Free Republic

Trey Gowdy joins Ted Cruz and other conservatives: Yes on TPA, No on TAA, and indeterminable about TPP (like calling the final score at half time.

Update: MA Dem governor candidate Martha Coakley will not concede tonight; they are hoping to be within one half of one per cent which would trigger an automatic recount. Repub gov candidate Charlie Baker may say a statement soon but probably would not give a victory speech, as it's not polite (or good karma) to declare victory without getting concession from your opponent. Coakley supporters being sent home. 95% OF PRECINCTS REPORTING Charlie Baker (R) 969,110 48% Martha Coakley (D) 945,815 47%

Our roving Radix observer in South Boston writes on the Massachusetts Gubernatorial race: “The news of the day is…Democrat Martha Coakley has attached ‘Thank you Mayor Menino’ signs to all her campaign signs in Boston…it backfired huge as all the people are sickened by her trying to use the mayor when he is literally just in the ground. People are bat [guano] about the Menino sign …he didn’t support her campaign …she is classless using the popularity of a dead mayor who is just in the ground.” Coakley operatives “showed up at midnight to attach the Menino signs …. trying...

Republican Charlie Baker has climbed to a 3-point lead over Democrat Martha Coakley in the race for governor, while a push to repeal casinos in Massachusetts appears to be headed for a lopsided defeat, a new Suffolk University-Boston Herald poll shows. Baker's 46-43 percent lead is well within the poll's margin of error but the GOP nominee holds several key advantages over his Democratic opponent heading into the campaign's final few days, according to the Suffolk-Herald poll of 500 likely voters. Just 6 percent of voters say they are undecided.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Charlie Baker has a nine point lead over Democratic rival Martha Coakley in the latest Boston Globe/SocialSphere. Nine points.

Attorney General Martha Coakley is locked in a dead heat for governor with Republican Charlie Baker because she’s struggling to win over the two demographic groups she needs most. Partisan Democrats and women voters formed the backbone of the recent Democratic victories in Massachusetts. But three weeks before Election Day, Coakley is still struggling to close the sale with the state’s Democratic base. Democrats have established a winning formula in recent contests: Roll up big margins with women voters, turn out the party faithful and capture just enough independent voters to allow Democrats’ built-in numerical advantage to overwhelm Republicans. This...

National Democrats are haunted by memories of Martha Coakley's unforced stumbles and missteps in 2010, which cost them a U.S. Senate seat in one of the country's bluest states. Four laters later, the Massachusetts attorney general might be about to blow another major contest: The race to succeed Deval Patrick as governor. With two weeks left to go, a new poll by WBUR, which tracks the race weekly, found Coakley trailing for the first time against Republican Charlie Baker, a former health care CEO who served as secretary of finance and health under Gov. William Weld in the 1990s. It's...

U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren is taking swings at Charlie Baker on behalf of Martha Coakley, blasting the Republican gubernatorial candidate’s gaffe last week in a fundraising message sent out yesterday, saying that when he “dismissed a woman news reporter by calling her ‘sweetheart’ a lot of people questioned Charlie’s attitude toward women.” “My colleague Kristen Gillibrand recently pointed out that even now, in 2014, sometimes she feels like she’s living in a Mad Men episode,” Warren wrote in the message, referencing an AMC television series set in the not-yet liberated 1960s. “When I hear some of the things that Republicans...

WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court has struck down a 35-foot protest-free zone outside abortion clinics in Massachusetts. The justices were unanimous Thursday that extending a buffer zone 35 feet from clinic entrances violates the First Amendment rights of protesters. ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT Chief Justice John Roberts says authorities have less intrusive ways to deal with problems outside the clinics.

Did you know the Obama administration’s position has been defeated in at least 13 – thirteen — cases before the Supreme Court since January 2012 that were unanimous decisions? It continued its abysmal record before the Supreme Court today with the announcement of two unanimous opinions against arguments the administration had supported. First, the Court rejected the administration’s power grab on recess appointments by making clear it could not decide when the Senate was in recess. Then it unanimously tossed out a law establishing abortion-clinic “buffer zones” against pro-life protests that the administration supported (though the case was argued by...

