Pope Francis standing on the balcony of St Peter's Basilica's after being elected. (Photo: Getty)

Amalia told reporters her "romance" with Pope Francis, who was then known as Jorge Mario Bergoglio, failed because her parents opposed the relationship. She also said she regrets he was unable to officiate at her wedding to her eventual husband.

Prior to being elected pope, Francis served as Archbishop of Buenos Aires. He will be the first Jesuit pope and entered the religious order nearly ten years after his alleged relationship with "Amalia."

A screenshot of the IEBC's partial results in the Siaya gubernatorial election. (Photo: Vote.IEBC.or.ke)

President Barack Obama's half-brother, Abong'o Malik Obama, won't be the second member of his family to launch a political career. Mr. Obama was defeated in his bid to be governor of Kenya's Siaya County this week by what seems to have been a very large margin.

Mr. Obama is the eldest child of President Obama's father. They have different mothers. Mr. Obama served as the best man at the president's wedding to Michelle Obama in 1992.

According to the Daily Nation newspaper in Nairobi, the Siaya gubernatorial race was won by Cornel Rasanga with William Oduol coming in second. The Daily Nation did not report Mr. Obama totals, however the Kenyan Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission, which oversaw the elections and has been releasing sporadically updated results since Kenyans headed to the polls Monday, published a partial count that showed him in third place with just a little over one percent of the initial vote. Three other candidates trailed behind Mr. Obama. A call from Politicker to the IEBC Election Hotline this morning to inquire about the full count for the Siaya gubernatorial election went unanswered.

Siaya is one of 47 counties that were created in the the 2010 Constitution of Kenya, which was ratified after the 2007 presidential elections there ended with violence that left over 1,000 people dead and a disputed result. This year's race had few violent incidents, but it was not without controversy. There were technical glitches at polling stations throughout the country. Though all the votes have not been counted the two members of the ticket headed towards a likely victory in the presidential election, Uhuru Kenyatta and his running mate William Ruto, have both been charged by the International Criminal Court with “crimes against humanity” for allegedly orchestrating the violence that followed the last elections. The United States and other Western nations have vowed there will be unspecified “consequences” for Kenya if Mr. Kenyatta emerges victorious.

In an interview with Politicker on Tuesday, Mr. Obama said there was initially a "blackout" with no information released about the election results in Siaya. Because of delay, Mr. Obama said he believed there was "a high risk that the results may be manipulated."

Mr. Obama was running as an independent candidate. The winner of the race, Mr. Rasanga, is a member of one of Kenya's major political parties, the Orange Democratic Movement, or ODM. Mr. Oduol, who came in second, belongs to the National Agenda Party of Kenya.

As of this writing, Mr. Obama has not responded to requests to comment on the results of his race and whether he believes they are legitimate. Our last communication with him came via text message Tuesday afternoon as the official results were still coming in.

"Am number three so far," Mr. Obama wrote.

Abong'o Malik Obama (Photo: Facebook)

Abong'o Malik Obama wants to have a career in politics like his half-brother, President Barack Obama. However, hours after the polls closed in Kenya's elections last night, Mr. Obama said he wasn't sure whether his bid to be governor of Siaya County was a success and he is concerned the election results may have been tampered with. He's also extremely angry about tabloid coverage of his campaign.

"It's impossible to tell at this time, the whole system crashed," Mr. Obama told Politicker when we called him Tuesday morning to inquire about the election. "We have no idea, it's still hanging out there, and I myself am extremely disappointed and there is a high risk that the results may be manipulated." 

Yesterday's elections are the first under the 2010 Constitution of Kenya, which was ratified after the 2007 election ended with widespread violence and a disputed result. Though the voting yesterday proceeded largely without violence, there were reports of technical problems at many polling places. Mr. Obama said he stayed up late into the night and was given no information about the election result from officials.

"I was sitting out there at the tallying center for the county up until almost 1 o'clock last night and there's a complete blackout," he explained.

