Free Republic

Republican politicians call Obamacare a train wreck and a failure. Wayne Root shows why that isn’t true. Obamacare isn’t an accident. Nor is Obama incompetent. He is brilliant. And Obamacare is a success – if you understand Obama’s goals. Watch Wayne expose the shocking truth:

A huge fire destroyed a large part of Nairobi’s international airport early on Wednesday, closing East Africa's most important transport hub with dozens of high-season holiday flights diverted and disruption expected to last days. It is the 15th anniversary of al-Qaeda attacks on US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania but officials said there was no immediate indication the fire was caused by a bomb or a deliberate act. The Kenya Red Cross said that there were no reports of casualties.

Editor's Note: Today's live webcast of the sun has been delayed one hour to 2 p.m. EDT (1800 GMT) due to cloud cover at the observing site. A huge sunspot 11 times the size of Earth is facing our planet now and you can see live telescope views of the solar behemoth in a skywatching webcast today. The giant sunspot AR1785 will star in a free webcast by the online skywatching website Slooh Space Camera Tuesday (July 9) at 2 p.m. EDT (1800 GMT) and last about 25 minutes. You can watch the sunspot webcast live on SPACE.com, courtesy...

Waves as high as 7m (22 ft) have hit parts of Chile and coastal areas are on alert as high winds and tidal currents sweep across parts of South America's coast. Footage showed huge waves surging onto the streets of Antofagasta in Chile where at least one injury was reported following the dangerous weather. In Peru, parts of the country's coastline were hit with waves as big as 5m (16 ft) and the weather caused flooded streets in the seaside city of Chimbote.

This is stupid, but I can't help myself from posting it. Apparently a town near me had a recent Hugh success."Big weekend of celebration was a hugh success!" One can't help but wonder if the writer is a Freeper just being funny.

"Top Justice Department officials, including Attorney General Holder, know more about Operation Fast and Furious than they have publicly acknowledged," said Chairman Issa. "The documents this subpoena demands will provide answers to questions that Justice officials have tried to avoid since this investigation began eight months ago. It's time we know the whole truth." The House Oversight Committee has officially delivered a subpoena to Attorney General Eric Holder requesting documentation from the Obama Justice Department about Operation Fast and Furious. The subpoena requests the following documents and communications in unredacted form and includes a request for communications between the...

New York area union members will join an expected several thousand labor activists and supporters tomorrow in a Wall Street march and rally in support of the Occupy Wall Street protesters.The grassroots-grown protest is now in its third week, with a diverse array of people from across the country camping out in the heart of the financial district to demand Wall Street is held accountable for the schemes and reckless games that led to the nation’s economic collapse.The mostly young Occupy Wall Street protesters are “speaking for the vast majority of Americans who are frustrated by the bankers and brokers who have...

All it took to give nearly two dozen labor leaders from Chicago a windfall worth millions was a few tweaks to a handful of sentences in the state's lengthy pension code. The changes became law with no public debate among state legislators and, more importantly, no cost analysis. Twenty years later, 23 retired union officials from Chicago stand to collect about $56 million from two ailing city pension funds thanks to the changes...

Red Alert: China is sending misleading messages about its massive military buildup. Last week China’s Communist regime published the every-second-year edition of its defense white paper, “China’s National Defense in 2010,” which claims to promote transparency in its defense planning and deepen international trust, and asserts that its security policy is defensive in nature. But the paper’s messages are not supported by the facts. Consider five of the many misleading messages imbedded in the 30-page defense white paper. First, “China attaches great importance to military transparency,” the paper claims. The Pentagon takes issue with that view in a report, stating,...

The Treasury may have made some silly paper "profit" on its bailout of Citigroup (C) but the taxpayer may not get much of anything. The Washington Post reports that as part of the bank's TARP payback agreement, it's quietly been given a $38 billion tax break by the IRS. Seriously. The Internal Revenue Service on Friday issued an exception to long-standing tax rules for the benefit of Citigroup and a few other companies partially owned by the government. As a result, Citigroup will be allowed to retain billions of dollars worth of tax breaks that otherwise would decline in value...

