Free Republic

<p>He can pick up a spare but can he pick up the state?</p> <p>That was the question after Republican Mike Huckabee bowled 10 frames Sunday evening at Olympic Lanes on Milwaukee's South Side.</p> <p>Sporting a little new color in his face and some sharp words for Republican officials who want him to get out of the race, Huckabee is again sloshing through the state after a detour to the Caribbean.</p>

Richard G. Darman, who marshaled a deep, prickly intelligence to guide policy and deal making in four Republican administrations, including negotiating the reversal of the first President George Bush’s campaign pledge not to raise taxes, died Friday. He was 64 and lived in McLean, Va. His death was announced by James A. Baker III, the former secretary of state and a friend of Mr. Darman. Mr. Darman had been fighting acute myelogenous leukemia, his son Jonathan said. In addition to serving President George Bush in the cabinet-level post of director of the Office of Management and Budget, Mr. Darman worked...

TOKYO - Warren Nobuaki Iwatake's family has seen more than its share of calamity. When he was still a child his father was lost at sea off Hawaii. With no breadwinner, his family was forced to move to Japan, where Iwatake was drafted during the war. He lost a brother when the bomb fell on Hiroshima. But through it all one thing has remained constant. The tree. His parents bought it in 1937, and his family has brought it out every Christmas since, without fail, even when that meant risking arrest. "This tree was a shining light, because it was...

Today the President discussed Housing in the Roosevelt Room and took place in the annual Lighting of the National Christmas Tree and the Pageant of Peace on The Ellipse near the White House in Washington. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice attended a Transatlantic working dinner held at the Egmont Palace in Brussels. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates left Iraq and travelled to Bahrain where he attended a meeting with the King of Bahrain, Hamad bin Al-Khalifa and visited US troops on the USS Vicksburg. The First lady is given a tour of the exhibit: "The Presidential Dish: Mrs. Woodrow Wilson...

A Day in the Life of President Bush (with photos): 11-17-07 Enjoy your visit to Sanity Island PHOTO OF THE DAY (from yesterday's National Adoption Day at the White House) QUOTE(s) OF THE DAY From the President's Radio Address ~~ November 17, 2007 Excerpt: "Good morning. In a few days, our Nation will celebrate Thanksgiving. Like millions of Americans, members of Congress will travel home for the holiday. Unfortunately, as they get to work carving their turkeys, they're leaving a lot of unfinished work back in Washington, D.C. And unless they complete this work soon, middle-class Americans will pay...

A Day in the Life of President Bush (with photos): 11-10-07 Enjoy your visit to Sanity Island Transcript: 11-10-07 - President Bush and Chancellor Merkel of Germany Participate in a Joint Press Availability - Prairie Chapel Ranch - Crawford, Texas QUOTE(s) OF THE DAY "First on al Qaeda, we do share a common goal, and that is to eradicate al Qaeda. That goal obviously became paramount to the American people when al Qaeda killed 3,000 innocent souls on our soil. And since then, the United States of America, along with strong allies and friends, has been in pursuit of...

The National Endowment for Democracy (NED), is a private, nonprofit organization, was founded in the early 1980's under the influence of Ronald Reagan for "supporting democracy abroad". So we've had that going on for years. The NED basically does overtly what the CIA used to do covertly. It funds civil society groups and organizations that fit within U.S. strategic interests in various countries.

Michael Dukakis has seen this script before: a Republican administration besieged by scandal and running out the clock on its second term, while wide-eyed Democrats confidently lick their chops, knowing there’s no way in hell voters will reward the G.O.P. with four more years in the White House. It was around this very moment 20 years ago, the summer when Oliver North told Congress he was “authorized to do everything that I did” and Reagan fatigue took hold, that Mr. Dukakis, then the 53-year-old governor of Massachusetts, emerged at the head of a crowded Democratic presidential pack. By the time...

The President held a press conference in the Press Briefing Room today then signed H.R. 2272, The America Competes Act Bill after which he departed to Maine where he will spend the week at the family home attending a wedding and meeting with the French President. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met with Lebanon's Charge d'Affaires Antoine Chedi at the State Department. Enjoy your visit to Sanity Island

ATHENS, Greece: Former U.S. President George H.W. Bush arrived in Greece on Monday for a sailing holiday around the Greek islands as a guest of a shipping tycoon. The former president landed early Monday in Athens and changed planes for Kavala, a port city in northeastern Greece, where he arrived shortly after 11 a.m. (0800GMT). ***SNIP*** Bush is a guest of Greek shipping tycoon Spiros Latsis, on whose yacht he has also vacationed in the past. ***SNIP*** Bush is accompanied by a party of 19, including his son Jeb Bush, the former governor of Florida.