The new constitution divided Kenya into 47 counties including Siaya, which contains more than 800,000 residents and the hometown of the president's father, Barack Obama Sr. Mr. Obama is the first child of the elder Barack Obama. He was born three years prior to his presidential sibling, who has a different mother. Mr. Obama operates a charity called the Barack H. Obama Foundation, which, according to its website, "is entirely the idea of Abon'go Malik Obama, in memory of their father, and is not dependent on the endorsement of his brother, President Barack Obama."

As of this writing, the website of Kenya's Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission, which is overseeing the election, shows Uhuru Kenyatta with a lead in Kenya's presidential race. Mr. Kenyatta and his running mate are two of the four people who have been charged by the International Criminal Court with "crimes against humanity" for allegedly orchestrating the violence after the last elections that left over 1,000 people dead. The United States and other Western nations have promised unspecified "consequences" if Mr. Kenyatta emerges victorious.

Though the IEBC site is showing results for the presidential election, it does not display results for other local offices including Mr. Obama's governor's race in Siaya. The IEBC did not pick up their "election hotline" when we called to inquire about the results. Mr. Obama is running as an independent candidate, a situation he said has left him with a tougher path to victory.

"I'm disadvantaged somewhat because of the resources that I have," said Mr. Obama. "I feel that I've done my best and so I just leave the rest to God."

Mr. Obama and the President served as the best man at each other's weddings. However, Mr. Obama said he hasn't discussed his political aspirations with his brother. According to Mr. Obama they last spoke in mid-November, when he congratulated President Obama on winning a second term. The White House did not respond to multiple requests to discuss Mr. Obama's campaign.

Along with his worries about the election result, Mr. Obama is concerned about an article in the British tabloid Daily Mail that alleged he mistreats his multiple wives. The story, which was written by reporter Andrew Malone, accused Mr. Obama of beating his wives and engaging in "secret trysts" to maintain an "estimated" 12 wives, which exceeds the four wives allowed by Islamic law.

"I also would like to, you know, comment on something that's going around on the net about me and my family and trying to malign and say a lot of bad things about me," Mr. Obama told us before we finished our conversation. "This gentleman who's from the Daily Mail ... he came down here and showed up, you know, just from the blue. ... He put out an article about me and how I'm philandering and how I'm beating up my wives and, you know, a lot of really bad things. And I really find that distasteful and it's a whole bunch of nonsense."

In the story, Mr. Maloney described Mr. Obama meeting prospective voters on the campaign trail including a "witch doctor ... with green and pink parrot feathers in his hair." Mr. Obama incorrectly claimed the reporter portrayed him as the one wearing feathers and said the article overall "sounds extremely racist and bigoted."

"He's talking about me wearing feathers and, you know, running around half naked," said Mr. Obama. "I really detest that kind of thing, especially in this day and this era, just because I'm related to the President of the United States, who happens to be a black man."

Mr. Obama also took issue with the story's claim two of his wives ran away from him and view him negatively.

"I don't understand why people go to those lengths just to be mean and nasty, because my wives and I--well, in fact, to tell you the truth, they voted for me yesterday," Mr. Obama said. "We were at the polling station and talking about my wives not wanting to vote for me and things like that is a whole bunch of fabrications and a whole bunch of lies."

As of this writing, we have been unable to reach Mr. Maloney to give him a chance to respond to Mr. Obama's claims. When we called the Daily Mail's headquarters in England an operator informed us Mr. Malone was "probably" a freelancer and told us to call back later today when the features editors are available.

In addition to racism, Mr. Obama blames the negative coverage he received on animosity people have towards his brother.

"You know, I didn't choose to be Obama. I didn't choose to be Obama's brother, you know, it just so happened. And now, everybody's going after me just because of my brother, so it's really unfair," said Mr. Obama. "Just because they hate my brother and so forth why do they have to attack me? I'm just trying to do the best I can with what I have, make a contribution. My brother's doing what he's doing over there, I'm doing what I'm doing over here. At the end of the day, we're just working to make this world a better place."

