Free Republic

As I watched Sarah Palin deliver a speech on behalf of Donald Trump the other day before an GOP establishment fundraiser in Wisconsin, I was struck by the enthusiastic response of the crowd. She received a standing ovation at the end. Ted Cruz, who followed her on the dais, received only light and intermittent applause. The contrast in their political skills was stark. Palin was the star who knew how to connect with, and hold, her audience. Cruz, not so much... Let me say at the outset that I am analyzing this from a purely utilitarian and political point of...

Generally speaking, your enemies' actions will tell you who or what they fear. Mitt Romney's windy tirade, on behalf of the Establishment and against Donald Trump, is no different. The Establishment fears Donald Trump and not because he might lose. The Establishment is very adept at losing, having lost the popular vote in five of the last six Presidential elections. No. They are afraid of Donald Trump because they not only believe he might win; the actually believe he WILL win. His victory would end their gravy train and suspend, as well as expose to scrutiny, the rackets they have...

Many pro-lifers find themselves in a dilemma this election season. Whom to trust on the all important issue of the sanctity of human life? It is by now well known that Donald Trump--as a private citizen in 1999--identified himself as pro-choice. As a businessman, he obviously had given the issue little thought, and he evidently defaulted to the prevailing views held by other native New Yorkers on the subject. Ted Cruz, on the other hand, has given many speeches on the subject, maintaining that he is, and always has been, pro-life. But let's go a little deeper. Has Trump done...

Sarah Palin's surprise endorsement of Donald J. Trump in Iowa yesterday has led to inevitable questions about whether Trump had offered, or would offer, her the Vice-Presidential slot on his ticket. Hearing that question put to Trump on TODAY caused me to reflect on perhaps the most consequential, and in my view regrettable, Vice Presidential selection in American political history. In 1980, at the GOP convention in Detroit, Ronald Reagan had secured the votes for a first ballot nomination. His difficulty in settling on a Vice-Presidential choice had led to abortive effort to place Gerald Ford on the ticket and...

Watching the Fox Business News debate last night, in particular Donald Trump's savage rejoinder to Ted Cruz's attack on "New York Values", I was reminded of a debate over twenty five years ago when another young Senator found himself on the receiving end of a similar shiv in the ribs from a more seasoned competitor. In the 1988 Vice Presidential debate, Senator Dan Quayle was attempting to allay fears that he was too young (41) for the job. He compared his level of experience to that of John F. Kennedy at a similar point in their careers. His opponent, Texas...

Wall Street Journal editor William McGurn, a former Bush White House speechwriter, argued in an article Tuesday that Mitt Romney is no worse off now than Ronald Reagan was at this stage of his historic 1980 campaign. He compared these two races and also tried to show that President Barack Obama is the heir to Jimmy Carter. The Romney camp would probably welcome these comparisons — but it’s more a theory in search of facts. There are indeed some similarities, but the differences are far more striking. Both Reagan and Romney did begin as frontrunners, both stumbled. Romney’s outcome is...

Just two days before the Michigan primary, Rick Santorum has gained the momentum going into the Michigan Primary. Two polls sampled voters both last Thursday after the debate and last night (Sunday, February 26), after Romney's disastrous foot in mouth comments over the weekend and his empty stadium appearance. Rasmussen had Obama up 6 Thursday, but now puts him up only 2, a net loss of 4 and in Rasmussen's own words a "dead heat". Mitchell/Rosetta Stone, which had Romney up 36-33 on Thursday, finds an even larger swing, with Romney dropping a point and Santorum gaining 4, a net...

Front-runners Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum are in a virtual tie with the former Massachusetts governor up by just two points as the Michigan Republican Primary race comes down to the wire. The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Likely Republican Primary Voters in Michigan, taken Sunday night, finds Romney will 38% support to Santorum’s 36%. Texas Congressman Ron Paul and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich remain far behind with 11% and 10% of the vote respectively. One percent (1%) likes another candidate in the race, and five percent (5%) remains undecided.

In 2012, a dozen states will decide whether President Obama is elected to a second term. The PurplePoll focuses exclusively on the Purple Electorate - likely voters only in these swing states. Updated regularly throughout the 2012 election cycle, the PurplePoll will follow leading political indicators and track new issues as they emerge. President Obama currently holds leads against the two top candidates in the GOP field. He leads Mitt Romney by 4 points (47% to 43%) and leads Rick Santorum by 2 points (46% to 44%). President Obama’s performance against Romney has been consistent since December, with leads ranging...

Mitt Romney leads in the Arizona Republican presidential primary with 39%. Romney is followed by Rick Santorum with 35%, Newt Gingrich with 11%, and Ron Paul with 9%. In a similar survey conducted February 13-14, 2012, Romney was leading with 38%, followed by Santorum with 31%, Gingrich with 15%, and Paul with 11%. Support for Santorum has increased 4 percentage points since the last survey and support for Romney has increased 1 percentage point. Romney leads Santorum 50% to 29% among likely Republican primary voters saying they have already voted through early voting. Santorum leads Romney 41% to 29% among...

