Free Republic

When the school bully starts glowering in your direction, the worst thing you can do is hold up your hands and say, “Please don’t hit me.” It’s a lesson most of us learn in the schoolyard, but one that Texas Sen. Ted Cruz seems to have forgotten.Now, here comes the knuckle sandwich.Cruz, who is making a strong run in Republican presidential primary polling, has done everything he can to put off an inevitable showdown with frontrunner Donald Trump. The reluctance is understandable – Trump’s attacks on other candidates in the race have been devastatingly effective. To avoid them, Cruz has...

The latest Des Moines Register poll shows Texas Senator Sen. Ted Cruz surging to a 10 point lead over his nearest rival, Donald Trump, among caucus goers in Iowa. Cruz's October surge is the largest jump measured over 5 Presidential campaigns. Cruz currently has the highest favorability rating of any Republican candidate for President. Cruz has 31 percent support, followed by Donald Trump with 21 percent. Since October, Cruz has gained 21 points while Trump has gained just 2 percent. Neurosurgeon Ben Carson is in 3rd place with 13 percent, down 15 points since October. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL)79%is...

We are now hearing news of the Empire Striking Back. We are hearing about a brokered convention. Republican officials and leading figures in the party's establishment are preparing for the possibility of a brokered convention as businessman Donald Trump continues to sit atop the polls in the GOP presidential race.More than 20 of them convened Monday near the Capitol for a dinner held by Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus, and the prospect of Trump nearing next year's nominating convention in Cleveland with a significant number of delegates dominated the discussion, according to five people familiar with the meeting.Weighing in...

Ted Cruz will embark next week on a splashy swing through many of the states that vote on March 1, an effort to lock down support in those mostly Southern states before turning full attention to the first four voting contests of the 2016 Republican presidential primary.The Texas senator, flying with staff and his family on a chartered plane, will hit 12 cities in one week, flying from Las Vegas to St. Paul, Minn. on Dec. 17 after the next presidential debate, and wrapping up on Dec. 23 in Oklahoma City. The fly-around tour, dubbed "Take Off with Ted," will...

The Texas senator's campaign is beginning to see returns after months of methodically courting evangelical leaders.Ted Cruz increasingly looks like the man to beat in Iowa. He's rising in the polls, building on an already extensive field organization and locking down critical conservative endorsements.Among the biggest yet came Thursday, when Bob Vander Plaats, the head of the conservative group Family Leader, came out for Cruz, citing what he sees as electability in Iowa and nationally. "This is a guy that's been very consistent in principles, in communications, and his campaign has shown ability to slowly gain ground and build momentum,...

The professional apparatus of the Republican Party are signaling their intent to do exactly what we predicted they would do. Trump will win the primary, and the GOPe will split the party to run an additional candidate in the general election. It’s not Trump going third party – It’s the establishment GOP (GOPe) intending to go third party. They are planning a modified version of the Mississippi Strategy from 2014.

**SNIP** Alberto M. Fernandez, who until earlier this year led the State Department unit that counters militant propaganda, said, "The administration seems to be really flailing and tone deaf to this latest challenge." He called the San Bernardino attack "D.I.Y. jihad," and said it "forces the administration to look at where it does not want to go and is weakest, at jihadist ideology and its dissemination." Others, however, cautioned against overreaction, warning that the focus on Muslims could lead to the kind of anger and alienation that creates more potential for terrorist recruitment. Some experts urged officials to keep the...

Is it just me or do others wonder what the Drudge Report is up to? It seems like so many headlines and stories are more Hollywood BS and other unimportant things, than any relevant information that concerned people would care about. Did Drudge turn into Nero just fiddling while Rome (the rest of the world) burns? One of the first sites (also Free Republic) I go to is Drudge, but unfortunately it is not usually not very important.

Author and human rights activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali argued President Obama's position on radical Islam is what he believes is strategic, but "it's a strategy that has failed" on Monday's "Hannity" on the Fox News Channel. Ali stated, "I'm always surprised to see people of authority here saying, what we see, these terrorist acts, the subjugation of women, the hatred of Jews and Christians, it has nothing to do with Islam. I mean, I watch that with amazement. I obviously have come to understand that it is a strategic position, that if we say these things, maybe the Islamist extremists...

The poll shows the absolute importance/benefit of the original GOPe road map. The poll shows there are only FIVE viable candidates for the 99 Winner-Take-ALL primary delegates. (As Previously Outlined) This poll shows EXACTLY what is being discussed inside Florida in every single on-the-ground report, every email, and every political forum for high-information Floridians. Most importantly this poll shows exactly how the GOPe plan to nominate Jeb Bush. When you look at this poll, and you remove Donald Trump from the equation, you can see EXACTLY how confident Team Jeb Bush (and Karl) was to the road map they created...

