Free Republic

A team of Pentagon officials is heading to Ukraine to help the country rebuild its fractured military, a mission that lawmakers and analysts expect will result in recommendations for greater military assistance in the country’s fight against pro-Russia separatists amid international outrage over the downing of a commercial airplane. Within the next few weeks, a group of Defense Department representatives who specialize in strategy and policy will head to Kiev to evaluate specific programs that the United States may want to help bolster, said Army Col. Steve Warren, a Pentagon spokesman. Their objective is to work with Ukrainians to “shape...

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid rarely makes time to travel back to Nevada and listen to the voters who sent him to Washington, according to a Washington Examiner review of Senate disbursement records. Reid's office budget showed only 11 trips in three years, far fewer than any other senator. snip Other high-profile senior lawmakers have records that aren't much better. Democrat Sen. Dianne Feinstein averaged only nine trips to California annually, according to Senate office travel logs. That's one-third as many as most lawmakers. As legislators prepare to adjourn to their home states for the August “district work period,” the...

Bill Clinton doesn't want his wife to win the U.S. presidency, according to sources cited in an explosive new book about the $100 million conglomerate that the Clintons have become since they left the White House. The former president is 'deeply conflicted' about the idea, writes Daniel Halper in 'Clinton Inc.: The Audacious Rebuilding of a Political Machine,' a well-sourced and easy-reading book released Tuesday. A former senior adviser to President Clinton told Halper that if Mrs. Clinton, the presumptive Democratic favorite, should become president, 'Clinton's f***ed.'

The updated standards released by the United States Department of Agriculture, which most schools put in effect over the 2012-13 school year, meant larger, faster changes to lunches nearly across the board. With the changes came news media reports of student complaints and food waste. A USA Today article in September 2012 described protests and boycotts from Kansas to Massachusetts. Those objections to the phase-in of the new standards are supported by the findings of two recent studies. Researchers asked school administrators and food-service providers whether students complained “at first” about the new lunches. Many did (56 percent of elementary...

When writing about politics, it's all too frequent to use terminology that often obscures more than elucidates. That's especially true when it comes to the word "wave"—shorthand for a landslide victory for the winning party. I've argued before that the likelihood of 2014 being a wave election has been rising, given the president's consistently low approval ratings and the fact that Republicans are running evenly on the generic ballot (which usually translates into a clear GOP edge) and that the right-track/wrong-track numbers are near historic lows. All these big-picture signs are ominous for the party in power. But this week,...

As hopes dim for bipartisan action in Congress this summer, President Barack Obama is calling on Republican lawmakers to cooperate while complaining that they have “gone off the rails” and urging Democrats to get over their complacency and vote them out of office. The mixed messages aim to cast Obama as being above the fray even as he embarks on one of his most intense fundraising sprees for the Democratic Party. “I’m not overly partisan,” he insisted Tuesday before 250 donors in a well-to-do lakefront neighborhood in Seattle. “The problem is not the Republican Party per se. The problem is...

WASHINGTON — President Obama had to laugh. He had just been asked how he deals with criticism, and something about the question just struck him as funny. Maybe it is because criticism is one thing he sees no shortage of these days. Addressing an audience largely made up of African-American boys and young men, Mr. Obama turned serious and gave a long, thoughtful answer about how, over the years, he has learned to focus on what is important to him and keep fixed on “the north star that steers you” no matter what others may say. “And then I just...

Transportation minister orders that Uvda airport near Eilat be utilized to replace Ben-Gurion Airport beginning noon local time. Transportation Minister Israel Katz on Wednesday instructed the relevant agencies to immediately open the Uvda airport, the country's second terminus for air traffic which lies just north of Eilat, in the wake of the spate of flight cancellations announced by major foreign airlines. Katz convened a meeting of senior civilian aviation officials who recommended that the Uvda airport be utilized to replace Ben-Gurion Airport. Related: • US urges deferral of travel to Israel, increases first aid to Gaza • El Al says...

The Obama administration will unveil new rules Wednesday proposing more stringent safety standards on trains carrying crude oil and other flammable fuels. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx is expected to announced the new rules, which will include standards for tank cars, speed limits for trains carrying crude oil, brake standards and testing for oil and other flammable liquids, according to a Wall Street Journal report. A Department of Transportation spokesperson confirmed to The Hill that the announcement will be made Wednesday. The federal rules have been anxiously awaited by the railroad and oil industries, which have met with White House and...

President Obama is unpopular. In the 12 states that will decide control of the Senate this November, though, he's even more unpopular. A new poll from Democratic pollster Democracy Corps shows 60 percent of people in these states say they disapprove of Obama, compared to just 37 percent who approve. Perhaps more striking: 50 percent of voters in these states say they not only disapprove of Obama, but they "strongly" disapprove of him. To the extent the 2014 election is about Obama and his job performance -- as midterm elections are generally theorized to be -- half of voters in...

