Free Republic

The 2016 presidential election cycle is already underway. Whether you are delighted or horrified at the prospect, the race is indeed now on. While it might seem impossibly far in the future, consider that the Iowa caucuses are only a year away. So we're going to take a very early look at the Republican field, which seems to be getting larger every week. The 2016 election will be rather unique, since it is a wide-open presidential election on both sides. No incumbent will be running, in other words, but the truly notable aspect of the race is that the parties...

Scott Walker has had a good week. The press is googly-eyed over him, waxing on about how he could just win this thing, and he's still rolling on his high from last weekend's Freedom Summit. Of course, that's not really something to write home about when you're besting the likes of Sarah Palin, Ted Cruz and Mike Huckabee. He's got that populist message down pat just like his other friends on the campaign trail. Income inequality! Deteriorating middle class! And he's so concerned about those things he's going to govern on that basis, right? Walker has a real problem on...

The nominating process for the 2016 Republican presidential candidate could be fraught with chaos because of the unusually large number of candidates who will likely run, creating real problems for the GOP, which is likely to end up without what many might consider a powerful, unifying nominee, an analysis by Real Clear Politics suggests. The candidate who does emerge could very likely come from a brokered convention, notes RCP's Sean Trende of possible scenarios. "I see a race that is largely chaotic. It is one where an unusually large number of candidates have perfectly plausible paths, if not to the...

If you want to understand America's painful lurch toward plutocracy, look no further than these mega-millionaires. It is time to stop talking about the Koch brothers and instead talk about the Koch Party, the nation’s third largest political network that is a full-blown but private political operation. The Koch Party has come into view in 2014, as some of the country’s best investigative reporters have traced and exposed various elements of their operation. The Koch Party is not as large as the Democrats or the Republicans, but is still unprecedented in size, scope and reach. Like other political parties, it...

Why Republicans fall in love with inexperienced, no-hope candidates every four years.Conservative Republicans have finally called it quits with short-term former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (she lasted just two-and-a-half years in that position before quitting). The final straw, it seems, is the 2008 vice-presidential candidate’s recent speech at the “Iowa Freedom Summit” that has charitably been called “an interminable ramble,” “an extended stream-of-consciousness complaint,” and simply “bizarro.” So America’s most-famous snowbilly is out of the running for the 2016 Republican nomination. But what about all the other manifestly unqualified novices, jackasses, and publicity hounds that surface every four years when...

Alabama's first openly gay state legislator fired back on Facebook over the weekend, including a threat to expose the affairs of state officials, to comments made by Republican Party officials in the wake of a federal judge declaring the state ban on same-sex marriage unconstitutional. State Rep. Patricia Todd, D-Birmingham, said she was elated and in "shock" when the judge issued the order overturning Alabama's same-sex marriage ban. But after seeing comments by Republican officials, particularly from Alabama Speaker of the House Mike Hubbard, and seeing Attorney General Luther Strange's efforts to get a stay of the judge's orders, Todd...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)Chris Cillizza, Editor of the Washington Post‘s The Fix praised Scott Walker, Carly Fiorina, and Ted Cruz’s speeches in Iowa, while saying that Chris Christie was only “so-so” on Monday’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports” on MSNBC....

Sen. Rand Paul prefers exhausting diplomatic efforts in dealing with overseas conflicts, and on Sunday he highlighted the difference between his softer approach to foreign policy and that of two other senators who are likely 2016 presidential candidates -- Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio. The Kentucky Republican joined fellow first-term senators Cruz of Texas and Rubio of Florida on stage Sunday evening in California for a summit organized by Freedom Partners. That group is the central hub of the powerful network of organizations backed by conservative billionaires Charles and David Koch....

DES MOINES — As a chance to evaluate possible 2016 Republican presidential candidates, the Freedom Summit here in Des Moines was a solid success. Several potential candidates — Scott Walker, Ted Cruz, Chris Christie, and a few others — left the 10-hour political marathon with their prospects undeniably enhanced. All that was good news for Republicans. But at the same time, more than a few GOP loyalists came away shaking their heads at the performance of a party star, former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, whose long, rambling, and at times barely coherent speech left some wondering what role she...

GOP elites want Americans to think the party's boring and safe again. Maybe someone should notify the Tea Party. If you’re understandably perplexed by the Republican Party’s apparent decision to enter the post-Obama era by nominating either another member of the Bush dynasty, or another version of Mitt Romney, there’s at least one way to think about it that might help explain the seemingly inexplicable. Put simply, the leaders of the GOP, the people who tend to be referred to as “the establishment,” fervently believe that in order to win in 2016, Republicans will have to convince voters that the...