The stretch of U.S. 65 between Ozark and Branson has some of the Ozarks’ most impressive scenery. There are lush, rolling hills, distant horizons and, if you look east, one of the biggest homes in the United States. A house currently under construction near Highlandville spans almost a full acre from wall to wall, on a 500-acre site. The ambitious project, nearly three years in and barely at the first floor, totals 72,000 square feet. Putting that figure in perspective might require a few comparisons. According to the Census Bureau, the average new home size over the last five years...

NEW YORK (AFP) – US computer chip giant Intel posted a quarterly net profit of nearly three billion dollars on Tuesday and record revenue of more than 11 billion dollars. The Santa Clara, California-based technology bellwether reported third-quarter revenue of 2.95 billion dollars, up from 1.85 billion dollars during the same period a year ago. Earnings per share of 52 cents were slightly better than the 50 cents expected by Wall Street analysts.

STOCKHOLM – An island of ice more than four times the size of Manhattan is drifting across the Arctic Ocean after breaking off from a glacier in Greenland. Potentially in the path of this unstoppable giant are oil platforms and shipping lanes — and any collision could do untold damage. In a worst case scenario, large chunks could reach the heavily trafficked waters where another Greenland iceberg sank the Titanic in 1912. It's been a summer of near biblical climatic havoc across the planet, with wildfires, heat and smog in Russia and killer floods in Asia. But the moment the...

Target has now apologized for contributing to a pro-business, pro-Tom Emmer for Governor in Minnesota group, which gives me a second reason not to shop in the store that banned the Salvation Army at Christmas a few years back. Would it have been that hard for the CEO to say that the company believes in free enterprise and especially in these times the home to its headquarters needs a competent governor committed to economic growth? Emmer deserves all the support that timid business execs won't give him, so please stop by his website and contribute. I will try and get...

Posted April 1st, 2010 by Javier Manjarres The Shark Tank has just received word from a very reliable source that U.S. Senate candidate Marco Rubio will receive an endorsement from one of the most prominent names in politics, and that it will be announced on Monday April 5th. The Rubio for Senate campaign will hold a press conference to make the formal announcement at: The Renaissance Ballrooms located at 2340 SW 32 Avenue in Coral Gables, Florida at 10:30 AM. All are invited to attend. As for who the mystery endorser is, ‘mum’ is the word for now. The editors...

Thousands of people filling the sidewalks and spilling onto Tully Road had arrived early Saturday morning to receive one of 5,500 doses of coveted swine flu vaccine. "There's no way there's enough," said George Reis, who was helping with crowd control. "They keep coming."

ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis told Fox News' Chris Wallace on Sunday that her group "absolutely pays its taxes." Not true: The IRS and Louisiana's taxmen have imposed nearly $2 million in liens against ACORN for failing to fork over taxes at its New Orleans national headquarters. The IRS recently filed a $548,000 lien against the group, and Louisiana state tax officials have slapped $334,000 in liens on ACORN since last October. Evidence that ACORN ignored its tax obligations may be less exciting than its branch offices' eagerness to help a self-professed pimp break multiple laws, or the voter-registration fraud for...

The huge “9/12” protest in Washington was the latest expression of discontent over President Obama’s leftward policy thrust. The discord is evident from the “Tea Party” movement to the chaotic “townhalls” on “healthcare reform.” The mainstream media and American left are thrown off by this, clearly wanting to dismiss it as a giant, petulant right-wing rant. Some “journalists,” as well as Democratic members of Congress, have described these genuinely concerned citizens in very demeaning terms, from “racists” to “Nazis.” I know why the left is dismissive: First off, it’s difficult to know if the protesters are mostly people who didn’t...

I have been doing some research analyzing photos and crowd data to try and ascertain the crowd size of the 9/12/09 Tea Party protests (which I blogged on here). It seems the best, most recent reference point is President Obama’s inauguration, which was estimated at 1.8-2.0 million people. If you look at the pictures from last January’s Inauguration it looks at first glance like the Obama crowds dwarfed the Tea Party crowds. The Tea Party Crowds did not extend back the Washington Monument (there were other events on the Mall yesterday). On the flip side, the inauguration is a controlled,...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi said on Sunday that Congress could put together an economic stimulus package of several hundred billion dollars that should also contain tax cuts. In a recorded interview with CBS' "Face the Nation" that was aired on Sunday, Pelosi, a California Democrat, said the package should be aimed at creating jobs immediately and include investments for future growth. Pelosi said several economists have called for a package in the hundreds of billions of dollars.