of $144,000 from the Kleins. Charlie Burr, an agency spokesman, told the paper the payment might be more than what they owe.
"We have been in touch with their lawyers throughout the process," Burr said. The amount might differ because of the accruing interest, according to the paper.
A 2007 Oregon law protects the rights of gays, lesbians, bisexual and transgender people in employment, housing and public accommodations. The state ruled it also bars private businesses from discriminating against potential customers.

John Kasich Cartoon

Huckabee, Kasich: Campaigns will continue, amid persistently low polls numbers

Mike Huckabee and John Kasich on Sunday dismissed suggestions that they would end their struggling Republican presidential campaigns before having to compete in a second-tier debate or suffer a big loss in the upcoming Iowa primary vote.
“Of course I’m not,” Huckabee responded on “Fox News Sunday.” “Not one person in all of America has even voted. … It's never settled this far out.”
Huckabee, a social conservative and former Arkansas governor, won the Iowa caucus in his 2008 presidential bid. But this time he’s ranked eighth in the GOP field of 12 and has only 1.8 percent of the primary vote, according to a RealClearPolitics averaging of polls.
Social conservatives historically do well in Iowa, which holds its first-in-the-nation vote Feb. 1. However, Huckabee’s path toward a 2016 victory has been narrowed by fellow GOP contender Ted Cruz, the like-minded and firebrand Texas senator. Cruz is now leading overall GOP frontrunner Donald Trump in Iowa, some polls show.
Ohio Gov. Kasich suggested Sunday on ABC’s “This Week” that he’ll continue his campaign at least through the Feb. 9 primary in New Hampshire, in which voters are less conservative and where he thinks he can do well.
“I have to do well enough there,” said Kasich, who is polling at 2 percent according to the RealClearPolitics average. “And I think I will … . I'll catch fire.  And if I catch fire, I think the sky is the limit."
Poor showings in both or either of those first two primaries can doom a campaign.
The next debate is being hosted by Fox Business and is on January 14.
Kasich express optimism that he’ll be in the main-stage debate and declined to comment on fellow GOP candidate Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul saying he won’t compete in the second-tier contest if demoted as a result of FOX Business criteria, which involves rankings in national, Iowa and New Hampshire polls.
“I think we'll make the main stage,” Kasich said. “I'm hopeful that we'll be on the stage and be able to participate.”
Kasich has been on the main stage for the first eight debates. Huckabee’s polls numbers have put him in the second-tier debates in two of the last four.

