Free Republic

Machiavelli’s famous advice to politicians is that it is better to be feared than loved. Less often quoted is an equally valuable admonition: avoid being hated. Jim DeMint, the former senator-turned-Tea Party leader at the helm of the Heritage Foundation, never tried to win the love of the Republican establishment. He did, however, succeed over the past several years, first as the junior senator from South Carolina and since last year, as head of the GOP’s most prominent think tank, at being feared by his fellow Republicans. But now he finds himself in the position of being merely despised. Read...

BRUCE Wallder the great dane may well be the first dog in history to receive a cheque in the mail as consolation for having his testicles removed. That is exactly what Darwin council did last week, much to the amusement of Bruce's owner Tom Wallder. De-sexed dog owners receive a registration reimbursement of $60 from the council for having their pets de-sexed, however the last thing Mr Wallder - the human - was expecting was for the cheque to be sent out in the name of his beloved and recently castrated eight-month-old canine. "I said to my wife, 'that's funny,...

- PJ Media - http://pjmedia.com - Click here to print. PJ Media Symposium: Will Ted Cruz Be a Plus or Minus for Republicans in the Midterm Elections?Posted By PJ Editors On February 27, 2014 @ 12:16 am In Politics,US News | 120 Comments Several high-profile conservative columnists and pundits, including Thomas Sowell [1], Ann Coulter [2], and Kim Strassel [3], have openly questioned whether Ted Cruz is hurting Republican chances by attacking fellow GOP senators. Others, like Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin, are supporting the Texas senator’s campaign against establishment Republicans.We asked several of our writers and columnists to...

The familiar Washington narrative on the scrum for the U.S. Senate has been rinsed, recycled and delivered once again: Republicans are primed to pick up the six seats necessary to capture control of the upper chamber. The midterm atmosphere sure looks ripe, the polling appears favorable but, as it did in 2010 and 2012, the most competitive batch of races will likely come down to candidate quality. It’s the key component that stifled GOP chances before, and could very well again. .... .... A closer look at the most competitive contests demonstrates why a Senate majority in 2014 is again...

Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) is tied with Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) for the lowest rating of any Republican facing a primary challenge this cycle on a new conservative scorecard. The scorecard, from the American Conservative Union (ACU), gives both Cochran and Alexander a 60 percent for 2013. That puts the two eight points behind the next highest GOP senator facing a primary, South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, and 24 points behind Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), who also has a primary challenger. Cochran is considered the most vulnerable Republican senator in a primary this cycle; he has faced heavy attacks from...

Remember last fall when Sen. Ted Cruz single-handedly forced the biggest, most powerful government in human history to grind to a halt?That's the conventional wisdom of Washington Republicans, who also claim the GOP suffered a public relations catastrophe because Cruz demanded that their votes match their promises.No matter that President Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid were at least equally intransigent about having their way. The government shutdown was solely and only the fault of the insurgent Texas Republican senator, according to the conventional wisdom.Wait till the debt ceilingNow, remember how those same Washington Republicans also said Cruz picked...

Among the many constitutional outrages President Barack Obama has perpetrated on the country is unilaterally amending legislation duly passed by Congress with a stroke of the pen. He's done it several times now with Obamacare alone, perhaps thinking that since the monstrous law has been dubbed with his name, he has the power to change its terms. The latest example is his decision to delay for three more years the penalty for employers not complying with the law. Now think about this. If Obama has the power to delay certain provisions of the law for three years, would his successors...

In last weekend’s column about the built-in absurdity endemic in Obamacare, I stated my thesis that elements within the United States government are making a serious and concerted effort to bring about America’s downfall and that the only way to stop it is to stand in their path, united. But so far conservatives haven’t done this. That’s why we’re in trouble.

The GOPe RINOS and their enablers are starting to believe that grassroots tea party conservatives are their enemy. And they might even be right for a change. So how are they going to combat that? Why, by moving even farther to the left, of course. Would never occur to these yahoos to even try to stand on principle and lock-in the grassroots conservative vote. Our representatives are permanently out to lunch. What do you think? Should we moderate our stance or soften our positions on abortion? Homo marriage? Gun control? Amnesty? Border security? National security? Commie health care? Big government?...

On Sean Hannity’s Fox News show on February 19, guest Anne Coulter and Hannity got into a heated discussion about the nature of the Tea Party on its fifth anniversary. While both are Tea Party supporters, Coulter differentiated between “people in America who call themselves Tea Partiers [who] are fantastic” and the “con men and scamsters” who “trick good Americans into sending them money, claiming we are fighting for you and they aren’t fighting for you.”“Basically anyone who claims to be going after establishment Republicans, the key word there is ‘Republican,’” Coulter said. “If we don’t elect Republicans, I don’t...

