Free Republic

A year and a half after the abrupt end of Wisconsin's high-speed rail plan, the federal government has reimbursed the state for the money spent on the project. That $14.6 million payment could be the last official action in the aborted effort to link Milwaukee and Madison by passenger rail. But Minnesota officials are trying to keep high-speed rail hopes alive, while Wisconsin officials are wrestling with issues surrounding new trains and other upgrades for Amtrak's Milwaukee-to-Chicago Hiawatha line. Starting with former Republican Gov. Tommy G. Thompson in the late 1990s, state officials had pushed to extend the Hiawatha to...

Barack Obama's re-election campaign hired Carrie Doyle, a high powered lobbyist for Colorado's most outspoken anti-drilling environmental organization, to run his campaign in the nation's key electoral battleground: Colorado. ... Among the green groups that Doyle lobbied for -- Colorado Conservation Voters, the Colorado chapter of the League of Conservation Voters. That would be the same League of Conservation Voters who most recently won national stardom for pressuring the Obama Administration to reject the Keystone Pipeline. Wondering whether Obama was going to move to the middle to shore up Colorado's notoriously independent voters? Wondering whether Obama's rejection of the Keystone...

Geraldine Doyle, Iconic Face of World War II, Dies at 86By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS Published: December 29, 2010 Geraldine Hoff Doyle, who was believed to be the unwitting model for the “We Can Do It!” poster of a woman flexing her biceps in a factory during World War II — an image that later became a symbol for the American feminist movement — died on Sunday in Lansing, Mich. She was 86. **SNIP** Mrs. Doyle was unaware of the poster’s existence until 1982, when, while thumbing through a magazine, she saw a photograph of it and recognized herself. Her daughter said...

Dec. 21, 2010 |(185) Comments Madison — Outgoing Gov. Jim Doyle quietly attended a United Nations climate change conference in Cancun earlier this month, an aide confirmed. The Democratic governor, who leaves office Jan. 3, and his chief of staff, Susan Goodwin, had their travel expenses to Mexico paid by an international group, the Governors' Climate and Forests Taskforce, said Doyle spokesman Adam Collins. But state taxpayers paid the undisclosed travel expenses of the governor's policy adviser and two security staff, who accompanied him on the trip. The governor's office did not put out any statement or news release about...

Me and four other conservative students attended a speech given by Hatem Abudayyehn, a member of the Palestinian Solidarity Group. Hatem has been accused of funneling money to terrorist groups in Palestine. The UWM Students for a Democratic Society sponsored the speech. We were kicked out almost immediately after one of our group decided to film Hatem's speech. We were going to ask a question about his feelings about Israel and the Holocaust, but we were unable. Yes, the SDS did call the cops, and we were removed by them. A member of the Palestinian Solidarity Movement gave an intro,...

UW-Madison athletics officials have created a unique way to use the UW Badgers' home football season to reduce carbon emissions. According to Justin Doherty, UW-Madison assistant athletic director, the effort to create a "carbon-neutral" football season involves offsetting the amount of carbon that is expended during home football games because of practices like fans traveling to and from the game and the use of electricity. He said along with the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, UW-Madison calculated the amount of carbon emitted at home football games and will pay for carbon "credits" as a part of the Chicago Climate...

Click on the link below to hear one of the funniest things I have EVER heard on Radio. Jerry Doyle can be heard Mon thru Friday Live from KDWN, Las Vegas, 3 to 6 pm EST.

Neumann Delivers Health Care Petitions to Governor's OfficeUpdated: May 24, 2010 6:23 PM EDT Wisconsin gubernatorial candidate Mark Neumann spent Monday at the governor's office. Neumann dropped off thousands of signatures from people urging Governor Doyle to let Wisconsin join a lawsuit challenging the recent federal health care reform law. "We've heard from many people that are very concerned about the increased taxes, higher cost, the government takeover of another portion of our society," Neumann, who's a former Congressman, said. Neumann will face Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker in a September primary, with the winner likely challenging Democrat Tom Barrett,...

<p>MADISON, Wis. -- Wisconsin elections officials are quashing a movement by citizen activists that encouraged voters to voluntarily show photo identifications at polling places.The Government Accountability Board voted on Monday to outlaw the practice, which its staff said could confuse, intimidate and offend voters who object to the requirement.The "We're Watching Wisconsin Elections" campaign urged citizens to tell their municipal clerks to list them in the statewide voter database as needing to show a photo ID to vote. Supporters argued the requirement would protect their vote by making sure others did not cast ballots under their identities.But board members said there was no law that authorized voluntary voter ID, and they couldn't order it.</p>

Just got this in my email box. Shapiro hosted for Doyle yesterday and was awesome: We'll have on Congressmen Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Thaddeus McCotter (R-MI), and we'll tackle the latest triumphalism from the Obama White House over the destruction of America's health care system. We'll also have exclusive tape on President Obama's new judicial nominee who many say will be sitting on the Supreme Court within the next year -- and yes, he's a radical socialist! You can listen live here.

