Free Republic

Newt Gingrich has effectively called on Rick Santorum to drop out of the presidential race, yet the former Pennsylvania senator continues to poll in the double digits and shows no sign of quitting. Why are so many conservatives dissatisfied with a choice between Gingrich and Mitt Romney? Michelle Malkin's Santorum endorsement is a good primer.... [Santorum] didn't cave when Chicken Littles in Washington invoked a manufactured crisis in 2008. He didn't follow the pro-bailout GOP crowd - including Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich - and he didn't have to obfuscate or rationalize his position then or now... Santorum opposed individual...

So, it turns out that the cool cat billed as “No Drama Obama” by his sycophants is actually quite the drama queen. While the White House publicly pretends to ignore conservative detractors of his administration, Chief Touchy-Touchy seems to be personally consumed by our critiques. Yes, mine included. On Wednesday, the president had himself a mini-”Toddlers and Tiaras”-style meltdown with Arizona GOP Gov. Jan Brewer after landing in Phoenix for a post-State of the Union dog-and-pony show. As Brewer told pool reporters on the scene, Obama took umbrage at Brewer’s recent memoir. She minced no words on the cover: “Scorpions...

So, it turns out that the cool cat billed as "No Drama Obama" by his sycophants is actually quite the drama queen. While the White House publicly pretends to ignore conservative detractors of his administration, Chief Touchy-Touchy seems to be personally consumed by our critiques. Yes, mine included. On Wednesday, the president had himself a mini-"Toddlers and Tiaras"-style meltdown with Arizona GOP Gov. Jan Brewer after landing in Phoenix for a post-State of the Union dog-and-pony show. As Brewer told pool reporters on the scene, Obama took umbrage at Brewer's recent memoir. She minced no words on the cover: "Scorpions...

The Iowa caucuses may not have much predictive value, but they did a wonderful job of unmasking both elitist whingers on the left and incompetent whiners on the right. As they do every presidential election cycle, progressives of pallor wore their indelible disdain for Middle America on their sleeves. Pale-faced University of Iowa journalism professor Stephen Bloom launched a 6,000-word jeremiad, littered with factual errors, against his home state's residents. The abridged version: Raaaaaaaacists! Hicks! Christians! Argggh! In the safe harbors of The Atlantic just a few weeks before Tuesday's electoral event, Bloom sneered: "Those who stay in rural Iowa...

MALKIN: 2011 was a year of widespread self-serving scandals, scamsMICHELLE MALKIN December 29, 2011 6:37 PM With 2011 drawing to a close, it is time to account. As an early-and-often chronicler of Chicago-on-the-Potomac, I am amazed at the stubborn and clingy persistence of President Barack Obama’s snowblowers in the media. See no scandal, hear no scandal, speak no scandal. Dartmouth College professor Brendan Nyhan asserted in May — while Operation Fast and Furious subpoenas were flying on Capitol Hill — that “one of the least remarked upon aspects of the Obama presidency has been the lack of scandals.” Conveniently, he...

NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE www.nationalreview.com Michelle Malkin December 9, 2011 12:00 A.M. Holder, Blago, Richardson: Triangle of Sleaze A rough week for the Obama administration’s corruptocracy. It was a rough week for the corruptocracy. White House officials better ho-ho-hold on tight because the sleigh ride isn’t going to get any smoother. On Wednesday, disgraced former governor Rod Blagojevich (D., Ill.) received a 14-year prison sentence for scheming to sell Pres. Barack Obama’s Senate seat, along with several other pay-to-play schemes. Blago played the distressed daddy for the federal judge, invoking his young daughters and wife (who held her notoriously foul tongue...

While Herman Cain’s foreign policy stumbles have raised questions about his command of the facts, he says he would consult with military officials and other expert advisers to guide him through the thicket of world affairs.So who might advise a President Cain? Henry Kissinger, the 88-year-old former secretary of state, has already turned down returning to that job in a Cain administration, the candidate says.“He said he’s perfectly happy doing what he’s doing,” Mr. Cain told The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.In a new video excerpt posted on the newspaper’s Web site, Mr. Cain responds to a question from editors and reporters...