Trump plots big TV ad blitz that could change campaign landscape

When Donald Trump and his team were planning his presidential campaign, they drew up a budget of $25 million for television advertising in the third quarter of this year.
They wound up spending zero for the rest of 2015.
That is about to change. Sources in the Trump camp say they will soon launch a major ad blitz that could cost at least $2 million a week, and possibly several times that.
The initial wave of ads will focus on Trump’s vision and his stance on key issues—no bio spots necessary for the celebrity candidate—but that could change if any GOP rivals target him with negative commercials. “If you attack Trump, he will attack you 10 times as hard,” an adviser says. “We will not allow any attack to go unanswered.”
The Trump camp is working with a Florida-based advertising firm, as widely reported, but also with several other media companies, some of which are well-known in the political community, the sources say.
Their advantage, in Iowa, New Hampshire and beyond, is that the bombastic billionaire can just write a check for the TV campaign. Some pundits have expressed skepticism that Trump really wants to dig deeply into his personal fortune, but these sources insist he is ready to do just that—perhaps as much as $100 million for advertising overall. “Our Super PAC,” says the adviser, “is Donald Trump’s bank account.”
The original plan was to saturate the airwaves so that the real estate mogul could define himself before his GOP rivals did it for him. But Trump says he had no need to do that because he generated such saturation coverage, all of it free.
If Trump pours big bucks into an ad campaign—and no budget has been set—he could again confound the prognosticators. While Trump enjoys a 20-point lead in national polls and dominates many state polls, he and Ted Cruz have been trading the lead in Iowa, where a win could give the Texas senator momentum and let some air out of the Trump invincibility balloon. A Gravis poll just before Christmas had Trump and Cruz tied in Iowa at 31 percent.
Journalistic skeptics also question whether Trump is doing what it takes in the ground game and whether his voters, some of them new to politics, will actually show up. The New York Times recently reported that “Mr. Trump has fallen behind in the nuts and bolts of organizing. A loss in Iowa for Mr. Trump, where he has devoted the most resources of his campaign, could imperil his leads in the next two nominating states, New Hampshire and South Carolina, where his get-out-the-vote organizations are even less robust.”
In the early  caucus state of Nevada, says the Wall Street Journal, “the Trump campaign has just four aides working out of campaign offices in Las Vegas and Reno. And they are playing catch-up with other campaigns.”
Trump advisers dispute such reports, citing the hiring of 17 paid staffers in Iowa and 15 in New Hampshire.
But let’s assume what once seemed unthinkable for the pundit class, that Trump wins the Republican nomination. The new conventional wisdom is that he’ll get creamed in the general election.
But could the political soothsayers be wrong about this as well?
Trump himself tweeted over the weekend, “The same people that said I wouldn't run, or that I wouldn't lead or do well (1st place and leading by 21%), now say I won't beat Hillary.”
Still, the polls suggest that Trump could have a tough time, especially with Hillary Clinton holding a built-in Electoral College advantage against any Republican challenger.
Trump has a 68 percent unfavorable rating among women, according to last week’s Quinnipiac poll—which is one reason Clinton fired back that his recent comment about her being “schlonged” in 2008 suggests sexism.
In a Q poll out in early December, Trump had an 87 percent unfavorable rating among blacks, and 84 percent of Hispanics had an unfavorable view of him. Such a cataclysmic outcome would push ever higher the percentage of white voters that Trump would need to win.
Back in September, though, a SurveyUSA poll found Trump with 25 percent support among African-Americans. It seems unlikely that Trump would more than double the black vote that George W. Bush won in his 2004 reelection. But anything significantly higher than the 6 percent of blacks that Mitt Romney won against President Obama would be an improvement. 
Trump advisers argue that his unconventional candidacy could change the electoral map—particularly his appeal to blue-collar workers who are Democrats and independents. They believe his street-tough persona could put such industrial strongholds as Michigan, Ohio, Illinois and Pennsylvania in play. He takes some moderate positions for a Republicans, such as not touching Medicare and Social Security.
Trump’s say-anything style could certainly create headaches for Clinton, an essentially conventional politician despite her ground-breaking gender. And there are two other sets of numbers to consider.
Trump has a daunting 59 percent unfavorable rating in the most recent Q poll, but Hillary’s unfavorable, at 51 percent, isn’t much better.
And in the latest CNN survey, Clinton beats Trump by only 49 to 47 percent in a hypothetical matchup, within the margin of error. He fares worse in other polls, trailing Hillary by 7 points in Quinnipiac and 11 points in the latest Fox poll.
Still, for a political neophyte running against a former first lady, senator and Cabinet member, those are the kind of deficits that can be made up in a long campaign. A July CNN poll found only 51 percent of Republicans viewing Trump favorably; by this month the figure had risen to 72 percent.
It’s entirely possible that Trump will get shellacked if he wins the Republican nomination. But if the pundits’ awful track record is any indication, all bets could be off.

