"The Obama administration is trying to persuade millions of uninterested, or perhaps reluctant, Americans to purchase health insurance through the Obamacare exchanges. But the heart of Obamacare is coercion. If Americans fail do what the law's Democratic authors believe is best, the federal government will punish them, through the progressively higher penalties of the individual mandate, until it hurts more not to buy coverage than it does to give up and purchase it. 

"But what if many of those Americans rebel? Even if they know having health insurance is better than not having it, what if they refuse to be forced to buy the kind of coverage dictated by the government -- which may not really meet their needs -- at prices they don't want to pay? What then? 

"'I don't think Obamacare can survive without people wanting to buy it,' Robert Laszewski, the respected health care analyst whose writings on Obamacare have become essential in recent months, told me in an email exchange recently."

"They sure don’t make political scandals like they used to. 

"In 1903, the sitting lieutenant governor of South Carolina shot and killed the editor of the state’s largest newspaper in broad daylight, in front of the State House. Jim Tillman believed the paper’s attacks cost him his bid for governor. 

"He was acquitted in a trial controlled by his uncle — former governor and then U.S. Sen. 'Pitchfork Ben' Tillman. He literally got away with murder. 

"Now that was a scandal. 

"Yesterday Gov. Chris Christie held a 107-minute presser responding to a story about the politically motivated closure of several traffic lanes leading to the George Washington Bridge."

"New Obamacare health insurance enrollees may feel a pang of envy when they eye the coverage plans offered by Walmart to its employees. 

"For many years, the giant discount retailer has been the target of unions and liberal activists who have harshly criticized the company's health care plans, calling them 'notorious for failing to provide health benefits' and 'substandard.' 

"But a Washington Examiner comparison of the two health insurance programs found that Walmart's plan is more affordable and provides significantly better access to high-quality medical care than Obamacare."

"In a new memoir, former defense secretary Robert Gates unleashes harsh judgments about President Obama’s leadership and his commitment to the Afghanistan war, writing that by early 2010 he had concluded the president 'doesn’t believe in his own strategy, and doesn’t consider the war to be his. For him, it’s all about getting out.' 

"Leveling one of the more serious charges that a defense secretary could make against a commander in chief sending forces into combat, Gates asserts that Obama had more than doubts about the course he had charted in Afghanistan. The president was 'skeptical if not outright convinced it would fail,' Gates writes in 'Duty: Memoirs of a Secretary at War.' ... 

"It is rare for a former Cabinet member, let alone a defense secretary occupying a central position in the chain of command, to publish such an antagonistic portrait of a sitting president. ... 

"Gates writes, 'I did not enjoy being secretary of defense,' or as he e-mailed one friend while still serving, 'People have no idea how much I detest this job.'"

"Another midterm election beckons, and over the next 10 months we’ll see headlines about a thousand supposedly critical developments — the 'game changers' and the 'tipping points.'  But we all know there aren’t a thousand powerful drivers of the vote. I’d argue that three factors are paramount: the president, the economy and the election playing field. And, at least preliminarily, those three factors seem to be pointing toward Republican gains in both houses in the 2014 midterms.  ... 

"The ebb and flow of politics is one of the few constants throughout American history, and 2014 will be no exception. The GOP fared well in 2002 and 2004, then it was the Democrats’ turn in 2006 and 2008. Since then, the back-and-forth cycle has speeded up, with Republicans winning handsomely in 2010 and Democrats in 2012. In the quick 'surge and decline' politics of our highly polarized era, the early bet has to be on Republicans to do well in 2014 — despite themselves."

"Liz Cheney announced early Monday morning that she is withdrawing from the Wyoming Republican Senate primary, bringing an abrupt end to her unsteady challenge to the incumbent, Michael B. Enzi. 

"'Serious health issues have recently arisen in our family, and under the circumstances, I have decided to discontinue my campaign,' Ms. Cheney said in a statement. 'My children and their futures were the motivation for our campaign and their health and well-being will always be my overriding priority.'"

"Eleven GOP attorneys general say the Obama administration is breaking the law by repeatedly making changes to ObamaCare without going through Congress. 

"The attorneys general specifically criticize President Obama's executive action that allowed insurance companies to keep offering health plans that had been canceled for not meeting ObamaCare's more rigorous standards. 

"'We support allowing citizens to keep their health insurance coverage, but the only way to fix this problem-ridden law is to enact changes lawfully: through Congressional action,' the attorneys general wrote in a letter to Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. 'The illegal actions by this administration must stop.'

"They say the healthcare fix was 'flatly illegal under federal constitutional and statutory law.'"

"Speaker John A. Boehner of Ohio has signaled he may embrace a series of limited changes to the nation’s immigration laws in the coming months, giving advocates for change new hope that 2014 might be the year that a bitterly divided Congress reaches a political compromise to overhaul the sprawling system.  

"Mr. Boehner has in recent weeks hired Rebecca Tallent, a longtime immigration adviser to Senator John McCain, the Arizona Republican who has long backed broad immigration changes. Advocates for an overhaul say the hiring, as well as angry comments by Mr. Boehner critical of Tea Party opposition to the recent budget deal in Congress, indicates that he is serious about revamping the immigration system despite deep reservations from conservative Republicans."

Very Best Wishes for a Most Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year Filled with Holiday Cheer!

"It’s hard to come up with new ways to describe the Obama administration’s improvisational approach to the Affordable Care Act’s troubled health insurance exchanges. But last night, the White House made its most consequential announcement yet. The administration will grant a 'hardship exemption' from the law’s individual mandate, requiring the purchase of health insurance, to anyone who has had their prior coverage canceled and who 'believes' that Obamacare’s offerings 'are unaffordable.' These exemptions will substantially alter the architecture of the law’s insurance marketplaces. Insurers are at their wits’ end, trying to make sense of what to do next. ... 

"[T]his most recent announcement from the Obama administration is the first time it has publicly admitted that Obamacare is making health insurance less affordable, not more so, for millions of Americans."