Free Republic

Daniel Foster: "Re: Romney’s Close" I’m sorry but, on purely tactical grounds, what a bonehead move by the Romney campaign. Negative attacks, especially in a primary, have to be run on a careful cost-benefit analysis, and what exactly is the upside here? That at least Tom Brokaw isn’t Dan Rather? Romney is comfortably up in the Florida polls in large part because his campaign (with the unwitting collusion of NBC News!) managed to turn Gingrich’s flank on the wealth issue and cut him off from reinforcement via a Newt-versus-the-establishment-media moment. He now affords Gingrich such a moment with juuuuust enough...

Does Mediaite have an editor screening its content before it goes up online?  In a 24-hour period, that lefty news site published one story defending Vice President Joe Biden’s charge that Republicans want rape to increase if they don’t align with the President’s “jobs� plan, and another article claiming that Biden, in fact, never did use a rape reference.  First we have some dude named Nando Di Fino, whom I’ve never heard of before.  He argued that Biden’s assertion about rapes surging really isn’t that “crazy� after all.  “He was basically showing that as you cut police, crime goes up,�...

.....In fact, “disqualifying” was the word that MSNBC anchor and former GOP Rep. Joe Scarborough used Monday morning to describe the matter. Mitt Romney called it “offensive.” And rival Herman Cain said in a Sunday appearance on ABC: “My reaction is that word is very insensitive. There are some words that do not basically inspire the kind of negativity like that particular word.” He went on to say that since Perry did not stop traveling to the camp to hunt, it shows a lack of sensitivity. On Monday, Cain took a different tone, saying it’s time to put the matter...

Leadership: Waking up to a thinner majority, the Senate majority leader suddenly finds the filibuster a threat to democracy. So he decides that the first legislative day will be the day the Senate stood still. Only in the Bible and Harry Reid's Senate can a day last more than 24 hours. As we predicted a week ago, the slightly less powerful majority leader, on the first legislative day in the 112th Congress, executed plans to make that "day" last until Jan. 25 so he can stage a legislative coup and neuter the filibuster rule that protects the right of the...

If elected, Radnor Township resident Jim Schneller, the Independent conservative candidate in the 7th Congressional District race, said he would fight government corruption....Schneller has also described the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks of the World Trade as an “inside job.”“Once the (Obama) birth-certificate theory started bouncing around, people started rethinking the World Trade Center issue,” he said.....

Nobody doubts that Andrew Cuomo is a thumb-in-your-eye political brawler -- not that there's anything wrong with that. And for Eliot Spitzer to be feigning shock about it in public is a little rich, don't you think? Spitzer, the disgraced ex-governor kicking off a career as TV yakker, this week tossed a brickbat at Cuomo: "The problem Andrew has is that everybody knows that behind the scenes he is the dirtiest, nastiest political player out there," he said. Dirty? Nasty? From Spitzer? Chutzpah Hall of Fame, we say! Spitzer's basic problem with Cuomo isn't hard to figure out, of course....

North Carolina Republican Facebook page will instantly delete anything you say against them. As usual, their tactics mirror those of the Democratic establishment. Time to do away with all establishment politicians!

The eruption of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull (I-jaf-jalla-jokull) volcano on April 14, 2010, is being compared to Krakatoa’s famous eruption on August 27, 1883 which had a great effect on weather patterns for the next few months. It seems that its Icelandic equivalent might have the same effect — creating a period of global cooling. This invalidates all of those computer models created by climate-change fanatics warning us of an earth becoming unbearably hot with oceans rising and covering all coastal cities. So Al Gore must be worried. But maybe, at this point, he just doesn’t give a volcano. After all, he’s...

KNOXVILLE - Federal court jurors reported today they have reached a verdict on three of four charges against former University of Tennessee student David C. Kernell, accused of illegally accessing the private e-mail account of 2008 GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin. But they also reported they are deadlocked on the first count, a charge of identity theft. Without asking what their verdict is on the other counts, U.S. District Judge Thomas W. Phillips sent them back to the jury room to continue deliberating the first count. In their written communication to the judge this afternoon, the jurors said: "Some...

