O'Malley emerges in New Hampshire as potential Clinton rival for 2016 but soft sells potential challenge

Former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley is emerging as a potential challenger to Hillary Clinton for the party’s 2016 presidential nomination but appears unwilling, at least for now, to mount a head-on challenge to the front-running Clinton.
O’Malley on Friday night at a Democratic fundraiser in key voting state New Hampshire declined to discuss two Clinton controversies -- donations to the Clinton Foundation and her use of a private email accounts -- much less use them to his political advantage.
“I like Hillary Clinton. I respect Secretary Clinton. I am not here to talk about Secretary Clinton," O’Malley said when asked after his speech about the foundation accepting large donations from foreign countries in the two years since Clinton left her post as secretary of state.
Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, have long been supportive of O’Malley, who reportedly got Hillary Clinton’s blessing to run for the White House as far back as 2013.
O’Malley’s speech Friday at the Merrimack County Democrats fundraiser in Concord, N.H., marks his first visit to the state since the midterm elections. He last visited New Hampshire in October to campaign on behalf of Democratic Gov. Maggie Hassan, who won re-election.
Clinton, also a former New York senator, has been the presumptive Democratic 2016 presidential nominee since polling started as far back as 2012, though she has yet to announce whether she is running.
With roughly 44 percent of the potential vote, formidable fundraising might and campaign infrastructure, Clinton has essentially cleared the field of potential primary challengers.
The 67-year-old Clinton has so far in speeches largely focused on wage equality for women and helping the middle and lower classes by increasing pay overall.
When O’Malley was asked Friday night how he would distinguish himself from Clinton, he said, “I don’t know. … I don't know what she's proposing as her candidacy.”
On the issue of Clinton using at least one private email account when secretary of state from 2009 to 2013, O’Malley, a former assistant U.S. attorney, said he wasn’t familiar enough with federal regulations to comment.
But he said that all personal emails for Maryland officials are subject to federal Freedom of Information Act requests.
He also said that openness and transparency is the way of the future and that cities and states have embraced this more than the federal government.
Republicans have sought to take advantage of the back-to-back Clinton controversies, with House Republicans saying they will subpoena the roughly 50,000 pages of emails in question.
And political observers say the controversies could create enough space for another Democrat to mount a strong challenge to Clinton.
On Friday, O'Malley did criticize President Obama and attempted to distinguish himself from the party’s torch-bearer.
He criticized the president for not using executive action to raise the federal overtime pay threshold and said reforming federal laws on immigration is necessary for a thriving economy and national security.
People living “in the shadows of society" create an "underground economy," O’Malley said.

WHERE IS FLIGHT 370? One year after tragedy, officials no closer to finding answers

One year ago today, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappeared as it made its way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
The search for the Boeing 777, with 239 passengers and crew on board, has covered almost 1.8 million square miles of the southern Indian Ocean, and has involved 82 aircraft and 84 ships from 26 countries, CBS News reported Saturday.
The search has yielded no signs of the plane -- no wreckage, no life jackets, no flotation devices, no luggage, no human remains.
In January, Malaysia's civil aviation authority reportedly declared passengers and crew on board deceased and officially classified Flight 370's disappearance as "an accident." The families were offered $50,000 per victim.
While the announcement allowed the airline to settle any legal obligations and speed up payments to the families of the victims, many of the families who lost loved ones are angry.
"Despite this complete lack of wreckage found or physical evidence of a catastrophic event, the Malaysian government has officially declared that the airplane crashed, leaving no survivors, and it has ended the rescue phase of the search effort," a group called Voice370, which speaks on behalf of the victims' families, said in a statement issued to the press on Friday, CBS reported. "We do not accept this finding and we will not give up hope until we have definitive proof of what happened to MH370."
According to CBS, four ships continue to search the South Indian Ocean and have covered nearly 45 percent of the target area to date.

