Free Republic

Congressional Republicans are locked in an internal debate over a difficult dilemma: Is there any way of persuading conservatives they are fighting against Obama’s immigration tyranny with everything they’ve got, without fully using the destructive scorched earth tactics conservatives actually want them to employ against it? This internal tactical struggle — and with it, the broader debate over immigration — are now set to spill over into the GOP presidential primary. Jeb Bush has now come out against the tactics conservatives want — which are favored by Ted Cruz.

For some time, rumors have been circulating as to whether former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush will run for the president in 2016. As Bush further considers the possibility of running, he’s seems to have realized one thing: the current GOP is completely insane. Yesterday, Bush announced a game plan of sorts should he follow through and run for president in 2016, according to The Huffington Post. Bush said a successful candidate must be willing to “lose the primary to win the general.” As strange as the rationale behind that analogy may seem, Bush is saying that a candidate must stick...

Former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida was blunt Monday night: If he runs for president in 2016, he will not pander to his party’s conservative base in the primaries. Mr. Bush said at The Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council in Washington that Republican candidates must be willing to “lose the primary to win the general, without violating your principles.” “It’s not an easy task, to be honest with you,” he added.

Jeb Bush revealed that a decision on his presidential ambitions is coming 'in short order', as he spoke out to condemn President Barack Obama's recent immigration order. The former Florida governor said he will make up his mind based on whether he can 'lift people's spirits and not get sucked into the vortex', and whether 'the sacrifice for my family is tolerable'. He said: 'I'm thinking about running for president. And I'll make up my mind in short order - not that far out in the future.' 'I don't know if I'd be a good candidate or a bad one,'...

Sen. Ted Cruz’s ambitions are clear. He’s a frequent visitor to Iowa and New Hampshire. He’s building a campaign staff. But to make a serious White House bid takes serious money — at least $20 million by the time the first ballots are cast in early 2016. And that could be a challenge. Although the Texas Republican is popular at conservative gatherings, Cruz has shown only modest success as a fundraiser. Like Ron Paul and Sarah Palin, he can probably count on showers of cash from enthusiastic legions of small-dollar donors, and that’s an important start. But many major GOP...

Conservative leaders who had a hand in key Republican victories including Ronald Reagan’s presidency, the Contract with America and the birth of the Tea Party, are ganging up to oppose a Jeb Bush presidential bid, declaring him easier to beat than Bob Dole or John McCain. “Jeb is a very good moderate Democrat,” added top-rated talk radio host Mark Levin. “He's very boring. He doesn't elicit excitement and energy outside a very small circle of wealthy corporatists and GOP Beltway operatives. Time to move on.”

This was not a banner year for youth voter participation. To be fair, off-year elections never are, but this year's mere 12 percent participation rate of voters under 30 is about more than midterm ennui. Rather, it's part of a larger trend of millennial disenchantment with the Washington establishment in both major parties — a trend that is primed to kick into high gear if we have a Bush vs. Clinton contest in 2016. Unfortunately, that contest is not so difficult to imagine. While Jeb Bush, brother of George W. and former governor of Florida, has yet to declare his...

Republican voters nationwide look towards 2012 presidential nominee Mitt Romney to get back in the game for 2016, according to a Quinnipiac University national poll released Wednesday. Voters give the former Massachusetts governor the top rank at 19 percent in an early glimpse of the 2016 presidential race. Romney continues to insist he will not seek the White House for a third time. With Romney out of the race, however, former Gov. Jeb Bush leads with 14 percent, followed by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie at 11 percent. Neurosurgeon Ben Carson, a conservative Tea Party favorite, gets 9 percent, while...

With the GOP poised to take over the Senate and strengthen its control of the House in January, all eyes are now turning to 2016's presidential race. And while Democrats have a single strong contender - paging Hillary Clinton - the Republican side remains up in the air. The Hill recently listed what 16 possible presidential contenders in what one strategist described as the "most open field we've ever seen." Here's the likely contenders in the class of 2016: First String Sen. Rand Paul (Ky.) - One of the most recognizable names in the field, Paul he's comfortable in front...

By the time this piece goes to press, America, for better or worse, will have a newly elected majority of Republicans sitting in the US Senate. Or at least that’s what the smart money, the boys in the back room say about how this 2014 off-year election will go down. So how do they know? Well there are several touchstones to tell us. Litmus paper tests to tell which way the wind will blow, you know? Polls they’re called. The public will. The voters’ choice. And why not? Ain’t that what democracy’s all about? Before the election, pollsters gather information...

With the 2014 election now in the history books, the reality is that the 2016 campaign is upon us. And you can expect Texas to get more time in the spotlight now that the 2016 GOP presidential primary is a main attraction. Four candidates with direct or indirect connections to the Lone Star State are on most early lists of top potential candidates: Gov. Rick Perry, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz and two scions of families with strong Texas ties — U.S. Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, the son of former Texas Congressman (and frequent presidential aspirant) Ron Paul, and...