It has nothing to do with anything Gloria Allred has her hands in. It’s his continued lack of preparedness on, and familiarity with, basic domestic and foreign policy issues. Sorry, Cain fans. Tried to give him the benefit of the doubt. But like Rick Perry, Herman Cain is just not ready for prime time. The real Cain scandal: He can barely form a coherent thought on Libya when put on the spot and garbles collective bargaining 101 facts. Watch for yourselves. Take anti-depressants or a stiff drink first: On Libya (listen for the part where he excuses his hemming and...

It’s not any of the women coming forward. It’s his top aide and chief of staff Mark Block. This is now the second time he’s popped off with bogus assertions and insinuations.

I’m starting a fresh thread on tonight’s Occupy Oakland “strike.” (Previous post and background here.)They’ve welcomed the Black Panthers and Communist revolutionary thug Angela Davis, and are currently marching to the Port of Oakland.Various sympathizers and observers are tweeting live. Mother Jones reports that the Oakland Whole Foods store — after being falsely accused of threatening to punish workers who walked out on the job today — has been vandalized.One person on scene writes: “Straight into window breaking and street furniture smashing at whole foods. #generalstrike #occupyoaklandwindow breaking and street furniture smashing at whole foods.” Whole Foods is defending itself...

In November of 2010 in Don’t be VAT stupid Herman Cain writes: ``A national retail sales tax on top of all the confusing and unfair taxes we have today is insane! It gives the out-of-control bureaucrats and politicians in denial one more tool to lie, deceive, manipulate and destroy this country.`` The fact is, Herman is now proposing a new tax, a national retail sales tax, in addition to taxing corporate profits and incomes, and also would tax the wages working people earn. Herman Cain essentially admitted in the above mentioned article his existing plan is ``insane!`` So, why do...

the Senate (going on 900 + days without a budget) was up to all sorts of stealthy business in the midnight hour. As of 1:28am, the Senate was casting procedural votes on the FY 2012 federal spending bill. Guess what else they did ? They approved the nomination of solar subsidy king and eco-radical John Bryson. ... Guess what else they did ? They paved the way for more Fannie/Freddie taxpayer crutches: ... Gotta love the Vampire Congress. As I’ve noted before, Democrat leaders have been promising the most ethical, transparent, open, and engaged administration for years. Instead, they have...

Yes, I’m still struggling. Like many of you, I am still carefully weighing all the costs and benefits of each declared GOP candidate. As the candidates continue highlighting each other’s unsavory left-wing alliances, I thought it might be helpful to compile a Hold Your Nose Tracker of the current top four front-runners. I’m just giving it to you straight. One way or the other, the plugs will come in handy. This is the hand we’ve been dealt, alas. Same as it ever was. (Flashback February 2008: The John McCain Nose Plugs.)

If you thought the half-billion-dollar, stimulus-funded Solyndra bust was a taxpayer nightmare, just wait. If you thought the botched Fast and Furious gun-smuggling surveillance operation was a national-security nightmare, hold on. Right on the heels of those two blood-boilers comes yet another alleged pay-for-play racket from the most ethical administration ever. Welcome to LightSquared. It’s a toxic mix of venture socialism (to borrow GOP senator Jim DeMint’s apt phrase), campaign-finance influence-peddling, and perilous corner-cutting all rolled into one. The company is building “a state-of-the-art open wireless broadband network.” Competition in the industry is a good thing, of course. But military,...

Sarah Palin obviously isn’t even a declared candidate, but according to a new national poll she’s not only still well within the fray, but gaining speed:

It’s a freakingly obvious night and day difference — Perry’s MANDATE on families and the MANDATE on insurers going over the heads of the state legislature versus the Palin administration’s decision to accept federal subsidies to increase access to those who choose to take it. (Note: Gardasil is not and never has been mandated in the state of Alaska.) Preston also objects to indirect costs imposed by the Palin administration’s program on taxpayers outside the state. Newsflash: The Perry executive order would have ordered Texas health officials to use federal Medicaid funding to cover the vaccine for young women —...

The right and wrong way to talk about Gardasil; Update: A really, really stupid attack on Palin Tweet By Michelle Malkin  •  September 13, 2011 11:42 AM A month ago, I was “fringe� for spotlighting Rick Perry’s Gardasil problem. As I said then, it’s not just a “single-issue,� one-off problem. It’s about his instincts, judgment, non-apology apology, and ethics.For everyone still catching up, here’s my column from a month ago.Now, Gardasil is the search word of the day. And there’s a new development.After successfully highlighting Perry’s troubling abuse of executive power during last night’s debate, Michele Bachmann risks blowing it with some...

