Free Republic

Money line: “This is what I do for a living.” Didn’t he predict a Bush/Clinton race in 2016 just nine months ago? If he believes what he says here about the parties swinging like “pendulums” from moderate nominees to ideologues and then back again, why would he have named Jeb as a strong contender last November? In fact, the roots of the counterargument are in Matthews’s own shpiel here: Most of the time, they head to the center. This is what Republicans did most successfully in 1952 – when, after twenty years of Roosevelt and Harry Truman – they wanted...

Cindy Sheehan is running for Governor of California. Her formal announcement will be made in a few weeks, but the campaign team is being put together now. A very few of the specialized positions may be compensated, but basically everyone involved in the campaign will be donating their labor. Can you help? If you can write, edit, speak to people on the telephone, participate in social media activities, register voters, pass out leaflets, raise money, or organize campaign coffees, here is what you need to do to get involved in Cindy’s campaign: Send a message, with your full contact information...

A leading House Democrat questioned Friday whether the Justice Department (DOJ) has the evidence to mount a civil rights case against George Zimmerman, the man acquitted of killing an unarmed black teenager in Florida. Rep. Henry Waxman (Calif.), the top Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee, said in a television interview that "it seems unlikely" Attorney General Eric Holder would file discrimination charges against Zimmerman. The killing of Trayvon Martin and Zimmerman's subsequent acquittal have sparked demonstrations around the country. Protests were scheduled nationwide on Saturday as disappointed court-watchers urged DOJ to pursue charges against Zimmerman. Waxman's comments put...

State Sen. Mimi Walters announced Tuesday that she plans to run for the 45th Congressional District seat retiring U.S. Rep. John Campbell (R-Irvine) will vacate next year. Walters, a Republican, currently represents the 37th District in the California Senate. The district includes Costa Mesa, Newport Beach, Irvine and portions of Huntington Beach and Laguna Beach. "John Campbell has served the people of Orange County, California and the United States with distinction and with a commitment to a firm set of principles," Walters said in a prepared statement. "He will leave behind some big shoes to fill. In Congress, I will...

Homelessness jumped 16 percent in the last two years in Los Angeles County. There are 58,423 homeless people in Los Angeles, which rose from 50,214 in 2011, according to a report by the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority. “Over the past year, we’ve seen a significant reduction in federal resources available to fight homelessness,” said LAHSA executive director Michael Arnold. “The increase we see today in our homeless population demonstrates the direct relationship between resources to address the problem and our ability to have an impact.” Homeless single adults jumped from 35,838 in 2011 to 46,303 in 2013. The number...

A top GOP critic pushed back Sunday on charges that Republican efforts to investigate last year's Benghazi attack are designed to inflict political damage on former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. "Hillary Clinton's not a target," said House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa on NBC's Meet the Press. "President Obama is not a target." Issa, who heads a panel probing the assault on the diplomatic outpost that killed four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, said he will seek depositions from Benghazi review board heads Ambassador Thomas Pickering and retired Adm. Mike Mullen, the former chairman of the...

Obama’s “you’re on your own”-attitude toward the DCCC and the DSCC during the 2012 campaign cycle was not particularly appreciated by his very vexed fellow Democrats, but he’s already starting to make good on his Lone-Ranger-no-more promise to help them with the 2014 midterms — he is going to need a fully Democratic Congress to have any hope of securing his legacy, after all. During the first of the at least fourteen promised Democratic campaign swings this year, the president paid the usual lip service to sincerely wanting to work with Republicans (“Look, my intention here is to try to...

Academy Award-winning director Michael Moore had some harsh words for Sen. Harry Reid and his fellow Democrats after they decided not to include an assault weapons ban in gun-control legislation. Moore ranted against the Senate majority leader after Reid removed Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s proposal to prohibit military-style weapons from the bill because they wouldn’t have the votes. The director behind “Bowling for Columbine” and “Fahrenheit 9/11” said people need to “rise up” against the Nevada senator. “There will be an Aurora next month and there will be a Sandy Hook the month after that,” Moore told CNN.....