Will it be Democrats or Republicans who have “national appeal”? Do any of these 13 Republicans have a chance? Jonathan Easley put them out there in an article in The Hill this morning just as the National Politics Examiner published a list of Democrats. See the story link below. Let’s analyze the Easley list. He begins by positioning what are identified as the “big three”: Paul, Christie, and Bush. As porkers go, Paul doesn’t have a chance as Christie and Bush win the weigh in. Bush’s heaviness is as much of a concern as Hillary’s age, maybe. Christie loses on...

*I have previously written several articles about how most Americans are pretty clueless. The results of the last elections showed that. A lot of Americans stayed home, and people from states that depend heavily on government programs, such as food stamps, welfare and social security, elected Republicans — the very people who have said they plan to slash these programs. MIT professor Jonathan Gruber, the architect of Obamacare, caught flak for referring to American voters as stupid, but he is right. Bill Maher, who is known for his biting comedy, recently ran a video montage showing all the times...

Past and perhaps future presidential hopeful Mitt Romney came to Chicago last night and, in blunt and sometimes surprisingly candid comments, acted like someone who probably won't run again but is leaving the door open in the apparent hope that his party might call. In a speech and question-and-answer session with the Chicago/Midwest chapter of the Turnaround Management Association, the man who lost to Chicago's Barack Obama in 2012 says he's "not planning" to seek the 2016 nomination—language that politicians frequently use to suggest they haven't decided but are keeping their options open. The former Massachusetts governor declined to elaborate,...

Jewish life in New York is dominated by ritual. Holidays. A pastrami reuben on a hero at Katz’s. The reading of holy books in cycles that take a year (the Torah) or seven and a half years (the Talmud). And just as reliably, there’s the ritual of presidential candidates sniffing around for dough right after the midterm elections. That last one got going in earnest yesterday and today, with Senator Ted Cruz of Texas making a whirlwind tour of power Jews in New York City. Last night, Mort Klein’s Zionist Organization of America dinner featured Mr. Cruz, known for his...

Peter Wehner made Mark Levin the target of his work at Commentary lately, as an extension of his zeal to cast G. W. Bush as more of a conservative than Reagan was, and  label numerous prominent conservatives as “purists” in desperate need of moderating their tone. Levin, rejecting the notion of being lectured to by a Bush grandee responded, correcting Wehner and calling attention to his aptitude for cherry-picking facts so that he can knock down prominent conservatives, and conservative causes.Peter Wehner arrived in Washington D.C. in 1983, and never left.  He was hired by Bill Bennett as a speechwriter...

Peter Wehner made Mark Levin the target of his work at Commentary lately, as an extension of his zeal to cast G. W. Bush as more of a conservative than Reagan was, and label numerous prominent conservatives as “purists” in desperate need of moderating their tone. Levin, rejecting the notion of being lectured to by a Bush grandee responded, correcting Wehner and calling attention to his aptitude for cherry-picking facts so that he can knock down prominent conservatives, and conservative causes. Peter Wehner arrived in Washington D.C. in 1983, and never left. He was hired by Bill Bennett as a...

President Obama will no doubt clash regularly with his newly empowered partisan adversaries in Congress. But the most important struggle in U.S. politics over the next two years will be inside the Republican Party. And the person who can play a decisive role in that battle is Jeb Bush. Yes, Democrats have their own divides, usually described as differences between their populist and Wall Street camps. Still, there is broad agreement inside the party, even among most of its Wall Streeters, that wage stagnation and economic inequality are major problems for the country and that Democrats need to make dealing...

The “Smithsonian” magazine compiled a list of the “100 most significant Americans,” and to the dismay of his fan base President Obama failed to make the cut. Adding insult to injury, former President George W. Bush made the list. But it gets even better, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin was also included. The liberal website Raw Story bemoaned the very idea that the Smithsonian Institution “decided that George W. Bush is a more ‘significant’ figure in U.S. history” than the exalted one. Curiously, the only redeeming qualification Raw Story named when mentioning Obama is that he was the country’s first...

<p>Who deliberately violated his solemn oath to uphold the Constitution in his insatiable quest to gain political power? Who currently not only advocates voter suppression but engineers it all across the land? Who works hand-in-glove with the Koch brothers to destroy democracy, remaking America into a Third World oligarchy? Who served as the political guru commissioned to deceive the American people into war, engineered stolen national elections, personally selected federal judges who pledged to serve foremost as political hacks, outed a CIA agent whose husband exposed treason committed by the President and his Vice, initiated whispering campaigns based on falsehoods about opponents, and sat in the White House as Chief Political Counsel to George W. Bush?</p>