Free Republic

With elections on and Joe Biden hovering at around a 40% public approval rating, everyone can see that Joe Biden's starting to get desperate over his polls. Vying for issue number one among voters is an out-of-control open border with illegal immigration now hitting record highs as hundreds of thousands pour in. Cities are going bankrupt with the onslaught. Border Patrol agents are shutting down legitimate trade to "process" migrants. Hospitals are flooded with diseased and injured migrants, and schools are overwhelmed with indigent pupils speaking more than a hundred languages. Instead of change his policies to match what's written...

President Biden apologized to some prominent Muslim-American leaders for publicly questioning the Palestinian death toll being reported by the Hamas-controlled Gaza Ministry of Health, a new report says. Biden huddled with five Muslim American leaders the day after his Oct. 25 comments about reported Gaza deaths roiled the Islamic community, vowing to “do better.” During the meeting, which was initially planned for 30 minutes but lasted more than twice as long, Biden heard the leaders describe individuals they knew who were personally affected by the conflict. “I’m sorry. I’m disappointed in myself,” Biden told the group, the Washington Post reported.

.....Speaking to CNBC’s Hadley Gamble on Friday, Prince Turki Al-Faisal said Biden was coming in as a “much diminished president” compared with when he was inaugurated in January 2021.“As an example, on energy issues, he came in with a policy to stop completely fossil fuel usage not only in the United States, but worldwide, and now he is finding himself having to rely on fossil fuels as a means of meeting the energy shortage that has come about, not only because of the Ukraine war, but also because of U.S. policy itself that shut down pipelines and stopped issuing ......

Russia’s ambassador to Israel said in an interview Monday his country cannot force Iranian forces to withdraw from Syria, despite Israeli calls for Iran to withdraw from the country. Speaking with Channel 10 news, Anatoly Viktorov said the Iranians are “playing a very, very important role in our common and joint efforts to eliminate terrorists in Syria. Viktorov said Russia can talk to its “Iranian friends” about a full withdrawal from Syria, as Israel demands, but “we cannot force them.” “The Iranian presence in Syria… is fully legitimate according to the UN principles and the UN charter,” he added. He...

The Trump administration is readying for a crackdown on marijuana users under Attorney General Jeff Sessions. President Trump’s Task Force on Crime Reduction and Public Safety, led by Sessions, is expected to release a report next week that criminal justice reform advocates fear will link marijuana to violent crime and recommend tougher sentences for those caught growing, selling and smoking the plant. Sessions sent a memo in April updating the U.S. Attorney’s Offices and Department of Justice Department (DOJ) component heads on the work of the task force, which he said would be accomplished through various subcommittees. In the memo,...

Last month I gave the keynote address at the Cannabis World Congress Business Expo in New York City. CWCBExpo is the trade show for the cannabis industry. I had the pleasure of meeting thousands of like-minded cannabis activists, and the experience was truly refreshing and inspiring on many levels. I learned firsthand that those in the legal cannabis industry — whether they're growing hemp, medical marijuana or recreational marijuana in Colorado or California or Oregon or wherever — have formed a united front. Everyone at the convention was looking to work together to come up with solutions on how to...

Bill O’Reilly apologized on Tuesday after he sparked backlash for calling Maxine Waters’ hair a “James Brown wig.” “As I have said many times, I respect Congresswoman Maxine Waters for being sincere in her beliefs,” O’Reilly said. “I said that again today on Fox & Friends calling her ‘old school.’ Unfortunately, I also made a jest about her hair which was dumb. I apologize.”

North Carolina Rep. Walter Jones on Tuesday became the first congressional Republican to call for fellow party member Rep. Devin Nunes to step aside from leading the House Intelligence Committee’s probe into alleged ties between Russia and Donald Trump’s successful presidential campaign.

Jeb Bush, trailing badly in polls here and itching to get to New Hampshire, used his farewell Iowa campaign event to ask caucus-goers to do what he couldn't: Stop Donald Trump. "You have a chance to define the next stage of this race," Bush told a ballroom full of supporters in an Embassy Suites hotel on Monday afternoon. "I'm counting on you and I trust you." The former Florida governor has essentially conceded Iowa, where polls show him in the low single digits. Bush will not be holding a caucus night party, instead leaving the state this afternoon for New...

I have all the respect in the world for Ben Carson. For only the second time in American politics, we would have a president who made his name outside of politics prior to his election if he won. (The first, for trivia fans, is Herbert Hoover as an engineer). He is humble, virtuous, honest, reliable, committed. But there is no way on Earth that he could defeat Hillary Clinton or even stand up to her in a debate. Hillary would have him for lunch. Carson combines the limited knowledge of government and budgeting of Sarah Palin with the soft voice...