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, suddenly an expert on the Constitution, said on Wednesday that she and Barack Obama are “honoring the Constitution” in their attacks on the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). Pelosi pontificated: "And given a choice I think we would all say we’re honoring, as the president does, the Constitution. When you pass a bill in the House, as we did with the health care bill, we made it iron clad constitutionally. You have a responsibility to honor the Constitution. In fact, we take an oath to do just that, and that is the oath that President...

Amazing. I predicted once or twice in writing about the AWB that there might not be 50 votes but I felt silly about it afterwards. Of course there’d be 50 votes. The bill was doomed to be filibustered given the GOP’s solid opposition plus the skittishness of red-state Dems like Mark Pryor, Mark Begich, and Mary Landrieu, but Reid would be able to muster 50 if only because Senate Democrats would want to avoid humiliating Obama after his big gun-control campaign. That way, even when the bill failed on the cloture vote, O could still claim that it had majority...

At a Senate judiciary committee hearing on Thursday, California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein shot down a proposed amendment exempting veterans from her “assault weapons” ban, bizarrely arguing that it’s legal to hunt humans with high-capacity magazines. “The time has come, America, to step up and ban these weapons,” Feinstein said. “The other very important part of this bill is to ban large capacity ammunition feeding devices — those that hold more than 10 rounds. We have federal regulations and state laws that prohibit hunting ducks with more than three rounds. And yet it’s legal to hunt humans with 15-round, 30-round,...

Former McCain aide Steve Schmidt told a apanel on Bill Maher which included California Lt. Governor Gavin Newsom that the GOP lags in its tech and internet capability because it can't attract young, cutting edge workers. Why? They don't want to work for a bigoted party. Said Schmidt. "If you look at your first guest on talking about brilliant young people in computers who understand all this stuff [and] be at the cutting edge, it's difficult to make the case to work for a political party that wants to discriminate against their friend who happens to be gay. So we...

Last Thursday, in a sign that the GOP is recalibrating its image after 2012, 100 prominent Republicans (many of whom are no longer serving in office) signed a friend-of-the-court brief seeking to overturn California’s Proposition 8, which effectively banned same-sex marriage in the state shortly after it became legal. The brief states the opinion that marriage is a constitutional right for gay couples—a position that goes beyond even President Obama’s stance on marriage equality. One of the signers, former communications chief for George W. Bush and senior advisor for the McCain–Palin campaign Nicolle Wallace, joined Morning Joe Monday morning to...

For a moment there the other week, I was kind of thrown by President Obama’s SOTU suggestion that we hike the minimum wage, and I chalked it up to just another lame, old-and-tired faux-stimulus type of suggestion for growing the economy. As Allahpundit already pointed out yesterday, however, it’s really so much more than that. In the run-up to the 2006 midterms, a minimum wage increase was one of the specific issues Democrats used in their collective campaign to take over the House — and in their desperate upcoming bid to win back the House in 2014, they are ready...

On Jan. 17, I attended the Atascadero Democratic Club business meeting and informational forum at 7:30 p.m. on gun safety which had been announced in the Atascadero News calendar to include a field representative from Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s office and a local emergency room doctor, Steven Sainsbury, with 25 years emergency room experience speaking on his perspective regarding gun safety. This program was planned after the Sandy Hook Elementary School killing of 20 first graders and six school personnel trying to protect them. As the gun control/safety issue heated up, the club found itself and meeting date right in the...

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Thursday linked outgoing Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) to one of the “saddest” Senate votes in years and suggested DeMint’s values won't be missed on Capitol Hill. Pelosi criticized the resigning South Carolina lawmaker and other GOP senators for voting Tuesday against Senate ratification of a United Nations treaty on rights for the disabled. “For them [DeMint and other treaty opponents] to slap the face of our veterans, of people with disabilities, of families with children with disabilities, that was one of the saddest days,” Pelosi said in the Capitol, taking care to avoid...

