Free Republic

Political prognostications are a risky business. But I have been thinking about what the Republicans might do if Hillary Clinton announces in early 2015 (since she has indicated that is when she will make her decision) that she is running for president. While Republicans dislike this prospect because they know she might win, not to mention take most of the available oxygen out of the race along the way, they understand that they have no woman in their ranks who is qualified to be president, and it is a stretch to say they even have a woman qualified to be...

MADISON, Wis. — The postal carrier who investigators say dumped hundreds of GOP political mailers in a Neenah apartment complex recycling bin days before the general election could face criminal charges, a federal agent tells Wisconsin Reporter. “What we have found is that the carrier’s actions, in our opinion at least, has merited some sort of (charging) decision on the part of” prosecutors, said Scott Pierce, spokesman for the Great Lakes Field Office of the Office of Inspector General for the U.S. Postal Service. “We feel like there is enough information here at least to present the case for prosecution.”...

The Republican National Committee released a new video Friday to promote #Grubering. The hashtag summarizes the deceptive strategy used by Obama administration to get Obamacare passed. The law’s architect Jonathan Gruber called the strategy “a very clever, basic exploitation of the lack of the American economic understanding of the American voter.” A montage of various Democratic leaders praising Gruber is paired with as well a litany of transparency claims. “Obama and Democrats promised to be transparent,” the ad says. “They lied to pass it, help us repeal it.”

Twenty years ago, emboldened by Newt Gingrich's triumphant "Republican revolution" in the midterm elections, a raft of Republicans--some famous, some not so famous--readied their campaigns to take on a Democrat named Clinton in a race that may well echo in 2016, albeit with a different Clinton. The 1994 "Republican Revolution," had just taken hold, and Republican party scrambled for the GOP presidential nomination and the chance to take on President Bill Clinton in 1996. It turned out to be more difficult than some of those candidates anticipated. "My name-face recognition was pretty low," said former Indiana Sen. Richard Lugar, one...

The Democratic dream of “turning Texas blue” dissolved on Nov. 4. The left had elevated Wendy Davis, an obscure state senator, to superstar status after she delivered an emotional 11-hour panegyric to abortion. She was expected to ride her celebrity status and the “war on women” into the executive mansion in Austin. She had only to defeat a Republican white man. It didn’t quite work out that way, drawing just 38.9 percent of the vote. From the top of the ballot on down, the wreckage from the Democratic effort was strewn across the state from Texarkana westward to El Paso....

If you're a political junkie -- or at least if you're a conservative political junkie -- you've probably seen the map. It's a map of the United States showing the congressional districts won by Republicans in red and those won by Democrats in blue. It looks almost entirely red, except for some pinpoints of blue in major metropolitan areas and a few blue blotches here and there -- in Minnesota, Northern New Mexico and Arizona, Western New England, along the Pacific Coast. Of course, it's misleading. Congressional districts are of basically equal population, and Democrats tend to roll up big...

Chris Parker, a political science professor at the University of Washington, Seattle, spoke at Grinnell on Tuesday, Nov. 11, about his recent book “Change They Can’t Believe In: The Tea Party and Reactionary Politics in America.” Parker’s talk revolved around the rise and identity of the Tea Party within the American political system, with a particular emphasis on the psychology behind the movement. Besides the unique and relevant nature of his book, Parker was invited to speak at Grinnell given his connections with the College. Fourteen years ago, Parker received a fellowship through the Consortium for Faculty Diversity in Liberal...

Other than that, how was the play, Mrs. Clinton? Gradually it is sinking in to Official Washington that the 2014 election could very well do to Democrats what the 1930 election did to Republicans: make them irrelevant for at least a generation. In 1930, the first election after the Stock Market Crash saw Republicans go from a 270-164 majority in the House to a minority, albeit by one seat. In the next three elections, Republicans would continue to lose until there were only 88 Republicans in the House after the 1936 election. The Depression wiped out two-thirds of the House...

Not a perfect strategy but if you’re grasping for last-minute ways to deter Obama from dropping the A-bomb, this may be your best shot. Impeachment’s not happening. If it did happen, Obama would welcome it as a post-landslide deus ex machina that turns the country against the GOP. Defunding’s probably not happening either, I hate to tell you. McConnell and Boehner will have no choice now but to insert language defunding executive amnesty in the new continuing resolution next month, but Obama will veto that CR. And I just don’t believe B&M have the stomach for a protracted shutdown so...

On Nov 21st of last year Harry Reid chose the "Nuclear Option", breaking 40 years of Senate tradition of according the minority party a generous say in the country's affairs: Reid's claim was that under the traditional rules "the Senate is broken" --under Reid's new rules, federal judicial nominees and executive-office appointments would "negotiate roadblocks" and advance to confirmation votes by a **simple majority** of senators, rather than the 60-vote supermajority that had been the requirement.Reid's new rules meant the Senate minority would suddenly have a smaller voice, a condition much less generous and much more typical of legislative bodies...

