Free Republic

No one who has not participated in the rules-making process for the national Republican Party is likely to understand all provisions of the current rules, much less how those rules, whether as they now read or how they might be changed, would affect what happens at the 2016 Republican National Convention in Cleveland. Changed or not, The Rules of the Republican Party will have huge effects not expected or predicted by any of the national pundits who make their livings now commenting on the Republican presidential nomination contest. Some surprising aspects of these effects are already becoming better known. A...

The Michigan Parkinson Foundation organized a pair of walkathons in Northville and St. Clair Shores in spring 2015 to raise money to help people who have Parkinson’s disease. This came on the heels of a surprising announcement that former two-sport MSU star and Detroit Tiger legend Kirk Gibson was diagnosed with the disease. According to the Detroit Free Press, single events like these can raise about $100,000. Fundraisers can be fantastic opportunities for individuals to pool their charitable efforts for a common goal, but there was a problem: At the time, an outdated Michigan law made endurance events like walkathons...

Sorry Mitt Romney– On FOX News Sunday this morning Rush Limbaugh pointed out that even with a brokered convention the Republican nominees must have won a majority of delegates in at least 8 states.So far only one candidate qualifies with 12 state victories – Donald Trump.So even if the GOP establishment wants to nominate a Paul Ryan or Mitt Romney they couldn’t because they have not won majority of delegates in any state let alone 8 states. This convention rule – Number 40 – was adopted at the 2012 convention. Rush said the GOP would have to change the convention...

Donald Trump consulted with his campaign manager during the first commercial break at Thursday night's Republican debate, violating ground rules from Fox News stating that candidates would not be allowed to have contact with their campaigns, rival campaign sources told CNNMoney. While that exchange was the clearest violation of debate rules to date, the sources said, it followed a pattern: At multiple debates, Trump has consulted with his campaign manager Corey Lewandowski backstage even though it was expressly forbidden by the networks. Thursday night's debate in Detroit marked a new extreme, however, as Lewandowski went directly onto the stage to...

<p>Even as major Republican donors coalesced Wednesday around a last-ditch effort to halt Donald Trump's march toward the GOP presidential nomination, resignation was setting in among some onetime Trump critics.</p> <p>"It is too late," Republican media strategist Alex Castellanos, who had unsuccessfully urged top GOP contributors to back an anti-Trump campaign earlier in the cycle, wrote in an email. "There is a fantasy effort to stop Trump, like a fantasy campaign to stop yesterday but it exists only as the denial stage of grief."</p>

**SNIP** Most of the ad is standard campaign fare, and not particularly noteworthy, even though the endorsements from Sheen and Moore are several years old. Both were taken from Grayson's House campaign nearly six years ago. But at the 18-second mark, the ad gets really interesting. That is the point where Grayson - to promote his Senate bid - uses an MSNBC clip of him speaking during a congressional hearing - yet another violation of U.S. House rules. Grayson runs afoul of ethics rules on the use of official resources for campaign or political purposes, namely House Rule 11, Clause...

One alternative to dreading Michigan’s cold and snowy winters is finding ways to get out and enjoy them. That was what Kevin Willcome of Ottawa County had in mind when he, his parents and some friends went out snowmobiling one Sunday afternoon last February. What he did not expect was to run afoul of the law, much less find himself charged for allegedly committing a crime. Shortly after Willcome and his companions arrived at the empty public school lot where they decided to ride, an officer with the Department of Natural Resources pulled up in a truck and asked them...

...The party voters possess the formal power to decide, but there is a vast infrastructure of donors, strategists, and insiders — an elite establishment — whose job is to control informally the people's decision.

New Hamp­shire Sen­at­or Kelly Ayotte is at odds with GOP lead­er­ship and the vast ma­jor­ity of her Re­pub­lic­an col­leagues over cli­mate-change policy head­ing in­to the 2016 elec­tions. Ayotte, who is gird­ing for a dif­fi­cult reelec­tion fight, on Sunday be­came the first GOP sen­at­or to sup­port Pres­id­ent Obama’s sweep­ing reg­u­la­tion that man­dates car­bon-emis­sions cuts from the na­tion’s power plants.

