Free Republic

"...The spot in front was appropriate for the new front-runner in Iowa, the state that in seven months holds the first nominating contest to pick the party's presidential candidate before the November 2016 election.Walker, who built his reputation by taking on labor unions, has led the five most recent polls in Iowa, including the respected Des Moines Register poll. The Register showed him with a seven-percentage point lead over four tightly bunched rivals and found he was viewed favorably by two-thirds of likely Iowa caucus-goers."If the caucuses were today, he would win. Unless he really screws up, he should win,"...

"Today, fewer than 10,000 troops remain on a mission to train and assist Afghan forces. We’ll continue to bring them home and reduce our forces further, down to an embassy presence by the end of next year," Obama said.

About six years ago, one of my producers at the Fox News Channel received a call out of the blue in which the caller asked if I'd be interested in coming on "The Colbert Report." At the time, I was generally unfamiliar with the genre of late-night comedy because I am usually in dreamland when it airs. Colbert was hilarious in his haughty imitation of the excesses of my Fox colleague Bill O'Reilly. I did not and do not know what his personal politics are, but his shtick was playing O'Reilly to a T. In fact, at one point during...

hether one observed Christmas or Hanukkah — or any other seasonal festivity — there was a nice little gift included for the drivers of this nation. Gasoline prices, in case anyone hasn't noticed, are down, way down. The average price of a gallon of unleaded in Maryland by Christmas week was in the neighborhood of $2.53, according to AAA, and there were some stations in the Baltimore area selling it for as little as $2.22. lRelated The cheap oil dividend One year ago, average gasoline prices were about $1 per gallon higher, which means a typical fill-up is saving drivers...

A network of businesses, public officials and educators are partnering with the Trayvon Martin Foundation to present “Letters to Trayvon” a holistic campaign to address the plight of Black males and police brutality, next February. The campaign, initiated by the Germantown-based small business Mission Inc., has been in its planning stages for about a year and will include a social media component, youth outreach and a culminating fundraising reception, panel discussion, black art showcase and exhibit on Feb. 28. “Letters to Trayvon is a campaign to end the disrespect and racial profiling of black men and boys [and] it’s a...

“No one knew that was me. Because a woman actually walked up to me, right? I was in the detergent aisle, and she said — I kid you not — she said, ‘Excuse me, I just have to ask you something.’ And I thought, ‘Oh, cover’s blown.’ She said, ‘Can you reach on that shelf and hand me the detergent?’ I kid you not. And the only thing she said — I reached up, because she was short, and I reached up, pulled it down. She said, ‘Well, you didn’t have to make it look so easy.’ That was my...

Back in 2005, Peggy Noonan wrote about the increasingly public friendship between George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton: What bothers me about the fervid friendship of the Bushes and Mr. Clinton — and the media celebration of it — is the faint whiff of superiority, a sense they radiate that all those slightly icky little people running around wailing about issues — tax reform, the relation of the individual to the state, the necessary character of a president — and working the precincts are somehow . . . a little below them. There is an air of condescension...

[Barf Alert] Gender equality must guide 2015 climate deal, U.N. envoy says By Megan Rowling, Reuters LIMA (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Gender equality must be a key part of a new global climate change deal due to be reached in Paris next year even though achieving it will be a struggle, U.N. climate envoy Mary Robinson said on Tuesday. The former Irish president said the 2015 agreement should drive climate policies that take both women's and men's needs into account and must include gender equality as a guiding principle. [excerpt. hurl here]

In order to justify the crush of medically unnecessary regulations on abortion clinics in recent years, it's become common for anti-choicers to pose as the protectors of women's health. Considering how much more dangerous childbirth is than abortion, this has always been a farcical claim, but now it appears some anti-choice activists are taking it a step further and actively encouraging women to take what could be a very serious risk to their health. Elizabeth Kulze at Vocativ reports that a crisis pregnancy center in Iowa (called the Women's Choice Center, one of the more obnoxious examples of anti-choice centers...

US Airways plane grounded by sick crew, passengers The Philadelphia-bound flight from Israel made an emergency landing in Rome after all 14 crew members, including four pilots, were affected by a mysterious smell. Vomiting crew members and passengers forced a Philadelphia-bound flight to make an emergency landing in Rome, airline officials said. The US Airways Flight US797 was en route from Israel when an odor in the cabin began to sicken the people aboard, NBC News reported. All 14 crew members, including the four pilots, were affected, and the mysterious smell made two passengers ill as well, an airline spokeswoman...

