Free Republic

By Jake Tapper Nov 21, 2011 Rush Limbaugh Says First Lady Was Booed Partly Because NASCAR Fans Hate Her ‘Uppityism’ On Sunday, First Lady Michelle Obama and Dr. Jill Biden visited Homestead Miami speedway to serve as ceremonial grand marshals of the Ford 400, where some in the crowd booed them. The White House downplayed the incident today, with the First Lady’s communications director Kristina Schake saying only that “Mrs. Obama was proud to join NASCAR in recognizing our nation’s veterans and military families to raise awareness of this important issue for all Americans. As she has always said, she...

Foes of illegal immigration are up in arms over plans for a weekend disaster exercise in western Iowa with a fictitious scenario in which young white supremacists shoot dozens of people amid rising tensions involving racial minorities and illegal immigrants. The exercise is planned for Saturday at Treynor High School in Pottawattamie County and will involve more than 300 people, confirmed Doug Reed, the lead exercise planner for the county's emergency management agency. Some 30 to 40 "victims" will be transported to area hospitals. He said a terrorism scenario is required by federal officials for the exercise to be eligible...

President Obama on Sunday called for gun-rights advocates and proponents of gun control to find common ground two months after the shooting which killed six people and wounded 13 others, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.). The Arizona Daily Star published an op-ed by Obama on Sunday calling for stronger restrictions on gun sales to buyers suspected of mental instability. “A man our Army rejected as unfit for service; a man one of our colleges deemed too unstable for studies; a man apparently bent on violence, was able to walk into a store and buy a gun,” Obama wrote of Jared...

It's been more than two months since the tragedy in Tucson stunned the nation. It was a moment when we came together as one people to mourn and to pray for those we lost. And in the attack's turbulent wake, Americans by and large rightly refrained from finger-pointing, assigning blame or playing politics with other people's pain. But one clear and terrible fact remains. A man our Army rejected as unfit for service; a man one of our colleges deemed too unstable for studies; a man apparently bent on violence, was able to walk into a store and buy a...

“We must seek agreement on gun reforms,” a guest editorial in the Arizona Daily Star by President Barack Obama declares. Snip “I'm willing to bet,” he says, “that responsible, law-abiding gun owners agree that we should be able to keep an irresponsible, law-breaking few - dangerous criminals and fugitives, for example - from getting their hands on a gun in the first place.” If by that he means take people who have been adjudicated menaces to society and segregating them from those they would harm, not many would argue. But that’s not what he means. He wants to end private...

Nothing says “sophisticate” quite like running down the rubes who live in the sticks, does it? After all, Barack Obama got elected after calling rural voters people “bitter” and who only “cling to guns or religion” through ignorance and fear. Via Mary Katharine Ham, John Hickenlooper offers an Obama-esque assessment of the rural and exurban voters in Colorado and assigns to them the same motivations that played into the murder of Matthew Shepard in Wyoming. The money quote occurs at about the two-minute mark in this interview

Memo to those who believe Obama is going to move to the center following his upcoming electoral smack-down: Dream on! Many of you also told us he wouldn't be that liberal in the first instance. Is that egg on your face sticky yet? I'm not denying that Obama might pretend to move to the center on some issues. As an accomplished Alinskyite, he'll do what he has to do to move the socialist football forward. But if he feints to the center, it will not be real. He will not deviate from his relentless quest to advance his leftist agenda....

At a Saturday-evening fundraiser held in the home of a wealthy Massachusetts hospital executive, President Obama suggested Democrats are having difficulties in midterm campaigning because Americans simply aren't thinking clearly. Seeking to explain his party's troubles, the president focused not on controversial legislation like national health care and the stimulus but on evolutionary psychology. "Part of the reason that our politics seems so tough right now, and facts and science and argument do not seem to be winning the day all the time, is because we're hard-wired not to always think clearly when we're scared," Obama told the assembled Democrats,...

The Machine Gun Shoot Competition happened at the Knob Creek Gun Range in Kentucky this weekend in which hundreds of machine gun dealers, owners and enthusiasts showed up to fire four rounds at random appliances and vehicles. The Knob Creek Gun Range websites describes this event with similar giddiness and rhetoric of a 13-year-old at a “Return of the King” premiere, stating: “..The charges are set off by the impact of the bullets. Creating large and small mushroom clouds and fire balls from hell!” It’s true. Astute men, women and judging from the FAQ sheet on their website inquiring what...