President Barack Obama on the phone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu today. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

President Barack Obama took some heat for not scheduling a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu while the latter leader was in the United States for the U.N. General Assembly this week. The president (sort of) addressed that criticism today by making time to meet Mr. Netanyahu (via telephone). According to a "readout" of the conversation distributed by the White House Press Office, "the two leaders discussed a range of security issues, and the President reaffirmed his and our country’s unshakeable commitment to Israel’s security."

"The two leaders underscored that they are in full agreement on the shared goal of preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. The Prime Minister welcomed President Obama’s commitment before the United Nations General Assembly to do what we must to achieve that goal," the readout said.

Both men also apparently pledged to continue their "regular consultations" on the Iranian nuclear threat in the future.

"The two leaders took note of the close cooperation and coordination between the Governments of the United States and Israel regarding the threat posed by Iran--its nuclear program, proliferation, and support for terrorism--and agreed to continue their regular consultations on this issue going forward," the readout said.

The White House also went the extra mile and distributed a photo of the president on the phone with Mr. Netanyahu.

Yesterday, in his speech before the U.N. General Assembly, Mr. Netanyahu used visual aids to express his desire the U.S. will join him in efforts to establish a "clear red line" with the Iranian government before they amass "enough enriched uranium to make a nuclear weapon."

Newt Gingrich holding a baby tiger in 1995. (Photo: Getty)

Former Speaker of the House, Republican presidential candidate and noted zoo enthusiast Newt Gingrich is traveling in Italy and he took some time today to visit the Bioparco in Rome. Mr. Gingrich tweeted a few observations about the zoo's large hairy armadillos.

Bioparco was built in 1911 and is billed as "one of Europe’s oldest zoological gardens." The Bioparco's collections include Pygmy Hippopotami, Asiatic Lions and Siberian Tigers. Based on his Tweets, Mr. Gingrich appears to have particularly enjoyed the exhibits with European Bison and the Large Hairy Armadillo:

The rome zoo's large hairy armadillos (their name, honest) are very active today -natives of argentina

—
Newt Gingrich (@newtgingrich) July 03, 2012

European bison was down to 54 animals in zoos none in wild after world war one. Conservation efforts have 1800 in wild and 1400 in zoos

—
Newt Gingrich (@newtgingrich) July 03, 2012

Rome has nice european bison exhibit and nice Italian biodiversity building

—
Newt Gingrich (@newtgingrich) July 03, 2012

Mr. Gingrich's wife, Callista, has also been tweeting updates from their European trip.

Last week, Mr. Gingrich was in Paris where he spoke to the National Council of Resistance of Iran, a group of Iranian exiles headed by Maryam Rajavi. In addition to her work with NCRI, Ms. Rajavi is also the head of Mujahadeen-e-Khalq or MEK, a leftist group dedicated to overthrowing the Iranian regime that is officially designated as a terrorist group by the United States.

Chen Guangcheng (Photo: Getty)

Chen Guangcheng, the blind Chinese activist who wanted to hitch a ride out of Beijing on Hillary Clinton's plane, is college bound. The State Department struck a deal with the Chinese foreign ministry to have Mr. Chen come to America for a university fellowship.

"If he wants to study abroad, he can apply through normal channels to the relevant departments, according to the law, just like any other Chinese citizen," a Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman said in a statement.

Soon after, the State Department announced a deal for Mr. Chen to come study at an as-yet-unnamed university and said the Chinese government agreed to accept his study abroad application. Mr. Chen has organized protests and worked as a lawyer for women allegedly threatened with forced abortions. He was imprisoned for four years and, since his release eighteen months ago, has been held in his home under armed guard where he claims his family was regularly assaulted by his guards.  He made a daring, late-night escape last month and fled to the U.S. embassy.

On Wednesday, Mr. Chen said he was led out of the embassy and taken to a hospital where he begged Ms. Clinton to intervene on his behalf.

