Free Republic

Joe Scarborough's "intuitive gut reaction" to the mess in Wisconsin is that Gov. Walker's holdout against union pleas for collective bargaining "seems kind of un-American" to him. It supposedly pained the self-described small-government conservative to say it, but he held to his opinion on Monday's "Morning Joe." "I'm going to get killed for saying this," Scarborough hesitantly prefaced his confession. "I'm going to get so killed for saying this – I hate to say this, but the concept of telling people that they

Sen. Dale Schultz, R-Richland Center, promised in column released tonight that he will introduce an amendment to the budget repair bill that would restore collective bargaining rights after 2013. "I agree with the long-term goal to have balanced state budgets without tax increases, transportation fund raids, and excessive borrowing. We can achieve that goal and preserve the Wisconsin community we want without having to eliminate collective bargaining in perpetuity," Schultz wrote. "With collective bargaining, Wisconsin residents have enjoyed high-quality and uninterrupted public services for decades. Our thinking and our decision about collective bargaining in Wisconsin should revolve around what is...

Mitch Daniels: Indiana Republicans Should Drop the Right to Work Bill Color me extremely disappointed with Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels right now: Gov. Mitch Daniels signaled this afternoon that Republicans should to drop the right-to-work bill that has brought the Indiana House to a standstill for two days and imperiled other measures. Daniels told reporters this afternoon that he expects House Democrats will return to work if the bill dies. It would be unfortunate if other bills are caught up in the turmoil, he said. He will not send out state police to corral the Democrats, the Republican governor said....

As Arlen Specter leaves the Senate after 30 years, the one-time corruption-busting Philadelphia prosecutor and architect of the "single-bullet theory" of the John F. Kennedy assassination says he wouldn't change a thing about his zig-zag-zig political path. Specter began and ended - for now - his political life as a Democrat and spent the intervening four decades as a Republican. But he sees himself as an independent who often bucked party leadership - ultimately ending his career. "I have always agreed with (John F.) Kennedy that sometimes party asks too much," Specter said in his last news media interview in...