Free Republic

The government's newest great idea to save us all from ourselves is to put billboard sized photos of cancer victims on packs of cigarettes. Big pictures of guys with holes in their necks, lungs blackened, maybe even the occasional really yellow teeth, or perhaps the severely calloused thumb of a smoker who was constantly flicking his Bic will assault our eyes when we go to buy our smokes. Whatever. But does anyone really care about people that have damaged themselves for smoking? Not really. In fact, the logical reaction is to shrug one's shoulders in a too-bad-for-you-pal way and move...

Rod Blagojevich is saying he fully intends to bring Rahm Emanuel into court as a witness in the next phase of his corruption trial. "Rahm is going to be a central witness in this case for us," Blago told Fox News Chanel commentator Geraldo Rivera. Geraldo wondered if this would be a major distraction for Rahm Emanuel next year as he runs for mayor as the second Blago trial will be occurring at the same time as the mayoral contest. This is one thing that could portend trouble for an Emanuel run for City Hall. Of course, Emanuel has to...

The wild-eyed, conspiro-nuts of the far left have been waxing goofy over claims that there simply must be a vast right wing conspiracy because Palin moppet Bristol Palin continues to scoot by ad stay on the Dancing With the Stars show. Well, now I'd guess they have a new conspiracy to launch: the New Oxford American Dictionary has just named "refudiate" its word of the year. The left is all ready to call in Jesse Ventura and his TV crew of Conspiracy Theory on this one. After all, it must be a vast right-wing conspiracy if a real-life dictionary is...

Everywhere you turn the Transportation Safety Administration (TSA) is getting lambasted. If it isn't people refusing to abide by TSA directions, it's stories of a "backlash against body scanners" because of the abusive treatment that TSA employees are doling out to travelers. People are becoming fed up with the whole edifice. But imagine how much worse this situation will get if the TSA is allowed to unionize? Well, if Obama has his way this is exactly what will happen. Evidence his Federal Labor Relations Authority ruled last Friday that the TSA could, indeed, vote on union representation. This decision opens...

111 companies and organizations were granted waivers by Obama's Dept. of Health and Human Services so that they could get out of having to comply with Obamacare and unions were particularly well rewarded by the HHS with these waivers. Interestingly, there was no great announcement of these waivers issued to the press. The HHS buried the waiver announcement six layers deep on its webpage and posted them on Friday when they imagined no one would notice. It's a typical Friday evening document dump so common when an administration wants to avoid the prying eyes of the people. So much for...