Here is video of Retired Col. Jack Jacobs - an MSNBC Military Analyst - telling Ed Schultz he believes President Obama's meeting with top U.S. Commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, was the direct result of McChrystal's comments yeserday in London that were critical of Vice-President Joe Biden's strategy of "leaving Afghanistan to the Taliban." Jacobs believes McChrystal was "summoned" to Copenhagen by Obama because of those comments. Here is a report on his comments that contricted what Biden has called for: The top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, used a speech here Thursday to reject calls for...

Obama White House Partners with ISIS-Linked GroupPosted By Matthew Vadum On February 16, 2015 @ 12:55 am In Daily Mailer,FrontPage | 17 Comments Ad sponsored by Americans for Peace and Tolerance published in the Washington Times. A Boston-based hub of terrorism associated with a top Islamic State propagandist and producer of hostage-beheading videos will receive the red carpet treatment at an anti-terrorism conference at the Obama White House this Wednesday.The so-called Summit on Countering Violent Extremism comes as President Obama seeks formal authorization from Congress to wage war against the Islamic State (also known as ISIS or ISIL).The terrorist-friendly Islamic Society of...

The controversy surrounding the F-35 is fundamentally an extension of the debate over what a future fighter should be. Recently the aircraft made news when it was officially announced that the airframe couldn’t dogfight worth a damn. The standard riposte is that dogfighting as a form of aerial combat, stopped being relevant a long time ago. Perhaps the best advocate for dogfighting-is-dead point of view isn’t a paper for the F-35 but a paper which argues that air combat is fundamentally changing. Perhaps the F-35 is not the best tool for coming era, but neither is the super-dogfighter many in...

In this video commentary, I discuss Hillary’s flawed strategy. Tune in!

It can be done. John F. Kennedy was on his way to doing so. Reagan did so. In 590 days from now, we can begin to do so again The Wednesday, June 10 Wall Street Journal headline at the top of the page was “Obama Set to Expand Troops in Iraq.” We were 589 days into the two terms Barack Hussein Obama has served in the office of President of the United States and he is as clueless now as he was when he arrived on January 20, 2009. “President Barack Obama is poised to send hundreds more American advisers...

The Obama administration is working quickly to push back against the notion that there is no strategy to defeat Islamic State terrorists, after President Obama’s comments during a press conference in Germany after the G-7 World Leaders Summit. (snip) “The ends are very clear, we’ve said this all along, the goal is to degrade and defeat ISIL and remove them as a threat in the region and around the world,” he said. (The newly minted State Department spokesperson John) Kirby outlined Obama’s effort to train and equip more Iraqi troops to fight ISIS, directing airstrikes against ISIS forces and working...

The Washington Times has uncovered what it calls "deep-seated doubts" among Pentagon brass regarding President Obama's strategy in degrading and defeating ISIS. This revelation undercuts the official White House line that would indicate a unified front between the president and military officials. One Pentagon official, said to be involved in counterterrorism analysis, asked incredulously, “What strategy?” He went on to say, “We are now floating along, reacting to ISIS.” The general consensus among top military officials is that the president will never activate their recommended plan of sending in ground troops, a strategy that is believed to be the only...

The largest oil and gas companies are employing different strategies to weather the downturn and plan for the future. Each strategy has its risks, and not all may work out. Which companies will emerge stronger after an oil price rebound and which will fall further behind because of bad decisions? There are different ways to play a down cycle. With oil prices half of what they were in 2014, revenues are significantly lower for everyone across the board. As a result, the oil industry has collectively implemented an estimated $114 billion in spending cuts. But oil executives are also trying...

.........Earlier this week, [Obama] waded into state politics, sharply denouncing Walker for signing legislation in Wisconsin that prohibited mandatory union dues. "Even as its governor claims victory over working Americans, I'd encourage him to try and score a victory for working Americans - by taking meaningful action to raise their wages and offer them the security of paid leave," Obama said in a statement. In both instances, he signaled he was not going to entirely ignore the 2016 contest or its main players if there was an opportunity to advance his own agenda. "We're going to engage in this dynamic...

WASHINGTON — Democrats are losing some skirmishes over the Department of Homeland Security, but many feel they are winning a political war that will haunt Republicans in 2016 and beyond. Democrats lacked the votes Friday to force Republicans to fund the department for a year with no strings. Still, even some Republicans say party leaders are on a perilous path with a very public ideological struggle only highlighting the GOP's inability to pass contested legislation and possibly worsening its weak relationship with Hispanic voters. Worst of all, numerous lawmakers said, Republican leaders have offered no plausible scenario for a successful...