Free Republic

Want to know what Barack Obama’s second-term agenda will be? Looking at the VIP admissions to the Democratic convention, the assumption will be more Solyndras and more wasted taxpayer dollars. ABC News caught former Department of Energy official Steve Spinner getting a “red-carpet” tour yesterday of the facilities in Charlotte. Who’s Steve Spinner, you may ask? He’s the man who pushed the DoE to ignore the advice of auditors and approve Solyndra’s $500 million-plus taxpayer-guaranteed loan:..... What happened when ABC trained their cameras on Spinner? He scurried out of the spotlight:.....

Unfortunately, as Mia Love and Ann Romney have found out, the Left is not kind to strong Republican women. Instead, the vitriol and ignorance that many on the Left have shown make it clear who is propagating a 'war on women.' Take Condoleezza Rice, the daughter of sharecroppers born into segregation. Impeccably educated and motivated, Ms. Rice became the National Security Advisor and Secretary of State. This would be nearly impossible just two generations ago. But to liberals, she's still nothing but a 'house negro' and not even black: Goat Rider @jarvisnoel "@TatiSmiff: Condaleeza Rice is the only black person...

By Mr. Curmudgeon:If you think government is so big it sucks all the oxygen out of the room ... you're an extremist. If you think green energy projects (like the failed Solyndra) are a waste of taxpayer money ... you're an extremist. If you think government mandates diminish individual freedom ... you're an extremist. If you think hard work and not roads, bridges and government employees - teachers - built your business ... you're an extremist. If you think it criminal for the American government to sell weapons to Mexican drug cartels ... you're an extremist. And finally, if you...

Switzerland hit back Tuesday at a US presidential election campaign video that portrays the country as a tax haven. In the video, a character named Miss Swiss Bank Account describes the Republican candidate Mitt Romney as a "boss millionaire with accounts everywhere", the ATS news agency reported. The film gives "the impression that having a bank account in Switzerland is dubious in itself and its only aim is to hide money from the tax authorities," Switzerland's Federal Department for Foreign Affairs (DFAE) said. Switzerland's Washington embassy reportedly expressed its unhappiness at the clip to the Obama team, ATS said.

George Clooney headlined a fund-raiser Monday that took in more than a half-million dollars for President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign. Organizers said they took in at least $625,000 from U.S. donors for Obama’s campaign, including many who flew in to Geneva, Switzerland, from around the world for the one-night event.

It wasn't long ago that Barack Obama's supporters pointed to his successful campaign as proof of his executive ability, responding to truthful claims he had no executive experience. As this year's flailing campaign matches his amateurish handling of the presidency, and the third Recovery Summer shows the US economy in worse shape than it was before all this recovering took place, Democratic women are manning their enemy's ramparts while preposterously claiming it is the Republicans who are waging a "war on women". Governor Romney has correctly noted that 92.3% of the jobs lost under Obama were women's jobs. But in...

Barack Obama was swept to the White House in 2008 by a wave of idealism and inspirational campaigning in which he encapsulated the mood of the nation with his slogans of ‘Hope’, ‘Change’ and ‘Yes we can’. Then, his message was a fundamentally positive one. Americans wanted an end to the Bush era but that almost went without saying. Obama pointed to his own vision of the country; a post-partisan, post-racial America in which gridlock in Washington was ended and common-sense centrist solutions were adopted. What a difference four years makes. Obama is campaigning ferociously for a second term –...

President Obama spoke from behind a podium emblazoned with the official presidential seal during a campaign event Wednesday morning in Las Vegas. The event, which took place at the Canyon Springs High School, was designated as a “campaign event” on the White House’s official daily schedule for the president. A backdrop that can bee seen behind the president notes that the event was “paid for by Obama for America,” the president’s reelection campaign.

The presumptive GOP presidential and vice presidential nominees Mitt Romney and Rep. Paul Ryan are attracting thousands of supporters to their campaign rallies since Mr. Romney named Mr Ryan to the bottom of the ticket. However, President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden are not drawing the crowds they once could. The New York Times is reporting that the Obama campaign is saying that it is intentionally limiting crowd size at their events because of security and cost: “We have plenty of time for big rallies,” a campaign spokeswoman, Jen Psaki, said between the rallies on Thursday. “Our focus...

