Free Republic

On Tuesday's The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, frequent MSNBC Republican guest David Frum lamented over the trend towards loosening gun laws -- even after high-profile mass shootings -- and then predicted that it would be necessary to convince gun owners that "you're a bad parent if you have a gun in the house" to get the public to support more gun restrictions. After Frum had spent time lamenting that since the Newtown school shootings in 2012, there have been a loosening of gun laws in many states, host O'Donnell followed up by suggesting that most Americans agree with a...

With the dust still settling, many Washington Republicans are mystified—and alarmed—by the fact that not even Donald “Drain the Swamp” Trump had enough populist cred to swing a primary race to his candidate in deep-red Alabama. While the GOP’s class of professional strategists are generally ambivalent at best when it comes to the president, they had taken a certain comfort in believing that he was fully in command of his base. The assumption allowed them to draw conclusions about what his voters wanted, how to cater to them—and how to avoid drawing their wrath. But Alabama fully punctured the illusion...

"If the party can't be fixed ... I'm not going to be able to support the party. Period. That's the end of it ... But have I given up? No," Ohio Gov. John Kasich said to CNN's Jake Tapper Sunday.

Vice President Mike Pence will be the keynote speaker at pro-mass immigration GOP mega-donors Charles and David Koch’s New York political strategy retreat. Pence is expected to speak on public policy at the Koch brothers’ retreat, which will be held on Oct. 12 and 13, according to USA Today. The retreat is also to cultivate Republican candidates for the 2018 midterm elections who are in-line with the Kochs’ open borders agenda. “As a legislator, governor and now vice president, Pence truly understands how good policies can help all Americans improve their lives,” Koch network spokesperson James Davis said in a...

GOP Senators Roy Blunt and Jerry Moran have introduced legislation which would outsource another 125,000 white-collar jobs to foreigners each year. The outsourcing bill is being pitched as a pro-technology, pro-entrepreneurship bill even though many young and middle-aged Americans in the two Senators’ home states of Missouri and Kansas are already working with technology or as entrepreneurs. The outsourcing bill is dubbed the “Startup Act,” and it closely models prior bills sought by the high-tech sector, where executives and investors are working to raise profits by further reducing the salaries paid to American college graduates and technology experts.

RUSH: We’ve got that. We got the Republican tax plan that was introduced. One thing about these tax plans. You know, it’s okay to have a reaction, and this clearly deserves one, but what they put forth in the early stages is never what they end up voting on. This is gonna go through a whole bunch of changes and other things. And it may never get to a vote like Obamacare. You have to realize what we’re talking about. We’re talking about people who don’t want to really do anything on taxes. They’re forced to make it look like...

We’ll dig through the tax reform details as they become available. However, pragmatic #MAGA Trump supporters would be wise not to get too far out in advance of supporting this GOPe tax reform package yet. The reason for caution is quite simple. Notice the players, the key constructionists. These are the exact same Decepticons who constructed the TPP (Trans Pacific Partnership) trade deal, and who operate in DC on behalf of their multinational corporate sponsors and benefactors. The representatives within this press conference are the EXACT SAME members who constructed TPP and pushed Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) to ensure its...

The stunning defeat of President Trump’s chosen Senate candidate in Alabama on Tuesday amounted to a political lightning strike — setting the stage for a worsening Republican civil war that could have profound effects on next year’s midterm elections and undermine Trump’s clout with his core voters. It marked yet another humiliation for the Washington-based Republican establishment, particularly Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), whose allies pumped millions of dollars into the race to prop up Strange and reassure his colleagues that they could survive the Trump era. “If you’re an incumbent, you have to assume the wind is against...

I'm a bit out of steam from my rants and phone blitzes during the last two attempts to repeal Obamacare. I am not a Lindsey Graham fan, but I must say I think his Graham-Cassidy bill is a very reasonable bill. For those of you who don't know, this bill merely takes the money for Obamacare subsidies and block grants it over to the states. Each state will be encouraged to design their own healthcare system. If they want Bernie-care in their state, they can go for it. But if they want more choices on the market, they can do...

On this weekend’s broadcast of “Fox News Sunday,” network contributor and Republican strategist Karl Rove discussed President Donald Trump criticism of NFL players for taking a knee during the national anthem at games. According to Rove, Trump would be “walking away” from this controversy a “loser.” ... “He could have come away from this the winner,” he continued. “But he is walking away from this a loser in the minds of the American people for exactly the reasons you pointed out. He was against the federal government interfering and telling the Washington Redskins what their name should be. Now he...