State Senate now to consider proposals to stop companies from hiring illegal immigrant workers.Companies employing illegal immigrants could lose government contracts or licenses if they continue to employ those workers under two bills pending in the state Legislature. The state House of Representative Tuesday passed the Industry Employment Verification Act and an employment verification amendment to the state law. The bills are now being sent to the state Senate for debate. The bills require construction companies, contractors and subcontractors providing goods or services to state agencies to use a free Internet-based employment verification system operated by the U.S. Department of...

Democrats had a very good night on Tuesday, dampening, at least for now, Republican boasts about taking back control of the House. Democrat Mark Critz, a longtime congressional aide, held the Pennsylvania House seat of his former boss, the late and legendary logrolling politician John Murtha, calling into question GOP claims that Republicans would sweep blue-collar swing districts in key states across the country and return the party to power. Building on this momentum, Democratic leaders showed off the balding, bureaucratic-looking Critz to their caucus Thursday morning, displaying him like a conquering hero even though he ran as a pro-life,...

What should we make of a recent editorial arguing that the Obama White House has made no attempt to infringe upon the Second Amendment and that Obama openly declared his respect for the right to bear arms during his presidential campaign? It's true that President Obama hasn't advanced the gun control agenda. He hasn't even sought a renewed ban on "assault" weapons. However, the idea that President Obama has more in common with Wayne LaPierre than with Sarah Brady is misleading. Remember the "bitter clingers" comment? Therefore, if eternal vigilance is freedom's price, then complacency must be its worst enemy....

Populist or professor? Contrite or uncompromising? President Obama will have a chance Wednesday to reintroduce himself to the nation when he delivers his first official State of the Union address before a joint session of Congress. The prime-time speech, which will be aired on all major TV networks and cable stations, could hardly come at a more critical time for a president grappling with double-digit unemployment, sinking poll numbers and the possible collapse of his top domestic policy priority, an overhaul of the nation's health-care system. "As often as the president has spoken over the past year, critics on the...

Amidst the innumerable excuses we're bound to hear for tonight's Massachusetts election results, credit Keith Olbermann with likely the most loathsome. The Countdown host would explain things away by accusing Brown supporters of . . . racism. [H/t reader Will H.] Olbermann floated his despicable theory to Howard Fineman: "the Republicans and the Tea Partiers will tell you what happens with Scott Brown tonight whether he wins or comes close is a repudiation of Obama policies. And surely one of Obama's policies from the viewpoint of his opponents is it's OK to have this sea-change in American history—to have an...

The truth finally outs. The Democratic Party has tipped so thoroughly into paranoid-lunatic territory they can no longer hide it. Scott Brown says it's "him vs. the Machine". Over the last 10 days, that's changed. It's now "The Machine vs. The People". Keith Olberman says Scott Brown is "an irresponsible, reactionary, homophobic, racist" teabagger. John Kerry says Brown's supporters are "dangerous" and "violent". Countless other Dems parade before the cameras to tell us repeatedly how we-the-people are simply too stupid to understand their magnificent health care reform. It used to be they reserved such disdain for Southern "rednecks" (God, Guns,...

I have just noticed that YouTube has pulled several Obama videos that I had saved in my playlist. For example...(from the remaining data that was left with the video pulled) Sen. Barack Hussein Obama attacks small-town Americans during a fundraiser in left-wing San Fransisco. We'll analyze his offensive remarks. (This is where he is calling us bitter, gun/religion clingers, etc.) Audio of Michelle Obama using the term "My Baby's Daddy" Barack Obama. This was in 2004 when Barack was running for Senator. ...and others that were not parodies but actual audio/video of his remarks... So this prompts me to ask...is...

Though you might not be able to run away from your problems, moving to another state could be good for the soul. New research suggests U.S. states with wealthier, better educated and more tolerant residents are also happier on average. The reasoning is that wealthy states can provide infrastructure and so it's easier for residents to get their needs met. In addition, states with a greater proportion of artists and gays would also be places where residents can freely express themselves.

