Free Republic

The RNC rolled out its 100-page report on what went wrong in 2012 and what could be done better. The report has 39,136 words in it. One word is missing. Tells you everything you need to know ... /snip/ For the RNC to produce a 100-page report and not have a single mention of the need to interact with and support the conservative blogosphere tells me that the RNC simply has rearranged the deck chairs on the HMS Consultant.

Murder in the United States1 is illegal, and has been for over two hundred years. Strong penalties, up to and including the penalty of death, are incurred by those who commit this heinous crime. Yet, strangely, despite murder’s high illegality, there were in 2011 over 12,000 of them committed! The largest number of murders were in 1991, with nearly 25,000 of these frowned-upon unlawful incidents. It is difficult to imagine a penalty more severe than death, so it remains a curiosity that so many murderers are found when such strong laws are in place. Perhaps this scourge can be eliminated...

...The state Senate, controlled by a coalition of Republicans and a handful of Democrats, approved the legislative package just after 11 p.m. by a lopsided vote of 43 to 18. The Assembly, where Democrats who have been strongly supportive of gun control have an overwhelming majority, planned to vote on the measure Tuesday... ...The expanded ban on assault weapons would broaden the definition of such weapons, banning semiautomatic pistols and rifles with detachable magazines and one military-style feature, as well as semiautomatic shotguns with one military-style feature. New Yorkers who already own such guns could keep them but would be...

A key New York Senate leader and the Assembly speaker said they expect the state Legislature to vote Monday to enact what would be the nation's first gun control measure following last month's Connecticut school shooting. "I think when all is said and done, we are going to pass a comprehensive gun bill today," Sen. Jeffrey Klein told reporters Monday morning. "I'm very excited about it. I am very confident we are going to vote on a comprehensive bill that will be agreed on by the governor, the Senate and Assembly." People familiar with closed-door negotiations told The Associated Press...

Short CBS newscast at noon (ET) Friday on the filmmaker taken into custody on probation violations. I was taken aback by Raviv say, and I checked the broadcast posted at the URL to make sure I had heard right. Asterisks indicate spoken emphasis in the broadcast: ANCHOR (Steve Kathan) "The man behind the anti-Islam video that sparked outrage in the Muslim world is still in jail in Los Angeles for a probation violation. RAVIV "I'm Dan Raviv in Washington. The short movie posted on YouTube has had a lot of diplomatic impact. It was *clearly* designed to insult the Prophet...

"...The EPA experts thought it unbelievable that an environmental accident could destroy so many in one tiny town and they didn't know about it. For the most part, the townsfolk themselves had no idea of the scope of the disease that had been killing them for years... Public health and occupational medicine researchers determined that the Libby asbestos may be more carcinogenic than any other type and that it brought on illness more rapidly. While most asbestos has a latency period -- the time from the inhalation of fibers to the onset of disease -- of 20 to 40 years,...

Clever. Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) said House leaders are specifically concerned about a Republican motion to recommit that would contain only language on abortion that Stupak originally had wanted to include in the Senate bill. The concern is based on the fear of GOP attack ads painting Democrats who vote against a motion to recommit that includes Stupak’s favored language on abortion as “flip-floppers” on the issue… Right now the best defense House leaders have against such a prospect is a colloquy that Stupak will hold on the House floor to publicly reaffirm that the executive order upholds the ban...

WASHINGTON, DC - Today, U.S. Rep. Michael A. Arcuri (NY-24) issued the following statement in opposition to the proposed health care reform package expected to be taken up by the House of Representatives in the coming days: "I have made my decision. I cannot support the health care package that is likely to be voted on later this week. "There is no question we must fix our nation's broken health care system. I supported a health care bill last year that controlled costs for those with insurance and made insurance affordable for those without it. The health care package expected...

... from Massachusetts. This will be their Waterloo: Nine months after he penned a memo laying out the arguments for health care legislation's destruction, Republican message guru Frank Luntz has put together a playbook to help derail financial regulatory reform. In a 17-page memo titled, "The Language of Financial Reform," Luntz urged opponents of reform to frame the final product as filled with bank bailouts, lobbyist loopholes, and additional layers of complicated government bureaucracy. "If there is one thing we can all agree on, it's that the bad decisions and harmful policies by Washington bureaucrats that in many ways led...

