Free Republic

The Republican-controlled U.S. House passed a bill to extend the nation's debt ceiling without any conditions until March 2015. The bill passed 221 to 201 on Tuesday, with only 28 Republicans voting yes and two Democrats voting no. Of those 28 Republicans, one was from Michigan: U.S. Rep Dave Camp, R-Midland. The vote comes after several years of political debate about raising the debt ceiling. Republicans have wanted to cut spending and not raise the amount of money the nation can borrow while Democrats have said it's important for the country's financial standing to continue to fund previously made obligations....

Despite the government shutdown, Vice President Joe Biden is vacationing at Camp David this long weekend. He's joined at the Maryland retreat by his family, including his wife (Jill Biden), children, and grandchildren. The vice president is also there with "essential" government workers, who must work despite the government shutdown. That includes his Secret Service detail, as well as the Secret Service details assigned to the rest of his family, and other support staff. They are protecting the Bidens as they vacation -- but aren't getting paid because of the federal shutdown. The vice president's public schedule simply reads: WEEKEND...

The debt ceiling should really be renamed the default ceiling. This catastrophic game of chicken cost the U.S. our AAA credit rating and $19 billion when it was last employed in the summer of 2011 by House radicals who pretended their intransigence was a stand for fiscal responsibility. Now the default ceiling is looming again, promising yet another showdown between President Obama and House Republicans. But even Speaker John Boehner realizes that the 50 or so radicals on the far right of his own party—the Bachmann, Broun, Gohmert and King crew—are the greatest impediment to responsible self-government right now. That’s...

CAMP PENDLETON - President Barack Obama will conclude a two-day West Coast swing Wednesday by visiting troops and their families at Camp Pendleton to thank them for their service to the nation. Obama will arrive at the Marine Corps base in northern San Diego County from the Los Angeles area after fielding online questions from homeowners, renters and prospective buyers in a virtual housing roundtable discussion. Obama began the trip Tuesday in Arizona where he toured a construction company and delivered a speech at a Phoenix high school, calling for sweeping housing reforms,

President Barack Obama will host Cabinet members and their families on Friday for a rare retreat at Camp David, a White House official said. Obama uses the facility far less often than many of his predecessors have, only occasionally holding meetings there or heading there for a weekend of rest and relaxation. The president has hosted Cabinet members and their families there just once before, weeks before Democrats' big losses in the 2010 midterm elections.

Rep. Dave Camp (R-MI), the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, tweeted Wednesday evening that the Senate's immigration bill is unconstitutional because it raises revenues and originated in the Senate instead of the House. “Chairman Camp: Senate immigration bill a revenue bill; unconstitutional and cannot be taken up by the House,” the official House and Ways Means Committee Twitter account sent out Wednesday evening. As of this writing, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has not sent the immigration bill that passed the Senate 68-32 to the House of Representatives...

Vid at link

Anti-Israel college students will trek to a scenic campsite in upstate New York this summer to learn how to launch campus boycotts against the Jewish state at a program subsidized and run by one of America’s largest Quaker faith groups. The American Friends Service Committee “We Divest Campaign Student Leadership Team Summer Training Institute” describes itself as a “five (5) day intensive program for campus [Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions] organizers—those with campaigns already running and those hoping to get one launched in the 2013-2014 school year.”

OWA CITY, Iowa – When it came time to draw up a budget, one of Iowa's regional Girl Scout councils reviewed its programs and made a proposal that would have been unthinkable a generation ago: selling its last four summer camps. Troop leader Joni Kinsey was stunned. For decades, the camps had been cherished places where thousands of young girls spent summer breaks hiking, huddling around campfires and building friendships. Kinsey, whose daughter learns to train horses at camp, immediately started a petition to fight the idea. Other scouting alums and volunteers have taken up the cause, too, packing public...

ALBUQUERQUE – The Internal Revenue Service not only wanted a wide variety of information from the Albuquerque Tea Party‘s application for nonprofit status, it also wanted to know what contacts it had with people from other political organizations too. That included an 83-year-old great-grandmother who was once held in a World War II internment camp, New Mexico Watchdog has discovered. “I’ve always paid my taxes and everything,” Marianne Chiffelle told New Mexico Watchdog. “What I do think is, it doesn’t surprise me…because of this government we have at the moment.” According to a review of documents conducted by the online...

President Obama says he regularly skeet shoots at Camp David and called on gun-control proponents to “do a little more listening” to gun owners in the national debate over firearms. In an interview with The New Republic posted on Sunday Obama said that he and guests “do skeet shooting all the time” at the presidential retreat and said he understood why many rural voters were protective of their gun-ownership rights. “Not the girls, but oftentimes guests of mine go up there. And I have a profound respect for the traditions of hunting that trace back in this country for generations,”...

