Free Republic

WASHINGTON — Edward J. Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who leaked a trove of documents revealing the agency’s surveillance operations, said he raised his concerns to more than 10 officials, “none of whom took any action to address them,” before he decided to give the documents to journalists. Mr. Snowden’s comments, in written answers to questions by members of the European Parliament that were released on Friday, amplified previous assertions that he initially tried to raise concerns internally about surveillance collection he believed went too far. An N.S.A. spokeswoman declined to comment, but the agency has previously said...

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) official who apologized for targeting conservative nonprofit groups for extra scrutiny is married to an attorney whose firm hosted a voter registration organizing event for the Obama presidential campaign, praised President Obama’s policy work, and had one of its partners appointed by Obama to a key ambassadorship. IRS Exempt Organizations Division director Lois G. Lerner, who has been described as “apolitical” in mainstream press coverage of the IRS scandal, is married to tax attorney Michael R. Miles, a partner at the law firm Sutherland Asbill & Brennan. The firm is based in Atlanta but has...

… Until he read the breaking news of President Obama’s earth-shattering interview with Bloomberg’s Jeffrey Goldberg on Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu might have anticipated that Monday’s meeting was going to be one of his less confrontational and unpleasant sessions of frank, allied diplomacy with his good friend Barack. […] For one thing is certain, the president’s resort to a newspaper interview on the eve of their talks to issue near-apocalyptic warnings about the disaster Netanyahu risks bringing upon Israel is just about the last thing likely to bolster the prime minister’s confidence in their alliance, and just about the...

While IRS officials were targeting Tea Party groups for special scrutiny of their 501(c)3 tax exempt applications, the IRS also hired a policeman who had been prosecuted by the Justice Department — and convicted in federal court — of using his access to the FBI’s NCIC system to tip off a terror suspect about the bureau’s surveillance. The leak wrecked a major terror investigation.He is still at the IRS. Weiss Russell (he has changed his name from “Weiss Rasool,” the name under which he was convicted), is currently employed as a financial management analyst in the IRS Deputy Chief...

Darrell Issa seen plowing ahead with IRS probe amid new evidence By JOHN BRESNAHAN and LAUREN FRENCH | 3/7/14 2:00 PM EST Updated: 3/7/14 3:53 PM EST Not even a trove of new evidence will stop Darrell Issa from going after Lois Lerner’s testimony. The House Oversight Committee Chairman is plowing forward with plans to hold the former IRS official in contempt of Congress - possibly as early as next week - despite word from the tax agency that it plans to hand over a broad set of documents spanning Lerner’s entire career at the IRS. Republicans have long sought...

Free-trade talks between the United States and the European Union are in danger of being derailed by populist groups opposing everything from globalization to multinationals, EU ministers and business leaders said on Friday. The rise of anti-EU parties, reports of U.S. spying in Europe and accusations that a trade pact would pander to big companies have combined to erode public support for a deal that proponents say would dramatically increase economic growth. "We have an uphill battle to make the argument that this EU-U.S. free-trade agreement is a good one," he said in remarks that were broadcast to reporters.

Barack Obama reached his tipping point today. I don't see him recovering from this confluence of events. Today we know for a fact that there is only one avenue left to salvage the rule of law in this country. Impeachment. Today Barack Obama reached a new low in the polls: President Obama’s job approval rating hits a record low this week, as a majority of Americans say his administration has mostly failed at growing the economy, creating jobs, improving health care and the country’s image. That’s according to a Fox News poll released Wednesday. For the first time in a...

VIDEO: 4 minutes - Rep. Marcia Fudge's oral presentation of the privileged resolution on House floor. The chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus is calling House Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) to be stripped of his gavel for his behavior at a contentious IRS hearing on Wednesday. Rep. Marcia Fudge (D-Ohio) told Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Thursday that Issa’s conduct in the hearing — which included cutting off the microphone of Rep. Elijah Cummings (Md.), the ranking Democrat — amounted to “an affront to the expectations of the American people.” Fudge also said Issa should apologize on the House...

RUSH: Salon.com. This is a huge piece here. This prints out to six pages. "Why You're Wrong About Communism: 7 Huge Misconceptions About It (and Capitalism) -- Most of what Americans think they know about capitalism and communism is total nonsense," and as I read through this... I'm not gonna read the whole thing to you, but we will link to it at RushLimbaugh.com. As you read through this, if you take the time to do it, this could very easily be the kind of gobbledygook that's being taught in college. "As the commentary around the recent deaths of Nelson...

