With the Sierra snow pack at “the smallest amount at this time of year since measurements began in 1964,” as reported in the San Francisco Chronicle, there’s plenty of concern about precious water resources to serve California. But there’s a deep reservoir of political discord in any debate over water allocation.

Texas is currently suffering its worst drought in recorded history with much of it in what the U.S. Drought Monitor classifies as D3, Extreme Drought, or D4, Exceptional Drought. Several municipalities are in danger of completely running out of water in less than six months. Some may have no water in fewer than 50 days.

So the Iowa caucus has come and gone for the 2012 election.  Does it really mean anything in the overall grand scheme of things?  Not really.  The Iowa voters don't necessarily pick the candidate that will eventually be the nominee.  And when it comes to the voting demographic in Iowa, it does not come close to being an accurate representation of the overall national voting demographic.  Regardless, though, Iowa goes first... as it has since 1972.

On December 29^th, the Arizona Green and Libertarian parties filed a lawsuit in the US District Court of Arizona charging that the state's new voter registration forms violate their First Amendment right to freedom of association and their Fourteenth Amendment right of equal protection under the law.

Not long after the president’s inauguration Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader of the Senate, told the National Journal’s Major Garrett his principal objective was to make Barack Obama a one-term president. What Mr. McConnell said in that interview, as a public declaration, is without precedent in our history – and foreshadowed the political and legislative difficulties that ensued. 

A recent Gallup Poll finds that the average American is slightly right of center ideologically. The implication? If Americans chose their President on the basis of their ideological views and perceptions of the candidates’ views alone, Gallup says that Jon Huntsman, Mitt Romney, and Ron Paul would be in the best position for the 2012 election.

Barack Obama took the presidential oath of office January 20, 2009. The challenges he inherited on that historic occasion were as great as any president has faced – including Abraham Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt; any assessment of Mr. Obama’s presidency not accounting for those challenges would be incomplete – and, more telling, dishonest.