Free Republic

Who wants to be a millionaire? With Barack Obama in the White House — nobody. He has declared the hard-working and successful America’s Enemy No. 1. “Tax the rich to grow the economy” was USA Today’s headline on the president’s “Buffett Rule” speech. His premise isn’t merely that wealthy people aren’t “paying their fair share,” but rather that not shaking them down for more money is somehow keeping you from finding a better job. “What drags down our entire economy is the growing gap between the ultra-rich and everyone else,” Obama said yesterday. The president is right about one thing:...

“I am extremely encouraged by today’s announcement that we added 15,400 jobs in Massachusetts last month.” So said Gov. Deval Patrick of February’s job numbers, which he called “another positive sign that our strategy for growing jobs. . . is working.” Only one problem: That was February of 2011. In March of 2012, we have the real numbers. And it turns out that the Patrick administration’s job claims have been about as dependable as Tim Murray’s driving record. According to the Patrick administration’s previous calculations, the state added 40,700 jobs. In fact, it added just 12,200 jobs last year — 70 percent fewer...

If the first iPad, released in April 2010, were a government program, it would be the most successful Washington initiative in history. Apple has sold more than 50 million iPads so far, and they are expected to sell another 50 million this year alone. Their nearest competitor, Samsung, is expected to sell just 8 million. In fact, 83 percent of all tablet users in the United States had iPads last year, according to a Wall Street Journal report. The astonishing success of the iPad has helped make Apple the most valuable company in the world. And what is Apple doing...

If the first iPad, released in April 2010, were a government program, it would be the most successful Washington initiative in history. Apple has sold more than 50 million iPads so far, and they are expected to sell another 50 million this year alone. Their nearest competitor, Samsung, is expected to sell just 8 million. In fact, 83 percent of all tablet users in the United States had iPads last year, according to a Wall Street Journal report. The astonishing success of the iPad has helped make Apple the most valuable company in the world. And what is Apple doing...

So tell me again why the pope has to pay for Sandra FlukeÂ’s birth control? Now that Rush Limbaugh has reminded the world heÂ’s a tired old crank, and now that MSNBC has elevated Fluke to sainthood for bravely appearing before a group of fawning congressional Democrats, can we get back to the actual issue? IÂ’d certainly like to, and so would the Catholic church. Democrats? Not so much. Forget about Rush and Sandra for a second, and think about what itÂ’s like to be a practicing Catholic in America under Barack Obama. For years, Catholic institutions were free to...

I am the 50.5 percent. I am, according to the Heritage Foundation, part of the lucky half of Americans who pay federal income taxes, so that the other half (technically the remaining 49.5 percent) can pay nothing. Half of us are paying the whole bill. Somehow that doesn’t seem fair. Folks like Elizabeth Warren and President Barack Obama agree. They think we should pay more. We’re used to that, we 50.5 percenters. Every time a new “stimulus” is announced, every time a new government program to solve all our problems is rolled out, we know that a) the problems aren’t...

Who’s Mitt Romney hiring as his top advisers — Hugo Chavez and Kim Jong Un? According to NBC’s Andrea Mitchell, a “top Romney adviser” says that if Mitt loses Florida on Tuesday, “we’re going to have to try to reinvent the smoke-filled room which has been democratized by all these primaries and come up with someone as an alternative to Newt Gingrich.” Finally — a Republican campaigning against the scourge of democracy! First we’ll go back to the good old days of the “smoke-filled room,” then we’ll bring back Prohibition and get rid of women’s suffrage, too! Personally I can’t...

Official “No Name-Calling Day” in Massachusetts? What [CENSORED] came up with that brilliant idea? Massachusetts politicians, of course. In accordance with the ridiculous and over-reaching 2010 “anti-bullying” law, Gov. Deval Patrick has declared today “No Name-Calling Day” in schools, urging students to wear black as a sign of their commitment to “Black Out Bullying.” Does anyone really believe a politician can stop school kids from calling each other [EDITED]? Or [EDITED] or even [CURRENTLY BEING INVESTIGATED AS A HATE CRIME]? Now seeing our public schools engaged in inept efforts that produce few worthwhile results is nothing new. (In most American...

Here’s the final outcome of the Anthony McKay case: If you defend your family and property from a knife-wielding druggie in Massachusetts, you’d better be prepared to also defend yourself from the justice system, too. McKay is the young father who, seeing a local druggie breaking into his truck and stealing the tools he uses to pay the bills, confronted him, subdued him and held him for the police. When the police arrived, they found the bad guy had a knife, a billy club and — thanks to the unarmed McKay — a broken jaw. Instead of thanking McKay for...

Dear Mitt Romney Sellouts: I’m ready to sell out, too. Like you, I’m ready to abandon my conservative principles, ignore Mitt’s big-government legacy and his obvious disdain for the right — if it means a guaranteed winner in November. But before I lift my conservative skirts for another H.W. Bush/Dole/McCain moderate because I’m supposed to suck it up and “back a winner,” is it asking too much to expect the guy to, you know, win something first? I get politics. I used to run campaigns. In fact, I ran a GOP primary in South Carolina against Strom Thurmond. Not only...

