POLITICO:  … When [Speaker John] Boehner walks onto the House floor on Jan. 3, there’s an outside chance he‘ll see low double-digit defections — and those in and around his camp recognize it. The speaker’s fate has become a much-discussed topic as the fiscal cliff approaches and the Senate conducts last-minute talks this weekend — […]

If conservatives need to face the need for gun regulations — controls that will make guns less ubiquitous while still staying on the right side of the Second Amendment — liberals need to acknowledge that untreated mental illness is also an important part of the reason mass killings take place. Yes, it is true, as has been noted in recent weeks, that most mentally ill people don’t commit crimes. But it is equally true that anyone who goes into a school with a semiautomatic and kills 20 children and six adults is, by definition, mentally ill…

WASHINGTON POST:  … Sergey Lavrov told reporters on Friday that Russia has contacted the Syrian National Coalition for Opposition and Revolutionary Forces through the Russian Embassy in Egypt and “we expressed readiness to conduct a meeting” with coalition leader Mouaz al-Khatib.  The statement comes in the wake of comments by officials, including President Vladimir Putin, […]

NEWSMAX:  …In a meeting of Senate Republicans Thursday, they agreed to support a deal that would raise taxes for the wealthy and continue the 35 percent tax on estates worth more than $5 million, a Republican senator who participated told The Hill. It’s unclear how that estate tax proposal will fly with Democrats. The party’s […]

NEWSMAX:  Senate leaders are working to craft legislation by Sunday that averts the year-end “fiscal cliff” of tax hikes and spending cuts, but many details needed to be worked out after a crucial meeting with President Barack Obama on Friday. Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid and his Republican counterpart Mitch McConnell, termed the meeting “constructive” […]

ALJAZEEREA:   Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed into law controversial parliamentary legislation, banning the adoption of Russian children by American families, the Kremlin has said. The law, considered a retaliation for a US law punishing Russian officials implicated in the 2009 prison death of the whistle-blowing attorney Sergei Magnitsky, will come into force on January […]

These are dollars that are raised through athletic ticket prices, things of that nature, that are raised mostly through Pennsylvanians that would go to benefit Pennsylvanians if it wasn’t taken away in this manner,” [Centre County RepublicanState Senator Jake] Corman said. “If we are going to pay for programs with this money, they should be programs here in Pennsylvania.”

WASHINGTON POST Column:  …There are roughly 23,000 high schools in America with about 15 million students. Of these, 165 schools with 136,000 students met the Finn-Hockett criteria for being “selective.” They had to be public schools; competitive admissions had to be based on academic performance; schools had to be free-standing (“not a program or school […]

NEWSMAX:  A majority of Americans have a favorable view of the National Rifle Association, according to a new Gallup poll… Fifty-four percent of respondents to the Gallup survey said they held a mostly favorable or very favorable view of the NRA, while 38 percent said they had a mostly unfavorable or very unfavorable view of […]

USA TODAY:  President Obama has scheduled a meeting Friday with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, House Speaker John Boehner and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi at the White House… Reid wants the House to take up a Senate-passed bill to extend the current George W. Bush era tax rates for […]