An Oregon woman who found a Chinese laborer's plea for help hidden in a box of Halloween decorations says she thinks the letter, which describes brutal conditions inside a work camp, is authentic. Julie Keith, 42, of Portland, bought a Halloween graveyard kit from Kmart last year and tucked it away in a storage box. When she opened the kit this October, she found the letter tucked in between two Stryofoam headstones. Sir: If you occasionally buy this product, please kindly resend this letter to the World Human Right Organization. Thousands people here who are under the persicution [sic] of...

Oregon mother Julie Keith expected to find Styrofoam headstones in the graveyard kit she bought at Kmart for Halloween. What she didn't expect was a desperate plea for help from one of the Chinese laborers forced to make the holiday decorations in brutal conditions. The 42-year-old charity worker from Portland discovered the chilling letter hidden between the two novelty headstones when she opened the kit in October. 'Sir: If you occasionally buy this product, please kindly resend this letter to the World Human Right Organization,' the unsigned note, that was folded into eighths, read. 'Thousands people here who are under...

Fort Pierce — Update: Campaign officials for Patrick Murphy, Democrat candidate for the congressional district 18 race, are calling their candidate the winner because the St. Lucie Canvassing Board has missed the noon deadline to certify results to the state Division of Elections. Under Florida law, if the deadline passes with final certified results, the unofficial certified results filed last Sunday stand. Those results show Murphy ahead by .58 percent – above the .5 percent spread which would trigger an automatic recount. West officials were not immediately available for comment. ------------------ The St. Lucie County Canvassing Board resumed ballot counting...

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has tapped Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and two other senior Republicans for key roles as he prepares for negotiations on the fiscal cliff with the White House and Democratic leaders. The Speaker is adding Ryan and Reps. Fred Upton (R-Mich.) and Dave Camp (R-Mich.) to his daily management meetings “in preparation for the fiscal cliff talks,” Boehner spokesman Michael Steel said. Those meetings already include the top four members of the House Republican leadership team. Ryan, the recently defeated GOP vice presidential nominee, is continuing as chairman of the House Budget Committee while Upton leads...

Cronyism: Did the Obama administration stiff a group of non-union workers and pay off a political ally in the 2009 auto bailout? Yes, it did, says the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. When the administration turned General Motors into Government Motors in 2009's M&A of the automaker, it made sure that retirees from Delphi Corp. who were members of the United Auto Workers didn't lose a dime from their pensions. The White House, though, was not as generous with the nonunion retirees from GM's parts supplier. Roughly 22,000 Delphi retirees who were salaried employees and not members...

Occupy Charlotte re-opens camp blocks from DNC siteBy Cleve R. Wootson Jr. The Charlotte Observer Modified: Saturday, Sep. 01, 2012 CHARLOTTE, N.C. Occupy Charlotte protesters reopened their uptown encampment late Friday night at Marshall Park, a site where they expect hundreds to camp, demonstrate and sleep during the Democratic National Convention. **SNIP** “There’s been some conversation with the city,” said Scottie Wingfield, an organizer with Occupy Charlotte. “We said we wanted to be in a public space. This is traditionally a park where people have met to protest.”

Obama campaign spokeswoman Jen Psaki acknowledged Thursday that the campaign was no longer pleading ignorance about the story of a man who has appeared in both a super PAC ad and a campaign ad. "No one is denying he was in one of our campaign ads. He was on a conference call telling his story," Psaki told reporters on Air Force One. Missouri steelworker Joe Soptic starred in an Obama campaign ad and participated in a conference call with the campaign in May, as POLITICO reported Wednesday.

[Bain Capital] is not a distraction, this is what this campaign is gonna be about. Meanwhile, back at campaign headquarters, Team Obama is in full meltdown mode after Newark Mayor Cory Booker went off script, undermining and mocking "what this campaign is going to be about." ABC News: The Obama campaign is in full damage-control mode one day after Newark Mayor Cory Booker publicly derided Democrats’ assault on presumptive GOP nominee Mitt Romney over his record at Bain Capital. Chief Obama strategist David Axelrod today publicly rebuked Booker, a popular and high-profile surrogate for the campaign, saying he was “just...

DEDHAM (FOX 25 / MyFoxBoston.com) - Video of a student restrained and shocked for hours at the Judge Rotenberg Center was played in court on Tuesday after a years-long battle by the center to keep it from the public eye. The video, which shows former resident Andre McCollins screaming, writhing in pain, and begging for help, was played at the start of McCollins’ trial against the Canton-based Judge Rotenberg Center.