Free Republic

How would you feel about Congress snatching away your credit card or preventing you from participating in credit card reward programs? Don't laugh. Left-wing groups in Washington are declaring that the plastic card in your wallet is the financial villain that needs to get reined in. A new study from researchers at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston finds that credit card reward programs are unfair because they create "an implicit money transfer" to wealthy cardholders from lower-income people who buy things with cash or debit cards. The study infers that consumers who pay with plastic and rack up reward...

The Democrats’ $1.75 trillion tax and spending bill is filled with special interest giveaways to trial lawyers, union bosses, wealthy blue-state taxpayers and even reporters. Aside from being a blatant giveaway to favored political interests, this is an effort for the Left to utilize the tax code for social engineering and to push woke policies. Here are six ways Democrats are using the tax code to reward special interests: 1. Giveaways to the News MediaThe bill provides a $1.6 billion tax giveaway to media companies of all sizes. In addition to the conflict of interest created by politicians giving reporters...

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is frog-marching her vulnerable members to a political suicide vote on a bill that’s likely dead on arrival in the Senate.On November 2, five House Democrats—enough to block the passage of the spending spree that the party hopes to enact via the budget reconciliation process—wrote to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, urging her “to only bring a bill to the floor for which we have a strong level of confidence…will be ruled in order by the Senate parliamentarian and earn passage in the U.S. Senate.”The lawmakers have justifiable reason for concern. Major pieces of the 2,135-page...

Tucked within the Democrats $3.5 trillion tax-and-spend plan is the largest expansion of the Internal Revenue Service in history. If the Left prevails, the agency will hire 87,000 new agents, more than double its current workforce, and receive $80 billion in new funding to audit and harass taxpayers including American families and small businesses. The left claims that additional IRS funding would help close the so-called “tax gap” by making wealthy people pay the taxes they allegedly don’t pay. In reality, the wealthy and large corporations already have armies of lawyers and accountants that ensure they legally take advantage of...

While all eyes are on Afghanistan, Congress is getting ready to shatter spending records with massive new spending plans. Hold on to your wallet! This fall, Congress has to tackle a debt limit hike, appropriations, the Democrat reconciliation measure and a so-called “infrastructure bill.” Congress is broken and maybe it is time for Republicans to block a debt limit hike like conservative Republicans attempted in the 2011 debt limit fight. That fight resulted in a provision in law, the Sequester, that was scheduled to trigger mandatory spending cuts if Congress did not abide by certain spending targets. One way Democrats...

There are some Members of Congress you see and think, “I get it, I can see how that person got elected.” Either they’re charismatic, smart, attractive, have that “it” factor, or some combination of those traits and you get it. Then there are some who have you thinking they made some kind of deal with the devil to get there – personality-less, weird, creepy, almost soulless people who’d say or do anything if it helped them, even a little. California Congressman Adam Schiff is the perfect example of that. He hasn’t been in the news much, which should tell you...

House Republican leadership removed Rep. Liz Cheney, (R-Wyo.), from her leadership position, a position her indignant liberal defenders likely did not even know existed until days ago. Cheney became Republican roadkill when she not only voted to impeach then-President Donald Trump but also became a vocal critic of his alleged "big lie" about the 2020 election. Cue the fake outrage by Democrats and the media. A CNN headline read in part: "Ousted Cheney Warns Direction of the Party is 'Dangerous.'" MSNBC wrote, "The GOP infighting reached a turning point after Republicans ousted Congresswoman Liz Cheney from her leadership position." PBS...

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's place at the head of the mob intent on correcting the wrongs of past generations has been endangered. She has been waving the bloody shirt about past generations' complicity in racism, and now her role at the head of the mob is in question. It has been discovered that her father was mayor of Baltimore in the 1940s and 1950s, and now the woke brethren want her to denounce him. Baltimore in the 1940s and 1950s was deeply racist, Maryland being a border state during the Civil War. In fact, the train bearing President Abraham Lincoln...

Here are just some of the unconstitutional, absurd, nakedly partisan, and crime-indulging provisions in this bill that 220 House Democrats voted for.On Wednesday, House Democrats passed an 800-page bill that would mandate insecure voting processes and subject voting tallies to partisan manipulation. It’s a slap in the face to the half of Americans, including many Democrats, who believe the 2020 election was riddled with fraud and errors, largely due to the rapid expansion of mail-in balloting and other suspensions of state election laws.“It is difficult to imagine a legislative proposal more threatening to election integrity and voter confidence,” write 20...

“He who pays the piper calls the tune.” It’s a hard, fast rule in the world of politics, which is precisely why we must always be vigilant against the corrupting influence of private money in our public electoral process.There was a great deal of consternation expressed throughout 2020 about funding nationwide elections in the midst of a deadly pandemic. Fortunately, our public institutions were up to the test. Unfortunately, we also experienced the reality of large-scale private election funding for the first time — and in the process discovered the reason we had never allowed it before.Wealthy individuals and corporations,...