Today the President and first lady attended and spoke at the United States Global Leadership Campaign at the Ronald Reagan Building in Washington DC. The President met with President Jalal Talabani of Iraq in the Oval Office today. Secretary of State Condoleezza is in Vienna Former President George H W Bush attended and spoke at a dedication for the Billy Graham Library in Charlotte, N.C., Yesterday Secretary of Denfense Robert Gates attended and spoke at the U.S. Air Force Academy graduation ceremony in Colorado Springs and today he is in Hawaii. Enjoy your visit to Sanity Island

Robert Poole, a mechanical engineer who has advised the administrations of George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush to privatize U.S. highways, estimates that more than $25 billion in Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) highway projects are planned or approved in the United States. Now, a prominent Oklahoma state representative has invited Poole to promote his PPP toll road ideas, a move evidently designed to counter growing citizen opposition. Poole Lobbies for PPP Highways in Oklahoma Oklahoma House Speaker, Republican Lance Cargill, the founder of a group known as The 100 Ideas Initiative, has invited Poole to give a June...

Former President George Herbert Walker Bush spent a significant part of his speech in Los Angeles on Monday night talking of his love of family and his pride in the son who currently occupies the White House. Yet as the 82-year-old former chief executive recounted his years as president, the tale of how he governed stood in marked contrast to what critics, a few of whom were in the audience, say are the official actions of his beleaguered son. Enumerating the crises and triumphs of his term — among them the successful coalition-building before the 1991 Persian Gulf War, the...

The President and First Lady attended the National Prayer Breakfast today and then participated in a meeting on child fitness in the Roosevelt Room of the White House. Enjoy your visit to Sanity Island

On this "National Day of Mourning throughout the United States," President and Mrs. Bush attended the funeral service for former President Gerald Ford at the National Episcopal Cathedral in DC today. President Bush was among those asked to eulogize (text and webcast at this link) his predecessor. Henry Kissinger's eulogy was very informative about the international achievements of Ford's presidency. I've been looking for the text but haven't found it so far. If anyone does, please post it or link it on this Dose. Goodbye, President Ford. Thank you for your faith in Christ that helped bindup and heal the...

Today the President met with President Boni Yayi of Benin at the White House and later he and the First Lady spoke at the White House Summit on Malaria. Today the Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice addressed a Human Rights Day Commemoration at the State Department Former U.S. President George H W Bush is in China Enjoy your visit to Sanity Island

FORMER US president George H.W. Bush broke down in tears today during a speech about his son, not the current president but the outgoing governor of Florida, Jeb Bush. Mr Bush, who was speaking at a leadership forum in Tallahassee, Florida, began weeping as he spoke about the way Jeb Bush handled losing the governor's election in 1994. "(He) showed not merely with words but by his actions what decent ...," the former president said before breaking down and being comforted by his son.

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (Dec. 5) - Former President George H.W. Bush came here Monday to talk about leadership and opened his remarks with advice on working with rivals, being patient and building personal relationships. He then broke down in tears mentioning his son, Gov. Jeb Bush, as an example of leadership and the way he handled losing the 1994 governor's race to popular incumbent Democrat Lawton Chiles. He vaguely referred to dirty tricks in the campaign. "He didn't whine about it. He didn't complain," the former president said before choking up in front of lawmakers, Gov. Bush's top administrators and state...

As president of Texas A&M University, Bob Gates abolished admissions preferences for the children and grandchildren of alumni, reportedly saying it was "unworthy of a great university." Funny, then, that he should be returning to Washington on the strength of his reputation as daddy's boy. "Daddy," of course, is former President George H. W. Bush, for whom Mr. Gates served as deputy national security adviser and director of Central Intelligence. Today, the elder Mr. Bush is being celebrated as a foreign-policy sage whose adroit stewardship of the world stands in flattering contrast with current management. Mr. Gates, along with Bush...

GLADWYNE, Pa. - Former President George H.W. Bush said Thursday that a Democratic takeover of Congress would be a "ghastly thing for our country." Bush, speaking at a fundraiser for Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., warned that the Republican majority of the Senate is at risk. "This is more than party versus party, it is the idea that if we have some of these wild Democrats in charge of these committees it will be a ghastly thing for our country," Bush said. Democrats would need to gain six seats in the Senate and 15 in the House in the Nov. 7...