Free Republic

"Who is Donald Trump?" The better question may be, "What is Donald Trump?" The answer? A giant middle finger from average Americans to the political and media establishment? Some Trump supporters are like the 60s white girls who dated black guys just to annoy their parents. But most Trump supporters have simply had it with the Demo-socialists and the "Republicans In Name Only." They know there isn't a dime's worth of difference between Hillary Rodham and Jeb Bush, and only a few cents worth between Rodham and the other GOP candidates. Ben Carson is not an "establishment" candidate, but the...

There's a clean question on the table regarding dual citizenship for persons born in Canada prior to 1977 (when they changed their law to officially recognize dual nationality.) Prior to that date, with few exceptions, you could not hold dual nationality with Canada. In other words the very act of "renouncing" Canadian Citizenship means that Cruz never held US citizenship at birth because his parents had to declare his nationality at the time he was born. There may be exceptions that were available at the time but the law now is immaterial. The only material fact is what the law...

Politicians tailor their messages to different audiences. Facing New Hampshire's primary, Ted Cruz talked more about "free-market principles" and a "commitment to the Constitution" and said "no one personality can right the wrongs done by Washington." Politico ran the headline "Ted Cruz, born-again libertarian." I'm skeptical. Campaigning in Iowa, Cruz had emphasized religion and social conservatism. But politicians no longer just target voters state-by-state -- they target by person. Last election, President Obama beat Mitt Romney partly by doing just that. Obama had 50 people working in data analytics. Romney had four....

III A nation is a soul, a spiritual principle. Two things, which in truth are but one, constitute this soul or spiritual principle. One lies in the past, one in the present. One is the possession in common of a rich legacy of memories; the other is present-day consent, the desire to live together, the will to perpetuate the value of the heritage that one has received in an undivided form. Man, Gentlemen, does not improvise. The nation, like the individual, is the culmination of a long past of endeavours, sacrifice, and devotion. Of all cults, that of the ancestors...

US President Barack Obama has signed into law an initiative aimed at bringing electricity to 50 million people in sub-Saharan Africa by 2020. The Electrify Africa Act of 2015 will give legal backing to Mr Obama's flagship Power Africa scheme, which is trying to improve access to electricity through public-private partnerships. It took nearly two years to be passed in both houses of the US Congress. About two-thirds of people in Africa do not have access to reliable power....

Donald Trump's position on cannabis appears to have flip-flopped wildly over the years. (No comb-over jokes - promise.) "Legalized marijuana is always a very difficult question - for medicinal purposes and medical purposes, it's fine," says Trump in the video. Earlier this year, Trump told FOX's Sean Hannity he supports medical users "100 percent," but added that overall, marijuana legalization has been "a bad thing for Colorado." He added the Evergreen state is now facing some "big, big problems." But back in 1990, Trump told the Sarasota Herald America's drug policy was "a joke," and legalizing all drugs was the...

He would have still won by 10 points. I don't this argument has been brought up.

An analysis of mass shootings in the United States since the year 2002 shows that gun wielding mass killers are more likely to strike where the Second Amendment right to bear arms has been supplanted by "gun-free zone" ordinances; be they federal, local, or specified by the owner of the property. The Stanford University Libraries' dataset of mass shootings ("Stanford Mass Shootings in America, courtesy of the Stanford Geospatial Center and Stanford Libraries") was analyzed for mass shootings over the past 14 years.The definition of a mass shooting for the Stanford database is three or more shooting victims injured or...

Marco Rubio's campaign seems to have crashed on the rocks because of his...shall we say somewhat repetitive use of the phrase "Obama knows what he's doing", but the truth is, he was 100% right. The reason that so many people scoff at the notion that Obama knows what he's doing is because the very notion of an American leader who seeks to destroy that which he leads is anathema to most rational Americans. And the truth is, Barack Obama doesn't seek to destroy the nation he leads, he seeks to "fundamentally transform" it. Splitting hairs you might say, but...

Trump Tower was built by a mob-owned company and the building that was torn down to make room for it was apparently torn down by illegal workers.

