Free Republic

Paul is the first potential 2016 contender to visit the city.Sen. Rand Paul met with civil rights leaders Friday in Ferguson, Missouri, the city torn apart by racial unrest following the August shooting of an unarmed black teenager by a white police officer. During his visit, the Republican Senator, who is seen as a likely presidential candidate, stated his concerns about long prison sentences for nonviolent crimes, the loss of voting rights for felons and military programs to give unused equipment to local police departments. “I wanted to find out what we could do to make the situation better,” Paul...

DETROIT, MI - First Lady Michelle Obama told a Detroit audience Friday "we are better off today than when Barack first took office," as she rallied the crowd in support of Michigan Democrats up for election in November. The first lady, stumping for Democrats around the country, cited historic economic growth, higher graduation rates and health care availability as signs the country is headed in the right direction. Democrats are campaigning to retain control of the U.S. Senate in November, though Republicans are mounting a strong challenge to takeover both chambers of Congress. In Michigan, Democrats are trying to hold...

When Ted Cruz was first elected to the United States Senate in 2012, practically all of America’s media outlets went gaga over him. We quickly learned about the man’s great intellect, having memorized the entire U.S. Constitution which added to his already stellar Ivy League academic performance. That was then, this is now. Today, the Ted Cruz that the country came to admire has evolved into one of the most ultra conservative voices in America. His alignment with conservative causes and organizations has propelled him to national fame. He’s the darling of conservative groups from Tea Party activists to political...

Four weeks away from the 2014 midterm elections and even some Democratic operatives struggle to imagine a scenario where they retain control of the U.S. Senate. The terrain and current momentum seem all but overwhelming and against them. A new CNN/ORC poll out Thursday morning suggests a Republican lead over a Democratic incumbent, this time in Alaska, and does nothing to calm Democrats' nerves. "If you put a gun to my head, I guess I'd say that we're going to lose the Senate," one Democratic consultant told me in a moment of anonymous candor. It's not even so much that...

A new poll out of Michigan’s U.S. Senate race shows that GOP candidate Terri Lynn Land is within the margin of error against Democratic nominee Rep. Gary Peters (D-MI). The poll, conducted by Wenzel Strategies from Oct. 6 through Oct. 7, shows Land at 44.3 percent and Peters at 46.9 percent. The survey of 615 likely voters in Michigan has a margin of error of 3.93 percent, meaning Peters’ 2.6 percent lead is within the margin of error. A total of 52.4 percent of respondents had a favorable opinion of Peters and 37.3 percent viewed him unfavorably, while 50.9 percent...

Will conservatives lose three elections in a row – three chances to win the Senate, three chances to stop Obama and the Democrats’ agenda, three chances to put Democratic senators up in 2016 on the hot seat by forcing them to vote on popular legislation that liberals oppose – because a cohort of die-hard conservative purists cannot bring themselves to choose between the lesser of two evils? For conservatives, the stakes in this election could hardly be higher. The course could not be more clear.

During the Obama Chicago/Northwestern speech, he touted how well the economy is doing, how his policies have brought us back from the brink, millions of new jobs, etc. Well, if the economy is finally on a roll, why didn't President Obama just say that "Anyone Who Wants A Job Anywhere In The United States, CAN FIND ONE !!" Didn't Reagan or Bush make this statement during the peak years of their presidency?, Yes, we all laughed or gasped when we heard that. Well what about the 93 Million Americans who can't find a job, or gave up looking? Why didn't...

Despite calls by party leaders for would-be presidential candidates keep the gloves on, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) is privately disparaging Chris Christie as the “Rudy Giuliani of this cycle,” to donors, according to a new Politico report that suggests a particularly nasty fight among GOP candidates is brewing even before the start of the 2016 campaign season. The report, quoting multiple sources, noted that Cruz is making the comparison to potential donors as he tries to expand his appeal beyond conservative Tea Partiers and access the easy campaign cash the flows most readily to those candidates with the highest...

Michigan GOP U.S. Senate nominee Terri Lynn Land called for the federal government to secure the U.S. border with Mexico and slammed President Barack Obama for failing to properly deal with Islamic State (ISIS) terrorists during an editorial board event with local news outlet MLive.com on Monday. “I’m a mom, I have two kids, and I’ll tell you it hurts my heart with these children who have come across this border,” Land said when asked about immigration reform and whether the U.S. government should allow illegal aliens to stay in the U.S. “President Obama has basically told them they could...

Luis Gutierrez 2016? It could happen. Left-wing Latino activists are reportedly getting ready to launch a "Draft Gutierrez" movement to lure Rep. Gutierrez, the 10-term Democrat from Illinois who has been one of the most vocal proponents of massive amnesty legislation, into the presidential race if President Barack Obama does not go big enough on his executive amnesty. "I'm not running for president," Gutierrez told ChicagoBusiness.com. But the outlet noted that "he repeatedly declined to say whether he might change his mind if the Chicagoan who now holds the job, Barack Obama, fails to deliver on his promise to enact...

