Free Republic

The father of terrorist suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab had reported his concerns about his son's radicalisation directly to the CIA more than a month before the attempted bombing of an aeroplane in Detroit, according to a report. But the warning was not passed on in full by the intelligence agency, a source told CNN. Abdulmutallab's father Alhaji Uma Abdulmutallab, a prominent banker, was said to have had one face-to-face meeting with a CIA official in Nigeria and several contacts by telephone. A report was said to have been sent to CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, but much of it was...

From Guantanamo to Health Care, Obama is certainly seeking to Change America – or more accurately -to accelerate the pace of change from a private enterprise-freedom based civilization to a Big Government-run society. According to Thomas Paine, “It is the duty of a patriot to protect his country from his government.” I realize that is a slightly different definition than Joe Biden would use, but nevertheless, in that light, here is my listing of the worst of his policy decisions: 6. Bailing Out GM. “His policy of public investments prevented necessary liquidations. The businesses he hoped thus to save either...

Republicans have wasted no time in attacking Democrats on intelligence and screening failures leading up to the failed Christmas Day bombing of Flight 253 — a significant departure from the calibrated, less partisan responses that have followed other recent terrorist activity. ...the GOP’s yuletide political offensive could backfire on Republicans, putting the spotlight on the party’s own less-than-spotless record on homeland security.

While most of us are trying to relax and enjoy Christmas Day, the hate stemming from Islam never rests. Thankfully the plot failed. Al-Qaida link in failed plane attack By LARRY MARGASAK and LARA JAKES

I've heard people say that it's not fair to criticize the Democrats for botching health care reform because the Democrats never truly had a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. Sure, they have 60 votes in principle, the argument goes, but with Lieberman, Nelson, Landrieu, and Bayh counted as four of those votes, it's not really a solid 60. Perhaps. But then how was George Bush so effective in passing legislation during his presidency when he never had more than 55 Republicans in the Senate? In fact, during Bush's most effective years, from 2001 to 2005, the GOP had a grand...

(snip) SAMUELSON: If John McCain had won, would there be more bipartisanship?HOLTZ-EAKIN: I think so. One reason is mechanical: it would have been a Republican president and a Democratic Congress. You have to operate in a more bipartisan fashion. It's also about style. McCain is more willing to disappoint Republicans than Obama is to disappoint Democrats.(snip)

Barack Obama gave himself a B+ on Oprah Winfrey’s White House Christmas Special on ABC, but the American public is far less generous. The latest influential Rasmussen Daily Presidential Tracking Poll of likely US voters gives Obama a thumping 56 percent disapproval rating – an F grade by any measure. 46 percent strongly disapprove of the president’s job performance, while just 25 percent strongly approve. That’s a Presidential Approval Index rating of -21 percentage points, a staggering figure for a president just 11 months into his term of office. These are historically low approval ratings for a US president, that...

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Tuesday shows that 25% of the nation's voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Forty-six percent (46%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -21 That’s the lowest Approval Index rating yet recorded for this President

If you are under 30, you really need to read this column and pass it on to your friends. Your elected officials are dooming you to a new sort of bondage, a form of 21st Century slavery, if you will. First, some background. On October 16, 1854, Abraham Lincoln, then a former one-term Congressman, gave a three hour speech in Peoria, Illinois in which he decried the extension of slavery into the territories. The Republican Party was barely three months old. Lincoln warned that slavery was a “monstrous injustice” based on the raw principle of “self-interest” at odds with the...

Promising change after eight George Bush and Republican dominated years, Barack Obama won the most sweeping non-incumbent victory in over 50 years along with congressional Democrats gaining large House and Senate majorities. In addition, at 56.8%, voter turnout was the highest since Richard Nixon's "secret plan" to end the Vietnam war and his "Southern" and "law and order" strategies beat Hubert Humphrey and independent George Wallace in 1968. On election night, the mood celebrated hope for progressive change, an end to imperial wars, and a new day for America. When word came around 10PM, expectant thousands in Chicago's Grant Park...

More B.S. from the Obama Administration

I am not making this up. Obama got his tuchis handed to him at Copenhagen. Large nations told him to get bent. "Developing nations" -- countries run by homicidal Marxist lunatics -- demanded hundreds of millions of dollars. Obama promised $100M a year -- he has no authority to do so. Next year's political ads should show taxpayers being forced to write checks that are seen being handed to foreign firing squads. China told him to go, ah, make love to himself. Delegation then flew home. Obama reported to be "angry." This has beenn a total disaster for Obama and...

