Free Republic

BENICIA - About 40 anti-war protesters held what they said would be their final rally Thursday, six years after the United States-led invasion began against Saddam Hussein's Iraq. Patricia Kneisler, who has led the Benicia Peace Vigil for five of the last six years of the conflict, said the weekly demonstrations on First Street and Military began to subside after President Barack Obama's election in November. "People are really conflicted now," Kneisler said, explaining how many of the demonstrators felt they should not be protesting the war while Obama established his administration. The Benicia Peace Vigil was begun by a...

Fox New's Glenn Beck is increasing "the chance for people to take horrible action" on President Obama. So said HBO's Bill Maher Friday evening in a lengthy discussion about FNC's new primetime star. I guess Maher missed the hypocrisy concerning his disturbingly caustic views of the Bush administration while they were in power, in particular his expression of regret that the March 2007 assassination of Vice President Dick Cheney failed. Possibly even more delicious was that sitting to Maher's left was MSNBC's Keith Olbermann who himself has made an almost endless number of personal attacks on members of the Bush...

Political commentator and TV host Bill Maher won “Quote of the Year” at the Media Research Center’s annual Dishonors Awards for his remarks about Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin during the 2008 presidential campaign. Maher – on HBO’s “Real Time” in September 2008-- questioned whether Palin’s infant son Trig was her child or that of her teenage daughter, Bristol. “I’m not that convinced that that’s her baby,” Maher said. “It’s not like they’re not willing to lie about everything else.”

Open Letter to Janeane Garofalo: Dear Ms. Garofalo: I saw a video of your interview with Keith Olbermann on MSNBC. You said: “Michael Steele. Who's that black guy in the Republican party who suffers from Stockholm syndrome. Which means you try to curry favor with the oppressor. . . . Any female or person of color in the Republican party is struggling with Stockholm syndrome.” Michael Steele, “that black guy,” suffering from Stockholm Syndrome, him currying favor with the “oppressor”? Therefore you are saying Black Republicans are suffering from Stockholm Syndrome? They identifying with the “oppressor”? You seem to imply...

WASHINGTON -- Can Americans face the truth about the Bush administration's abuse of power? I believe so, but clearly President Barack Obama and some Democratic lawmakers think they can't. Or possibly they don't want to be bogged down in a search which could be viewed as vindictive against the former regime. Too bad. Obama -- a former constitutional law professor-- has ruled out a look backward, claiming that any review of possible illegalities by Bush and his coterie would lead to "politics that have made Washington dysfunctional." Picking up on the last Bush mantra that we should move "forward," Obama...

A ploy by the Obama White House to depict the inflammatory conservative talkshow host Rush Limbaugh as head of the Republican Party has triggered a furious partisan battle – just the style of bareknuckle politics the new President promised to end. The increasingly bitter feud between the Obama team and the bombastic Mr Limbaugh, who enjoys the largest talk-radio audience in America, has delighted Democrats and dismayed many Republicans. Yet it has also brought accusations that the White House has cynically created a bête noire to distract attention from the debate over its economic policies. The thrice-married Mr Limbaugh is...

The Senate Intelligence Committee is preparing to launch an investigation of the CIA's detention and interrogation programs under President Bush, setting the stage for a sweeping examination of some of most secretive and controversial operations in recent agency history. The probe is aimed at uncovering new information on the origins of the programs as well as scrutinizing how they were executed -- from the conditions at clandestine CIA prison sites to the interrogation regimens used to break Al Qaeda prisoners, according to Senate aides familiar with the inquiry plans.

(CNSNews.com) - Mindless Republicans are heeding the iron discipline of conservative talk radio hosts Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh, Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) told reporters after President Barack Obama’s address to the nation on Tuesday. “I don’t think we found any Republican minds today,” Frank told a reporter minutes after the president had finished his speech. “They shut their minds down. They are so afraid of being yelled at by Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity they won’t even clap for him [Obama] even when they agree with him.” “They are literally afraid to...

President Barack Obama and Congress are locked in a stare-down over how much to expose or punish Bush administration employees for any abuses they committed in waging the war on terrorism. Obama, after critical rhetoric on the campaign trail, has sent mixed signals about how far he's willing to go. His concerns are grounded in pragmatism and politics. Politically, pursuing Bush administration abuses could bog Obama down in partisan warfare with Republicans over the past, endangering his agenda for the future. Pragmatically, intelligence agency veterans have warned the new administration that investigations into the Bush administration's practices of interrogation, rendition...

