Free Republic

As the country grows more ethnically and racially diverse, Americans' attitudes towards diversity seem pretty sanguine. Most Americans, regardless of ethnic or racial background, think diversity is a good thing and makes the nation stronger. More than three-fourths of all Americans say diversity is either very good (57%) or somewhat good (20%) for the country, with little difference among specific racial or ethnic groups on this measure, according to a new survey of attitudes by the Pew Research Center. More highly educated people of all groups are the most enthusiastic, but even among whites with less than a high school...

(snip) -- So-called “conservative” commentator Bill Kristol reportedly has his never-ending campaign to take down President Donald Trump receive funding from a left-wing billionaire. Kristol, the editor-at-large of The Weekly Standard, seems to have taken his never-Trump activities to another level, actively opposing Republican candidates and conservative causes through the group he founded, “Republicans for the Rule of Law.” But despite its name, the group seems to have no Republican donors according to a report by Julie Kelly of American Greatness, though there is one prominent benefactor: progressive billionaire Pierre Omidyar, the co-founder of eBay. One of Omidyar’s nonprofits, the...

Senate Republicans breathed a big sigh of relief Tuesday night when Roy Moore went down to defeat in the Alabama special election -- even though it halved their already razor-thin majority. Alabama voters rejected a man who was totally unfit to serve as U.S. senator, not just because of numerous allegations that he preyed on young girls when he was a local district attorney in his 30s but because his reverence for the Constitution was as phony as his 10-gallon hat.P But the race might have turned out differently had it not been for the courage of my home state's...

Hillary Clinton may be the most tone-deaf politician in modern history. Repeatedly over the course of a 41-year career as a political wife, candidate and appointee, she's said and done things that alienated voters. Who can forget her acerbic comments during the 1992 presidential race? "I suppose I could have stayed home and baked cookies and had teas," she told one reporter on the campaign trail in describing her decision to continue her legal career while first lady of Arkansas. And then there was her response in defending her husband from allegations of extramarital affairs: "You know, I'm not sitting...

Back when I was a young staffer in the House of Representatives, we viewed the Senate with some disdain. Senators -- and more so their staffs -- were imperious. They viewed themselves as being in the higher chamber and employed arcane rules, most notoriously the filibuster, to block actions they didn't like. But I've learned a thing or two in the more than 40 years since I left my job on the House Judiciary Committee, and I've changed my mind about those Senate rules. Sometimes we need a brake, judiciously applied, to give politicians and the country the time to...

Donald Trump has predicted there will be riots in the streets if he is not crowned victor at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland this summer. Given his exhortations to his supporters to "knock the crap out of" anyone disrupting his rallies and his promise to "pay for the legal fees," I'll take him at his word. Trump's comments are what sociologist Robert K. Merton called a self-fulfilling prophecy: "a false definition of the situation evoking a new behavior which makes the originally false conception come true." Trump likes to play the tough guy, and his rallies have become a...

Marco Rubio may be the most gifted natural politician to come out of the GOP since Ronald Reagan. But the GOP base seems in no mood to rally around a principled conservative who happens also to be an optimist. That may change, but it hasn't yet. The problem is, Rubio is competing in a primary with two demagogues willing to say pretty much anything to win; several other candidates long on experience but with little personal appeal; and one neurosurgeon who should stick to medicine. Donald Trump tapped into a deep well of anger in the Republican grassroots, driven by...

When Barack Obama accepted the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008, he predicted that the occasion would be remembered as "the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on earth." Some seven years later, America is weaker, and the world is a far more dangerous place. President Obama did not end the war in Iraq. His precipitous withdrawal of American troops allowed the Islamic State group to take control of major cities and Iran to become the puppet master in Iraq. His decision to announce when the U.S. would...

My 50th high school reunion is still a month away -- time enough to lose the 10 pounds that have crept back on after a successful diet a few years back. I have a feeling all my classmates are in the same boat. Well, maybe not all. As I look through the pictures of those brave enough to post updates to their graduation photos, there are a few who have remained slim, but most are heavier and almost all grayer, except for the minority, who, like me, color their hair. I don't know that I'll make my goal, and maybe...

In a recent piece on this site, Linda Chavez chastises Rich Lowry for arguing that Donald Trump had a point concerning the problematic aspects of Mexican immigration. Lowry rightly made clear in his article that Trump’s comments were “crude” and “did more to insult than to illuminate.” He further made clear that the problems stem directly from the huge share of Mexican immigrants (nearly 60 percent) who have less than a high-school diploma. Chavez’s response to Lowry suggests that she does not fully understand many of the issues involved. Lowry’s main point is that unskilled immigration from Mexico (or anywhere...

