Free Republic

In 2013, Michael Bloomberg’s pro-gun control PAC injected $1.1 million into the Virginia gubernatorial race to help out Democratic candidate Terry McAuliffe. It succeeded. McAuliffe won, and now Bloomberg is trying to make sure the state legislature’s composition is slightly more favorable for the next session by dumping another $1.5 million in the Old Dominion’s respective state senate races (via WaPo): Former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg’s gun-control group will bankroll a $1.5 million advertising campaign for a Northern Virginia state Senate candidate, in its second big ad buy in the commonwealth in as many days. Less than two...

Friday, October 23, 2015 Akin: Illinois ranks high for creating lawsuits, not jobs By Travis Akin - The University of Illinois football team is struggling once again this year, mired at the bottom of the Big Ten and near the bottom of numerous national rankings. Similarly, the State of Illinois is stuck near the bottom of another set of rankings, only these rankings reflect not just lost games but lost jobs and thus are important to every person living in Illinois. These important but depressing rankings come from a new national study that confirms Illinois’ status as a lawsuit haven,...

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/10/23/hillary-helped-by-partisan-media-atmosphere-undermining-benghazi-hearing/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+foxnews%2Fpolitics+%28Internal+-+Politics+-+Text%29 When the House Benghazi hearings opened yesterday, it seemed like the committee was on trial rather than Hillary Clinton. Chairman Trey Gowdy kicked things off with a passionate defense of his panel, insisting that the proceedings were purely professional and dismissing suggestions that the investigation is about the former secretary of State. “Let me assure you it is not,” he told Clinton. Ranking Democrat Elijah Cummings responded by blasting the probe, telling Clinton that the committee was set “loose because you’re running for president” and demanding that the Republicans end the “fishing expedition.” In short, the media atmosphere surrounding...

http://townhall.com/columnists/victordavishanson/2015/10/22/can-california-be-saved-n2069002/page/full Never has a region been so naturally rich but so poorly run by its latest generation of custodians. California endures some of the highest gasoline taxes, sales taxes and income taxes in the nation. Yet its roads and public schools rate near the very bottom of U.S. rankings. Traffic accidents in California increased by 13 percent over a three-year period -- the result of terrible roads and worse drivers. Almost half of all accidents in Los Angeles are hit-and-runs where the drivers leave the scene. California has lots of petroleum and natural gas. It used to be a pacesetter...

http://townhall.com/columnists/kenblackwell/2015/10/23/hillary-offers-disastrous-obamacare-20-n2069866/page/full One thing is clear: our country faces many challenges when it comes to health care. And the last thing Americans need is another misguided leader with failed policies that discourage risk taking and innovation. Yet, after seeing Secretary Clinton’s proposal to address prescription drug costs, we should be deeply concerned about another national health care policy that could have disastrous effects. Clinton’s sweeping proposal combines a number of misguided policies that would undermine access and choice of medicines for patients. It would also destroy incentives to invest in new cures and life-saving treatments. A reckless plan of this magnitude...

http://townhall.com/columnists/michellemalkin/2015/10/23/doctors-agree-obamas-electronic-medical-records-mandate-sucks-n2069809?bt_alias=eyJ1c2VySWQiOiJkNmM1NGMxZS1kY2NkLTRmYjktODdmZi02ZmIzMmFmZDEzYjgifQ%3D%3D Hey, who's up for a stiff dose of "See, I told you so?" For the past several years, medical professionals have warned that the federal electronic medical records mandate -- buried in the trillion-dollar Obama stimulus of 2009 -- would do more harm than good. Their diagnosis, unfortunately, is on the nose. The Quack-in-Chief peddled his tech-centric elixir as a cost-saving miracle. "This will cut waste, eliminate red tape, and reduce the need to repeat expensive medical tests," he crowed at the time. In theory, of course, modernizing record-collection is a good idea, which many private health care providers...

http://clashdaily.com/2015/10/no-white-house-invite-for-this-kid-even-though-he-made-a-life-changing-invention-for-vets-with-ptsd/?utm_source=Email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=subscriber_id:19815131&utm_campaign=Liberal%20Chick%20Asks%20Dumb%20Americans%20Who%20This%20%E2%80%98Ben%20Ghazi%E2%80%99%20Guy%20Is%20(WATCH) Ahmed Mohamed makes a ‘clock’ that looks like a briefcase bomb and gets an invite to the White House. But Tyler Skluzacek? Obama probably won’t ever know who he is. Senior Tyler Skluzacek said he was in sixth grade when his dad, Sgt. First Class Patrick Skluzacek, spent a year in Iraq. It had a huge impact. His dad returned with PTSD and night terrors. So Tyler’s team created an app they say helps prevent them.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/oct/22/editorial-congress-failed-benghazi-responsibility/ The House leadership, when it is installed and settled, should press for a new way to conduct oversight. There should be fewer speeches by members tailored for re-election campaign commercials and better questions from the members of the committee and their lawyers. Mr. Gowdy is a former federal prosecutor but his performance Thursday hardly demonstrated that. The hearing was undisciplined in time and narrative. Learning from this hearing, making oversight more effective, would be a way to honor the four Americans who gave their lives for their country at Benghazi. They deserved better than they got from Hillary Clinton...

(Washington, DC ) – Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton made the following statement regarding the Obama Justice Department decision to close its investigation of the IRS targeting of Tea Party groups and other conservative opponents of President Obama’s policies: “President Obama’s IRS was used against his opponents to help him win reelection. So the Obama Justice Department’s decision to shut down its IRS abuse investigation with no prosecutions is as unsurprising as it is corrupt. Judicial Watch’s independent litigation proved the Obama IRS obstructed justice and destroyed evidence. And we uncovered that the IRS and Lois Lerner conspired with the...