Where exactly does “The South” begin, anyway? At Harpers Ferry? Just left of Philadelphia? What is the crossroads that divides “Southerners” from the rest of us, those of us in the East, Midwest, Southwest and West who don’t talk with corn in our mouths? Somebody please buy Ohio Sen. George Voinovich a ticket to the real South, preferably on a slow-moving train, so he can observe the country he helps govern. Last month, Voinovich charged that Southerners are what’s wrong with the Republican Party. “We got too many Jim DeMints and Tom Coburns,” he told the Columbus Dispatch, talking about...

Scary how a lot of bitter McCain backers oppose Obama at every turn Comments BY Opening shot . . . At any given moment, 40 percent of Americans are dead wrong. Four out of 10 colonists would have happily remained under British rule -- some even fought on the side of the Redcoats. Forty percent of the country -- if not more -- were content with the Nazis overrunning Europe and would have never considered taking up arms against Hitler had not the Japanese attacked us and the Germans -- unwisely, as it turned out -- joined them in declaring...

My 2nd great-grandfather was a Civil War Soldier. Grandpa LuckyBogey, Sr., and his two brothers are listed in the muster roll of Company B, 49th Regiment, Georgia Volunteer Infantry, Army of Northern Virginia, C.S.A. of Telfair County, Georgia, known as the Telfair Volunteers. 4th Sergeant LuckyBogey, Sr. was wounded and captured at Petersburg, Va. in April 1865. Grandpa Luckybogey , Sr. escaped from Jackson Hospital in Richmond the next day and as General Lee surrendered, Grandpa LuckyBogey, Sr., , on his own, made his way back home to Georgia. See the History of the 49th Regiment and the 35th Georgia...

WASHINGTON -- Southern writer Walker Percy liked to poke fun at Ohioans in his novels, just to even things out a bit. "Usually Mississippians and Georgians are getting it from everybody, and Alabamians," he once explained to an interviewer. "So, what's wrong with making smart-aleck remarks about Ohio? Nobody puts Ohio down. Why shouldn't I put Ohio down?" Percy, the genial genius, laughed at his own remark. Now, apparently, it's the Buckeye State's turn to poke back. In a fusillade of pique, Ohio Sen. George Voinovich charged that Southerners are what's wrong with the Republican Party. "We got too many...

...In a fusillade of pique, Ohio Sen. George Voinovich charged that Southerners are what's wrong with the Republican Party... Alas, Voinovich was not entirely wrong...

Senator Voinvich claims Ohioans can't relate to pro-gun Republicans from the South printable page Submitted by cbaus on Wed, 07/29/2009 - 00:10. Ohio Politics National Politics Guns in the News Gun Grabbers By Chad D. Baus One week after ignoring thousands of phone calls from his constituents and helping a Democrat filibuster kill nationwide CCW reciprocity, Republican Senator George Voinovich of Ohio told editors at the Columbus Dispatch he knows what the Republican party's biggest problem is. According to the anti-gun Senator, who has decided to retire after recognizing a 2010 re-election bid would meet the same fate as anti-gun...

Ohio Senator George Voinovich says that the GOP is "being taken over by southerners," the Columbus Dispatch reports. In an interview with with the paper, Voinovich said shrinking demographics and southern senators are alienating his conservative constituents. He cites Republican Senators Jim DeMint and Tom Coburn as the GOP's biggest problem. "We got too many Jim DeMints (R-S.C.) and Tom Coburns (R-Ok.). It's the southerners. They get on TV and go 'errrr, errrrr.' People hear them and say, 'These people, they're southerners. The party's being taken over by southerners. What they hell they got to do with Ohio?'," Voinovich said....

Here is information on the VA Bus Tour to OPPOSE Socialized Medicine: Tuesday, July 28, 2009 7:00 pm Bristol Event Cumberland Square Park 497 Cumberland St Bristol, VA 24201-4394 Wednesday, July 29, 2009 9:00 am Gate City Event Town hall 156 E Jackson St, Gate City, VA Local Phone: (276) 386-3831 11:30 am Norton Event Norton City Hall 618 Virginia Ave NW Norton, VA 24273-1915 Local Phone: 276-679-1160 3:00 pm Grundy Event Courthouse 1012 Walnut Street Grundy, VA 24614 Local Phone: Circuit Court Clerk’s Office (276-935-6500) 5:00 pm Tazewell Event Courthouse 101 East Main Street Tazewell, VA Thursday, July 30,...