"I still call the phone."- Jacqui Gonzales

The one-year anniversary is a difficult time for many victims' families, including Jacqui Gonzales, whose husband of nearly 30 years, Patrick, worked on Flight 370 as an in-flight supervisor.
"A year of no news, no answers and no Patrick," she told CBS. One year later, Gonzales says she still calls Patrick's cellphone.
"I still call the phone," she said. She doesn't hear his voice, "but the recording of his voice mail. His number is still there."
On Saturday, Malaysia's transport minister, Liow Tiong Lai, told the BBC that search teams would continue to look for Flight 370. Liow said he is confident the plane will be found in the southern Indian Ocean.
Still, according to Liow, if the massive undersea search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 turns up nothing by the end of May, the three countries leading the effort will go "back to the drawing board," Malaysia's transport minister said Saturday.
Liow told a small group of foreign reporters on the eve of the anniversary of the plane's disappearance that he remains cautiously optimistic the Boeing 777 is in the area of the southern Indian Ocean where the search is ongoing.
Australian Transport Minister Warren Truss said last week that if the plane isn't found by May, one option is to expand the hunt beyond the current search zone to a wider surrounding area.
Despite the exhaustive search for the plane, which disappeared last March 8, no trace of the jet has been found. Malaysia's government on Jan. 29 formally declared the incident an accident and said all 239 people on board were presumed dead.
"By the end of May, if we still can't find the plane, then we will have to go back to the drawing board," Liow said.
Ships looking for debris from the plane on the ocean floor off the coast of western Australia have so far scoured 44 percent of the 60,000-square-kilometer (23,166-square-mile) area the search has been focused on, Liow said.
In the latest report he received Friday, he said the search team had identified 10 hard objects that still need to be analyzed.
Such findings, which often include trash and cargo containers from passing ships, have been common during the search, and so far no trace of wreckage has been located.
Liow said that Australia, Malaysia and China would meet next month to discuss the next steps in the search. Most of the plane's passengers were Chinese.

Transparency Cartoon

Dem strategist on Christie: ‘We want to kill him dead’

A longtime Democratic strategist is taking heat for recent comments about how aggressively his super PAC plans to go after New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. 
"We're not going to pull resources from Christie, we want to kill him dead," Brad Woodhouse told Bloomberg Politics.
Woodhouse is president of the left-leaning American Bridge, launched by Media Matters' David Brock.
During the Bloomberg interview, Woodhouse made the comment when asked if recent bad press about Christie would prompt his group to pull back.
He made clear it would not.
The Republican Party is now calling for an apology.
"We understand that Democrats are getting desperate after the recent revelations about their presumptive nominee and need to create a distraction," Republican National Committee spokesman Sean Spicer said in a statement Thursday night.
Spicer added that "in no circumstance is it acceptable to say about a sitting governor that you want to kill him dead."
"A line has been crossed, and Brad Woodhouse should apologize," he said.
Woodhouse lobbed back: "Let me respond by using the acronym of Christie's PAC- LMFAO," Woodhouse said via Twitter.  
That retort might be a bit in the weeds, but for context, Christie's PAC name is Leadership Matters for America. LMFAO is Internet shorthand for "laughing my f---ing a-- off."

