Free Republic

Cancer-stricken Sen. Kennedy asks state leaders for speedy process to replace him in Congress BOSTON (AP) — A cancer-stricken Sen. Edward M. Kennedy has written a poignant letter to Massachusetts leaders asking that they change state law to allow a speedy replacement of him in Congress. The note to Gov. Deval Patrick and the state's Senate president and House speaker acknowledges the state changed its succession law in 2004 to require a special election to fill any vacancy. At the time, legislative Democrats were concerned Republican Gov. Mitt Romney would be able to fill any vacancy created as Sen. John...

When George W. Bush was President, ABC and Charles Gibson, like most media members, couldn't get enough of anti-war protester Cindy Sheehan. Now that Barack Obama is in the White House, the host of "World News Tonight" is no longer interested in Sheehan, even telling WLS radio in Chicago, "Enough already." I guess she served her purpose as reported by the Washington Examiner's Byron York Thurday: In an appearance August 18 on WLS radio in Chicago, ABC News anchor Charles Gibson was asked about anti-war protester Cindy Sheehan's plans to travel to Martha's Vineyard next week, where she will protest...

Those words begin this stark, frank, and -- unfortunately -- utterly necessary column by the very fine writer Leonard Pitts, Jr.. The subject is Nazis, who seem to be everywhere these days. Read on: I hope this column makes you sick. See, we'll be talking about Nazis, something many of us are doing lately. Indeed, just this week a fellow named Joseph e-mailed me about a caller he heard on a radio show. The man, vexed over healthcare reform, likened President Obama to Adolf Hitler. Asked why, he said, ``Hitler took over the car companies, then healthcare and then he...

I missed this yesterday at Newsbusters but Treacher, rightly aghast, tipped me to it this afternoon. Never will you see a starker example of MSNBC getting away with the sort of deception for which Fox News would be pilloried, especially in the context of race. If you missed Monday’s post about this, go watch the footage (or look at this photo) and see if you can deduce why they wouldn’t want to show the guy with the rifle from the neck up during this particular segment. For all the well-deserved heat that MSNBC’s primetime line-up has taken for its demagoguery...

SALEM, Ore. – Marion County Sheriff Russ Isham has resigned after an investigation found "substantial evidence" of official misconduct. In a separate public statement, Isham admitted to an extramarital affair. According to Tony Green of the Attorney General's office, the Oregon Department of Justice was asked on August 12 by Marion County to investigate a report of official misconduct. Within the week, the DOJ found substantial evidence of official misconduct as a result of Sheriff Isham trying to conceal a "personal impropriety." On Wednesday, Isham admitted that the impropriety was an affair. According to Green, a subordinate learned of the...

<p>A Florida teenager could face felony vandalism charges for allegedly gluing posters depicting President Obama as the Joker onto public property, FOXNews.com has learned.</p> <p>Clermont, Fla., Police Capt. Eric Jensen said the state attorney will review evidence to determine whether to charge the unidentified teenager with gluing "dozens" of the posters last week to the city's light poles, public and private buildings, bridge overpasses, road signs and a mailbox.</p>

Here is video of former White House Press Secretary Dana Perino saying the White House Press Corps is giving Obama a free pass on the unsolicited emails sent to citizens who never requested to receive the emails from the White House. Perino likened what the White House has done to it being the same if people had gotten unsolicited emails from former Bush strategist Karl Rove, which Perino said would have made people "go crazy." Only Fox News is questioning these actions by the White House, and it is absolutely true that had the Bush White House done anything like...

CLERMONT - Clermont police have interviewed one suspect who is admitting to putting up the dozens of posters pasted around the city depicting President Obama as the Joker character from the Batman film The Dark Knight, city officials confirmed. Assistant City Manager Darren Gray said city officials have an individual "admitting to putting up 500" of the posters. Clermont Police Capt. Eric Jensen said the male individual has admitted to putting up some signs, but investigators suspect others were involved and their investigation is continuing. "We have talked to an individual," Jensen said. "He only admitted to some of it...We're...

On her MSNBC show last night, the left-wing Air America host Rachel Maddow took a swipe at the conservative Shirley & Banister Public Affairs firm, specifically President & CEO Craig Shirley. Maddow accused Shirley of being behind a grassroots Web site funded by the group Grassfire.org, based on research provided by the "independent watchdog group Public Citizen," and she showed still images from an incendary "Obama=Hitler" video that's still posted on the Grassfire's ResistNet.com Web site. BUT MADDOW WAS WRONG. THE PUBLIC CITIZEN WEB PAGE SHE CITED IS SEVERAL YEARS OLD. Shirley & Bannister hasn't represented Grassfire.org since 2004, and...