"I’m absolutely, absolutely ready to fly out on Hillary Clinton’s plane,” he said. “I don’t know why the Americans didn’t answer my phone calls.”

Mr. Chen's situation was threatening to become a political problem  for the Obama administration. A hearing on the matter was held yesterday in the House of Representatives. Mr. Chen phoned in to say he wanted a meeting with Ms. Clinton and to ultimately come to America. By sending Mr. Chen to school, the State Department avoided the potentially messy problem of dealing with a request for asylum that would be seen as a criticism of the record of political repression in China, which owns over $900 billion in U.S. debt.

Herman Cain on stage at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference. (Photo: Getty)

WASHINGTON -- Herman Cain is exporting his "9-9-9 Plan" to the Land of the Rising Sun, but the Japanese version of Mr. Cain's tax plan won't be based on the number nine.

"It's going to be 7-7-7 in Japan, because it's revenue neutral," Mr. Cain's chief of staff, Mark Block, told The Politicker yesterday at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference.

In Japanese, "7-7-7" would be translated as either "Shichi-Shichi-Shichi" or "Nana-Nana-Nana."

Mr. Cain met with a group of Japanese businessmen at CPAC yesterday to work out the details for his journey to Japan. He will officially announce the Asian incarnation of "9-9-9" in a column on his website next Monday trumpeting the Japanese Tea Party's support for the plan. The Japanese Tea Party movement has grown in recent months as a response rising taxes in that country.

After he dropped out of the presidential race in December, Mr. Cain launched the "Cain Connections" initiative to promote a series of proposals he dubbed the "Cain Solutions Revolution." His "9-9-9 Plan" is the centerpiece of the "Cain Connections" platform.

Congresswoman Michele Bachamnn (Getty)

WASHINGTON Michele Bachmann made a speech at the American Conservative Union's annual Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C. where she accused President Barack Obama of making a series of dangerous foreign policy "miscalculations" including failing to support Israel and not standing by ousted Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak in his quest to keep the Muslim Brotherhood at bay.

"Obama failed to stand by Mubarak and that helped fuel the revolution in Egypt and it led to a regime that was based on sharia law with 72 percent of the seats in the Lower House in Egypt now occupied by the Brotherhood and an even more radical Salafist party," Ms. Bachmann said.

Ms. Bachmann said she wanted to prevent President Obama from highlighting "foreign policy successes" in his re-election effort.

"This fall, President Obama will be pointing to his foreign policy successes in order to make the case for his successful re-election. He'll be pointing to Bin Laden, he'll be pointing to the overthrow of Qaddafi, he'll be pointing to the Arab Spring as his foreign policy success story," Ms. Bachmann said. "These are tactical successes that don't begin to compare with the mess that Barack Obama has made of the Middle East and the strategic foreign policy blunders."

Ms. Bachmann said the president's main mistake was choosing "Islamic outreach over Israel" and she cited his speech in Cairo, his handling of Israel and the withdrawal of troops from Iraq as examples of the president's missteps.

"When Barack Obama chose Islamic outreach over Israel, he changed the course of history," Ms. Bachmann said. "No president since the modern state of Israel has failed to stand by our ally Israel, only President Obama."

Ms. Bachmann had particularly harsh words for President Obama's decision to invite members of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood to his landmark 2o09 Cairo speech, a decision she called "absolutely shocking."

"The president spurned the President of Egypt when he took his first foreign trip to Cairo," Ms. Bachmann said. "In an absolutely shocking move, he invited the Muslim Brotherhood to hear his speech when Mubarak's policy was to keep the Brotherhood at arm's length. The Muslim Brotherhood's mission is the spread of global jihad and their leader has called for the demise, not only of the United States, but also of Israel."

Ms. Bachmann blamed this choice for helping to "fuel" the Arab Spring, which she said led to the "rise of political Islam" throughout the Arab world.