After a two-week felony trial culminating with notes from a conflicted jury, four Kerry-Edwards campaign workers - including the sons of U.S. Rep. Gwen Moore (D-Wis.) and former Acting Mayor Marvin Pratt - had their charges in the Election Day 2004 tire-slashing reduced to misdemeanors and accepted the deal. The fifth Democratic staffer accused of crippling Republican vans won a jury acquittal by sticking with a fight against the felony charge. "Any other case like this, they would have made the offer (to reduce charges) right away, but for the people involved," said Adam Essling, attorney for Lavelle Mohammed, one...

Many people have wondered why Barack Obama and his team seem to have a soft spot for tyrants. Was it just the anti-Americanism and radicalism imbibed by Barack Obama from his youth and stoked by the ministrations of his minister, Jeremiah Wright and by his pals and comrades such as Bill Ayers and Rashid Khalidi? Or was it just the fad found in academia where Barack Obama has spent so many years? But maybe it is something else entirely. Maybe Barack Obama just likes their style - and we know this is a man who appreciates style because he seems...

The Democrats in the House are working on an extraordinary break of parliamentary procedure that will make reconciliation look like a conciliatory gesture. It's called the Slaughter rule named after House Rules chair Louise Slaughter. Each new bill that is voted on by the complete congress has it's own voting rules, Slaughter's scheme attempts to get the Senate version of Obamacare passed through the house without the house having to vote on it. The rule will state that once the house approves the "corrections" bill which will legislate the compromises between the two houses, the Senate bill will be passed...

Filegate, Consolidated Cases, DISMISSED While this Court seriously entertained the plaintiffs' allegations that their privacy had been violated--and indeed it was, even if not in the sense contemplated by the Privacy Act--after ample opportunity, they have not produced any evidence of the far-reaching conspiracy that sought to use intimate details from FBI files for political assassinations that they alleged. The only thing that they have demonstrated is that this unfortunate episode--about which they do have cause to complain--was exactly what the defendants claimed: a bureaucratic snafu. Chief Judge Royce Lamberth USDC District of Columbia

I am not a fan of Congressman Eric Massa, and he may very well be the creep that his "scandal seems to make him look like." But as for his charges that that Democratic leaders are using the House ethics committee to get him out of office before the vote on health care because he voted against the House health care bill last fall, those charges are very believable, especially since (unless you believe in coincidences) a similar thing may very well have been what happened to Governor Paterson of NY

Rep. Eric Massa, D-N.Y., under investigation for alleged sexual harassment of a male staffer, accused House Democratic leaders of lying about the charges against him and using them to run him out of Congress because he voted against health care reform when it last came before the House. Roll Call reports this morning that on the local radio show he hosts in his district, Massa said he had not been informed of the sexual harassment allegations before they became public. He claimed that Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., spoke falsely when he said he had brought the matter to him...

Last Week Democratic Congressman Joe Sestak made an astounding prediction. The White House offered a plum job in the administration if he would only drop his primary battle against now Democrat, former Republican, former Democrat, Arlen Specter. Both Fox News and the Philadelphia Enquirer spoke to unnamed White House officials, who insisted on “anonymity,” but had denied the congressman’s claim. Sestak, meanwhile, has repeatedly stood by his assertion that the administration offered him a job in exchange for not running against Specter. Yesterday, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs was asked the question out in the Instead of answering the...

The Clinton Army is famous for its Dirty Tricks and their "A" team of destroyers is back in action. According to Big Government, Bill Clinton has assembled a hit squad to go after key leaders of the Tea Party Movement. When tea party, 9/12 and townhall protests and rallies first erupted on the national scene, they were derided by national politicos as astroturf or a small fringe movement. Lefty journalists at MSNBC, CNN and elsewhere laughed away the movement with derogatory, pornographic references. Then, Scott Brown won election to the U.S. Senate from Massachusetts. No one is laughing anymore. In...

