Free Republic

The Obama administration doesn’t have watchdogs. It has whitewash puppies. The president’s Chicago bullies have defanged true advocates for integrity in government in D.C. from day one. So the latest report by the Senate Homeland Security and Government Operations Committee on corruptocrat Charles K. Edwards, the former Department of Homeland Security inspector general, isn’t a revelation. It’s confirmation. Investigators found that Edwards compromised the independence of his office by socializing and sucking up to senior DHS officials. “There are many blessings to be thankful for this year,” the sycophantic Edwards wrote to the DHS acting counsel on Thanksgiving 2011, “but...

Zeituni Onyango, President Obama's illegal alien aunt, died this week of cancer and other complications. I hope she rests in peace. America, however, should be up in arms. Auntie Zeituni is an enduring symbol of all that is wrong with this country's immigration "policy" -- or rather, its complete lack of a coherent, enforceable system of laws and rules that puts the national interest first. She was a beneficiary of the welfare state run amok, enabled by bipartisan fecklessness. To the bitter end, she bit the hand that fed her with predictable ingratitude and metastatic entitlement. Zeituni's 14-year illegal overstay...

I have created a new species designation for the female Democrats who play hypocritical gender politics on behalf of Barack Obama. They're genderhawks. You remember the term "chickenhawk," don't you? During the Bush years, anti-war activists and journalists hurled the ad hominem epithet at anyone who supported military action against our enemies but hadn't personally served. I say let's give 'em a dose of their own tactical medicine. Genderhawks are feminist chickenhawks. They demand "equal pay" for women, practice militant identity politics based on chromosomes and purport to wage an all-out government war on gender inequity. Yet, they personally refuse...

Our great friend and Boss Emeritus, Michelle Malkin, offers a powerful testimony today in her column on marijuana legalization — and a surprisingly personal perspective. Sure, we all have fun with jokes at Colorado’s experiment with recreational approval, but the access it creates does more than just serve as easy access to intoxication. Michelle found herself in one of the pot shops that have opened to serve demand that comes from more than just fun and games, hoping to find help for her mother-in-law: It’s 9 a.m. on a weekday, and I’m at the Marisol Therapeutics pot shop. This is...

Back in September, our family received an Obamacare-induced health insurance death notice. We joined millions of other Americans whose individual market health plans died after Democrats lied about our ability to keep the plans and doctors we liked. President Obama tried to "fix" the mess he created. But as usual, the federal government's solutions have made things even worse. Confusion and chaos reign not just in our household, but across the country. As I reported last fall, our letter from Anthem BlueCross BlueShield of Colorado informed us that we could no longer keep our high-deductible PPO plan with a wide...

I need to pick someone's brain on a Firefox question and on what happened to Michelle Malkin. First, I can't keep Firefox from automatically updating. I have tried everything I can find on the Internet about ensuring Firefox doesn't automatically. I have version 24 and 25 and I don't want to update any further, but no matter what I try it still continues to do so. I've told Firefox not to update under the Tools/Options/Advanced/Update tab. I deleted the Maintenance Service. I've gone into about:config and deleted the update URL. AND NOTHING WORKS!!!!!! Anyone else out there got any ideas?...

Michelle Malkin doesn’t run away from fights, she runs toward them. And she’s running faster than ever headlong into the 2014 Republican primary battles on behalf of upstart conservative candidates who are mounting insurgent challenges to the GOP old guard. Twitter is Malkin’s weapon of choice. Battles with her almost always devolve into wars, and those who follow the conservative social media scene know she has a proven formula online: Taunting quips from foes bring out the full force of her Twitter arsenal, with snappy replies, catchy hashtags and the mobilization of a legion of energized followers. Malkin, 43, says...

Giant corporations make common cause with leftist special interests to win government favors. he U.S. Chamber of Commerce is a politically entrenched synod of special interests. These fat cats do not represent the best interests of American entrepreneurs, American workers, American parents and students, or Americans of any race, class, or age who believe in low taxes and limited government. The chamber’s business is the big business of the Beltway, not the business of mainstream America. If you are a business owner who believes your country should strictly and consistently enforce its borders and deport illegal immigrants who violate the...

Not so fast, Andrew Cuomo. We see what you did there. After publicly bashing conservative New Yorkers as "extreme" people who have no place in his state, the intolerant Democratic governor wants to blame the media for his unmistakable contempt for those who oppose abortion, support gun rights and defend traditional marriage. Newsflash: Crapweasel politicians can backtrack and scapegoat, but they can't hide. When he railed against socially conservative Republican candidates in a radio interview last week, Cuomo hyperbolically singled out those he called "right-to-life, pro-assault-weapon, anti-gay" citizens. Sounding unapologetically purge-tastic, the governor said these political opponents "have no place...

