Free Republic

The Bay Area is considering a long-range plan to become the first place in the nation to tax drivers for every mile they travel, with an average bill of up to $1,300 per year. ...drivers would have to install GPS-like trackers on their cars to tally travel in the nine-county Bay Area, from freeways to neighborhood streets, with only low-income people exempted. ...planners know they would have a tough time selling such a radical plan but argue the goal of the so-called VMT (vehicle miles traveled) tax is to reduce traffic and pollution while raising revenue needed to fill potholes...

Obama's Communist Mentor Accuracy in Media has an in-depth profile of a leftist who influenced Obama during his high school years. In an article entitled, "Obama's Communist Mentor," Cliff Kincaid identifies a member of the Communist Party USA, who has been influential in Obama's life and education, Frank Marshall Davis, who was a communist -- and born in Kansas. Obama had an admitted relationship with someone who was publicly identified as a member of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA). The record shows that Obama was in Hawaii from 1971-1979, where, at some point in time, he developed a close relationship,...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Hey, Cookie, give me that Obama sound bite from Friday night in Roanoke, Virginia. The one where he says, "You started a business, you didn't do that yourself, somebody else did that." It's the most profound thing I've heard in a long time from somebody at such high levels of power and leadership. And I've been gauging people's reaction to this. I'm stunned. This notion that we're just in the middle of commonplace politics, it's just the same as it's always been. The Democrats are in charge now. The Republicans will win an election here and there...

[Last week], the House Commerce Subcommittee on Communications and Technology dragged all five FCC commissioners up to Capitol Hill to oversee the agency on a wide range of issues. As to be expected, there were some notable takeaways on regulation, taxes, spectrum, and more. First, Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) managed to get FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski to commit to maintaining a “light touch” approach and not enact new regulations on fiber networks, including price controls. The FCC adopted the policy back in late 2003, noting that such requirements “tend to undermine the incentives of both incumbent LECs and...

After much soul searching, Barack Obama has figured out where his presidency has gone wrong -- and he shared it with CBS's Charlie Rose and viewers across the fruited plain Sunday morning. "The mistake of my first term -- couple of years," the president allowed, "was thinking that this job was just about getting the policy right." At times, Obama confessed, he'd forgotten that "the nature of this office is also to tell a story to the American people that gives them a sense of unity and purpose and optimism, especially during tough times." He needed to do "more explaining,...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Who does Obama think paid the taxes for the roads and the bridges and the stoplights? Who paid for this? Who paid for all of that? People that don't have anything? People who pay taxes paid for all this stuff! Folks, it's a shame that we have to sit here and react to this kind of sophistry and explain to people how this country was built and who did it and why it happened and how it happened. Because we live in a period of time where the president of the United States is trying to rewrite...

The Romney campaign is chastising the Obama administration for announcing that it may allow states to waive a federal requirement that welfare recipients engage in “work activities.” The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced Thursday that it will consider requests from states wishing to waive the requirement, which were at the heart of the welfare reform law negotiated between congressional Republicans and President Bill Clinton in 1996. In a memo to states, the department said the change will spur state-level welfare innovation and provide the increased flexibility in enforcement that many states want. The new policy would allow...

Mr. President, thank you for this brief opportunity to address this conference. I am Wayne LaPierre and for 21 years now, I have served as Executive Vice President of the National Rifle Association of America. The NRA is the largest and most active firearms rights organization in the world, with four million members who represent 100 million law-abiding Americans who own firearms. On behalf of those 100 million American gun owners, I am here to announce NRA’s strong opposition to anti-freedom policies that disregard American citizens’ right to self-defense. No foreign influence has jurisdiction over the freedoms our Founding Fathers...

While the Obama administration was taking a victory lap last week after the 5-4 Supreme Court decision to uphold the president’s signature legislative accomplishment, Obamacare, the Interior Department was using the media black hole to release a much-awaited five-year plan for offshore drilling. That plan reinstitutes a 30-year moratorium on offshore energy exploration that will keep our most promising resources locked away until long after President Obama begins plans for his presidential library. (snip) In the past three years, the government has collected more than 250 times less revenue from offshore lease sales than it did during the last year...

The United Nations is putting the finishing touches on an Arms Trade Treaty that transcends borders and may even trample our Constitutional right to bear arms. Every indication is that the president will sign it. Like the New Start and Law of the Sea treaties before it, as well as the Kyoto Protocol and Agenda 21, the Arms Trade Treaty being finalized at the U.N. this month is one of those feel-good, can't-we-all-get-along pieces of parchment whose net effect is to accomplish little except to eat away at American sovereignty and freedom.