Students at UC Irvine vote to ban American flag

Idiots

Students at the University of California, Irvine have voted to make their school a more “culturally inclusive” place by banning the American flag.
The Associated Students of University of California (ASUCI) passed a resolution March 3 that would remove the Stars & Stripes along with every other flag from the lobby of a complex housing the offices of the student government.
“Designing a culturally inclusive space aims to remove barriers that create undue effort and separation by planning and designing spaces that enable everyone to participate equally and confidentially,” read the resolution authored by Matthew Guevara.
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The resolution passed 6-4. Two people abstained. Let me break down the vote for you -- six unAmerican students, four patriots and two individuals who could have a career in House Republican leadership.
Guevara’s resolution, which was in dire need of an edit, rambled on about “paradigms of conformity” and “homogenized standards” and blah, blah, blah.
It sounds like Mr. Guevara could have a future career in community organizing or the Democratic party.
“The American flag has been flown in instances of colonialism and imperialism,” he bemoaned. “Flags not only serve as symbols of patriotism or weapons for nationalism, but also construct cultural mythologies and narratives that in turn charge nationalistic sentiments.”
I know, folks. I know it’s California. But this is beyond bizarre even for the yoga and granola crowd.
I reached out to the university for a comment and a very nice spokesperson (who seemed anxious for the weekend) assured me the university did not endorse the resolution.
She also told me the executive board of the student government association is going to meet this weekend and discuss the possibility of a veto.
Reza Zomorrodian, the ASUCI president and a young patriot, told me he was very upset over the student government’s actions and will push for a veto.
“It’s an attack on American values,” he said. “A lot of people want to come to the United States for a reason – it’s because of the freedoms we have.”
Zomorrodian told me the legislation was the result of a longstanding feud over the display of the American flag. He said unknown perpetrators kept taking down the flag and he would put it back up.  The flag is currently folded and being protected in a vice president’s office.
“I’m really disappointed in our legislative council right now,” he said. “I’m firmly against what they did. I think it was a horrible idea.”
Zomorrodian said he wants the American public to know that UC Irvine is a patriotic campus.
“Only six people voted for this,” he said. “We have 22,000 undergrads here. Six people made this decision. The UC Irvine has made huge contributions to bettering this country. This is an elected body that made a decision for the whole and will suffer the consequences of making that decision.”
Mr. Zomorrodian sounds like a very nice young man who understands what the American flag represents --- and I hope he musters the votes necessary to rehoist the Stars & Stripes.
As for the handful of un-American rabblerousers who’ve brought shame upon the campus of UC Irvine – I would offer these gentle words:
If you have a problem with the flag and what that flag stands for and the brave men and women who died for that flag – then you are more than welcome to pack your bags and haul your ungrateful buttocks across the border.
And one final thought about the vandals who keep taking down the flag in the dark of night. I wonder if Mr. Zomorrodian has considered asking the university’s ROTC program for help. I suspect a handful of young soldiers might be able to nip that problem in the bud.

Defiant Sen. Menendez declares, "I am not going anywhere"

A defiant Sen. Robert Menendez declared, “I am not going anywhere,” Friday night amid reports the Justice Department is preparing to charge the New Jersey Democrat with corruption counts over allegations he used his office to help a Democratic donor.
A person familiar with a federal investigation of Menendez told the Associated Press the Justice Department is expected to bring criminal charges against him in the coming weeks. The pending charges were first reported by CNN.
Menendez told a press conference about four hours after the reports surfaced that he had “always conducted myself appropriately and in accordance with the law.”
He added, “I fight for things I believe important…and for the people of our country. That’s who I am.
“I am not going anywhere.”
Menendez took no questions from reporters, saying that because of the “ongoing inquiry” he could not make any additional comments.
The Justice Department would not comment on the criminal charges report, although DOJ sources are not denying that charges may be coming.
Menendez' office did not confirm the reports, but defended the senator's conduct.
In a statement, the senator's spokeswoman Tricia Enright said: "As we have said before, we believe all of the Senator's actions have been appropriate and lawful and the facts will ultimately confirm that. Any actions taken by Senator Menendez or his office have been to appropriately address public policy issues and not for any other reason."
Attorney General Eric Holder also declined to comment on the case when asked by Fox News and President Obama ignored shouted questions by reporters as he left Marine One following a trip to South Carolina.
The case against the powerful lawmaker, two years in the making, comes at a sensitive time for Menendez -- and the Obama administration. Menendez has been a leading critic of the direction of current diplomatic talks with Iran over its nuclear program, and has helped draft legislation meant to check the administration's power to negotiate a deal.
As top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee -- and a Cuban-American lawmaker -- he also has criticized the administration's efforts to normalize ties with Cuba.
The federal case involves Florida ophthalmologist Salomon Melgen, a friend and donor, and allegations of potential favor-trading.
According to CNN, investigators looked at a plane trip the senator took as Melgen's guest to the Dominican Republic. They also looked at how the senator allegedly advocated for him with Medicare officials who accused him of overbilling and allegedly pushed his friend's business interests in the Dominican Republic.
The New Jersey Law Journal, late last month, also reported on court documents in the case, which reportedly were posted by accident for a brief time. The publication said an appeals court has ordered a hearing into whether Menendez' aides can be compelled to testify to a grand jury in the case. The Law Journal, citing the court documents, said the case revolves around the billing dispute Melgen had with Medicare officials and the donor's deal to sell port-screening equipment to the Dominican Republic. In the latter instance, the documents reportedly said the senator's former chief counsel asked U.S. Customs and Border Protection not to donate old screening equipment to the Caribbean nation -- which would allow a Melgen-tied contractor to sell such equipment.
Enright said Friday that Melgen is one of Menendez' closest friends but they cannot specifically address the claims.
"The two have spent holidays together and have gone to each other's family funerals and weddings and have exchanged personal gifts. As has been reported, the start of this investigation is suspect," she said. "We know many false allegations have been made about this matter, allegations that were ultimately publicly discredited. We also know that the official investigation of this matter is ongoing, and therefore cannot address allegations being made anonymously."
Various allegations indeed have swirled around the New Jersey lawmaker, including that he solicited prostitutes in the Dominican Republic -- allegations that have not been substantiated.
The Justice Department's record of going after high-level lawmakers is mixed.
They have won convictions against several House members, including former Republican Rep. Rick Renzi and former Democratic Rep. Bill Jefferson. But the late Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, had his conviction vacated over prosecutorial misconduct. They also never went after Alaska Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska, despite claims they were considering it years ago.