South Carolina has been where underdog Republican presidential candidacies die and front-runners begin to look toward November. The only asterisk to its 32-year streak of picking the eventual GOP nominee came in the whack-a-mole 2012 contest that placed former House Speaker Newt Gingrich over eventual nominee Mitt Romney. “Romney never closed the deal with the voters,” said legendary South Carolina Republican strategist Chip Felkel about Romney's inability to win the first-in-the-South primary. “Voters cast with their hearts, not their heads, in that cycle.” Everyone understandably focuses on who is coming and going in Iowa, the first contest of 2016's presidential...

As Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney battle behind the scenes for big money donors, Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz is working to portray himself as the presidential candidate of the conservative base. Speaking to tea partiers in South Carolina over the weekend, Cruz cautioned that Republicans will lose the White House in 2016 if the nominee is insufficiently conservative. “If we nominate a candidate in that mold, the same people who stayed home in 2008 and 2012 will stay home in 2016 and the Democrats will win again,” Cruz told the crowd. His comments come as the Texas senator —...

Mitt Romney and Jeb Bush have emerged to save the party from its immoderate urges.Rick Perlstein’s The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan was among the most gripping books published last year. Anybody old enough to remember Nixon’s weighty jowls sagging towards delayed resignation will savour Perlstein’s detailed analysis of Watergate and its aftermath. The book reminds us that – though positively merry in comparison to the UK and Ireland – the United States passed through seven layers of dementia during the 1970s. Patty Hearst was kidnapped. New York City went bust. Helicopters lifted the...

I’m not much of a conspiracy theorist — and I certainly have nothing on Paul Craig Roberts whose most recent article, helpfully disseminated by the Ron Paul Institute, claims the Charlie Hebdo attacks to be a “false flag” operation — but I can’t help but wonder if the “mainstream media” is playing up the potential presidential candidacies of Mitt Romney, Jeb Bush, Mike Huckabee, and Rick Santorum simply to depress Republican voters. Or, going the full tin-foil-hat route, maybe these guys are themselves double agents, part of a MoveOn.org (does it still exist?) sleeper cell which was just activated (by...

SAN DIEGO — Mitt Romney's unexpected step into the 2016 presidential contest is drawing enthusiasm from the GOP's most passionate conservatives. But not because they want him to win. For the first time in recent memory, prominent conservatives see a Republican presidential field that could have as much competition among the party's establishment-minded prospects — like Romney — as its fiery conservatives....

HOUSTON – Like other visitors to the Harris County Jury Plaza, the prospective juror with neatly combed black hair emptied his pockets as he approached the metal detector, took off his belt, removed his boots and proceeded through in his white socks. But he wasn’t your average citizen come to perform his civic duty – it was Sen. Ted Cruz. “It is both a privilege and responsibility to serve on a jury. One of the best aspects of being an American is our right to trial by jury,” Sen. Cruz said. “When I received my jury summons, I was proud...

Hillary Clinton is still receiving the majority of attention among Democrats with regard to the presidential nominations, despite the fact that her chances of becoming Mrs. President are slim to none. However, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren is still in the circle of limelight as well, although her chances are only marginally better than those of the former first lady. Republicans, on the other hand have a wide open field that includes candidates new and old alike. Interesting statistics Sixty-six percent of registered voters across all political parties believe Republicans should seek a fresh candidate for 2016, while 42 percent of...

RALEIGH — Is North Carolina ready to be an early stop on the road to the White House? Thanks to recent legislation, the Tar Heel State has abandoned its traditionally late presidential primary, held in May. State lawmakers couldn’t let Iowa, New Hampshire, and especially South Carolina have all the fun. So they separated North Carolina’s presidential contest from the state’s other primaries and moved it to the Tuesday after South Carolina’s Saturday primary. Although some of the dates remain tentative, here’s how the nomination battles may unfold according to Josh Putnam, an Appalachian State University political scientist who maintains...

The next two years are a good time to be a local candidate or party organization in Iowa and New Hampshire. The political action committees supporting Rand Paul, Rick Perry, Ted Cruz and Hillary Clinton have already started doling out cash to the campaigns of potential supporters in the states with the earliest presidential contests of 2016. Leadership PACs — like the one Jeb Bush, the former Florida governor, will be forming soon — provide a natural vehicle for sending campaign money to state and local candidates and committees in key early presidential states. Several potential presidential candidates, through their...

I enjoy a good “maybe Huckabee’s going to be president” story the way I enjoy a good campfire ghost story. They’re BS, we all know they’re BS, but there’s nothing more satisfying than watching the terror build in your audience as you tell it. They’re even better than “Romney’s 2016!” stories. Well done, Scott Conroy. This one’s the political equivalent of “The Golden Arm.” [T]here is little doubt that a substantial segment of the South Carolina Republican electorate remains culturally and ideologically aligned with Huckabee—giving him a distinct chance of success in a state where he retains a wide swath...