Free Republic

The State Department on Monday said it has no evidence that “core al Qaeda” was behind last year's terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya. “We have no indications that core al Qaeda, which I think is what most people are referring to when they talk about quote ‘al Qaeda,’ directed or planned what happened in Benghazi,” State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said at a briefing. The statement appears to leave open the possibility that associates or followers of the terrorist network were involved in the assault. The comments come on the heels of a New York Times investigation published over the...

The rise of nonphysician providers will enable more team care. Skilled health aides will monitor patients at home and alert a doctor if certain medical parameters decline. Nurses will provide wound care to diabetic patients, adjust medications like blood thinners and provide the initial management of chemotherapy side effects for cancer patients. Pharmacists will provide more counseling and urgent care. Physicians will remain essential to the proper diagnosis and treatment of disease, but will be backed up by teams who will help manage the more routine features of chronic illness.

remember when I was growing up, New York was a rough-and-tumble place where attitudes of racial animosity ran parallel to the perceptions of black-on-white crime. And despite a robust, national civil rights movement, there were feelings that blacks were almost exclusively responsible for gangs, prostitution and heroin addiction. Back in the ’60s and ’70s, believe it or not, as a young black man I too had concerns about crime being perpetrated upon me. I recall how to cross Central Park, my buddies and I would sprint top speed from Central Park West to the Fifth Avenue on the East Side...

Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) says that, contrary to recent reports, he does not plan to run for governor next year. But he left the door open to changing his mind. “What I’ve said all along is I have no intention of running,” Nelson told POLITICO on Tuesday. “I wish Charlie Crist the best,” he added, referring to the state’s former Republican governor who is running for his old job next year as a Democrat. However, in an exchange with another POLITICO reporter later Tuesday, Nelson was less adamant. While he said he’s not considering the governor’s race now and again...

A REPORT that China would be relaxing its decades-long family planning policy soon to allow couples with just one spouse from a one-child family to have a second child has been denied by authorities. The National Health and Family Planning Commission said no new documents mandating such a change had been issued and there was no timetable for the issue of such a policy, the People’s Daily website reported yesterday. However, the commission said the central government was discussing the issue. Current policy allows a few exceptions to the one-child rule, such as when both parents are from a one-child...

Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) went on MSNBC to run cover for President Obama’s “If like your , your ,” which has proven to be a huge political thorn in the President’s side, as Americans are losing those very healthcare plans he said they could keep. you plan you can keep plan “At the end of the day, most of those people who are having their plans transitioned will have better benefits for lower costs, All they have to do is go on the exchange and shop around, which arguably needs to be easier than it...

President Barack Obama told his enthusiastic supporters Monday night that he never promised what video recordings show him promising at least 29 times. The videos show Obama promising 300 million Americans that “if you like your health-care plan, you will be able to keep your health-care plan, period.” (snip)

**SNIP** Several reporters asked Carney about Obama’s attempted revision, and why the president won’t admit that he “misspoke” by telling Americans “you can keep it.” “Thank you for the question. I just want to be clear. The president was referring to the law and to the fact that the law was written in a way,” Carney initially responded. When pressed to explain why the president won’t say he “misspoke” in 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2012, Carney declared that “it’s a little bit more complicated than that.” As he tried to deny the contradiction between Obama’s “you can keep it” statements...

U.S. President Barack Obama never considered the idea of dropping Vice President Joe Biden from his 2012 re-election team and replacing him with Hillary Clinton, the White House said on Friday. “Double Down,” a new book on the 2012 campaign, says Obama’s top aides considered the notion but decided not to pursue it because it did not materially improve Obama’s odds. White House spokesman Jay Carney, pressed on the issue at his daily news briefing, did not deny that such an idea was floated within Obama’s re-election campaign. …

Tried reasoning with any of them lately? IMHO now entering a new period where Obama voters simply won't admit their mistake, no matter how bad the pain gets for us all. They're in denial mode it seems (now the only remaining alternative to surrender) rejecting reason on every level while hurling threadbare prog talking points at you, i.e. 'But now they can't turn away people for pre-existing conditions- it's a Good Thing!', like we needed a monstrosity of this magnitude to have this one single change legislated. Alas, they also seem plain tuckered-out and spent from defending a bumbling ...