Rarely has a president been confronted with so many seemingly disparate foreign policy crises all at once — in Ukraine, Israel, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere — but making the current upheaval more complicated for Mr. Obama is the seemingly interlocking nature of them all. Developments in one area, like Ukraine, shape his views and choices in a crisis in another area, like the Middle East. “It’s a very tangled mess,” said Gary Samore, a former national security aide to Mr. Obama and now president of United Against Nuclear Iran, an advocacy group. “You name it, the world is aflame....

Chances that Kerry will secure a cease-fire in near future are small; government will likely be able to buy time needed to complete mission in whole or large part. Operation Protective Edge is now two weeks old. Since the ground offensive began Thursday night, we have begun to get a better picture of just how dangerous Hamas has become in the nine years since Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip. And what we have learned is that the time has come to take care of this problem. It cannot be allowed to fester or grow anymore. We have known for...

A new study shows the lesser prairie chicken population has exploded by 20 percent prompting concern by western lawmakers that the Obama administration acted hastily when it listed the bird as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. The aerial survey conducted last month by the Western Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies showed the grouse species numbers jumped from 18,747 to 22,415. That study plus the Agriculture Department’s tardiness in reporting conservation efforts to Congress as required by law prompted a letter from lawmakers including Colorado Republican Rep. Scott Tipton demanding the report. “We request that your department provide this...

It’s a taboo subject among Senate Republicans but one that’s on many senators’ minds: What if Mitch McConnell loses his reelection bid? There appears to be no clear answer to that question, at least not right now. In interviews and private conversations with more than half of the 45-member Senate Republican Conference, there is a split over a potential McConnell successor. His top deputy, John Cornyn of Texas, is favored to succeed him, several GOP senators said. But others ranging from John Thune of South Dakota to Tennessee’s Lamar Alexander — or a dark horse — are among those who...

The Minnesota Tea Party Alliance is warming to Republican U.S. Senate candidate Mike McFadden. Or at the very least, its leaders are no longer actively opposing him, as they did during the GOP endorsement process. Some history: After McFadden appeared at a Tea Party event in May, Jake Dusenberg, executive director of the Tea Party Alliance, took to Facebook to warn his followers: “Folks, Mike McFadden is bad news. He has dodged the tea party and conservative base. He's flip-flopped on multiple issues. And he is the establishment's choice for the Senate.” But in a recent email fundraising message, Tea...

Former state Sen. Barry Loudermilk convincingly defeated former U.S. Rep. Bob Barr Tuesday in their bruising Republican primary runoff for the Atlanta area’s 11th Congressional District seat. Loudermilk, who campaigned with strong support from tea party groups, will head to Washington as no Democrats have gotten on the ballot for the 11th District, which covers all of Bartow and Cherokee counties and parts of Cobb and Fulton counties. Also Tuesday evening, Jody Hice, a former Baptist minister who ran with substantial tea party backing, bested Jackson trucking company executive Mike Collins in the GOP primary runoff for Georgia’s 10th Congressional...

With the decision of United States Senator Pat Roberts to skip debates with his opponents, Kansans are deprived of a useful part of the political process. Election campaigns are an essential element of representative democracy. Campaigns are simultaneously a means for those who seek elective office to connect with voters and a way for citizens to learn about the candidates who are seeking their votes. Political campaign debates are an integral component of the modern political campaign. … Voters have come to expect election debates, particularly in the race for the president of the United States but increasingly for other...

While Republicans are reluctant to speculate about the possibility of a Mitch McConnell loss to Alison Lundergan Grimes in Kentucky this November, when asked if his number two, Texas Republican John Cornyn, was a lock for Leader if he does lose, it appears Cornyn may have good reason to look over his shoulder in the event that scenario plays out. Given that a McConnell loss would likely mean the GOP would have failed in winning a Senate Majority, it would seem a change in leadership might be in order. Some Senators also seemed to express concern that Cornyn would be...

Voters strongly believe the United States is a more divided nation these days, and they think both sides are to blame. Most are also ready to do something about it at the ballot box in November.

Former Dollar General CEO David Perdue narrowly beat Rep. Jack Kingston in the Georgia GOP primary runoff tonight, and in the days leading up to election day, he made a big push to tie the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's support for amnesty to Kingston, who had benefited from over $3 million in campaign spending from the lobby group. "Kingston's largest backer...is 100 percent pro-amnesty. Kingston now owes them big," a brutal television ad from Perdue said. After Eric Cantor's stunning primary loss, the Georgia race turned into a brawl over immigration, with both candidates trying to out-flank each other on...