Free Republic

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is blaming Republican senators for the creation and immediate collapse of the pro-migration bill that he secretly drafted with Democrat leaders. “The reason we’ve been talking about the border is because they [GOP Senators] wanted to,” he told Politico, adding, “The reason we ended up where we are is the members decided, since it was never going to become law, they didn’t want to deal with it … I don’t know who is at fault here, in terms of trying to cast public blame.” In reality, McConnell sent Sen. James Lankford (R-OK) to develop...

For 40 years, Lucy Calkins dominated literacy instruction in much of the country and especially New York City. She built an empire both intellectual and financial. In the past year, Teachers College in Columbia University tossed Lucy and her Reading and Writing Project out on the sidewalk. According to The New Yorker, there was a problem, especially in New York City: "literacy rates remain dismal." Uh-oh. The big question is, how can a person who got everything wrong be the brains of a world-famous education juggernaut? Calkins was an elementary school teacher — not an original thinker, but probably well...

BLOGIt's official! Bud Light is no longer No. 1! And your new champion: Modelo Especial, who has slid into the first place spot as America's top-selling beer. (Photo Illustration by Mario Tama/Getty Images) (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images) It’s official, ladies and gentlemen! Bud Light is no longer No. 1! And your new champion: Modelo Especial. They have slid into the first place spot as America’s top-selling beer over Bud Light, who has been in turmoil ever since the Dylan Mulvaney fiasco. Over the course of 2023, sales of Modelo at grocery and beer stores have surpassed Bud Light‘s, according...

LONDON, NatWest CEO Alison Rose stepped down with immediate effect on Wednesday after she admitted to a "serious error of judgment" in discussing former Brexit party leader Nigel Farage's relationship with the bank with a BBC journalist. ... NatWest has faced intense political and media scrutiny over a decision by its private bank Coutts to close Farage's accounts. An internal review .. showed Coutts' wealth reputational risk committee had said his values did not align with the bank's own. ... Some major NatWest investors are also applying pressure on the bank's chair Howard Davies to step down for mishandling the...

The Left is enjoying the moment, chuckling as residents near East Palestine, Ohio, are gripped with fear after the toxic train crash. To liberal America, these people deserve to live in fear, and without a doubt—some hope a few die. ‘This is what they voted for’ is the mantra which explains the woefully inadequate response from the Biden administration, which dithered for nearly three weeks before releasing federal resources to the area. It’s no coincidence that Biden authorizing the Federal Emergency Management Agency to deploy to the site came from Donald Trump’s announcement that he’d visit the town. East Palestine...

Progressives are taking aim at Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg over the Southwest airlines holiday travel fiasco that continues to cause mass delays and cancellations across the country, urging further scrutiny of the department’s practices. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), a leading left-wing lawmaker on Capitol Hill, took to Twitter on Thursday to question the Transportation Department’s handling of the debacle that left travelers deserted and frenzied and administration officials scrambling.

https://nypost.com/2022/10/07/mayor-adams-finally-calls-out-biden-for-border-fiasco-and-he-has-to-help-fix-it/

A YouTuber recently demonstrated that buyers of GMC’s new electric Hummer better clear their calendars if the truck is running low on battery charge. The video he produced demonstrated that when the $80,000+ electric vehicle (EV) is plugged in to a regular house outlet, it will take over four days to fully charge. A special 240-volt charger still takes a full day to charge the vehicle. A YouTuber with an electric GMC Hummer — an EV starting at $86,645 — plugged in his EV at home and found out that it would take, at best, one day to charge —...

While addressing the American people on Monday, President Joe Biden said the “buck stops with me” with regard to the Taliban’s alarming takeover of Afghanistan amid the U.S. military’s withdrawal. Then he went on spreading blame to everyone but himself, including former President Donald Trump. But Biden’s blame-game tactic appears to have failed, even among members of his own party. Democratic lawmakers this week turned on the president over his botched handling of the rapidly deteriorating situation in Afghanistan and are demanding answers from his administration, the Hill reported. What are they saying? One Democratic member of Congress, who remained...

Speaking to the MassesPope Francis' recent attack on the traditional Latin Mass and those who attend and offer it has produced quite the outcry around the world. Yet another example of the unintended Francis Effect, slapping around faithful Catholics has blown up in the face of the Vatican. When the Jesuit, left-wing America magazine and normally anti-TLM neoconservative George Weigel both voice public criticism of restricting the freedom to offer and attend Latin Masses, clearly the Vatican roll-out of Francis' hit-job can be considered a massive communications failure based on bad policy and poor planning.To that end, we all...