I have watched as the predictable polls have been produced showing Mitt Romney creeping back into the lead in Michigan by the exiguous margin of 1.6% according to the RealClear Politics Average. But is Willard Mitt Romney really ahead or not? No one knows for certain but I have done a little analysis of the polling during this primary season and have come away with several salient factoids. The first is that Romney nearly always overpolls. He was narrowly ahead in Iowa by 1.3% and he lost by .1%. His lead in New Hampshire was 20, while his margin of...

Not even 24 hours passed before the Establishment hive was out in force this morning, after Newt Gingrich's stunning decimation of Mitt Romney in the South Carolina primary. Chris Christie said that Newt has been an embarrassment to the party. His political paramour, Ann Coulter (who endorsed Romney in 2008, then Christie this cycle, and now Romney again...three liberals in a row) deemed him the "least conservative" of the current field and the least electable, among other snarky and degrading comments I will not repeat. Paradoxically, She also repeated the old liberal saw that we need to reach to the...

Sleep makes a difference. Two debates here in New Hampshire proved that can be especially true in politics. In the hours before the ABC News Saturday night debate in Manchester, Rick Santorum criss-crossed southern New Hampshire, holding at least four events in which he spoke or debated with supporters and critics for more than five hours. In his next-to-last event, at a barn in Hollis, he arrived, saw the crowd spilling out of the doors, and spent about 20 minutes talking to the people who couldn't get inside before going in and conducting a 90-minute town hall. It was a...

As a supporter of Sarah Palin before her decision last October 5 not to run for President, I have been casting about for a candidate who might fill the void left by her departure. Last night, I believe Providence answered my prayer with a thunderclap from the Hawkeye state and the emergence of Rick Santorum as the "not-Romney" candidate. Let me say at the outset that I have tremendous respect for Newt Gingrich and I fervently hope that he and Santorum can form some sort of entente cordiale against the common foe....Mitt Romney. Gingrich has already made an overture in...

A former Texas Supreme Court justice whose appointment by Gov. Rick Perry led to accusations of racial pandering was part of a Federal District Court decision Thursday to issue a new voting district map for Texas that will likely overturn the map proposed by the Texas Legislature and is designed to create ethnic voting districts for Latinos. U.S. District Court Judge Xavier Rodriguez joined with another Latino justice from the three-justice federal panel — Clinton-appointee Judge Orlando Garcia — to issue the racially-drawn map, which has not yet been given final approval. Lawyers for the Democrats and Republicans were given...

Last August, I posted a vanity in which I wondered aloud if Rick Perry's record was conservative in any meaningful way. LINKAt that time, I wrote the following: "How would he handle judicial appointments, for example. Bear in mind that in Texas, in contrast to states such as Alaska (where a Commission presents the Governor with three choices from which he or she MUST select a Judge), the Texas Governor has pretty much unfettered control of the appointments process to fill judicial vacancies. In a conservative state like Texas, it would be easy to remake the courts in a conservative...

In her recent interview, Sarah Palin has raised a bit of a kerfuffle among her supporters by referring once again to the "title" thing, as I call it. All she did was pose the question, "Is a title worth it?", and "Will a campaign shackle someone like me from effecting positive change?" She never answered the questions. She articulated some of the arguments against running. She also said she could make a difference without a title. Once again, nothing but a proven historical fact, based upon her ability thus far to drive the political debate and to influence, in a...

It is hard to argue that Sarah Palin's delay in formally announcing her candidacy has been anything other than a smashing success. I have been among a minority who have contended from the outset that Governor Palin's delay in announcing was prudent strategy both for financial as well as political reasons. She has been able to campaign both in Iowa and New Hampshire within the last month, garnering huge amounts of publicity and the largest crowds of the campaign season. Her crony capitalism speech in Indianola on September 3 has driven the debate (as well as the GOP debates) even...

For the past ten years, America has been at war. Over the course of this war, more than 7,000 U.S. and coalition servicemen and women have died in Afghanistan and in Iraq. Still, there is no end in sight. We pour money into these countries, we sacrifice our brave men and women, and yet, progress is slow. Many of the problems we face stem from our leaders’ inability to understand the nature of the present conflict. Like the Cold War, the “war on terror” is primarily a conflict of ideas–a clash of irreconcilable world views. As the limited success we...

As the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 terror attack on our country approaches, every American should pause to reflect upon the cultural and economic transmogrification of our country. Economically, we are distinctly poorer. In 2001, the price of gasoline was $1.52. It remained above $2 for nearly the entire Bush Presidency and has crossed the $4 barrier, remaining stubbornly above $3 for nearly the entire Obama admistration. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, which stood at 11,175 on June 5, 2001, after some wild gyrations, now stands...still...at a dismal 10,992, lower than it was when Bill Clinton left office. George Bush...