Free Republic

DES MOINES, Iowa - Republican presidential hopeful Michele Bachmann is telling college students in politically important Iowa that all Americans should pay taxes since they all benefit from services such as roads and bridges, national defense and the courts. Her position, which she was outlining today at Iowa State University in Ames, is a direct challenge to rivals Rick Perry and Herman Cain, who are advocating plans that would allow low-wage earners to continue paying no taxes while implementing a form of a flat tax on all other workers. The Tax Policy Center estimates that some 46 percent of households...

JAMESTOWN—A Jamestown mother was arrested on welfare fraud charges for allegedly receiving more than $3,600 in food stamps and family assistance benefits to which she wasn’t entitled, Chautauqua County Sheriff’s officials said Friday. Julia D. Toledo, 29, was arrested Friday morning and given appearance tickets for felony misuse of food stamps, fourth-degree welfare fraud and five counts of offering a false instrument. Toledo allegedly had failed to report to the Department of Social Services that she was receiving child support payments from the father of her child. Investigators said she fraudulently received $3,635.50 in benefits.

Today the president will unveil a multi-trillion-dollar deficit reduction package, which reportedly includes hundreds of billions of dollars in tax increases.  These tax hikes could top $1.2 Trillion -- a figure that includes the $800 Billion in tax increases the president's plan will propose, plus the price tag for his unpaid-for $450 Billion "jobs plan."  Careful -- these numbers should not be confused with the additional record-shattering $800 Billion across-the-board tax increases scheduled to take effect in 2013, when the current Bush rates expire.  Two daunting tax cliffs; so little time.  For a solid overview of why the president's deficit...

Edged out by corn dogs and chocolate-dipped bacon, one of the few remaining church dining halls at the fairgrounds is calling it quits. File this one under E, for End-of-an-Era. Or at least the beginning of the end. When the State Fair opens for its 148th year next Thursday, it's going to be the last season for the Epiphany Diner. The landmark dining hall, operated by the Church of the Epiphany in Coon Rapids and one of the fair's three remaining church-run operations, is closing up shop after this year's fair. Its space will be used for tasting Minnesota wines....

INDIANAPOLIS - A stage has collapsed at a concert at the Indiana State Fair. The stage was set up for the Sugarland concert at the state fairgrounds. Rigging for the stage lighting reportedly fell around 8:50 p.m., before the main act took the stage. Police and fire crews believe they have everyone moved from the grandstand. A triage unit has been set up near the Hoosier Lottery exhibit at the fair. Other victims are also being transported to at least two area hospitals. Several ambulances can be seen entering and leaving the area. Fair and emergency officials are planning a...

Stage rigging collapsed after a storm gust Saturday night, trapping and injuring at least a dozen people at a concert at the Indiana State Fair, NBC station WTHR reported. The outdoor stage was set up for the Sugarland concert at the state fairgrounds. Medics and rescue crews throughout Indianapolis were converging on the State Fairgrounds after Hoosier Lottery Grandstand stage rigging fell. Dave Lindquist, music journalist for The Indianapolis Star, reported on Twitter, "Tragedy at fair concert. Entire stage collapses on track." He also wrote that "perhaps a dozen injured people have been removed from track on stretcher-type boards."

WEST ALLIS, Wis.—West Allis police say the ongoing investigations into 11 violent incidents on the opening night of the Wisconsin State Fair suggest race did play a role. The 11 incidents included nine assaults, a robbery and an attempted robbery. All the victims were white or Hispanic and the offenders were described as African-American. On opening night of the fair last week, 31 people were arrested and at least 11 people were hurt. The West Allis Police Department is handling some of those cases. The department said Tuesday that its officers arrested seven people in different incidents around the fairgrounds...

WEST ALLIS, Wis.—West Allis police are releasing new details about some arrests on the opening night of the Wisconsin State Fair, but say none of those incidents possessed elements that would prompt their prosecution as hate crimes. WTMJ-AM reports ( http://bit.ly/roRWMr) the Police Department issued a statement Tuesday with new information about a handful of the more than two dozen arrests made last week

WEST ALLIS - Witnesses tell Newsradio 620 WTMJ and TODAY'S TMJ4 of a mob of young people attacking innocent fair-goers at the end of the opening night of State Fair, with some callers claiming a racially-charged scene. Milwaukee Police confirmed there were assaults outside the fair. Witnesses' accounts claim everything from dozens to hundreds of young black people beating white people as they left State Fair Thursday night. "It looked like they were just going after white guys, white people," said Norb Roffers of Wind Lake in an interview with Newsradio 620 WTMJ. He left the State Fair Entrance near...

