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With apologies to Aristotle, there is one thing that abhors a vacuum even more than nature, and that is politics. As the Obama scandals continue to unfold, every Democrat is already thinking HARD about what might happen, and what it might mean for 2016. So let's speculate as well, shall we....

"You're travelling to another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound, but also of mind....your next stop, the twilight zone."Barack Obama was elected President of the United States on November 7, 2000. On Sept. 11, 2001, the United States was attacked as hijacked airplanes crashed into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, and the Pentagon. Here is the transcript of the first presidential press conference, held the day after the attacks...

Her'e something to amuse you as we await Jay Carney's 12:45 WH presser. In an article about the impact of the Obama scandals on the upcoming Massachussetts senate special election, we get this gem.....

Hey, I don't get it..but it IS funny. Seems that during the infield party before the Preakness stakes, people run across the tops of the rows of Port-A-Potties while others throw beer cans at them. Sort of a human shi**ing (er, shooting) galler, perhaps? Link below to five (yes, that's right, FIVE)of the best???? videos of drunken idiots running the gauntlet.

Attorney General Eric Holder will appear before the House Judiciary Committee at 1 PM EST today. This appearance had been scheduled some time ago, but is drawing huge attention because of the rapidly unfolding scandals about the IRS and the DoJ seizure of the AP telephone records. These are crucial, very important hearings, but nevertheless, we can expect to be treated to a side-show spectacle of three of the stupidest Democrat House members competing to see who can say the absolutely dumbest things. Of course, I am speaking of John Conyers, Sheila Jackson Lee, and Hank Johnson....

Let me be 100% clear from the outset. The question I pose is in no way meant to imply or suggest any criticism of Lt.Col. Gibson. I suspect that at some time in the future we will know what he was thinking on that day. Because there are a great many Freepers who are active-duty or retired military, I ask the question because it is both fascinating, and needs to be asked.

Chris Stirewalt has an excellent article today at FoxNews.com.."Clinton's Candidacy May Ride on Benghazi." The link is below, and it is definitely worth reading, especially in advance of today's hearing. However, as I was reading it at about 5am this morning, still somewhat sleepy, I well, "misread" one word in a line...and said to myself..WHOA!!!! Did he really write that? If we ever needed a typo, this was surely the time and palce. See for yourself...

Matt Labash, a wonderful writer, has a long piece in The Weekly Standard (link is below) about why he can't stand Twitter. Definitely worth bookmarking and reading later. However, there are two really good quotes which I thought Freepers would enjoy......

I thought that some here might be interested. CNBC (and while yes, it is part of NBC/MSNBC) of late they have been airing many informative, and balanced investigative shows in the evening hours ( after the markets close). Given that a great many FReepers have a passionate interest in firearms, I thought I'd post this FYI. Links below to the program's website, and a review:

Among the most memorable moments of President Reagan's funeral are the image of Lady Thatcher laying her hand on the flag-draped casket, a final, silent farewell to an old friend; and the magnificent eulogy that she delivered at Washington National Cathedral. The eulogy was prerecorded, and amid the huge outpouring of affection and interest in President Reagan, that fact was barely noticed. A few years after the funeral, there were some rumors that when Reagan first realized that he was suffering from Alzheimer's, and commencing what Nancy Reagan termed the "truly long, long, goodbye," he called Lady Thatcher and asked...

Words absolutely do fail..click the link below

Let's be honest here. Toxic waste dump sites are probably more popular with Freepers than the ACLU. But the 'toon (link below) is spot-on, and absolutely worth watching..

With all the news about banks in Cyprus grabbing a piece of every savings account, and continued intelligent speculation that Obama and congressional Democrats are salivating over the trillions that Americans hold in retirement accounts, I'm wondering if anyone else here remembers about 35 years back, when the Democrats attempted something along similar lines..

While walking to a Tampa Courthouse this morning for a court appearance, a sinkhole opened directly underneath the feet of Casey Anthony, and she disappeared into the bowels of the earth, along with her attorneys....

First of all, let's be clear..this NOT meant to be a complaining, bitching thread, but rather to pose a simple, straightforward question that might deserve consideration. Yes, FR is slow..that's a given.it has been slow for a while, it is slow, and appears that it will likely continue to be slow in the future. And I have made the suggested tweaks and modifications on my computer, and that has helped somewhat, but as we know, during high volume periods of use, it really crawls.

Arthur O. "Pinch" Sulzberger, the publisher of the New York Times, announced this morning that in Monday's edition, the paper will print the names and addresses of all know Red Sox fans living in the five boroughs of NYC. At midnight tonight, all the data will be on the paper's website, including an interactive map of NYC. Readers will be able to move their mouse over any particular part of the city, and the names and address of known Red Sox fans living in the area will be displayed on the screen.

In a stunning development just moments ago, that left reporters in the room absolutely speechless, Redskins QB Robert Griffin III held a sudden press conference and announced that the entire Redskins teams had voted unanimously to NOT play tonight's game against the Dallas Cowboys until Congress reaches a deal to solve the fiscal problem.

