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House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., arrives on Capitol Hill on Oct. 10 for a hearing on the attack on the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya, that resulted in the death of U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens.

The GOP attack dog is not letting go of the Obama Administration's leg.

On Sunday, U.S. Republican Rep. Darrell Issa, who has spent years investigating the alleged misdeeds of Democrats, accused Team Obama on CBS' Face the Nation of being prioritizing public relations over security at the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya.

"We believe they didn’t want the appearance of needing the security. We want to put real security ahead of the appearance of not needing security,” said Issa, who chairs the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

The criticism was in response to last month's attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, which killed American Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans. 

The California Republican said the consulate attack reminded him of President Bush's "mission accomplished moment," referring to the 2003 incident in which Bush announced the end to major combat operations in Iraq underneath a banner behind him that read "Mission Accomplished." The fighting, obviously, did not end following that event. 

Obama, Issa argued, should not be "in denial" about the presence of terrorism in Libya. 

Meanwhile, Democratic Rep. Elijah Cummings accused Team Romney on CBS of treating the Libya situation "like a political football."

 "We don't have substantial evidence yet," Cummings said. "We're still gathering evidence, coming to conclusions and searching for facts."

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TV personality Stephen Colbert promotes "America Again: Re-becoming The Greatness We Never Weren't" at Barnes & Noble Union Square on October 2, 2012 in New York City.

America just got a glimpse of the real Stephen Colbert. 

The Comedy Central host broke out of character—a rare thing for the funnyman—during an interview with David Gregory on Sunday’s Meet the Press.

Colbert argued rather earnestly that the presidential election matters because there’s a difference between President Obama and Mitt Romney’s governing style. 

 “I’m not Ralph Nader. You know what I mean?," the comedian said. "I don’t think that there’s no difference. There is a difference. I don’t know what the difference is, though."

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Beau Biden has some strong words for Paul Ryan: Lay off my dad, hypocrite.

On Sunday, the Delaware attorney general and son of the vice president dug his claws into his father's opponent at last Thursday's debate. Appearing on Sunday's This Week, the younger Biden dismissed as "outrageous" the Republican claim that the Obama administration doesn't take seriously the security of diplomats around the world.

It's "especially outrageous coming from the congressman, who in his budget proposed to cut diplomat security by $200 to $300 million," he said.

The subject of diplomat security has become a hot-button issue on the campaign trail since the U.S. ambassador to Libya, Chris Stevens, was killed in an attack in Benghazi last month. 

Beau Biden, a 41-year-old Iraq War vet, blasted Romney's foreign policy record, pointing out that the former Massachusetts governor once disclosed a meeting with a secretive branch of British intelligence, in addition to casting doubt over London's readiness to host the Olympics. 

Team Romney "seems to be more interested in kind of pounding their chest to make the neoconservatives who advise them proud than they are about being serious about foreign policy and protecting our national interests around the world," said Biden.

Biden also rebutted GOP criticism of his father's laughter and repeated interjections during last week's debate.

 "I'm happy to defend my dad," he said.  "...Any time the other side—Karl Rove or folks on the far right—are going after my father for smiling too much, you know that's a victory."

Biden continued, saying the issue was not "how much my father smiled or how many gallons of water that the congressman drank nervously on that stage. It's about talking directly to the American people about very important facts, and what you saw from my father was him articulating the vision that the president and he have to continue to build this middle class, you know, out and take this country forward." 

An aggressive Vice President Joe Biden went after Rep. Paul Ryan on the economy, taxes, foreign policy and more throughout their 90-minute debate in Danville, Ky., on Thursday night.  

Frequently scoffing and smiling at Ryan's claims, Biden several times explicitly cast doubt on the GOPer's veracity and command of the facts. 

Unprovoked, Biden brought up Mitt Romney's devastating 47% remarks, in which the White House hopeful dismissed nearly half of the electorate as government moochers—and which President Obama failed to mention in his own debate last week.

