Free Republic

I have a lot of respect for my Libertarian friends, and they are frequently the first people I’d like to have a discussion with about a new policy or political controversy. I find most of them to be intelligent, thoughtful, well-read people. I also find that in large part Independents (including the Tea Party) often have much in common with the right when it comes to the issues of this particular election–economics and the over-reach of the Federal government. But I do think that to actually vote for a 3rd party candidate in a tight general election (as this one)...

Yes, yes, I know, this comes from Kos’s pollster. What can I say? If the left can cling bitterly to Rasmussen as a bulwark against terrible numbers from Gallup, I can cling to this. RCP’s average already had New Hampshire within a point so the new PPP number there isn’t news. The Iowa number is. This is the first poll in a month showing Romney ahead in the state, notwithstanding his blockbuster debate two weeks ago. NBC’s poll last night, in fact, had O up by eight points in Iowa, a ridiculous figure given that Obama’s worried enough to have...

On October 15th, the Washington Post did on article on early voting in Iowa and how it is "looking good for democrats." They explained that of all ballots cast, it's 53% democrat and 28% republican - a 25% lead. In 2008, democrats won the early vote by 18% Now, today, only 3 days later, the Iowa Secretary of State reports of ballots cast, it is now 49% democrat and 30% Republican. That's a SIX POINT swing in just 3 days. Furthermore, the ballots "requested" is 46% to 31%. A report from Politico yesterday said this: "Republican voters’ requests for ballots...

Mitt Romney leads President Obama in national polls, and the president is approaching his all-time low in the RealClearPolitics average. Romney leads in some key swing states (e.g., Florida, Colorado and North Carolina) and has largely erased the deficit in others (Ohio, Virginia, Nevada). His approval rating (the likability rating so many liberals have obsessed about) is in positive territory; the gap between the two candidates’ approval ratings has all but disappeared. Obama is below 60 on Intrade. Crowds for Romney and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) are swelling in battleground states like Ohio. The Associated Press reported: The crowds tell...

GLIDDEN, Iowa - William J. Clinton and three other locals — Tim, Jeff and Jack, who declined to give their last names — sat at the Dairy Mart lunch counter, a Carroll County roadside staple on the Lincoln Highway for more than 60 years. Besides a name, Clinton said, he shares only one thing with America’s 42nd president: “We are both from the South and both Democrats.” He and his lunch-counter buddies voiced displeasure with America’s direction. “Let me tell you something,” Clinton said. “It takes more than pretty words to run the country. I was fooled once by the...

Less than an hour after President Barack Obama had stepped off of the Democratic National Convention stage, Republican challenger Mitt Romney's campaign announced 15 new, state-specific television advertisements which the campaign says will run in 8 battlegrounds. A week ago, Romney was officially made the Republican Party's presidential nominee, granting him access to a substantial war chest set aside for the general election. His campaign largely stayed off of television during the Democratic National Convention, which concluded after Obama's speech on Thursday. --snip-- Now that Romney has officially been named the GOP nominee his campaign will get its hands on...

Clint Eastwood is the “perfect icon” for the GOP, Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin said Tuesday, describing the legendary actor as “an old angry white man spewing incoherent nonsense.” The Des Moines Register reported the 72-year-old Harkin made his comments on the Iowa delegation’s breakfast this morning in Charlotte, N.C. “We’ve got our work cut out for us this week, folks, following the Republican convention,” Harkin told the delegates. “I mean, how are we ever going to match Clint Eastwood? I got to thinking he is the perfect icon for today’s Republican tea party: an old angry white man spewing incoherent...

DAVENPORT, Iowa -- With the first lady at his side, an energized President Obama wrapped up his bus tour of Iowa on Wednesday, firing up crowds in Dubuque and Davenport by outlining the huge stakes in November and urging Iowans to stand with him to "finish the work we started together four years ago." Under mostly clear skies in picturesque settings along the Mississippi River, the Obamas recaptured at least some of the magic that embodied the unlikely 2008 run that put them in the White House. Yet despite the meticulously scripted events and adoring crowds during the president’s three-day...

“I have nightmares about the electoral college coming down to 266-266, with Iowa to decide it,” said longtime Iowa Democratic operative Jerry Crawford. “It’s not as far-fetched as it might sound.” Added Dave Roederer, who ran the George W. Bush operation in Iowa: “This is an unprecedented five-city tour. I doubt he’s here for the mountains.” Iowa has long been a place of practical and symbolic importance to Obama. It was in Iowa where Obama delivered perhaps the most important/best speech of his 2008 candidacy (at the 2007 Jefferson-Jackson Dinner) and it was in Iowa where the idea of Obama...

President Barack Obama assailed rival Mitt Romney's opposition to tax supports for wind power, delivering an Iowa-specific critique Tuesday on the Republican challenger in that crucial Midwestern state. Obama's deputy criticized GOP budget plans to overhaul Medicare, cut trillions of dollars from social programs and lower taxes on high-income taxpayers. Iowa is a center of wind energy production in the United States and the Obama administration credits tax breaks for helping build that industry. Obama has called on Congress to extend the breaks. Romney opposes it. Obama, on the second of a three-day Iowa bus tour, noted that Romney once...