An Assembly attempt to override Gov. Jim Doyle's veto of a bill that would strip the governor's power to appoint Department of Natural Resources secretaries failed by six votes Tuesday. The bill's chief Assembly sponsor, Rep. Spencer Black, D-Madison, criticized those who opposed the override, saying they were acting based on political convenience and pressure from special interest groups. "I've heard excuse after excuse," Black told lawmakers. Democrats have long sought to strip the governor's power to appoint DNR secretaries after Tommy Thompson made the position a Cabinet post in 1995. In November, the governor vetoed AB 138, which would...

Shapiro's in for Doyle today. Making the case that Obama is politically raping the American people with health care.

He’s a felon. He’s from South Carolina. He wants to run for political office. There’s been a lot of turmoil in South Carolina political circles over the past year. Brian Doyle is making sure it continues. The best thing about this felon (he was convicted in 2003 and served two years for conspiracy and document fraud), is his party affiliation. This guy is a Democrat.

Sherlock Holmes hails as the most portrayed movie character of all time with 75 actors providing their unique spin to Doyle’s legendary character in over 200 films. Having grown up reading some of the Holmesian “canon”, I always found Basil Rathbone’s, who always portrayed a great antagonist too, portrayal very “true” to the literary characterization of the great detective – as much as I longed for some sardonic wit. I have a friend across the pond who swears Jeremy Brett’s rendition of this classic figure in the 80s and 90s for British television was the most true- to-form. Yet, due...

Bellevue tax collector Joe Nolan, 53, plans to announce today he's challenging U.S. Rep. Mike Doyle, D-Forest Hills, in the 2010 general election. Nolan, a Republican, said he's "become more and more concerned about the path we've taken," specifically bank and insurance company bailouts, he said. He said he opposes the cap-and-trade legislation, which could come up for a final vote in Congress this year, as being too restrictive of energy production. Doyle beat Green Party candidate Titus North in the 2008 election 91.3 percent to 8.7 percent. He ran unopposed in the general election in 2006, in an overwhelmingly...

FOND DU LAC, Wis. – Union workers at Mercury Marine put their jobs at risk Sunday when they rejected a package of wage and benefit concessions the boat engine maker said it needed or it would move their work to a nonunion plant in Oklahoma. Union leaders did not immediately release Sunday's tally but said the vote was "overwhelming" to reject what the company called its final offer. The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, Local 1947, represents 850 workers at Mercury Marine, the largest employer in the eastern Wisconsin city of Fond du Lac and the world's largest...

Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle, whose approval ratings have plunged as he struggled with a weak economy and a multibillion-dollar budget deficit, will not seek a third term in 2010, a person informed of the decision told The Associated Press. The person, who was not authorized to announce the decision, told The AP on Saturday that Doyle, a Democrat, would make the announcement public in a Monday news conference. The person also said Doyle would serve the rest of his second four-year term. [Snip] Meanwhile, it's been a rough year for Doyle. Faced with a record high $6.6 billion budget shortfall,...

Madison — Gov. Jim Doyle and his staff failed to properly account for 145 travel expenses over two years, including a $5,200 business-class flight to Ireland and a $654-a-night stay in a London hotel. Nearly three-fourths of the time in 2007 and 2008, Doyle and his staff didn't supply receipts as required under state travel policy. By comparison, Lt. Gov. Barbara Lawton and her staff didn't provide receipts one-third of the time during the same period. Travel records also showed Doyle spent more than $1,500 on two chauffeured vehicles in Canada. That expenditure did not violate state travel policy, however....

Can't post due to copyright, but the story is here.

The game is still afoot. Today is the 150th anniversary of the birth, on Picardy Street in Edinburgh, Scotland, of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes. Doyle died in 1930, but Holmes and Dr. Watson live on. Every day, some child's imagination vanishes into the foggy depths of Victorian England and accompanies Holmes in pursuit of mysteries and malefactors. Descend just once into that world with Holmes and the memory is marked for life. Some 200 movies have been made starring Sherlock Holmes - he is, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, the most frequently portrayed...