One week after ignoring thousands of phone calls from his constituents and helping a Democrat filibuster kill nationwide CCW reciprocity, Republican Senator George Voinovich of Ohio told editors at the Columbus Dispatch he knows what the Republican party's biggest problem is. According to the anti-gun Senator, who has decided to retire after recognizing a 2010 re-election bid would meet the same fate as anti-gun Mike DeWine's did in 2006, Ohioans just can't relate to pro-gun Republicans from the South. On Monday, Voinovich told Dispatch editors "We got too many Jim DeMints (R-S.C.) and Tom Coburns (R-Okla.). It's the Southerners. They...

THE WHITE HOUSE Office of the Press Secretary _______________________________________________________________________________________ FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE JUNE 30, 2009 President Obama Announces Rural Tour with Cabinet Secretaries and Administration Officials WASHINGTON D.C. – Today, President Obama announced the launch of his Administration’s Rural Tour. This summer, over the course of the next few weeks and months, top Administration officials, including Cabinet Secretaries, will fan out across the nation to hold a series of discussions on how communities, states, and the federal government can work together to help strengthen rural America. Vice President Joe Biden and Secretaries Gary Locke and Tom Vilsack will kick-off the...

People on the government’s terrorist watch list tried to buy guns nearly 1,000 times in the last five years, and federal authorities cleared the purchases 9 times out of 10 because they had no legal way to stop them, according to a new government report. In one case, a person on the list was able to buy more than 50 pounds of explosives. The new statistics, compiled in a report from the Government Accountability Office that is scheduled for public release next week, draw attention to an odd divergence in federal law: people placed on the government’s terrorist watch list...

·11250 Waples Mill Road ·   Fairfax, Virginia 22030    ·800-392-8683   New York: Micro-Stamping Bill To Be Heard In Senate Codes Committee Tomorrow!   Monday, June 01, 2009   Contact Your State Senator Immediately!Senate Bill 4397, sponsored by State Senator Eric Schneiderman (D-31), is a bill that would ban the sale of all semi-automatic handguns not equipped with micro-stamping technology.Micro-stamping is an unproven technology that would require unique identifying information from the firearm, including the make, model, and serial number to be etched into the firing pin and breech face in such a manner that those identifiers are imprinted on the cartridge...

As President Obama indicated during the campaign, there are just a few gun-related changes that we would like to make, and among them would be to reinstitute the ban on the sale of assault weapons," Holder told reporters. I think closing the gun show loophole, the banning of cop-killer bullets and I also think that making the assault weapons ban permanent, would be something that would be permitted under Heller," Holder said, referring to the Supreme Court ruling in Washington, D.C. v. Heller, which asserted the Second Amendment as an individual's right to own a weapon.

His choice of Eric Holder to be attorney general bolsters that distrust. Like Obama, Holder is a gun-control zealot —typical of the loony, anti-freedom wing of the Democratic Party. Do not believe the president’s thinly veiled statements about supporting an individual’s right to own guns. Rather, review these men’s previous, career-long, freedom-restricting, gun-grabbing statements.

Incoming U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., takes office today amid criticism from gun control supporters, who say they are troubled by the National Rifle Association's endorsement and a stance favoring what she has called "hunters' rights." During two years in the House, Gillibrand has built only a short record on gun issues, but each of the votes placed her squarely on the side of gun rights. Those votes dovetail with her campaign rhetoric, including proclamations last year that she is "a strong supporter of the Second Amendment" and "will continue to oppose legislation that will restrict the rights of responsible...

HOLDER:...I think you had asked me earlier about the regulations that I thought might still exist, post-Heller. And I had mentioned, I think, closing the gun show loophole, the banning of cop-killer bullets and I also think that making the assault weapons ban permanent would be something that would be permitted under Heller, and I also think would be good for my law enforcement perspective.