President Barack Obama plans to replace a "batch" of U.S. Attorneys in the next few weeks and more prosecutors thereafter, according to Attorney General Eric Holder. "I expect that we’ll have an announcement in the next couple of weeks with regard to our first batch of U.S attorneys," Holder said Thursday during a House Judiciary Committee hearing which stretched out over most of the day due to breaks for members' votes. "One of the things that we didn’t want to do was to disrupt the continuity of the offices and pull people out of positions where we thought there might...

Will media that savaged Joe the plumber now go after the fake doctor? When regular citizen "Joe the Plumber" asked an innocent, heartfelt, but challenging question of presidential candidate Barack Obama last year, he ended up getting skewered by the "mainstream" media. Every detail of his past was looked at for possible motives and nefarious associations. Democratic state officials in Ohio even thumbed through his records illegally to find dirt on him. That somehow doesn't happen with liberals. A woman at Democratic Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee's town hall meeting in Texas recently claimed to be a pediatrician and stood up to...

Since at least May, this newspaper has received suspiciously uniform letters to the editor expressing support for Democratic health care reform plans. The letters come in the same format, use the same talking points and often contain the exact same language. We have found that they came (and are still coming) from Organizing for America. That's President Obama's own campaign organization. Its Web site is www.barackobama.com. That's interesting because last week White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs dismissed thousands of Americans who have protested against Democratic health care plans. He said these citizens displayed "manufactured anger," and he warned of...

(CNN) -- The guitarist stands in front of a mirror messing with his mohawk. The drummer strikes a wild tempo. The singer rips off his T-shirt and begins to scream the lyrics. Basim Usmani is bassist for The Kominas, a group that blends traditional sounds with punk rock beats. They're young. They're punk. And they're rocking both their Muslim and American worlds with their music, lyrics and style. "A lot of times people say, 'Oh wow, look, brown people playing music' [but] it's more than that," said 25-year-old Pakistani-American Shahjehan Khan, the lead singer for a Muslim punk band, The...

During his recent HBO special, "Tall, Dark and Chicano," comedian George Lopez tore a hole in the Big Tent. Incensed that 31 Senate Republicans had voted against Sonia Sotomayor's nomination to the Supreme Court, Lopez informed the GOP that it would never again get the votes of Latinos. In fact, he said, given changing demographics, Republicans might as well get used to losing in the years to come because "you won't win a . . . pie-eating contest." That's harsh, but fair. Republicans know not what they did. They're only fooling themselves if they think they won't pay a price...

I have a question. Why do conservatives allow ourselves to be called "Rednecks". I'm on YouTube and Digg. When a poster calls us uneducated Rednecks, no one says a word. Why don't we own this word? Why aren't we framing the conversation? I find it insulting to be called a dumb Redneck. Much more than to be called a dumb Pollack, because at least I'm Polish. If macaca is insulting, why is Redneck okay?

Last week, psychotic lesbian Rachel Maddow used the following words in reference to Town Hall protesters: intimidation, terrorism, mob rule, angry mob, fear– in a tone that could only be described as the solemn outrage of the oppressed. In the second video, compare Maddow’s reaction (in first video) to an Iraqi attempting physical violence in protest against President Bush.

For years, the Bush administration was criticized for not cleaning up enough of the nation's most contaminated waste sites. The Obama administration plans to do even less.

For years, the Bush administration was criticized for not cleaning up enough of the nation's most contaminated waste sites. The Obama administration plans to do even less. Environmental groups and some Democratic lawmakers railed against President George W. Bush's cleanup record. But this time, they're shying away from speaking out against a popular president who's considered an ally in the fight to clean up the environment. Associated PressFewer EPA cleanups are planned under the administration of President Barack Obama, above. In Obama's first two years in office, the Environmental Protection Agency expects to begin the final phase of cleanup at...

Perhaps it's the Russ Feingold influence. Feingold, when he served in the Wisconsin Legislature before traipsing off to Washington, was the bulldog behind legislation that outlawed gifts and other perks to legislators, things like free dinners and drinks, pen sets and the like, or even a cup of coffee. The idea was that legislators ought not be beholden to anyone except the people who elected them. Conversely, lawmakers are not to lavish favors on lobbyists and other influence peddlers. So by law they are to pay for their own meals and reimburse their hosts when they get something of value...

Talk about "manufactured outrage!" These people could give the right lessons in how to do it!Thanks "Missy" for passing this along: Now is our chance to make health care work. America’s health care system is broken. Health care costs are spiraling out of control, throwing families, businesses and government into financial crisis. Families are worried their health coverage won’t be there when they need it. Our country can’t afford to wait for health reform that keeps costs down and protects consumers. We can’t wait for affordable, dependable health care. We’re fighting for health care that will protect families’ financial health,...