This Christmas marks the 65th anniversary of “It’s A Wonderful Life,” one of the most beloved holiday movies ever made. And one of the very worst. I know, I know. Admitting you aren’t charmed by the story of George Bailey and Zuzu’s petals is like admitting you spend your spare time kicking puppies, but sorry. The fact is, “It’s A Wonderful Life” is a movie that only an Occupod could love. The story is sweet, but the message is truly awful. Consider George Bailey. In your mind, you see him after a lifetime of poverty, grief and bad luck, running...

Ready for your Massachusetts IQ test? Which sounds smarter to you: A) Building a pipeline to bring oil from Canada, or B) Continuing to import oil from terror-sponsoring nations like Saudi Arabia. A) Killing jobs in the middle of a recession, or B) Putting 20,000 blue-collar American workers to work. Running for U.S. Senate as, A) The candidate in favor of American jobs and energy independence, or B) As the candidate who opposes them. If you picked A on all of the above, congratulations. You’re smarter than a Harvard professor! And her supporters. Yesterday afternoon, while you were at the...

Dear Massachusetts Moms and Dads: When your kids come home from college this Christmas season and you’re gathered around the tree in the warm glow of an open fire, take a moment to lean over, put your arm around them and ask: “What the hell are you thinking!?” It’s called the “Higher Ed Bubble,” and it’s about to burst. For years the costs of college have been rising much faster than the rate of inflation while the vast increase in the number of degrees — particularly low-brain-wattage bachelor of arts degrees — has lowered their marketplace value. As a result,...

OK, so a Rhode Island governor who won’t call it a “Christmas” tree? Dumb, but I get it. A Virginia courthouse where Santa’s been banned? I get that, too. But when the guy who won’t say “Merry Christmas” is Santa Claus, you know you’ve crossed the line into utter PC insanity. Or the border into Massachusetts. Same thing. On Sunday evening, my kids and I dropped into the Friendly’s in Sudbury for a post-Christmas-shopping-day treat. They got ice cream decorated with smiley-faces, and I got a few minutes of blessed relief from “Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer” blasting...

They refuse to get their kids vaccinated, they are suspicious of fluoridated water and their kids are more likely to be inflicted with ringworm than the average American. Trailer park rednecks? Nope. America’s bobo elites. Scratch a liberal suburbanite and you’re likely to find the modern equivalent of an Appalachian clay chewer underneath. This week Fox 25 interviewed Natalie Norton of the Boston YMCA about “the recent resurgence of measles and whooping cough.” Yesterday CBS reported a whooping cough outbreak on Long Island, in the environs of the Hamptons. And on Tuesday the University of California at Berkeley alerted all...

No, Dean Nelson, it’s not about free speech. It’s about fundamental decency. That was the point attorney Robert Roughsedge was making Monday when he resigned from a job as adjunct professor at Suffolk University Law School. “(Suffolk Law) Professor Avery has engaged in hate speech against a class of citizens who ironically do not enjoy the same First Amendment rights. Members serving in the U.S. military,” Roughsedge wrote to Suffolk Law Dean Camille Nelson. He should know. He sent his resignation letter from Kabul, where he’s better known as Maj. Bob Roughsedge of the Army Reserves. And he resigned not...

In life, the three big lies are “The check’s in the mail,” “The car was fine when I parked it” and “Honey, I swear I don’t know whose thong that is in the glove box.” In this political moment, the three big lies are “Social Security is solvent,” “Everyone should go to college,” and “Honey, I swear I don’t know whose thong that is in Herman Cain’s glove box.” Setting aside the Social Security issue and Herman’s possibly “Cain-al” knowledge of a lady, who is foolish enough to believe everyone belongs in college? “We should be doing everything we can...

“We are the 99 percent that will no longer tolerate the greed and corruption of the 1 percent.” — Occupy Wall Street Web site. In the struggle between “Occupation” and “Jobs,” I’m firmly on the side of “Jobs.” Steve Jobs. God’s sense of irony was on full display last week when the death of the world’s most famous college dropout pushed America’s ungrateful grads off the front page. And the best part? Nearly every one of those BU boneheads and Northeastern nutjobs owns an iPhone. By any measure Steve Jobs was part of the evil, greedy “1 percent” the Occupods...

“Thank God” is right. Finally the Massachusetts Senate race is starting to get interesting. No, not the primary — that’s over and done. Obedient Massachusetts Democrats will do as they’re told and nominate the party bosses’ pick, Harvard Law professor Elizabeth Warren. I’m talking about the battle royale, Scott Brown vs. Elizabeth Warren which has turned, literally, into a “beauty contest.” It began at Tuesday night’s Boston Herald debate when Warren was asked how she paid for college. In reference to Brown posing for Cosmo, Warren quipped, “I kept my clothes on.” Gales of hearty liberal laughter ensued. Then, yesterday...

Attention, Boston: The Occupiers want YOU — to do their laundry. The Occupation movement featured an online posting on Monday requesting “volunteers” to come to the New York City campsite, pick up the protesters’ laundry, “take it to their home to get it clean and bring it back.” You know — just like Mom? Has there ever been such a collection of mewling, puking overgrown babies as the clueless college brats of the “Occupation” — a particularly ironic phrase given how few of these oafs actually have one. Ask them what they’re protesting and, according to The New York Times...