With time running out to forge a comprehensive climate agreement, negotiators at the U.N.-sponsored talks are considering a new draft agreement that would not require a binding treaty by 2010 but would lay the groundwork for a more ambitious target in limiting the rise of temperatures around the globe. The decision to remove the 2010 deadline is significant, because scientists have warned that the longer nations wait to make deep greenhouse gas emission cuts, the harder it will be to avert dangerous climate change. Many environmentalists, as well as leaders from both Europe and the developing world, have said they...

Barack Obama came, he spoke, and no one concurred: India and China have taken a united stand and walked out of the climate summit as Copenhagen talks fail.Tensions prevailed at the climate talks at Copenhagen today, as Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh and China premier Wen Jiabao walked out of the summit along with their respective delegations, as talks failed. Obama feted Singh just this month, saying that they should be impressed that India got first crack at Obama’s state dinner agenda.  Apparently, Singh was less impressed than Obama presumed.Meanwhile, Obama is getting some pretty bad reviews for his intervention...

Declaring that she “was honored and proud to run with him,” former Alaska governor Sarah Palin pushed back hard Wednesday against a report that she had disrespected Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) by blacking out his name on a sun visor she wore on vacation. The website TMZ accused Palin of “a frontal attack on Sen. John McCain” during a Hawaii vacation this week: “Sarah chose to wear a visor from her campaign -- a visor that was emblazoned with the former presidential candidate's name ... that is, until Palin redacted McCain's name with a black marker.” But Palin said in...

World leaders could put off major decisions on global warming for another six months time amid a warning from Gordon Brown that at the Copenhagen climate conference is threatened wirth “deadlock”. The Prime Minister spoke as Governments meeting in Denmark failed to resolve their disputes over how much to cut their emissions, how to prove that those cuts are actually made, and who should pay for the move to a low-carbon economy. As British officials admitted that the talks remain “ very difficult”, Ed Miliband, the climate change secretary, signalled Britain is prepared to back a move to hold another...

EMPEROR ZEROZERO POSSUMUS ARUGULA So it seems Emperor Zero was on with Oprah Windbag last night, and she asked him to give himself a grade for this, his first year in office. Mr. Modest gave himself a "good solid B plus." He added that if ObamaCare passes, he would tip that up to an "A minus." What kind of a report card do the DUmmies give Dear Leader? Now you would think at a place called DEMOCRATIC Underground, the Democrat President would score very high. Think again, Einstein! The DUmmies give Zero an "EPIC FAIL"! At least a lot of...

“Barack Obama as a person is a fantastic individual, but Barack Obama as an idea marks an evolutionary flash point for humanity,” gushed actor Will Smith, who will co-host Friday's Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Oslo. His idealization of Obama came during a recorded interview, from Norway, with CNN's Dan Lothian run shortly before 5 PM EST on Thursday's The Situation Room. Asked if Obama had really earned the peace prize, Smith's wife, actress Jada Pickett Smith who will co-host the concert with her husband, insisted: “All I can say is that our President has opened his arms to the...

The Libertarian Party is stuck in a loop that sustains its electoral irrelevance. Now is the perfect time for a strategy change. America has long used third parties as forums for statements of dissatisfaction with the big two. But while Theodore Roosevelt, Strom Thurmond, George Wallace, and Ross Perot generated considerable heat, they were populist flares who soon burned out. Every four, years the Libertarian Party picks a presidential candidate who tallies meager vote totals. In 2008, former Georgia Congressman Bob Barr received 523,686 votes -- 0.4% of the national total. Clearly, the purpose of the exercise isn't to win....

Speaking in Kabul alongside the US defence secretary Robert Gates, Mr Karzai said Afghan security forces would take the lead in securing the nation within five years, but that his country would need financial help to pay the salaries and equip the growing number of recruits. "Afghanistan is looking forward to taking on our responsibilities in terms of paying for its forces with its own resources, but that will not be for another 15 years," he said.

