Free Republic

(Reuters) - In contrast to 2008, Democratic President Barack Obama cannot count on a wave of support for his re-election bid next year from well-known moderate Republicans. Unhappy with Obama's handling of the economy, conservative backers from three years ago are either sitting on the fence or have thrown their lot in with Republican presidential hopefuls like Mitt Romney. Known as "Obamacons," moderate Republicans helped make the Democrat's case in 2008 that he was a new breed of "post-partisan" politician who would work with both parties. Obama's youth and the narrative of electing the first black president also attracted Republicans...

I suppose I have to accept the insanity that some glassy-eyed Republicans are considering voting for Barack Obama, but I don't have to like it. Whether or not this is an example of the liberal media trying to create rather than report news, The New York Times is reporting that small enclaves of Republicans are meeting around the country to discuss their support for Obama. Let's call them "support groups." One such support group in Indiana is calling its attendees "whispering Republicans." Fittingly, these renegades, as the Times called them, met over iced tea and brownies, as if to signify...

I saw a Republicans for Obama bumper sticker the other day and couldn't help laughing out loud. Republicans for Obama is an oxymoron. Oil and water, fire and ice. Impossible. Then I stumbled across a news article about this craze that featured two "Republicans" who are supporting the O Man. Former GOP Senator Lincoln Chaffee, who put down the bong long enough to vote for John Kerry in 2004, and Jim Leach, former Iowa Congressman who always looks concerned, have jumped on the Obama bandwagon. Neither man is a conservative, and both were voted out of office, so this isn't...

Why this lifelong Republican may vote for Obama The party of Bush and McCain outsourced the hunt for bin Laden, failing to accomplish a vital mission since 9/11. By Michael SmerconishSep. 11, 2008 | Where the hell are Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri? And why does virtually no one ask anymore? What's changed since the days when any suburban soccer mom would have strangled either of them with her bare hands if given the chance? And what happened to President Bush's declaration to a joint session of Congress nine days after 9/11 that "any nation that continues to harbor...

THE MORE I LISTEN TO AND READ ABOUT “the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate,” the more I like him. Barack Obama strikes a chord with me like no political figure since Ronald Reagan. To explain why, I need to explain why I am a conservative and what it means to me. In 1964, at the age of 16, I organized the Dallas County Youth for Goldwater. My senior thesis at the University of Texas was on the conservative intellectual revival in America. Twenty years later, I was invited by William F. Buckley Jr. to join the board of...

My party has slipped its moorings. It’s time for a true pragmatist to lead the country. THE MORE I LISTEN TO AND READ ABOUT “the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate,” the more I like him. Barack Obama strikes a chord with me like no political figure since Ronald Reagan. To explain why, I need to explain why I am a conservative and what it means to me. In 1964, at the age of 16, I organized the Dallas County Youth for Goldwater. My senior thesis at the University of Texas was on the conservative intellectual revival in America....

"I do know libertarians who think Obama is the Antichrist, that he's farther left than John Kerry, much farther left than Bill Clinton, and you'd clearly have to be insane to vote for this guy," said David Boaz, executive vice president of the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank. "But there are libertarians who say, 'Oh yeah? Do you think Obama will increase spending by $1 trillion, because that's what Republicans did over the past two presidential terms. So really, how much worse can he be?' And there are certainly libertarians who think Obama will be better on the war...

Mr Powell is now a four-star general in America’s most surprising new army: the Obamacons. The army includes other big names such as Susan Eisenhower, Dwight’s granddaughter, who introduced Mr Obama at the Democratic National Convention and Christopher Buckley, the son of the conservative icon William Buckley, who complains that he has not left the Republican Party: the Republican Party has left him. Chuck Hagel, a Republican senator from Nebraska and one-time bosom buddy of Mr McCain has also flirted heavily with the movement, though he has refrained from issuing an official endorsement.The biggest brigade in the Obamacon army consists...