A month ago, I was “fringe” for spotlighting Rick Perry’s Gardasil problem. As I said then, it’s not just a “single-issue,” one-off problem. It’s about his instincts, judgment, non-apology apology, and ethics. For everyone still catching up, here’s my column from a month ago. Now, Gardasil is the search word of the day. And there’s a new development. After successfully highlighting Perry’s troubling abuse of executive power during last night’s debate, Michele Bachmann risks blowing it with some factually inaccurate assertions. She’s RIGHT on the principles, wrong on some of the details. She needs to stay on message and stick...

Time for President Obama to wake up and look like he’s doing something about jobs again! Today, he’ll take to the Rose Garden with “teachers, police officers, firefighters, construction workers, small business owners and veterans” —read Big Labor supporters with a few non-union tokens tossed in —as he wags his finger again at Capitol Hill to pass the jobs bill. Which, er, he’ll finally get around to sending to Capitol Hill later tonight. President Rerun will be quite busy this week, rehashing his warmed-over porkulus plan across the country. President Obama will again press Congress to pass his American Jobs...

The truth is still seeping out, despite Team Obama’s best efforts to cover up and shut up the Fast and Furious whistle-blowers. Last week, we noted the latest evidence that the scandal went straight to the top and chronicled the desperate dance of the lemons. In discussing the quiet resignation of U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke in Phoenix, I talked with NRA News’s Cam Edwards about Burke’s transparent attempt at liability avoidance. Today, the WSJ spotlights the Phoenix USAO’s botched handling of an Arizona man accused of supplying grenades to a Mexican drug cartel. Business Insider provides a closer look (h/t...

GOP Rep. Jason Chaffetz had raised the hopes of grass-roots conservative activists outside the Beltway for months with strong indications that he would mount a David vs. Goliath challenge to the four-decade incumbent Hatch: The Chaffetz calculus is not simple. On one hand, Hatch is widely seen as vulnerable to a conservative challenger and Chaffetz is well-known and liked among Utah’s tea party base. However, Chaffetz was a leading spokesman for House conservatives during the recent debt ceiling debate and sponsor of the Cut, Cap and Balance proposal, which advocated slashing government spending and requiring Congress to pass a balanced...

As faithful readers of this blog know, I was reporting on the Tea Party movement long before it was even called the Tea Party movement — and long before a legion of Johnny-come-latelys in Washington had grabbed their fiscal conservative costumes and joined the parade. I can remember not being able to get mainstream media coverage on the day of one of the first taxpayer protests in Denver in February 2009. We’ve come a long way, baby. From day one, I emphasized that the grass-roots activists leading the Tea Party charge have been as opposed to Big Government Republicans as...

I just read a very bizarre blog post about entrenched incumbent Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch by Fox News anchor Greta van Susteren and then watched an equally distressing interview van Susteren conducted last night with Sarah Palin regarding Hatch. First, the title of van Susteren’s blog post: “Is someone trying to manipulate the UTAH Tea Party vote unfairly away from Senator Orrin Hatch?” Van Susteren absurdly suggests that dark, sinister, unnamed, and uninformed forces in Utah with outside backing are somehow trying to take away Hatch’s seat through nefarious means. She’s clearly talking about D.C.-based fiscal conservative groups like FreedomWorks...

China recently launched its first aircraft carrier. This has apparently prompted some in Washington to wonder, “Hey, what are they going to do with that?” As J.E. Dyer over at Hot Air points out, did the question really have to be asked? Yes it did: As China’s first aircraft carrier takes to the open seas today for its inaugural sea trials, the U.S. government directed a pointed question at the Chinese military: Why would you need a warship like that? “We would welcome any kind of explanation that China would like to give for needing this kind of equipment,” U.S....

The Debt Panel’s Profligate Pork Patty Murray Problem By Michelle Malkin • August 12, 2011 10:34 AM House minority leader Nancy Pelosi rounds out the Super Debt Panel of Stupid today with her three hack picks. My column today focuses on the panel’s Democratic co-chair, my old Senator from Washington state: Profligate Pork Patty Murray. *** The Debt Panel’s Patty Murray Problem by Michelle Malkin Creators Syndicate Copyright 2011 Everything that’s wrong with the so-called debt “super-committee” can be summed up in the person, partisan hackery and policy ignorance of Washington Democratic Sen. Patty Murray. On Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader...