First conservative icon Thomas Sowell turned on Ted Cruz, now it appears that Ann Coulter is souring on the Texas Republican as well. Sowell published two columns this week slamming Cruz for being self-serving. Coulter praised the first of Sowell’s columns in a tweet Wednesday. Later, in an appearance on Fox News’ “Hannity” Wednesday night, Coulter doubled down on her praise of Sowell’s anti-Cruz column: ”I never push anyone else’s column but mine. Today everyone has got to read Thomas Sowell’s article.” During the “Hannity” segment, Coulter attacked tea party groups for being filled with “shysters” and “conmen,” naming specifically...

Ann Coulter and TV host Sean Hannity clashed on Wednesday over the tactics being used by some Tea Party lawmakers in Washington. While Hannity commended lawmakers for taking a stand for their principles, Coulter suggested the movement is being hijacked by “con men” who are “tricking Americans to send them money.” Coulter also criticized Tea Party lawmakers who are focusing on “defeating establishment Republicans” instead of Democrats because the party should be united in taking back the Senate in 2014 — regardless of which Republicans get elected to office. The ultimate goal should be to repeal Obamacare, she said. “You...

The permanent political class in D.C. won't listen. So, let's start putting our efforts behind good new candidates who will go to Washington not to line their pockets, but to help restore our country. It's time to put inspiration, ingenuity, and integrity over incumbency in the GOP.

In the time Barack Obama has been President of the United States the public debt of the country has more than doubled. Using the U.S. Treasury’s Monthly Statement of the Public Debt our friend Terence P. Jeffrey of CNSNews calculates the public debt of the federal government has climbed by 106 percent while President Barack Obama has been in office, increasing from $5,749,916,000,000 at the end of January 2009 to $11,825,322,000,000 at the end of January 2014. How could this happen if Republicans, allegedly the Party of fiscal discipline, have been in the majority in the House since the 2010...

Yesterday our old friend Craig Shirley, chronicler of Ronald Reagan’s five-decade war of ideas against liberalism and communism, defined the national Republican Party this way in an interview with Brietbart’s Michael Patrick Leahy: "The Washington Republican party is no longer a political party in the way we understand political parties. It more resembles a crime family than a movement of ideas." Shirley was commenting on the charge that the reason Congress has not gotten to the bottom of the IRS targeting of conservatives and Tea Party movement groups is because the establishment GOP wants the IRS to hobble these groups...

Senator Ted Cruz is a hero in some Republican circles — and the opposite among many of his Senate Republican colleagues. At this crucial juncture in the history of America, internal battles within the only party that can turn things around are the last thing Americans need. Moreover, each side in this political civil war has all too many valid criticisms of the other. The Republican establishment’s criticisms of Senator Cruz are criticisms of his rule-or-ruin strategy, which can destroy whatever chance Republicans have of taking back the Senate in 2014 and taking back the White House in 2016. And,...

CNN's Ana Cabrera interviews George P. Bush - the grandson of former President George H.W. Bush, nephew of former President George W. Bush, and the son of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush - as he carries out his own campaign for Texas land commissioner.

Remember when the Republican establishment declared war on the tea party? One year ago, the Crossroads super PAC founded by Karl Rove launched a new group to defend incumbents from volatile, too-conservative challengers who might scuttle the party's takeover of the Senate in 2014. The empire-strikes-back counteroffensive gained allies like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and gridlock-weary Republicans in Congress after tea-party members shut down the government in October. But so far, what was billed as an ugly and expensive all-out civil war within the GOP looks more like a few scattered skirmishes unlikely to declare a clear victor. "There's...

Senators Mitch McConnell and John Cornyn say they put the country first. The debt ceiling needed to be raised. Ted Cruz opposed raising it. So McConnell and Cornyn voted to shut down Ted Cruz. They voted to cut off debate on raising the debt ceiling so that it could be raised. McConnell and Cornyn have both been very clear about this. John Cornyn told the Austin American-Statesman “I think it would have been bad for the economy, bad for the American people, and I don’t think it would have been good politics either.” Mitch McConnell declared it his job to...

credit Greg Nash Conservatives in Iowa and New Hampshire are preparing a hero’s welcome for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) after he showed up Senate Republican leaders during a crucial vote on the debt limit. Cruz infuriated his Senate Republican colleagues this week when he filibustered a clean bill to raise the debt limit. His objection forced Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and 11 other Republicans to vote with Democrats to advance the legislation. But in Iowa and New Hampshire, two important presidential primary states, conservative activists are cheering Cruz’s stand and buzzing about a possible presidential run in 2016....