Here's a recap of Republicans, Republicans-turned-independents and conservatives who supported who supported Obama for President in 2008. They supported an Undeniable Disaster & a Historic Failure. Shame on them. --------- Elected Officials: Jim Leach, Former Congressman from Iowa "For me, the national interest comes before party concerns, particularly internationally. We do need a new direction in American policy, and Obama has a sense of that."Lincoln Chafee, Former United States Senator from Rhode Island "As I look at the candidates in order who to vote for, certainly my kind of conservatism was reflected with Senator Obama, and those points are that...

A new poll spotlighting the faith community's outlook on the 2012 campaign shows that evangelicals have high views of Mike Huckabee and Sarah Palin, less-than-enthusiastic views of Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney, and low views of President Obama. SNIP Among evangelicals, Huckabee's ratings (88 percent favorable, 11 percent unfavorable) led those of Palin (79 percent favorable, 21 percent unfavorable), Gingrich (57 percent/37 percent), Romney (56 percent/29 percent and Ron Paul (51 percent/26 percent). Obama, though, is viewed favorably by only 6 percent of evangelicals. Ninety-four percent view him unfavorably. The Barna survey was based on interviews with 1,021 adults nationwide...

(snip) McCain admitted while he felt invincible as a 20 year old testing himself and the very expensive planes the government allowed him to operate. “I wasn’t even very distressed when I found myself in my airplane sitting on the bottom of Corpus Christi Bay one fine day,” McCain confessed in front of his son and other young aviators. “I swam to the surface, went to my quarters, changed my clothes, took a couple aspirin and headed out for another night’s entertainment with my fellow bachelor officers. “Kick the tires and light the fires.” I loved the image of a...

Politics is often a game of who-do-you-fear-the-most. The pragmatists, the “mavericks,” the oh-goodness-gracious-somebody’s-going-to-call-me-a-homophobe Republicans must be taught an object lesson – good, hard and fast. Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown, a Lady Gaga Republican, is the perfect candidate for a shock-and-awe campaign. His vote to sodomize the military, by repealing Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, should be his political obituary, writ in 24-point type. Brown pleaded for conservative support in the January 19 special election to fill Ted Kennedy’s Senate Seat. (Given the way things turned out, the enormous Ted must be smiling from that Au Bar in the sky.) The man...

WASHINGTON — Senator Scott Brown’s decision to buck his party leadership in recent days on the “don’t ask, don’t tell’’ military policy and on a nuclear arms treaty has set off a new wave of anger among some of the activists who helped elect him — and renewed talk among conservatives that he might face a primary challenge. Tweet 1diggdiggYahoo! Buzz ShareThis Some Tea Party movement leaders who dislike Brown’s votes acknowledge that the Massachusetts Republican has demonstrated his independent and pragmatic streak, and by doing so may strengthen his chances at reelection in 2012. No primary challenger has emerged,...

Well. We've just seen, the fruits of our corrupt, lame, spineless and wimpy "Republicans" idea of how to deal with democrats: Surrender. Abject surrender. How deeply disappointing this month has been.

"My view is that Washington and the regulators are there to serve the banks" Rarely do you see a politician quite this honest: Last Wednesday, just hours after securing the position of chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, Spencer Bachus, R-Ala., told the Birmingham News that "in Washington, the view is that the banks are to be regulated, and my view is that Washington and the regulators are there to serve the banks." In the very next paragraph, the newspaper reported that Bachus "later clarified his comment to say that regulators should set the parameters in which banks operate...

(snip) Saturday's debate on the repeal of the "don't-ask-don't-tell" policy was only half an hour old when the Arizona Republican burst onto the floor from the cloakroom, hiked up his pants and stalked over to his friend Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.). Ignoring Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), who had the floor, McCain hectored the men noisily for a few moments, waving his arms for emphasis. When McCain finally stormed off, Durbin shook his head in exasperation and Lieberman smiled. A minute later, McCain returned - he had apparently remembered another element of his grievance -...

Jindal: As I grew up, my mom and dad taught me the values that attracted them to this country -- and they instilled in me an immigrant's wonder at the greatness of America. As a child, I remember going to the grocery store with my dad. Growing up in India, he had seen extreme poverty. And as we walked through the aisles, looking at the endless variety on the shelves, he would tell me: 'Bobby, Americans can do anything.' Obama: ...Dillon, South Carolina - a place where the ceilings leak, the paint peels off the walls, and they have to...

