Free Republic

Congress's approval rating is in the basement, at sixteen percent. Fifty-three percent rate the Democrat-controlled Congress as "poor." It's striking that even more independents (72%) than Republicans (64%) rate Congress's performance as poor. Michael Barone says that Democrats are losing the enthusiasm battle, too. No surprise there: what phenomena have liberals mustered that begin to approach the tea parties, townhalls, and the march on Washington of a couple of weeks ago? The Washington Post finds that the public's dwindling support for the Obama administration and Congressional Democrats is hitting them where it hurts, in the pocketbook. Contributions to the Democrats'...

If, like me, you haven't had time over the last few days to keep up with the story of Barack Obama's firing of Gerald Walpin, the Inspector General who has responsibility for the AmeriCorps program (Bruon York) will bring you up to speed. The story is an interesting one that sheds light on the lawless, bullying nature of the Obama administration. Walpin, who by statute is supposed to be independent of White House control, ran afoul of Obama because he investigated a charity operated by former pro basketball player Kevin Johnson, a prominent Obama supporter. The non-profit, St. Hope, received...

We noted here efforts by Barack Obama's campaign to shut down his critics' free speech. In particular, Obama obviously doesn't want the public to know about his long-term, cozy relationship with proud-to-be-a-terrorist Bill Ayers. Now, Obama himself has upped the ante by demanding that the conservative who funded the Ayers ad be criminally prosecuted: Obama general counsel Bob Bauer today sent a second, sharper letter to the Justice Department, directly attacking the Dallas billionaire funding a harsh attack ad, Harold Simmons. "We reiterate our request that the Department of Justice fulfill its commitment to take prompt action to investigate and...

That's how a great many people feel about the impromptu rebellion that House Republicans have staged against Nancy Pelosi's refusal to allow a vote to lower energy prices by increasing supply. Last Friday, Pelosi adjourned the House without having done anything to address the country's energy problems. Republicans voted against adjournment, and since then, an energetic band of Republican Congressmen has carried out a guerrilla campaign against the thoughtless arrogance that Pelosi embodies and that typifies the modern Democratic Party. Initially, Republicans refused to go on vacation and instead stayed in the House chamber, continuing to discuss and debate the...

Barack Obama's suggestion that we can't drill our way out of the current energy shortage, but we can solve the problem through tire inflation, has been the source of much hilarity. We did the math here, and found that it would take approximately 11,308 years of tire inflation to equal the energy we can obtain by developing our own petroleum resources. Now, remarkably, Time magazine has rushed to the defense of its candidate, arguing that "Obama is right." The author of the article, Michael Grunwald, mixes apple-and-orange statistics to try to create the false impression that there is more to...

McCain began by recalling the beginning of the surge: "Senator Obama and I also faced a decision, which amounted to a real-time test for a future commander-in-chief. America passed that test. I believe my judgment passed that test. And I believe Senator Obama's failed. We both knew the politically safe choice was to support some form of retreat. All the polls said the "surge" was unpopular. Many pundits, experts and policymakers opposed it and advocated withdrawing our troops and accepting the consequences. I chose to support the new counterinsurgency strategy backed by additional troops -- which I had advocated since...

A horrific news story has slowly made its way into the headlines here in the Twin Cities. A local resident, his wife and three daughters spent the evening of the Fourth of July at Valleyfair, a local amusement park. They were leaving the park at midnight when a criminal began to molest his twelve-year-old daughter. The father intervened to defend his daughter, and the offender put out a call for his "homies." Eight "men" materialized and began to beat up the father. They knocked him to the ground and took turns stomping on his head. The man's wife and daughters...

The debate over Iraq and the war on terror rages, even amid signs we're winning. John Hinderaker of powerlineblog.com recently posted a blog entry answering the perennial question, "Are We Safer?" We rerun it here with his permission.On the stump, Barack Obama usually concludes his comments on Iraq by saying, "and it hasn't made us safer." It is an article of faith on the left that nothing the Bush administration has done has enhanced our security, and, on the contrary, its various alleged blunders have only contributed to the number of jihadists who want to attack us. Empirically, however, it...

There are several stories in the news this morning that share a common theme. (The New York Times) headlines that the Democrats are "Newly Willing to Compromise on Iraq":"[S]enior Democrats now say they are willing to rethink their push to establish a withdrawal deadline of next spring if doing so will attract the 60 Senate votes needed to prevail."The Times attributes the Democrats' flexibility--grudgingly--to a stiffening of Republican resolve:"Democrats had been counting on more Republicans to make a clean break from the president after the summer recess, but the White House has managed, at least temporarily, to hold on to...