Sarah Palin dropped in Saturday at a major summer dinner hosted by one of Iowa's top GOP businessmen, a source in attendance at the event says. The former Alaska governor paid a visit to the get-together hosted by wealthy energy executive Bruce Rastetter, mingling with a crowd of upwards of 750 people. Palin stayed for a full three and a half hours, the source said. She wasn't the only pol there — Gov. Terry Branstad and Reps. Tom Latham and Steve King were present — but she was the only national figure. In 2011, Rick Santorum, Tim Pawlenty and Michele...

Sarah Palin heaped praise Saturday on Deb Fischer, the Republican running against Bob Kerrey for one of Nebraska's seats in the U.S. Senate. Palin had just eaten lunch with Fischer and was taking a look at items in the La Vista Cabela's, talking with a couple customers and signing a man‘s cap. She called Fischer a “hard-working, very grounded, down-to-earth, patriotic American woman.” Palin, the Republican vice presidential candidate four years ago, said that as a Nebraskan, Fischer knows agriculture and could “help common-sense, constitutional Americans.” “We need more of that when it comes to regulation and policy,” Palin said...

A google search using the term, “McCain voters say they wished they’d voted Obama” shows about 7,450,000 items, but searching through them yields not a single article about voters feeling this way. When most people are asked, “We all know people who voted for Obama and say they wished they had voted for McCain, but where are the people who say they voted for McCain but wish they had voted for Obama?” they start laughing. By now, we have all heard the public “secular confessions” of the Barack Obama supporters who wish they hadn’t done what they did. These people...

Not too long ago pundits were arguing that Mitt Romney’s path to 270 electoral votes was “narrow.” We didn’t buy it. Lo and behold, conventional wisdom has now changed. The Associated Press writes: “Warning signs for Obama on tight path to 270.” The AP explains: Obama’s new worries about North Carolina and Wisconsin offer opportunities for Republican Mitt Romney, who must peel off states Obama won in 2008 if he’s to cobble together the 270 electoral votes needed to oust the incumbent in November. Iowa, which kicked off the campaign in January, is now expected to be tight to the...

On his show Tuesday night, Ed Schultz took on birthers — specifically those in Iowa and Arizona who have brought President Barack Obama‘s eligibility for office back into headlines recently. He asked, isn’t this just racism? The Iowa GOP chairman, Don Racheter, and Arizona’s secretary of state, Ken Bennett, have recently questioned Obama’s natural-born citizenship (though Bennett said he’s not a birther, he sought verification of Obama’s birth certificate from Hawaii, saying it’s possible he’d take Obama off the ballot otherwise). Schultz asked his guest, Georgetown University Professor Michael Eric Dyson, “Is this just another form of racism being played...

Former MSNBC contributor and conservative author Pat Buchanan appeared on Fox’s America Live with Megyn Kelly on Monday where he said that President Barack Obama’s recent embrace of gay marriage imperils his presidency. He said that gay marriage rights is the “heart of the cultural war” and that Republican voters are “right now riding to the sound of the guns” to get behind Republican candidate Mitt Romney as a result of Obama’s support for same-sex marriage rights. RELATED: Pat Buchanan To Hannity: Liberals ‘Use Terms Like Bigot… To Set Up An Inquisition’ What the President has done is forfeit –...

First lady Michelle Obama, making campaign stops in Nebraska and Iowa on Tuesday, boosted her husband's credentials while appearing to make small contrasts with his likely rival Mitt Romney, lauding President Barack Obama's core set of values and relaying stories of his modest upbringing. Appearing alongside Warren Buffett in Omaha, Nebraska, Michelle Obama touted the White House-backed provision named for the billionaire investor, which would place a minimum 30% tax on Americans making more than $1 million a year. The "Buffett Rule" was blocked in the Senate last week. In explaining the president's commitment to helping Americans who are struggling,...

When all polls close by 8 p.m. Eastern tonight in Florida, the winner of the state’s Republican primary may not initially be apparent. After all, the winner takes all, which means the candidate who gets the most votes gets all of the delegates. But the state, with 10 different media markets and a cultural mélange that ranges from Alabama South to Cuba North, is by no means homogeneous. Here are five crucial indicators to keep track of as the returns come in: Absentee VotersThe first key factor is, about a third of Florida voters have already cast their ballots, and...

IN the five days since his almost-victory in the Iowa caucuses, Rick Santorum’s critics have tried out an unusual line of attack against the former Pennsylvania senator. Not content with the many targets that Santorum’s record presents, they’ve gone after the way he and his wife, Karen, handled the premature delivery and death of their fourth child, Gabriel, in 1996. At 19 weeks of pregnancy, Gabriel was found to have a potentially fatal fetal abnormality. After a risky intrauterine surgery, Karen Santorum came down with an infection that ended up triggering labor. The baby lived for just two hours, and...

If Rick Perry was a legitimate conservative (which I always warned he was not) he would have dropped out of the campaign today and endorsed Rick Santorum, Ron Paul or Newt Gingrich. Yet "Pay-for-Play" Perry stays in, and heads for South Carolina. So what's the deal? The big winner of Perry staying in, by far, is Mitt Romney. The big loser is the conservative movement and the candidates who appeal to that movement. Keeping in mind my long-held view that Perry is not conservative, just a "pay-for-play" guy, what is in it for Perry? 1. Perhaps Romney offered Perry a...