After a Nov. 6 election that saw unprecedented gains in Latino political power, Latino organizations already are organizing voter-registration and citizenship drives aimed at increasing their influence further. Several groups are preparing to fan out to colleges, high schools and churches in coming months to register new voters. Citizenship workshops, including one in San Bernardino on Saturday, Dec. 1, aim to turn legal permanent residents into voter-eligible citizens. “The Latino vote really fulfilled its potential this past election in a way it hadn’t done before,” said Arnulfo De La Cruz, California director for Mi Familia Vota, a six-state voter-registration campaign...

Frank Aquila wasn’t 100 percent positive that former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney was going to win heading into Tuesday’s election. Despite his strong conservative roots, Aquila – who served as a county chair for John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign and penned a book about the decision to go with former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate – had seen too much transpire over the course of four years to count out to former senator from Illinois that cut his teeth in the rough-and-tumble world of Chicago politics. And while certain parts of the election – like the Democrats...

It's not just Democrats making a final push in the state's four competitive Senate seats. Senate GOP leader Bob Huff hit the trail last week to boost candidates he needs to win to prevent Democrats from winning a veto-proof supermajority in the upper house. . . .

ACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California has reached an all-time high of 18.2 million registered voters, while the number of registered Republicans has fallen below 30 percent, signaling a worrisome decline for the state's minority party, officials said Friday. In its final update before Tuesday's general election, the secretary of state's office said the number of registered voters has increased by 950,000 since the 2008 presidential contest. Officials attribute that surge in part to the state's new online registration system, which helped many young, Democratic-leaning Californians sign up to vote this fall. That system was seen as a threat to the...

SAN FRANCISCO – About 30 Filipino-American seniors from all over the Bay Area gathered Thursday morning at a community center in a largely Filipino enclave in the heart of San Francisco’s South of Market district. Along with their regular breakfast and a mental health workshop, Rudy Asercion, who directs the West Bay Filipino Multi-Services Inc., also served up a good dose of politics, rallying them to register and vote. He also invited them to the center that evening to watch the vice presidential candidates Joe Biden and Paul Ryan in their first and only televised debate. A recent national survey...

Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz may be President Barack Obama's worst surrogate, at least according to the Obama campaign's internal polls. But Wasserman Schultz may be campaigning for herself to win an under-the-radar race for a leadership position in her party that may allow her to succeed Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, who could retire from Congress next spring. The Democratic Caucus Vice Chair -- the no. 5 leadership post -- is opening up and the National Journal reports Wasserman Schultz may be actively campaigning for the spot. DWS has been soliciting votes from Democrats who could potentially unseat...

In the off chance that Democrats take back the House in November, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has dreamed up quite a busy first day for her return to the Speaker's podium. After laying out the Democrats' path back to the House Thursday, Pelosi ticked off a bold list of the achievements she most wants to see on day one - including perhaps, a constitutional amendment. First and foremost was a jobs bill, based largely on President Obama's, she said. Second on the list was passing the DISCLOSE Act, a bill introduced in 2010 that would effectively overturn the Supreme Court's...

Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney has received his first regular intelligence briefing from the Obama administration during a stop in Los Angeles. Romney spokesman Rick Gorka says the former Massachusetts governor met Monday with members of the intelligence community at a federal building. Romney's briefing lasted 2 hours...

WASHINGTON — California Democratic Rep. Brad Sherman said at a press conference on immigration outside the Capitol Friday afternoon that America needs immigration reform to help those here illegally while also allowing them unionize for better wages. “We need a regular process by which the 12 million people who are part of our society can be fully part of our society, and they need documents,” the congressman said. “It’s important for the labor market of this country because as long as there are 12 million people without documents, there are 12 million people who can’t stand up for their rights...