Gov. Scott Walker has ordered the Wisconsin State Patrol to provide additional law enforcement help at the Wisconsin State Fair after several incidents involving rampaging youths broke out on the fairgrounds and on the streets outside Thursday night. Cullen Werwie, Walker's spokesman, said the governor made the decision after reviewing the events from Thursday night, in which at least 24 people were arrested. "We will continue to evaluate the situation and make any adjustments necessary to ensure a successful and safe event. We will be doing everything in our power to ensure that parents feel that it is safe to...

Gov. Scott Walker has ordered the Wisconsin State Patrol to provide additional law enforcement help at the Wisconsin State Fair after several incidents involving rampaging youths broke out on the fairgrounds and on the streets outside Thursday night. Cullen Werwie, Walker's spokesman, said the governor made the decision after reviewing the events from Thursday night, in which at least 24 people were arrested. "We will continue to evaluate the situation and make any adjustments necessary to ensure a successful and safe event. We will be doing everything in our power to ensure that parents feel that it is safe to...

Race War At Wisconsin State FairRicky Kreitner | Aug. 5, 2011, 10:25 AM According to witnesses, a group of anywhere from 30 to 100 young black men descended on the Wisconsin State Fair last night, beating fairgoers and looting carnival games, in what witnesses said were racially-motivated attacks, Milwaukee's WTMJ reports. One witness named Eric, an Iraq veteran, said the attacks reminded him of war: "I had a black couple on my right side, and these black kids were running in between all the cars, and they were pounding on my doors and trying to open up doors on my...

If one child complains that he didn't get as much food as his brother because his frankfurter was cut into four pieces, while his brother's hot dog was cut into five pieces, we laugh. What we often don't realize is that the definitions of "fairness" that adults use are often every bit as arbitrary as those of children. This is why politicians are so in love with the word "fairness." Using that word justifies their attempt to swoop in, ignore merit, overrule the market, and take something from one group of people to give it to another group of people...

Sen. Dick Durbin plans to make a full-court press Tuesday to revive the debate over a controversial proposal to give illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. as children a path to legal status, as the Obama administration moves on a separate track to grant what some describe as "amnesty" to the same group. Durbin, D-Ill., in announcing the first-ever Senate hearing on the so-called DREAM Act, said his proposal would "make our country stronger." Under the plan, which passed the House last year but died in the Senate, illegal immigrants who came here as children and complete two years...

Geithner’s explanation of the administration's small-business tax plan came in an exchange with first-term Rep. Renee Ellmers (R.-N.C.). Ellmers, a nurse, decided to run for the U.S. House of Representatives in 2010 after she became active in the grass-roots opposition to President Barack Obama’s proposed health-care reform plan in 2009. “Overwhelmingly, the businesses back home and across the country continue to tell us that regulation, lack of access to capital, taxation, fear of taxation, and just the overwhelming uncertainties that our businesses face is keeping them from hiring,” Ellmers told Geithner. “They just simply cannot.” She then challenged Geithner on...

The liberal bias of the mainstream media tilts so far left that any outlets not in that political lane, like the Drudge Report and Fox News Channel, look far more conservative than they really are, according to a UCLA professor's new book out next month. -Snip- According to my analysis, the Drudge Report is approximately the most fair, balanced, and centrist news outlet in the United States.

The freak show, haunted house, and Skull-Crushing Terror Drop of Impending Death—all child's play. Mere cheap thrills. If you want to see something truly frightening at your local amusement park, swing by the concession stand. On the menu: artery-clogging fatty foods and belt-busting confections...

This is a perfect example of what the left thinks of the Catholic Church. In their eyes the church is an evil entity that abuses and molests children. And, now they’re smearing the pope as the molester in chief. Obama lackey, Huffington Post contributor and author Keli Goff compared cop-killer promoting poet Common, a member of Barack Obama’s former radical church, to the "child molester enabling" Pope Benedict. What an outrageous statement.

Joseph Stiglitz has created a frisson of excitement among the chattering classes with his recent piece in Vanity Fair. Stiglitz thinks that maybe the uprising on the Arab street will come here. His article decries the fact that in America, a small percent of the population has the greatest amount of wealth. He says they monopolize "the nation's income." The nation's income? What exactly does that phrase mean? Stiglitz' article is a classic re-statement of Marxism's critique of free enterprise. The idea that the rich somehow "control" all the wealth in the country, that they act in concert, that their...

Who pays Minnesota taxes? Every two years, the Minnesota Department of Revenue answers this question with its 'Minnesota Tax Incidence Study.' The newest study shows that low- and middle-income Minnesotans continue to pay a much larger share of their earnings in state and local taxes than our state's wealthiest citizens. This trend has worsened over the last decade. In 2008, the most recent year analyzed, the top 5 percent of Minnesota's income-earners, with annual incomes over $183,000, paid an effective tax rate of 10 percent of their incomes on all state and local taxes. However, middle-income Minnesotans, earning between $32,000...