Free Republic

Subpoenas hit allies of Scott Walker as his re-election campaign looms. Americans learned in the IRS political targeting scandal that government enforcement power can be used to stifle political speech. Something similar may be unfolding in Wisconsin, where a special prosecutor is targeting conservative groups that participated in the battle over Governor Scott Walker's union reforms. In recent weeks, special prosecutor Francis Schmitz has hit dozens of conservative groups with subpoenas demanding documents related to the 2011 and 2012 campaigns to recall Governor Walker and state legislative leaders. Copies of two subpoenas we've seen demand "all memoranda, email . ....

The Health and Human Services Department said 106,185 people have successfully applied for and chosen private insurance through the health care law's new marketplaces. That total is only about 20 percent of the administration's initial enrollment target for October, the first month in which consumers were able to sign up for coverage.Officials have long acknowledged they would fall short of that target because of the problems surrounding HealthCare.gov, the problem-plagued website that handles enrollment for 36 states.HealthCare.gov has performed even worse than expected. Fewer than 27,000 people selected a plan through the website, compared with roughly 79,000 who picked a...

“Today, we can sound like conservatives and act like conservatives—and still win elections. Those who say we can’t don’t see what I see in Wisconsin and what my fellow governors in states all across America see. We don’t need to change our principles. What we need is more courage.” In 2011, Wisconsin governor Scott Walker’s chances of staying in office looked bleak. Angry protesters—furious about his collective bargaining proposal—swarmed Madison, camped in the capitol, and attempted to block the passage of the governor’s reform legislation. Teachers unions accused him of sabotaging education. His approval numbers fell to the basement, and with the national media’s descent on Wisconsin, liberals denounced “Dead Man Walker.” He found himself fighting...

WASHINGTON (AP) Think you're confused by "Obamacare"? It's roiling Capitol Hill behind the scenes, too.Members of Congress are governing themselves under President Barack Obama's signature law, which means they have great leeway in how to apply it to their own staffs.For House members and senators, it's about a section of the law that may or may not require lawmakers to toss some staffers off their federal health insurance and into the Affordable Care Act's exchanges. The verdict from congressional officers is ultimately that lawmakers, as employers, have discretion over who among their staffs gets ejected, and who stays. And they...

CBS) – Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan says she is looking into what appears to be a bogus campaign to sign people up for federal health care coverage under the Affordable Care Act. Don’t be tricked. You may think you’re signing up for affordable health care, but experts say it could be a scheme to get you to enroll in something else.CBS 2’s Mike Parker reports posters and flyers are popping up in hopes of enticing people who need health insurance.

WASHINGTON — President Obama and House Republicans failed to reach agreement on a six-week extension of the nation’s borrowing authority during a meeting Thursday at the White House, but both sides agreed to keep talking and the Republican offer was seen as a first step toward ending the budget standoff. Twenty Republicans, led by Speaker John A. Boehner, went to the White House at Mr. Obama’s invitation after a day of fine-tuning their offer to increase the Treasury Department’s authority to borrow money to pay existing obligations through Nov. 22. In exchange, they sought the president’s commitment to negotiate a...

Trend sparks fears among low-paid workers that they will be hit twice: by having earnings cut and paying more for healthcareAvita Samuels has worked at the Mall of America in Minneapolis for the last four years, juggling a sales job with her studies in political science and law at the University of Minnesota. The 24-year-old has been the top sales associate for the last three years and works between 29 and 35 hours a week. But over the past few months, she said, she has watched as friends working in stores around her have their hours and benefits slashed –...

MADISON – We can do it better than you.That was the message from Gov. Scott Walker Tuesday, as he called for Wisconsin lawmakers to hold public hearings on Common Core State Standards.Walker thinks the state can replace those national standards with its own set of stronger standards.“I’d like the Legislature to hold those hearings,” Walker said in a response to Wisconsin Reporter’s question on Common Core. “And in the larger context I’d like us to be in the position where we can identify our own unique standards that I think in many ways will be higher and more aggressive than the...

Ten members of the G20 have joined the United States in accusing the Syrian government of carrying out a chemical weapons attack on civilians last month and called for a strong international response.A joint statement by the 10 countries and the United States stopped short of explicitly calling for military action against the regime of Syrian president Bashar Assad, as Barack Obama is advocating.But the tough language aligned half of the G20 members with the US president, who worked the sidelines of the summit in St Petersburg to build international support for a limited US military response. The 10 countries...