The race is officially on in the 6th Assembly District. Republican Assembly candidate Andrew Pugno announced Monday that he plans to move forward with his bid to unseat Assemblywoman Beth Gaines, R-Rocklin, on the Nov. 6 ballot, despite an earlier pledge to stop campaigning if another Republican came in first in the June primary. The Folsom attorney said in a statement that he has concluded he "cannot, in good conscience, endorse (Gaines') dishonest and unethical campaign tactics," citing what he called "last-minute attack ads that she knew were lies." "As the only other candidate on the November ballot, stepping aside...

Republican Assemblyman Jeff Miller is touting an unusual new endorsement in his bid for the targeted 31st Senate District: a former Democratic rival. Miller's campaign announced today that Steve Clute, the former Democratic assemblyman who came in third in the June 5 primary for the Inland Empire seat, has endorsed him over Democratic candidate Richard Roth. "Although our party of preference means ideologically we may not agree on every issue, one thing I know is Jeff Miller will stand up for Riverside County," Clute said in a statement released by the Miller campaign. "Voters can trust that Jeff will stand...

Earlier this morning, we alerted you to a report that the Democrat Party Chair from California, John Burton, compared Paul Ryan and the GOP to Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels. From the Chronicle (who will be posting audio shortly): Greetings from the California delegation breakfast at the DNC where before he had a cup of coffee Democratic Party Chair John Burton – much like his ol’ pal Guv Jerry Brown once did – just compared the Republicans to Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels, for “telling the big lie,” a reference to several falsehoods GOP VP nominee Paul Ryan recently told. “They lie...

New tone alert... According to a just released report from the San Francisco Chronicle, California Democratic Party Chair John Burton compared Paul Ryan and the GOP to Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels. Let's see how - or if - the media reports this outrageous comment. Had this been a Republican, you would have already heard about it, as opposed to having to read it here. From the Chronicle (who will be posting audio shortly): Greetings from the California delegation breakfast at the DNC where before he had a cup of coffee Democratic Party Chair John Burton – much like his ol’...

. NBC News : Free Republic's Patton@Bastogne calls-out Myth Romney as a "Pathelogical Political Liar" at the Tampa 2012 GOP Convention ... Patton@Bastogne calls-out Myth Romney as a "Pathelogical Political Liar" in Tampa ...(click) Internet Link: http://video.msnbc.msn.com/nbcnews.com/48798495 .

SAN FRANCISCO -- House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said Tuesday that she expects the U.S. Supreme Court next month will uphold President Obama's signature legislation: the Affordable Care Act. "We believe that this bill constitutionally is iron-clad," she told a crowd of about 550 at a Commonwealth Club event in the Fairmont Hotel. "I expect a 6-3 'aye' verdict from the Supreme Court." Pelosi, whose discussion with the club was meant to commemorate her 25th anniversary in Congress, said the bill is among her proudest legislative accomplishments. More than 80 million Americans -- young people allowed to remain on their...

Competing radio ads spotlight wealthy Stanford physicist Charles T. Munger Jr.'s deep-pockets support for incumbent Assemblywoman Beth Gaines against challenger Andy Pugno in a Placer County-based Assembly district. Spirit of Democracy, an advocacy group funded largely by Munger, has poured more than $175,000 into a radio and mail promotional campaign for Gaines this month. Pugno is attempting to create a backlash by painting the GOP activist as a liberal. Munger is a major GOP donor and was a key financial backer of redistricting reform. He has pushed to moderate the Republican Party by downplaying divisive issues such as abortion, gun...

Liberal activists organized by CREDO SuperPAC are planning to protest outside a fundraiser that House Speaker John Boehner is holding Wednesday on Portola Road in Woodside with Rep. Dan Lungren, R-Gold River. The event with Boehner, R-Ohio, costs up to $35,000 a plate or $5,000 for a photo opportunity, and is occurring just six miles from the Atherton home in which President Obama is scheduled to hold a $35,800-a-plate fundraiser at about the same time.CREDO SuperPAC says it has launched a campaign against Lungren with four full-time organizers and a Carmichael field office to mobilize local voters to defeat a...

