Chelsea Handler said she wouldn't have Melania Trump on her TV show because she "can barely speak English." The first lady not only speaks English but also French, Italian, German and Slovene. Handler speaks profanity, vulgarity and smut.



Billionaire Donald Trump's presidential salary must be cramping his style. His Florida resort, Mar-a-Lago, is doubling its membership fees.



"I was raised Catholic, became Episcopalian and found out later my family was Jewish. I stand ready to register as Muslim." Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. But the strongly partisan Democrat is not about to become a Republican.

Builder Donald Trump. Reality TV star Donald Trump. Now he's President Donald Trump. And he's letting no  grass grow under his feet. While engaging in inaugural festivities and other traditional activities, he made a special trip to the CIA, talked on the phone with foreign leaders and signed dozens of executive orders.

Chief executives commonly have "to do" lists. President Trump has an "undo" list, focusing on reversing many of his predecessor's actions. He targeted Obamacare, telling agencies to ease the burden of the law where possible while "repeal and replace" legislation was being perfected. He also withdrew the U.S. from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and reinstated a ban on promoting abortions overseas.

Presidential wannabe Ted Cruz has become more of a team player in the U.S. Senate. Not only is he supporting Trump administration appointees and issues, politico.com reports the Texas Republican is hosting a weekly pick-up basketball game "to get his fellow senators to like him.

Donald Trump gave an indication of how he'll work with Republican members of Congress as President when he saved them from their own stupidity. In a tweet, he pointed out what a bad impression it would make with voters for the House majority to make its first order of business gutting the Office of Congressional Ethics.

Joe Biden is still being frisky in his final days as vice president. During the swearing-in ceremony on the Senate floor, he gave the wife of Sen. Chuck Grassley a full kiss on the lips.

The new Senate Minority Leader, Democrat Chuck Schumer of New York, fired his opening shots after virtually declaring war against the incoming president by poking fun at Donald Trump's main campaign theme, "Make America Great Again." Never mind that a Democratic president, Bill Clinton, used the slogan in his 1992 presidential campaign.

Blogger Bob, like many political newsmakers, is taking some time off for the holidays.

President Obama failed to slow the rise of the oceans as promised in his 2009 inaugural address, but he seized control of parts of the Atlantic and Arctic by using his executive authority to ban offshore drilling in those waters. His action is raw meat for the incoming Trump administration and Republican Congress.

With only a short time remaining in his presidency, Barack Obama delivered a sharp blow to police groups and their supporters in Congress by giving a four-year term on the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights to Debo Adegbile, who defended former Black Panther and convicted cop-killer Mumia Abu Jamal. The action was branded a "slap in the face" and a "kick in the teeth" by opponents.

And while innocent shoppers were killed and injured in an apparent terrorist attack in a German Christmas market and the Russian ambassador to Turkey was assassinated in Ankara, President Obama plays golf in Hawaii on his final taxpayer-funded vacation.

Donald Trump told voters he would go to Washington and "drain the swamp." He's not the only politician to make that promise.
In fact, Ben Carson, one of his primary rivals, also used the phrase. "Washington is built on a swamp," he said. "Together we can drain the swamp and protect our children's future." (President-elect Trump has given Carson the responsibility of "draining the swamp" in the bureaucracy of the Department of Housing and Urban Development.")
The Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call reports the phrase first became popular in 1983 when President Ronald Reagan said he was in Washington "to drain the swamp" of big government.
Even Democrat Nancy Pelosi, when she became House Speaker in 2006, said one of her priorities was to "drain the swamp" after more than a decade of Republican rule.
Trump, with his selection of so many Washington "insiders" for his administration, now finds the promise coming back to haunt him.

How Your Taxes Are Spent

The Internal Revenue Service allowed 27 of its employees to spent more than $1.4 million on travel expenses in the 2015 fiscal year, including luxury apartment bookings and stays in five-star hotels. Don't try claiming this kind of exhorbitant expenditure on your tax return.

WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange insists the Russian government was not the source of emails damaging to Hillary Clinton's campaign. Russian President Vladimir Putin's spokesman blasted the U.S. for "groundlessly" accusing Russia of meddling in America's elections. lBut the White House, despite calling for a "smooth transition", points to President-elect Donald Trump as the guilty party.

In the Watergate drama of Richard Nixon's administration, a source known as "Deep Throat" gave reporter Bob Woodward inside information that led to the president's resignation. A man claiming to be a player in the WikiLeaks release of emails damaging to Hillary Clinton in her campaign said a source passed the documents to him in a meeting in a Washington, D.C. park.