Free Republic

There's not much I can add to Mark Levin's explanation of why Donald Trump does not represent the conservative or Tea Party movements. He wasn't there when we needed him, and he helped those who were against us. So why the swirling support around Trump? Much of it, without doubt, is name recognition. But that cannot explain it completely. As of now, Trump is the only one willing to meet Obama's smash-mouth attitude with smash-mouth attitude. Obama can invite Paul Ryan to sit in the front row for Obama's budget speech, and then spend 45 minutes calling Ryan everything but...

LAS VEGAS -- Federal agents seized five pounds of C-4 military explosives from the home of a man accused with a Navy SEAL and a Las Vegas associate of smuggling machine guns from Iraq into the U.S. for sale and shipment to Mexico, authorities said Thursday. Grenades and night-vision goggles also were found in the Colorado home of 34-year-old Richard Paul, according to federal prosecutors and federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents in Las Vegas and Colorado. Paul and Andrew Kaufman, 36, of Las Vegas, were arrested Wednesday and appeared Thursday before federal magistrate judges in Durango...

The bad news is that there is a lot of bad news. BP, known to our president as British Petroleum, is destroying the ecology of the Gulf of Mexico, and wrecking the economies of the states that abut it. The eurozone is in a state of chaos as profligate nations prove unable to repay the money they have borrowed, creating the possibility of another collapse of the international financial system. Tensions in the Middle East and on the Korean peninsula are rising. Japan’s prime minister has resigned, as has Germany’s president, unsettling the political picture in both countries, not good...

Click the music link and sing along! BAD NEWS FOR BARACKTune: "Limbo Rock" Original MIDI Every lib'ral boy and girl All the folks in Limbaugh World Both sides bashing on Barack All find something they can mock Track his numbers, track his polls Track the unemployment rolls All the pollsters on the block Say it's bad news for Barack He'll go lower now He'll go lower now How low can he go First he spread the wealth around Then he bowed down to the ground Spend a trillion, make it three Spend it like it grows on trees Track his...

By more than a two-to-one margin, Americans believe the Democratic Party is better suited to getting the country out of a recession over the Republican Party, according to the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll to be released today. Almost half of all respondents, 48%, identified the Democratic Party, while just one in five, or 20%, said the Republican Party. Some 8% said both parties were equally qualified, while 16% said neither party was qualified. Comparatively, in December 1990 when the U.S. economy was also going through a recession, the Democratic and Republican parties tied at 33% when asked who...

by David C. John WebMemo #2310 Bad policy is not improved by limiting it to certain situations. The Helping Families Save Their Homes Act (H.R. 1106) would allow bankruptcy judges to reduce the principal owed on a mortgage, a practice often referred to as a "cramdown." Judges would also be able to reduce interest rates or lengthen the term of the mortgage. This is a huge policy mistake that will help only a few people while raising the cost of borrowing for thousands of moderate-income and first-time homebuyers. Although supporters claim that this is a limited provision that applies only...

A federal jury on Tuesday ruled that an Arizona rancher did not violate the civil rights of 16 Mexican nationals he detained at gunpoint after they had snuck illegally into the United States in 2004, but the jury awarded $78,000 in actual and punitive damages to six of the illegal immigrants on claims of assault and infliction of emotional distress

America's sky is falling. A Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll conducted last month found that 78 percent of Americans think that the country is heading in the wrong direction. Of course, almost 4 in 5 Americans think the country is heading to heck in a handbasket. The news media are stuck in one gear when it comes to reporting economic news - Armageddon. As Hillary Rodham Clinton supporters so aptly noted, many journalists are besotted with Barack Obama. That makes them open to any bad news that can be tacked onto Republican George W. Bush. But it's more than liberal bias....

The George W Bush administration plans to launch an air strike against Iran within the next two months, an informed source tell, echoing other reports that have surfaced in the media in the United States recently. Two key US senators briefed on the attack planned to go public with their opposition to the move, according to the source, but their projected New York Times op-ed piece has yet to appear. The source, a retired US career diplomat and former assistant secretary of state still active in the foreign affairs community, speaking anonymously, said last week that the US plans an...

