Free Republic

Lawmakers who've endorsed Rick Perry for president reacted warily to his plan for a part-time Congress and expressed concern about his proposal to cut their salaries in half. In response to inquiries from The Hill, the lawmakers disagreed with some aspects of the plan but said they liked other parts, such as the idea of spending more time in their districts. Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) vowed to continue to stand by Perry, although he wasn’t necessarily on board with all of the Texas governor's plans. “I don’t anticipate that I’m going to agree with everything he says,” Inhofe said. At...

Super Secrecy of Debt 'Super Committee' Rubs Some Lawmakers the Wrong WayFoxNews.com Published October 21, 2011 Hiding behind closed doors may be an attempt to actually get something done, but the secrecy of the so-called congressional “super committee” tasked with finding $1.2 trillion in deficit reductions over the next 10 years is drawing scorn from fellow lawmakers who want the process to be more open. Sen. Dean Heller unveiled a bill last month to open up the talks, though it's unlikely to get action in the next five weeks the panel has left to come up with a plan. Sen....

The most prominent Republican in the Obama administration is accusing GOP House members of blocking efforts to resolve the nation's problems, partly because they don't want the president to be successful. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood was asked at a transportation conference Friday why it was so difficult to get big infrastructure projects built right now. He responded that "some people don't want Obama to be successful."

During Tuesday’s Los Angeles City Council meeting, where the most scintillating item on the agenda was a proposal to increase ticket prices at the L.A. Zoo, a speaker stood up and told lawmakers they were ignoring an obvious fact: “You are surrounded by tents.” He was referring to the large group of protesters camped a few hundred feet away, on a grassy lawn outside City Hall. The group, which calls itself Occupy L.A., has been there since Saturday in a demonstration against economic policies that benefit corporations and the wealthiest Americans. The speaker, a well-known political gadfly named John Walsh,...

The inspector general of the Department of Justice undermined and obstructed a congressional investigation by releasing secret tape recordings that corroborate allegations of misconduct in "Operation Fast and Furious," according to a letter written by Rep. Darrell Issa and Sen. Charles Grassley. The two lawmakers leading the probe into the Obama administration scandal claim Justice Inspector General Cynthia Schnedar compromised their investigators' ability to get to the truth and potentially prosecute those responsible for selling thousands of weapons to the Mexican drug cartels. Schnedar failed

Posted: 5:37 pm EDT September 20, 2011Updated: 6:30 pm EDT September 20, 2011 TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- Florida is bringing in thousands more police officers as added security during the 2012 Republican National Convention in Tampa. Roughly 4,200 law-enforcement officers from throughout Florida will be on duty and the state also will have 1,700 National Guard on hand the week of Aug. 27. Charlotte, N.C., is adding a similar number of police for the Democratic National Convention the week of Sept. 3.

Some California schools are turning away middle and high school students who have not received a required whooping cough vaccine while others are defying a law passed last year after a historic spike in cases of the potentially fatal disease. The law approved last September initially required all students entering grades seven through 12 to get vaccinated by the start of the 2011-2012 school year. Lawmakers passed a 30-day extension this summer as districts worried many students wouldn't meet the deadline.

Study: 80 Percent of Lawmakers Lack Academic Background in Business, EconomicsFoxNews.com Published August 25, 2011 Congress might want to find some consultants as it tries anew to tackle the country's deep deficits. A report from the Employment Policies Institute finds that only one in five members of Congress has an academic background in business or economics. The organization looked at lawmakers' college degrees and found that most of them -- 55.5 percent -- majored in either a government-related field or "humanities." Just over 8 percent majored in economics, while almost 14 percent studied business or accounting. The numbers raise questions...

Missouri state representative Chris Molendorp filed a bill last session to set up a health insurance exchange. HB 609 was passed unanimously by the House and by the Senate committee it was assigned to. It was never brought to the floor of the Senate. Why? Sen. Jane Cunningham said it was because she actually read the bill and was shocked at what it contained. In 2010, Sen. Cunningham sponsored the Health Care Freedom Act, a referendum that sought to protect Missourians from the now infamous ‘individual mandate.’ The Act was placed on the ballot in August 2010 as Proposition C;...

Milwaukee - Democrats appeared to have ousted one Wisconsin lawmaker but three Republicans survived recall on Tuesday, leaving two races still in doubt in the nation's largest ever group of recall votes. WisPolitics.com said that Republican state Senators in three of Tuesday's six races beat back Democratic challengers who targeted them for voting to curb the power of public sector unions in the state legislature. In a fourth race, the Democratic challenger held a comfortable lead with most ballots counted and appeared to have ousted a Republican who narrowly won in 2010. Democrats needed to win three of the six

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Congressional leaders rushed to line up Republican and Democratic votes on Monday for a White House-backed deal to raise the U.S. borrowing limit and avert an unprecedented debt default. With scars still fresh from the months-long brawl over increasing the $14.3 trillion debt ceiling, a new fight was shaping over the incendiary topic of taxes. Global markets showed signs of relief that the United States appeared to be dodging default, but fears that the country might still lose its triple-A credit rating even with a debt deal contributed to a fizzle in a brief stocks rally. "We...