According to the Center for Responsive Politics, a research group in Washington that monitors the influence of money in politics, Mr. Hayworth was the largest single Congressional recipient of donations from Mr. Abramoff and his family, his associates, his Indian tribe clients and a gambling cruise ship line that he owned, with more than $101,000 going to Mr. Hayworth and his political action committee since 1999. Mr. Hayworth was also a frequent guest in sports skyboxes controlled by Mr. Abramoff and his clients, and at Signatures, a Washington restaurant owned by the lobbyist. Mr. Mitchell said Mr. Hayworth needed to...

Many opponents of Obamacare have been saying it doesn't matter if it gets passed, if the GOP takes over in 2010 they will repeal it. Sorry that will not be possible. The bill making its way through the Senate includes a clause that requires a two-thirds vote to amend or repeal certain sections of the bill. Section 3403 of Senator Harry Reid's amendment (page 1020) (A) IN GENERAL.—It shall not be in order in the Senate or the House of Representatives to consider any bill, resolution, or amendment, pursuant to this subsection or conference2 report thereon, that fails to satisfy...

NEWARK, N.J. - Gov. Jon Corzine says it might have been a "good idea" to use different wording in a campaign commercial criticized by some as a cheap shot at his Republican opponent's girth. The ad accused Chris Christie of "throwing his weight around" to get out of traffic citations while he was New Jersey's top federal prosecutor. It included unflattering images of Christie struggling to exit an SUV. Appearing Monday on CNN's "The Situation Room," Corzine said the choice of words may have distracted viewers from the real issue: abuse of power. Christie has acknowledged that he's struggled with...

Yes, Democrat operatives and their lawyers cost Alaska 80% of their operative time and 2 million in debt, but she also said her family has become a HALF MILLION in debt from these operatives.

Today, delegates to the Republican Convention (this weekend) started receiving mystery robocalls, with a child's voice....about Brownlee "throwing grandpa in jail" and directing people to a website that is critical of Brownlee and his past behavior: http://johnlbrownlee.com/ This website has the actual audio of the call: http://starcityharbinger.com/?p=6298 Website owner Brian Gentry denies being part of the calls...and both the Cuccinelli and Foster campaigns have released statements denying connection to the calls. The calls are so juvenile and poorly done, I cannot believe they would change anybody's mind...and I doubt that a major campaign is behind this ************************************************* Statement of Dave...

We are often exposed to the corroding acid of the politics of personal destruction, but I've never seen anything like this ? this wrenching break between pastor and parishioner before our very eyes. Both men no doubt will carry the grief to their graves. All the rest of us should hang our heads in shame for letting it come to this in America, where the gluttony of the non-stop media grinder consumes us all and prevents an honest conversation on race. It is the price we are paying for failing to heed the great historian Jacob Burckhardt, who said "beware...

Robert Gibbs takes on Sean Hannity Over the top. Gibbs got really slimey .. took out a piece of paper and read off talking points about Andy Martin's views, who was one of Sean's Sunday show guests, and which Gibbs twisted to infer Sean and FNC were anti-Semitic.

Where is the wisdom of Mike Royko when you need it? Royko was by far Chicago’s most beloved political columnist. His scathingly brilliant, uproariously funny writings on the Chicago political machine not only shone a light in the dark corners of corruption, favoritism, and mobbed up businesses of Richard J. Daley’s City Hall, he had fun doing it. A small sample: Several theories have arisen as to what Mayor Daley really meant a few days ago when he said: “If they don’t like it, they can kiss my ass.” On the surface, it appeared that the mayor was merely admonishing...

http://dustinsgunblog.blogspot.com/2008/02/unbelievable-attempt-at-ammunition-ban.html So far 10 States have bills that want to enact ammo serialization. It turns out that two Seattleites stand to make a hefty profit if the legislation goes through... Ravensforge inventors of record are Mr Steve Mace of Seattle, Washington and Mr Russel H Ford also of Seattle. As if by magic they have a patent pending for this magical system (Ravensforge is connected to the microstamping technology that California bought into recently.) It is very interesting to see that as part of their About Us mission statement they boldly state that the implementation requires legislation. Interestingly enough they...