More federal government interference, more violations of the 10th Amendment. Maybe Conyers should investigate himself House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) and three fellow Democrats want the Department of Justice to investigate civil rights complaints against controversial sheriff Joe Arpaio. The lawmakers, in a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano sent Friday, are seeking a probe into reports Arpaio has used skin color as a basis to search for illegal immigrants in Arizona. Exactly what skin color do illegals crossing the southern border tend to have, John? As the saying goes, isn’t...

Are you a conservative? Then you're a d***, and there's something wrong with your brain. At least that's what "24" actress and comedienne Janeane Garofalo believes. According to the former Air America radio host, a conservative starts out an “a**hole,” and the politics come later. She asserted, “The reason a person is a conservative republican (sic) is because something is wrong with them...It really is neuroscience.”

PRINCETON, NJ -- Earlier this week, Sen. Patrick Leahy called for a special commission to investigate possible government wrongdoing by the Bush administration in its anti-terror policies, as well as possible attempts to politicize the Justice Department through the firing of U.S. attorneys who were viewed as potentially disloyal to the administration. While Americans appear to support some kind of investigation into these matters, no more than 41% favor criminal probes.

A U.S. "truth commission" should investigate Bush administration policies including the promotion of war in Iraq, detainee treatment and wiretapping without a warrant, an influential senator proposed on Monday. Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, urged a commission as a way to heal what he called sharp political divides under former President George W. Bush and to prevent future abuses. He compared it to other truth commissions, such as one in South Africa that investigated the apartheid era. "We need to come to a shared understanding of the failures of the recent past," Leahy said in a...

(video) Speaking as if he had stepped out of the pages of George Orwell’s novel 1984, Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy said he wants to appoint a “Truth Commission” to investigate a whole range of decisions made during the Bush administration. He says it’s not intended to “humiliate” people, but to discover the truth. Specifically, Leahy wants to look into detainee abuse, politically-inspired actions at the Justice Department, and matters of Iraq prewar intelligence. “I’m doing this not to humiliate people or punish people,” Leahy said, “but to get the truth out.” “And after we get the Truth Commission going,” Leahy...

Who cares if we're like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, careening in his pickup toward the brink of the rock quarry? At least we're moving fast! That seemed to be Claire Shipman's logic in urging speed in the implementation of the stimulus plan. The ABC correspondent made her curious comment today during the roundtable segment of This Week. CLAIRE SHIPMAN: I think that, I mean as George [Will] said, given that nobody knows the outcome, it seems as though the most important thing is speed here. Will made the logical response. View video.

Grammy award-winning singer and Academy award-winning actress Cher told CNSNews.com that living under Republican rule almost “killed" her, and she does not understand why anyone would want to be a Republican. She also said that President Barack Obama’s “intelligence” and “spirit” are “so great” he will be able to do “more than anyone could possibly do.” “His intelligence is so great and his spirit is so great, I believe he will be able to do as much if not more than anyone could possibly do,” Cher told CNSNews.com at the “Declare Yourself” inaugural ball. “I just think he’s totally the...

Cher: Republican Rule Almost ‘Killed Me’ Friday, February 06, 2009 By Nicholas Ballasy, Video Reporter (CNSNews.com) - Grammy award-winning singer and Academy award-winning actress Cher told CNSNews.com that living under Republican rule almost “killed her,” and she does not understand why anyone would want to be a Republican. She also said that President Barack Obama’s “intelligence” and “spirit” is “so great” he will be able to do “more than anyone could possibly do.” “His intelligence is so great and his spirit is so great, I believe he will be able to do as much if not more than anyone could...

Here’s another one to add to the “Best of Nancy Pelosi” reel. Nancy “The Genius” Pelosi says that every month we don’t pass the economic stimulus bill, another 500 million Americans lose their jobs. She must be including illegal aliens. Watch the video.

Here at I Hate The Media, we’re pretty well known for our sensitivity. So we want to make sure we say this delicately, so as not to offend. Ah, the hell with it. Rachel Maddow is out of her mind. It snowed in Dubai this week and the queen of MSNBC blamed it on global warming. “Some big global warming news today...

If you believe in the pendulum theory of politics, one sign that the clock has struck midnight and might not be far away from heading toward dawn [to mix a few metaphors], is when the party in power engages in an excess of triumphalism. When ruling party members or their media claque do the political equivalent of singing “na, na, na, na, hey, hey, hey: goodbye!” followed by a rousing chorus of “We Are The Champions,” there’s reason to think their power might just have crested. Rachel Maddow gave a perfect example of the phenomenon on her show last night....