Everything that's wrong with the so-called debt "super-committee" can be summed up in the person, partisan hackery and policy ignorance of Washington Democratic Sen. Patty Murray. On Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid named Murray co-chair of the dog-and-pony deficit-reduction panel tasked with identifying $1.5 trillion in spending cuts by late November. Murray, an unrepentant Nanny State cheerleader and patron saint of the Washington lobbyist, is a double-exclamation point on the debt deal's rotten joke. Charlie Brown had Peppermint Patty. America has U.S. Mint Patty. This is a career politician who has never met a special interest that shouldn't be...

Watch Wisconsin: Recall Day By Michelle Malkin • August 9, 2011 11:23 AM Just a reminder: Today’s the day the big-spending public employee unions hope to oust 6 GOP Wisconsin state senators — not for any corruption, malfeasance, or criminal actions, but for making the tough decisions and supporting the fiscally responsible measures spearheaded by GOP Gov. Scott Walker. Tea Party activists across the country stood with Walker. Don’t forget to stand with the legislators who stood with Walker and stood against Big Labor. Much more than state GOP control of the legislature is at stake. It’s a critical chance...

“Actor Matt Damon is a walking, talking public service reminder to immunize your children early and often against La-La-Land disease,” states syndicated columnist, and popular blogger, Michelle Malkin, in “Schooling Matt Damon” – a dig at Hollyweird. The movie star has been criticized, for uncritically praising bureaucrats and state school teachers, at a time when many American students are functionally illiterate. Damon has also attacked standardized tests, in favor of feelings-first lessons. Continues Malkin, “Students can’t master simple division or fractions because today’s teachers — churned out through lowest common denominator grad schools and shielded from competition — have barely...

Wu-hoo! Welcome to another freaky ethics fiasco brought to you by the D.C. den of dysfunctional Democrats. This one comes clothed in a Tigger costume, wrapped in blinders and bathed in the fetid Beltway odor of eau de Pass le Buck. Liberal David Wu is a seven-term Democratic congressman from Oregon who announced Tuesday that he'll resign amid a festering sex scandal involving the teenage daughter of a longtime campaign donor. He won't, however, be vacating public office until "the resolution of the debt-ceiling crisis." Translation: Call off the U-Haul trucks. Wu's staying awhile. Wu's sexually aggressive, alcohol-addled and erratic...

On July 6, I told you about all the well-heeled spinners in the White House Office of Public Engagement. Their ranks keep on swelling. My column today introduces you to the newly-designed “America’s Champions of Change for the Arts.” Yes, it’s as creepy as it sounds.

[...] The former Utah Republican governor and Obama ambassador to China is the answer to an election-year problem that doesn't exist. The quadrennial "problem," in the minds of Beltway GOP strategists and liberal media chin-pullers, is that the Republican Party isn't moderate, civil, self-critical or inclusive enough. Huntsman is the latest no-labels flavor of the month, a straw man of the same people who have spent the past year smearing entitlement reformers as senior citizen-killers, budget hawks as Hitler's spawn, border-security activists as racists, and leading GOP women as sluts, nuts and bimbos. Just like the failed 2008 GOP contender...

The same congressional panel that launched a preliminary inquiry into Weiner-gate this week has been diddling around with several other Democratic ethics scandals for years. These aren't foxes guarding the henhouse. They're sloths guarding the foxhole. The House Ethics Committee is now reportedly probing into Twitter-holic Democratic New York Rep. Anthony Weiner's possible abuse of government resources while sending pervy messages and photos to young women across the country. The latest batch of Weiner's leaked social-media self-portraits -- more cheesecake than beefcake -- showed him in various states of undress at the congressional gym. From what other public buildings has...

Scroll down for updates…King County Superior Court has closed out our records request as of today… There’s a lot that’s been going on behind the scenes over the past two months since my cousin Marizela Perez disappeared from the University District in Seattle on March 5, 2011. As I mentioned last week, we gathered in Seattle on Mother’s Day for a community fundraiser and benefit concert/auction. There will be another South Jersey fundraiser/bake sale/raffle on May 22. Details here. The Seattle Times has just posted a front-page piece by reporter Christine Clarridge on Marizela’s case and the plight of other...

