From pro athletes who waste money at their charitable foundations to federal employees who don't pay their taxes, legislators have a few suggestions for whom the IRS should have been scrutinizing instead of going after partisan organizations.
President Obama's nomination of Ernest Moniz for secretary of energy seemed at first to offer some promise for the hapless department.
With the Environmental Protection Agency set to play the central role in President Obama's second-term climate change agenda, would-be agency chief Gina McCarthy on Thursday tried to calm Republican fears that she would continue the perceived "war on coal" and other harsh regulations under her predecessor.
A tax on everything from X-ray machines to oxygen tanks took effect at the beginning of this year — one of about 20 taxes and fees included in President Obama's health care law — and has emerged as the central battleground in the fight by the law's opponents to repeal parts of the president's overhaul.
Sally Jewell is one step closer to becoming the nation's next secretary of the interior.
President Obama's health care law passed Congress three years ago and remains almost entirely intact, but Republicans say they are still gathering support to dismantle it, betting that the overhaul will lose its political heft as Americans feel the brunt of its taxes and regulations.
Top congressional Republicans on Sunday predicted that deep, across-the-board spending cuts will take effect March 1, dismissing a Democratic proposal to avert them as dead on arrival and setting the stage for a high-stakes political game of chicken — just as Congress' weeklong recess gets under way.
Two of the most outspoken critics of Chuck Hagel's nomination as defense secretary indicated Sunday that the former senator from Nebraska likely will be confirmed when the Senate reconvenes next Monday.
Key Senators from both parties said Sunday that background checks on virtually all gun sales can win bipartisan support in the Senate, signaling progress on one of the key provisions of President Obama's gun control package.
