Free Republic

Donald Trump Stands by Refusal to Commit to GOP Nominee: ‘It’s Great Leverage’Trump on Possible Third-Party Run: 'Great Leverage, Might as Well Use It' As seen on Hannity Donald Trump appeared on "Hannity" tonight to react to the Fox News Republican debate. Trump said that he refused to take the pledge to not run as a third-party candidate because he didn't want to give up his leverage with the Republican Party. "If they don't treat me well, Sean, why should I make that pledge?" Trump asked. "At this moment, it's great leverage, and I might as well use it." "I...

The Cleveland Clinic is owned by doctors. But thanks to Obamacare it's illegal for doctors to own hospitals. Section 6001 of the health care law effectively bans new physician-owned hospitals (POHs) from starting up, and it keeps existing ones from expanding. It has already halted the development of 24 new physician-owned hospitals and forced an additional 47 to struggle to meet the deadline to complete construction, according to the Physician Hospitals of America (PHA). You couldn't build the Cleveland Clinic today if you wanted to.

RUSH: James in Memphis, as we go back to the phones. It's great to have you, sir, on the EIB Network. Hello. CALLER: Yes. This is James. RUSH: Yes. CALLER: I was calling 'cause I wanted to let everybody know that Barack Obama really stomped McCain in the debate Friday. RUSH: You wanted to let everybody know that Obama stomped McCain in the debate Friday? CALLER: Yes, he did. The reason why I say that is because McCain was using the same old tired things that he had been trying to bring forth all along, and Barack Obama called him...

I’m giving it to McCain — and you know I’m a tough grader on him. He was slow out of the gate — a broken record on earmarks and spending — but Obama failed to turn the bailout debacle against him. McCain hit his stride in the second half, schooling Obama on counterinsurgency, Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, and Russia. McCain made no major soundbite-able gaffes. It was more a matter of a few missed opportunities for McCain than the commission of any major errors. Major omission of the night from McCain: Did he say a single word in defense of...

The Battle of the (Bush) Bulge: Why Did the 'NYT' Kill Its Story? By Brian Orloff Published: February 09, 2005 1:00 PM ET NEW YORK "It's just as important a story after the election, and they've dropped it," says freelance writer David Lindorff, referring to the alleged bulge under President Bush’s suit jacket during the first presidential debate late fall. Lindorff’s take on how, and why, The New York Times killed a story on the controversy just before the November election gained wide attention this week after it was published in Extra!, a magazine produced by the media watchdog group...

The last word on Bush’s bulge Call off the conspiracy freaks. Now it can be told: That mysterious bulge on President Bush’s back during the first presidential debate was not an electronic device feeding him answers, but a strap holding his bulletproof vest in place. Speculation about the bulge on the Internet only increased since Georges de Paris, the Washington tailor who makes Bush’s suits, told The Hill last month that it was nothing more than a pucker on the back of Bush’s coat caused when he crossed his arms. But sources in the Secret Service told The Hill that...

The Internet, as it will, has been buzzing for weeks about that mysterious bulge under President Bush's jacket during his first debate with Sen. John Kerry. Was it an electronic receiver? Was Bush being coached via a hidden earpiece? The president finally responded to the speculation this week by insisting that the bulge was in no way an electronic device. "I'm embarrassed to say it's a poorly tailored shirt," he told a TV interviewer. Jason Woodside, owner of San Francisco's International Spy Shop, the Bay Area's sole purveyor of espionage and counterespionage gear, could only shake his head when told...

I thought John Kerry clearly won the first debate, lost the second, and did worse in the third. Most Americans, however, apparently disagreed, since many polls showed that respondents thought Kerry won all three. We hear of mayhem daily in Iraq; news on the economic front is mixed; and an entire host of surrogates has defamed George Bush in a manner not seen in decades during a political campaign. Why, then, does Kerry gain little traction, trail in most polls, and perhaps even start to slip further? After all, he is a hard campaigner, has a razor-sharp memory, speaks well,...

Elisabeth Bumiller, Left-Wing Conspiracy-Monger White House reporter Elisabeth Bumiller again treats a conspiracy theory as actual news. Monday marks her second piece on the "bulge," previously a subject of debate only on the far-left side of the Internet. She writes in her "White House Letter": "In these closing weeks of the presidential campaign, the talk at an edgy White House is of polls, turnout, swing voters and polls. There are also two story lines from the presidential debates that to the exasperation of President Bush's advisers won't go away: the bubble and the bulge. The bulge -- the strange rectangular...

In the first presidential debate, John Kerry made a little noticed statement affirming his intention to provide Iran with nuclear fuel. "I think the United States should have offered the opportunity to provide the nuclear fuel, test them, see whether or not they were actually looking for it for peaceful purposes." For those with a short memory, this was essentially the same policy the Clinton administration adopted toward North Korea – provide them nuclear fuel under the ridiculous assumption that Kim Jong II would only use the nuclear fuel for electricity. Hence, the growing nuclear arsenal being amassed in North...

