Joe Biden

Former Republican Tim Miller was once a GOP strategist, but these days, the Never Trump conservative is a scathing critic of former President Donald Trump, the MAGA movement and Trump’s allies — including Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas. Miller recently got into an argument with Cruz, who described him as a “hack”; in an article published by The Bulwark on October 10, Miller lays out an abundance of reasons why he considers Cruz the epitome of a “hack” and exemplifies so much that is wrong with the Republican Party in 2022.

The argument occurred at an event at a MAGA-themed restaurant in Queen Creek, Arizona, where Cruz was campaigning for two far-right “Stop the Steal” Republicans: gubernatorial nominee Kari Lake and Blake Masters, who is trying to unseat centrist Democratic incumbent Sen. Mark Kelly. Cruz grew testy when Miller brought up the Big Lie — the false claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Trump — and the Texas senator tried to change the subject.

Barack Obama is a very competitive man, if you haven’t noticed. He grew up a bi-racial child in a broken home, his high school basketball team won the state championship his senior year, was the first black leader of the Harvard Law Review, State, then US senator in his adopted Illinois, and was the fifth youngest person elected President of the United States. President Obama was so competitive that he resisted golfing with Speaker of the House John Boehner for bonding and legislative cajoling because the Ohioan was a better player. Yet, a decade ago, on October 3, 2012 during his reelection campaign, Obama got his clock cleaned by former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney in their first debate in Denver, Colorado

This is unusually common when the incumbent president faces off with the challenger across the debate stage. After the famous Kennedy/Nixon debates of 1960, there wasn’t another debate until 1976. That October, President Gerald Ford infamously remarked “there is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe and there never will be under a Ford Administration.” Um yes sir, there has been for three decades now. Four years later against Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter told the nation he discussed nuclear weapons with his thirteen-year-old daughter Amy. Even Ronald Reagan, always on his mark as a former actor, came out sluggish in his 1984 debate with Walter Mondale.

During an appearance on CNN's "State of the Union," host Jake Tapper both confronted and lectured Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R-VA) over his plan to head to Arizona this week to support the gubernatorial bid of 2020 election denier Kari Lake.

Youngkin, who likes to present himself as a moderate while pushing far-right policies, ducked condemning Lake for her conspiratorial rhetoric despite the fact that he parts ways with her over the legitimacy of Joe Biden's election over Donald Trump in 2020.

Aside from outrightly rejecting the reality that President Joe Biden won, which has almost certainly undermined public trust in secure elections, having a litany of 2020 deniers up and down the ballot could have big implications for future races.

Michigan is not alone in having many GOP candidates running for office (see also Arizona, Nevada and Pennsylvania). FiveThirtyEight reports that 60% of Americans will have an election denier on the ballot this year. And the Washington Post found that the majority of GOP nominees for the House, Senate and key statewide offices have denied or questioned the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.

Democrats are fighting to hold their razor-thin majorities in the U.S. House and U.S. Senate, citing two years of victories on infrastructure, climate and prescription drug coverage. Republicans—whose early expectations they’d sweep the House were tempered after a Supreme Court abortion ruling—are trying to convince voters they need to balance the scales by putting them in charge of one, or both chambers.

GOP candidates are attempting to tie Democrats to inflation, crime, fears about immigration and an unpopular president. But they’re shying away from talking about a national abortion ban in the wake of the court’s decision to overturn two previous cases declaring abortion a constitutional right—while Democrats are seeking something of a nationwide referendum on abortion access.

Democrats in Florida fear that President Joe Biden may have sealed re-election for GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis with his praise following Hurricane Ian.

"Charlie Crist, whose career as a Republican ended with a hug from a Democratic president, may have seen his political fate sealed by another Democratic president complimenting his Republican rival," CNN reported. "That’s the sentiment rolling through Democratic circles in Florida after President Joe Biden’s tour of the state’s storm-ravaged Gulf Coast, where he praised Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, Crist’s opponent, for his handling of Hurricane Ian."

In a deep dive into the unlikely possibility that Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) will lose her seat in November, some voters in her highly conservative district expressed dismay that they have to admit that she is their representative in Congress.

According to the Guardian's David Smith, reporting from the controversial lawmaker's hometown of Rome, Georgia, MTG ---as the House member is commonly referred to -- is a heavy favorite to retain her seat in Congress in a district dotted with Confederate flags where "Three in four people are white and three in four voted for Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election."

US President Joe Biden admitted this week that American diplomats still did not know how Russian President Vladimir Putin could bring an end to his faltering war in Ukraine and save face. Western analysts see no good options.

The question of Putin's "off-ramp" -- or decisions that allow him to end the fighting without admitting defeat -- has exercised Western policymakers and foreign policy experts since the very start of the war in February.

Moscow announced Saturday that a truck explosion ignited a huge fire and severely damaged the key Kerch bridge -- built as Russia's sole land link with annexed Crimea -- and vowed to find the perpetrators without immediately blaming Ukraine.

Russia said the blast set ablaze seven oil tankers transported by train and collapsed two car lanes of the giant road and rail structure.

The US midterm elections were once seen as a likely landslide victory for Republicans, as President Joe Biden's approval ratings slumped amid spiraling inflation, record migrant arrivals and rising violent crime.

With a month to go, Democrats are banking on a much closer contest amid a series of legislative wins, improving gas prices and the nomination of a slate of Trumpist candidates who have been struggling in winnable seats.

President Joe Biden spoke about the September jobs report praised by leading economists Friday afternoon, and took a few moments to criticize the "socialist Republicans" who publicly voted against the critical infrastructure legislation that is an important part of his economic agenda, while privately begging him for funding for their districts.

"There's a report, you guys can, as they say, as my grandkids say, 'Google it,' but a report that came out on CNN that says, 'Republicans called Biden infrastructure program socialist.' Then they asked for the money," the President said mockingly.

Democratic leaders on Friday blasted a new Republican bill that would roll back modest prescription drug pricing reforms that U.S. President Joe Biden recently signed into law.

"Their new bill is a giveaway to Big Pharma at the expense of seniors."