Free Republic

President Joe Biden’s proposed infrastructure legislation has the political class seemingly locked in a debate about what “infrastructure” means. Biden and Democratic leaders—backed by a majority of the U.S. population—believe that “infrastructure” is more than just roads and bridges and encompasses all the structures that help modern society function. Their new bill reflects that understanding, including improvements to water pipes and the electrical grid, universal broadband access, charging stations for electric vehicles, physical upgrades to schools and universities, and—perhaps most innovatively—home care for the elderly and disabled, support for families with children, and expanded access to health care. Republican elected...

Sen. Chuck Grassley has moved to halt consideration on two Trump administration nominees until the White House offers more information about why it fired two inspectors general. The hold from Grassley will indefinitely block confirmation of Christopher Miller as National Counterterrorism Center director and Marshall Billingslea as undersecretary of state for arms control and international security. “Congress has made it clear that should the president find reason to fire an inspector general, there ought to be a good reason for it,” said the Iowa Republican, who added that it was important Americans not “be left speculating whether political or self-interests...

The president’s critics thought his presidency was illegitimate to begin with. His Cabinet members changed frequently. Mainly based on policy disagreements, members of Congress demanded his ouster. Some lawmakers were willing to toss out constitutional norms based on what they said was the president’s “ignorance of the interest and true policy of this Government, and want of qualification for the discharge of the important duties” of his office. But we’re talking 1843, not 2019. In the midst of House Democrats’ impeachment inquiry targeting President Donald Trump, many pundits make comparisons to the impeachments of Presidents Andrew Johnson in 1868 and...

Conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh didn't mince words while addressing multiple issues Tuesday on "The Story with Martha MacCallum" but his strongest hits were aimed at Republicans who had yet to fully jump on the President Trump bandwagon. "Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson, we are not in politics. We are media titans, but we are not in politics. It is the party of Donald Trump right now, and the Republicans that don't realize that had better get on board," Limbaugh said, reacting to a New York Times op-ed by Joe Lockhart, a press secretary to then-President Bill...

Have the Democrats turned working class middle America against them just like the Whig Party? I know many Trump supporters who are quietly going about their day-to-day business, working 40 - 50 hours a week, paying bills and trying to keep afloat and move their lives forward. However, they are keenly aware of what is happening on the left. The violent (paid) protest, the stupid pussy hats, the suppression of free speech, and the all around anarchy that has happened in places like Berkeley, CA has not gone unnoticed. These Trump voters would like nothing better than to send the...

I've only recently become a Trump supporter. I was leaning toward Cruz, but couldn't go with him when he decided to collude with the GOPe, fully knowing (I have to imagine) that there wasn't a snowball's chance in Hell they would pick him in a contested convention. It's obvious that the GOP has decided to self destruct. Their disregard for conservatives and their complete disdain for the middle and working class has turned my stomach. I've turned in my membership. I'm finished for good with the Republican Party. I've decided to go Independant from this point forward, and I've gotten...

Aaron Burr, Patriot and Vice President On February 6, 1756, a boy was born into privilege in Newark, New Jersey. Young Aaron Burr, Jr. was son of the president of the College of New Jersey, and grandson of Jonathan Edwards, the Calvinist theologian regarded as a leader of the evangelical movement of the 18th century, an equal to the great preacher George Whitfield. Privilege then wasn’t quite what privilege is today, of course; there were no Rolls-Royces to drive, no Waldorf Astorias to stay in during constant vacations, no jet-setting to Monte Carlo, no celebrity photographers and magazines to put...

Texans cherish the memory of Davy Crockett's heroic death at the Alamo in 1836 but few know what led him there or why he fought so valiantly. Throughout his life, Davy Crockett was renowned for his love of liberty and fierce loyalty to the Constitution. Originally a Democrat, Crockett found he could no longer identify with the party's positions which he believed were straying from our country's founding principles. As a man who believed in individual liberty and the principle of congressional restraint this shift was unacceptable to him. He left the party in 1833 and joined the Whig party...

Every once in a while a scholar will write an absolutely pathbreaking article . . . then disappear. No books. No other articles. Sometimes they fail to get tenure, sometimes it's a health problem, sometimes they change research direction. One of the most fascinating people I have come across is a historian named Lynn Marshall, who in 1967 wrote what I thought was one of the most profound articles ever---in the prestigious American Historical Review. He briefly taught at my school, the U. of California, Santa Barbara and word was (unverified) that he failed to get tenure. Marshall produced no...

