Politics

President Barack Obama has plenty of taxes in his budget proposal, with his plan to achieve $1.8 trillion in revenue featuring some truly weird ideas.

Not necessarily good, or bad. Just weird in the sense that you'd never expect or hear about them, unlike the public sequestration or fiscal cliff debates.

President Obama wants to establish a "Buffett Rule" of a 30 percent minimum tax rate for people making over $1 million in a year. That he's made clear.

Far less clear? Some of the other means of increasing revenue included in his 246-page budget. Here's a look at the five weirdest Obama taxes ...

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He's been one of the few celebrities on the side of Conservatives of the past few years, openly campaigning for Mitt Romney in 2012.

But in a new interview with Rolling Stone, Kid Rock makes he feelings on the GOP rather well-known, telling the magazine:

"I'm f-cking embarrassed to be a Republican."

Is he reacting to Mitch McConnell slamming Ashley Judd? Republicans' take on gun control? Not exactly.

Rock is peeved over legislation that has raised concert ticket prices.

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Ashley Judd's U.S. Senate campaign ended before it started.

It still made for plenty of headlines, however, not the least of which when she wound up the subject of a recent scandal involving would-be opponent Mitch McConnell (R-KY).

Ashley Judd Leaked Tape

On Tuesday, Mother Jones released a recording of a private meeting among McConnell's aides, in which they plotted against Judd in preparation for the 2014 campaign.

In the leaked Ashley Judd tape, McConnell staffers talked and laughed about her political ambitions, religious beliefs, and mental health (among other things).

Now Judd, for her part, is fighting back.

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Former U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner, who resigned from Congress after tweeting lewd pictures of his junk to women online, is considering a political comeback.

For one of the highest-profile offices in the U.S., no less.

Weiner said he hopes to enter this year's New York City mayoral race, saying that the five boroughs' voters might be willing to give him a second chance.

"I don't have a burning, overriding desire to go and run for office," said Weiner, a Democrat who coveted the job long before his infamous scandal.

"It's not the single animating force in my life as it was for some time. But I do recognize, to some degree, it's now or maybe never for me, in terms of running."

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Ashley Judd is a joke and probably mentally unbalanced, according to a leaked tape in which Sen. Mitch McConnell's staff is plotting how to run against her.

McConnell (R-KY) was fully expecting a U.S. Senate bid from Judd in 2014, and although she decided not to run, his staff discussed her at length.

McConnell's voice can be heard during parts of the recording. At one point, someone played a recording of the star describing her religious beliefs:

"I still choose the God of my understanding as the God of my childhood," she says.

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Bill Clinton has finally joined Twitter!

Sort of. Thanks to Stephen Colbert.

In a hilarious interview live from the Clinton Global Initiative, The Colbert Report pundit persuaded the 42nd president to open up a Twitter account.

Colbert took the liberty of activating @PresBillyJeff, a shorter version of his full name, William Jefferson Clinton ... the better ones were all taken.

"Now President Clinton was taken. William Jefferson Clinton was taken. But PrezBillyJeff is available," Colbert informed the amused ex-President.

"Would you like to break into the 21st century right now and send your first tweet?" he asked, and Hillary Clinton's husband obliged. What did he write?

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Former Presidential hopeful Rick Santorum is not backing down from his opposition to gay marriage, saying it would be political suicide for the GOP to do so.

Santorum, who ran for President in 2012, told the Des Moines Register that Republicans must maintain opposed to marriage equality to avert disaster.

He also predicted that the U.S. Supreme Court would reject gay-marriage rights in upcoming rulings on Prop 8 and the Defense of Marriage Act.

“I’m sure you could go back and read stories, oh, you know, ‘The Republican party’s going to change. This is the future.’ Obviously that didn’t happen,” he said.

“I think you’re going to see the same stories written now and it’s not going to happen. The Republican Party’s not going to change on this issue."

"In my opinion it would be suicidal if it did.”

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Glenn Beck's biggest nightmare has come true.

The former Fox News host blasted MSNBC on his radio show yesterday, taking the network to task for a promo that features Melissa Harris-Perry telling viewers that "kids belong to whole communities," not just their parents.

Watch the ad in question now:

MSNBC Promo: Your Kids Belong To Us

"It's almost a parody of reality," Beck said of the spot. "It is so far beyond what we have ever thought as a nation, it's remarkable."

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Amid escalating international tensions, North Korea has released footage of Kim Jong Un firing a gun during some target practice with his military last week.

This comes as the young leader continues to threaten South Korea and the U.S. in an attempt to bolster his image at home in the rogue, isolated nation.

His propaganda machine is in overdrive. See below.

If the 28-year-old weren't an authoritarian dictator and violator of human rights who may have access to nuclear weapons, this would honestly be hilarious.

One wonders what he thinks he's accomplishing with this nonsense, but perhaps that's part of it: Kim Jong Un loves keeping enemies off balance and on alert.

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Margaret Thatcher, the British Prime Minister who governed the kingdom from 1979-1990 and was known as The Iron Lady, died this morning at the age of 87.

Her son, Sir Mark, and daughter Carol confirmed Thatcher's passing.

Lord Bell, her longtime spokesman, said this morning:

"It is with great sadness that Mark and Carol Thatcher announced that their mother Baroness Thatcher died peacefully following a stroke this morning."

Thatcher will go down in history not only as Britain's first female prime minister, but as the woman who transformed Britain economically and internationally.

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