If there's one thing about liberals, it's that they're predictably predictable. In their eyes, it is more than acceptable to mock Sarah Palin and her family, using descriptions that range from rude to crude. When President Bush was in office, he was the focus of daily ridicule from left-wing journalists and bloggers. However, no one better make fun of Barack Obama or the thought police will express "outrage" and brand you a racist. That's exactly what is happening now as a poster of Obama in "Joker" makeup is popping up on walls and city streets. My question to the lefties:...

This is no time for jokes or trivial banter. The stakes are getting higher by the nanosecond. As tensions are inflamed at health care town hall meetings across the country, a dangerous trend of Hitler comparisons, Stalin comparisons, and all-around dictator comparisons to President Barack Obama is taking shape. The most probing question at this juncture might be uncomfortable to some, but it must be asked: Do conservative, hard-right demagogues, whose hatred for President Obama has hardly ever been subdued, secretly hope for--and are hard at work toward--the assassination of the nation's first Black president. The sheer thought that a...

In a very orderly discussion of the Health care issue on Saturday 8/8/2009 Congressman Doggett was asked about mandating all Congressmen, Senators, government workers and the President to be required to use the same health plan as the American Public. His committee has studied health care for 2 years but says that such provisions are not part of the overall plan. Both sides of the healthcare reform issue cheered when this was brought up to the Congressman.

Imagine it's four years ago and an aide to President Bush posted a blog on the Whitehouse.gov website that bemoaned Internet criticism of the Iraq war, then continued: "These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversations. "Since we can't keep track of all of them here at the White House, we're asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about anti-war protests that seem fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.'' Substitute the words "health insurance reform" for "anti-war protests," and you get the exact wording of a...

What happens when the middle class feels even more victimized than the nation's poor? When American middle-class citizens feel that they are being steamrolled by a Changeopoly Blitzkrieg, engineered by the principalities and powers of overreaching government and corporate oligarchs? When the only answer they're given to their just concerns about unsustainable debt is "We won."? Well, those beleaguered middle-class folks might take a look at the tactics which have been working against them for four decades and decide to make use of some of those tactics themselves. Middle-class Americans, myself among them, have watched for 40 years, as one...

Here is video of a 2004 MoveOn.Org ad that blatantly compared President George W. Bush to Adolf Hitler. The ad was run in opposition to the War in Iraq. I don't recall hearing any Democrats condemn MoveOn.Org or refuse to use money provided by it's primary source of funding - George Soros. Yet, when conservatives today draw parallels to Obama's attempt to get citizens to spy and "rat" on one another and what Hitler did in Germany to get citizens there to report opposition to him, the Left goes crazy. The difference? Iraq was an invasion designed to depose a...

As so-called journalists negatively depict town hall meeting protesters as an organized angry mob (or worse!), they seem to forget how throughout most of this decade while George W. Bush was president dissent was quite encouraged. As an example, try to guess who said this in 2003? I am sick and tired of people who say that if you debate and you disagree with this administration somehow you're not patriotic. We should stand up and say we are Americans and we have a right to debate and disagree with any administration.

This required a few passes to be sure my eyes weren’t playing tricks. You keep telling yourself to stop being amazed by hypocrisy and bias, but again and again someone like Philip Kennicott, a staff writer for the Washington Post, comes up with nonsense like this: And didn’t we see George W. Bush depicted as the Joker not so long ago? Yes, in an image by Drew Friedman published online by Vanity Fair on July 29, 2008. That drawing at least played into a view of Bush popular among his detractors, that the former president was unpredictable and fast on...

ON first watching Hillary Clinton’s recent “It’s 3 a.m.” advertisement, I was left with an uneasy feeling that something was not quite right — something that went beyond my disappointment that she had decided to go negative. Repeated watching of the ad on YouTube increased my unease. I realized that I had only too often in my study of America’s racial history seen images much like these, and the sentiments to which they allude.

Posters started appearing in Los Angeles depicting Obama as the Joker with the word “socialism” below his face. The image quickly spread throughout the internet, gaining knee-jerk liberal condemnation and making people ask things like “What does Obama have to do with the Joker?” and “What does the Joker have to do with socialism?” and “Is this racist somehow? I’m pretty sure it has to be racist.” Well, as it’s my job as some guy on the internet, I will definitively answer all of these questions. First off, it’s worth looking at whether the poster is racist. Liberals seem pretty...

