Free Republic

You can almost smell the sweat. The Democrats and their media handmaidens are starting to panic about Joe Biden’s prospects. The proof comes in their efforts to wish away the wave of crime and violence engulfing many American cities. Their argument can be boiled down to two false claims. First, it’s President Trump’s fault. Second, it’s not that big of a wave. The first is patently absurd on its face. Democratic mayors running nearly all those cities are pulling back cops and rejecting federal help. The blood is on their hands.

It’s pearl-clutching Democrats who got massacred by Trump impeachment trial: Goodwin Pearls clutched, hair on fire, heads exploding — pick your favorite image to describe the left’s latest reaction to President Trump. Once again, the end is near, he’s gone too far, this time we got him. His outrage against all that is good and pure was to pink-slip star impeachment witnesses Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman and EU Ambassador Gordon Sondland. “Friday Night Massacre” screamed the usual suspects, a not-very-subtle reference to Richard Nixon’s “Saturday Night Massacre.” The difference, unmentioned, is that Trump was already acquitted, whereas the Nixon impeachment...

The dictionary defines a conjurer as someone who “practices magic arts” and “performs feats of sleight of hand and illusion.” In plain English, someone like Adam Schiff. The California Democrat takes his magic act public Wednesday as the impeachment hearings burst out of a Capitol Hill dungeon and onto television. Donald Trump’s presidency and the 2020 election likely hang on whether Schiff’s sleight of hand can survive the bright lights of public exposure and cross-examination. Operating in darkness, where he controlled the witness list and leaked snippets of testimony that the Dems’ media echo chamber turned into proof of Trump’s...

For nearly three years, Democrats were certain they would eat President Trump’s lunch in 2020. The 25 dreamers seeking the party’s nomination are testament to the conviction that one of them definitely would be the next president. Oops. Suddenly, after just two debates, the Nervous Nellies are climbing the walls. Many Dems are worried that the battle is too nasty and too negative, and that the front-runner, Joe Biden, is looking awfully ­wobbly. Equally worrisome, Biden’s strongest challengers, Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, are leaning so far left that their appeal could be limited to the most radical elements....

Then there was Thursday’s spectacle in the Oval Office. Once again, his stream-of-consciousness commentary veered from nonsense to common sense and included references to the 13th Amendment, which forbids slavery, and his feeling of being “programmed” as a black man to support only liberal politicians. A black anchor on CNN accused West of putting on a “minstrel show,” a black pundit on the same panel called him an “attention whore” and “the token Negro of the Trump administration.” Another chipped in with, “Kanye West is what happens when Negroes don’t read.” A black New York Times columnist said the White...

Reader Jamie Gelfand asks the right question about the Brett Kavanaugh disgrace, writing: “If Christine Blasey Ford held a news conference tomorrow and said she made everything up and apologized for dragging Kavanagh through the mud, would even one Democrat change his vote?” The question answers itself because the Dems keep moving the goalposts. When one line of attack fails, they come up with another. The only consistency is their determination to keep Kavanaugh off the Supreme Court. Recall that some of the party’s initial talking-point objections described his judicial rulings as “extreme” and “out of the mainstream.” They are...

This month marks the two-year anniversary of one of the most important articles ever written on journalism. On Aug. 7, 2016, after Donald Trump formally secured the Republican nomination and the general election was underway, New York Times media columnist James Rutenberg began with a question: “If you’re a working journalist and you believe that Donald J. Trump is a demagogue playing to the nation’s worst racist and nationalistic tendencies, that he cozies up to anti-American dictators and that he would be dangerous with control of the United States nuclear codes, how the heck are you supposed to cover him?”

*snip* A third layer of the onion involves the revelations in the letter GOP Sens. Charles Grassley and Lindsey Graham wrote to the Justice Department. They urge a criminal investigation into whether Steele lied to the FBI about how much and when he fed the dossier to the anti-Trump media. The letter is compelling in showing that Steele said one thing under oath to a British court and something different to the FBI. The contradictions matter because the agency relied on Steele’s credibility in both the FISA applications and its actual investigation. Strangely, even after it fired him for breaking...

....“too big to believe” ... a cabal dedicated to defeating Donald Trump and to let Hillary skate in the classified email probe. FBI leaders betrayed the nation by abusing govt powers to hand-pick the president. ....also involves the salacious Russian dossier paid for by the DNC and Clinton campaign......almost certainly used to get FISA court warrants to spy on Trump associates....oppo-research of the party in power convinced a court to let it spy on the candidate of the other party — without telling the court of the dossier’s political link. Even worse, there is growing reason to believe someone in...

