Free Republic

In what the GOP is billing as a cost-cutting move, the House will vote next week on legislation that would end public financing of presidential campaigns and national party conventions. The program, which Congress enacted during the aftermath of Watergate, is funded via voluntary taxpayer contributions of $3 a year when they file their federal income taxes."Eliminating the program all together would save taxpayers $520 million over ten years and would require candidates and political parties to rely on private donations rather than tax dollars," according to House Majority Leader Eric Cantor's office, which announced the move on its website...

Incoming Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has tapped Rep. Jo Bonner (R-Ala.) to be chairman of the ethics committee in the GOP-led House. In his announcement, Boehner said Bonner is “widely respected” on both sides of the aisle and has a “deep appreciation for the importance of both ethics education and enforcement in the House.” “The American people have every right to expect the highest standards of ethical conduct from their elected leaders, and it is important for members of both the majority and the minority to work together to ensure that such standards are observed and respected at all times...

Two new rules will give Constitution a starring role in GOP-controlled HouseBy Philip Rucker and Krissah Thompson Washington Post Staff Writers Wednesday, December 29, 2010; 4:53 PM When Republicans take over next week, they will do something that apparently has never been done before in the 221-year history of the House of Representatives. They will read the Constitution aloud. And then they will require that every new bill contain a statement by the legislator who wrote it citing the constitutional authority to enact the proposed law. Call it the tea party-ization of Congress. "It appears that the Republicans have been...

A new Congress begins two weeks from today, and if the American people sense that change is coming, they’re right. We got a preview last week when the president signed a bill that extends current income-tax rates for the next two years. After insisting for the past two years that the best way to help the economy was to send trillions of dollars to bureaucrats in Washington, here was the president praising a tax cut that, as he put it, would help business owners “take the reins of the recovery and propel the economy forward.”

Republicans may have made major gains in the November elections, but they have yet to win the hearts and minds of the American people, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

If the assignment of House committee chairs provided a letdown to Tea Party activists, especially on Appropriations with Hal Rogers, the assignment of newly-open seats on critical committees looks more like a win. Twenty-two freshmen Representatives have won seats on Appropriations, Ways and Means, Energy and Commerce, and Financial Services, and most of those won their elections with heavy Tea Party backing: Most of the 22 House Republican freshmen-to-be selected to sit on much-coveted, A-list committees won their races with Tea Party backing.The House Republican Steering Committee last week added the incoming members to the rosters of four powerful committees:...

Republicans who captured the House last month in part on the strength of a promise to rein in government spending have tapped a veteran lawmaker known as the "prince of pork" to head the powerful House Appropriations Committee. And the decision's not sitting so well among some conservatives. Rep. Harold "Hal" Rogers, who earned the "pork" nickname by steering hundreds of millions of federal dollars to projects in his rural district in Kentucky over a 30-year career in Congress, will chair the 60-member Appropriations Committee, the panel responsible for disbursing more than $1 trillion in non-entitlement-program dollars every year. Rogers...

House Majority Leader-designate Eric Cantor (R-Va.) said Monday that Republicans will not be seeking to completely scrap the healthcare reform law. Cantor said there are certain elements of current law that will be included in the GOP plan, which he said will move simultaneously with a repeal measure through the House. Provisions that Republicans will seek to retain include the barring of insurance companies from refusing coverage to patients with a pre-existing condition and allowing young people to stay on their parents' insurance plans until age 26. Speaking to more than 100 students at a town hall event at American...

Presumptive House Speaker John Boehner says he will use commercial flights to and from House duties in Washington from his home District instead of the USAF executive jet aircraft Nancy Pelosi used. Introduced as a security measure following September 11, Nancy has a history in this area, using these top of the line C-37A (Gulfstream V) as her own private air force, and it's good to see the new Speaker allowing the Air Force to get back to its core duties. We have added a slideshow facility to this Post to show images of the aircraft and the hardships Nancy...

Republicans were cast into the wilderness beginning in 2006 because they abandoned a basic set of principles – not just their own principles, but those of the nation they were entrusted to lead. Rather than standing up for American freedoms and free markets, the GOP instead became the party of big government and corruption – enabling Democrats to sweep into power promising to “drain the swamp” and usher in an era of “hope and change.” Obviously lurking beneath these rhetorical flourishes was a radical socialist agenda – one that has exploded our debt, derailed our economy and eroded our individual...

eedom is in crisis and in danger of disappearing along with all of its benefits. America had traveled so far and for so long down the ‘Road to Serfdom' that we have nearly lost sight of how far off the tracks we have strayed from our founding principles. Our current understanding of the Constitution resembles more the cradle to grave paternalism of Marx than freedom through personal responsibility that our Founders designed. This misunderstanding of our Constitutional Republic extends beyond the unwashed masses and well into the heart of the professional politician and bureaucrats within the federal government itself. It...

Welcome to all Republican Freshmen and congratulations! Congratulations to all of you for your contribution to this historic election, and for the contributions I am certain you will make to our country in the next two years. Your victory was hard fought, and the success belongs entirely to you and the staff and volunteers who spent countless hours working for this chance to put government back on the side of the people. Now you will come to Washington to serve your nation and leave your mark on history by reining in government spending, preserving our freedoms at home, and restoring...