"With great power comes even greater responsibility." Though this maxim most-likely was born in French politics of the 18th century, it very much applies to our elected officials in the 21st century. But, far from just a hopeful, high-minded missive, in our system of government there are actually built-in laws and rules that require this “greater responsibility“ from our political leaders--our ethics laws. Though not nearly as high-profile as votes, floor speeches, and TV interviews, Members must be aware they are now governed by a set of rules designed to ensure integrity and transparency and it's critical they follow them....

America is on edge this week. The harrowing scenes of our nation’s Capitol being attacked by rioters was an emotional and jarring experience for the American people. What we need right now is to come together, as we have been able to do during turbulent times in the past, as Americans, united in our commitment to the Constitution, and seeking national healing. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, however, misreads the situation. She is less interested in a moment of national healing than she is in scoring political points by satisfying her party’s far-left base with a new call for a second...

In case you haven’t heard, House Democrats want to remove all gendered language from their legislation, while the prayer to open the 117th Congress ended with, “Amen and awomen.” I kid you not. Who would make up something so insane?Let’s start with the PC prayer, which has to be seen to be believed. It is addressed to the monotheistic God, who has many faces and names, thereby offending only atheists and polytheists. And it concludes with, “Amen and awomen,” as if the “men” of “Amen” was somehow a gendered term. How patriarchal and bigoted to use the “men” word in...

It’s not very often in politics that you experience the thrill of principled vindication, but apparently as an ex-congressman, it can still be had. Six years ago, I shocked the Washington establishment by running against “Chamber of Commerce Republicans.” It was tough to convince many well-meaning conservatives in Washington and in my own district of what I meant. They were too used to the Reagan era, when the Chamber was a rock-solid champion of American business and the free enterprise system it needs to flourish. It was difficult for some conservatives to stomach just how far the Chamber and the...

The House Appropriations Committee recently released the draft Fiscal Year 2021 Homeland Security funding bill, which provides annual funding for the components of the Department of Homeland Security. It should come to no one’s surprise that the bill is being used as a political football by those who seek a borderless America and all the human misery that would come with it.  The Democratic leadership in the House are changing their tactics. Instead of trying to abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol, they have decided to starve them of money so they cannot succeed in their mission....

Since the Minutemen of Lexington and Concord rallied to the cause of liberty in 1775, the American military has held a unique place of respect and affection in our national ethos. Yet in the Coronavirus relief package recently passed by Congress, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her fellow Democrats tried to include language making it easier to commit voter fraud with the ballots of our military stationed overseas. House Democrat’s proposed additions to the Families First Coronavirus Response Act included changes to election law that would provide cover for individuals and activists yearning for federal protection for voting fraud schemes that...

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's attempted partisan sabotage of the coronavirus relief bill might mark a new low for her. That the bill finally passed the Senate doesn't excuse her reckless gamesmanship. Republican and Democratic Senate leaders were close to an agreement when Pelosi parked her partisan broomstick and poured poison into the congressional punchbowl. "Talking to some Senate GOP sources," Townhall political editor Guy Benson tweeted. "They seem stunned and angry. I'm told there was lots of bipartisan input into the legislative outline & emerging specifics -- including an agreement in principle on broad strokes. Then Pelosi showed up and...

The House speaker not only wants to use the coronavirus pandemic to entrench Obamacare, she wants to make taxpayers fund abortion in the process In the words of her former House colleague Rahm Emanuel, Nancy Pelosi never wants to let a crisis go to waste. The House speaker not only wants to use the coronavirus pandemic to entrench Obamacare, she wants to make taxpayers fund abortion in the process.A recent summary of the legislation Pelosi plans to introduce as an alternative to Senate Republicans’ “stimulus” bill laid out the strategy. House Democrats want to force insurers to reopen enrollment in...

While Congress fiddles and the U.S. economy is left to burn, the citizens are the ones being asked to bear the full weight of this crisis. Now is not the time for business as usual, it is time for a post-pandemic reality. The old ways of red tape and kick-backs to favored groups and special interests must end now. A crisis of liquidity for individuals, small businesses, and Fortune 500 companies will soon send our economy into even further decline unless the federal government acts quickly and decisively. On Thursday, the Washington Times published my proposal for a Temporary Income...

The liberal media may have temporarily won the battle to trash the stock market with this Wuhan coronavirus outbreak, but the Trump administration’s proactive response to this disease is winning the larger public relations battle. Polls now show a majority of Americans now approve of how the president is handling the crisis. The anti-Trump media cannot fight a two-front war. They’re not smart enough. So, either way—Trump has won—again. And if this outbreak is contained—and God-willing that occurs soon—the economy should recover. The media has done well in stirring up apocalyptic-laced reports about this disease, which while highly contagious, has...