Imitation being the sincerest form of flattery, the Clintons should bask in the glow of McCain's Clintonian gloss on this fact: Ten months ago Romney said that President Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki should discuss, privately, "a series of timetables and milestones." That unremarkable thought was twisted by McCain, whose distortions are notably clumsy, as when Romney said, accurately, that he alone among the candidates has had extensive experience in private-sector business. That truth was subjected to McCain's sophistry, and he charged that Romney had said "you haven't had a real job" if you had a military career. If,...

1. We expect promises of change from Democratic candidates, but it's disappointing to watch certain Republican candidates yield to that superficially seductive sound bite, too. It's like the global-warming freight train, which few politicians have displayed the guts and character not to board. 2. It's disappointing to watch candidates from both parties accept the premise that criticizing your opponents' records and pointing out their inconsistencies and lies is engaging in dirty politics. It is not dirty but obligatory to draw distinctions between you and your opponents. Dirty politics is distorting one's record or spreading lies about a candidate. Why do...

The retired general who asked about gays and lesbians serving in the military at the CNN/YouTube Republican debate on Wednesday is a co-chairman of Hillary Rodham Clinton's National Military Veterans group. Retired Brig. Gen. Keith H. Kerr was named a co-chairman of the group this month, according to a campaign press release. He was also active in John F. Kerry's 2004 campaign for president. Kerr asked candidates “why you think that American men and women in uniform are not professional enough to serve with gays and lesbians.” After the debate, former Education Secretary Bill Bennett said on a CNN panel...

WASHINGTON - The first victim of Hustler Magazine publisher Larry Flynt's most recent crusade, Sen. David Vitter, a Louisiana Republican, stepped forward last week, admitting that he had used a Washington prostitution service. The sudden announcement, which was clearly rushed out to beat Flynt to the punch, portrayed the ordeal as old news. Nothing more than past actions he regretted, a mistake allegedly long since forgotten by both him and his wife. But as the senator tried to control the news cycle, the blogosphere dug up Vitter quotes about "family values" and "strong marriages," and Flynt reigned over the airwaves,...

If I was a gambler, my money would be on Hillary Clinton being the guilty party in this one and I am seriously wondering if Sandy “The Burglar” Berger may have been spotted lurking around Davenport, Iowa. After all, he was convicted and disbarred for STEALING important Security documents from the National Archive to protect and cover up for the Clinton’s appalling approach to national security and their irresponsible defence of Americans from Islamic Terrorism during the 1990’s. DAVENPORT, Iowa The Davenport, Iowa, campaign headquarters for presidential candidate Barack Obama was burglarized Friday evening. Obama spokesman Tommy Vietor says two...

Republican Fred Thompson, who likes to cast himself in the role of Washington outsider, has a long history as a political insider who earned more than $1 million lobbying the federal government. As a lobbyist for more than 20 years, billion-dollar corporations paid Thompson for his access to members of Congress and White House staff. During that time he was close to two Senate majority leaders, both from his home state of Tennessee - his political mentor Howard Baker and, more recently, his former colleague Bill Frist. During Baker's tenure, Thompson lobbied for a savings-and-loan deregulation bill that helped hasten...

“Obama Just Got Less ‘Brown’ Friendly,� reads the Indian American blog Sepia Mutiny. The US-India Political Action Community, having elicited one tepid pseudo-apology from the Barack Obama campaign, then demanded an acceptably contrite expression of contrition. Barack Obama’s macaca moment is hardly the campaign killer that George Allen’s proved to be, but the spectacle of a Kenyan Kansan would-be president deflecting criticism from pro-trade Indian Americans is at least more interesting. Last week, Obama’s campaign sent out a not-for-attribution memo to media professionals, slamming Hillary Clinton for courting Indians and the Indian American Community. The dossier, delicately titled “Hillary Clinton...

Remember the Republican culture of corruption? The revolving door of Republican politicians moving in and out of top political offices and Washington D.C. lobbying firms? That's Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson. For years, acting wasn't the Law & Order star's profession -- it was a hobby. In the real world, Thompson has made a fortune in a decades-long career as a Washington lobbyist. And just this month, as part of his role as the ultimate Washington insider, Thompson offered to host yet another fundraising event for Scooter Libby's legal defense fund. Thompson has been vocal in his support of Libby,...