The myth of the poor, oppressed jihadist never dies. U.S. secretary of state John Kerry is the latest Obama administration official to peddle this odious narrative. Cue John Lennon’s cloying “Imagine,” don your plaid pajamas, and curl up with a warm cup of deadly naïveté.While meeting with Catholic Church officials at the Vatican in Rome on Monday, Kerry expounded on their “huge common interest in dealing with this issue of poverty, which in many cases is the root cause of terrorism or even the root cause of the disenfranchisement of millions of people on this planet.” In other words:...

The myth of the poor, oppressed jihadist never dies. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is the latest Obama administration official to peddle this odious narrative. Cue John Lennon's cloying "Imagine," don your plaid pajamas, and curl up with a warm cup of deadly naivete. While meeting with Catholic Church officials at the Vatican in Rome on Monday, Kerry expounded on their "huge common interest in dealing with this issue of poverty, which in many cases is the root cause of terrorism or even the root cause of the disenfranchisement of millions of people on this planet." In other words:...

The Common Core gold rush is on. Apple, Pearson, Google, Microsoft and Amplify are all cashing in on the federal standards/testing/textbook racket. But the EduTech boondoggle is no boon for students. It's more squandered tax dollars down the public school drain. Even more worrisome: The stampede is widening a dangerous path toward invasive data mining. According to the Silicon Valley Business Journal, the ed tech sector "is expected to more than double in size to $13.4 billion by 2017." That explosive growth is fueled by Common Core's top-down digital learning and testing mandates. So: Cui bono? In North Carolina, the...

Politifact’s rating of the famous Obama promise “if you like your plan you can keep it” has gone through a heck of an evolution in the past five years. In October of 2008 “if you like your plan you can keep it” was totally true: Less than four years later, in June of 2012 it was downgraded to “half true” (“true,” but only for the people who could manage to keep their plans): Now, “If you like your plan you can keep it” has been deemed 2013′s “Lie of the Year”:

Bank of America has agreed to pay Freddie Mac $404 million in a mortgage settlement over 716,000 loans, many purchased from Countrywide. This is one of many lawsuits by the Federal government over Countrywide and related mortgages. One wonders when the litigation will end. Here is the thing. These suits are largely about representations and warranties between the loan seller and the loan purchaser concerning underwriting standards. The reps and warranties provide relief to the loan purchaser if the underwriting of the loans by the loan seller proves to be misleading or false. But there is another issue called causality....

Religious liberty is front and center on the nation's Thanksgiving table. On Tuesday, the Supreme Court agreed to hear Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby Stores Inc. The family-owned craft store company is intrepidly challenging the constitutionality of Obamacare's abortion coverage mandate. Hobby Lobby's faithful owners deserve our thanks and praise as they defend freedom of conscience for all Americans. The privately held retail chain's story is the quintessential American Dream. Founder David Green started out making mini picture frames in his Oklahoma garage in 1970. He recruited his two sons, Mart and Steve, to pitch in at an early age. The...

The ink isn’t even dry on the temporary Iran nuclear deal and it already has that distinct “passed it to find out what’s in it” scent.

Last week, I explained what the Common Core State Standards are and how, despite the federal government's saying it's staying out of the classroom standards business, there is much evidence to show that the feds are intricately linked to them. The first way I demonstrated that was by pointing out that the feds have spent $350 million of taxpayer money, funding and giving grants and waivers to muscle and bribe states and local school districts to accept CCSS. And all of that was done without a single act of Congress, meaning the federal government -- including the White House --...

While her husband's signature health care law goes up in flames, first lady Michelle Obama is reveling in the success of her East Wing pet project, the "Let's Move" initiative. But ignore the do-gooder dressing. Mrs. Obama doesn't care about your children. What we have here is a textbook case of Washington influence peddling, which the Obamas so vigorously condemned a long time ago and far away. On Wednesday, Mrs. Obama announced an agreement by the Sesame Workshop and the Produce Marketing Association (PMA) to join her nonprofit Partnership for a Healthier America (PHA) in a two-year agreement to help...

Could this be the end of Monument Syndrome? Across the country, ordinary Americans are rising up in revolt against the old Washington tactic of closing public parks and memorials during selective government “shutdowns” to score political points. Tax-paying tourists are tossing off the orange traffic cones and “Barrycades.” Enough is enough. The movement started with waves of World War II veterans who flew to D.C. last week as part of the Honor Flight Network. (The nonprofit group brings our surviving heroes to visit the memorials that honor their service and sacrifice.) The vets and volunteers breached the fences last week,...

Could this be the end of Monument Syndrome? Across the country, ordinary Americans are rising up in revolt against the old Washington tactic of closing public parks and memorials during selective government "shutdowns" to score political points. Tax-paying tourists are tossing off the orange traffic cones and "Barrycades." Enough is enough. The movement started with waves of World War II veterans who flew to D.C. last week as part of the Honor Flight Network. (The nonprofit group brings our surviving heroes to visit the memorials that honor their service and sacrifice.) The vets and volunteers breached the fences last...