The official White House account of Osama bin Laden's demise has seen more slapdash cosmetic surgery over the past week than your average "Real Housewives" reality-show star. President Obama's allies attribute the bungled "narrative" (their word, not mine) to the "Fog of War." But each passing day -- and each new set of hapless revisions -- shows that what really ails the administration is the Fog of Fog. Errors happen. Miscommunications happen. Confusing the name of which of bin Laden's myriad sons died (Hamza, not Khalid), for example, is no biggie. But the hourly revamping of key details of Sunday's...

The Fog of Fog By Michelle Malkin • May 6, 2011 08:36 AM Today’s syndicated column summarizes the week in bin Laden narrative bungles. The Navy SEALs did what they were told to do. It’s President Obama’s civilian messengers who can’t tell a straight story and do right by our heroes who risked their lives. The White House Keystone Kops aren’t just squandering a public opinion bump. They’re squandering the victory of our men in uniform, along with the intel-gatherers who made the mission possible. Milblogger Greyhawk reminds us of a past bungled narrative from this administration that undermined troop...

Wanted; Plus: Other young missing women in the Pacific Northwest By Michelle Malkin • April 12, 2011 12:52 AM It’s been more than a month, but my family hasn’t given up hope and hasn’t stopped looking for my missing cousin, Marizela Perez. Many volunteers across the country have joined us in this search. We can’t thank them enough for their dedication, energy, generosity, expertise, and commitment to finding Marizela. America’s Most Wanted, John Walsh’s ground-breaking Fox television show, is now featuring Marizela’s story on its website here [Click Here for AMW.COM story]. Their appeal for help: “Detectives with the Seattle...

Air traffic controllers have been catching a lot of grief for sleeping on the job lately. But do you know what Transportation Security Administration officials have been doing -- or rather, not doing -- lately? A federal watchdog revealed this week that TSA's counterterrorism specialists failed to detect 16 separate jihad operatives who moved through target airports "on at least 23 different occasions." The name of the TSA monitoring program paying for all this flying-blind failure, I kid you not: SPOT. Under the "Screening of Passengers by Observation Techniques" plan, TSA's designated behavior detection officers are supposed to closely watch...

Marizela Perez: Missing one month By Michelle Malkin  •  April 4, 2011 11:37 PM On March 5, 2011, one month ago, my 18-year-old cousin Marizela (“Emem” to her family, “Mei” to her friends) vanished after walking out of a Safeway grocery store in Seattle’s University District.This is one of the many ClearChannel Outdoor billboards across the West Coast that’s featuring Marizela and our family tip line for information about her disappearance: This is the awareness-raising bracelet Marizela’s friends are selling to help the family:One month later, we have on our own searched adjacent parks, streets, and neighborhoods for any signs or clues....

Recently defunded NPR apparently thinks it's funny to falsely accuse Michelle Malkin of being a birther while making lame jokes about her family. This, at a time, when Malkin's kin is frantic with worry over the disappearance of her niece. Malkin has a transcript of the inane little radio skit so I won't duplicate it here. Her comments: The premise of Jobrani's p.c. comedy gag is completely false, as actual readers of my work know. I was one of the first conservatives to criticize Birthers who go to the extreme and have never accused President Obama of being a "secret...

Yes, I know: Japan is in the middle of the meltdown of 4 nuclear reactors on the heels of a monster earthquake and biblical tsunami. I’m aware that Egypt, Bahrain, Yemen and Libya remain a tinderbox. Gas prices are up, food prices have skyrocketed nearly 4% in just one month – the most since 1974! There seem to be a lot going on in the world to set off the panic button. Butt I’m taking my cue from the Wons. And their message is “stay focused on what’s important.” So yesterday Big Guy nailed his brackets for ESPN and met...

Might you help in finding her? Marizela Perez was last seen in Seattle on Sat. March 5th... Click to enlarge downloadable MISSING notice: For obvious reasons it's the ongoing lead story  at Michelle Malkin.com -here- You can make a donation to the  Find Marizela search fund -here- Prayers across-the-miles to Marizela and her family at a difficult time... 

We spent the weekend on the ground in Seattle, looking for any signs of our missing 18-year-old University of Washington student Marizela Perez. Family, friends, supporters, student and church volunteers, Facebook users, blog readers, and kind strangers met us on Saturday in the parking lot at the Safeway in the University District where Marizela was last seen. Family members continued the search on Sunday. We spread out and canvassed Ravenna Park, Cowen Park, the Arboretum, the University District, Chinatown, Green Lake, Rainier Beach/Rainier Valley, and the UW Bothell campus. Nothing. Family members were on the ground again today in the...