‘Nobody is going to wait’: Saudi drafting nuclear back-up plan to counter Iran?

Saudi Arabia, growing increasingly nervous about its neighbor across the Persian Gulf, may be hedging its bets and crafting a nuclear back-up plan if a diplomatic deal with Iran fails to halt the Islamic Republic's alleged march toward a weapon.
The latest sign is a curious visit on Wednesday by Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, the day before Secretary of State John Kerry's visit to the capital Riyadh.
Sharif arrived in Saudi Arabia following a visit by the Egyptian president on Sunday and Turkey's president on Monday -- but the Pakistan PM's House of Saud call might be the most significant of the three, considering Pakistan is seen by some analysts as Saudi Arabia's future nuclear tech supplier, should the Kingdom take that leap.
"The visit by the PM ... almost certainly has to be seen in the context of Saudi Arabia looking to Pakistan for nuclear cooperation to counter Iran's emerging status," Simon Henderson, of the Washington Institute, told Fox News.
Henderson, in an essay for the Washington Institute last month, also noted Riyadh's support for Pakistan's nuclear program, "providing financing in return for a widely assumed understanding that, if needed, Islamabad will transfer technology or even warheads."

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The developments point to increasing tension in the region over the course of U.S.-driven nuclear talks. Earlier this week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave an address to Congress urging the Obama administration to pull back on the talks, warning the pending deal is too soft on Iran.
"When the Israelis and Arabs are on the same page, people should pay attention," Israel's ambassador to the United States Ron Dermer told Fox News on Thursday. "That doesn't happen too often."
President Obama and his top advisers have urged allies, and lawmakers, to be patient and wait until a deal is actually presented before judging it.
But some in the region are getting impatient. "Nobody is going to wait for Iran to get a nuclear weapon. Proliferation has already started," retired Col. Derek Harvey, a former senior intelligence official in Iraq, told Fox News. The reported sunset clause allowing unrestricted enrichment for Iran after 10 years may be a driving factor.
The State Department did not return a request for comment from Fox News on whether it was concerned about Saudi Arabia seeking a nuclear weapon.
Henderson, in his essay, pointed out that Saudi Arabia and Pakistan may have just renewed a secret nuclear weapons pact.
In early February, the chairman of Pakistan's Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee visited Saudi Arabia, amid some speculation that the House of Saud had indeed reconfirmed a supposed arrangement with Pakistan for the nation to supply Saudi Arabia with warheads should Iran go nuclear. The visit to Saudi Arabia last month came a day after a successful test-firing of Pakistan's Raad air-launched 220-mile-range cruise missile, which supposedly is able to deliver nuclear and conventional warheads.
Ironically, the father of Pakistan's nuclear program, Abdul Qadeer "AQ" Khan, also provided the technology to Saudi Arabia's nemesis, Iran.
Kerry is navigating complicated Arab world geopolitics as he meets with foreign counterparts. Amid wariness over Shiite Iran's nuclear program, these countries are also concerned about Iran's support for Shia militants against ISIS militants in Iraq, support for Houthi rebels in Yemen and the country's ever-growing regional footprint.
In Riyadh, Kerry met Thursday with counterparts from the Kuwait, UAE, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman -- all Sunni nations concerned about Iran's intentions in Iraq, Syria and Yemen.
At a press conference Thursday, Saudi Arabia's Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal expressed concern over Iran's involvement in helping Iraqi forces in Tikrit. "The situation in Tikrit is a prime example of what we are worried about. Iran is taking over the country," he said.  
The Pentagon acknowledged Iran's leading role in the battle for Tikrit. Two-thirds of those taking part in the operation are Iran-backed Shia militias led by Quds Force commander Gen. Major General Qasem Soleimani, the special operations wing of Iran's Revolutionary Guard.
"This is the most overt conduct of Iranian support in the form of artillery and other things," Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told members of Congress Tuesday.
Kerry did his best to reassure Saudi Arabia and other Gulf allies that the United States will not ignore Iran's actions in the region outside of the ongoing nuclear talks.
"The first step is, make sure they don't have a nuclear weapon, but nothing else changes the next day, with respect to our joint commitment, to stand up against any other kind of interference of violation of international law, or support for terrorism," he said Thursday in Riyadh.
Joining the Sunni alliance against Iran is Israel. Netanyahu cautioned the U.S. on Tuesday not to become too dependent on Iran fighting inside Iraq.
"When it comes to Iran and ISIS, the enemy of your enemy -- is your enemy," Netanyahu told Congress.
While Pakistan's prime minister was meeting his ally in Saudi Arabia this week, over in northern Iraq, the head of the Kurdistan Regional Government was also looking to shore up support from one of its patrons -- Iran.
An official representing the KRG in Iran, Abdullah Akerei, told Iranian Press TV that gas for the Kurdistan region's power plants would be supplied by Iran.
KRG has welcomed Iran's help in the past. Over the summer, Soleimani and 70 soldiers arrived to defend Irbil from the Islamic State after Mosul fell. Iran has since helped supply the Kurds with weapons to help them in their ongoing fight against ISIS.

