Free Republic

On FoxNews a little while ago, they showed a video clip of Warren Buffet speaking at what looked like a Hillary campaign fundraiser. I can't find the video on Fox's site, YouTube, or Google video, so it seems like it isn't up yet. From memory it went like this: Buffet: My idea is that you make a company so good that even an idiot can run it, because you know that one day an idiot will end up running it! (Audience laughter) Buffet: Kind of like this country, where even an idiot can run it, and is... (LOUD cackling from...

Support for a Bush candidacy is building far beyond Florida. At a gathering of prominent conservatives in Las Vegas last weekend — where presidential hopefuls kissed the ring of billionaire casino mogul Sheldon Adelson — Bush was among those who puckered up. And the donors liked what they saw. "GOP elite hoping to lure Jeb Bush," trumpeted the headline at the top of the Washington Post's Sunday-morning paper. Some see Bush as the party's best hope. Others see weaknesses ripe for exploitation. I think both sides are right. Right now, Florida's 43rd governor towers above most of the other Republicans...

<p>Former CIA head Mike Morrell is scheduled to testify at 10AM in a PUBLIC hearing before the House Intelligence Committee. C-span doesn't have it scheduled live, and FOXnews.com isn't showing that they'll carry it. If anyone finds a link, please post it.</p>

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal announced a plan to repeal and replace President Obama’s health-care law, an effort by the Republican to insert himself into the increasingly competitive early maneuvering for his party’s presidential nomination. Jindal, a former state and federal health official, said his plan is one of many policy proposals he will release in coming months, making clear that he wants to be seen as a policy-driven problem solver. In his 26-page plan, Jindal lays out a lengthy critique of the health law — which he refers to throughout as “Obamacare” — and reiterates his belief that it needs...

Anxious Senate Republicans are worried party leaders are focusing too much this election year on ObamaCare and not enough on jobs and the economy. The concern among GOP centrists comes as President Obama and congressional Democrats are crowing about a surge in late enrollments and claiming the political winds are shifting around the Affordable Care Act. A growing rift in the GOP was exposed when a group of Senate Republicans recently struck a bipartisan deal to extend unemployment benefits. Neither Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) nor Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) embraced the agreement. Sen. Dean Heller (R-Nev.), who spearheaded...

When Democratic National Committee operatives describe something as "undemocratic," they mean it's not good for the Democratic Party. "We believe that we should expand democracy -- that expanding democracy is good for the nation; it is good for our party," Democratic National Committee spokesman Mo Elleithee told reporters during a conference call in which he attacked "undemocratic" Republican voter ID laws and other state-level election laws.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid preemptively slammed the budget proposal Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) will release Tuesday, calling it a document written to pander to the Koch brothers and other billionaires. “It’s a blueprint for a modern… how would we say this? Koch-topia. Yes, that’s it,” Reid said. “Call it whatever you want. We might as well call it the Koch budget because that’s what they’re doing, protecting the Koch brothers.” Reid’s remarks mark the latest volley in Democrats’ mid-term election year strategy of attacking the Kochs repeatedly, hoping to fire up their liberal base and associate Republicans with the...

They have amassed huge college loan debts to pay for degrees made useless by his policies but young voters love the lies Barack Obama tells so they will continue to support him. They can’t move out of their parent’s basements or marry and eventually start a traditional family because Obama has crippled their efforts to live independent lives but they still love Obama’s lies. Telling themselves his policies will work is the only thing short of illegal drugs that eases their pain. The thought of ever affording a home of their own doesn’t even enter their dreams because of Obama’s...

Early national polling is supporting the prevailing view in Washington that Democrats are in trouble in the 2014 midterm elections. While Democrats are more popular than the GOP among the general public, the party faces a number of challenges in November. First, there's an enthusiasm gap. Typically, but not always, Republicans vote at higher rates than Democrats in congressional elections. And at this early stage, that seems likely to happen again, perhaps at an even greater rate than usual. One telling indicator came in December, when the Pew Research Center found that Republicans are much more optimistic about their party's...

Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner is offering his support to a PAC whose mission is to destroy the Tea Party and other conservatives within the Republican Party. Joining him in this effort are Eric Cantor and 26 other members of the GOP. These Republican leaders will attend a swanky $5,000 per person event at the Ritz Carlton at Amelia Island in Florida. The PAC in question is the Republican Main Street Partnership PAC founded by RINO Leader Steve LaTourette from Boehner’s state of Ohio. The PAC claims that it seeks party unity and has the following as its...

Parents across the country may hold the key to this year’s mid-term elections as they vent their anger over the implementation of a controversial education achievement measure called the Common Core State Standards Initiative. Forty-five states and the District of Columbia have adopted the initiative in a bid, they say, to improve education standards in Math and English, and give new life to what many view as a sagging education system. Indiana recently voted to back out of Common Core. But many parents see the initiative as a bid by the federal government to take over the education system. They...

