Free Republic

If you haven’t seen the Bret Baier interview with Mitt Romney it is now abundantly apparent why Mitt Romney will not sit in the middle chair and take tough questions from the roundtable — his skin is as thin as Barack Obama’s. (To Bret’s credit, he had the roundtable panel submit questions and Steve Hayes asked an awesome one. You’ll have to watch the interview to see it) Bret Baier asked Romney, “About your book, you talk about Massachusetts healthcare. We’ve heard you many times, in the debates and interviews, talk about how it is different in your mind than...

I finally got a hold of the transcript for Romney's very unsuccessful Bret Baier interview (for some reason Fox hasn't posted it on their website, perhaps the Romney folks put pressure on them?). Anyway, courtesy of Lexis Nexis, I was able to get it. Below are some key highlights with snarky commentary from your humble narrator: BAIER: Like the "Union Leader," your critics charge that you make decisions based on political expediency and not core conviction. You have been on the both sides of some issues, and there's videotape of you going back years, speaking about different issues, climate change,...

Mitt Romney appeared strangely agitated in his interview with Fox News host Bret Baier on Tuesday. Romney had won praise earlier in the campaign for his calmness. But the calmness has given way under campaign pressures to open irritation. He testily brushed off Baier's blameless questions as "unusual." Baier isn't exactly Martin Bashir, yet Romney felt the need to treat him like a particularly hostile questioner. Romney hasn't been this agitated since he grabbed at Rick Perry's shoulder. Behaving like a thin-skinned pol didn't lend any credence to Romney's claim during the interview that he is the refreshing outsider in...

Anita Perry, campaigning for husband Rick Perry in South Carolina, suggests he's been "brutalized" by the media and the GOP because of his faith. Perry is the most religiously expressive candidate in the Republican field. He hosted a seven-hour Christian prayer rally in August in advance of entering the presidential race. And at last week's Values Voters Summit, he was introduced by a Dallas Baptist pastor who said rival Mitt Romney is not a Christian and Mormonism is a cult. Perry has suffered several extremely bad weeks, stumbling in the debates and losing the coveted endorsement of New Jersey Gov....

Karl Rove responds to controversy over his speculation if Fmr. Gov. Sarah Palin will indeed enter the GOP field. Rove said chances are she will jump in, but was not definitive in his observation. "I mystified," Rove said about his speculation. "Look, she is all upset about this saying how I am trying to sabatouge her in some way. How do I speculate on her future." "Look, if she doesn't want to be speculated about a potential presidential candidate there is an easy way to end the speculation. Simply say 'I'm not running.' Instead, every time she pops up in...

WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama's top counterterrorism adviser said Sunday that lawmakers and others are using national security to score political points and defended the handling of the attempted Christmas Day bombing of a U.S. airliner. Deputy national security adviser John Brennan complained that politicians, many of them Republicans, were unfairly criticizing the administration for partisan purposes and second-guessing the case with a "500-mile screwdriver" that reaches from Washington to the scene of the abortive attack in Detroit. Brennan said he had personally briefed top GOP lawmakers on Christmas night about the arrest of accused bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab and...

CHILMARK, Mass. – President Barack Obama and his family began a weeklong vacation on this Massachusetts island with a message to the reporters who have crowded the New England villages: Chill out and don't expect much. Pleading for privacy, the White House said Obama would have no public events while vacationing on Martha's Vineyard with his family and close friends. Aides also asked that the journalists not take pictures of the Obamas' two young daughters, age 8 and 11, when they aren't with the president.

Palin hits back at 'malicious' photo Posted: 10:22 AM ET From CNN Ticker Producer Alexander Mooney (CNN) – A week after a high-profile uproar with comedian David Letterman over the late-night host's joke about her daughter, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is again sharply responding to the appearance of her children in the public sphere. Palin's latest response comes after liberal Alaskan Blogger Linda Kellen Biegel doctored a photograph of the former Republican gPresidential candidate with her 1-year-old son Trig, who suffers from Down Syndrome. Biegel, who blogs in support of the Alaska Democratic Party under the name "Celtic Diva," superimposed...

From Thompson for President Communications Director Todd Harris. Statement on Romney's South Carolina Cover-Up "Fred Thompson entered the race for president just days ago, talking about uniting our country around a core set of conservative beliefs. According to the Washington Post, it is now clear that while Fred Thompson is working to bring our country together, an increasingly desperate Mitt Romney and his campaign are already hard at work to divide us, practicing the lowest kind of politics. "Today's half-baked cover-up attempt by the Romney campaign does not even pass the laugh test. The Romney campaign has paid Warren Tompkins...

Blacks object to cows roaming near tribute to former slave By Olivia Munoz ASSOCIATED PRESS December 21, 2006 ALLENSWORTH – Basque immigrant Sam Etchegaray had two seemingly perfect swaths for two large dairies: 2,000 rural acres of dusty fields in the Central Valley where thousands of cows would be at home in the No. 1 milk-producing county in the nation. The only problem is the pastures were next to a state park that pays tribute to a freed slave who founded the community, raising the ire of environmentalists and blacks who objected to the pollution and stench that would come...