Emails show Clinton aides running interference during Benghazi attack

Emails obtained through a federal lawsuit show that two top aides to then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton were running interference internally during the 2012 Benghazi terror attack.
The aides were Philippe Reines, widely described as Clinton’s principal gate-keeper, and Cheryl Mills, who has been at Clinton's side for decades.
The emails show that while receiving updates about the assault as it happened, Mills told then-State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland to stop answering reporter questions about the status of Ambassador Chris Stevens, who was missing and later found dead.
Also littered throughout the State Department emails, obtained by conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch, are references to a so-called Benghazi Group. A diplomatic source told Fox News that was code inside the department for the so-called Cheryl Mills task force, whose job was damage control.
The effort to stop Nuland from answering reporter questions also may have contributed to confusion over the nature of the attack. Clinton that night had put out the first statement wrongly linking the attack to a supposed protest sparked by an obscure, anti-Islam YouTube video – but that was never updated that night.
"Cheryl Mills was instrumental in making sure the big lie was put out there,"  Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said.
Judicial Watch obtained the State Department emails through legal action. "What's notable thus far is we received no emails from or to [Hillary Clinton],” he said. “You have to wonder whether these aides went offline and were using secret accounts to communicate with her about Benghazi attack."
The emails emerged as Clinton fields criticism over revelations that she used personal email during her tenure as secretary. She is now asking the department to make public thousands of emails she has turned over.
On Friday, the State Department spokeswoman was pushed to explain how they will review the Clinton emails under the Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, and what will be made public.
"We will use FOIA standards for the review,"  spokeswoman Marie Harf said. "What we determine is appropriate under those FOIA standards will be public."
Harf also was questioned on a State Department unclassified cable, obtained exclusively by Fox News. The cable shows in 2011, Clinton's office told employees not to use personal email for government business, citing security reasons -- while she carried out government business exclusively on private accounts.
"This isn't her best practice guidance,” Harf said. “Her name is at the bottom of the cable, as is practiced for cables coming from Washington … some think she wrote it, which is not accurate."
Nevertheless, cables sent under Clinton's electronic signature carry her authority.
Mills, meanwhile, is a focus of the select congressional committee investigating the Benghazi attacks. During congressional testimony, retired Adm. Mike Mullen, who helped lead the Accountability Review Board investigation into the attacks, confirmed under cross-examination that he personally warned Mills that a witness would be damaging to the department.
Critics say it is more evidence the Accountability Review Board, or ARB, was deeply flawed.