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National Publicity Secretary, All Progressives Congress, Alhaji Lai Mohammed | credits: File copy

The All Progressives Congress has said President Goodluck Jonathan bears a huge moral responsibility that will hunt him for a long time to come for allowing the Boko Haram menace to fester, leading to the deaths of over 15,000 Nigerians and the displacement of over 3 million others in the past six years.

In a statement issued in London on Tuesday by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party also hailed the military for the successes it has recorded in the battle against Boko Haram in recent times, saying the string of victories confirms the partys stand that the Nigerian military can hold its own anywhere and anytime, if provided with the necessary equipment and if the morale of the troops is not undermined.

President Goodluck Jonathan has finally owned up to his globally-acknowledged incompetence, a development which, in truly democratic societies, should be part of a statement of resignation by a leader whose terrible error of judgement has caused so many deaths and inflicted so much pain and sorrow on his compatriots.

APC said the truth is that President Jonathan deliberately allowed the Boko Haram crisis to fester because he and his team saw it as their trump card for winning re-election in 2015 by currying local and global sectarian sympathy with a Muslim-group-killing-Christians narrative that totally distorts the fact that Boko Haram is a band of marauders who have no consideration for ethnicity, regionalism, religion or any other thing beyond their mad disposition to terror.

The party said the marauders are equal-opportunity killers who went after Christians, Muslims, northerners, southerners, men, women, the old, the young, the rich and the poor.

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APC carpets Jonathan over Boko Haram, hails military

WASHINGTON -- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday turned down an invitation to meet privately with Senate Democrats next week during his visit to Washington, saying the session "could compound the misperception of partisanship" surrounding his trip.

Netanyahu had previously accepted an invitation from Republican leaders to address a joint meeting of Congress on March 3 and speak about Iran. The GOP leaders did not consult with the Obama administration, which the White House and even former Secretary of State James Baker, a Republican, called a breach of protocol.

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Former Secretary of State James Baker says he can't remember the last time a foreign leader was invited to address Congress without the president...

Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., on Monday invited Netanyahu to meet in a closed-door session with Democrats during his visit, saying a private meeting would be a "wholly appropriate opportunity" for him to discuss issues facing the U.S. and Israel. The GOP invitation, the Democrats said, "sacrifices deep and well-established cooperation on Israel for short-term partisan points - something that should never be done with Israeli security and which we fear could have lasting repercussions."

But Netanyahu declined the invitation on Tuesday and expressed regret about the politically fraught tone of his trip.

"I regret that the invitation to address the special joint session of Congress has been perceived by some to be political or partisan," Netanyahu wrote. "I can assure you that my sole intention in accepting it was to voice Israel's grave concerns about a potential nuclear agreement with Iran that could threaten the survival of my country."

Netanyahu said to meet with Democrats "at this time could compound the misperception of partisanship regarding my upcoming visit."

More than a half dozen House and Senate Democrats have said they will skip the speech, calling it an affront to President Obama and the administration as they engage in high-level negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program. Vice President Joe Biden will be traveling and has no plans to attend the speech.

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Netanyahu won't meet privately with Democrats

For Harry Reid and his Senate Democrats, revenge is a dish best served bold.

For years, they complained that the Republican minority had tied the chamber in knots. But now, just weeks into their stint in the minority, Democrats are brazenly using the same knot-tying procedures.

Four times, they used filibusters to block the majority from bringing up a Department of Homeland Security funding bill that would undo President Obamas executive orders on immigration. And even after Majority Leader Mitch McConnell essentially surrendered on Monday splitting the immigration proposal from the funding bill Democrats continued grandstanding gleefully on Tuesday, confident that if parts of the Homeland Security department shut down in the coming days Republicans will be to blame.

And so Reid (Nev.) led about 30 Senate Democrats and a couple of uniformed firefighter chiefs into a basement room in the Capitol complex Tuesday afternoon for a pep rally daring Republicans to let funding run out for DHS and essentially declaring the GOP majority soft on terrorism. With terrorists threatening to attack America, we must fund Homeland Security and fund it now, said Reid, who, wearing Wayfarer sunglasses and sporting ghastly facial bruises because of a recent accident, seemed downright scary as he invoked terrorist beheadings.

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) asked of the Republicans: Are they going to prioritize politics? Or are they going to prioritize national security?

