Free Republic

While most media accounts of the fiscal cliff fiasco have focused on Republicans' travails, few have adequately noted Democrats' starring role in our current dysfunction.  Harry Reid obstructed a vote on the president's plan, Nancy Pelosi whipped votes against her own erstwhile plan, and the president has fully retreated from ideas he supported as recently as last year.  A pre-Christmas Wall Street Journal article walks readers through the failed negotiations, and two recurring themes are woven throughout: (1) Obama has zero interest in meaningful concessions on his end, and (2) Obama is supremely confident in his ability to stick Republicans...

On Jan. 13, 2009, Michael Allison brought a digital recorder to the Crawford County Courthouse in Robinson, Ill., where he was contesting a citation, because he had been told there would be no official transcript of the proceedings. He was immediately confronted by Judge Kimbara Harrell, who accused him of violating her privacy and charged him with eavesdropping, a felony punishable by up to 15 years in prison. Because Allison had recorded conversations about his legal situation with police and other local officials, he soon faced four more eavesdropping charges, raising his possible sentence to 75 years. The case against...

BELLEVUE, Wash., Nov. 18, 2010 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms today is announcing its opposition to the nomination, by President Obama, of Andrew Traver as director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Traver is currently special agent in charge of Chicago's BATFE field division, where he has a history of working with gun prohibitionists. He served as an advisor to the International Association for Chiefs of Police on that group's 2007 "Gun Violence Reduction Project," in cooperation with the anti-gun-rights Joyce Foundation. This project involved several high profile anti-gun-rights...

The same mafia-style Chicago thugocracy that got Obama into his state senate seat (by elbowing all his opponents off the ballot with an army of lawyers seizing on bogus technicalities) is now using the same brutal gutter tactics to silence an electrifying black conservative. State senate candidate Cedra Crenshaw of Bolingbrook, Illinois is a brilliant, Tea Party-backed patriot who champions the free market, limited government, and legitimately got herself on the ballot with the required number of signatures. But the Chicago Machine is threatened by her, so it hired some of Barack Obama's lawyers to force her out. The will...

As expected, Mayor Daley and Chicago's City Council are circling the wagons to defend against an unfavorable decision by the Supreme Court concerning the city's gun ban. Daley said the city would have in place a new ordinance aimed at making it difficult to purchase and own a gun in Chicago. "We'll publicly propose a new ordinance very soon," Daley said at an afternoon press conference concerning the gun ban. "As a city we must continue to stand up ..and fight for a ban on assault weapons .. as well as a crackdown on gun shops," Daley said. "We are...

CHICAGO (CHICAGOPRESSRELEASE.COM) — Today, U.S. Representative Mike Quigley (D-IL) released the following statement after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the City of Chicago’s handgun ban. Earlier this year, Quigley spearheaded the effort of 55 Members of Congress in filing a “friend of the court” amicus brief, urging the Court to allow Chicago’s handgun ban to stand. Quigley also supports the right of state and local governments to maintain sensible restrictions on gun possession and use. “I am disappointed and disheartened by the Supreme Court’s decision today. When illegal guns flood our streets, precious lives are lost and communities are...

Here is shocking video of North Carolina Democrat Rep. Bob Etheridge being asked by some students on a public sidewalk in Washington, D.C. if he supports the “Obama Agenda.” Once he realized the students were asking him that question, he went bonkers. Etheridge hit their camera and then grabbed one of the students by the arm as he repeated over and over “Who are you, Who are you? Tell me who you are?” The students identified themselves as such, but Etheridge persisted. At one point he then grabbed the student whose arm he had been holding onto and pulled himself...

Obama learned his lesson well.” — quote attributed to L. David Alinsky, son of Saul Alinsky. From time to time, media reports have referred to a unique brand of systemic corruption and political hardball tactics as being “the Chicago Way.“ The term is taken from the motion picture adaptation of “The Untouchables.” The screenplay was written by David Mamet. Although the exploits of Eliot Ness were exaggerated in the film, much like the original television series which often dispensed fiction for fact, the drama nonetheless struck a responsive chord. On a political level, this brand of thuggish behavior has even...