Dear Jim: When the House Freedom Caucus formed in January, I fervently hoped that it would provide responsible and effective leadership to advance conservative principles in the House of Representatives. I know that every member of the HFC sincerely supports these principles, but as I have expressed on many occasions during our meetings, I believe the tactics the HFC has employed have repeatedly undermined the House’s ability to advance them. Allow me to review a few examples. On February 27th, we faced the imminent shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security over the funding of Obama’s unlawful amnesty orders for...

This has been a tough few weeks for Republicans. Donald Trump is emerging as a far more complex threat to the party’s future than it first appeared. It remains nearly impossible for him to win the nomination and he probably lacks the attention span for an independent run, but that’s cold comfort. Viability as a candidate is not what makes him dangerous. By loudly embracing the party’s nastiest impulses, Trump threatens to topple a domino that could force the GOP into an open split and a full rebranding. Though rare, there is a precedent for this phenomenon in the Republican...

Conservative activist and best-selling author David Horowitz tells Newsmax that the Democratic Party has been “seized by a religious cult” of leftists and will go the way of the 19th-century Whig Party — disappearing from the political scene. He also declares that giving terrorist suspects the rights of American citizens and trying them in civilian courts is “a form of national suicide” and says the tea party movement is a “huge development” that will keep Republicans true to conservative principles. [Snip] Asked about the political problems the Democrats face in the wake of their poor showing in the midterm elections,...

In 1856, the Whig Party ran former president Millard Fillmore for president of the United States. Fillmore had last run in 1852; he'd been denied the nomination as the party fell apart over the issue of slavery. In an attempt to bring the party back together that year, the party nominated General Winfield Scott, who promptly imploded in the general election against Democrat Franklin Pierce. "We are slain!" shouted Representative Lewis D. Campbell of Ohio. "The party is dead, dead, dead!" Free Soiler Charles Sumner wrote, "Now is the time for a new organization. Out of this chaos the party...

It’s generally agreed that Thad Cochran squeaked out a win in Mississippi last night in part by getting Democrats, especially African Americans, to turn out. Here’s a flier that was distributed in heavily black precincts suggesting how he accomplished this:

PLATFORM OF THE INDEPENDENCE PARTY, ADOPTED AT CHICAGO, ILL., JULY 28, 1908.We, Independent America citizens, representing the Independence party in forty-four States and two Territories, have met in national convention to nominate, absolutely Independent of all other political parties, candidates for President and Vice-President of the United States Our action is based upon a determination to wrest the conduct of public affairs from the hands of selfish interests, political tricksters and corrupt bosses, and make the Government as the founders intended, an agency for the common good. At a period of unexampled national prosperity and promise, a staggering blow was...

Recently, Peter King, the court jester of the House of Representatives, had this to say to PMSNBC's Andrea Mitchell about Tea Party heroes Rand Paul and Ted Cruz: *** "I'm really more concerned about why more Republicans around the country didn't join me in denouncing Ted Cruz. We now have people on the sidelines coming forward who we have to take a stand here. We cannot allow our party to be taken over by the likes of Ted Cruz and Rand Paul. I mean, these are people, isolationists, I consider them RINOs, because they don't represent traditional Republican principles. Ted...

...First, and most important, is focusing on the economic concerns of working-and middle-class Americans, many of whom now regard the Republican Party as beholden to “millionaires and billionaires” and as wholly out of touch with ordinary Americans. This is a durable impression—witness Bill Clinton’s effective deployment of it more than 20 years ago and its continued resonance during the 2012 campaign when Team Obama portrayed Mitt Romney as a plutocrat who delighted in shutting down factories and moving jobs overseas. Sure enough, in November exit polls, 81 percent of voters said that Barack Obama “cared for people like me”; a...

What drama: Bachmann, Garrett, Blackburn wait till LAST MIN to cast vote for Boehner, bring the vote from 17 defections down at final second— Robert Costa (@robertcostaNRO) January 3, 2013

Are You Going To Remain A Republican in light of today's gutless actions by both the Senate and House? This was the last straw for me; I'm done! I will be switching my party affiliation tomorrow.

Is this really the reason why markets are rallying today? (or is it front-running the potential 'cone of silence' from a long-weekend in DC) We suspect neither, but Mike Krieger, having written extensively on the two-party political sham, notes the issue is that both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party are at their core the same on the big issues most affect these United States at this time. This past election should have been a wakeup call to the Republican establishment, but based on John Boehner’s recent actions, they have learned absolutely nothing. The Republican Party is imploding from...