As Russia devours Ukraine, President Obama’s decision to stall missile defenses for Poland looks more and more reckless. Let’s go back to 2009, in the heady days when President Obama was sworn in and his advisers were eager to hit “the reset button” with Russia. The “reset button” was self-congratulation masquerading as a bold new idea. Just because the occupants of the White House had changed, didn’t mean Russia’s long-term interests had. The “reset button” mentality assumed that personalities, not interests, drive nations. Still, Vladimir Putin was shrewd enough to spot a naïf at the poker table and upped the...

John Boehner's first order of business in his second term as speaker is no more one-on-one meetings with President Obama. An aide to the speaker, who won re-election to the leadership post Thursday afternoon, confirmed to Fox News that Boehner is done with closed-door talks with the president. Boehner and Obama over the past two years have made two unsuccessful attempts at striking a "grand bargain" deficit-reduction deal. The last set of talks, in the context of crafting a bill to avert the fiscal crisis, ended with Boehner exiting the negotiations and pushing a failed "Plan B" and then being...

SEMINOLE, Fla. - As a pawn shop owner, Frank James was always a big believer in gun rights and the second amendment. After all, it was his bread and butter business. But after what he saw in Newtown, Connecticut on Friday, he's had a change of heart. "I basically broke into tears and looked up on the wall, seeing the types of firearms I am selling," James said. At the Loan Star Pawn store in Seminole, a glass display case that once housed several Bushmaster AR-15 assault rifles is now empty. The glass counters normally filled with handguns has been...

video at link Obama on credit downgrade from Standard & Poor's: "It happened because Washington does not have the capacity to come together and get things done. It was a self-inflicted wound. That is why people are frustrated. Maybe you can hear it in my voice. That is why I am frustrated. Because you deserve better."

Leadership: If the president meant to calm the markets on Monday, he failed utterly — and no wonder. All he did was make it clear he's completely out of ideas on how to get the economy moving again. After his televised remarks, the Dow industrial average continued to fall, finishing 5.5% lower. The Nasdaq plummeted 6.9%. Why should it have been any different? In his brief statement, the only thing President Obama demonstrated was a cluelessness about the country's current mess — of which the debt downgrade is just the latest example — and an even weaker grasp on how...

The fourth consecutive day of debt meetings between President Barack Obama and congressional leaders from both parties ceased abruptly with Obama walking out of Wednesday's talks, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) said. Cantor told FOX News Channel that the approximately two-hour meeting at the White House Wednesday "ended with president abruptly walking out of the meeting." He said Obama shoved back from the desk and said "we'll see you tomorrow." "We are very far apart right now," Cantor told FOX, adding, "The progress we made seems to have been erased now." "He [Obama] became very agitated. Said 'Ronald Reagan...

After two years of being called a tyrant and a dictator, President Obama returns to Washington from a five-day overseas trip to find that he has become a weakling. Would-be opponents such as Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty and Sarah Palin had been trying out this somewhat contradictory line of attack for more than a month, as Obama gave mixed signals about events in Egypt and Libya. But the “weak leader” charge gained traction over the weekend, as Obama chose to launch the attack on Gaddafi’s forces while on an excellent adventure in South America with his family. At about the...

The U.S. is facing a "Sputnik moment" in which it must embrace investments in research and education, President Obama will say at his State of the Union address Tuesday night. Obama, in excerpts of his speech released Tuesday evening, hearkened back to the Sputnik era, when the Russian satellite's 1957 launch set off the "space race" and a decade of intense technological development. "Half a century ago, when the Soviets beat us into space with the launch of a satellite called Sputnik, we had no idea how we’d beat them to the moon. The science wasn’t there yet. NASA didn’t...

The first family, along with an entourage of 3000, head for India on Friday. The traveler-in-chief leaves the United States with no statement on the bloodbath that took place this past week in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, roughly two miles from El Paso and 5 minutes by car from the center of the Texas city. Last May, Mexican President Felipe Calderon, visited Mr. Obama at the White House. The two stood united against Arizona’s audacious attempt to protect its borders and save American lives. The Department Of Justice led by Eric Holder sued the state in July claiming...

Yesterday, Obama attempted to be hip and cool and tried to show some emotional investment in the BP oil crisis that is rapidly becoming Obama’s Katrina by showing BP that he meant business: I was down there a month ago, before most of these talkin’ heads were even paying attention to the gulf. A month ago I was meeting with fishermen down there, standin’ in the rain talking about what a potential crisis this could be. and I don’t sit around just talking to experts because this is a college seminar, we talk to these folks because they potentially have...