<p>Washington has a way of quickly acculturating people, especially those who are most susceptible to derangement by the derivative dignity of office. But Jim Webb, Democratic U.S. senator-elect from Virginia, has become a pompous poseur and an abuser of the English language before actually becoming a senator.</p>

Newly elected Senator Jim Webb, D-Va., was so infuriated by a remark from President George W. Bush that the former Marine officer was tempted to punch the commander-in-chief. The confrontation, disclosed in the influential Washington, D.C.-based publication The Hill, came shortly after the midterm elections at a private White House reception for newly elected lawmakers. Webb, who defeated Republican Sen. George Allen in Virginia, ran a campaign critical of the administration’s Iraq policy, and has a son, a Marine lance corporal, serving in Iraq. At the reception, Bush asked Webb how his son was doing. Webb answered that he really...

THAT WAS certainly swift. Washington has a way of quickly acculturating people, especially those who are most susceptible to derangement by the derivative dignity of office. But Jim Webb, Democratic senator-elect from Virginia, has become a pompous poseur and an abuser of the English language before actually becoming a senator. Wednesday's Washington Post reported that at a White House reception for newly elected members of Congress, Webb "tried to avoid President Bush," refusing to pass through the reception line or have his picture taken with the President. When Bush asked Webb, whose son is a Marine in Iraq, "How's your...

Washington – Senator John Kerry issued the following statement in response to White House Press Secretary Tony Snow, assorted right wing nut-jobs, and right wing talk show hosts desperately distorting Kerry’s comments about President Bush to divert attention from their disastrous record: “If anyone thinks a veteran would criticize the more than 140,000 heroes serving in Iraq and not the president who got us stuck there, they're crazy. This is the classic G.O.P. playbook. I’m sick and tired of these despicable Republican attacks that always seem to come from those who never can be found to serve in war, but...

[down near the bottom of the story is the local Silicon Valley reaction]Imams at mosques across the Bay Area addressed the issue during worship Friday afternoon, asking congregants to "respond in the spirit of Islam,"said Samina Faheem-Sundas, executive director of the American Muslim Voice, a Newark-based non-profit, educational group.Faheem-Sundas was critical not just of the Danish newspaper that first published the caricatures last year, but also of the Mercury News, for running the story about the furor that resulted, and a photo of one of the caricatures.Ibrahim said CAIR will step-up its local education campaign about Islam and Muslims, similar...

And now I think I'm going to leave. Because one my first post I was called a troll, and told by a poster I made them sick. Then some dink corrected my grammar. Are the rest of you nice? PS I voted for GWB last year, (my first time ever voting, I'm 19.)

President Bush took part in the annual lighting of the National Christmas tree last night, but failed to mention by name Jesus Christ, whose birth millions celebrate in the U.S. and around the world. "Christmas is a time to rejoice, and to give thanks for the blessings of the season and for the blessings that surround us every day of the year," said Bush, flanked by the first lady, as well as members of Congress and the Cabinet. The president made a brief allusion to Jesus, but crafted it into a joke which got mild response. "Each year, we gather...

My wife and I heard this "song" played on Seattle radio on Saturday and I just had to find out if Jay Leno really allowed this "bleep" on his show. When I searched Google, I found this film of it. It's apparently true. Did anyone see this on Leno? If so, he needs to be "outed"

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. NEW YORK - A man arrested after telling lawyer jokes at a courthouse got the last laugh when a grand jury dismissed the disorderly conduct charge against him. "It's still legal in America to tell jokes - even about lawyers," said 70-year-old Harvey Kash's lawyer, Ron Kuby, about Monday's decision. Kash testified he was exercising his First Amendment right when he shared a few lawyer jokes with his friend, Carl Lanzisera, 65, as they waited to enter a Long Island courthouse last month. Kash and Lanzisera are founders of Americans for...

In the wake of CBS News' "60 Minutes" controversy, an influential Republican on Tuesday said he wants to convene a Capitol Hill hearing on TV news operations after the Nov. 2 election. Rep. Joe Barton (news, bio, voting record) (R-Texas), chair of the House Commerce Committee, told a meeting of the TV engineering trade group MSTV in Washington that broadcast network news divisions "need to have safeguards to prevent reporters from infusing their opinions into news reports." The lawmaker said he wanted to hear from execs of all the nets -- not just CBS -- and threatened to introduce legislation...

KANSAS CITY, Kan. -- Southwest Airlines is not liable for a flight attendant who upset two black passengers by using a version of a rhyme with a racist history, a jury determined Wednesday. The two passengers, sisters Louise Sawyer and Grace Fuller, were heading home from a Las Vegas vacation nearly three years ago when flight attendant Jennifer Cundiff, trying to get passengers to sit down, said over the intercom, "Eenie, meenie, minie, moe; pick a seat, we gotta go." The sisters say the rhyme was directed at them and was a reference to a racist version that dates to...