WATCH THE VIDEO AND PASS IT ON TO YOUR FRIENDS There is a reason that CNN has been known as CLINTON NEWS NETWORK. Rick Kaplan made it so. And now, it gets even better. The man in charge of the polling for CNN is a personal friend and big donor of the Clintons. Learn all about Vinod Gupta. He is in the perfect position to skew poll questions to benefit Hillary. BILL'S UGLY BUDDY (PAYMENTS FROM SCANDAL-TIED FIRM) CNN Pollster Vinod Gupta donates $1000 to Hillary Clinton - "She'll be our next President" CLINTON PAL EYEBALLED (InfoUSA CEO Vinod...

Democrats plan scandal offensiveBy: Jeff Patch and Patrick O'Connor April 24, 2007 03:27 PM EST House Democrats plan to recycle their "Culture of Corruption" slogan this week in an attempt to further tar congressional Republicans as scandals continue to plague the GOP. Democratic leaders hope this spring offensive puts Republicans on defense when the majority introduces a lobbying reform package early next month.Their most recent campaign targets a series of alleged misdeeds, including the controversy surrounding eight fired U.S. attorneys and the recent FBI raids of California Republican Rep. John Doolittle's home in Northern Virginia and a business associated...

It’s tempting to believe that the terrible revelation of Elizabeth Edwards’ incurable cancer will benefit the John Edwards candidacy, and that the understandable sympathy generated by the announcement will render the campaign immune to political attack. But precedent suggests otherwise. Last week’s announcement that Mr. Edwards’ wife and frequent campaign surrogate is now facing incurable Stage IV breast cancer should call to mind the story of Paul Tsongas, the Massachusetts Democrat who sought his party’s Presidential nomination in 1992, five years after receiving a bone-marrow transplant to treat non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, the disease that had prompted him to give up his...

Rep. Heather Wilson has long been among the most vulnerable Republicans in Congress, eking out wins in a Democratic-leaning New Mexico district because of her independent reputation and persistent campaigning. She now faces a new challenge to her future as well as her reputation: involvement in a growing political tempest over the firings of eight U.S. attorneys by the Justice Department. Wilson acknowledged Monday night that last October she contacted then-New Mexico U.S. Attorney David Iglesias to inquire about the pace of a corruption probe against the state treasurer, a Democrat. But she firmly denied calling to pressure Iglesias to...

Finally, a Republican scandal that may stick Usually when the Republican chairman of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children instant-messages an underage boy and asks him to get out a ruler to measure his... Well. Ahem. Let's just say: Usually when a congressman is involved in a scandal, he doesn't bring the whole party down with him. This time could be different. The Mark Foley affair is so simple and so human, it's like a Cliffs.Notes version of all the other Republican scandals: Rampant corruption. Leadership? Ha. No one cares till the klieg lights get turned on. THE...

Update: More on Mike Rogers. He edits this site, which used to be affiliated with Raw Story. Interestingly enough, one month before that small site that broke the news showed up, Rogers closed down his old blogger site “Blogactive” and started a new one under a new URL. More on this later if I find something of interest. Update: Well, folks should have known I would turn an eye on the blog site that was used to “expose’ Folely’s problems. One thing to note is it would not be impossible for the Dems to know of Folely’s issues. So let’s...

Washington County Commissioner Diana L. Irey seized on a report Tuesday from Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington that targeted her opponent in this fall's 12th Congressional District race, U.S. Rep. John Murtha. Irey hand-delivered a letter to U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan's downtown Pittsburgh office in the U.S. Courthouse calling for an investigation to determine if Murtha violated federal law. Irey based her request on the Ethics Reform Act of 1989, asking for a probe into whether Murtha accepted "campaign contributions in exchange for placing earmarked appropriations into legislation he is largely responsible for drafting and pushing to...

One of Virginia's best-known political analysts said he had never personally heard Sen. George Allen use racial epithets, despite saying on television a day earlier that the senator "did use the n-word." Larry J. Sabato, director of the University of Virginia's Center for Politics, said Tuesday in an e-mail to The Associated Press, "I didn't personally hear GFA (Allen's initials) say the n-word. "My conclusion is based on the very credible testimony I have heard for weeks, mainly from people I personally know and knew in the '70s," Sabato wrote. Sabato, a classmate of Allen's at the University of Virginia...