"It shouldn't be surprising for a guy who says 47% of the American people are unwilling to take responsibility of their own lives," said Biden. "My friend [Paul Ryan] recently said in a speech in Washington said 30% of the American people are takers. These people are my mom and dad, the people I grew up with, my neighbors. They pay more effective tax than Gov. Romney pays in his federal income tax. They are elderly people who in fact are living off of Social Security. They are veterans who are fighting in Afghanistan right now who are not quote, not paying taxes."

WATCH THE CLIP ABOVE OF BIDEN'S 47% ATTACK

That testified to a combative approach throughout from the vice president, who, in a likely successful effort to re-enthuse Democrats after Obama's limp performance last week, repeatedly sought to challenge Ryan on everything from social programs to jobs to national security.

Of course, Ryan got a zinger of his own in when he referred to the interruption-laden debate.

"I know you're under a lot of duress to make up for lost ground, but I think people would be better served if we don't interrupt each other," Ryan said, referring to President Obama's poor debate performance last week.

The high-stakes faceoff kicked off with a discussion of the deadly attacks at the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, with Ryan criticizing Obama's initial unwillingness to call the violence terrorism.

Biden promised to pursue the attackers, and vowed that any mistakes in the original assessment of the attack would "not be made again." He also ripped Ryan for not laying out a clear plan on foreign policy.

At one point, Biden declared that Ryan was full of "malarkey" after the Republican accused the president of advocating "devastating defense cuts."

The two also traded blows on Iran, with Ryan insisting the U.S. was failing to stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. Biden countered by insisting that his team has implemented the "most crippling sanctions in the history of sanctions."

The debate got personal —and serious—when moderator Martha Raddatz of ABC News asked the two candidates how their Catholic faith has played into their personal views on abortion.

Biden said his religion teaches him that life begins at conception, but would not impose his beliefs on all Americans. "I do not believe we have the right to tell people, women, they can't control their body," the former Delaware senator said.

Ryan said he is against abortion, but would include exceptions in cases of incest, rape or when the life of the mother is at risk. 

One of the night's most memorable lines came during a discussion of tax policy. Ryan insisted that Mitt Romney could make good on his promises to lower tax rates without increasing the deficit.

"Not mathematically possible," Biden quipped. "It is mathematically possible," Ryan insisted. "Jack Kennedy lowered taxes and raised revenue."

Biden shot back, "Oh, now you're Jack Kennedy?" That evoked memories of the famous moment in the 1988 vice presidential debate in which Lloyd Bentsen schooled Dan Quayle. After Quayle brought up JFK, Bentsen replied: "Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy, I knew Jack Kennedy, Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy."

Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan dropped his endorsement of a Wisconsin state lawmaker who is under fire for controversial remarks he made about rape. 

State Rep. Roger Rivard recently told a local newspaper that his father told him "some girls, they rape so easy," as a way to warn him that women could consent to sex but then later claim they had not. 

Ryan's spokesman, Kevin Siefert, said in a statement that the vice presidential candidate believes "there is no place in our discourse for rhetoric such as this" and that Ryan cannot support Rivard "or his indefensible comments."

Ryan's withdrawal of support comes the same day that he will debate Joe Biden in the first and only vice presidential debate in Danville, Kentucky.  The timing of Rivard's statement could be potentially awkward for Ryan, whose record on women's rights has come under scrutiny.

On Wednesday's PoliticsNation, host Al Sharpton pointed out that Ryan has cast 78 anti-choice votes since he's been in Congress, in addition to co-sponsoring 38 anti-choice measures. "This record could really hurt him," said Sharpton.

Huffington Post reporter Laura Bassett, who covers women's issues, agreed. "Paul Ryan will have some explaining to do," at the debate said Bassett.

Dr. Romney has a prescription for sick Americans: Go to the emergency room!

The Republican presidential nominee reiterated his claim that uninsured Americans can find the health care they need in emergency rooms and that people do not die or suffer simply because they can't afford care.

“We don’t have a setting across this country where if you don’t have insurance, we just say to you, ‘Tough luck, you’re going to die when you have your heart attack,’  ” Romney told the Columbus Dispatch. 