As someone who has spent nearly three frustrating years actively advocating the impeachment of President George Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney for their many crimes and abuses of power, I have to admit that not only did it not happen, but that the likelihood of their being indicted and brought to trial now that they have left office is exceedingly slim. While both men are clearly guilty of war crimes, and have in fact admitted to willful violation of international law and the US Criminal Code relating to torture and treatment of captives, and while Bush has admitted to...

(video at article) While Senators of both parties bowed and curtsied to Al Gore, and Dennis Miller used his sharply-honed analytical skills to determine that the man is a doofus, not a genius. “He’s a bit of a doofus,” Miller observed. “He’s got too much of his personal salvation tied up in this for me to just take him at face value and think, well, it must be so. Al Gore said it. “Since the people of Tennessee essentially kept him from getting the White House, the people who knew him the best,” Miller continued,...

DENVER (AP) ― Denver's mayor and workers at about a dozen businesses are wearing pajamas to work Thursday to raise awareness about homelessness.

Global financial services company Citigroup today cancelled an order for a Dassault Falcon 7X business jet to be delivered later this year as pressure mounted from the US Congress and even the White House. The action is an about-face from the company's staunch defence of its order on Monday, telling news outlets that the purchase of the $40 million long-range business jet would proceed. Citigroup last year secured $45 billion in aid from the US government to continue operating amid the financial meltdown. Key critics of the deal included Michigan Senator Carl Levin, whose home-state automobile manufacturers shed their corporate...

Rove subpoenaed by Conyers By: John Bresnahan and Andy Barr January 26, 2009 06:31 PM EST House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) has subpoenaed Karl Rove, the former top political advisor to President George W. Bush, to question what Rove knows about “politicization” of the Justice Department. The Senate Judiciary Committee had subpoenaed Rove during the last Congress, but relying on an executive privilege claim by Bush, Rove refused to appear. Conyers had previously subpoenaed former White House Counsel Harriet Miers and Josh Bolten, Bush former White House chief of staff, seeking any information they had. Conyers is also...

Poll: 44% of Dems Say Bush Guily of War Crimes @ 3:49 pm by Chris Good According to a new poll from Rasmussen, 44 percent of Democrats surveyed said President Bush and his administration were guilty of "war crimes"; 28 percent of Democrats disagreed. Obama has faced calls from liberals to investigate Bush administration actions for potential criminal activity: one of the most popular reader questions posted to Obama's transition website asked whether Obama would appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the Bush administration's use of torture and warrantless wiretapping. (Though he suggested in April 2008 that he would consider...

Why is it that Democrat Presidents Clinton and Obama compulsively compare themselves to more successful men who have held the Presidency? The 42nd President, William Jefferson Blythe Clinton compared himself to JFK. The only actual common denominator turned out to be that they were both compulsive philanderers. The "Man from Hope, Arkansas" may have been born there but he turned out to be from Hot Springs. The 44th President Barack H. Obama, compares himself at every opportunity to arguably America's greatest President, Abraham Lincoln. Other than settling in Illinois and getting himself elected to the Presidency, what has Obama accomplished...

Allies of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi call her a grand master at “three-level chess” — a skilled politician who games out her complex relationships with the White House, the Senate and her own fractious, heterodox House Democratic Caucus. Two days before Barack Obama’s Inauguration, the speaker showed off a new move — using the media to keep even a Democratic president from wandering onto her turf. Pelosi used a Fox News appearance Sunday to break with the president-elect on two key issues: the fate of President George W. Bush’s tax cuts for families earning $250,000 or more and the possibility...

It's payback time. Democrats are calling for investigations, congressional committees-of-inquiry—a special prosecutor, even, to hunt down those complicit in the more unsavory elements of President Bush's "global war on terror." Party leaders on Capitol Hill, like Rep. John Conyers, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, have urged "an independent criminal probe" into, by Conyers's reckoning, virtually everything controversial the Bush administration did. President-about-to-be Obama is reluctant. But he needs the support of congressional Democrats to pass his agenda. He would be well advised to take a pass, even if he loses some votes from his party's caucus along the way....