It looks as though the USSC or for that matter any of our elected representatives are going to do anything to call into question Barrack Obama's foreign national status. So, it's up to us (American Citizens) to apply the pressure to get them to take notice. We can BOYCOTT any spending on luxury/non-essential items. This will get the governments attention. Pay your bills but don't spend your tax refund, don't spend your stimulus payment. Call in to local radio talk shows.......you know the drill. If it's good enough for Jesse Jackson, then it is certainly good enough for us in...

Ken (liberal) Duberstein to endorse Obama. CNN's October suprise. . . Mark Levin

Kenneth M. Duberstein, Ronald Reagan’s final White House chief of staff and a former political confidant of Senator John McCain, is the latest high-profile Republican to say he will vote instead for Senator Barack Obama for president. Mr. Duberstein’s decision, confirmed in a brief interview, was not a big surprise given his close friendship with former Secretary of State Colin Powell, who recently announced on NBC News’ “Meet the Press” that he would vote for Mr. Obama, the Democratic nominee, because he was disappointed that both Mr. McCain and the Republican Party have become so socially conservative and negative.

It may be something of a surprise that, as a long time conservative, I now support Barack Obama. In 1968, I was a speechwriter first for Ronald Reagan, when Governor of California, then, as Richard Nixon became the presidential nominee, a speechwriter for Nixon, working at his home office at 450 Park Avenue. I became a senior editor at National Review in 1969, a position I held until recently. Republican President George W. Bush has not been a conservative at all, either in domestic policy or in foreign policy. He invaded Iraq on the basis of abstract theory, the very...

They are starting to eat their own. Polls show that Democrat Barack Obama is leading in battleground states, including some -- such as Ohio -- carried by George W. Bush not once but twice. But even before the election is over -- and despite the fact that some polls show a tightening race -- Republicans are piling on their own presidential candidate, John McCain, accusing him of deserting principle. Some moderate Republicans think McCain has sold his soul to the right, abandoning the bipartisan record he built on immigration and other issues. "He has lost his brand as a maverick,"...

Christopher Buckley, the author and son of the late conservative mainstay William F. Buckley, said in a telephone interview that he has resigned from the National Review, the political journal his father founded in 1955. As a result, he wrote to Richard Lowry, the editor of the National Review, and its publisher, Jack Fowler, offering to resign, and “this offer was rather briskly accepted,” Mr. Buckley said.

If your parents live long enough there comes that awful moment when you look at them and realize: they’ve grown old. Suddenly, they’re unsteady on their feet. They tell bizarre, wince-inducing jokes. They’re the only ones grinning - and grinning weirdly at that. That’s how I felt watching John McCain on Tuesday night. What happened? Remember when he burst onto the national scene in 2000? Remember all those New Hampshire Republicans, independents, even Democrats who fell in love, who said they had never supported a candidate with such passion? McCain was the bad boy/fly boy war hero turned wry, caustic...

Senator Obama has announced that he intends to create a Council For Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. Having been privileged to give some advance guidance for this worthy idea, it is exciting to watch it become part of the public record. An old idea talked about by George W. Bush and even "his thousand points of light" father? Well, yes, talked about; but by the writing of Bush's own staff, regrettably, not done. Obama says he's different and this will be a "critical part of his administration." The proof will be in the doing, of course, but this much is plain:...

Abortion has been dividing the culture, including political parties for over 30 years now. In its last several iterations with the Clintons, Al Gore, and John Kerry, the Democratic party platform has been rather decidedly one-sided.Roe v. Wade is to be affirmed and defended. End of story. Oh yes, there was the language of "safe, legal and rare," but the emphasis was always on 'safe and legal,' with 'rare' little more than an afterthought. Barack Obama is a different type of candidate. As he sees it, Roe is not an endorsement of abortion, so much as an affirmation that abortion...