March 29, 2014, 12:17 pm Clinton tells Dems: Deal with ObamaCare drama By Justin Sink President Bill Clinton says Democrats would be making a “terrible mistake” if they choose not to directly confront controversy over the Affordable Care Act ahead of the upcoming midterm elections. The former president pointed to his widely heralded speech at the 2012 Democratic National Convention as an example of how his party could turn a perceived problem into an advantage, in an interview with Real Clear Politics. “When the president asked me to speak for him in North Carolina, I said that I would do...

March 29, 2014 4:00 AM Which Side Are You On? If you don’t care whether Republicans win, care that Democrats lose. By Kevin D. Williamson For conservatives, the story of the Obama years has been the depressing spectacle of Republicans fighting a rearguard action covering their retreat from a Democratic agenda backed by superior numbers. Republicans began the Obama administration with effectively no leverage: Barack Obama in the White House, Nancy Pelosi in the speaker’s chair, and Harry Reid running the Senate. The outcome of that was the enactment of the Affordable Care Act, the worst domestic defeat for the...

Framing the potential Senate contest as the "The Clown vs. The Mama Grizzly," former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin endorsed Minnesota State Senator Julianne Ortman Thursday in her bid to get the GOP nomination and unseat Sen. Al Franken (D-MN). The primary is August 14. Palin slammed the former Saturday Night Live comedian's record in the Senate as a "joke" and, riffing off of Franken's Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot book, called Franken just a "Big Fat Liberal" who voted with Obama 100% of the time: Al Franken’s career has been a joke; we all know this. The biggest...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: There's a story here by Chris Cillizza in the Washington Post: "President Obama Got Elected on Competence. Now People are Starting to Wonder." You see, ladies and gentlemen, the Drive-Bys are beginning to get worried. The very low approval numbers, around 40 -- I don't know how it's that high, frankly. But the disapproval number is almost at 60%. Six out of 10 disapprove of the way Obama's doing the job. That is really bad. Really worrisome, because, remember, these people back in 2007 and 2008 promoted Barack Obama as the single greatest living human being to...

The Missouri state auditor’s post has been a launching pad for politicians with higher aspirations like Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill, former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft and former GOP Sen. Kit Bond. But this year, Democrats concede they won’t field a serious candidate against incumbent Republican Auditor Tom Schweich — sparking questions about the strength of the party’s bench in the red-trending swing state. Schweich may also be using his position to mount a bid for higher office in 2016, making Democrats’ historic failure to recruit an opponent for Schweich even more costly. “The reality is we believed we had...

A push by the casino billionaire Sheldon Adelson to outlaw online gambling has ignited a bitter civil war in the gambling industry, dividing one of Washington’s most powerful interest groups and posing a major test of the Republican megadonor’s political clout. Mr. Adelson’s effort officially kicked off on Wednesday, when lawmakers, including a senator, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who has accepted tens of thousands of dollars from the businessman and his family, introduced legislation originally drafted with Mr. Adelson’s lobbyist. The bill would close a three-year-old loophole in federal law, banning online gambling — a growing industry that Mr....

I met Dr. Greg Brannon four years ago and am excited at the prospect of him being our next U.S. senator in the great state of North Carolina. Dr. Brannon has delivered approximately nine thousand babies; read that again it’s not a typo. He is the most ardent pro-life candidate in our state. He has literally been a leader in many state pro-life organizations while running a busy OBGYN practices in Cary, North Carolina. Dr. Brannon has 7 children, including 3 he and his wife adopted from China. He was born to a single mother who was loved this country...

Several Democratic senators reportedly plan to introduce as soon as Thursday a set of principles and legislation aimed at fixing parts of ObamaCare amid concerns the law could cost Democrats House seats and possibly the Senate in November. Sens. Mark Warner, D-Va.; Mark Begich, D-Alaska; Mary Landrieu, D-La.; Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D.; Joe Manchin, D-W.Va.; and Sen. Angus King, I., Maine, will introduce proposals to improve the law, The Wall Street Journal reported. Begich and Warner have called for allowing "copper" plans on the government-run health exchanges. The new insurance plans would offer lower premiums and higher out-of-pocket costs than the...

An Alabama congressional candidate uses a .40 Glock pistol, a .270 Cooper rifle and an AR-15 to destroy a copy of the Obamacare bill in a new video released by his campaign. The message in candidate Will Brooke’s video, shared first with The Daily Caller on Wednesday, is clear: Republicans have been successful in taking shots at Obamacare, but it’s going to take “more extreme measures” to get rid of it. Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2014/03/26/alabama-congressional-candidate-shoots-up-obamacare-bill-in-new-ad-video/#ixzz2x7nwK5ha