Activists who have spent years protesting President Bush admit their chances are slim of seeing Bush or any members of his administration face legal recourse for what they say are "crimes against humanity." Several activists hoped to squeeze out a few parting shots against the outgoing president in the run-up to President-elect Barack Obama's inauguration on Tuesday. Demonstrators are trying to organize final shows of force in the last hours before Obama becomes president. "People give [Obama] all kinds of excuses because they want so much to believe in him," she said. "That's how they make a tyrant. ... If...

Speaking on Fox News Sunday, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said that House Democrats would by open to the possibility of investigating and potentially prosecuting former Bush Administration officials for alleged crimes committed during the Bush years. Pelosi said that Democrats may even be forced to pursue prosecution in some instances, even though doing so might be politically costly. "I think you look at each item and see what is a violation of the law and do we even have a right to ignore it. And other things that are maybe time that is spent better looking to...

Samantha Cook, 29, of Saginaw, shows off her new Obama tattoo at Donna's Etched in Skin Tattoos, 3645 Bay, Saturday. Tattoo artist Donna Hartung, 50, of James Township spent about an 90 minutes on the tattoo. Saginaw's Samantha R. Cook is willing to suffer for President-elect Barack Obama. The 29-year-old Verizon Wireless sales representative underwent 90 minutes of needle pricks Saturday to put a tattoo of the nation's 44th, and first African American, president on her upper arm. "I really stand by Obama, " said Cook, a mother of two sons, Justin Cook, 7, and Dewon Hatfield Jr., 6-months old....

Pelosi Open to Prosecution of Bush Administration Officials The House speaker suggests to "FOX News Sunday" that the law might compel Democrats to press forth on some prosecutions of Bush administration officials, saying they may not "have a right to ignore" them. By Bill Sammon FOXNews.com Sunday, January 18, 2009 House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is receptive to the idea of prosecuting some Bush administration officials, while letting others who are accused of misdeeds leave office without prosecution, she told Chris Wallace in an interview on "FOX News Sunday." "I think you look at each item and see what is a...

The House speaker suggests to "FOX News Sunday" that the law might compel Democrats to press forth on some prosecutions of Bush administration officials, saying they may not "have a right to ignore" them......

Judiciary Chairman Conyers Issues Report Documenting Bush Abuses, Calling For Further Committee Investigation, Blue-Ribbon Panel, and Criminal Probes For Immediate Release January 13, 2009 Contact: Jonathan Godfrey, Lillian German (Washington, D.C.) -- Today, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, Jr. released a nearly-500 page report documenting numerous abuses and excesses of the Bush administration. The report, titled "Reining in the Imperial Presidency: Lessons and Recommendations Relating to the presidency of George W. Bush," contains 47 separate recommendations designed to restore the traditional checks and balances of our constitutional system. Recommendations include calls for continued committee investigation, a blue ribbon commission...

On Thursday night's "Hardball," Chris Matthews played several clips from documentarian John Zeigler's interview with Sarah Palin, in which the former GOP VP candidate criticized Katie Couric and the press as a whole for bias against her but his guest, Newsweek columnist Jonathan Alter, dismissed Palin's charges as "So lame," and called her "a Nixonian Nanook of the North." The following exchanges were aired on the January 8, edition of "Hardball": First up, after Matthews aired a clip of Palin criticizing the McCain campaign for forcing her to conduct continuing interviews with Couric, Alter called the Alaskan governor: "So lame."...

White House: Reid 'Isn't Really Taken Seriously' @ 4:14 pm by Hill Staff White House Press Secretary Dana Perino issued a terse response to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's (D-Nev.) suggestion that President Bush is the "worst president we've ever had." "The Senate Majority Leader isn't really taken seriously," Perino said. Reid, on "Meet the Press" on Sunday, defended his past remarks that Bush was the worst president and the the Iraq war had been lost. "I think you just have to call things the way you see them," Reid said. "I really do believe President Bush is the worst...

Peddlers are pushing Barack Obama everything, from now ubiquitous T-shirts and campaign buttons, to the slightly more risqué Obama-themed cigars and “Yes, We Can!” thong underwear. But the president elect in your bathtub? Proving that the power of political kitsch transcends even the lousiest of economic times, two Dallas businessmen are stimulating their own economics by peddling Obama soap. Specifically, “The Audacity of Soap,” complete with a wrapper featuring an image of the president-elect and the slogan, “This is our moment to clean up America.” With scents ranging from “sea to shining cedar” and “blue state bluebonnet,” Obama bar proprietors...