"No, you go to the hospital, you get treated, you get care, and it’s paid for, either by charity, the government or by the hospital," he added. "We don’t have people that become ill, who die in their apartment because they don’t have insurance."

Romney's remarks come as his running mate, Paul Ryan, will face Joe Biden in the first and only vice presidential debate on Thursday night in Danville, Kentucky. Both Romney and Ryan have called for repealing Obamacare.  

On Thursday's Hardball, MSNBC host Chris Matthews said Romney seems to think "we don't need Obamacare because we put people in the emergency room."

When Matthews asked former Republican National Chairman Michael Steele if Romney's remarks was representative of the GOP health care plan, a testy Steele declared "No." 

"He's giving an example that we are a caring people, that we do not leave people on the streets to die," Steele insisted.  

Rep. Paul Broun was once schooled in the sciences. But now, he says, a key scientific principle is the devil's work.

Broun, a Georgia Republican who is running for re-election, declared during a recent speech in Hartwell that "God’s word is true."

He continued:

All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and Big Bang theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of hell. And it’s lies to try to keep me and all the folks who are taught that from understanding that they need a savior.

Broun also claimed (incorrectly) that the Earth in 9,000 years old. 

And wouldn't you know  it: Broun sits on the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology—alongside Rep. Todd Akin. Akin, of course, recently claimed a woman can't get pregnant if she is raped.

 MSNBC host Lawrence O'Donnell declared Monday night, "If Congressman Broun is a scientist, he is a mad scientist. A very, very mad scientist." 

Lawrence Wilkerson, the former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell, skewered Mitt Romney’s foreign policy team on Monday, saying their policies make his stomach turn.   

Wilkerson took particular aim at John Bolton, former President George W. Bush’s ambassador to the United Nations—and now an adviser to Romney. 

“The man scares me to death,” Wilkerson, a retired U.S. Army colonel told MSNBC’s Ed Schultz. “He would defeat all the enemies in America and the world—and believe me they’re plentiful—and he’d do it with everyone else’s blood. John is like Dick Cheney, never served a day in his life and wouldn't serve a day in his life … These people make me sick.” 

Wilkerson’s harsh rhetoric comes on the heels of Romney’s foreign policy speech earlier in the day, in which the former Massachusetts governor laid out a hawkish approach.

Without offering much in the way of specifics, Romney vowed to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, go after terrorists who attacked the U.S. consulate in Libya, and work to ensure Syrian rebels obtain arms to defeat Bashar al-Assad’s regime. 

"Utterly unbelievable, Wilkerson said, blasting Romney as “operating on a Cold War music sheet.” 

Asked about former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s endorsement of Romney’s speech, Wilkerson declared that Rumsfeld, one of the key architects of the Iraq War “has zero credibility with me and he’ll never regain it again.” 

Now, the watchdog has got somebody watching it.

Rep. Elijah Cummings has launched a probe into True the Vote, a Tea Party group that is under fire for attempting to prevent thousands of registered voters from casting ballots ahead of Election Day, Cummings told Rev. Al Sharpton on PoliticsNation Monday.

"Voting is a fundamental right...It is not to be limited to a few as a privilege," said Cummings, who is the ranking Democrat on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

"This is clearly a case of voter suppression," Cummings added, noting the Texas-based group is zeroing in on students, African-Americans and Hispanics—groups that tend to vote Democratic. 

In a letter to Catherine Engelbrecht, president of True the Vote, Cummings wrote that True the Vote's "volunteers, and its affiliated groups have a horrendous record of filing inaccurate voter registration challenges, causing legitimate voters—through no fault of their own—to receive letters from local election officials notifying them that their registrations have been challenged and requiring them to take steps to remedy false accusations against them."

Sharpton called the organization, which has been accused in the past of hovering over voters, getting into election workers' faces and blocking lines of voters, "offensive" and "maybe illegal." 

In a low-key and often wonkish presidential debate on Wednesday, Mitt Romney distanced himself from his own plans, but received only intermittent push-back from a subdued President Obama.