In this year's midterms, Jews voted for Republican candidates more than they have in any election in the last decade. First, some raw facts. In the 2006 midterm elections, 87 percent of Jews voted for Democratic candidates for the House of Representatives. Last week, in the 2014 midterm elections, 66 percent cast ballots for Democrats. That's a 21-point drop in eight years—and, it might seem, a major cause for celebration among the likes of the Republican Jewish Coalition and philo-Semitic political strategists everywhere. But while Jewish support for Democrats has definitely declined over the last decade, the context is important....

After a White House meeting last week, Republicans described Speaker John Boehner aggressively confronting President Obama over the president's planned executive amnesty, prompting an extended period of a defensive Obama attempting to justify his actions. But a key moment of the meeting, left out from those accounts, was unveiled by Boehner himself in an exuberant moment of boasting in a closed-door meeting with GOP colleagues minutes ago. Boehner recalled telling Obama, “Mr. President, just give us one more chance to do this the right way. If we can't, then do what you gotta do.” The sentiment, recalled by several lawmakers...

A growing group of at least 50 GOP legislators are pushing Republican leaders and the powerful appropriations committee to adopt safeguards against President Barack Obama’s plan to grant work permits to millions of illegals now living in the United States. Without the safeguards, Obama could use taxpayer funds in 2015 to produce work permits and social security cards for the illegals, who could then compete directly against Americans for jobs. If the funding bill is approved without curbs, Republicans would not be able to stop Obama’s work permits because he could use his veto power to kill subsequent legislative curbs...

Greg Abbott made a very public play for Hispanic voters in his successful quest for the governor’s mansion. He frequently reminded people that his wife would be the first Latina First Lady of Texas, made economic opportunity and education reform important parts of his campaign message, and invested significant financial and volunteer resources in the heavily-Hispanic Rio Grande Valley. How did these efforts pay off?Statewide, the campaign did quite well. Abbott captured 44% of Hispanics who cast ballots, and actually outright won Hispanic men, 49%-48%. By almost any measure, this is a significant victory for a Republican candidate. What about...

Dozens of House Republicans have signed onto a new letter that insists the GOP include language in the upcoming spending bill to prevent President Obama from taking unilateral action on immigration, escalating a simmering fight between Congress and the White House. Rep. Matt Salmon, an Arizona Republican who organized the letter, said Congress needs to use its power of the purse to defend its own powers to write immigration policy — and he said he believes there could be enough support even in the Democratic-controlled Senate to win. “I’m not going down without a fight,” he said in an interview...

John Boehner and Mitch McConnell, as well Valerie Jarrett and Barack Obama, should take heed. By a commanding 17 point margin, Americans want Congress to take the lead, according to a new Gallup Poll (hat tip: Bloomberg and Instapundit): Following the midterm election that some have termed a Republican wave, the majority of Americans want the Republicans in Congress -- rather than President Barack Obama -- to have more influence over the direction the country takes in the coming year. This is a switch from early 2012 when a slim plurality, 46%, wanted Obama to prevail in steering the nation....

Legendary Washington Post reporter and editor Bob Woodward said on a “Face the Nation” panel that when he speaks to Senate Democrats about Obama they are “on fire,” and just as loud in the criticism of the president as Republicans are publicly. HOST BOB SCHIEFFER: I’m wondering about the talk after this election, I think the president’s relations with the Democrats in the Senate may be as bad as his relations with the Republicans. WOODWARD: That’s absolutely true. You get the Democrats in private, and they are on fire! Because he won’t spend the time, because he won’t listen. Peggy...

DALLAS, Texas -- A Texas State Representative, Giovanni Capriglione (R-Southlake), shocked Tea Party activists in Fort Worth Monday night, November 10, when he declared he would be supporting the current Speaker of the Texas House, Joe Straus, instead of the Tea Party favorite son, State Representative Scott Turner (R-Rockwall). The announcement came during the NE Tarrant Tea Party final meeting of 2014 as a pre-84th Texas legislative session panel discussion on the upcoming race for the Speakership in the Texas House. Many conservatives and Tea Party leaders across Texas are rallying around Turner. However, in front of over 200 Tarrant...

In the early 3rd century B.C., after King Pyrrhus of Epirus again took brutal casualties in defeating the Romans, he told one person who offered congratulations, “If we are victorious in one more battle with the Romans, we shall be utterly ruined.” In his more sober moments, Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), about to achieve his lifelong ambition of becoming Senate majority leader, may wonder whether he, too, has achieved a pyrrhic victory. Republicans are still crowing about the sweeping victories in 2014 that give them control of both houses of Congress. They will set the agenda, deciding what gets considered, investigated...

House Republicans have scheduled two more hearings on the U.S. response to Ebola, focusing on the health system's readiness for more cases and the development of cures and treatments. The House Energy and Commerce Subcommittees on Health and Oversight and Investigations will host the events on Tuesday and Wednesday. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Tom Frieden will appear at one to discuss training for U.S. health workers and other preventative measures against the virus's spread. "The threat of the Ebola outbreak is real and extends beyond its source in West Africa," said Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred...