You even hear Republicans themselves say this now. The right-wing majority in the House has been reduced so that -- even though the Republicans held on -- I think you're going to see defections from the Republican Party if they don't give in on the fiscal cliff issue. It seems to me that Boehner is drawing a line in the sand to present a strong front to be the "mouse that roared" just to try to cut the best deal possible.

Then there's the continuing turf battle -- as there has always been -- between the CIA and the FBI. The Wall Street Journal headlines a story "Petraeus Affair Puts Scrutiny on FBI" while the New York Post headlines a story "CIA Sex Scandal: The Other Other Woman."

This is Criminal Business As Usual (CBAU) in the District of Corruption, even as Republicans are trying to make hay with the expose' of Petraeus's and Obama's lies about the Benghazi incident, which turns out to be an attack on the CIA safe house which reportedly held captured and tortured Libyan prisoners.

After all Obama kept quiet about the Benghazi incident and Petraeus' resignation until after the election -- but what difference does it make now? It's more fodder for the tabloid mainstream media, even as the fiscal cliff issue is more critical because there's a drop-dead date of December 31, 2012. In other words, something has to be done in the lame duck session.

For the rest of this Exclusive Column by Al Martin, click on to Al Martin Raw.

* AL MARTIN, author of "The Conspirators: Secrets of an Iran Contra Insider," is an Independent Political-Economic Analyst with 25 years of experience as a trader on NYMEX, CME, CBOT and CFTC. He is also currently trading the commodity futures market day and night and has a teleconferencing service to facilitate transactions in the markets. This is a service for independent market-experienced traders.

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