Just a fun observation based on the movie Caddyshack. Trump is the Rodney Dangerfield like real estate developer character leading an uprising against Judge Smails and his bunch (the stodgy GOP establishment). Jeb is Spaulding Smails, the judge's nephew who eats his own boogers: Have fun figuring out which character best matches the rest of the field.

When running for office, Gov. Rick Snyder said he would sign a bill repealing the exemption of the governor, lieutenant governor, legislators and other executive officers and employees from Michigan's Freedom of Information Act. He may get a chance, as two lawmakers, one Republican and one Democrat, are jointly planning to introduce bills that would make the governor and Legislature subject to FOIA. Rep. Ed McBroom, R-Vulcan, and Rep. Jeremy Moss, D-Southfield, say they’ll introduce the legislation within roughly six weeks. Dating back to its inception in 1976, Michigan’s FOIA law has included an exemption for the governor as well...

... Convention: State will bind delegates to the national convention at a state/territory convention. Other conventions will leave the delegation unbound. Proportional: State will proportionally allocated delegates based either on the statewide primary/caucus vote or on the combination of the statewide and congressional district votes. Proportional with Trigger: State will follow above proportional rules but allows for a winner-take-all allocation if a candidate wins a majority of the vote statewide or at the congressional district level. Hybrid: State will follow some form of winner-take-more plan (i.e.: winner-take-all by congressional district) or directly elects delegates on the primary ballot. Winner-take-all: State...

An OPEC production cut is unlikely until U.S. production declines by about another million barrels per day (mmbpd). OPEC won’t cut because it would accomplish nothing beyond a short-term increase in price. Carefully placed comments by OPEC and Russian oil ministers about the possibility of production cuts achieve almost the same price increase as an actual cut.

Watch what happens when this deer tries to jump a High FenceWe've all heard of, or maybe even seen a deer leap over a fence that seems way too high like it was nothing. Unfortunately, it doesn't always turn out that way. A driver was filming three does running on the side of a country road when she got this clip. In the video, the three does try and make a break for it by going across the road and jumping over a high fence. The first doe to give it a go hits the fence about half way up...

Ouch Yesterday, a half hour before her defeat in New Hampshire, Hillary Clinton’s campaign released a three-page memo. It was designed to reassure the Hillary-faithful that, despite her impending loss, she was still a viable candidate. It had the opposite effect on MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell: “Hillary Clinton had the Democratic Party establishment. She still has their endorsements, but he has out-raised her in January. He now will have a ton of money on those online contributions in February, and the Clinton team anticipated this with this three-page memo.”

'Special places' being brought online Ladies, you were warned. Last week, Madeline Albright told you that there was a “special place in hell” for women who don’t support Hillary. She did her best to make sure you knew about the horrific spiritual dangers that stem from voting for Bernie Sanders, and we did our best to get the message out. Yet, for whatever reason, you decided to ignore the eternal damnation of your mortal soul. Last night, women chose - in massive numbers - to turn their backs on Hillary Clinton. According to anonymous torment-industry sources Hell is gearing up...

Obama's favorite JV team has chemical weapon and a new home in which to grow, courtesy of Hillary Clinton. In testimony before the Armed Serves Committee DNI James Clapper confirmed that ISIS has produced and used chemical weapons. The nation's top intelligence official confirmed Tuesday that the Islamic State has succeeded in making and deploying chemical agents in Iraq and Syria -- calling it the first such attack by an extremist group in more than two decades. The confirmation of mustard gas use came during Director of National Intelligence James Clapper's testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, where he spoke to...

Donald Trump won the New Hampshire Primary and he made sure to savor his victory to the full. The bleeding that resulted from his loss in Iowa and his subsequent unseemly reaction to it has been staunched, at least for the time being.

As the Republican primary process heads south, with the next stop in South Carolina, an important factor will be lurking just below the surface: The Democrat voters’ thirst for free stuff now, free stuff tomorrow and free stuff forever. The support for Comrade Bernie Sanders among young people, who by definition have always been pampered and paid for, shows a lop-sided tilt toward the lure of something for nothing. A final pre-New Hampshire survey among 18 to 30 year olds showed nearly 90% backed Sanders, a man who has promised everything with little mention of how these “goodies” would be...