News reports say that Reid and McConnell are going to work through the weekend to try ad reach a deal. House members have been called back to the Capitol,and the House is scheduled to meet Sunday evening. All this is designed to possibly get a bull that Obama can sign Monday morning, in order to avoid going over the fiscal cliff. But there's just one small problem, which nobody's talking about.. the House rule that mandates that no legislation can be passed until three days have passed, to allow for representatives, and the public, to read, understand, and comment on...

Sec. of State Hillary Clinton announced this morning that she's approximately two months pregnant, and would thus be resigning immediately. Against the background of two of her top aides testifying this morning to Congress about the multiple failures in the State Dept outlined in the just released report on the Benghazi, Clinton, in a prepared statement, revealed that because of the very high risk nature of the pregnancy, given her age, her doctors had advised that she "pretty much spend the next 7 months in bed."

We are just starting to learn a great deal about Adam and Nancy Lanza, probably far, far more than we really care to. We've been told about Adam just getting his driver's license, Nancy's newly rediscovered passion for firearms and shooting, how Adam was a near genius in some ways, how he lived in the basement of his mother's home, decorated with military type posters, how much alimony she received. One simple thing we have yet to be told: Did Nancy Lanza own a gun safe?

Could really use help here. I recently installed the Total Defense internet security suite on my new computer. Prior to this, I'd used the free one from my ISP, but it had been causing problems the last few months. Several people had recommened the Total defense suite, and I'd read several good reviews, but the damn toolbar is driving me insane.

Well, FReepers, since it's obvious that most of us can't predict elections, in an attempt to add a little humor to an otherwise bleak week, let's see how well we can do at guessing something far easier.....

Quick observations: Obama won on the "cult of Obama." He did not help the Democrats down ticket per se. We hold the House; we'll lose a few seats, but the next GOP caucus will be slightly more conservative, a good thing. The Senate's the problem here..specifically, the leadership. McConnell has allowed Reid to run rings around him. He is not willing to stand and fight on principals..he wants to go along. This cannot stand. DeMint CAN win it, if he runs.

Just checked...with early results, Ryan should easily keep his House seat. Boehner needs to grant him a waiver so that he can stay on as House Budget committee chair

I guess this is one of those "filler" pieces they post until we start to get some election results, (or unless Israel launches an attack on Iran in the next 4 hours). Don't waste your time reading the article..it's pure crapola, but the list of names, which I've added below, is hysterical. Boy oh boy, do the Dems ever have problems.

Nate Silver has gone all in for Obama. In his final column today, he gives Obama a 91.6% chance of winning, which is UP 14.2% since Sandy.

Let's face it, barring an act of divine providence in the next 24 hours, FR is going to be very, very slow, if even that, on Election Day. The Robinsons are doing everything possible, and we all hope they succeed, but if they don't, then FR will be very, very frustrating to all of us. It is thus, in the spirit of offering practical solutions, that we are proposing the FR Election Day drinking game, which should solve all these service problems.

The federal government, the MSM, the Democrat party, all hold the thesis of global warming as the gospel truth. NY Governor, Andy Cuomo, as he surveyed submerged tunnels and subway stations in NYC, said that the "hundred year storm now seems to be occurring every two or three years." NJ elected officials, inspecting the devastation along miles of Jersey shoreline, vowed to rebuild. Who will be the first to point out the inherent contradiction in these comments?

Here's an interesting, alternative roadmap for a Mitt win. RealClearPolitics now has 201 for Obama, 191 for Mitt. Let's give Florida, Virginia, North Carolina, Nevada, Colorado, and Iowa to Romney. ( not implausible ) That puts Mitt at 269. Now it gets interesting.

There have been hundreds of threads on FR about all the various polls, and their accuracy, or lack of. Much of the discussions have focused on the party identification, the D/R/I sampling that each poll uses; and how they are weighted to reflect the model of the electorate that the pollster uses. Will turnout in 2012 mirror 2008, or 2010? On FOX NEWS Sunday, Chris Wallace interviewed Frank Newport, head of the Gallup organization, to ask these, and other questions. To me, the response was, well...hard to fathom.

From National Review's Jim Geraghty's "Morning Jolt".. 'But the single biggest metaphorical crotch-kick came from great-grandson Al Smith IV, who told President Obama...'"We recognize that you have some challenges this year. But it's never good when your opponent has produced more jobs than you have sons.."

As soon as the election is over, attention will immediately turn to the fiscal cliff and the lame duck session. For purposes of discussion, let's assume that Mitt wins ( which appears more likely every day). The GOP will retain control of the House, possibly gain a few seats. The new House GOP caucus will be more conservative. The Senate's the big question. The GOP will gain seats, but control is unsure at this point. So now, comes the lame duck...

The fat lady, AKA Candy Crowley, has indeed sung. It's over. Despite all her attempts at interrupting Mitt, and even trying to throw him off-stride ( and bail out Obama) with a faux fact check, didn't work. She was forced to admit ( though AFTER the debate) that Romney was indeed right, and surveys of independent voters, the real target audience of the debates, showed that Mitt was indeed the winner. But most importantly, as we shall see, Crowley has all but buried the president.

