Big News

As we head into the new year, I want to let you know my big news: I'm writing a book! It will be published in the spring, and it's going to knock your socks off. I promise you...it's going to be big. I do have to finish it though, so I will be taking the next week off to finally get it done. I will be back right after the new year to cover the Iowa caucuses and let you know a bit more about the book. In the meantime, I wish you a very happy, healthy 2012!

Merry Christmas, 2011

Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.

Matthew 1:23

For Kids Of All Ages: Track Santa

Have you been naughty or nice? You'll soon find out! How close is Santa Claus to your home? The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) has a day job: monitoring American and Canadian airspace for unauthorized airborne objects. But on Christmas Eve, they watch an airborne object that is most certainly authorized: Santa.

NORAD tracks him as he travels around the world. They show where he's been, where he is at this very moment, and where he's going next.

To track Santa around the globe, check out NORAD:

www.NORADSanta.org

You can also follow NORAD on Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/noradsanta

And on Twitter:

http://www.twitter.com/noradsanta

Ho ho ho! Merry Christmas!

Waste Not, Want Not

Just in time for Christmas, Congress gave us another hot mess with a ridiculous two month payroll tax holiday as the national debt crossed the $15.1 trillion mark. They're headed home for the holidays---and Obama is headed to Hawaii---and not a moment too soon. Get out. And stop trying to "help" us.

Also in time for Christmas, Senator Tom Coburn (R-Okla) released his annual "Wastebook 2011." (See it here: http://www.coburn.senate.gov/public/6946d43b-bccf-4579-990e-15a763532b40.html ) If you're still wondering how we're careening toward $16 trillion in debt, check out these tasty spending items from this year:

A $113,000 federal grant for a "detailed conservation survey" of the video game collection for the History of Video Games in upstate New York.

$550,000 for a documentary on how rock music contributed to the fall of the Soviet Union.

$923,000 to build robots that look like dragons to help preschoolers learn language skills.

$198,000 to study whether Facebook, Twitter and MySpace make people happy.

$75,000 to promote awareness of Michigan's role in growing Christmas trees.

And $10 million to produce a version of "Sesame Street" for Pakistan.

I wish I could say that these items are a joke and that instead of Christmas, it's April Fool's. Sadly, these spending items are very real and totally ludicrous. Our government is out of control. Nearly $2.5 billion was added to our national debt EACH DAY because of crap like this and because no one has the cojones to deal with the biggest budget monsters: Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.

Congress: Get out. Stop trying to "help" us. And we hope you get lumps of coal from Santa because that's what you're giving us every day. Very, very expensive lumps of coal.

HOSTING HANNITY---AGAIN TONIGHT!

I'll be HOSTING for Sean Hannity again TONIGHT at 9pm and midnight ET on the Fox News Channel! Please join me for a great show and a lot of fun.

HOSTING Hannity---TONIGHT!

I'm HOSTING for Sean Hannity on the Fox News Channel TONIGHT at 9pm and midnight ET. We've got a great show for you, including a special appearance by NFL great Boomer Esiason! Please join me.

Freedom and Tyranny

Over the past day or so, we've gotten the news of the deaths of two prominent global leaders: former Czech president Vaclav Havel and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il.

The two men could not have been more different. Havel was a brave voice in the wilderness of communist hell. Locked and brutalized behind the Iron Curtain, Havel became one of the most dynamic and eloquent dissidents of the cold war era. He spoke out relentlessly and profoundly about the soul-crushing nature of communism, the trampling of the individual and the basic human desire for liberty. He was an artist and a poet, which made him even more loathed by his communist overlords. But more importantly, Havel was a warrior for liberty, with his words that rang out throughout the Soviet bloc, and later with his actions when he became president of a free Czech Republic. Havel was true hero of freedom.

On the opposite side of the scale was Kim Jong Il. He spent decades studying communist brutality and oppression at the feet of his tyrannical father, Kim Il Sung. When he ascended to power, the totalitarianism of the North Korean regime didn't miss a beat. He plunged his people deeper into poverty and despair. He starved millions to death. His country rationed electricity, so much so that at night, satellites showed the northern end of the Korean peninsula drenched in darkness every night. Those who dared to speak out were sent to the gulag, never to be heard from again. His regime was the most isolated on earth, but it was nuclear (its only point of leverage with the United States and the west and what made it markedly more dangerous.)

Havel and Kim: the yin and yang of human freedom. Interesting that they were called to meet their Maker on the same day. What different stories they have to tell Him---and what very different legacies they leave.

HOSTING "HANNITY"---TONIGHT!

I'm HOSTING for Sean Hannity TONIGHT at 9pm and midnight ET on the Fox News Channel. Please tune in and join me!

Potpourri

Some varied thoughts:

1. After last night's GOP debate, the race is still Mitt Romney vs. Newt Gingrich, but the other candidates really helped themselves with strong, confident performances---with the exception of Ron Paul, who really hurt himself with his dovish answers on Iran, which revealed that he's living in a bizarre, dangerous unreality.

2. A new Gallup poll shows that most Americans aren't falling for the leftist Astroturf of Occupy Wall Street: a whopping 82% say that it's more important to grow the economy, while just 46% think it's more important to address "income inequality." Since OWS was launched by Bill Ayers, the unions and other radical leftists to supply Obama with his campaign theme of "income inequality," Team Obama must be reaching for the Tylenol. Although more likely: the true believers among Team Obama just don't care.

3. The brilliant and controversial British writer, thinker and provocateur Christopher Hitchens has died after a yearlong battle with cancer. I met him a few times, and he was relentlessly charming, interesting and fun to observe. During the Iraq war, which he supported, he and I were part of a very small group invited to have lunch at the Pentagon with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. Hitchens arrived late, hair mussed and shirt rumpled and untucked. Once at the table, he showed off his wide-ranging mind and vastly original thinking. He wrote a book, "God is Not Great," in which he revealed and defended his atheism. After his diagnosis, he said he hadn't changed his mind about the existence of God but that he had been moved in unforeseen ways by the prayers of people he had never met. Godspeed, Christopher Hitchens.

Tonight's Backdrop

I know that the U.S. economy is the number one issue for most Americans. Despite a few weeks of a positive downward trend in first-time unemployment claims, the jobs situation remains bleak. The labor participation rate is incredibly low, meaning that the labor force itself is shrinking. If the same number of people were working or looking for work today that were working or looking for work when Obama entered office, the unemployment rate would be 11%. Further, a lot of the jobs currently being created are in retail and are seasonal. Once the holidays are over, so are those jobs.

While we're all understandably focused on the economy and the presidential race here at home, the world outside our door rumbles. Much of the Middle East is falling to the Islamists. The Russian bear is back (not that he ever went away). The Chinese are preparing to slap tariffs on U.S. car imports, sparking what could be a major trade war. Much of Europe remains perilously close to a sovereign debt-driven implosion, which would consume us and the rest of the world.

So as we watch the Republican presidential candidates tonight in their last major debate before the real primary voting begins, let's keep in mind that we're not just voting for someone to return the nation to free market principles and pro-growth policies. We're also electing a commander-in-chief.

Who will be the toughest adversary for our enemies and our allies' best friend? Who will seek to best protect and defend American interests abroad? Who will also seek to advance those interests? Who will tell the hard truths about the way the real world works and be best prepared to deal with it?

And remember: the strength of the economy IS a national security issue. The two go hand in hand. When our economy is crippled, it severely impairs our ability to project power and defend ourselves and our interests.

And when the U.S. falls apart, so does the rest of the world. The GOP candidates all know this. Who among them is best suited to put not just America back on track, but with it, re-establish American global leadership?