Obama started out strong at the Denver debate, nipping at Mitt Romney for the Republican's tax plan, which would reportedly cut $5 trillion in tax revenue and add $2 trillion in military spending. Obama insisted the move would pulverize middle-class families or balloon the deficit.

"How we pay for that, reduce the deficit and make the investments that we need to make without dumping those costs on to middle-class Americans, I think is one of the central questions of the campaign," the president said.

Romney, however, insisted that he doesn't have a $5 trillion tax cut in his plan, and that he won't reduce the taxes paid by the wealthiest Americans. On the stump, Romney has pushed to lower everyone's tax rates by 20%, an amount independent groups say will reduce federal revenue by $5 trillion over the next decade.

Obama charged that for the past year-and-half, his opponent has been running on such a tax plan and now his "big, bold idea is 'never mind.'" 

On Medicare, Obama noted that although Romney's plan to turn Medicare into a voucher system might not affect current seniors, it would affect those who'll soon be eligible for the program. "If you're 54 or 55, you might want to listen because this might affect you," he said.

Obama argued that Romney has yet to lay out concrete plans on taxes, healthcare and Wall Street reform. "And at some point I think the American people have to ask themselves is the reason that Governor Romney is keeping all these plans to replace secret because they're too good?"

While there was no knockout moment, the tables seemed to turn in the GOPer's favor when Romney insisted the president's policies have stunted job growth and a second term in the White House for Obama would kill more jobs. He ripped Obama's plan to repeal tax cuts for small businesses and  referenced Vice President Joe Biden's gaffe this week, saying "Under the president's policies, middle-income Americans have been buried."

Romney, appearing poised and confident, argued that health insurance costs have gone up, gas prices have doubled, costs of food have skyrocketed and the middle class has been crushed under Obama.

"You raised taxes and you killed jobs," Romney declared.

Throughout most of the evening, Romney was the clear aggressor, seizing control of the debate at several moments and interrupting moderator Jim Lehrer, while the president often seemed somewhat listless as he looked down at his podium.

Richard Wolffe, executive editor of MSNBC.com, said the cards fell in Romney's favor, but that in the end, Romney may not have achieved everything he needed to.

"I think the GOP is going to be delighted with Romney because it's all small bore. They want him to rough up the President and he did. Sadly for the GOP, he missed the real target: telling voters what he really stands for. Especially about jobs," Wolffe wrote on MSNBC.com.
 
Romney's big push comes as polls show him behind in several battleground states.

Listen up Mitt: It seems as if every conservative worth his or her salt has some debate advice for you.

With Mitt Romney down in the polls in several critical swing states, many right-wingers threw their two cents in just hours before Wednesday night's presidential  face-off.

MSNBC's Al Sharpton rounded up the suggestions:

 •“Treat [Obama] with respect but not deference” suggested Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan.

 •"Be on offense without being offensive," advised former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

 •A "dash of humor is worth its weight in gold," commented Karl Rove. 

 •"Go large," Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer urged. 

 •"Explain his tax plan," recommended political analyst and commentator Bill Kristol. 

Liberal columnist Cynthia Tucker told Sharpton that Romney is "suffering from a surfeit of advice." We'll be watching to see which pieces, if any, Romney ends up taking.

Supreme Court expert Jeffrey Toobin joined The Last Word host Lawrence O'Donnell Monday night to discuss a subject that hasn't received the attention it deserves: the election's massive implications for the high court.

Toobin, a writer for The New Yorker, predicted that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a liberal who is 79, likely will step down if Obama wins a second term, because it would guarantee her place would be filled by a like-minded individual.

Toobin pointed out that four of the nine justices are in their 70s, which may mean the court could be shaken up if elderly judges retire or pass away.  Currently, the court is finely balanced between five right-leaning justices and four left-leaning justices. 

On the flip side, Toobin predicted that if Ginsburg, the eldest justice, were forced to leave during a Mitt Romney presidency, Roe vs. Wade—which keeps abortion legal—would likely be overturned. 

The court is expected to hear cases this term on voting rights, gay marriage, and affirmative action, other other crucial issues.