Hey, no top-down direction here in President Obama’s latest mass e-mailing to his minions. Only thing missing is advice on how to dress like “real” grass-roots activists and instructions on how to snitch on friends and neighbors saying “fishy” things about socialized medicine. Astroturf powers, unite! from President Barack Obama info@barackobama.com reply-to info@barackobama.com date Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 10:21 AM subject This is the moment mailed-by bounce.bluestatedigital.com This is the moment our movement was built for. -snip- read the rest at Michelle Malkin

"Enough of the MOB" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtTBkxvBq88 Washington -- The Democratic National Committee today released a new web ad "Enough of the Mob" highlighting the angry mobs of a small number of GOP and special interest backed rabid right wing extremists who are disrupting thoughtful discussions about the future of health care in America taking place in Congressional Districts across the country. "It's become clear that Republican leaders, having lost every major legislative battle on Capitol Hill, the confidence of the American people and two consecutive national elections, would rather incite angry, special interest funded mobs and disrupt and drown out legitimate...

"When you are running for President, everything should be public..."

On his TV show Glenn Beck railed against the hypocrisy of the left for attacking a poster depicting Barack Obama as the villainous Joker character from The Dark Knight Batman movie. The poster, by an anonymous artist, has popped up in Los Angeles and Atlanta. The word “socialism” appears under the president’s PhotoShopped face. Said Beck: “Don’t they know rule number five from Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals: ‘ridicule is man’s most potent weapon’? Interesting how mad they get when you use their rules against them, isn’t it?” The posters have some liberals furious, Beck said. For example, Steven Mikulan...

Remember when the media lionized Cindy Sheehan and her fellow anti-war Code Pink protesters as they protested the war with tactics like disrupting multiple State of the Union addresses? The President’s inauguration? Hearings and public events too numerous too mention? And I’m sure you’ve all seen news reports about union groups and other liberal activists storming the campaign offices of Republicans and things like that. It happens all the time. It’s interesting to watch those same media types who seemingly have no problems with liberal activists harassing Republicans cluck their tongues derisively when Democrats are confronted by angry constituents at...

Political conspiracy theories – like the so-called “birther” allegation that Obama is not a legitimate US citizen – are as old as the nation. In the late 1700s, it was rumored that the Freemasons were actually a Satanic cult and George Washington was a member who was elevated to the presidency so they could control the country. Such views were generally held by a few fringe groups and were viewed by the mainstream culture as a bit nutty. But in the past few decades, conspiracy theories have tended to become a part of mainstream political culture, say political analysts. They...

The LA Weekly ”…only thing missing is the noose.”: A new poster depicting President Obama as a version of Heath Ledger’s Joker character in The Dark Knight has appeared in Los Angeles. It has a bit of everything to appeal to the drunk tank of California conservatism: Obama is in white face, his mouth (like Ledger’s Joker’s) has been grotesquely slit wide open and the word “Socialism” appears below his face. The only thing missing is a noose.

A poster depicting Barack Obama as Batman villain The Joker has been called 'mean-spirited and dangerous' by the U.S. President's supporters. The image, which has been adopted by Mr Obama's critics, shows him wearing the white face paint and smudged red lips of the character most recently played by the late actor Heath Ledger. Beneath the picture reads the word 'socialism'. The creator of the image remains unknown, but the website that first published the image crashed yesterday because so many had been attempting to view it. It has since been spotted in Los Angeles and Atlanta after it appeared...

Not surprisingly, the Obama Joker Poster reported by NewsBusters Saturday is already drawing some outrage. According to a television station where the posters have been spotted, "Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable President Earl Ofari Hutchinson is calling the depiction, politically mean spirited and dangerous." Yet, when Vanity Fair's Politics & Power blog published a somewhat similar visual representation of George W. Bush last July, nobody seemed to complain. In fact, throughout the Bush years, demeaning drawings of the President and Vice President Dick Cheney were quite commonplace. But, according to KTLA.com, depicting Barack Obama in unflattering terms is a no...

By now you have probably seen the wave of Sarah Palin rumors in the dinosaur media and the liberal blogs’ focus on the story that Sarah Palin and husband Todd are headed for divorce because of extramarital affairs by both. As you may imagine, the rumor was like a dream come true for many lefty bloggers. Look at the “name in the paper” syndrome that followed Palin resigning her office and the stir that caused on the left. Not only did she reinforce her name recognition with that move with publicity you couldn’t buy from the dinosaur media at any...

Liberal radio talk show host Mike Malloy trashes Rush Limbaugh, Sarah Palin and Free Republic on his radio show. "I hope that Limbaugh chokes to death on his throat fat," Malloy said. To comment on this video click here or click the "Comments" link below.

