"The U.S. Senate failed to advance another piece of popular bipartisan legislation late Monday, and the reason tells the real story of Washington gridlock in the current Congress. To wit, Harry Reid has essentially shut down the Senate as a place to debate and vote on policy. 

"The Majority Leader's strategy was once again on display as the Senate failed to get the 60 votes to move a popular energy efficiency bill co-sponsored by New Hampshire Democrat Jeanne Shaheen and Ohio Republican Rob Portman. Mr. Reid blamed the defeat on Republican partisanship. But the impasse really came down to Mr. Reid's blockade against amendments that might prove politically difficult for Democrats. ... 

"It's important to understand how much Mr. Reid's tactics have changed the Senate. Not too long ago it was understood that any Senator could get a floor vote if he wanted it. The minority party, often Democrats, used this right of amendment to sponsor votes that would sometimes put the majority on the spot. It's called politics, rightly understood. This meant the Senate debated national priorities and worked its bipartisan will. Harry Reid's Senate has become a deliberate obstacle to democratic accountability. ... 

"The lesson for voters is simple: If they want anything meaningful done in the last two years of the Obama Administration, they will have to elect a Republican Senate."

"Today's news media are largely ignoring the IRS scandal, and it is impossible to have confidence in the current investigations by the FBI, Justice Department, and House committee. I am not suggesting that the current scandal in the end will rise to the level of Watergate. But the allegations are serious, and fair-minded Americans of both parties should agree that a thorough investigation needs to be undertaken to either debunk them or confirm them. 

"Step one should be to give Lois Lerner full immunity from prosecution in exchange for her testimony. And then let the chips fall where they may."

"Boko Haram, whose name means 'Western learning is forbidden,' kidnaps 200 schoolgirls, and the world rightly takes notice. ... 

"I’m sorry for those kidnapped schoolgirls. But I’m sorrier for the hundreds of millions of women in the Middle East who are invisible to us. Our silence puts us in the same class as the Germans and others who carefully closed their shutters as the local Jews were herded off to the railyards. 

"But you can’t hear the screams in Malibu. Or Manhattan."

"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."