FreedomWorks announced its support for three upstart Republican House candidates today, pitting the conservative grass-roots group against local elected officials in each state. The group endorsed Public Service Commissioner Kevin Cramer in North Dakota’s at-large seat; Lewis County Judge Executive Thomas Massie in Kentucky’s 4th district; and former state Sen. Sam Aanestad in California’s 1st district. All three candidates are running in open-seat races. FreedomWorks’ support is notable because it’s backing the underdogs in each race and, in one case, going against the state party’s endorsement. In North Dakota, the state GOP endorsed Public Service Commissioner Brian Kalk at its...

A political advocacy group funded largely by wealthy Stanford physicist Charles T. Munger Jr. has poured $83,000 this week into an independent push to re-elect Republican Assemblywoman Beth Gaines. Gaines, of Rocklin, is running against attorney and fellow Republican Andy Pugno in the 6th Assembly District, a newly drawn district based in Placer County but extending into Sacramento and El Dorado counties. Democrat Reginald Bronner of Lincoln rounds out the field. A radio advertisement and campaign literature supporting Gaines was funded by Spirit of Democracy, whose coffers consist of $727,000 from Munger and $150,000 from the California Dental Association, records...

Since just before the last California presidential primary, the proportion of voters registered as Republicans has fallen from 33.5 percent to 30.4 percent, according to new figures from the California Secretary of State.

After years of being labeled the "Party of No" by majority Democrats, California Republican leaders stood under rainy skies Thursday outside the Capitol to dub themselves the "Party of Yes." The newly christened party kicked off its campaign by asking for a "no" vote on Gov. Jerry Brown's tax hike. California Republican Party leaders organized the press conference to launch a statewide whistle-stop tour just as Brown finished collecting signatures for his $9 billion tax initiative. "Jerry Brown is turning in his signatures as we speak to make that (top tax rate) the highest rate in the country," said California...

Shocker: One of CA’s most promising young Republicans abandons GOP in midst of heated SD mayoral raceCalifornia State Assemblyman and San Diego mayoral candidate Nathan Fletcher, seen as one of the California Republican Party’s most promising future possibilities for statewide office, announced today he’s abandoning the GOP and “partisan politics” to become an independent. The defection of Fletcher, who served in the Marine Corps for more than a decade and is an Iraq war veteran as well as a spouse of a prominent GOP activist — Mindy Tucker Fletcher, the former campaign spokeswoman for George W. Bush — is an...

The Tehama County GOP announced it has disinvited California Republican Party Chairperson Tom Del Beccarro from speaking at its May Lincoln-reagan Dinner. Apparently the Tehama GOP does not appreciate the CRP Chair’s hamfisted disregard for party bylaws and the state party’s controversial endorsement process that picks favorites before the California Primary. Not like we’ve never heard these complaints before. And brushing off bylaws concerning endorsements is just the tip of the iceberg.CRP Chairman Tom Del Beccaro,After serious discussion of the endorsement actions taken by the California Republican Party Board of Directors during their March 11th meeting, the Tehama County Republican...

Republican Assembly hopeful Andy Pugno kicked off his campaign today with a pledge that could leave him backing his rival over his own candidacy in November. The Folsom Republican is challenging Assemblywoman Beth Gaines, R-Rocklin, in the 6th Assembly District. Under the state's new top-two primary rules, voters could send both Republicans to the general election. But voters in the safe GOP district might be spared a second round of a same-party slug fest if that happens. Pugno said today that he would support whichever Republican gets the most votes in the June 5 primary -- even if he secures...

As a lifelong Democrat, I never thought I would be in this place. I never thought I would have to confront this dreaded unforeseen fear - the terror that is for me, dating a Republican. I don’t even know very many Republicans. But it turns out, I’m not alone. Outside of Washington D.C., the entire country is pretty segregated when it comes to political parties. According to dating website, seven out of ten people are in a relationship with someone of the same political persuasion. I grew up knowing very few Republicans and the rare ones I did know got...