Top Senate Democrats insisted on Tuesday that legislation to fund the Department of Homeland Security be passed before members would consider debate on immigration. (AP)

And Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, where the Mall of America is the target of a new terrorist threat by the Somali group al-Shabab, told Republicans to get these firefighters funded, to fund our security and not to send a message to al-Shabab that were just going to shut down Homeland Security.

All of this must make McConnell wonder why he wanted so much to become majority leader. The Kentucky Republican is making a good-faith effort to keep his promise not to have a shutdown. But he is finding out that the Senate is just as ungovernable under his Republican control as it was under the previous management.

For his troubles, McConnell is the target of carping by conservatives and is so far receiving no assistance from House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio). Hes also an easy mark for mischief-making Democrats, who are now enjoying the advantage Republicans did for years: Its easier to stop things from happening than to make them happen.

On the Senate floor Tuesday morning, McConnell described his proposed surrender. My preference remains with the legislation thats already passed the House, he said, referring to the plan to make homeland-security funding conditional on the demise of Obamas immigration orders. But Im ready to try another way. I hope our friends across the aisle will demonstrate similar flexibility.

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Milbank: Harry Reid takes the stage in the DHS fiasco

The movie star created a stir during her Best Supporting Actress Academy Award acceptance speech at Sunday night's Oscars, when she said: "To every woman who gave birth to every taxpayer and citizen of this nation, we have fought for everybody else's equal rights. It's our time to have wage equality once and for all, and equal rights for women in the United States of America."

The comment was a hit in the moment, with Meryl Streep and Jennifer Lopez effusing their support.

Now, likely 2016 presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, Labor Secretary Tom Perez and other Democrats are using those comments as a way to raise an issue that's been central to their party's economic message in recent years.

"I think we all cheered at Patricia Arquette's speech at the Oscars -- because she's right," Clinton told an audience of women working in Silicon Valley's technology industry in California on Tuesday.

Other Democrats praised Arquette's comments, too. Among them were House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California, Perez, the Labor secretary, and Valerie Jarrett, one of President Barack Obama's top White House aides.

Democrats have pushed a bill intended to close the pay gap between men and women by offering new legal protections to women who complain that they're being underpaid relative to their male peers, and by having the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission collect gender and racial pay data.

The bill failed to clear the 60-vote procedural threshold in the Senate last year -- and it's all but certain not to advance now that Republicans control both the House and the Senate, leaving Democrats to raise the issue on the presidential campaign trail instead.

Republicans argue there are already enough protections on the books to ensure women have the right to equal wages.

Clinton's comments come as The New York Times reports she plans to make her gender -- and potential to break the "glass ceiling" and become America's first female president -- a central theme in her widely expected 2016 campaign.

During her speech Tuesday, Clinton recalled being pregnant while working in an Arkansas law firm that had no maternity leave policy. She also called the tech industry the "wild west," and said it needs to be more welcoming to women.

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Clinton, Dems embrace Arquette's equal pay pitch

Comprehensive immigration reform must come sooner than later. If not for political gamesmanship, substantive immigration reform would have happened long ago.

Instead, the American public is left waiting for Washington do something while the functional legitimacy of immigration law continues to erode.

At a Feb. 10 Riverside County supervisors meeting, Riverside County supervisors John Benoit and Marion Ashley reiterated their support for immigration reform.

Unfortunately, our federal government has failed to move that issue, and its certainly one that needs to be addressed, said Mr. Benoit. I represent a part of the county that is dramatically impacted by the needs of good people who are here but are not legally here. Thats a problem for them and certainly a problem for our government also.

There are approximately 275,000 undocumented immigrants living in the Inland Empire, according to the Migration Policy Institute. An estimated 150,000 reside in Riverside County, nearly a third of whom live below the poverty line and most of whom are without health insurance.

We educate them. We ought to try to keep them and not let them go back to the countries and then theyre competing against us, said Mr. Ashley at the supervisors meeting.

In 2013, the county supervisors unanimously approved a resolution in support of an immigration reform bill being considered at the time. The resolution claimed that our broken national immigration system undermines our core national and local interests.

Further, the resolution argued that developing a comprehensive, functioning immigration system is essential to ensuring Americas future economic prosperity.

All of these concepts are important to keep in mind amidst ongoing national debate over what to do with the millions of undocumented immigrants in the United States.

It is clear that undocumented immigrants broke the law to get here. It is also clear that our immigration policies have been poorly conceptualized and enforced.

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EDITORIAL: An immigration law eroded