Free Republic

In a major setback for innovation in the urban transportation market, the Seattle City Council voted Monday to cap the number of cars that ride-on-demand services like Uber and Lyft may have on the road at any one time. The mayor of Seattle, Ed Murray, has said he will sign it. Under a new ordinance, which is the first of its kind in the United States, companies like Uber, Lyft, and Sidecar will be limited to having 150 cars each on the road at a time. This means that ride-on-demand services will collectively have no more than 450 cars on...

Most Americans who are dissatisfied with President Barack Obama's leadership are thinking about the poor economy and the misbegotten health care law. That disillusionment is justified -- if not tardy. But the foreign policy failures of this administration are likely to be far more consequential, lasting and possibly catastrophic. What we are seeing is the collapse of American influence in the world. Permitting people like Obama, Hillary Clinton, Chuck Hagel and John Kerry to deal with the brutal realities of world politics is like putting Richard Simmons into the ring with Muhammad Ali.

On the surface, it appeared that a major New York hospital had gratefully accepted a $100 million gift from a philanthropic family with a long history of donating to the arts, higher learning and medicine. But the new wing at New York-Presbyterian Hospital inspired a bizarre protest last weekend by activist groups including the NAACP New York State Conference, the New York State Nurses’ Association and the hospital-employee union SEIU Local 1199.

President Obama warned young people that if they don't sign up for Obamacare by March 31, they will face a penalty -- if they can afford it. During an interview with radio host Ryan Seacrest, Obama explained that young people might be charged a fine if they don't get insured. "If you can afford it — you just decide you don't want to get it because your attitude is 'nothing's ever going to happen to me' — then you'll be charged a penalty," Obama explained. Obama was careful to specify that people who can't afford Obamacare will not suffer a...

Yesterday, Paul Ryan spoke at length on a conservative radio talk show about the role of work in raising people out of poverty. Asked what the Republican plan was to end poverty, he replied: In a nutshell, work works. It’s all about getting people to work. And when you were one of the leaders of welfare reform in the 1990’s, we got excoriated for saying that as a condition of welfare, people should go to work and it should be a bridge not a permanent system. And it worked very well, but there were dozens of other welfare programs that...

A New Jersey cheerleader who sued her parents for child support after she moved out was today pictured leaving her family's home with her mother after returning to the house this week. In an apparent sign that the family were attempting to return to normality after their embarrassment, Rachel Canning, 18, climbed into her car to head to school on Thursday while her mother Elizabeth climbed into a separate vehicle. They were followed by her father Sean and a younger sibling. Rachel returned to the Morris County home with her tail between her legs on Tuesday night after a judge...

Was just watching the show and they played a clip of Rick Perry saying that Texas has lowered fines for first time offense for marijuana use. So far he has not said he would legalize it. So the members went around the table and all but Beckel (recovering addict) said they were for legalizing marijuana. Dana Pirino said Texas might as well legalize it because Texans are coming into Colorado to legally smoke the stuff. She also said that if a republican wants to get a hand in an audience full of hipsters all they have to say is they...

If a recent column about Hillary Clinton is any indication of how far the media will go in its blind worship of her, this year should be entertaining. Wringing his hands that, “I expect better from Hillary Clinton” Sun Sentinel op-ed writer Gary Stein lamented that his hero actually made a statement comparing Vladimir Putin to Adolph Hitler. Stein is unabashed in his love for Hillary; and although he is a “non-partisan” member of the media, since Hillary IS a Democrat he loves her regardless of what she does. So how did Hillary upset Stein? “She used the Hitler comparison,”...

Hatred for Charles and David Koch is now so pervasive among the far-left that unions are actually protesting a hospital that committed the cardinal sin of accepting a $100 million donation from the infamous billionaires–even though the money will likely create jobs for unionized employees of the hospital. The donation, made by businessman and philanthropist David Koch, is the largest in the New York-Presbyterian Hospital’s history, and will be used to build a new wing at the facility, according to The Washington Free Beacon. The Free Beacon’s Andrew Stiles pointed out that the donation “will presumably create a fair number...

A liberal blog surmising why the media always covers CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference) to the point of obsession described the conference (and conservatives) as "These f***ing people are delivering crazy to the crazy."...LOL...oooooookay!There are thousands upon thousands of graphics out there, but I rounded up 24 that make arguments against liberals or for conservatism that no reasonable person would deem "crazy."In fact, only crazy people (liberals) would disagree with them...