We noted (here) that the prosecution of some, at least, of the Marines accused of committing murder at Haditha appeared to be crumbling. Sure enough: today, Lt. Gen. Jim Mattis, head of Marine Corps Forces-Central Command, (dismissed all charges against two of the Marines), Lance Cpl. Justin Sharratt and Capt. Randy Stone, a lawyer who was the infantry battalion’s staff judge advocate.As to these individuals, at least, the dismissal can be taken as proof that they were innocent. Lt. Gen. Mattis wrote eloquently about the conditions under which Marines in Iraq are required to make split-second decisions. I haven't seen...

Powerline Post by John Hinderaker (excerpts) "A couple of years ago, the conventional wisdom was that Rudy Giuliani would be a formidable Presidential candidate, but could never get the Republican nomination because of his liberal views on some social issues. I believe that we were among the first to question this assumption...At the Candidates' Forum, the Giuliani campaign has started a thread titled Social Conservatives Back Giuliani, which cites some of the recent poll data...UPDATE: Interesting--so far, the commenters on Giuliani's Forum site are pretty much unanimously OK with his position as laid out above. That could change as more...

ABC News finds that the U.S. re-deployment of troops to Baghdad, and their placement in large numbers in the most dangerous neighborhoods, appears to be working. Preliminary reports show a significance decrease in violence. Iraqi authorities say the number of violent attacks has gone down by 30 percent. The U.S., using different calculations, says such attacks have decreased by 22 percent. On the same note, the Washington Times quotes Army Maj. Gen. William Caldwell, who sees "life coming back to some normalcy" in Baghdad. "We are cautiously optimistic and encouraged by all the indicators that we are seeing," says General...

Blog of the Week Vital Perspective notes that the government of Iran is going from building to building in Tehran, smashing satellite dishes. This can only be construed as an effort to cut Iranians off, as much as possible, from news originating in the outside world. Which strikes me as ominous, especially with August 22 only five days away.

The New York Times reported yesterday on the military's investigation into the killings at Haditha. The Times purports to describe the report that Lt. Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli has sent up the chain of command. No such information was officially available, as the investigation is not complete: In a brief statement issued from Iraq on Friday, General Chiarelli's headquarters said he had finished reviewing a lengthy investigation by Maj. Gen. Eldon A. Bargewell of the Army into the actions or absence of actions by Marine leaders in Haditha, as well as the training that marines had received and the command...

The Bush administration and Republican Senators have badly misjudged both the attitudes of most Republicans (and, of course, most Americans) toward illegal immigration, and the intensity of those views. While we have opposed the Senate plan, we have been pretty mild-mannered about it. So I'm turning the microphone over to my friend Bob Cunningham. No one I know of argues immigration-related issues more cogently. Equally important, no one I know of conveys the white-hot anger and sense of betrayal that millions of Americans feel about this issue more effectively. We know that this site is widely read in the White...

We got several emails from readers who heard press secretary Tony Snow interviewed on NPR this morning. Joe Malchow was kind enough to track down the audio; here it is. The fireworks start around five minutes into the clip, but it's all interesting. What I find striking is the hostile attitude of the NPR interviewer, Steve Inskeep. At one point, Snow describes one of his questions as "snarky." Basically, Inskeep was trying to get Tony to agree that past press secretaries had been liars, and pledge not to follow their example. Tony does an excellent job, and keeps his good...

A new batch of Iraqi documents has been released on the Foreign Military Studies Office web site. Only three are in English, so we need some Arabic speakers to take a look at the others. Only one of the three translated documents appears interesting. It is from Iraqi intelligence, and includes the following order, dated Dec. 2, 2001: In preparation for any foreign attack (God forbid), be prepared to disperse documents from Headquarters to private residences in various geographic locations. Which raises three questions: Why was Iraqi intelligence fearful of a "foreign attack" in December 2001? Why was the agency...

On March 11, the New York Times printed the gripping story of Ali Shalal Qaissi, the Iraqi in the most famous photo from Abu Ghraib, depicted below: The story begins: Almost two years later, Ali Shalal Qaissi's wounds are still raw. There is the mangled hand, an old injury that became infected by the shackles chafing his skin. There is the slight limp, made worse by days tied in uncomfortable positions. And most of all, there are the nightmares of his nearly six-month ordeal at Abu Ghraib prison in 2003 and 2004. The story continues in lurid detail, a searing...

In today's article on the investigation of the leaks underlying the New York Times's December 16 disclosure of the NSA terrorist surveillance program, the Times finally acknowledges its own legal jeopardy: [C]onservatives have attacked the disclosure of classified information as an illegal act, demanding a vigorous investigative effort to find and prosecute whoever disclosed classified information. An upcoming article in Commentary magazine suggests that the newspaper may be prosecuted for violations of the Espionage Act and says, "What The New York Times has done is nothing less than to compromise the centerpiece of our defensive efforts in the war on...