US quietly maneuvers to cut UN dues

The U.S. is locked once again in a back-room struggle with developing nations over how much of the United Nations tab Washington will pick up over the next three years, especially the bill for peacekeeping activities.
There is cautious hope among diplomats that the U.S. can chip away at least marginally at the U.N.’s “scale of assessments”-- a dues system loaded in favor of many poor and not-so-poor countries that pay less than their fair share, and saddle the small number of rich countries -- especially the U.S. -- with the difference.
In broad terms, the bottom line will remain the same: the U.S. will continue to pay billions more than everyone else. Last year, the U.S. handed over $3 billion toward the U.N.’s so-called “regular” Secretariat budget and its peacekeeping forces, though the full amount of U.S. contributions to the U.N. system -- the Obama administration does not divulge them -- was much more.
The last official tally of overall U.S. contributions, in 2010, was about $7.6 billion, and that was widely considered a low-ball figure.
The basis of U.S. giving is the U.N. assessments scale -- currently set so that the U.S. pays 22 percent of the so-called “regular” U.N. Secretariat  annual budget (about $2.8 billion in 2015), and 28.36 percent of its peacekeeping budget, which has ballooned in the past few years to $8.47 billion in 2014-2015.
The bigger the overall bills, the bigger is the share in dollar terms the U.S. must pay because of its outsized dues percentages.
The next-biggest percentage payee, Japan, forks over 10.83 percent of both the U.N.’s regular budget and peacekeeping spending, and as a result signed a check for about $1.23 billion -- about 40 percent of the U.S. total. Powerhouses like Germany fall even further behind.
The U.S. peacekeeping tab is more than the tally for the other four veto-wielding members of the U.N. Security Council -- France, the United Kingdom, China and Vladimir Putin’s Russian Federation --combined.
On the other hand,  the least-paying 176 countries at the world organization -- and there are only 193 in the U.N. system -- coughed up in toto little more than Japan-- some $1.4 billion for both their peacekeeping and “regular” dues, according to figures compiled by the conservative Heritage Foundation.
Taken separately, the peacekeeping tab for the Bottom 176 is even worse: about 10 percent of the bill, or roughly $848 million, again less than Japan’s share.
This year, however, a few factors are favorable to change, starting with the fact that the annual cost of U.N. peacekeeping appears, for the first time in a decade, to be going down rather than up.
Peacekeeping is currently estimated to cost U.N. member states about $8.27 billion in 2015-2016. (Typically for the U.N.’s spaghetti-tangled system of bookkeeping, peacekeeping budgets are calculated from mid-year to mid-year, while “regular” U.N. budgets are calculated on a January-to-December basis -- but biennially.)
One cause: A small number of expensive U.N. missions, including that in Haiti, for example, have shrunk considerably, and some are likely to shrink more.
The other reason for a difference is that some of the biggest economies in the so-called developing world -- China, Russia, Korea, not to mention Brazil and Argentina -- are likely facing hikes in their U.N. percentage tabs due to rising local Gross Domestic Product, producing increases in their “regular” dues rates of 30 percent or more.
In some cases, notably Argentina’s, the hike will still be hard to spot: that country’s share of regular U.N. dues actually rose dramatically in the past two years -- from 0.0574 percent to .432 percent. 
A further catch in the budget process is that many countries actually receive a discount from their regular dues for peacekeeping, which the five veto power countries in the U.N. Security Council are expected to pick up as a “premium” that ticks upward from their baseline “regular” budget dues in exchange for their veto-wielding status.
Outcome: the U.S. once again gets hosed worse than other members of the veto club, even though the percentage increase in its “premium” rate is the same as for other nations that don’t pick up anywhere near as much of the U.N.’s “regular” tab, because of its higher baseline, bringing its peacekeeping share to the current 28.36 percent level.
“When the math [of discounts] was created, perhaps the dynamic was not clearly understood,” says a U.S. official.
This year, American effort is aimed, according to the official, at ways “to get the discounts streamlined, and eliminate those for the wealthiest countries.”
Among the countries targeted for persuasion are Saudi Arabia, the Gulf Arab states, and prosperous mini-states like Singapore.
Saudi Arabia, for example, had an oil-inflated GDP of 746.25 billion in 2014, its highest level ever. But its share of the U.N. regular budget was a measly 0.864 percent, and its peacekeeping share, due to discounts, even lower: 0.518 percent.
Spain, with twice the GDP of Saudi Arabia, but a much larger population -- which means its per-capita wealth is significantly less -- pays more than three times as much as the Saudis for the regular U.N. budget, and nearly six times as much for peacekeeping.
Will the U.S. effort pay off?
“The situation is fluid,” a U.S. diplomat told Fox News. “I can’t say we have clarity.”
In other words, no one is likely to be sure until somewhere around Christmas Eve, if then.