Sebilius is an interview this evening claims Obama didn't know about Obamacare debacle until after October 1st rollout.

Swiss radiation experts have confirmed they found traces of polonium on clothing used by Yasser Arafat which "support the possibility" the veteran Palestinian leader was poisoned. In a report published by The Lancet at the weekend, the team provide scientific details to media statements made in 2012 that they had found polonium on Arafat's belongings. Arafat died in France on November 11 2004 at the age of 75, but doctors were unable to specify the cause of death. No autopsy was carried out at the time, in line with his widow's request. His remains were exhumed in November 2012 and...

It certainly makes for a good story: a scrappy kid from Baltimore flunks out of an English class at what is now Loyola University Maryland only to become an international bestselling author. The problem is that the oft-told tale concerning Tom Clancy is just as fictitious as Jack Ryan. “It was an urban legend that just wouldn’t die,” said Carol Abromaitis, the English professor accused of giving Clancy an F in her class. For decades, Abromaitis urged English majors to let others know the truth. Her efforts bore little fruit. “One major said to me, ‘Of course not. It makes...

[With video] Texas Congressman Louie Gohmert got into a tense back-and-forth Saturday with Fox New’s Arthel Neville over who is to blame for the partial government shut down and the frightening possibility of a debt-ceiling breach. The Republican Congressman insisted that President Barack Obama and his Democrat allies in the U.S. Senate are responsible for the current mess in the nation’s capital. [SNIIP] The Fox News anchor wasn’t satisfied with Rep. Gohmert’s analysis. “You’re not saying that either, Congressman?” Neville said. “Let’s have some honest talk here.” The Congressman repeated that it’s the Democrats, especially Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid,...

White House: Kerry did not gaffe By REID J. EPSTEIN | 9/9/13 2:06 PM EDT White House press secretary Jay Carney said Secretary of State John Kerry’s assertion that U.S.-led airstrikes on Syria would be “unbelievably small” was only in context to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. “I think that Secretary Kerry clearly was referring to that in the context of what the United States and the American people have experienced over the past 10, 12 years, which includes large scale, long-term … open-ended military engagement with boots on the ground in Afghanistan and Iraq,” Carney said during Monday’s...

The same idiot politicians who thought creating “Gun Free Zones” would make our schools safe assumed they could stop a few million patriotic bikers from driving non-stop through Washington, D.C. by denying them a permit. As usual, the idea BACKFIRED. The bikers, from some far-away states are already on the road and they all still intend to be there but now, obeying every law, every stop light, every pedestrian, their two hour ride will last all day long. The real patriots in America are the one’s willing to put down their personal business to join in a mutual effort to...

Bild am Sonntag cites high-level German surveillance source suggesting Syrian president was not personally behind attacks President Bashar al-Assad did not personally order last month's chemical weapons attack near Damascus that has triggered calls for US military intervention, and blocked numerous requests from his military commanders to use chemical weapons against regime opponents in recent months, a German newspaper has reported , citing unidentified, high-level national security sources. The intelligence findings were based on phone calls intercepted by a German surveillance ship operated by the BND, the German intelligence service, and deployed off the Syrian coast, Bild am Sonntag said....

NBC's Maria Shriver has confirmed to E! News that reports of Nicholson retiring from acting due to memory loss or dementia are 100 percent false, adding that the Chinatown star is not suffering from any memory-related illness or dementia and has no current plans to retire.

Wyoming senatorial candidate Liz Cheney definitively stated her opposition to gay marriage on Friday, despite the pro-marriage stance of her father Dick Cheney, and her sister Mary Cheney, who married her partner last year. “I am strongly pro-life and I am not pro-gay marriage,” declared Cheney in a campaign statement. “I believe the issue of marriage must be decided by the states, and by the people in the states, not by judges and not even by legislators, but by the people themselves.” Cheney issued the statement because she felt opponent (and friend of her father’s) Mike Enzi was “distorting her...

Nine-month pro-choicers who speak out against bullying are beyond hypocrisy.[And other gems from this new pro-life spokesman.]