Free Republic

• Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, said “we have the votes” and Republicans expect the legislation to pass. • Democrats are crying foul over getting a revised, nearly 500-page bill just hours before being asked to vote on it. • The revised bill includes a significant number of changes, including a modified version of the alternative minimum tax on wealthy individuals. • Senator Susan Collins of Maine said she has secured the changes she needs to vote yes. For example, the bill will now include a $10,000 deduction for state and local property taxes.

WASHINGTON — In the weeks before Donald J. Trump took office, lawyers joining his administration gathered at a law firm near the Capitol, where Donald F. McGahn II, the soon-to-be White House counsel, filled a white board with a secret battle plan to fill the federal appeals courts with young and deeply conservative judges.Mr. McGahn, instructed by Mr. Trump to maximize the opportunity to reshape the judiciary, mapped out potential nominees and a strategy, according to two people familiar with the effort: Start by filling vacancies on appeals courts with multiple openings and where Democratic senators up for re-election next...

<p>Last fall and in the spring, the otherwise quiet campus of Eastern Michigan University was hit by three ugly incidents of vandalism targeting blacks that rocked the community.</p> <p>The first came in September, when “KKK” was sprayed in red, white and blue paint on the wall of a dormitory, along with a threatening racial slur telling blacks to “leave” the school in Ypsilanti, about 11 miles southeast of Ann Arbor.</p>

BALTIMORE — The mass shooting in Las Vegas renews the country's long-running conflict over guns. Should there be more regulation? Should there be bans on high-powered weapons? There's also a question of how secrecy cloaks ownership records. If police get the license plate number on a car, they can easily find out who owns it. But it's a whole different story when it comes to guns. For 30 years, Congress has kept a veil over the nation's gun supply. Who are the owners? How many guns do people have? In May, city leaders in Baltimore touted the arrival of the...

The scourge of tourists who think they can bring their guns to New York City, despite the fact that our city has some of the toughest gun laws in the country, continued with an arrest on Sunday morning.The latest offender is Terell Coleman of Georgia, who allegedly left a .45 Glock under his mattress at the DoubleTree hotel in the financial district, according to a police spokesperson. A cleaning lady phoned the police at around 11 a.m. on Sunday after finding the firearm, and Coleman was subsequently cuffed and charged with criminal possession of a weapon, a felony police said.

Legislation to fix the cumbersome patchwork of concealed carry laws in the U.S. has gained momentum with the addition of a 212th co-sponsor in the House of Representatives.The legislation–H.R. 38–was put forward by Rep. Richard Hudson (R-NC) on January 3, 2017. Breitbart News reported that it will make the concealed carry permit of any one state valid in the other 49–just like a driver’s license–and will also allow residents of permitless carry states to carry in any state, provided they have government documentation proving their residency in a permitless carry state. On June 21, Breitbart News reported that 199 House...

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said Tuesday that he will introduce legislation to crack down on a background check "loophole" in the wake of the mass shooting in Las Vegas. "I will introduce a measure to close the loophole that lets a buyer walk away with a gun if the background check is not complete in 72 hrs," Blumenthal wrote in a tweet.The so-called "default to proceed" loophole allows a business to sell a gun after 72 hours if the FBI hasn't completed a background check confirming that the sale is legal before then.The practice allowed more than 2,500 prohibited purchasers...

Russia has aimed its entire media arsenal at the veteran Hollywood actor Morgan Freeman over his appearance in a video accusing the Kremlin of waging "war" on America during last year's presidential election.The video shows the Oscar winner accusing President Vladimir Putin, a "former KGB spy", of launching cyber attacks and spreading false information in order to avenge the collapse of the Soviet Union. He urges President Donald Trump to tell the nation that "during this past election, we came under attack by the Russian government".The clip was produced by The Committee to Investigate Russia, a group set up by...

On taking office, the Trump administration promised to repeal and replace Obamacare. So far, it has failed. It also promised to reduce and reform business and personal taxes. That effort, too, is heading for failure. Why? The reason is that both efforts are based on mutually irreconcilable principles and conflicting goals that cannot simultaneously be achieved. Together, these two failings make political consensus virtually impossible. The health policy conundrum is now clear for all to see. Candidate Trump pledged to replace Obamacare with a plan that would insure as many people as Obamacare does, cut out-of-pocket costs for insurance and...

A little before midnight on Saturday, a crowd of around 700 gathered in an old industrial warehouse a few blocks from the Detroit River for what they'd been told was the "largest public satanic ceremony in history." Most of them professed to be adherents of Satanism, that loosely organized squad of the occult that defines itself as a religious group. Others came simply because they were curious. After all, Satanists exist in the popular psyche as those who casually sacrifice goats and impregnate Mia Farrow with Lucifer's child; if this ceremony was indeed unprecedentedly big, who knew what could be...