During the financial crisis, the federal government bailed out banks it declared “too big to fail.” Fearing their bankruptcy might trigger economic Armageddon, the feds propped them up with taxpayer cash. Something similar is happening now at the FBI, with the Washington wagons circling the agency to protect it from charges of corruption. This time, the appropriate tag line is “too big to believe.” Yet each day brings credible reports suggesting there is a massive scandal involving the top ranks of America’s premier law enforcement agency. The reports, which feature talk among agents of a “secret society” and suddenly missing...

But the Clinton e-mail scandal, like Clinton herself, won’t go away. It remains a blot on the legacy of the Obama administration, the Justice Department and the FBI, and now comes fresh evidence that the investigation that cleared her was a total sham. The revelation from the Senate Judiciary Committee that J. Edgar Comey drafted his statement exonerating her about two months before FBI agents interviewed Clinton or 16 other witnesses confirms suspicions that the probe was neither honest nor thorough. When the outcome is decided long before the investigation is over, the result can’t be trusted. There is only...

Sometimes a speech is just a speech. And sometimes it heralds the prospect of a great national revival. Donald Trump gave the best speech of his short political life last night, and it had nothing to do with grand oratory. He was thoroughly presidential, speaking plainly and yet masterfully in projecting an optimistic vision of the America he aims to build. It is a vision so optimistic and encompassing that even steaming Democrats had to join boisterous Republicans in the applause at times. Anything you could possibly want, he served it up in a feast of ideas and promises. Trump...

His slogan, Make America Great Again, was so in-your-face that there was no mistaking its meaning. It was nationalist and populist, and the fact that those ideas offended the tender sensibilities of the political and media elite was a bonus. Trump’s no-bulls–t approach struck a deep chord in the hearts of Americans who felt abandoned by both political parties and their government.

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Let's go audio sound bite route because I have teased a couple times that we've got Doris Kearns Goodwin and others just continuing to pull their hair out trying to figure out how Hillary lost to Trump. As the days go by, they just can't figure it out. And they're not chalking it up to things like fake news, bamboozling people. One of the problems they're having is they cannot and are not honest with themselves about who they are. That's their biggest problem. The left's biggest problem is they lie even to themselves. But let's listen....

So, if you were a fruit, what kind of fruit would you be? Barry thought he was a grape:Unfortunately, with his root stock, Barry’s more of a blackberry: small, prickly, seedy and filled with pith.Butt shiny!And while you can make wine from blackberries, it doesn’t age well. I’ll let Michael Goodwin at the NYPost explain:  The presidency is sinking, but we are expected to believe that only the president is blameless.We are witnessing the total collapse of a bad idea. Obamaism, a quasi-socialist commitment to a more powerful government at home and an abdication of American leadership around the world,...

On Sunday, a stunned audience sat in silence as Doris Kearns Goodwin turned the keynote address at the opening ceremony for the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg into a political lecture focusing on women's and gay rights. Missing from much of her keynote: Gettysburg.

The reports are not good, disturbing even. I have heard basically the same story four times in the last 10 days, and the people doing the talking are in New York and Washington and are spread across the political spectrum. The gist is this: President Obama has become a lone wolf, a stranger to his own government. He talks mostly, and sometimes only, to friend and adviser Valerie Jarrett and to David Axelrod, his political strategist. Everybody else, including members of his Cabinet, have little face time with him except for brief meetings that serve as photo ops. Secretary of...

<p>Knowing your interest in how previous presidents faced national crises, I recommend an example you might have missed. It's an Oval Office speech noted not for its oratory, but for its surprising content. The parallels to your situation are striking.</p>

Senate Judiciary Approves Pro-Abortion Goodwin Liu Nomination Washington, DC -- The Senate Judiciary Committee approved the nomination of a pro-abortion activists President Barack Obama nominated for a federal appeals court in the western United States. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/04/08/senate-judiciary-approves-pro-abortion-goodwin-liu-nomination/

W.Va. special election for U.S. Senate seat in doubtJuly 18, 2010 CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A special election is now in doubt for the seat held by the late U.S. Sen. Robert C. Byrd. Pending legislation would put the seat on the Nov. 2 ballot following an Aug. 28 primary. But the Legislature recessed Sunday without acting on it. State officials had questioned whether they could follow the necessary election timetable if a bill wasn’t passed by Sunday. Gov. Joe Manchin’s office says it believes the special election can still go forward if a bill passes Monday. Without the legislation,...