Free Republic

.....It was a learning moment for the entire family, and everyone, including Nick, emerged stronger for it. But it made Rattray re-examine all his priorities, about family, love, happiness and his goals. He decided that a life in pursuit of making money and personal indulgence was empty. But he didn't know how he could empower people all by himself. He just knew that he didn't fit in anymore with the corporate banking track at Stanford. ............Spreading democracy After graduating, he left for London to get a master's degree in political theory from the London School of Economics and Political Science....

I still get republicans who scratch their heads and wonder what "GOP-E" means. Show this to them. The "E" means: (1)Establishment. It really is _us_ conservatives vs THEM in the establishment. And I don't mean "established". Just because someone gets elected, yes, they get 'established' in their various positions and offices. But "The Establishment" is a specific group, they are the (2)Elite of the republican party. But why do we conservatives have so much disdain for the establishment? It's because they are (3)Enablers Of people like Obama, or Reid, or anybody else. How often do you hear someone like Pelosi...

......I've often thought that God has a particularly acerbic wit. After all, FriedrichNietzsche, who famously proclaimed God is Dead, badly wanted to be known as a famous writer. He was granted his wish -after he became too insane to enjoy his fame. Obama seems to have wanted to become an uber-celebritycumpolitician in the worst possible way. How fitting it would be if presides over the bankruptcy of both systems. ..fabulists rising to some of the most esteemed positions in our society have potential impact far beyond what people suspect. They lay bare a rottenness at the heart of academia, the...

As a card-carrying member of the media elite, it’s hard for me to say something nice about Newt Gingrich. But here it is: He doesn’t wear blue jeans in public. [SNIP of SNARK due to excerpt limit] For many Republican primary voters, the only thing worse than a regular elite is an intellectual elite or a media elite or especially a liberal intellectual media elite. [SNIP] More to the point, does the fact that a guy reads books and deals in ideas disqualify him? For many Americans, it does. Anti-intellectualism has been a consistent theme throughout American history. The political...

Will France’s Nicolas Sarkozy be the next European leader to fall? If you understood how French president Nicolas Sarkozy found himself holed up in a barroom in Bayonne last Thursday afternoon, it would take you a long way towards figuring out what is going to happen in France’s two-round presidential election, coming up in April and May. Sarkozy, who heads France’s conservative UMP party, was making a surprise visit to the Basque country, along the border with Spain. The Socialists, who have not held the presidency since 1995, got wind of his visit. Together with local Basque separatists, they succeeded...

Rick Santorum continued to lambaste President Obama's healthcare policy during a Tuesday night campaign stop in Boise, Idaho, labeling members of the administration as "elite snobs." "They don't believe you can make these decisions," Sanatorium said to a packed high school auditorium. "They need to makes these decisions for you because if you were left to make decisions you will obviously jump off a cliff.

Dear Chairman Preibus, I am writing an open letter to you in hopes that you will do the right thing and make the Florida Republican Party abide by the rules of the Republican National Committee. The state of Florida deliberately snubbed its' nose at the party and the rules several months ago when it voted to hold the Florida primary early, which has already cost if 49 delegates out of the original 99 delegates allocated by the RNC. Now they further give the party the middle finger by allocating the remaining delegates as "winner-take-all", instead of the proportional allotment that...

One of Mitt Romney’s strongest assets as the GOP presidential front-runner is also a potentially serious liability in the race: his heavy reliance on a small group of millionaires and billionaires for financial support. A quarter of the money amassed by Romney’s campaign and an allied super PAC has come from just 41 people, each of whom has given more than $100,000, according to a Washington Post analysis of disclosure data. Nearly a dozen of the donors have contributed $1 million or more.

The South Carolina primary results have made President Obama a very happy man. He and his campaign high command know the longer the Republican nomination fight drags on, the less time the eventual nominee will have to turn his full attention and resources towards defeating Obama. Some strategists believe that a prolonged battle strengthens the candidate and prepares that person for the general election. The Hillary/Obama primary fight of 2008 is often cited as an example how a bruising battle helped to hone campaign skills and otherwise prepare the victor. However, in 2012, I disagree with this line of thinking....

No candidate has won the GOP nomination for President without winning South Carolina since Ronald Reagan in 1980. But every one of those candidates who won had also won either Iowa or New Hampshire. We’re now confronted with a designated front runner, Mitt Romney, who got less votes in Iowa in 2012 than he got in 2008 and who lost South Carolina. His reason for being somehow remains that he is “electable.” If you read a lot of the Republican commentary coming out of Washington even before the polls closed, suddenly South Carolina is irrelevant and the hick rubes of...