The questioners for tonight's town hall debate are supposedly undecided voters, as chosen by the Gallup Organization. But it's probably more incumbent upon Gallup that they present us with a diverse group of questioners. Given the announced format, and the time parameters, we can expect some 80 attendees, and about 25 questions, in the 90 minute session. The moderator, CNN's Candy Crowley, will herself select who gets to ask the questions. We can be assured of one thing; that Crowley will go out of her way to make sure that a diverse group actually gets to pose the questions.

Many FReepers will recall "Hogan's Heroes," the 60's TV comedy set in a German POW camp during WW II. The bumbling, stumbling, fumbling guard, Sgt. Hans Schultz, is the most iconic character from the show, and during the VP debate, Joe Biden obviously channeled Sgt. Schultz in an attempt to distance himself, and Obama, from the fast growing scandal about the utter lack of security at our embassy in Benghazi, which led to the deaths of four Americans.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi today announced that she would ask the US Fish & Wildlife Service to formally designate House "Blue Dawg" Democrats as an endangered species. If her request is granted, they would be protected from facing any future electoral opposition.

Follow me on this, please. I've actually thought there were two winners at the debate: Mitt Romney, and Hillary Clinton. Mitt, for the obvious reasons, and Hillary, because I've believed ever since 2008 that she was going to run again in 2016. If Obama wins, IMHO, what he will do to the country the next four years will make it impossible for any Democrat to win the WH. So, an Obama loss is a very good thing for the Clintons.

The first debate is over. Obama had his hat handed to him by Mitt. James Taranto, in an excellent piece in the WSJ this week, suggests that Obama's failure was inevitable, because he's been coddled, pampered by the MSM for more than 4 years, and thus the first time he faced an articulate, prepared, challenger, Obama wasn't ready. The problem with this argument is that it suggests that next time Obama will be much better prepared, bring his A-game. What if that's just plain wrong? What if what we saw Wednesday night is the best that Obama has to offer?

In his first response to the comments by the head of MSNBC, that the "one FOX on-air personality they would like to have is Sheppard Smith," Roger Ailes, the head of FOX News said tonight that MSNBC was welcome to Smith, but they would also have to agree to take Juan Williams as part of the deal.

I have a slightly different take on last night's debate. I think that Mitt was good, but not great, it's just that Obama was really, REALLY bad. He seemed tired, disinterested, acted passive, and let Mitt steamroll him. Next week's VP debate will be completely different. We should see Biden step in it with both feet up to his knees.

The battle for the AL East division ends tonight (perhaps) Orioles are tied with the Evil Empire, aka the Yankees). Orioles have a tough game against the Rays, while the Yankees get the pathetic Red Sox ( and they'e MY team, gawd help me..)Both games start at 7Pm..so tney should be over about the same time as the debate ends. They you can turn on FOX and hear Juan Williams tell you that Obama won the debate..

There's been considerable discussion about the videotape of Obama in 2007 that was released yesterday. But IIRC, when, shortly before his death, Andrfew Breitbart said that this time, Obama would be "thoroughly vetted,"....that he was in possession of VIDEOS..that would be released. So, is there more to come?

I've pretty much ignored anything and everything to do with Ah-nuld, especially his latest round of public mea culpas to promote his book ( and attempt to restart his movie career.) He's a buffoon. But this morning, with Fox&Friends on in the background, as usual..I caught some of his interview with Gretchen Carlson ( and did you see the way she was glaring at him...hoo-boy!!) and Brian Kilmead. Which prompts the question..

OK Freepers...we don't believe the polls. We know they're skewed to favor Obama, and that the MSM is just about all in the tank for Obama. But the ONLY poll that counts is the one taken on Election Day, Nov 6th. So, to cheer us all up...you're invited to write the banner headlineS for the NY Times the day after the election.

Here we are, a little more than a month from Election Day. The race is very close, despite what the pollsters and the MSM try to tell us. And oddly, the one person who most energizes the GOP base, the Tea Party, has all but disappeared from the public view.

I wanted to check the dates for the presidential debates, and while doing so, happened to read the details. I'm both mad, and disgusted, that the GOP would agree to these. The second debate, on Oct 16th, will be a town hall format, moderated by CNN's Candy Crowley. The topics will be both domestic and foreign policy. Questions will be asked by UNDECIDED VOTERS AS SELECTED BY THE GALLUP ORGANIZATION. Anyone else see what's wrong with this?

"It all depends on what the meaning of "terrorISm" is...

A nuclear armed Iran, headed by radical, fanatic Islamic terrorists, poses an existential threat to Israel. Just beneath that on the threat profile is the re-election of Barack Obama to a second term. Yet for reasons that are unfathomable to any rational person, American Jews appear once again ready to overwhemlingly support Obama.

I admit it, I have mixed feelings about this. First, the news. "Roll Call" has just moved the FL-9 race into the "likely Dem" category, meaning that bloviating buffoon Alan Grayson will return to the House.

Well, here we are, a little more than a month before the election, and the loud, brash, lying Chair of the DNC, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, has all but disappeared from public view. Talk about flying below the radar..she's become invisible. Is she on the way out? Will she become the designated "fall-girl" for Obama's loss?