Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) is renewing his push for legislation that would amend how the federal government assesses the U.S. unemployment rate. When calculating national unemployment, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) currently omits those individuals who have given up looking for work, making the overall joblessness rate appear substantially lower than it actually is.

Tax Armageddon, or "Taxmageddon," looms on the horizon, as $500 billion in tax cuts will all be expiring at the end of the year. While Americans were hustling on April 17 to complete their taxes, experts were warning about a much larger tax day — January 1, 2013. And if Congress doesn’t take action, American households will be hit with an average tax hike of $3,800, according to the Heritage Foundation.

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, the purported founders of communism, established in the 19th century a government paradigm that transformed Europe and other regions in the eastern hemisphere, adding to an already expansive repertoire of political ideologies. And the seemingly farfetched assertion that communism could someday take control of America seems, quite simply, unfathomable. But is it really that improbable, or furthermore, has it already ensnared certain sectors of society?

The now-infamous 2010 Las Vegas conference that resulted in the resignation of General Services Administration (GSA) chief Martha Johnson, has spurred even more controversy, as documents show that GSA employees received bonuses for their work planning the lavish, taxpayer-funded convention.

The government doled out more than $200,000 in 2010 to "translocate" a bush that was blocking the path of San Francisco’s $1.05-billion highway project — partially funded by President Obama’s 2009 economic stimulus law — adding to the laundry list of "shovel-ready" projects that resulted in a cesspool of taxpayer waste.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta acknowledged Monday that his numerous flights home to California, which have cost taxpayers about $860,000, may have been a little excessive. Despite his purported regret, however, he indicated that his weekend trips  — which have tallied to nearly 30 times since July — will not end. He told reporters that he is open to "alternatives here that I can look at, that might possibly be able to save funds and, at the same time, be able to fulfill my responsibilities not only to my job but to my family."

As the 2012 election nears, the race for the Hispanic vote becomes more and more critical, as President Obama and his presumed Republican rival Mitt Romney scramble to recruit minority supporters. The Obama campaign, for example, launched on Wednesday a series of Spanish-language advertisements in Florida, Nevada, and Colorado that highlight the President’s purported dedication to boosting federal funding for education.

In a first-ever investigation of its type, the United Nations dispatched a professor to the United States on an official visit to research and report on the living conditions of America’s indigenous population. Professor James Anaya, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, arrived in the United States on Monday and will carry out his visit through May 4, traveling to Arizona, Alaska, Oregon, South Dakota, Oklahoma, and Washington, D.C.

In an effort to woo Hispanic voters, President Obama made a pledge Saturday to push for immigration reform early in his second term. "This is something I care deeply about, [and] it’s personal to me," Obama told news anchor Enrique Acevedo in a television interview with Univision (left), a network viewed largely by Hispanics in the United States. Obama’s appearances on Univision have been frequent, as Saturday marked the 15th time he has been interviewed by the network, which purportedly reaches 97 percent of Hispanic households in the United States.

The Obama administration is quietly steering about $500 million to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to help bolster the President’s healthcare overhaul, despite efforts in the Supreme Court to strike down the law. The half-billion-dollar transfer is only a snapshot of the IRS’s total ObamaCare implementation spending, and it is being siphoned outside of the traditional appropriations process.