Dear readers, Apologies for my absence. I’ll be getting back up to speed today, but it is hard to function with dread coursing through your veins. Spread across the country, the family and friends of Marizela Perez — missing in Seattle since Saturday and last seen at the University District Safeway — are going through this: You try to eat, but all you can taste is indigestible fear. You try to breathe, but all that fills your lungs is stifling uncertainty. You try to sleep, but all that comes is fathomless fatigue. Your heart is weighted with grief, but your...

SEATTLE — The photo above from Marizela’s friends/family shows the tattoo on her left inner arm that reads “lahat ay magiging maayos” — a Tagalog saying for “all will be well.” Thanks so much to all of you for your prayers and for helping to spread the word across the Internet. Thanks to many friends/contacts in the Seattle-area media who covered her disappearance over the past few days, including: Seattle Times KOMO radio’s John Carlson and KOMO TV’s Shomari Stone KING TV KIRO Marizela still hasn’t been heard from or seen by family since Saturday. The Seattle PD says it...

I just got off the phone with my family. This is my beautiful cousin, Marizela Perez: She is a University of Washington undergrad and she has been missing since Saturday afternoon, when she left the Rainier Beach neighborhood headed to the UW Seattle campus. Her parents have been trying to reach her all weekend; she apparently never made it to campus and has not been heard from by phone/Internet. They’ve filed a missing persons report with the Seattle Police Department. Hospitals have been alerted, according to family members, and bus and train routes have been checked. No sign. Here’s more...

My fellow Americans, who are "your people"? I ask because US Attorney General Eric Holder, who is black, used the phrase "my people" in congressional testimony this week. It was an unmistakably color-coded and exclusionary reference intended to deflect criticism of the Obama Justice Department's selective enforcement policies. It backfired. In pandering to identity politics and exacerbating race consciousness, Holder has given the rest of us an opportunity to stand up, identify "our people" and show the liberal poseurs what post-racialism really looks like. Herman Cain is my people. I've never met him, but we are kin because we are...

Here's a modest proposal for liberals who say they support job creation: Stop smearing successful, law-abiding private companies whose values don't comport with yours. I'm looking at you, New York Times. Chick-fil-A is an American success story. Founded by Georgian entrepreneur Truett Cathy in 1946, the family-owned chicken-sandwich chain is one of the country's largest fast-food businesses. It employs some 50,000 workers across the country at 1,500 outlets in nearly 40 states and the District of Columbia. The company generates more than $2 billion in revenue and serves millions of happy customers with trademark Southern hospitality. So, what's the problem?...

You might be seeing a lot of Eric Fuller over the weekend. He’s one of the people injured in Jared Loughner’s shooting rampage, taking rounds in the knee and back. He’s also a vicious bigot, and because he’s elderly and a military veteran, the Left is going to fall in love with him. Fuller gave an interview with the Democracy NOW radio show, in which he said of the Tucson shootings: “It looks like Palin, Beck, Sharron Angle, and the rest got their first target.” Presumably he’s not talking about Judge John Roll. “Their wish for Second Amendment activism has...

The Tuscon massacre ghouls who are now trying to criminalize conservatism have forced our hand. They need to be reminded. You need to be reminded. Confront them. Don’t be cowed into silence. And don’t let the media whitewash the sins of the hypocritical Left in their naked attempt to suppress the law-abiding, constitutionally-protected, peaceful, vigorous political speech of the Right.They want to play tu quo que in the middle of a national tragedy? They asked for it. They got it. ***The progressive climate of hate: A comprehensive illustrated primer in 8 parts:I. PALIN HATEII. BUSH HATEIII. MISC. TEA PARTY/GOP/ANTI-TRADITIONAL MARRIAGE...

It was a nefarious year for nettlesome nosy-bodies employed by the Nanny State. Here are the top power-grabbers of 2010 who just can't leave us alone: -- New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Two feet of snow paralyzed trains, buses, plows and emergency vehicles in the Big Apple this week... -- Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. He proposed meddling mileage taxes, mused about a system to track drivers' routes, lobbied for high-speed rail boondoggles and promoted a "livability initiative" to limit suburban growth and force dwellers into public transportation. Then America's driving czar floated a plan earlier this fall to disable...