Tonight the crowd booed the Republican Party at the Republican rally. The voters really hate what the GOP is doing to this president.

Various aphorisms address adult liberal behavior, especially that of elected governing elites of the left. When Democrats have the majority, they rule; when Republicans have it, they hold office. You can govern or you can spend. Wow – ponder that! Liberals lust after power to impose their coercive utopia upon the masses and to indulge their favored identity groups. Republicans would like to have power; they're just not sure why, or what to do with it. Democrats play offense; Republicans play defense...and have a miserable record in the red zone. Liberals accuse conservatives of preaching gloom and doom; the latter...

In a strange twist of fate, one of the key figures who helped bring about this transfer of jobs out of Alabama is now campaigning for the Senate seat formerly occupied by Jeff Sessions. Even stranger still, his campaign ads promise that he will “Kill Unfair Trade Deals.” Lobbying for the Central American free trade pact was a very lucrative job for Luther Strange. But for thousands of Alabamians it was far more devastating than that 1902 fire that nearly destroyed Alex City. A senior adviser to the campaign of Judge Roy Moore, the conservative frontrunner for the U.S. Senate...

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and his gang of establishment Republicans implored President Donald Trump to campaign for establishment Republican Sen. Luther Strange (R-AL) against conservative frontrunner Roy Moore, the former Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice, because they reportedly are terrified that more grassroots candidates across the country will challenge establishment Republicans if Moore defeats Strange on Tuesday. Moore has led in every poll leading up to Tuesday’s runoff in what has been described as the “first proxy battle” between Trump and his former Chief Strategist Steve Bannon, who has vowed to support the economic nationalist agenda that got...

WaPo: Swamp Worries That a Luther Strange Defeat ‘Could Prompt Some GOP Senators to Retire’ White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly, who has tried to control what information Trump receives about the Alabama race, was initially wary of the president appearing with a senator who might lose. He preferred Trump spend his time on policy initiatives such as tax reform rather than rousing crowds at political rallies. Likewise, Bill Stepien, the White House political director, urged caution and at first recommended that Trump stay out of the state, administration officials said. Senate Republicans, however, were unwilling to let...

Roy Moore’s close friend says the Republican establishment is right to be concerned with the Alabama GOP primary candidate leading the closely watched special Senate election against Trump-backed Senator Luther Strange. Dean Young, who calls Moore his “best friend”, says Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) “and all the establishment are going crazy” because, should the former Alabama Supreme Court chief justice defeat Strange in next week’s runoff, Moore’s fiery social conservative brand will spell trouble for the McConnell-Beltway establishment — which has sunk millions of dollars into his opponent. From the Washington Examiner‘s David Drucker: Young said flatly that...

Becky Gerritson, the president of the Wetumpka Tea Party in Wetumpka, Alabama, just outside Montgomery here, has a message for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s PAC Senate Leadership Fund: Stop deceptively editing videos to attack conservative Judge Roy Moore. Last week, Senate Leadership Fund was caught splicing together videos from two separate events in an out of context manner—in other words deceptively editing videos—to make it appear as though Judge Moore does not support President Donald Trump’s planned border wall. Not just Breitbart News, but PolitiFact too, has called out the McConnell-affiliated organization for the attack ads. Of course, such...

When he was interviewed on "60 Minutes" recently, former White House strategist Steve Bannon cited Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell as a great enemy of President Trump, even greater than House Speaker Paul Ryan. McConnell's Super PAC and allied interests have relentlessly dumped millions into Alabama to fuel a massive media campaign to smear Judge Roy Moore and prevent him from winning the runoff election next Tuesday. One ad claims Moore does not support President Trump's notion of a wall on the southern border, even though Moore has publicly said he supports President Trump including "the Wall". As we all...

The Washington Post’s Greg Sargent writes that former White House chief strategist and current Breitbart Executive Chairman Steve Bannon is “is planning to escalate his war with the GOP establishment, by promoting primary challengers who will run against GOP incumbents on a platform that is fully faithful” to the populist and economic nationalist issues that got President Trump elected in 2016.

So, anyone endorsed and supported by Steve Bannon should be a non-starter. Even if it is someone who agrees with all of my views 100 percent, if that person fully embraces Bannon, I will stand opposed to him or her. It’s that simple. Embracing and trading in on that power and influence means you’re tainted, and that is not what the conservative movement needs right now. And, yes, that also means that I will support some of the more liberal Republicans if their only opponent is a Bannon-pushed candidate. We have already allowed Bannon’s influence to be felt too much...