King says terror threat coming from mosques, calls for better surveillance

New York GOP Rep. Peter King on Sunday called again for better surveillance of mosques in the U.S., suggesting Islamic terrorists visit them and said that critics can “cry all they want” about the tactic amounting to a civil liberties violation.
King, a member of the House’s Homeland Security and Select Intelligence committees, told “Fox News Sunday” that “99 percent” of Muslims in the United States are good people and that he’s friends with people of the Islamic faith.
“But the fact is, (mosques are) where the threat is coming from,” King said.
He also argued that some Americans have a “blind political correctness” on such issues and that civil libertarians and other critics of better mosque surveillance can “cry all they want.”
King pointed out that one of the so-called Boston Marathon bombers, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, was told to leave a local mosque following two outbursts, yet members declined to warn authorities.
“If they had known that in advance, you combine that with the fact that the Russians had already told us to be on the lookout for him, we could have possibly prevented the … bombing,” King said.
Tsarnaev and younger brother Dzhokhar Tsarnaev killed three race spectators and injured as many as 264 others in the April 2013 attack.
Mosque members reportedly said Tsarnaev did nothing to suggest he would plot, then lead such an attack.
King’s call for better surveillance follows GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump calling for similar efforts, following the deadly Dec. 2 shootings in San Bernardino, Calif., in which a Muslim husband-wife team killed 14 and wounded 22 others.
He also said the Islamic State terror group’s intentions to attack on U.S. soil “has become clear” to intelligence officials over “the last several months.”
King, a 12-term congressman and former chairman of the lower chamber’s Homeland Security committee, also suggested that he agrees with Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al Baghdadi saying in a purported video this weekend that the roughly 16 months of U.S.-led airstrikes in Syria have done little damage to the terror group.
“I would expect al-Baghdadi to say that,” King said. "We've had some impact, but unfortunately overall he is probably right. … ISIS is stronger.”
King said the group now has more territory under its control and is making “great inroads” in Afghanistan.
He also said the Transportation Security Administration’s plan to now conduct full-body scans on some airline passengers is in part a response to the San Bernardino attack and the Paris bombing attacks weeks earlier in which 160 people died and for which the Islamic State has claimed responsibility.

Trump, Grand Rapids, Mich.

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump gave new perspective on Russian President Vladimir Putin speaking favorably about him. When he mentioned allegations the Russian president killed reporters, Trump said it's awful and said he would "never kill reporters but I hate them - such lying, disgusting people".
He told the crowd in Grand Rapids, Mich. that the current U.S. approach towards Russia isn’t working. “It would be so great if we could get Russia on our side and knock the hell out of ISIS, right, so stupid, just knock the living hell out of them?”
Trump weighed on Hillary Clinton saying ISIS is using videos of the GOP front-runner as a recruitment tool. “It turned out to be a lie and the last person she wants to run against is me”.
He also reacted to S.C. Sen. Lindsey Graham dropping out of the 2016 race. In what seemed to be a sarcastic remark, Trump said the news was “extremely sad” and added, “he was nasty to me, everybody who goes against me is then gone”.
Then knocking his other GOP rivals, Trump said “ask Jeb bush if he enjoys running against me, ask Lindsay graham did he enjoy running against me … do they enjoy it, I enjoy it”.
He attacked Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, accusing him of being controlled by outside money. “Politicians are controlled by special interests and lobbyists, companies pay them millions of dollars and they get in, look I don't' want to get involved, Rubio, then this one and this one.”
The businessman talked a good portion of his remarks about the car industry with Michigan being the home state to Ford, G&M, and Chrysler.
“You have your closed plants and you're looking for jobs it's a disgrace, and I'll tell you the one thing that really helps me is that you're really making great cars now,” he told supporters.
Trump proposed imposing 35 percent tax on “ever car truck and part” that comes from outside the country.
At what has become the norm at Trump rallies, protestors nearly a dozen times during his speech interrupted the GOP candidate. He tried to downplay their significance saying they look so young or calling them losers.  One protestor called Trump a “bigot” before being escorted outside the venue.