Like Hillary Clinton, Attorney General Martha Coakley also has a book coming out. And by sheer coincidence both books have the same title -- "Hard Choices." Who would have thought that possible? Yet, when you think about it, both women have a lot in common. Actually Coakley really does not have a book coming out -- we just said that. But she could have, given how much the two are alike. They even dress alike.

Editor's note: This post was co-authored by Townhall web editor Christine Rousselle. A 2007 Massachusetts law stops pro-life activists 35 feet short of abortion clinic entrances. Because of the enforced distance, they often have to shout to get their message across to the scared young women walking into Planned Parenthood to have abortions — not exactly a winning strategy. McCullen v. Coakley, the case that enforces the unfair limit on pro-lifers' free speech, was center stage at the Supreme Court today. Justices listened to oral argument this morning after deciding to hear the case in June. SCOTUSblog outlined what’s...

How far can lawmaking go in creating a buffer zone around abortion clinics to ensure women can go to the clinic before violating the First Amendment rights of those who want to talk to women about alternatives to abortion? On Jan. 15, the Supreme Court heard arguments in McCullen v. Coakley against a Massachusetts law under which a line is painted on the ground 35 feet from the door of abortion clinics. Anyone who enters that zone to speak against abortion to a woman can go to prison for committing a crime. Eleanor McCullen is an elderly woman who counsels younger women who are...

Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley officially launched her campaign for governor Monday, saying she had learned from the errors made during her stunning loss to Republican Scott Brown in a special election for the U.S. Senate.

With every passing day, Elizabeth Warren’s campaign looks more and more like the Martha Coakley campaign. The Weekly Standard reports (via Instapundit h/t Linda in Tennessee), a Warren campaign staffer physically assaulted a cameraman following Warren (language warning): An aide to Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat, appears to have knocked the video camera of a Republican tracker after an event this weekend in Martha’s Vineyard. Watch the video below:

Attorney General Martha Coakley is seeking $4 million penalty from the Western Massachusetts Electric Company, saying the utility failed to adequately communicate with residents and municipal officials or secure proper staffing levels during the October 2011 snow storm. In a press release, Coakley is recommending that the state Department of Public Utilities issue the $4 million penalty. In a legal brief filed Tuesday, Coakley said that the electric company failed to meet three separate standards of its plan for responding to storms. “The October 2011 snow storm left thousands of Western Massachusetts customers without power for as many as 12...

In the wake of complaints about slow responses by utilities to the freak October snowstorm, the Massachusetts Senate Thursday unanimously approved a bill that requires utilities to provide customers without power twice-daily estimates of when electricity would be restored. The bill also mandates that utilities pay a new assessment to help finance costs of a state investigation into utility performance during a storm. The bill also seeks to hold utilities accountable by assuring that all state-imposed penalties on utilities for violations of their storm response plans are distributed to affected customers via a credit. The credit would be based upon...

Although frustrated after going days without power, speakers at a public hearing arranged by the state Department of Public Utilities had mostly words of praise for Western Massachusetts Electric Company. ... Greenfield joined a chorus of voices questioning the power companies, particularly Western Massachusetts electric companies, for their handling of the crisis. An estimated 2 million customers, including 672,000 in Massachusetts, lost power for some period of time following the storm. Some were without heat and electricity for more than a week. ... "The attorney general's office wants answers as to why WMECO's restoration effort took as long as if...

The biggest danger facing Cambridge elitist Elizabeth Warren, the Democrats' celebrity candidate for the U.S. Senate, is that she is turning into Martha Coakley. Two years ago, Coakley, the attorney general, was the odds-on favorite to run away with the U.S. Senate seat made vacant by the death of Ted Kennedy. She rolled up an impressive victory in the four-way Democratic primary, and it seemed her only problem was picking out her office furniture after she, as expected, squashed Republican Scott Brown, the unknown state senator from Wayland. Coakley's supporters -- President Barack Obama, Gov. Deval Patrick, U.S. Sen. John...

If any Massachusetts Freepers want to see Martha Coakley defeated twice in one year and put a true Conservative as Attorney General In Massachusetts please make a donation to Jim McKenna's campaign. He got on the November ballot via write in once he found out the Republicans weren't running a candidate, something that has never been done in Massachusetts history. He needs our help though raising money for the campaing, so if you're able to donate please do so, the address is: http://jimforag.com/moneybomb.htm This is our chance to put Coakley in the unemployment line.