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) is fast becoming the king of useless fights and empty gestures. First came his destructive government shutdown gambit. Then came his half-baked idea for fighting the Islamic State. Then he set up a showy albeit unnecessary confrontation with a Christian group, managing to be the only one on the right these days magnifying differences between Jews and Christians — unlike, say, Gov. Mike Huckabee, who rallies Christians and Jews to a shared fight against jihadists bent on slaughtering both. And now Cruz is pushing a constitutional amendment to prevent federal courts from vindicating the rights of...

You don’t have to live in Texas to hear the incessant reminders by demographers and political pundits that the Lone Star State is on track to become majority Hispanic. By the time of the 2010 census, Texas had already become a “majority-minority” state, with minorities outnumbering Anglos by some two million—and with Hispanics alone accounting for 37.6 percent of residents. Although projections vary, within the next 10 to 20 years, Texas will likely have a Hispanic majority. You’ve also probably heard that this Hispanic surge is turning Texas, which has been a reliably Republican state in presidential politics since 1980,...

AUSTIN, Tex. — FOR most of a long, hot summer, Wendy Davis’s campaign for governor here resembled a cowboy lost in the desert — horseless, stumbling and finally just left for dead in the remorseless Texas heat. Despite a strong national profile, she trailed her Republican opponent, Attorney General Greg Abbott, sometimes by double digits. Among the experts, a conventional wisdom set in: Ms. Davis can’t win, Republicans can’t lose and Texas won’t change. Yet as summer has turned to fall, Ms. Davis has entered new territory: Last week a poll by the Texas Lyceum, a nonpartisan, nonprofit educational institution,...

CONWAY, Ark. - Former President Bill Clinton urged voters in his home state Monday not to use the midterm election as a protest against the White House, as he toured the state to help Democrats' efforts to prevent a GOP takeover in Arkansas. Clinton kicked off a series of rallies in Arkansas on Monday, praising Democratic candidates in close races for U.S. Senate, House and governor as people willing to work with both parties for the good of the state. He also criticized Republicans' efforts to tie Democrats to President Barack Obama, who lost Arkansas in the 2008 and 2012...

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) conceded that the state of Wisconsin lost its fight to ban same sex marriage on Monday when the Supreme Court declined to hear gay marriage cases in multiple states. With the Supreme Court's punt back to the appeals court that struck down the ban, county clerks in Wisconsin have started issuing marriage licenses to gay couples. And Walker seems to have accepted that this is the end of the road for the state's ban....

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)Vice President Joe Biden is a complete idiot. That truth, reinforced by a string of recent foreign policy gaffes, is supported by evidence too great to summarize in one article. Suffice it to say that Uncle Joe's incompetence is stipulated by all political parties. He apparently believes he still has a shot to be President. There is no chance of that--but on Nov. 4, Biden could suddenly become the most powerful man in the U.S., and therefore the world. That is because the fight for control of the U.S. Senate is shaping up to be far closer than it ought...

Public Policy Polling's first Connecticut poll of 2014 finds Dan Malloy with an 8 point lead for reelection over Republican foe Tom Foley, 43/35. Independent Joe Visconti is polling at 9%. Visconti is largely drawing voters away from Foley- his supporters say their second choice would be Foley by a 46/27 spread. In a head to head, Malloy's advantage over Foley is 6 points at 45/39. Malloy's had low approval numbers throughout most of his term and that hasn't changed- only 40% of voters approve of the job he's doing to 50% who disapprove. But Foley's numbers are even worse...

In a perfect world, Democrats would love to the 2014 midterm elections to be all about the economy. But in 2014, the world has been far from perfect. And Democrats say it's hard to grab the public's attention and focus it on a slowly improving economy with crises popping up at home and abroad. "August was Ebola. It was ISIS. It was Ukraine," Rep. Steve Israel (D-N.Y.), the chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, told a small group of reporters Monday morning. "Global issues dominated. And in September, those issues continued to dominate. And so, part of the headwind...

NORTH TONAWANDA, N.Y. – More schools are pointing out the emperor has no clothes, or in this case, isn’t eating the “rabbit food” being given to everyone else. York’s North Tonawanda Board of Education is the latest to lash out at the new school lunch rules championed by First Lady Michelle Obama. “We left thinking, what are we feeding these kids?” school board president Colleen Osborn, said at a recent meeting, according to the Tonawanda News. “We have students of all different shapes and sizes. Some of these kids have lunch at 10 a.m. and then they’re limited and can’t...

A few weeks after the national Republican Party moved in to revamp the campaign and begin an ad blitz aimed at saving incumbent Sen. Pat Roberts' job, a new poll shows him facing more of an uphill battle than ever against independent businessman Greg Orman.