The White House legend that is Barack and Michelle Obama’s romance is heading to the screen. Southside With You, a drama in the vein of Before Sunrise, chronicles the summer 1989 afternoon when the future President of the United States of America wooed his future First Lady on an epic first date across Chicago’s South Side. Get On Up’s Tika Sumpter will play Michelle Obama (née Robinson), while the search is on to cast the young Barack. As Presidential lore has it, the date took some convincing. Obama, then an idealistic first-year Harvard Law student, took a summer job as...

A 1968 photo taken during a Lunar Orbiter mission to the moon shows what appears to be a spacecraft that is at least 10 miles (16 km) long resting inside the Crater Manlius. The photo was the subject of a Youtube video that was released on October 4 that shows various close ups and light contrasts of the apparent spacecraft. Most of the object is well illuminated by the sun, but the rest is in the shadows of the crater which is approximately 20 miles (34 km) in diameter, What appears to be a spacecraft cockpit is in shadows. According...

U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan said Thursday he would love to see Mitt Romney run again for president and teased the GOP's former nominee at one point that the "third time's the charm." Appearing with Ryan at a public event for the first time since their ticket lost two years ago, Romney offered his own good-humored praise by saying that Ryan "wouldn't be a bad president" himself.

What happens when President Obama has supper with people he just met? Well, for one thing, he may have to share his fries. The president invited four Kansas City residents to dine with him at Arthur Bryant's Barbecue last month. The four are among the thousands of people who have addressed personal letters to the White House. President Obama sat down to talk with the letter writers, and moments later the pool of reporters on hand were ushered out (as is the norm). NPR reached all four by phone to get a download. "Having dinner with the president was just...

...Shortly after arriving, the President turned up at the Farm Neck Golf Club. Wearing a baseball cap, white shirt and grey pants, Mr. Obama could be seen at one of the early holes and some onlookers tried to snap a photo on the street. “It’s so exciting to see him play golf,” said Trayce Hillman of Brockton. The presidential visit brings excitement to the island and businesses hope for a visit from the famous family.

McCain, co-host of Pivot's “Take Back Live,” has been named as a potential “View” panelist Meghan McCain will guest-host on “The View” next week amid talk of her joining the show's panel full-time, a person familiar with the situation told TheWrap.

President Obama’s instincts about Iraq and Syria have been sound from the beginning: Greater U.S. engagement probably cannot make things better but certainly can make them worse, both for the people of the region and for our national interests. Obama’s only mistake was to buy, for a time, the notion that Bush’s troop surge had miraculously healed ancient divisions and made the dream of a pluralist democracy still possible. There are aspects of Obama’s foreign policy that I question. His heavy reliance on drone strikes may create as many terrorists as it eliminates. He should have realized that the National...

The tale of Cliven Bundy, a Nevada cattle rancher, had all the elements of a certain type of political theater, making it inevitable that he would become a hero in the conservative blogosphere and a fixture on Fox News. The story line, as told in those forums, went like this: Heavy-handed federal bureaucrats, having seized Bundy’s cattle, were forced to back down after being confronted by cowboys on horseback toting nothing more than their side arms and an unshakable faith in the U.S. Constitution. (A little-told detail: A sniper or two were concurrently taking aim at the federal agents.) Bundy...

VIDEO AT LINKAt a petite 5’3’’, Sage Santangelo may not look like a combat fighter at first glance. But the female second lieutenant has never let that hold her back from pursuing her dream of becoming an infantry officer in the Marine Corps. Growing up, Santangelo found she was always able to keep up with the guys and enjoyed playing hockey on all boys’ teams. But when she joined the Marines, Santangelo found the playing field changed; she was segregated into female-only training units and as a woman, was relegated to less strenuous physical training than her male counterparts. And...

Gun owners beware. Squirt gun owners, that includes you. If a Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team SUSPECTS you of crime, you may receive a late-night visit from an armed SWAT team. That’s right, an armed and militant SWAT team could trot right through your front door as you slumber this summer. No-knock warrants are increasingly used by military-style police units, like SWAT teams for drug raids. Unfortunately, SWAT teams can obtain these warrants too easily from judges and consequently do not always perform sufficient due diligence. As a result, tens of thousands of decent, law-abiding American citizens are surprised...