Citizens who flout the Internal Revenue Service face the prospect of jail, but when the IRS flouts the law, it’s business as usual. The case of Christine O’Donnell, former Delaware candidate for U.S. senator, highlights the continuing abuses by the sprawling agency charged with collecting our taxes. Before running, O’Donnell had heard that if she chose to run in 2010 for the U.S. Senate against former Delaware governor Mike Castle, the IRS and others would “F— with her head,” in the words of a top Delaware political insider. In short order, someone accessed O’Donnell’s tax return information containing private financial...

In the midst of the Obama Administration's efforts to “reform” IRS regulations, the Senate Democratic majority rejected language proposed by Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) that would have blocked the IRS from acting to penalize dissent against government policies and programs. The specific text of Senator Cruz's proposed language would have made it unlawful for the IRS to “willfully act with the intent to injure, oppress, threaten, intimidate, or single out and subject to undue scrutiny any person or organization in any state.” As Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev) explained, “whether intent is malicious or scrutiny is undue is a...

Attorney General Eric Holder’s call to restore voting rights to felons after they’ve served their time in prison has split Senate Democrats. Liberal Democrats who are not facing tough re-elections this year say it’s the right thing to do, but vulnerable incumbents are steering clear of the proposal. ADVERTISEMENT Holder has become increasingly outspoken recently. This week he declared that state attorneys general are not obligated to defend laws that are discriminatory. Political experts say barring ex-felons from voting impacts African Americans disproportionately.

Has anyone noticed that there is a Resolution [1] in the U.S. House of Representatives (H.Res.411) to impeach Eric H. Holder, Jr., Attorney General of the United States, for high crimes and misdemeanors? November 14, 2013, Rep. Pete (R-22-TX) officially introduced Articles of Impeachment against Holder, which had nineteen co-sponsors who are: Rep. Lynn R Westmoreland (R-3-GA), Rep. Larry Bucshon (R-8-IN), Rep. Roger Williams (R-25-TX), Rep. Ted Yoho ((R-3-FL), Rep. Randy Weber (R-14-TX), Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-27-TX), Rep. Bill Flores (R-17-TX), Rep. Michelle Bachmann (R-6-MN), Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-1-TX), Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-50-CA), Rep. Mark Amodei (R-2-NV), Rep. Jeff Duncan...

News organizations often disagree about what Americans need to know. MSNBC, for example, apparently believes that traffic in Fort Lee, N.J., is the crisis of our time. Fox News, on the other hand, chooses to cover the September 2012 attacks on the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi more heavily than other networks. The American people, for their part, disagree about what they want to watch. But everyone should agree on this: The government has no place pressuring media organizations into covering certain stories. Unfortunately, the Federal Communications Commission, where I am a commissioner, does not agree. Last May the FCC...

Actor Steven Seagal appeared at the Western Conservative Conference in Phoenix on February 22, 2014, where he called for the impeachment of President Obama.

If the most disturbing, if underreported, news from yesterday, was Obama's "modification" of NSA capabilities, which contrary to his earlier promises, was just granted even greater powers as phone recording will now be stored for even longer than previously, then this latest development from the Supreme Court - one which some could argue just voided the Fourth amendment - is even more shocking. RT reports that the US Supreme Court has ruled that police may search a home without obtaining a warrant despite the objection of one occupant if that occupant has been removed from the premises. With its 6...

The Obama administration has asked the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA) to give it more time to hold onto phone data captured by the National Security Agency.

Your 2014 tax return will ask if you had insurance coverage or qualified for an exemption. If not, you may owe a shared responsibility payment when you file in 2015.

A House committee is planning a showdown next week with a former Internal Revenue Service official who declined to answer questions last year about agency targeting of tea-party groups. The former official, Lois Lerner, appeared at a contentious hearing House Oversight and Government Reform Committee last May, soon after news broke that the IRS had targeted grassroots conservative groups for special scrutiny as they sought tax-exempt status. At the hearing, Ms. Lerner made an opening statement asserting her innocence of any wrongdoing, then sought to invoke her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. She declined to answer questions from committee members...

DAVID GREENE, HOST: … wealthy donors like Tom Steyer are putting a pistol to someone's head, forcing their pet issues on candidates. Steyer himself sees things very differently. He quit his hedge fund with $1.5 billion and now in his view he's fighting as hard as he can with money and passion to do something very noble - save the planet. .. With plans to pour $100 million into key elections this year, Steyer joins this elite group of wealthy individuals trying to influence politicians and voters. Steyer says he doesn't agree with the growing influence of money in politics...