'Your papers, please' must never be heard in America
Signs of waning evangelical power in the nation's culture wars and in Republican policy — and some unexpected challenges for GOP candidates — loom as the 103-year-old Boy Scouts of America gears up for a definitive vote this week on whether to welcome openly gay youths into the organization's ranks.
After South Dakota Sen. Tim Johnson's embrace of gay marriage last week, activists who have made the issue a litmus test for Democratic Party officeholders are cranking up the heat on the three remaining holdouts among Democrats in the Senate.
Evangelical organizers from as far away as California have been quietly mining Ohio pastors and their pews for evangelical voters, hoping to tip the election Mitt Romney's way, just as they did for President George W. Bush in 2004.
Economic issues seem to be dominating the 2012 campaign, but a quiet electoral revolution is brewing. The "religious vote" is on the move, and it's not going leftward.
Guest lineups for the Sunday TV news shows:
President Barack Obama delighted his liberal base by coming down on the side of gay marriage, but he cheered the opposition, too.
Guest lineups for the Sunday TV news shows:
He's still a force to be reckoned with as tax day looms: Herman Cain has arrived in the nation's capital for a "patriot's summit" and tax day rally Monday at the U.S. Capitol with a cast that includes Faith & Freedom Coalition Director Ralph Reed, Tea Party Nation founder Judson Phillips and conservative activist Alveda King.
Appearing ever-more confident in Wisconsin's primary, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney focused entirely on Democratic President Barack Obama during a campaign trip through this upper Midwestern battleground and predicted a victory that could effectively seal the nomination for him Tuesday.
Don't get poll fatigue just yet: The Republican presidential primary season stretches ahead with eight more primaries until the big finale in Utah on June 26. In the more immediate future, the District of Columbia, Maryland and Wisconsin are next at bat, on Tuesday.
Conservatives gathered in Washington this week are increasingly relishing the prospect that the Republican presidential nomination fight will extend for months, and could even lead to a brokered convention in Tampa this summer.
The House will vote next week on a Balanced Budget Amendment (BBA) to the Constitution. Democrats agreed to hold this vote as part of the deal raising the debt ceiling, but House Republicans are going to make it more than just a symbolic gesture. They're going to bring up the version that passed the House in 1995.
Rick Perry and Mitt Romney played a rhetorical badminton game in the debate in Orlando, Fla., Thursday, with the two Republican presidential front-runners trading barbs over Social Security, illegal immigration and jobs.
The next three days amount to a virtual GOP-palooza in Florida.
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney on Wednesday questioned how Texas Gov. Rick Perry would fix Social Security as the focus of the GOP presidential race turns to senior-citizen-rich Florida this week.