A jumpy cat caused a distraction, report saysHOLLYWOOD - After a Hollywood police officer rear-ended a car in February and then arrested the driver on drunken driving charges, he and other officers talked about doctoring the report -- it said a jumpy cat created a distraction -- to cover up the crash. The exchange was recorded by a dashboard camera in one of the patrol cars. The officers apparently didn't realize it was on.

Well, surely this will settle finally once and for all that Barack Hussein Obama was really, actually and factually born in the United States and, therefore, is fully qualified according to the U.S. Constitution to be the president that he has been since he took the oath of office on Jan. 20 and a second time shortly after, just to make sure. Not! In yet another quite possibly futile attempt to silence the zombie birther controversy that won't die,

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs today admitted that the questions about Barack Obama's eligibility to be president simply won't go away, even though he contends there are 10,000 things "more important" for Americans to worry about. Gibbs appeared exasperated by the issue, even when it was raised by left-leaning pundit Bill Press, who phrased his interest this way: "Robert, I hate to bring this up but somebody has to … Is there anything you can say that will make the birthers go away?" "No," said Gibbs. "I mean, the God's honest truth is no. I mean, Bill, let's understand...

Researching the Obama birth certificate conspiracy has yielded many theories and wild speculations. Despite the likelihood that most of them are without merit, the one haunting theme i: what is Obama hiding? The forged birth certificate that appeared on Obama’s campaign site has spawned new curiosities, theories and demands to know where in the world is Barack Obama’s birth certificate. Is it in Kenya, Hawaii, Chicago, and Indonesia? We believe the Certification of Live Birth is authentic, but that is not that part where it gets tricky with parsing of words and comparing apples to oranges. The document provided by...

Last week, the media was forced into reporting on the Obama birth-certificate/eligibility issue. It had little choice because respected CNN Journalist Lou Dobbs had the audacity to suggest that Obama should produce his long-form birth certificate to put to rest the doubts of millions of Americans who believe Obama is not constitutionally eligible to serve as President. Immediately and predictably, much of the reporting from the main stream media was in the form of vicious attacks, seeking to discredit Mr. Dobbs and others looking for clear and convincing evidence that Mr. Obama is or is not a “Natural Born Citizen”...

"Cook v Obama Complaint filed today cook-v-obama-tro-fl Tampa, Florida 33602-3800 MAJOR STEFAN FREDERICK COOK, Plaintiff, Civil Action Number: v. 8:09-cv-01382-RAL-EAJ SIMTECH, INC., LARRY GRICE, CEO OF SIMTECH, DEFENSE SECURITY SERVICES, COLONEL LOUIS B. WINGATE, DR. ROBERT M. GATES, UNITED TRIAL-BY-JURY DEMANDED STATES SECRETARY OF DEFENSE, Pursuant to 28 USC §1861 and BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA, de facto Seventh Amendment PRESIDENT of the UNITED STATES, Defendants. COMPLAINT FOR DAMAGES, DECLARATORY JUDGMENT, AND INJUNCTIVE RELIEF 1. Comes now the Plaintiff Stefan Frederick Cook with this Complaint, Declaratory Judgment, and Application for a Temporary Restraining Order and Preliminary Injunction to preserve the status quo...

On a story that no news organization has followed more closely than WND – questions surrounding Barack Obama's birth certificate – one of the Internet's top news portals, Google News, is now placing dozens of sources and even left-leaning blogs higher in the search rankings than WND. So appears to be Bing, the new Google competitor. Weeks ago, when WND was one of the few sources for news information about President Obama's eligibility controversy, a search for "Obama birth certificate" on Google News would have produced dozens of WND story links. Today, however, typing in "Obama birth certificate" and sorting...

For the last week the OCCE (Orange County Conservative Examiner) has plowed through many of the complaints and reports on Obama’s birth certificate. Like many Americans we felt that despite the partisanship of our leaders that no Democrat or Republican would let someone run for the highest office in the land that was unconstitutionally unqualified. There is a reason they’re called vital records. However, to the OCCE does surprise and chagrin we found merit to the claim and disappointment that the POTUS has thumbed his nose at Americans want reassurance. Despite the zealots that are involve there are points that...

The Fourteenth Amendment and a “natural born citizen” A common misunderstanding of “natural born” citizenship comes from the Fourteenth Amendment, but a strict reading of the fourteenth amendment is quite clear that this only conveys an at birth naturalized citizenship. Those born in the United States at the time of adoption and afterwards were only citizens. Those who wrote the amendment knew exactly what they were doing. Because of the distinctive use of “natural born citizen” and “citizen,” in Article II, Section 1 the simple fact that being born in the United States does not make one a “natural born...