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — The former chairman of the Republican National Committee says that new immigration reform efforts will give his a party a chance to soften its tone on the issue. Ed Gillespie said Tuesday the GOP should present itself as anti-illegal immigration but not anti-immigrant in the debate. Gillespie said he thinks some of the party's harshest voices were the loudest the last time Congress debated immigration reform. Gillespie, who also served as counselor to former President George W. Bush, said Republicans need to do a better job of reaching out to minorities.

A White House spokesman dismissed polling that shows President Barack Obama's approval rating at a new low. A Gallup poll released Monday showed Obama’s overall approval rating dropped to 47 percent -- the lowest during his presidency. On Tuesday morning White House press secretary Robert Gibbs compared the poll to a child's art work. Gibbs was specifically referring to the trend line, which shows Obama's approval ratings declining. Gibbs noted "a six year-old with a crayon could do something a lot like that."

Stuart Varney was just on Fox and said Moody's will lower the United States bond rating for the first time ever in 2013 with current spending plans.

Currently, the only people left defending the Massachusetts health care reform are liberals who want to see Obamacare passed ... and Mitt Romney. On Sunday, while the Senate debated a bill to have the government takeover the health care system, Romney went on CNN and argued that his state takeover of health care worked out quite well for Massachusetts. Asked by John King to respond to criticism offered by his likely 2012 presidential rival Tim Pawlenty about how spending exploded in Massachusetts after the implementation of RomneyCare, Romney responded...

Republican Glenn Richardson has been dogged by talks of an alleged affair with a lobbyist and has admitted to struggling with depression. He leaves office Jan. 1. BY RICHARD FAUSSET Atlanta - Embroiled in a strange and unsavory drama involving a suicide attempt and allegations of an affair with a lobbyist, Georgia's powerful House Speaker Glenn Richardson, a Republican, said Thursday that he would resign. The announcement by Richardson -- a hard-charging, family-values conservative -- came amid Republicans' mounting calls for his ouster and fears that a lingering sex and ethics scandal could harm the Georgia GOP in next year's...

Insiders say around 60 NYT employees will take buyouts. You can add two new names to the growing list of New York Times staffers who are taking the buyouts offered by the newspaper in its efforts to downsize its staff. The newest names are: Stephen Labaton, who has been covering financial regulation and reform for the paper; and Edmund Andrews, a long time economic editor for the paper who wrote a book, Busted, about his own financial woes. (That's him pictured with his family in the pic.) Labaton's acceptance had been reported earlier. (See here for Gawker's full list of...

PRINCETON, NJ -- Barack Obama's presidential job approval rating is 47% in the latest Gallup Poll Daily tracking update, a new low for his administration to date. His approval rating has been below 50% for much of the time since mid-November, but briefly rose to 52% last week after he announced his new Afghanistan policy. Any slight bump in support Obama received coincident with his new Afghanistan policy proved to be very short-lived, as his approval rating returned to below the majority level by the weekend, and slipped further to 47% in Dec. 4-6 polling. Afghanistan is just one of...

In an embarrassing blunder, Gov. Charlie Crist mistakenly directed parents of uninsured children to call a toll-free sex line. People calling the governor's office heard an on-hold recording of Crist promoting the toll-free Florida KidCare line. Except two numbers were transposed.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs told reporters in his West Wing office Friday that the Republican Party's approval rating is "only slightly above the national drinking age." Gibbs was criticizing GOP efforts to delay Senate passage of the healthcare bill. With only two amendments being voted on so far, Gibbs was asked if a more realistic deadline for the healthcare bill is somewhere around the State of the Union address in late January. "I'm not going to wiggle on the date," Gibbs said. He said the president still wants a bill he can sign this year, and Obama "would...

Prominent liberal activists are warning Democratic leaders that they face a problem with the party’s base heading into an election year. The latest issue to roil relations between President Barack Obama and the liberal wing of the party is his decision to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan, which liberals fear could become a debacle like Vietnam. The left is also concerned the administration and party leaders have drifted too far to the center or are caving in to non-liberal interest groups in key policy battles, including healthcare reform, climate change and energy reform and financial regulatory reform. In some...