No sane person wants innocent people victimized, maimed, or murdered, nor to see the perpetrators escape justice. This is true, whether the perpetrators use their hands or objects — like baseball bats, rocks, knives, vehicles, or a host of other readily available inanimate objects of endless variety — or a firearm. It is the intent and the will of the criminals, and not the inanimate objects they use, that are responsible for the criminal acts and the harm done to victims. From the dawn of man, violent acts have been a sad aspect of life in nearly every civilization and...

The grassroots community organization, ACORN, is fighting for a new law it says will save lives. "Stop the Bullet" is a campaign that would make it harder for felons to buy ammunition from stores. When you buy a gun, gun shops have to run a background check first to make sure you're not a convicted felon. Although it is also illegal for convicted felons to buy bullets, a background check is not required. As it stands now, gun shops aren't required to ask any questions before selling bullets, as long as the buyer is 18 and can present identification. Community...

"Once people started to realize that the Democrats had a better chance, or seemed to have a better chance, they started getting nervous about certain gun regulations," said Illinois Gun Works' Owner Dan Mastrianni. Recent gun sales are up nationally 42 percent. In Illinois, they are up 38 percent; and in Chicago's suburbs 50 percent.

Charlene Fernandez, chairwoman of the Yuma County Democrat Party, stated in a front page article ("Gun Sales On Rise," Nov. 18) that she doesn't understand why people have always associated the Democratic Party with the loss of gun rights. The answer to that is very simple: The Democratic Party has always been at the forefront in attempting to disarm the American populace since the late 1960s. A perfect example of this is the Gun Control Act of 1968. It accomplished the following: Congress set up a massive new bureaucratic scheme run by the U.S. Department of the Treasury to regulate...

Threats against a new president historically spike right after an election, but from Maine to Idaho law enforcement officials are seeing more against Barack Obama than ever before. The Secret Service would not comment or provide the number of cases they are investigating. But since the Nov. 4 election, law enforcement officials have seen more potentially threatening writings, Internet postings and other activity directed at Obama than has been seen with any past president-elect, said officials aware of the situation who spoke on condition of anonymity because the issue of a president's security is so sensitive.

Business is booming for local gun dealers. Propelled by concerns over the election of Barack Obama and Democratic control of the U.S. House and Senate, guns are flying off the shelf at a record rate, said Craig Ball, manager of Impact Guns, 2710 S. 1900 West. "We're selling every one we can get, and it's not just here, it's all over the country," he said. "We've had standing orders for these for months, and right now all the distributors nationwide are out. Everyone's snapping them (guns) up." Ball said Wednesday was the busiest day he's ever seen at the Ogden...

WASHINGTON -- If you're a Democrat who needs help getting the votes of rural white folks, the go-to guy is David "Mudcat" Saunders, a central-casting political consultant recently made famous by a parade of magazine writers led by The Weekly Standard's Matt Labash. But sometimes you can learn more about a people and their place through literature than by hiring consultants. So I called Ron Rash, poet, author and purebred Appalachian whose newest novel, "Serena," should be at the top of Barack Obama's reading list. Sarah Palin might enjoy it as well. Described by one blurber as "an Appalachian retelling...

NEW HOLLAND, Ohio -- Joshua Rea, 30, heard the news while having a bite at CC's White Cottage restaurant. "This is crazy, man," he said incredulously, reaching for a phone to call his dad. "Obama's ancestors lived right down the road," he told his father, a local farmer. "Our ancestors were probably kicking it with his ancestors." Here in rural Pickaway County, 30 minutes south of Columbus, word is spreading that a pair of U.S. Sen. Barack Obama's ancestors are buried just a few miles away and that the Democratic nominee has loads of distant relatives living in southern Ohio....

Barack Obama leads John McCain by five percentage points in Pennsylvania for the second month in a row. Both candidates have lost some support from a month ago, with the Democrat now favored by 45% while his Republican opponent earns the vote from 40%. When “leaners” are included, Obama’s lead is down to just three points, 48% to 45%. A month ago, Obama led by six when leaners were included. The data in Pennsylvania reflects patterns seen elsewhere in recent polling. McCain has more support from Republicans than Obama does from Democrats, and McCain also wins more crossover votes from...