When tough guy interviewer Bill O'Reilly had his much anticipated interview with Hillary last week, Hillary stated flatly, "We can not win militarily in Iraq." This answer, like so many others, went unchallenged. Despite the fact that we are in the process of a military win in Iraq. Can you spell surge? The media and the Democrats are largely silent on Iraq these days. Unless its to celebrate the anniversary of the Bush photo op declaring "Mission Accomplished". Or to throw roadblocks in the way of the, now successful, surge. Or to keep the body count in the public eye....

LIBERAL - Ignacio Rivas stands at his paletas cart chatting with another guy who also pushes frozen fruit treats on a three-wheel cart. It's about 7 p.m. in downtown Liberal, a town proud of its Yellow Brick Road and annual Fat Tuesday pancake race. But as Rivas tilts his straw cowboy hat down and pushes across the city's main drag before sundown, the scene looks like one out of Mexico. Perhaps a third to half of the independent business storefronts advertise in Spanish. Most others note that they habla español. This snapshot reflects what's happening in Liberal -- the heart...

The growing number of young Hispanic mothers is the primary cause for an uptick in Montgomery County's teen pregnancies, according to state statistics presented yesterday to county leaders. In the county, which has one of the lowest overall birthrates in the United States, the birthrate increased 16 percent from 2002 to 2005 among all women 15 to 19, according to a report by county staff. In the same period, births for women in that age group dropped nationally and statewide. Births among Hispanic women 18 to 19, which have particularly driven the growth in teen pregnancies in Montgomery, have increased...

The budget impasse in Sacramento is unwelcome news for the soon-to-be-termed-out legislators who hope to persuade voters next year to let them keep their jobs a little longer. It also is a problem for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who wants to enact major health care reform this year. His situation is particularly delicate, since the budget is languishing because he cannot persuade the members of his own party to vote for it. Perhaps more than anything except a badly handled disaster, late budgets have the potential to drag down approval ratings. They make leaders look ineffective at the main task they...

We WON

Vote not yet complete but NAYS are well over 40. A lot of unexpected NAYS including McConnell, Voinovich, Warner. More details soon.

WASHINGTON - Republican presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani has confronted a spate of bad news in recent days, from the drug indictment of his South Carolina chairman to criticism for skipping meetings of the Iraq Study Group. Every campaign faces bad news at one time or another, but with a fundraising deadline looming Saturday, the timing couldn't be worse. Most voters are not tuned in, but for those who are giving and raising money for the former New York mayor, the heartburn-inducing headlines may make them think twice. The string of events — some Giuliani's making, some out of his hands...

Perhaps the budget deficit is getting too large. The IRS is trying to get eBay Inc. (NASDAQ:EBAY) to turn over records on its customers, especially the larger ones, so that the IRS can go after those who have not paid taxes on their auction transactions. What fun. Getting a company to rat out its own. eBay is fighting the move, but the government seems determined to go after merchants, especially those who have transactions of over $5,000 a year. The government may have a point; tax evasion is a serious business. And so why shouldn't eBay potentially poison its relationship...

OPEC Abandons U.S. Dollar Oil-producing countries have reduced their dollar holdings to the lowest level in two years and shifted oil income into other currencies, according to the Bank for International Settlements. Members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and Russia reduced their dollar holdings from 67 percent in the first quarter to 65 percent in the second quarter. At the same time, they increased their holdings of euros from 20 percent to 22 percent, the BIS said. They also boosted holdings of the yen and British pound. Eighteen months ago, the oil-producing countries’ exposure to the dollar was...

<p>Breaking news just announced - 200 Taliban fighters killed this morning in Afghanistan.</p>

WASHINGTON - The U.S.-backed strategy to fight Afghanistan's massive drug trade has been unsuccessful in stemming opium cultivation, which is expected to hit record levels this year, a senior U.S. official said Thursday. "It's bad news and we need to improve it," said Thomas Schweich, principal deputy assistant secretary of state for international narcotics. "But we don't feel it's a hopeless situation, and we don't think the overall strategy is the wrong strategy." Schweich spoke to reporters as Western officials in Afghanistan were forecasting a possible 40 percent increase this year in land under opium poppy cultivation, despite hundreds of...