I have written two Tickers in recent days in which I put forward what I believe is a clear and convincing, if lengthy, case that Bernanke simply can't be justified for re-confirmation - So Bernanke, You Want To Be Reconfirmed? and The Black Hats Strike Back. But today, on the eve of Bernanke's reconfirmation hearing in the Senate Banking Committee, I want to focus on one and only one thing - The Fed's basic mandate: The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System and the Federal Open Market Committee shall maintain long run growth of the monetary and credit...

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is holding a rival jobs forum to match the White House's Thursday event, heading to Cincinnati, Ohio, on Wednesday for the start of a program he calls "a real jobs summit." Gingrich, who is head of a political action group called "American Solutions," is widely known to be toying with a run for the presidency. The trip to Ohio, where unemployment is slightly higher than the national average of 10.2 percent, is the first in a series and will followed by a trip to Jackson, Miss. In promoting the event, Gingrich's group is dismissing the...

We've all seen reports that Barack Obama's job approval rating has recently fallen below 50 percent in the Gallup poll for the first time since the president took office in January. A look inside those numbers -- Gallup publishes a weekly breakdown of its results by demographic groups -- shows that there are a lot of other firsts in the polling: Among age groups: For the first time in the White House, Obama is below 50 percent with every age group of Americans except those between 18 and 29. He's at 48 percent with people in the 30-49 range; 46...

Since the start of his presidency, U.S. President Barack Obama's approval rating has declined more among non-Hispanic whites than among nonwhites, and now, fewer than 4 in 10 whites approve of the job Obama is doing as president. Obama last week fell below 50% approval in Gallup Daily tracking for the first time in his presidency, both in daily three-day rolling averages and in Gallup Daily tracking results aggregated weekly. (snip) Blacks' support for Obama has averaged 93% during his time in office, and has been at or above 90% nearly every week during his presidency. Thus, part of the...

I am preparing a text which I will publish at The Brussels Journal in the not-too-distant future, but I will begin the discussion here first. When I read the various comments at Lawrence Auster’s place and Dennis Mangan’s blog, Takuan Seiyo’s recent piece at TBJ and the latest post by El Inglés at Gates of Vienna, I get the feeling that tensions are building up and that something big is going to happen within the coming generation, probably within the next five to ten years. Since I have been writing about geology lately I will use an analogy from plate...

For the past couple of months I have worried about the risks of a failed presidency. No one should want this, regardless of party affiliation. It is harmful and dangerous to our economy and country. However, it appears obvious to me that the royal regime known as Obama has ended. Seth Leibsohn writing in the National Review summarized it this way: "This is reminiscent of the Jimmy Carter years - the last time the U.S. was seen as weak - unable to move and coax other countries, unable to reassure dependent allies, unable to have the respect of the world...

Barack Obama is on track to have the most spectacularly failed presidency since Woodrow Wilson. In the modern era, we've seen several failed presidencies--led by Jimmy Carter and LBJ. Failed presidents have one strong common trait-- they are repudiated, in the vernacular, spat out. Of course, LBJ wisely took the exit ramp early, avoiding a shove into oncoming traffic by his own party. Richard Nixon indeed resigned in disgrace, yet his reputation as a statesman has been partially restored by his triumphant overture to China. George Bush Jr didn't fail so much as he was perceived to have been too...

We have a failed presidency that cannot be retrieved. The dream cannot be rebuilt because there was never a foundation to begin with. It was all show and no substance.

President Obama didn't look his age when he took office in January. Ten months later, nobody would mistake him for a kid. There are flecks of gray in the mane, and Obama, who is 48, no longer looks like the kind of guy who glides through life. "Every day, I wake up thinking, 'How can I give those folks who are out of work right now a job? How can I make sure that people who don't have health care get health care? How can I make sure that I'm doing right by those young men and women who are...

Innocent bystanders blog began this...I have merely updated it. If anyone else is more handy at graphics, then feel free to make it better!

Brownsville, TX (The Weekly Vice) - Anthony Carrazco, a 19-year-old Brownsville man was jailed Thursday after he allegedly went door-to door trying to sell marijuana until he knocked on on the door of a cop's house. According to police, Carrazco knocked on the doors of several apartment residents until he reportedly knocked on the wrong person's door. Investigators say Carrazco went up to an officer’s door and tried to sell him three ounces of marijuana. The deputy grabbed his badge and placed Carrazco under arrest. Police reportedly found Carrazco in possession of a 9MM handgun, a scale, and three ounces...