“Obama learned his lesson well.” -- quote attributed to L. David Alinsky, son of Saul Alinsky. From time to time, media reports have referred to a unique brand of systemic corruption and political hardball tactics as being “the Chicago Way. “ The term is taken from the motion picture adaptation of “The Untouchables.” The screenplay was written by David Mamet. Although the exploits of Eliot Ness were exaggerated in the film, much like the original television series which often dispensed fiction for fact, the drama nonetheless struck a responsive chord. On a political level, this brand of thuggish behavior has...

h/t Freeper mnehring Did Barack Obama inspire one of his donors to threaten a top GOP lawmaker? Norman Leboon, Sr, the man reported to have been arrested for making a death threat video against House Minority Whip Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) and Cantor's family is listed by the Federal Elections Commission as having made two donations to the presidential campaign of Barack Obama in 2008.According to the FEC, the donations were made on successive days in June 2008, on the 20th for $255 and on the 21st for $250. There are no other federal election campaign contributions listed for Leboon....

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama's much-challenged health care overhaul gained traction Wednesday as a liberal lawmaker became the first to switch his opposition and Catholic nuns declared their support in an unusual public break with the bishops. Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, long a supporter of Medicare-for-all, voted against the House Democratic bill in November because it did not go far enough in creating a robust government-run plan to compete with private insurance. But Kucinich said Wednesday that the bill coming before the House represents the best chance to expand coverage to the uninsured, even if it does not include...

President Barack Obama’s top advisers are quietly laying the groundwork for the 2012 reelection campaign, which is likely to be run out of Chicago and managed by White House deputy chief of staff Jim Messina, according to Democrats familiar with the discussions. The planning for now consists entirely of private conversations, with Obama aides at all levels indulging occasionally in closed-door 2012 discussions while focusing ferociously on the midterm elections and health care reform, the Democratic sources said. “The gathering storm is the 2010 elections,” one top official said. But the sources said Obama has given every sign of planning...

Oh yes. There is something nasty in the air. It leaves a greasy tang inside your nostrils if you walk through the foul mist emanating from the White House. Maybe Obama's gotta cut back on Michelle's sewer-enriched collard greens. From Jeffrey Lord in the American Spectator: A bombshell has just exploded in the 2010 elections. For the second time in five months, the Obama White House is being accused -- by Democrats -- of offering high ranking government jobs in return for political favors. What no one is reporting is that this is a violation of federal law that can...

Politico notices a buried lede in the Boston Globe’s morning report on the Massachusetts special election to replace Ted Kennedy in the Senate. With Haiti crumbling, a war to fight, and ObamaCare negotiations hitting a high-pressure point, Barack Obama could only offer a two-minute snoozefest of a web ad in support of Martha Coakley. Now it looks as though Rahm Emanuel may be sounding the red alert at the White House and get Obama on the ground in Massachusetts (emphases mine, h/t Geoff A): The White House has shown increasing alarm about the race, with Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel...

In November 2007, President Obama promised that the reform of health care including the negotiations will be open in a public setting, and not behind closed doors. He even suggested that they would be broadcast live on CSPAN and streamed live over the net. In fact he said they needed to be open because that's why Hillarycare was defeated. Both the president and the congress have been Ignoring that promise, because transparency is the last thing they want. Throughout the Health Care debate, preferring instead to Ram a bill down out throats, with provisions that would make the American People's...

The most accurate poller, is always the crook? LMAO. “If we accepted that it was flawed to use likely voters because it skews right, then that would assume that most voters vote Republican as a general rule. We know that is not true as there are plenty of Democrat voters, so the left’s assumption that using likely voters somehow must skew right is flawed right there.”

President Obama has yet again summoned Democrats from House and Senate leadership to the White House to determine their final strategy to pass some bill that reconciles the disparate healthcare “reform” measures passed by each congressional body. Republicans were not invited to today’s meeting. Among those expected at the White House either in person or by teleconference are Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Ca.) and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.). If the majority leadership cannot agree to try to strong-arm the Senate-passed bill through the House without changes...