Donald Trump’s outrageous comments about Mexican immigrants in his announcement speech two weeks ago should have been an occasion for conservatives to say that we have no room for bigots in our midst. Instead, a host of conservatives, from Ted Cruz to National Review’s own Rich Lowry, have defended his message, if not the crude way he expressed it:

A new CBS poll on Hillary Clinton this week suggests that the former first lady, New York senator and secretary of state faces a steeper road to the White House than her supporters might think. Only 26 percent in the poll of the adult population had a favorable view of Clinton, while 37 percent had an unfavorable opinion, and an astonishing 36 percent said they hadn't heard enough to form an opinion or were undecided. Because the poll sampled all adults, not just registered voters, the poll's political significance is limited. Much of the general public pays little attention to...

Next week I'm scheduled for a cervical spinal fusion that costs upward of $100,000, but I won't be paying for it. Like 50 million other Medicare recipients, I will receive the medical care I need more or less free of charge thanks to Medicare. It's something most seniors take for granted -- a benefit we believe we're entitled to because, after all, we paid Medicare taxes all our working lives. But as it happens, those taxes aren't nearly enough to pay for the benefits we receive from the system -- at least for most of us. Despite the fact that...

Both Democratic and Republican strategists are dissecting Tuesday's election results for clues to what might happen in next year's congressional elections. State races in off years are not always good predictors of how a party will do nationally during congressional or presidential elections, but there are some important lessons to be learned. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's reelection win was predictable. He is a popular reformer who reached out to minorities and women running in a state that has had its fill of Democratic corruption and tax hikes. He's a conservative -- a pro-life Catholic who personally opposes gay marriage...

The immigration debate has taken a sudden and nasty turn with the publication of a new report by The Heritage Foundation claiming that reform legislation will end up costing American taxpayers $6.3 trillion. The Heritage Foundation, one of the most respected conservative organizations in the U.S., has sullied its reputation by lending its name to this tendentious piece of propaganda. First, the study grossly exaggerates the "cost" of immigration reform by assuming that all of those who gain legal status will claim welfare and other social service benefits as soon as they become eligible. While it is true that Hispanic...

With little discussion or fanfare, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta lifted the ban on women in combat that has been in effect for as long as there has been a U.S. military. Feminists and some women serving in the military are applauding the move as a victory for equal rights. They claim that justice requires nothing short of opening all positions to females, regardless of the consequences to combat effectiveness, unit cohesion, or military readiness, factors whose importance they minimize in any event. What is perhaps most striking about Secretary Panetta's action is that it reverses the combat exclusion policy that...

Gov. Scott Walker's victory in the Wisconsin recall election this week was no surprise to anyone but Big Labor. Unions were furious when Walker and the Republican-controlled legislature cut back their right to bargain on anything beyond wages. Democratic legislators fled the state for several weeks in 2011 in order to try to prevent a final vote from taking place. Demonstrators took over the state capitol, and when that didn't work, unions and left-leaning groups gathered signatures to force a recall vote. The national Democratic Party initially saw what was happening in Wisconsin as a popular revolt against Republican excesses...

One thing was missed in Newt Gingrich's victory in the South Carolina primary: Conservatives embraced a pro-amnesty candidate without batting an eyelash. This should come as a wake-up call to those who've been pushing a hard-line anti-illegal immigrant position in the Republican Party. Granted, Gingrich didn't spend a lot of time discussing his position, which favors amnesty for those illegal immigrants who have been here for a long time, have deep family and community ties, and have paid taxes and avoided breaking other laws. But that's the point. He didn't have to spend a lot of time defending his position...

President Barack Obama offered few concrete suggestions for spending cuts this week in his much-anticipated speech on reducing the federal debt, but he had lots to say about raising taxes. "As a country that values fairness, wealthier individuals have traditionally borne a greater share of this burden than the middle class or those less fortunate. Everybody pays, but the wealthier have borne a little more," the president said. So he wants to raise the top marginal tax rate to 39.6 percent and eliminate itemized deductions for the top 2 percent of earners. What the president didn't say is that he...

After nearly 40 years in Washington, I'm leaving the nation's capital pretty much as I found it when I arrived. The players have changed, but the problems haven't. Richard Nixon occupied the White House then, and the United States was involved in a long and unpopular war and faced economic problems at home. In 1971, to combat nearly 6 percent inflation, and a trade and balance-of-payments deficit, and to protect the value of the dollar, Nixon imposed a 90-day freeze on wages and prices, and a 10 percent import surcharge, and ended the convertibility of dollars into gold. He also...