Los Angeles -- Democratic gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides on Thursday maintained his campaign did nothing wrong when it downloaded an audio tape of a private meeting from the governor's Web site. Instead, the state treasurer sought to steer the debate away from the legal or ethical questions of obtaining the file and focus attention on Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's comments. The governor was overheard on the tapes, during a private meeting with staff members last March, remarking about the fiery temperament that results from the mixing of "black blood" and "Latino blood." "As I understand it, this audiotape was downloaded from...

Charlie Crist confronted an 18-year-old claim that he fathered a child with a St. Petersburg woman, calling it "absolutely false" on Sunday as a secret campaign was launched near the end of the Republican primary for governor to leak the paternity dispute to the press. Documents faxed anonymously to the St. Petersburg Times show that in 1989 Rebecca O'Dell Wharrie said Crist was the father of a baby she wanted to place for adoption. Crist signed an affidavit denying paternity and relinquishing any parental rights. "Parenthood by myself is not possible as I never consummated the act necessary for parenthood,"...

U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman's campaign Web site remained offline Thursday, and federal and state authorities were investigating why it crashed on the eve of this week's defeat in a high-profile primary. The site, Joe2006.com, appeared to have suffered from a so-called "denial of service" attack, in which computers overwhelm a site with fake traffic so real visitors can't get through, said Richard M. Smith, an Internet security consultant in Brookline, Mass. The Lieberman campaign denied speculation among liberal Web pundits that the centrist Democrat's Web site had simply crashed because it used a low-budget Web host unable to handle the...

Seeks to clear way for independent in US Senate bid... Vermont's Democratic Party is maneuvering to keep the Democratic candidates for the state's open US Senate seat off the November ballot, as party leaders seek to clear the way for independent Representative Bernard Sanders in his bid for the Senate. State Democratic leaders are spearheading efforts to gather signatures to put Sanders on the ballot as a Democrat, even though Sanders has repeatedly said he would turn down the party's nomination if he wins the primary. At least three other candidates have announced their intention to run for the Democratic...

Buffeted by questions about his honesty and investigations into his wife's multimillion-dollar stock options, DFL endorsee Matt Entenza dropped out of the race for state attorney general Tuesday. Buffeted by questions about his honesty and investigations into his wife's multimillion-dollar stock options, DFL endorsee Matt Entenza dropped out of the race for state attorney general Tuesday. With wife Lois Quam, a top executive of UnitedHealth Group, at his side, Entenza stood on the steps of the State Capitol and said he was withdrawing despite his confidence that he still could win the election to succeed Attorney General Mike Hatch, the...

AUSTIN - A federal judge hearing a ballot dispute Monday involving former U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay said he thinks that DeLay withdrew from the November election, indicating potential trouble for Republicans who want to name a replacement candidate. "He is not going to participate in the election and he withdrew," said U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks, who did not issue an official ruling after a daylong trial regarding DeLay's status as the GOP nominee for the 22nd Congressional District. Jim Bopp, a lawyer for the Republican Party of Texas, disagreed, telling Sparks "there's been no withdrawal." Bopp said that instead,...

Democrats believe making embryonic stem cell research a campaign issue will help them in their effort to gain a majority in the House of Representatives in November’s elections.  The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has unveiled new advertisements that target seven Republicans who oppose federal funds for stem cell research that results in the destruction of embryos. The Democrats plan to promote the controversial issue with fervor in areas where there are large medical centers or biotechnology companies, the Chicago Tribune reported March 27. They also plan to use the ads in congressional districts known for politically moderate voters but represented...

<....snip....> What a condescending remark - but what a useful example of liberal racism. Mention the words "liberal" and "racism" in one sentence in a classroom at one of the nation's most elite universities, and you'll get blank stares. For a lot of people on the left, the phrase is an oxymoron. They really don't seem to know what it means. How can liberals be racist? How can people dedicated to promoting tolerance be guilty of intolerance?