You hear that sound? Of course you do. It’s a dog whistle. I’m told that we conservatives (read: racists) use dog whistles all the time to clandestinely run down members of minority groups and others with whom we disagree. It is fascinating, I will concede, that the people we use these coded messages to badmouth—blacks, Latinos, etc.—often seem more adept at hearing the high-frequency whistles than we do. Why, just today, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee became the latest member of the Congressional Black Caucus to call out Newt Gingrich for the “underlying suggestions” in his reference to Barack Obama as...

Glenn Reynolds is correct in his weekend post to point to the social theory of the New Class as key to understanding the convulsions in the middle and upper middle class; I’ve written about it myself here at VC and in a 1990s law journal book review essay. The angst is partly income, of course — but it’s also in considerable part, as Glenn notes, “characterized as much by self-importance as by higher income, and is far more eager to keep the proles in their place than, say, [Anne] Applebaum’s small-town dentist. It’s thus not surprising that as its influence...

BEIJING — A rich Chinese couple who had eight babies with the help of two surrogate mothers has been forced to move out of their villa following a public uproar and could face a large fine for breaching strict family planning laws mandating only one child. The couple in the booming southern metropolis of Guangzhou had the children last year, according to state media, but the story only came to light after a picture of the children — four boys and four girls — was used by a photography studio in an advertisement. The story was first featured in the...

Anti-whaling activists said they had intercepted the Japanese harpoon fleet far north of Antarctic waters Sunday with the help of a military-style drone. Sea Shepherd Conservation Society spokesman Paul Watson said the unmanned long-range drone, launched from the anti-whaling ship the Steve Irwin, had located the Japanese fleet and relayed the coordinates back to the activists. Watson said Sea Shepherd, a militant activist group which annually shadows and harasses the Japanese whalers, had caught up with the fleet at 37 degrees south, 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometres) above Antarctic waters. No whales had been killed so far, he added. "This is...

... Never before have so many of the unemployed owed their job loss, not indirectly at all, but quite obviously directly, to the intentional, conscious directives of their president and his direct appointees, the czars and cabinet secretaries who have launched a direct frontal assault on industry after industry ever since their appointments. Consider: Car Dealers: In 2009, though everyone knew that the problems dooming Chrysler and General Motors were their enormous property and property tax obligations caused by too big, too old, factories, and their utterly unsupportable labor and pension costs, Barack Obama ordered the closure of over 3000...

Want Gingrich To Speak? He Needs ‘First Class Expenses’ and 2 Bathrooms By Dan Eggen December 7 Newt Gingrich, the Republican presidential candidate with a penchant for luxury jets and Tiffany & Co. jewelry, also appears to demand top-notch accommodations when he travels for a speech. The Smoking Gun Web site, which specializes in unearthing revealing documents, has posted a copy of a speaking gig contract apparently signed by Gingrich for an appearance at Missouri Western State University in October 2010. The contract called for payment of “first class expenses,” including the hotel of Gingrich’s choice, and “first class airfare.”...

President Obama expressed confidence that “even if America fails, I have no fear that Sasha and Malia will suffer as a consequence.” Obama said his confidence springs from “two crucial truths—money and connections. My children will have the benefit of both. I’ve already made a few million dollars on my way up. There’ll be plenty more when I leave office—book advances, speaking fees, and leftover campaign donations, to name some.” “On top of the money I can give them will be the doors I have opened for them,” Obama added. “I’ve helped them escape from the dreadful public school system....

We live in interesting times. Even as our own civilization hangs on the precipice of financial solvency, the priorities of the uninformed masses as so distorted that many will actually camp out in front of a Best Buy store in order to be the first in line to save $100 on a big-screen TV. In a time when the very problems of society are rooted in over-consumption and too much television, the everyday pleebs place such high importance on expanding the size of their mainstream media hypnosis devices that they will physically fight each other to get one of these...

End-Game for USAF Competition? By Ed Timperlake November 20, 2011 11/20/2011 The headline in the Wichita Eagle says it all—“Hawker Beechcraft loses out on big Air Force contract” Reporter Dan Voorhis writing for The Wichita Eagle, (November 18 2011) points out that; “Hawker Beechcraft Corp. says the Air Force has informed the company that it lost out on a military contract worth nearly $1billion. “The company had hoped to win the Light Air Support contract with its AT-6, an armed version of its T-6 trainer. But on Friday, the company said it received a letter from the Air Force saying...

People have been asking me all week if conservatives will stick with Herman Cain, but I think he's got a bigger problem than the conservative vote. A lot more women than conservatives vote, and the women I've talked to are finished with him. There's a new CBS poll which says that 38 percent of female Republican primary voters are "less likely to back him" now that more accusers have come forward. Among all registered voters, CBS reports that Cain has lost support among women since last month—from 28 percent in October to 15 percent now. My sense is that 15...