Free Republic

Hunter Biden used his family’s high-profile connections to promote friends and associates to federal office while his father was vice president, emails obtained from his hard drive show. During the spring of 2010, Hunter Biden exchanged a series of emails with John M. Mott, an associate judge of the Superior Court of the District of Columbia who was angling for appointment to the federal bench. “I appreciate your help,” Mott told Hunter Biden in a March 9, 2010 email after the two spoke by phone. Mott asked Hunter to press his case to then Vice President Biden’s chief of staff...

I recently gave an interview to the New Statesman, on the assumption that, as the magazine’s former wine critic I would be treated with respect, and that the journalist, George Eaton, was sincere in wanting to talk to me about my intellectual life. Not for the first time I am forced to acknowledge what a mistake it is to address young leftists as though they were responsible human beings. Here is my brief response to an unscrupulous collection of out of context remarks, some of them merely words designed to accuse me of thought-crimes, and to persuade the government that...

RUSH: So here we are, folks, it’s Tuesday, and that must mean tax cuts. That must mean the House is gonna vote on the Trump tax cut bill today, and then after that the Senate is gonna take up debate and maybe probably vote on it tonight. Now, over in the Senate, they’ve sent Mike Pence over there. He’s gonna be presiding over the vote because they’re not sure about Flake. Senator McCain is back home in Arizona. He will not vote. So they have a margin of one. If Flake decamps and votes against it, they’re gonna need Pence’s...

The People's Repudiation Of Media Influence Thus, despite the media's best efforts to defeat Trump through a barrage of negative news stories, most Americans appeared not to be swayed by media coverage. Election Day provided the most definitive proof of both the media's bias against Trump and the people's repudiation of its attempts to influence the election narrative. Heading into the day of the vote, most news outlets were confident that Clinton would become the 45th president of the United States, as they pointed to poll after poll showing the former secretary of state comfortably leading Trump. This coverage seemed...

There's nothing that I could write which isn't better explained by Larry's own words in the video. But everybody, and I mean everybody, should be talking about this interview with Larry King. It is the most revealing slip-up into the mindset of liberal journalists, and the perversion of media that I've ever seen. And he doesn't even realize it...

Multiple judges have found there was no crime even if what prosecutors claim was true. (Update – Walker interview added) The big breaking news in the “John Doe” anti-Conservative Wisconsin investigation is that the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals released previously sealed court exhibits detailing accusations made at the time the Wisconsin prosecutors commenced the proceeding. p So you get screaming headlines such as these: What is not being reported, is that multiple judges have found that the alleged criminal conduct was not in fact criminal even if the factual allegations were true. Here is part of Federal Judge Renda’s...

There are four cities on this map of President Obama's upcoming bus tour of New York and Pennsylvania, which was shown on MSNBC's Martin Bashir yesterday afternoon. And all four cities are in the wrong place. They're not even close! Here's where those cities are actually located: Bashir later called the errors an "honest geographic mistake" (obviously?), but he doesn't explain how this map turned out so terribly inaccurate. Did they literally just guess? You shouldn't just guess.

ABC News is being accused of deceptively editing, or at least misrepresenting (intentionally or not), some of the comments made by Juror B29, the lone “nonwhite” juror in the George Zimmerman murder trial. Further, the media as a whole are being accused of manipulating some of her statements. These allegations come not from a conservative news source, but rather from Slate.com. The key phrase latched onto by most media outlets, due to its sensational nature, was “George Zimmerman got away with murder” — words that were, in fact, said by Juror B29. But the full unedited video of the comment,...

ABC is defending its decision to edit out an apparently erroneous claim by Michelle Obama in its broadcast of the first lady’s interview on Good Morning America today, saying it made the changes “solely” for the sake of time. As The Washington Examiner reported this morning, the first lady claimed during an interview with Good Morning America’s Robin Roberts that 15-year-old Hadiya Pendleton, who was killed in Chicago shortly after performing during the President’s Inauguration, was shot because “some kids had some automatic weapons they didn’t need.” In fact, Chicago Police reported Pendleton was shot by a man who “opened...

In what has become a recurring theme for the Spanish language network Univision, one of their employees took to social media recently to smear Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.). According to the Miami Herald, a top assistant to a Univision news boss criticized Rubio being chosen as the Republican response to the State of the Union. The employee at the center of the controversy is one Angelica Artiles who took to Facebook to post the following vicious attack: "Oh, wow, the loser is going to speak after our President. Anything to get publicity. Ask him to do us a favor and...