God, Republicans are saps. They think that they’re running against some academic liberal who wouldn’t wear flag pins on his lapel, whose wife isn’t proud of America and who went to some liberationist church where the pastor damned his own country. They think they’re running against some naïve university-town dreamer, the second coming of Adlai Stevenson. But as recent weeks have made clear, Barack Obama is the most split-personality politician in the country today. On the one hand, there is Dr. Barack, the high-minded, Niebuhr-quoting speechifier who spent this past winter thrilling the Scarlett Johansson set and feeling the fierce...

In this election we have very a clear choice to make. A choice between Victory against Islamic Terrorism or surrender to our terrorist enemy. A choice between free market capitalist economy or socialism. A choice between constructionist judges or liberal judges who legislate from the bench. A choice between Life for the unborn or abortion on demand going wild. A choice between lower taxes or higher taxes. A choice between small government or big government. A choice between John McCain or Barack Obama. Let us choose John McCain. A Patriot, a war hero, and would be an excellent President. God...

By now, most McCain haters will have already skipped down to the comments section to post their expletives and tell me how it’s a free country and they have a 1st Amendment right, etc. to yammer on and on about how bad McCain sucks, totally missing the point of my post, again. But I’m here to tell you, in this free country, that in my opinion, you should SHUT YOUR STINKIN TRAP! To all you ingrates, rageaholics, and self-absorbed punks, WE KNOW YOU HATE MCCAIN. You can give yourself a rest now and stop posting on every single thread the...

PART SIX -- in my JUST SAY NO SERIES: KeyWord: JustSayNo2JohnMcCain.... The focus of PART SIX in my "Just say no" series is on the RNC itself.. I have recieved several solicitations/phone calls from various RNC fund raising efforts, Have You? I would like to encourage you to JUST SAY NO - To the RNC this cycle... I would encourage you to send any contributions you have made in the past to the RNC to CONSERVATIVE candidates for the U.S. House and the U.S. Senate. I know this will take extra time/effort, but we need to send the message that...

I am usually quite proud of being a conservative. I know in my heart that the only way to enjoying liberty under the law AND equality of justice is through the application of conservative principles to government and society. And I am usually proud of the rational, reasonable basis on which most conservatives see the world and evaluate people and events. That’s why it embarrasses me to no end to see fellow conservatives who actually believe that Barack Obama is some kind of “Manchurian Candidate” sent by Muslims to undermine American society. Or that Obama is a closet Muslim just...

PART FIVE -- in my JUST SAY NO SERIES: KeyWord: JustSayNo2JohnMcCain In response to the FReepers who think they should "HOLD THEIR NOSE" and Vote FOR McCain.. I ask you to reconsider this option, unless you want to completely DESTROY the two-Party system and move our party so far to the left that the base is completely ignored in ALL FUTURE ELECTIONS... While I certainly respect your opinion, and your right to vote FOR McCain, please understand the many of us who make up the conservative base just CAN’T.. no matter how many times we “the Base” hold our nose...

<p>Fox news just reported that Mark Halprin, from Time Magazine, has information that Mitt Romney will be ending his campaign sometime today.</p>

If John McCain rolls on Super Tuesday then it is time for all Freepers living in remaining primary states to cross-over in your respective primaries and vote for Obama on the dem ballot. It's our best opportunity to stop her because she will crush McCain in November.

"If you're looking at substance rather than whether it's an R or a D after his name...If he's our candidate, then Hillary's going to be our girl, Sean, cause she's more conservative than he is. I think she would be stronger on the war on terrorism. I absolutely believe that." VIDEO HERE

ANN COULTER Will Campain For Hillary Clinton Click on the photo to go to "youtube.com" to listen and watch it for yourself.

What could be wrong with a presidential candidate who is a longtime Republican senator from a conservative state, a certified war hero with a great smile and a wisecracking sense of humor? Nothing at all, except the last time one ran against a Clinton, he ended up filming Viagra commercials while Bill was rehearsing his inaugural address. The media have created the fiction that Sen. John McCain, alone among the Republican candidates, can beat Hillary or Obama this fall. This is a fiction because only a conservative can unite the Republican Party this year and win. Call him “maverick”, call...