Actress and longtime Donald Trump nemesis Rosie O’Donnell lashed out at the president once more on Tuesday, taking to her Twitter account to say that anyone who “stands” with or “works” with Trump in any capacity is a “Nazi.”The 55-year-old comedian posted several messages on her social media account Tuesday afternoon in an apparent response to a press conference called by Trump in which the president denounced the media’s coverage of Saturday’s deadly attack at a Charlottesville political protest, at which a woman was killed and 19 others injured after a man deliberately drove a car into a crowd. “[R]epublicans...

Troubling and significant statistics produced by the government indicate important facts about our political system and its priorities. Unfortunately, these statistics often get little coverage in the media. What coverage is provided usually only focuses on the current year and might include comparison with the previous year. Two such sets of government statistics cover wealth distribution and poverty. These statistics have a margin of error and do not account for the up and down fluctuations in the economy nor changing historical conditions or limitations of what any president can do. What is perhaps most critical are the trends. These trends...

They use their guns to assassinate black people. They use their schools to funnel black students through a school-to-prison pipeline. They use their state institutions, bought politicians, business conglomerates and white-supremacist domestic terrorists to incite violence over and over again. And then they use their new president to enact a law-and-order administration. All to make them shoot first, to make them ask questions later, make them scream, “I thought he had a gun in his hand” and “I feared for my life” and “he matched the description of a suspect” and “she was threatening us.” To shoot and kill Philando...

A House measure that would allow those with a concealed carry license to ignore “no gun” signs is headed to the Ohio Senate. Termed the Decriminalization Effort for Ending Notorious Deaths Act by its sponsor, HB 233 states that members of the military or those with a carry permit would not be guilty of violating most areas deemed gun-free. The measure passed in a Republican-heavy 65-31 vote on Thursday.“The bill decriminalizes so-called ‘gun free’ zones for concealed handgun license holders,” said bill sponsor, Rep. John Becker, R-Clermont. The proposal’s language protects CHL holders and military members found carrying a weapon...

Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower,” believed the late Steven Paul “Steve” Jobs, co-founder, chairman and CEO of Apple, Inc. It’s obvious that Nosler, Inc., subscribes to this philosophy as well; since 2014, the year that the 26 Nosler made its debut, the Bend, Ore., company has introduced a total of five new cartridges. Outside of the early 2000s, when Winchester and Remington were embroiled in a frenzied ballistics battle, such a flurry of activity is somewhat unusual—makers of proprietary and wildcat cartridges notwithstanding, of course. Of the new Nosler namesakes, the .22 caliber is arguably the most...

WASHINGTON, D.C., May 2, 2016 (LifeSiteNews) – By legalizing same-sex “marriage” nationwide, the U.S. judiciary gave Democrats something they could not achieve legislatively, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi told a press conference Thursday. Pelosi at the same time also disclosed the party’s four-part agenda to promote acceptance of the homosexual lifestyle across the nation. “Legislatively, we couldn’t really succeed, but from the courts and the rest, and public opinion, of course, in the actual courts and in the court of public opinion, that victory has been won,” Pelosi said, referencing last June’s Obergefell v. Hodges Supreme Court decision mandating legal...

President Trump's outside lawyer, Marc Kasowitz, flat-out denied on Thursday that the president ever asked or pressured Comey to drop the investigation into fired National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, accusing Comey of leaking privileged information to the press. Kasowitz' claim came in response to fired FBI director James Comey's testimony earlier in the day before the Senate Intelligence Committee. In a statement he read to reporters at the National Press Club, Kasowitz said, "the president never, in form, or substance, directed or suggested, that Mr. Comey stop investigating anyone, including the president never suggested that Mr. Comey "let Flynn go"....

If revenge is a dish best served cold, former FBI director James Comey's testimony was a true Beltway feast. Comey delivered the most dispassionate and devastating delivery possible in portraying President Trump as the new Richard Nixon - just a lot less likeable. Despite the effort of GOP members to undermine Comey's credibility, he retained his signature Eagle Scout image in expressing his unease with a series of alleged and grossly inappropriate comments from the president.The testimony unleashed a torrent of Watergate analogies, and even Watergate-era figures like Carl Bernstein and John Dean were called forth to complete the analogy....

Two Democratic congressmen are drawing up articles of impeachment for President Trump including a Texas lawmaker who thinks Trump's firing of former FBI director James Comey is Grounds for impeachment.Texas Democrat Al Green believes it is "indisputable fact" that Trump obstructed justice in his firing of Comey.Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Calif, said Wednesday he supports Green's efforts to draft articles of impeachment but that he is also drafting his own version of impeachment articles. Sherman hinted he may pair his articles with Greens in the down the road. "This is going to be a long process" he said.Green and Sherman join...

Power-short Indonesia has been mulling building a nuclear power plant for nearly 15 years, and it is exploring a number of novel options, including high-temperature gas-cooled reactors (HTGRs) and a thorium molten salt reactor.The 1958-established National Atomic Energy Agency (Badan Tenaga Nuklir Nasional, BATAN) wants to build an experimental nuclear power reactor at Serpong, the site of its largest multipurpose research reactor, and it continues to assess its options. In early 2015, BATAN signed a contract to build and test a pebble-bed HTGR at Serpong with a consortium of Russian and Indonesian companies led by NUKEM Technologies. And, in August...