A Phoenix man who violated city zoning laws by hosting a Bible study in the privacy of his home has started serving a 60-day jail sentence for his crimes. Michael Salman was found guilty in the City of Phoenix Court of 67 code violations. He was sentenced to 60 days in jail along with three years of probation and a $12,180 fine. A spokesperson for the city attorney confirmed that Salman reported to a county jail Monday afternoon. Members of Salman’s Bible study group posted video of their teacher as he self-reported to the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office. It was...

The powerful American gun lobby worries about the reach of a global pact on conventional arms. Delegations from almost 200 countries convened at the United Nations this month to come up with a new treaty that would regulate international trade in conventional weapons. The effort, supported by the Obama administration, has very vocal opposition: the American gun lobby. Proponents of the Arms Trade Treaty argue that inadequate controls over the international arms market result in armed violence against civilians by human rights violators, criminals, gangs, warlords, and terrorists. The treaty would require governments to deny weapons transfers to states that...

CANYON LAKE [CALIFORNIA} (CBS) — A city in Riverside County will consider a plan to force all pet owners to spay and neuter their pets. KCAL9′s Jeff Nguyen reports not everyone in the guarded and gated city of Canyon Lake located just east of Lake Elsinore likes the proposal. Marlene Marich’s dog Skylar is fixed and has a microchip, but she doesn’t like the idea that the Canyon Lake city council is considering a plan to make the spaying, neutering and microchipping of cats and dogs mandatory. “That’s going too far, asking them to do that,” said dog owner Marlene...

DETROIT (AP) — Chevrolet is trying to pull more customers into its dealerships by offering a money-back guarantee on new cars and trucks. The General Motors brand said Tuesday that buyers can get refunds if they return their 2012 or 2013 vehicles for any reason. The guarantee lasts for up to 60 days from the date of purchase. Chevy Marketing Chief Chris Perry says research shows that customers like it when companies show confidence in their cars and trucks. Customers pay a set price equal to the discount GM offers to parts supply companies, including incentives. If they aren't satisfied with the vehicle,...

Second Amendment: The United Nations is putting the finishing touches on an Arms Trade Treaty that transcends borders and may even trample our Constitutional right to bear arms. Every indication is that the president will sign it. Like the New Start and Law of the Sea treaties before it, as well as the Kyoto Protocol and Agenda 21, the Arms Trade Treaty being finalized at the U.N. this month is one of those feel-good, can't-we-all-get-along pieces of parchment whose net effect is to accomplish little except to eat away at American sovereignty and freedom. Just as the world's worst human...

With the economy threatening to fall into another recession and job growth plummeting, Obama came before the American people today demanding taxes be raised on those making over $250,000 a year, including what he admitted would include 3% of small businesses. Even if that 3% is correct, which is disputed, that 3% means a tax increase on 900,000 small businesses. That's nearly a million small business owners who will now be even more crippled and have less capital available to expand their payrolls -- which of course means fewer jobs for the middle class and the poor who would like...

The United Nations is deliberating over a treaty that will place comprehensive limits on the international weapons trade. The language of the draft agreement is so expansive it wouldn’t take an Obama-appointed judge very long to extend the treaty to cover the domestic firearms market as well. If American jurists continue to be enamored by the popular trend to consider international precedence when making U.S. rulings, you can kiss the Second Amendment goodbye. This week, the U.N. General Assembly began formal discussion of the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), which seeks to establish “common international standards for the import, export and...

President Obama is obviously panicked. Last month Obama and his supporters spent a lot more than Mitt Romney, but even with that cash advantage and the media on their side, the polls haven't budged. Moreover, the President and his campaign have been running around frantically trying to find something that will stick to Romney, be it provable lies about his outsourcing and outright smears involving offshore accounts. Still, Obama can't get above 47% and Romney hasn't even started campaigning in earnest or spending the $160 million he has on hand. Today, in yet another desperate attempt to win a news...

With the Supreme Court giving President Obama’s new health care law a green light, federal and state officials are turning to implementation of the law — a lengthy and massive undertaking still in its early stages, but already costing money and expanding the government. The Health and Human Services Department “was given a billion dollars implementation money,” Republican Rep. Denny Rehberg of Montana said. “That money is gone already on additional bureaucrats and IT programs, computerization for the implementation.” “Oh boy,” Stan Dorn of the Urban Institute said. “HHS has a huge amount of work to do and the states...

The House Energy and Commerce Committee unanimously approved a resolution that urges President Obama to resist any international attempts to regulate the Internet. The United Nation’s International Telecommunication Union (ITU) will meet in Dubai this December and initiatives that will put the Internet under greater government control are expected to be up for vote. The committee-approved resolution, introduced by Rep. Mary Bono Mack (R-Calif.), is intended to show the international community that the United States is united behind an open and innovative Internet, free from government control. But the World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT), the ITU meeting that will...