PHILADELPHIA - Three days have passed since Election Day, and races for auditor general, state senate and state representative are still up in the air in Pennsylvania. Election officials haven’t finished counting the vote because they are grappling with an influx of more than 1.4 million mail ballots after the state implemented no-excuse absentee voting for the first time ever amid a pandemic, widespread protests and riots. In Philadelphia, the biggest city in the state, only about 14,000 of nearly 160,000 mail and absentee ballots had been tallied as of Friday afternoon. **SNIP** The fact that Philadelphia, a Democratic stronghold,...

Asked by a volunteer how results would be transmitted from one place to another, the staffer demurred. “Those are all excellent questions, and we’re still working out some of the details around those ...” she said. In interviews, volunteers said they received little information at the training beyond a rough outline of how the tool is supposed to function. They also were unsure how the party plans to carry out its four-day early voting period, which previously relied on the use of an app to capture people’s preferences. Morrison said that there was “not a bit of proof” at the...

WASHINGTON -- Senate Republicans said lead impeachment prosecutor Adam Schiff insulted them during the trial by repeating an anonymously sourced report that the White House had threatened to punish Republicans who voted against President Donald Trump. Schiff, who delivered closing arguments for the prosecution, was holding Republican senators rapt as he called for removing Trump from office for abusing his power and obstructing Congress. Doing anything else, he argued, would be to let the president bully Senate Republicans into ignoring his pressure on Ukraine for political help. “CBS News reported last night that a Trump confidant said that key senators...

The unidentified whistleblower whose bombshell complaint is at the center of the Democrat’s impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump has suggested they may be accused of political bias for a third, unreported reason. The whistleblower acknowledged to the Intelligence Community Inspector General (ICIG) that bias against President Trump might be alleged against him or her for a reason that was previously unreported, sources familiar with the ICIG investigation revealed to Fox News. However, the nature of that third reason has not been disclosed. Two previous reasons for potential political bias against the mystery whistleblower have been reported - firstly, that...

Beto O’Rourke is planning a counter-rally as President Donald Trump addresses supporters in Dallas next week — recalling the dueling events held on the Texas-Mexico border eight months ago that helped launch the former congressman’s White House bid. The Democratic presidential candidate will stage a “Rally Against Fear” the evening of Oct. 17 at The Theatre at Grand Prairie in suburban Dallas around the same time Trump is holding an event of his own at the American Airlines Center, home to the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks and the NHL’s Dallas Stars. Trump says he’ll highlight the strength of the Texas economy,...

‘Being mean isn’t funny. It’s mean.’ The swells and grandees of the White House Correspondents Association expected to have themselves a hearty laugh blowing up President Trump Saturday night. Instead, the WHCA was so rattled that it pulled the pin on its little comedy grenade and threw the pin at Trump. It held onto the grenade and it blew up in its face. It’s hardly worthy of note that the previously little-known comic Michelle Wolf’s act was mean-spirited, vulgar, and unfunny as she tore into Sarah Huckabee Sanders and said President Trump loves Nazis. If the comedy at the White...

Friday, California's High-Speed Rail Authority published its draft 2018 Business Plan. Its 800-mile bullet-train project's estimated cost is now $77.3 billion, up from $64 billion two years ago, and its final completion has been pushed out another four years to 2033. The current estimate is now more than 70 percent above the $45 billion presented to voters in 2008. The related Associated Press story failed to disclose that original cost estimate, as did three leading California newspapers. The Authority's draft discloses that "More than $3 billion has been expended to date on construction in the Central Valley and planning for...

So the passing of another week has a new performer showing up to participate in the year-long circus unfortunately known as the Alabama State Department of Education. The new act is headlined by Bryan Taylor, legal counsel to Governor Kay Ivey. He burst onto the stage with great fanfare late on August 17 clutching a letter decreeing that the music must stop and the clowns return to their makeup room. As things now stand, the state board of education has a called meeting set for Aug. 23. But lawyer Taylor, the same guy who recently took to social media to...

In the two years since James “Patrick” Harris was arrested after the Twin Peaks shootout in Waco, he lost the lease on his apartment, was rejected for a job with a state health and human services agency and was kicked out of Mexico while on the way to work with sick children and Dr. Patch Adams. All because he rode to Waco with a few friends as members of the Grim Guardian motorcycle group on May 17, 2015, he said. Judy Bergman said her husband, George, hardly rides his motorcycle anymore. It used to be his passion. Now he rides...

There’s corruption in DC... This concept comes into clear view when we look at ACA and AHCA, better known as Obamacare and Trumpcare. These two “competing” bills are so similar one would think the same people who support one would support the other, but the exact opposite is true. It’s divided along party lines. In fact, nobody is on record supporting both, though some Federalist-minded politicians were wise enough to support neither. Congressman Justin Amash reluctantly supported the latter. He was so disgusted by the necessity to support AHCA as the lesser-of-two-evils that he penned a response to his vote...