The Koch brothers are at it again. Their right-wing political Panzer Division descended on a New York City hospital over the weekend to protest (!) the addition of a new ambulatory care center. What the hell, Koch bros? Why not pro-America?Sorry. That’s not quite right. In fact, it was the New York State Nurses’ Association, the NAACP New York State Conference, and SEIU Local 1199, among others, who marched on the soon-to-be-built David H. Koch Center at New York-Presbyterian Hospital, which was funded in part by a $100 million donation from the man one prominent liberal recently predicted would...

<p>Harvey Weinstein revealed on Saturday that he wasn't sure how he felt about Barack and Michelle Obama when Hillary Clinton -- a longtime friend -- was defeated by Obama in the Democratic primary.</p> <p>"I strongly support Hillary. When she lost, Michelle invited me back in ... but I thought I was going to sit that one out," Weinstein said during his keynote speech at the 38th annual UCLA Entertainment Symposium, hosted by the UCLA School of Law.</p>

Harry Reid is under a lot of job-retention stress these days, so Americans might forgive him the occasional word fumble. When he recently took to the Senate floor to berate the billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch for spending "unlimited money" to "rig the system" and "buy elections," the majority leader clearly meant to be condemning unions. It's an extraordinary thing, in a political age obsessed with campaign money, that nobody scrutinizes the biggest, baddest, "darkest" spenders of all: organized labor. The IRS is muzzling nonprofits; Democrats are "outing" corporate donors; Jane Mayer is probably working on part 89 of...

...Over the past 50 years or so, these post-Protestants have gradually formed the core of a new and fascinating social class in America....And we can recognize their origins in mainline Protestantism when we discern some of the ways in which they see the world and themselves. They are, for the most part, politically liberal, preferring that government rather than private associations address social concerns. They remained puritanical and highly judgmental, at least about health. And like all puritans, they are willing to use law to compel behavior they think right. Nonetheless, they do not think of themselves as akin to...

WASHINGTON -- Members of the huge millennial generation are less religious, less likely to call themselves “patriotic” and significantly more‎ liberal than older generations, new research shows. Although adults aged 18-33 are much more likely to call themselves political independents than their elders are, they are also far more likely to vote Democratic. Their views favoring activist government, as well as their stands on social issues such as gay rights, reinforce that voting behavior, an extensive study by the Pew Research Center shows.

This should come as a surprise to absolutely no one. The radical Marxist-progressives (communists) took control of the democrat party some time ago. They’ve only become more emboldened with the election of Barack Obama, who was raised as a communist from birth. With their new found leader, Barack Obama, the Socialist Party of America felt secure enough to announce the names of 70 democrats in Congress that belong to their caucus. Other than Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who openly ran as a socialist, the rest of this lot ran as “moderate democrats.” I think it’s time we put the myth...

Like a simple parlor trick, the networks are able to make skeptical scientists vanish, at least from the eyes of their viewers. In some cases, the broadcast networks have failed to include such scientists for years, while including alarmist scientists within the past six months. ABC, CBS and NBC's lengthy omission of scientists critical of global warming alarmism propped up the myth of a scientific consensus, despite the fact that many scientists and thousands of peer-reviewed studies disagree. Neither CBS nor ABC have included a skeptical scientists in their news shows within the past 1,300 days, but both networks included...

Was it ultimately a race about race? The best picture Oscar is meant to honor the year's greatest achievement in film, and "12 Years a Slave" had no shortage of supporters before winning the top honor Sunday. But for all the film's artistry, the undercurrent of many "12 Years a Slave" conversations hinged on race and how Hollywood has for decades given short shrift to one of the most inglorious chapters in the nation's history. All the same, two Oscar voters privately admitted that they didn't see "12 Years a Slave," thinking it would be upsetting. But they said they...

February was not kind to supporters of the liberal agenda. In the span of four weeks, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released four separate reports, each concluding that misguided big government policies are hurting American businesses and families. CBO first reported in early February that President Obama’s healthcare law will drive millions out of full time work and push our ballooning national debt to $27 trillion dollars. A second report released by the CBO concluded that a mandated hike in the minimum wage to $10.10 would kill 500,000 jobs, mostly for low-wage workers. And a third report suggested that...