You can buy the presidency. But it’ll cost you. [MSNBC link] OBAMA’S OCT 1-15 SPENDING = $105,599,963.76 That’s more than $293,000 an hour. It’s also 49% of EVERYTHING McCain has spent the entire time he has been running for president ($216,769,840). By contrast, McCain’s Oct. 1-15 spending was $9,246,618.70 (or $26,000/hr). The RNC’s chipped in $45 million but doubtless some of that includes congressional races. To put Obama’s numbers in perspective, to break even at $293K an hour, he needs slightly more than three $25 donations per second.

Kristian Stiles. What is her role in the Spitzer scandal, and how is she connected to the campaign of Congressman Michael Arcuri? (snip)

March 31, 2008 ALBANY - The scandal-scarred State Police is suspected of harboring a renegade unit that for years has secretly compiled personal information on top New York officials - possibly including Gov. Paterson, The Post has learned. The governor got a whiff of the existence of such an illegal, politically directed operation after being told by several lawmakers that the State Police targeted them for unjustified traffic stops and "interfered in their personal lives," a senior Paterson aide told The Post yesterday. The explosive information - supplied to Paterson by both Democrats and Republicans - suggests that the Dirty...

SACRAMENTO—State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell announced today that the California Department of Education has completed a legal review of the February 28 California Court of Appeal ruling regarding homeschooling. O’Connell issued the following statement: “I have reviewed this case, and I want to assure parents that chose to homeschool that California Department of Education policy will not change in any way as a result of this ruling. Parents still have the right to homeschool in our state. “Every child in our state has a legal right to get an education, and I want every child to get an...

This link is to the official "email the governor" in case any of you NY Freepers would like to encourage him to leave office ... Link: http://www.ny.gov/contact/index.html

Nancy Pelosi and the House Democrats wrapped up another busy three-day work week Thursday morning with a flurry of legislative action. She passed five bills naming post offices, created the official inaugural committee, and authorized the use of the Capitol Rotunda for the 2009 Inaugural. With that workload behind her, it was time to call it a week and break for four days until next Tuesday. On the bad side, she and her Democratic colleagues couldn't seem to find time on the calendar to bring up the permanent patch to the FISA law, the bill that already passed the Senate...

Header: Fatal infections in state-run hospitals are encouraging patients to look again at private medical insurance, writes Alison Steed The revelation that 90 patients cared for by the Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells Hospitals NHS Trust died from infection by C. difficile and pictures of grimy hospitals are enough to make people think of going private. About 7.4m Britons already have private medical insurance but the number is beginning to tick up after years of falling. With cases of MRSA and C. difficile (Clostridium difficile) becoming more common, there are plenty of people who would rather have a stay in a...

Senator Tom Harkin has joined the Democratic left's attack on Rush Limbaugh for calling a phony soldier a phony soldier. Here is Harkin's charming contribution, which he saw fit to offer on the floor of the U.S. Senate: Well, I don’t know. Maybe [Limbaugh] was just high on his drugs again. I don’t know whether he was or not. If so, he ought to let us know. But that shouldn’t be an excuse. As Michelle Malkin points out, Harkin knows a thing or two about phony claims regarding military service. During his 1992 presidential campaign, Harkin claimed he served as...

Byron York has a complete recap of the phoney "phoney soldiers" controversy. Senate Democrats are clearly clueless about how this appears to the national audience, so we can only hope they continue to push it as a scandal. I gave a talk last night on the presidential race to an audience of approximately 100 very successful business people and their spouses, and in the Q&A that followed, a soft spoken woman asked a question in very soft and almost grieved tones: What has happened to the Democrats and the media that they are so filled with hate? The backdrop was...

This evening, in honor of the publication of My Grandfather's Son, the Heritage Foundation hosted a dinner for Clarence Thomas and his wife Virginia, along with a group of conservative journalists and "new media" types. I have been at social gatherings where Justice Thomas was present but had never actually met him before. Those who know him have told me how warm and gracious he is, and these qualities certainly were evident tonight. Justice Thomas began his after-dinner remarks by saying he wishes the new media had been around at the time of his confirmation hearings because it "gets beyond...

Dear Republican supporter, What will the cost of the Democrat Senate be to you? Be the first to see what the Democrat Senate is costing you at the NRSC's new website, www.CostOfDemocrats.com. We will be detailing the Democrats' liberal agenda and what it will mean to you and your family. In its first 100 days, the Democrat Senate passed the largest tax increase in history -- more than $700 billion and that's just the start. Next, Democrats are expected to force through legislation to strip workers of their right to a secret ballot. What's next? Cost Of DemocratsAll it takes...