"The spread of radical Islam has not been confined to Egypt. The rise of political Islam has brought sharia law now to Tunisia and Al Qaeda to Libya, as I warned during the presidential race earlier this year," Ms. Bachmann said.

According to Ms. Bachmann these "miscalculations" have put the world "on the verge of a nuclear Iran."

"And Iran is committed to both the destruction of Israel and of the United States," Ms. Bachmann said. "And they are the epicenter of global jihad."

Ms. Bachmann equated the withdrawal of troops from Iraq with handing that country "to the Iranians" and she predicted the president will do the same thing in Afghanistan.

"We credit our brave troops for winning the war in Iraq at a very tremendous cost, but the president recently chose intentionally to lose the peace," Ms. Bachmann said. "They intend to do the same thing in Afghanistan and they will likely lose the peace in Afghanistan. It's unthinkable after a decade of effort to defeat global jhad, Obama, for the sake of his political re-election, has chosen to hand Iraq to the Iranians."

Ms. Bachmann said President Obama has done several things wrong with respect to Israel starting with his call for the country to retreat to its pre-Six Day War borders.

"Before Obama was elected, Israel could count on America's unwavering support, but since Obama's election, Israel has rarely enjoyed President Obama's support, and in May he even said that Israel should retreat to her indefensible 1967 borders," Ms. Bachmann said. "In a bad case of misplaced priorities, the president thinks that Israel building apartment buildings on her own land is worse than Iran getting a nuclear bomb."

Ms. Bachmann also criticized the president for the State Department's policy of not recognizing Jerusalem as the Israeli capital.

"Obama's State Department now designates Jerusalem as an international city and, in a bizarre move, our State Department won't even acknowledge that Jerusalem belongs to Israel. Jerusalem does belong to Israel," she said.

She also slammed the president for saying America is "not a Christian nation, or a Jewish nation, or a Muslim nation."

"Before obama was elected, no one had ever heard of a United States president saying to the world that the United States is not a judeo-christian nation," Ms. Bachmann said. "I am here to say we are."

Though she expects President Obama to tout his "foreign policy success story" on the campaign trail, Ms. Bachmann concluded by saying his foreign policies are precisely the reason he shouldn't be re-elected.

"The president's foreign policy does change the history of the world, which is why Barack Obama cannot have a second term as president."

Former Clinton administration Labor Secretary Robert Reich predicts an Obama/Clinton ticket in '12.

Protesters are setting up camp outside Mayor Bloomberg's house (again). 

A new year means a slew of new state laws.

Alex Borgognone is giving up his bid to challenge Michael Grimm.

Is hydrofracking headed to China?

Singer Kelly Clarkson experienced fan backlash after she endorsed Ron Paul.

President Barack Obama misses his former body man, Reggie Love.

Nancy Pelosi's office said she doesn't want to leave politics, regardless of what her daughter said.

Karl Rove predicts the GOP will take the Senate and keep the House.

Rick Perry seemingly forgot about a Supreme Court case he has fought for years--the ruling that overturned Texas' anti-sodomy laws.

"Strong wind gusts" destroyed about 20 tents at the Occupy encampment in Providence, Rhode Island.

Georgia police shot and killed a woman who allegedly sent a fake WMD to State Senator Greg Ball.

Museums are collecting memorabilia from the Occupy Wall Street protests. 

President Obama is still holding on to donations connected to the bankrupt brokerage firm MF Global.

Councilwoman Melissa Mark-Viverito is a big fan of Assistant Attorney General Thomas E. Perez.

Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told CNN she'd "love do-overs on several things" including the effort to rebuild Iraq and "some of the aspects with our relationship with Mexico."

Newt Gingrich compared his exclusion from the Virginia primary ballot to Pearl Harbor.

Mitt Romney doesn't want to release his tax returns or the names of his bundlers.

Michele Bachmann is going on a 99 county bus tour of Iowa.

Hackers affiliated with Anonymous celebrated Christmas by attacking the security think tank Stratfor.