Rep. Dan Lungren is stepping up his re-election efforts this week, raising cash, recruiting volunteers and holding town hall meetings in his Sacramento County district. The Gold River Republican faces a rematch with his 2010 challenger, Elk Grove Democrat Ami Bera, in the newly drawn 7th Congressional District. A close voter registration split and high turnout in the presidential election are expected to make the race one of the most competitive congressional elections of the year. Lungren, who has trailed his opponent in campaign cash both this election and in 2010, got some help from Republican leadership for a Monday...

The race for the newly drawn 6th Assembly District is shaping up as a potential political – and personal – Republican slugfest. GOP Assemblywoman Beth Gaines could face two challengers from her side of the aisle in her re-election bid for the safe Republican district. The Rocklin Republican's potential rivals – Folsom attorney Andrew Pugno and Roseville school board member Linda Park – both have ties to Gaines' former rival, Roseville Councilman John Allard. Pugno, who has filed a statement of intention to run but has made no formal announcement, used the same campaign consultant in 2010 that Allard did...

Suddenly June 5 doesn't seem so far away. With a muddled outcome from the 10 Super Tuesday states, there's no sign the GOP presidential primary process will be resolved before California Republicans hold a vote that pundits once said was too late to matter. In fact, June 5 -- when California and four other states will vote -- is now "one of the key dates between now and the convention" in late August in Tampa, Fla., said renowned election prognosticator Larry Sabato, who directs the University of Virginia Center for Politics. "As it turns out, every state is relevant, just...

Ron Paul's super PAC is secretly funded by San Francisco gay billionaire Peter Thiel, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. Thiel, who co-founded PayPal and invested early in Facebook, has given $2.6 million to Endorse Liberty, the super PAC which has released several ads attacking Paul rivals Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry, without ever meeting Paul. The German-born Thiel is a 44-year-old conservative Christian who has previously supported gay rights causes and artificial intelligence research. “He has great insight,” Jimmy LaSalvia, the executive director of gay GOP group GOProud, told the paper. “He also is inquisitive, and most of...

Long written off as too late to matter, California's Republican primary June 5 may turn out to matter a lot. A new Field Poll shows former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum just six points behind front-runner Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts. California's mother lode of 172 delegates has long been considered Romney's firewall against a contested or even brokered national convention in Tampa, Fla., in August. A contested convention is the ultimate nightmare scenario for the GOP, which has savored this year as its best chance since Jimmy Carter to deny a second term to an incumbent Democratic president."It's...

Republican Rep. Dan Lungren of Gold River is getting some early help for his re-election bid from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. A new television ad airing in the Sacramento area praises Lungren for "fighting to protect California jobs" and singles out his support for repealing the federal health care overhaul. A slight voter-registration edge for Democrats in the new 7th Congressional District and high turnout for the presidential election are expected to make Lungren a top target this year. He faces a rematch with Elk Grove Democrat Ami Bera, the doctor and medical educator who lost to Lungren by...

Republican presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich is spending Valentine's Day in the Central Valley. Sure, the former House Speaker is looking to woo California Republicans, whose votes he's hoping will still make a difference by the time the state's June primary rolls around. But the real object of desire for this trip is cash to fuel his campaign fund. The GOP presidential candidate is holding an evening reception at the Fresno home of Wendy Turner, daughter of former Secretary of State Bill Jones, and her husband Ryan as part of a fundraising swing through California. Gingrich is no cheap date. Spending...

Folks, we're not even being contrary when we point this out. For the 9th Circuit to rule Prop 8 unconstitutional, just as Gingrich is looking again for his footing -- just as Rick Santorum is about to steal his headlines -- is a Gingrichian dream. Look! He agrees: (TWEET FROM NEWT AT LINK) The link goes to the 9th (coincidentally) of Gingrich's solutions for fixing the judiciary, to prevent it from doing things that conservatives don't like -- abolishing courts that make "un-American decisions." He's been on the record wanting this treatment for the 9th circuit for a long, long...

Since just before the last California presidential primary, the proportion of voters registered as Republicans has fallen from 33.5 percent to 30.4 percent, according to new figures from the California Secretary of State.