President Barack Obama alienated 37,00 twitter followers last night with scores of tweets urging followers to contact their local Congressman over the debt deal. With his approval rating sitting at an all-time low of 40 per cent amidst the debt crisis, tens of thousands of Americans unfollwed the President to avoid the deulge. The president’s staff sent a total of 118 tweets asking his followers to write their Republican lawmakers to demand a compromise on debt legislation. The first tweet read: 'The time for putting party first is over. If you want to see a bipartisan #compromise, let Congress know....

WASHINGTON, July 11 (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama and top U.S. lawmakers fell short on Monday of finding enough spending cuts for a deal to avoid an Aug. 2 debt default and Republicans came under fresh pressure to agree to tax hikes. The two sides achieved no breakthrough in a roughly 90-minute meeting and scheduled a third straight day of talks for Tuesday. This came after Obama, at a news conference, declared it is time for both Republicans and Democrats to "pull off the Band-aid, eat our peas" and make sacrifices. "If not now, when?" Obama said.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Several members of Congress called Thursday for a presidential commission to study the formation of a "melting pot museum" in Washington to tell the history of immigration and migration that formed the nation. Democratic Virginia Rep. Jim Moran introduced legislation Thursday that calls for studying the creation of a National Museum of the American People without any federal taxpayer funds. The bill had 11 other co-sponsors. "The people of the United States do not have a comprehensive and accurate picture of all the peoples who created and continue to build the nation," the bill says.

A bipartisan group of House members announced on Wednesday that it is filing a lawsuit charging that President Obama made an illegal end-run around Congress when he approved U.S military action against Libya. “With regard to the war in Libya, we believe that the law was violated. We have asked the courts to move to protect the American people from the results of these illegal policies,” said Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio), who led the 10-member anti-war coalition with Rep. Walter Jones (R-N.C.). The White House is expected on Wednesday to deliver to Congress a much-anticipated report detailing military activity in...

The handful of Republican lawmakers most likely to provide crucial votes for Gov. Jerry Brown's budget plan are threatening to withhold their support without a dramatic rewriting of state environmental law. The demand, pushed in private talks with the governor, would curtail lawsuits against projects threatening ecological damage, grant waivers to big telecommunications companies and exempt many urban developments from environmental review. The legislators have declined to share the details of their proposal publicly, but draft legislation to overhaul the law was obtained by The Times. Sweeping changes in the California Environmental Quality Act would stand little chance of approval...

Concord, N.H. - New Hampshire House lawmakers — not known for short speeches — plan to wax long into the night to free their chamber for a statewide poetry competition. The House had planned on meeting three days this week to vote on more than 250 bills. When they scheduled the three sessions, House Speaker William O’Brien had already promised the 2011 New Hampshire Poetry Out Loud program could hold its statewide championship in Representatives Hall at 7 p.m. Thursday. O’Brien hopes to finish the work on bills Wednesday night.

The right to carry a concealed weapon in California is mostly reserved for those at risk of violence — jewelers, bail bondsmen and criminal prosecutors among them. But some legislators say their job has become dangerous too. Despite objections from some law enforcement officials and even gun rights advocates, they want a law that would make it easier for them to tote firearms for protection. The lawmakers cite the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) in Tucson and threats from constituents in California as cause for permits to carry weapons. "I've had guys physically come up to me

MADISON, Wis. – A group of Wisconsin lawmakers blocked passage of a sweeping anti-union bill Thursday by ignoring orders to attend a vote and instead left the state to force Republicans to negotiate over the proposal. As ever-growing throngs of protesters filled the Capitol for a third day, the 14 Democrats disappeared from the Capitol. They were not in their offices, and aides said they did not know where any of them had gone. Hours later, one of them told The Associated Press that the group had left Wisconsin. Sen. Jon Erpenbach said Democrats fled to slow down consideration of...

Republican lawmakers of Cuban descent sharply criticized President Obama's plans to loosen Cuban travel policy to allow students and church groups to go to the communist country, saying the changes will benefit the Castro regime while doing little for the average citizen. "Loosening these regulations will not help foster a pro-democracy environment in Cuba," said U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. "These changes will not aid in ushering in respect for human rights. And they certainly will not help the Cuban people free themselves from the tyranny that engulfs them."