"Only one employee in the entire federal government lost a job due to sequestration, according to a government audit that found the only permanent cut came at the U.S. Parole Commission, which eliminated one position. 

"Sen. Tom Coburn, an Oklahoma Republican, said Wednesday that the audit — performed by the Government Accountability Office and released last month — shows that the worries over sequestration's impact on jobs was overblown. 

"'Despite relentless warnings about the dire consequences of sequestration's budget cuts, it appears sequestration resulted in only one layoff,' he said. 'While that's good news for federal employees and other workers, it is devastating to the credibility of Washington politicians and administration officials who spent months — and millions of dollars — engaging in a coordinated multi-agency cabinet-level public relations campaign to scare the American people.'"

"Benghazi matters because four of our fellow citizens were murdered under terrifying circumstances. Benghazi matters because a diplomatic facility emblematic and representative of our country was attacked and burned on the anniversary of 9/11. Benghazi matters because Americans deserve to know the truth from those entrusted to lead and govern. ... 

"Facts are neither Republican nor Democrat. While our fellow citizens are free to draw varying conclusions and inferences from the facts, surely there can be consensus that every relevant fact must be uncovered. ... 

"'May justice be done, though the heavens fall.' That adage governed my time as a prosecutor in state and federal court, and it would serve us well as we uncover the truth about Benghazi."

"Assume they are right about global warming. Assume that it is all caused by man. The United States has reduced carbon emissions since 2006 more than any other country on earth. We are right now at 1992 levels, according to the IEA, and yet, carbon emissions have gone up globally. Why? We don’t control the emissions of the other 96 percent of humanity, especially China and India. As we dismantle the coal plants in our country, China and India together are adding one coal-fired plant every week. …"

"The nation was shocked by charges that more than 1,400 vets lingered and 40 died on a secret waiting list at the Phoenix, Ariz., Veterans Administration medical center. The list was concocted to conceal long waits for care. But what you haven’t heard is even worse: VA hospitals across America are manipulating the official electronic waiting list, and the deadly coverups have been going on for years. ... 

"More investigations and congressional hearings won’t fix this mess. The top three administrators at the Phoenix VA have been put on administrative leave, but punishing only them is like putting a Band-Aid on a gaping wound. ... 

"The practical answer is to provide vouchers or health plans for vets who need colonoscopies, heart care, diabetes management and other treatment for non-combat-related conditions so they can escape the wait lists and use civilian doctors and hospitals."

"There is much to be learned still about what happened at Benghazi and how to be better on guard against such events in the future. But about what happened in Washington regarding Benghazi there is no doubt: The Obama administration intentionally misled the American public for political purposes, shamefully distorting the facts about an attack in which American citizens and public servants were murdered, for its own narrow political ends. One needn’t think that Benghazi is the next Watergate to be disturbed by the administration’s behavior, and by its continued resistance to providing a full and honest accounting of its actions that day."

"The Ben Rhodes memo revealing the duplicity of this administration on the subject of Benghazi reminds us about the character of those involved. That President Barack Obama could lie so evenly and so passionately (remember the second presidential debate?) is not perhaps surprising at this stage. But let's not forget what it took for Hillary Clinton to lie to the grieving father of an American hero. ...

"As the Rhodes memo makes clear, the president sent his U.N. ambassador to the Sunday shows to lie. Susan Rice was 'to underscore that these protests are rooted in an Internet video, and not a broader failure of policy.' Rice did as she was told. The election was less than two months away. A foreign policy failure would not be politically convenient, so it would be made to go away. It's one of the minor injustices of this sorry story that Rice has received more condemnations than the president or secretary of state, who pulled the strings."

"WH won’t release enrollment data, tells GOP to ask insurers. GOP asks insurers, WH disputes data. GOP asks WH for data, WH won’t release."

'"The point is, the repeal debate is and should be over. The Affordable Care Act is working,' the president said while announcing the enrollment of more than 8 million Americans. That is not the point. The debate is not over. ... 

"A new Washington Post-ABC poll shows that Americans aren't buying Obama's latest spin, his closing the door on debate, especially when it comes to the quality and cost of their own health care.

• By a two-to-one margin, more people think the quality of care they receive is getting worse rather than better under Obamacare (29 percent to 14 percent). A majority says the quality has stayed the same.

• By a two-to-one margin, more people think the nation's health care system is getting worse, not better (44 percent to 24 percent). Less than a third say the quality of U.S. health care is about the same.

• Nearly half of Americans say their personal health care costs are increasing under Obamacare (47 percent). Just 8 percent report decreases."

"Last night Texas Senator Ted Cruz took to the Senate floor to call for Secretary of State John Kerry's resignation over his closed door comments about Israel becoming an 'apartheid' state if its leaders don't come to a two-state solution with the Palestinians.  

"'There is no place for this word in the context of the State of Israel. The term ‘apartheid’ means ‘apart’ -- different, isolated -- the state of the victims of apartheid with which the Jews are all too familiar. The notion that Israel would go down that path, and so face the same condemnation that met South Africa, is unconscionable. The United States should be aggressively asserting that Israel can never be made an apartheid nation while America exists, because America will be with Israel regardless of the status of any diplomatic process,' Cruz said in a statement. 'The fact that Secretary Kerry sees nothing wrong with making such a statement on the eve of Holocaust Remembrance Day demonstrates a shocking lack of sensitivity to the incendiary and damaging nature of his rhetoric. It is my belief that Secretary Kerry has thus proven himself unsuitable for his position and that before any further harm is done to our alliance with Israel, he should offer President Obama his resignation and the President should accept it.'"

"Last year, as the launch date for Obamacare's insurance exchanges drew closer, Oregon was held up by the law's supporters as a model of a state that was doing things right. Liberals touted the Oregon's whole-hearted embrace of Obamacare and its effort to recruit young participants with an ad featuring a folk singer with an acoustic guitar. A Washington Post article described Cover Oregon as 'the White House's favorite health exchange.' But a funny thing happened on the way to nirvana. Oregon's health insurance exchange turned out to be the most dysfunctional one in the United States, and last Friday the board of the state's exchange threw in the towel. 

"After spending $248 million of the $303 million in federal money allocated for the exchange, Oregon officials determined the best course of action would be to scrap the website altogether and simply default to the federal healthcare.gov website. ... 

"What’s breathtaking is that not only has the state wasted so much federal money due to utter incompetence but, according to the Oregonian newspaper, the Obama administration will not be asking Oregon to return the money. And it is estimated that it will cost roughly $5 million more to make the transition to the federal exchange. In other words, if the administration gets its way, federal taxpayers are going to have to foot the bill for the entire fiasco."