"Friday October 15, 2004--The Presidential debates are over and the election is just two-and-a-half weeks away. The latest Rasmussen Reports Presidential Tracking Poll shows President George W. Bush with 49% of the vote and Senator John Kerry with 46%. The Tracking Poll is updated daily by noon Eastern. Voters surveyed last night declared the third and final debate a tie, with fans of each candidate thinking their man won. The number of voters who prefer Bush over Kerry on both national defense and the economy has returned to the levels that existed before the first debate" Posted by: Adrian Spidle...

<p>The man behind the story picked up by The Washington Post and New York Times &#8212; suggesting a bulge in President Bush's suit during last week's debate may have been a transmitter feeding him answers &#8212; turns out to be left-wing writer Dave Lindorff (search), who just last year said, "It's going a bit far to compare the Bush of 2003 to the Hitler of 1933. Bush simply is not the orator that Hitler was."</p>

I personally think the first debate was a tie and the second debate GW up slightly but by the 3rd debate John Kerry was used to mop the floor. Why? GW’s strong suit was supposed to be the first debate. Shouldn’t he have won it? Let’s look at this for a minute. If you are an A student in math do you study for that test or do you study for the test in English where you are a C student? GW and his team did NOT prepare him for debate 1 because his numbers were already up for this...

• Question 3 -- What 'misjudgments' has Bush made? • Question 4 -- Who's top target, bin Laden or Saddam? • Question 6 -- When should troops come home? • Question 7 -- Are U.S. soldiers dying for a mistake? • Question 8 -- What was the 'miscalculation' in Iraq? • Question 9 -- When has Bush misled the public? • Question 10 -- Has the war been worth the loss of life? • Question 11 -- When will the war in Iraq end? • Question 12 -- Would Bush lead another pre-emptive war?

If President Bush fails in his re-election bid, the enduring image of his campaign will be the scowls on his face while Democratic nominee John Kerry answered questions during the debate at the University of Miami last month, according to one of Bush's opponents in 2000. "It was the single most disastrous performance of any president at the debate level," Patrick J. Buchanan, the 2000 Reform Party presidential candidate, said Tuesday night at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. "He had the chance to put it away." Buchanan spoke at Fisher Auditorium for the college's "Ideas and Issues" lecture series, which is...

According to the NY Times: "First they said that pictures showing the bulge might have been doctored. But then, when the bulge turned out to be clearly visible in the television footage of the evening, they offered a different explanation." I recall that theory all over the internet about the possibility of the photo being doctored, but I don't recall Bush or the Bush campaign ever being the ones making that claim. Anyone got a link, a quote, or is the NY Times just blowing biased smoke into our eyes?

Expressing its appreciation for some Sen. Kerry’s remarks during the first presidential debate, the American Muslim Taskforce on Civil Rights and Elections (AMT*), a coalition of the ten largest American Muslim organizations, has asked him for greater clarity and commitment. The AMT leaders believe that the Democratic Presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry may have raised two of the most important questions concerning election 2004 during the first Bush-Kerry debate: Are we at war against Islam or against terrorism? Are we waging a war of liberation or occupation? The election 2004 could actually become a national referendum on these two questions....

OLEAN -- Somewhat lost in all the media mist over who won last week's initial debate in the presidential election is a stinging John Kerry reference to late September news that I thought would draw much more play and citizen attention than it did. It should have triggered a public furor. Three days before the Kerry-Bush face-off in Miami, the Justice Department released a classified summary of a frightening report by that agency's Inspector General. The bad news literally sent a chill down my spine. The IG investigation discovered that 123,000 hours of eavesdropped recordings related to possible terrorist plans...

The Mystery of the Bulge in the Jacket WASHINGTON, Oct. 8 - What was that bulge in the back of President Bush's suit jacket at the presidential debate in Miami last week? According to rumors racing across the Internet this week, the rectangular bulge visible between Mr. Bush's shoulder blades was a radio receiver, getting answers from an offstage counselor into a hidden presidential earpiece. The prime suspect was Karl Rove, Mr. Bush's powerful political adviser. When the online magazine Salon published an article about the rumors on Friday, the speculation reached such a pitch that White House and campaign...

John K. Fairy? Columnist Maggie Gallagher has an amusing take on last week's presidential debate: What got to Bush? Here's what I think: It was not the brilliance of Kerry's debating tactics but the absurdity of the essence of the new Kerry position: The war on Iraq is an easy thing. The reason bad things are happening is Bush is bungling. Give that man a wand and slap a pair of wings on his back: John Kerry is running for fairy godmother! Our allies are opposed to the war? A swoosh of the Kerry wand and President Kerry will have...