 THE HEARINGS on John Roberts's and Sam Alito's nominations to the Supreme Court featured a Latin phrase most people hear only in connection with Supreme Court confirmations: stare decisis. Stare decisis is the legal doctrine holding that in general, an issue once decided should stay decided, and not be revisited. This exchange between Judge Alito and Senator Arlen Specter, near the beginning of Alito's testimony, was one of many similar colloquies:  SPECTER: In Casey, the joint opinion said, quote, "People have ordered their thinking and lives around Roe. To eliminate the issue of reliance would be detrimental."  Now, that states,...

This morning I came across one of the most remarkable pieces of poll data I've seen in a long time, in the Quinnipiac University poll that was released yesterday. The poll has generally been cited for its finding that Americans are highly optimistic about 2006; by a margin of 79% to 10%, respondents say that they expect 2006 to be better for them personally than 2005. But here is what I found stunning. Respondents were also asked whether 2005 had been better for them personally than 2004. By a 53% to 33% margin, they said it was better rather than...

The CIA'S war against the Bush administration is one of the great untold stories of the past three years. It is, perhaps, the agency's most successful covert action of recent times. The CIA has used its budget to fund criticism of the administration by former Democratic officeholders. The agency allowed an employee, Michael Scheuer, to publish and promote a book containing classified information, as long as, in Scheuer's words, "the book was being used to bash the president." However, the agency's preferred weapon has been the leak. In one leak after another, generally to the New York Times or the...

Scooter Libby may just be misdirection to shield Judith Miller from another source of legal exposure. LAST SUMMER, New York Times reporter Judith Miller went to jail rather than reveal to Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald the identity of the source who told her that Valerie Plame was an employee of the CIA. Or so she said. But there was always some doubt as to what motivated Miller. It has been widely reported that her source was Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff. Libby himself has testified before Fitzgerald's grand jury that he met with Miller on July...

There is a lot to be said about Ronnie Earle's indictment yesterday of Tom DeLay--and, by the way, a corrupt DA like Earle can procure an indictment of pretty much anyone he chooses, so I refuse to give Earle cover by attributing the indictment to the grand jury--but the most interesting question to me is, why did he do it? To help the Democratic Party, obviously; but I mean the question more specifically. Earle has been conducting this "investigation" for three years. He indicted three of DeLay's aides a year ago. If he thought he could get away with indicting...

PRESIDENT BUSH'S NOMINATION of John Roberts to the Supreme Court has brought into public view a hitherto-obscure movement, or conspiracy; or maybe just an obscure hoax: the "Constitution in Exile" movement. The concern that Roberts might be part of this shadowy group was voiced most explicitly by the editorial board of the Minneapolis Star Tribune:  If [Roberts] won't answer, if he falls into word games and other avoidances, or if he indicates he subscribes to the beliefs of Scalia, Thomas and other supporters of the so-called "Constitution in exile"--meaning the Constitution as it was interpreted prior to the New Deal--then...

Journalism professor Chris Hanson begins his piece in the Washington Post by taking Newsweek to task for its handling of the Koran-gate story. However, he quickly shifts his criticism to conservative blogs, and then implies that Drudge (which he calls a blog of sorts) is the real cause of Newsweek's error. Hanson's attempt to portray bloggers' handling of the Dan Rather and Eason Jordan stories as particularly noteworthy instances of the rumor-mongering that got Newsweek into trouble is preposterous. In the case of Rather, bloggers carefully examined every facet of the document-authenticity issue -- the document format, style, and substance...

Oh Boy! Just when you thought the legacy media might have wised-up in the wake Dan Rather's career crash, along comes Nick Coleman, the worst columnist at the Worst Major Daily Newspaper in America. The old adage is that when you find yourself in a hole, you should stop digging. Instead, Nick has rented a metaphorical backhoe. Coleman is about to gain fame well beyond his home market, and I don't think he is going to enjoy the experience. Evidently, Nick has been wounded deeply by the ridicule he has endured at the hands of fellow Minnesotans John Hinderaker and...

THE D.C. SNIPER'S JIHAD By MICHELLE MALKIN -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Email Archives Print Reprint December 10, 2003 -- FROM the moment John Allen Muhammad and Lee Malvo were arrested in the Beltway-area sniper case last fall, the media and Muslim activists wanted us to believe that the serial killings had absolutely nothing to do with Islamic terrorism: * CNN downplayed Muhammad's religious conversion - calling him by his old name, John Allen Williams, when his identity was first revealed. Malvo was cast as a clueless dupe with no true convictions. * Nihad Awad of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) argued: "There...