Ben Smith floats the balloon ... If Caroline Kennedy is appointed to the Senate and wins reelection, and Barack Obama serves two successful terms, Senator Kennedy from New York, into her second term after two high-profile campaigns, having amazed the pundits with her ability to step on and off charter jets in Rochester and be friendly to members of the City Council, will be an automatic top-tier candidate for president. ...and Allahpundit responds: Sounds good, but if we do it, let's do it the right way -- by electing a completely different Democratic ticket, having the VP resign and Caroline...

The Goracle spoke to an audience in Germany this week where he told them that "the entire North Polarized cap will disappear in 5 years." By 2013?... This guy is insane.

San Francisco, CA (AP) -- Some same-sex marriage supporters are urging people to "call in gay" Wednesday to show how much the country relies on gays and lesbians, but others question whether it's wise to encourage skipping work given the nation's economic distress. Organizers of "Day Without a Gay" — scheduled to coincide with International Human Rights Day and modeled after similar work stoppages by Latino immigrants — also are encouraging people to perform volunteer work and refrain from spending money.

WASHINGTON (AP) - Barbra Streisand is visiting the White House on Sunday but says she'll play nice. "Art," she says, "transcends politics this weekend." Streisand, a vocal critic of President George W. Bush, has the awkward honor of visiting 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue during one of Washington's few A-list events.

We are asking everyone, regardless of sexual orientation, to help us fight for basic human rights. In reaction to the devastating and inhumane ‘yes’ on Proposition 8, the LBGT community, is asking all Queers and supporters to “call in gay” for ‘Human Rights Day’ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Rights_Day), the 10th of December. The Queer population has suffered social injustice for too long and now is our chance to show the world how much we matter. December 10th is a Wednesday and we encourage everyone to do nothing to help the economy. We ask that students skip class, teachers cancel class and business owners...

On Thursday night's "Hardball," Chris Matthews actually praised Sarah Palin for her ability to draw a crowd and even pegged her as the early frontrunner for the GOP nod in 2012, "Who’s gonna beat her?" However the MSNBC host, later admitted giving Palin that much credit took a lot out of him as he confessed to a guest panelist: "This is really hard to do this, to salute Sarah Palin." The following exchange occurred during a segment with the Politico's Roger Simon and Chicago Tribune's Jill Zuckman on the December 4, edition of "Hardball": CHRIS MATTHEWS: As a student of...

“The KGB, I think, was an honorable place to work” with “worthwhile” achievements, CNN founder Ted Turner contended in an interview aired on Sunday's Meet the Press in which he blamed the U.S. for starting the battles with Vladimir Putin “by putting the Star Wars system in Czechoslovakia and Poland” and, when host Tom Brokaw recalled that Leonid Brezhnev reacted to Jimmy Carter's outreach by invading Afghanistan, Turner retorted with moral equivalence: “Well, we invaded Afghanistan, too, and it's a lot further -- at least it's on the border of the Soviet Union.”

A real sad example on how these brain dead morons have no idea when was the biggest event in American history Attack of the Brain dead Sheeple...

Thanksgiving is next week, and President Bush could make it a really special holiday by resigning. Seriously. We have an economy that’s crashing and a vacuum at the top. Bush — who is currently on a trip to Peru to meet with Asian leaders who no longer care what he thinks — hasn’t got the clout, or possibly even the energy, to do anything useful. His most recent contribution to resolving the fiscal crisis was lecturing representatives of the world’s most important economies on the glories of free-market capitalism. Putting Barack Obama in charge immediately isn’t impossible. Dick Cheney, obviously,...

I wont post this as the original source is Ap ...but its funny http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1202426219680

Pollster John Zogby has rejected a conservative commentator’s offer to sponsor a poll to test the knowledge of people who voted for John McCain. The commentator was proposing to mirror a poll of Obama voters that caused a political uproar when it suggested that Obama supporters didn’t know what they were voting for.

That didn’t take long. As we observed throughout the campaign, Barack Obama gave indications that his election would mean a return to the September 10 mentality, a national-security outlook marked prominently by its lack of seriousness about the terrorist threat. In choosing Eric Holder to be his attorney general, President-Elect Obama has taken a step toward confirming those misgivings. Holder was the Clinton administration’s last deputy attorney general, succeeding Jamie Gorelick in 1997 under Janet Reno. That appointment marked the final elevation in a series of Clinton-era promotions that punctuate his résumé. Holder’s rise, like Obama’s own, is of symbolic...