On Friday it was revealed that the FBI is investigating Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) for allegedly sleeping with underage prostitutes in the Dominican Republic. Despite this, when Menendez was given a six-minute interview with Martha Raddatz on ABC's This Week Sunday, he was not asked one question about the investigation or the allegations (commentary follows with full transcript at end of post): Raddatz began the interview asking Menendez about what Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) had previously said on the program concerning immigration. She followed this up by asking Menendez what he wanted to hear from the President about this issue....

My (rhetorical) question is this: Why would a pro-abortion--or, "pro-choice" if you're looking for something more value neutral--advocate like Andrea Mitchell want the issue of life and death to be "value-neutral"? Here's a little nugget I came across today from Pastor John MacArthur: "They keep saying, 'A school is supposed to be a safe place!' Yeah well so is a womb. Andrea Mitchell Corrects Guest Who Called Herself "Pro-Life": "Anti-Abortion Is More Value-Neutral"

South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley on Monday announced she will appoint Republican U.S. Representative Tim Scott to the U.S. Senate to replace the departing Senator Jim DeMint, but though he will become the “first African American U.S. Senator from the South since Blanche Bruce of Mississippi in 1881” and the only black -- Democrat or Republican -- in the current Senate, neither ABC nor CBS mentioned the news Monday night. Yes, the newscasts were dominated by the aftermath of the Newtown, Connecticut tragedy, yet the NBC Nightly News managed to squeeze in 24 seconds to note Scott’s historic appointment.

A reporter for the Chicago Tribune congratulated President Obama on winning reelection during a press conference Wednesday at the White House. Obama called on Christi Parsons, the White House reporter for the Chicago Tribune. "Thank you, Mr. President," Parsons said. "And congratulations, by the way." Obama then noted Parsons was there "when I was running for state Senate." "That's right, I was," Parsons replied, adding that she had "never seen you lose. I wasn't there that one time."

President Barack Obama's senior campaign adviser David Axelrod said on CBS's "Face the Nation" on Sunday that his next project will include inspiring young people to become "journalists." "What do you do next?" CBS's Bob Schieffer asked Axelrod. "I'm going to spend part of my time starting an institute of politics at the University of Chicago," said Axelrod. "My feeling is if I can help inspire some young people to get into this arena as candidates, as strategists, as journalists, then that would be a great contribution to make."

Twenty-three million people unemployed or underemployed, a $16-trillion debt and repeated trillion-dollar deficits. Boo. The scariest thing this Halloween has nothing to do with witches and goblins or even the Munsters remake (ugh). The scariest thing in America right now is the continued awful economy. An incumbent president running for re-election in a down economy – we’ve heard that story before. Only when we heard it last time, George W. Bush was running for re-election in 2004 and the economy was in remarkably fine shape. That horror story hasn’t been told by the major media according to a soon-to-be-released report...

...The emails reviewed by the AP offered an unusual, behind-the-scenes glimpse of the interpersonal relationship between Ryan and Walker. Although as a congressman Ryan's emails are exempt from disclosure under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act, messages sent by Ryan or his aides to Walker or the governor's staff are subject to Wisconsin's open records law. The week after Ryan was tapped as Romney's vice presidential candidate, the AP requested all such emails since Walker was elected in November 2010. It received 1,037 pages of them late Friday....

A growth in early voting and tough economy for the media are forcing changes to the exit poll system that television networks and The Associated Press depend upon to deliver the story on Election Night, all with the pressure-filled backdrop of a tight presidential race. The consortium formed by ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox News Channel, NBC and the AP is cutting back this year on in-person exit polls while upping the amount of telephone polling. This is to take into account more people voting before Nov. 6 and households that have abandoned land lines in favor of cell phones. "It...

Voting machine provider Hart Intercivic will be counting the votes in various counties in the crucial swing states of Ohio and Colorado and elsewhere throughout the country come November 6 — even though it has extensive corporate ties to the Mitt Romney camp, and even though a study commissioned by the state of Ohio has labeled its voting system a “failure” when it comes to protecting the integrity of elections. Reports of Hart Intercivic’s ties to Romney first surfaced in late September, in ... an Ohio web site which reported that a key investor in Hart was HIG Capital, seven...

On Tuesday night's debate, the evening's most notorious exchange did not begin with moderator Candy Crowley's wildly inappropriate intervention on the "act of terror" question. It almost assuredly began minutes earlier. The audience question that prompted the exchange came from Long Islander Kerry Ladka, who, reasonably enough, asked in regards to the Libyan consulate, "Who denied enhanced security and why?" The question went to President Barack Obama, and he launched into a well-rehearsed set piece about how he was handling the issue. Mitt Romney responded much as one would expect him to respond, criticizing the White House response to the...