Bo, the president's Portuguese Water Dog, arrived separately on one of two MV-22 Ospreys, a hybrid aircraft which takes off like a helicopter but flies like a plane.

Some unions' finances also suffer after Scott Walker curtails powers Gov. Scott Walker's signature plan to slash collective bargaining has set off a Darwinian struggle for survival among Wisconsin's public employee unions. In the two years since Walker's plan became law, tens of thousands of teachers and state and local workers have dropped out of their unions, according to a Journal Sentinel analysis of little-used federal financial records. No labor group has been hit harder than the one representing Milwaukee city and county workers. In 2010 — the year that Walker was elected governor — the American Federation of State,...

MADISON, Wis.—Surrogacy agreements allowing for a woman to carry the child of another who is unable to get pregnant are valid contracts, the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled Thursday, drawing praise from those who are working to make it easier for such deals to occur. Wisconsin has no law governing surrogacy, or parentage, agreements, a fact noted by the Supreme Court in its unanimous opinion urging the Legislature to take action. In the meantime, the court ruled that the agreements are valid and able to be enforced, unless they are contrary to the best interests of the child. However, the court...

Dear Dog Lover, The American Kennel Club® (AKC) and the Virginia Veterinary Medical Association (VVMA) have today issued statements to highlight their vehement disapproval of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA)’s apparent policy of euthanizing animals frequently at its shelter in Norfolk, VA. Furthermore, the AKC has called for the PETA shelter to take steps towards balancing its adoption and euthanasia rates for dogs and cats in its shelter. “While most shelters strive for a 90% re-homing rate, PETA is apparently proud of their 99% killing rate and callously boasts that the animals it rescues are ‘better off...

Groups sought temporary restraining order pending action in lawsuit filed by abortion providers

Liz Cheney, daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, is eyeing a Senate seat in Wyoming, a state her father once represented in the House of Representatives.There's only one problem: The seat Cheney covets is already held by a Republican, Sen. Mike Enzi, a friend and former fly-fishing partner of her father's. And as her designs on the seat become increasingly apparent, the state's Republican establishment is growing concerned that her ambition may tear the Wyoming GOP apart, the New York Times reports.Cheney, who grew up in Virginia due to her father's rotating roles in public service but moved to...

Republican and Democratic lawmakers already are plotting ways to rein in the Obama administration's mass collection of phone and Internet data, after a rapid-fire series of disclosures about the program set off privacy alarms.  "This is a dragnet," Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., told Fox News on Friday.  The latest development, as reported by The Guardian newspaper, is that the British government has also been secretly gathering intelligence from U.S. Internet companies via the U.S. National Security Agency data-mining project. That project, along with reports about a secret court order allowing the government to collect phone records for millions of Verizon...

FLOTUS Pool Report #2 Pool was ushered in as FLOTUS began speaking at 6:07 under a white tent in the backyard of the residence of Karen Dixon and Nan Schaffer in NW DC. FLOTUS was introduced by Dixon. Debbie Wasserman Schultz also in attendance. FLOTUS was wearing a dark blue sleeveless shirt dress, with a black belt and pumps. Most notable part of the event was an interruption from a protester about 12 minutes into the 20-minute speech. A pro-LGBT rights individual standing at the front began shouting for an executive order on gay rights. (Pool did not hear exactly...

Democratic leaders handed this 78-page packet out to members of Congress heading home this summer to face questions about the health-care overhaul. Some advice: Target young people, seniors, and women; and work with Planned Parenthood.

Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee sent a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder on Wednesday expressing "great concern" about the possibility that Holder lied under oath during his testimony earlier this month on the Justice Department's seizing of journalists' records, CBS News has learned. On May 15, Holder told the committee he wasn't involved in "the potential prosecution" of a member of the press under the Espionage Act for disclosing classified information. "This is not something I've ever been involved in, heard of, or would think would be wise policy," he said.

Madison — Requiring basic job training from able-bodied participants in the state's food stamp program would cause about half of them to drop out of the program — a total of tens of thousands of people statewide and 14,500 in just Milwaukee. The new projections come from the Legislature's nonpartisan budget office, which last week released its analysis of Gov. Scott Walker's plan to require 62,700 able-bodied adults without children in Wisconsin FoodShare to attend bare-bones job training. The Legislative Fiscal Bureau puts the total cost for that at $35.8 million over two years, including $16.8 million for state payers.The...