CHIANG MAI, Thailand (Nov. 16) -- Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said Monday that he had no regrets about his handling of the Iran hostage crisis more than 30 years ago, saying he didn't attack the country as his advisers proposed because thousands of people would have died. Islamic militants stormed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran on Nov. 4, 1979, and seized its occupants. Fifty-two Americans were held hostage for 444 days. Carter acknowledged that his failure to bring the hostages home — including a botched rescue mission in which eight U.S. servicemen died — led to his election defeat...

The Obama administration, under fire for inflating job growth from the $787 billion stimulus plan, slashed over 60,000 jobs from its most recent report on the program because the reporting outlets had submitted "unrealistic data," according to a document obtained by ABC News. The Office of Management and Budget document shows that before an Oct. 30 progress report on the program the administration asked the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board to remove information from 12 stimulus recipients that contained "unrealistic data," including "unrealistic job data." One recipient – Talladega County of Alabama – claimed that 5,000 jobs had been saved...

There will only ever be one Iron Lady, but confusion between Maggie and a moggy led to the Canadian Government preparing its condolences for the death of Baroness Thatcher. John Baird, the country’s Transport Minister, set the cat among the pigeons by sending a text message to a friend reading: “Thatcher has died.” The message spread quickly among the BlackBerrys of the 1,700 fellow Conservatives gathered in Toronto for a black-tie dinner to honour the country’s military. Soon Stephen Harper, the Canadian Prime Minister, had received the news that “Lady Thatcher had passed away”. The usual dinner chatter died away...

From where I sit I see many people underestimating President Obama because they cannot get their heads around who and what this man actually is and what he portends. Instead, historical or metaphoric analysis prevails making Obama like “Lincoln” or “Stalin,” like an "angel" or a "devil." Regardless of the comparisons evoked they all fail because Obama is none of these. He is "None of the above." He is not "That what came before." He is all of "What shall come after." Politically and personally, Obama is a genetic sport, a Chimera; a now not-so-mythical being composed of multiple parts...

In the second blockbuster Quinnipiac poll out today, Governor Ted Strickland’s hopes for re-election look dim indeed — but that’s not the main takeaway from the survey. Democrats successfully turned Ohio from red to blue in 2006 and 2008, but the love affair with Barack Obama and the Democrats has come to an end. Obama’s job-approval ratings on issues has dropped precipitately, and as his fortunes fall, so do those of his party (via Jim Geraghty): Ohio voters disapprove 50 – 45 percent of the job President Barack Obama is doing, down from his 53 – 42 percent approval September...

Obama said the White House forum will gather CEOs, small business owners, economists, financial experts and representatives from labor unions and nonprofit groups "to talk about how we can work together to create jobs and get this economy moving again." "We all know that there are limits to what government can and should do, even during such difficult times. But we have an obligation to consider every additional, responsible step that we can take to encourage and accelerate job creation in this country," he said.

As the most gifted orator of his generation, President Obama finds speechmaking perhaps his most potent political tool. It propelled him to national prominence in 2004 and to the White House in 2008. And whenever he needs to calm economic fears or revive stalled health care legislation, he takes to the lectern. It may be too soon to reach such conclusions. The Democrats who lost last week, after all, had fatal flaws all their own. But the results do suggest that Mr. Obama’s addresses these days may not resonate quite the way they did. Speeches that once set pulses racing...

A day after Tim Pawlenty took a few shots at Olympia Snowe, RNC Chairman Michael Steele came to her defense. Asked on Morning Joe whether there was room for the Maine centrist in the GOP, Steele responded "absolutely." Welcome! Welcome! Because--you know why that's important? Because every footprint of this party is different from region to region, from county to county. I can't win in the northeast with someone who'd be a better candidate suited in the south....So the reality of it is I'm looking to find my candidates where they are. And I want to lift them up because...

Washington (CNN) -- Victories in New Jersey and Virginia Tuesday provided a major shot in the arm for the Republican Party heading into the 2010 elections, but the Democratic losses of these two governorships should not be interpreted as a significant blow to President Obama. While the economy and jobs were the chief concern for voters in both states, 26 percent of New Jersey residents said property taxes was also a major issue, while another 20 percent mentioned corruption, according to CNN exit polling. In a similar CNN survey taken in Virginia, health care was the most important issue for...