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/oct/21/surge-illegal-children-families-accelerates/ Border Patrol officials in Washington blamed violence and poor economic conditions in Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras for pushing illegal immigrants to flee their homes and head north, but agents on the ground said the problem is lax U.S. enforcement, which entices migrants to make the dangerous journey, assured that they will be allowed in the U.S. rather than turned away at the border. “We’re talking about the rule of law in other countries; we’re not enforcing the rule of law in this country,” Chris Cabrera, an official with the National Border Patrol Council, the labor union for line...

“Recent videos exposing the abortion-for-baby parts business have shocked the nation, and demanded action. At my request, three House committees have been investigating the abortion business, but we still don’t have the full truth,” Mr. Boehner said. The new committee will have the resources and subpoena power to “get to the bottom of these horrific practices, and build on our work to protect the sanctity of all human life,” Mr. Boehner said. The following Republican representatives will make up the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s new investigative panel: Rep. Marsha Blackburn, Chairman (R-TN), Rep. Joe Pitts (R-PA), Rep. Diane Black...

President Obama announced Friday that he was replacing retired Marine Gen. John Allen with lawyer and diplomat Brett McGurk as his special envoy for Iraq and Syria with a wide-ranging portfolio that includes holding together a coalition against ISIS. Allen, who reportedly had clashed with the military over the now-defunct $500 million effort to create an army of Syrian volunteers, was departing after 13 months as special presidential envoy for the global coalition to counter the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or ISIL, another name for the terrorist group.

Washington (CNN)The Justice Department notified members of Congress on Friday that it is closing its two-year investigation into whether the IRS improperly targeted tea party and other conservative groups. There will be no charges against former IRS official Lois Lerner or anyone else at the agency, the Justice Department said in a letter.

Its for the Children... The Obama administration Tuesday pushed illegal immigrant youths to enroll in high school and college and announced a list of guarantees in schools and tips to help students apply for scholarships or financial aid. In a 63-page handbook, the Education Department urged schools to create support groups for illegal immigrant students and their families and warned against asking about students’ legal status. “Message publicly that your institution supports undocumented students and their rights to a high-quality education,” the handbook said. The administration hopes to enlist schools in the effort to normalize the experience of being in...

There are many opinionated people on each side of the political spectrum, including me, but I haven’t heard of any conservatives trying to muzzle leftists. Liberals on the other hand? Ha. Man-made global warming liberals ridicule skeptics as corrupt or brain-dead deniers, and their advocate in chief, President Obama, habitually derides conservatives for rejecting his hysterical narrative on climate change. Don’t assume they do this solely for political advantage. It can be far more serious than that. A claque of 20 climate scientists, in an open letter, urged Obama and Attorney General Loretta Lynch to use the federal Racketeer Influenced...

In the sadistic era of fraudulent Hope and Change, inspectors general inside the federal government have been kicked, neutered and starved of the authority and information they need to do their jobs. It's transparently clear: President Obama loathes and fears independent watchdogs. Accountability is an empty talking point without whistleblower protection and investigative autonomy. That is why Capitol Hill must do everything in its power to stop the White House war on the public's ombudsmen. Federal inspector generals across dozens of agencies are begging lawmakers to grant them access to public records as guaranteed by the 1978 Inspector General Act....

SEATTLE -- Laura Dodson knows a thing or two about numbers. Dodson, an accountant, was doing yard work at her boyfriend's Maple Leaf home earlier this month when workers for the Move Seattle levy came knocking. He expressed his disapproval for the ballot measure, which asks voters to allocate $930 million for walking, cycling, and transportation improvements in Seattle. "Absolutely, he did not agree with this levy at all," Dodson said. "He disagreed a bit with the proposition and so (the worker) backed off and said, 'oh, okay.'" For a woman who has a built a career on mathematics, calculations,...

ORANGE, Calif., - A new study by a California university shows Americans have a much greater fear of the government, technology and pandemics than ghosts or zombies. Nearly 60 percent of Americans are afraid or very afraid of government corruption, the Chapman University Survey of American Fears found. At 58 percent, the subject topped a list of 88 items people were asked about, with personal appearance -- specifically what people thought of how you were dressed -- being last at 4.2 percent. Researchers quizzed 1,541 people across the United States about all their various fears and anxieties and nearly half...

A law professor at Jesuit-run Fordham University in New York is appealing for an end to the institution of marriage in America, which he describes as “religious, gendered, and bourgeois.” Ethan J. Leib published his essay in the Fordham Law Review. The article, titled “Hail Marriage and Farewell,” says Leib was “elated” when the U.S. Supreme Court made same-sex marriage the law of the land on June 26, 2015, a ruling he described as “a victory for rights, for open-mindedness, for love, and for the future.” The decision, in fact, made him feel, at least for a moment, as if...

Why North Korea is so corrupt, and why that may be good Official willingness to take bribes and ignore regulations has saved lives, but may present obstacles for reform October 16th, 2015 Andrei Lankov North Korea is probably the most corrupt country in Asia. Measuring corruption levels is difficult, and existing ratings (like the well-known index published annually by Transparency International) should be taken with a pinch of salt. Nevertheless, anecdotal evidence appears persuasive enough: Official corruption in North Korea has been exceptional over the last 20 years. In my frequent discussions with North Koreans, I have discovered the fact...