After the last presidential nomination cycle, where Mitt Romney had to struggle a bit to get the nomination, GOP leaders decided to make it easier for one of their own to get the nomination. They figured that a GOP insider, bankrolled with big money from the Chamber of Commerce and other like-thinking crony capitalists who want illegal immigration and business opportunities with Iran, could, with proper funding, get 35% or 40% of the vote in Republican primaries. Therefore, GOP insiders thought that increasing the number of states who award delegates based on "winner take all" – where the largest vote-getter,...

Better late than never. Actress and singer Vanessa Williams returned to the Miss America stage Sunday night, three decades after she became the first black woman to win the crown but resigned following a nude photo scandal. ...the Miss America CEO apologized to Williams on stage Sunday at the Miss America 2016 pageant for the way the scandal was handled.

WASHINGTON — Stung by years of criticism that it has coddled Wall Street criminals, the Justice Department issued new policies on Wednesday that prioritize the prosecution of individual employees — not just their companies — and put pressure on corporations to turn over evidence against their executives. The new rules, issued in a memo to federal prosecutors nationwide, represent the first major policy announcement by Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch since she took office in April. The memo is a tacit acknowledgment of criticism that, despite securing record fines from major corporations, the Justice Department under President Barack Obama has...

The review process under the Corker law never began — by the law’s own terms. To undermine President Obama’s atrocious Iran deal despite the Republican-controlled Congress’s irresponsible Corker legislation, it will be necessary to follow, of all things, the Corker legislation. On Wednesday, Barbara Mikulski became the 34th Senate Democrat to announce support for the deal, which lends aid and comfort to a regime that continues to call for “Death to America.” Under the Corker Roadmap to Catastrophe, Mikulski’s assent ostensibly puts President Obama over the top. After all, the legislation sponsored by Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Bob Corker...

SHANGHAI—As social media helped topple regimes in the Middle East and northern Africa, a senior colonel in the People’s Liberation Army publicly warned that an Internet dominated by the U.S. threatened to overthrow China’s Communist Party. Ye Zheng and a Chinese researcher, writing in the state-run China Youth Daily, said the Internet represented a new form of global control, and the U.S. was a “shadow” present during some of those popular uprisings. Beijing had better pay attention. Four years after they sounded that alarm, China is paying a lot of attention. Its government is pushing to rewrite the rules of...

The Supreme Court ruled 5-4 against Environmental Protection Agency pollution rules for power plants Monday, in a blow to President Obama's environmental agenda. The EPA rules in question regulate hazardous air pollutants and mercury from coal- and oil-fired power plants, known as the MATS regulations. The regulations went into effect April 16. The utility industry argues that the rules cost them billions of dollars to comply and that EPA ignored the cost issue in putting the regulations into effect. Many of the companies have either made the investments or closed power plants to comply. If the investments necessary to upgrade...

The Obama administration on Monday ordered all insurers to provide IUDs, the contraceptive patch and other birth control free of out-of-pocket charge to all women, rewriting the rules after reports that some insurance carriers were refusing to cover all types of contraceptives. Insurers must cover at least one brand of contraception in each of 18 different methods outlined by the Food and Drug Administration, such as oral contraceptive pills, the emergency contraceptive morning-after pill and intrauterine devices. Insurers can in some cases still impose costs to prod women to use generics rather than brand-name drugs, under the new guidance —...

A taxpayer watchdog group is calling for an ethics investigation into meetings between Hillary Clinton's team and key Senate Democrats inside official Senate offices where political activities are barred. The Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust has asked the Senate Select Committee on Ethics to probe the "apparent breach of ethics rules" stemming from an April 21 Clinton strategy session in a room just off the Senate floor. The group said that the rules need to be reinforced because it appears that "ongoing" strategy sessions are planned between the Democratic frontrunner and Senate supporters. "The taxpayers expect and deserve that...

Gov. Snyder recently sent a letter to Michigan House Speaker Kevin Cotter and Senate Majority Leader Arlan Meekhof explaining some of the problems of occupational licensure. The governor summarizes some of the good work the Legislature has done, and outlines the principles he'll use in "determining whether to support any legislation providing for additional occupation regulation.” Below are these principles: There must be a substantial harm or danger to the public health, safety, or welfare as a result of unregulated practice, which will be abated through licensure. The practice of the occupation must require highly specialized education or training. The...

I was looking through some real old FReeper threads and found one that has been repeated a few times over the years but might be fun again to post on a Sunday evening.

Check out how many times the word "enforcement" comes up in the net FCC Net Neutrality Document. How many times does the word enforce come up? 200 or more times???