The Obama re-election campaign huddled today with “progressive” religious leaders as they coordinate a line of attack against conservative Catholic congressman Paul Ryan, Republican Mitt Romney’s selection as his ticket-mate. The Democrat-aligned religious leaders are critical of the budget proposals Rep. Ryan has championed on Capitol Hill, which, they charge, will exacerbate the sufferings of the nation’s poor. They also portray Ryan as a secret admirer of Ayn Rand, who famously authored “Atlas Shrugged” and “The Fountainhead;” who was, at once, a strong defender of capitalism and an avowed atheist. Of course, it is hard for left-wing religious leaders to...

Election '12: Until lately, the media have kept President Obama's missteps from doing him much damage. But the outrageous lie his campaign has used to blame Mitt Romney for a cancer death is uncontainable. High likability ratings are one thing the Obama campaign has going for it. Gallup recently found that twice as many registered voters consider Obama "the more likable of the two presidential candidates." His campaign has been exploiting this with "Happy Birthday Barack!" web cards, and ads featuring a supercute Obama family photo.

Senior Obama Campaign official David Axelrod, admitted Sunday, August 5th on Fox News that Ohio military voters who are allowed early voting was indeed the target of the lawsuit filed against the state of Ohio. He incorrectly claimed that military early voting was an exception, which must be corrected, so that all Ohio voters can have the right to vote early. As Ohio democrats and the Obama campaign were targeting the military overseas voters and lambasting the Ohio state legislature and the Secretary of State for engaging in alleged discriminatory practices, they conveniently avoided mentioning that federal law protects early...

Earlier this morning, Karl Rove appeared on Fox & Friends to discuss Harry Reid's reckless accusations against Mitt Romney.  In case you're just joining this controversy, the Senate Majority Leader has spent the last few days peddling a scurrilous and evidence-free claim that Romney is a serial tax evader.  Rove wondered aloud why our fraudulent post-partisan prince of a president hasn't denounced Reid: Karl Rove Calls Out Harry Reid's 'Slimeball Nature'; Says the Senate Majority Leader Should Be 'Embarrassed and Ashamed' There's a pretty straightforward answer to this question.  Obama isn't lifting a finger to put an end to this...

Curious how many Democrats live on your block? Just download the Obama campaign's new mobile app. The app, released last week, includes a Google map for canvassers that recognizes your current location and marks nearby Democratic households with small blue flags. For each targeted address, the app displays the first name, age and gender of the voter or voters who live there: "Lori C., 58 F, Democrat." All this is public information, which campaigns have long given to volunteers. But you no longer have to schedule a visit to a field office and wait for a staffer to hand you...

The Ohio Democrat Party joined the 'party' and along with the Obama for America Campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) - the 3 filed suit to reduce the three extra days the members of our military have to vote...because, you know they might be busy and might need those extra days. According to the sue-happy administration and Democrats, the Military has "no discernible rational basis" for needing extra time. That's a good argument considering Military absentee votes are seldom counted - but you have to think if you show up to vote in your own district, three days, or two...

Eric Fehrnstrom, a senior adviser to the Romney campaign, told reporters on a conference call this morning that Obama campaign manager Jim Messina "appears" to have broken the law, based off a series of emails Messina sent from his personal account as White House deputy chief of staff Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/eric-fehrnstrom-jim-messina-obama-romney-emails-obamacare-2012-8#ixzz22PKKy5zs

One cannot help noticing the struggle between Barack Obama’s natural instincts and the serene and benevolent persona he projects to the world. Beneath the visage of a cosmetically populist, post-racial, post-partisan reformer who wants to “perfect” America and to have “millionaires and billionaires” “pay their fair share” is just another condescending, self-important, sarcastic, academic liberal Democrat, who believes in false consciousness and in scholastic theories that success in life can be attributed to birth or luck or community but not to individual effort and grit. Obama may be talented at self-fashioning, but he cannot maintain his public face constantly. The...

U.S. National Security Advisor Tom Donilon shared Washington's contingency plans for a possible attack on Iran with Israel's PM, according to a senior American official. The U.S. national security adviser has shared with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the United States' contingency plans for a possible attack on Iran. According to a senior American official, National Security Advisor Tom Donilon briefed Netanyahu on the plans during Donilon's visit to Israel two weeks ago. According to the official, who requested anonymity, Netanyahu hosted Donilon at a three-hour dinner. For part of the time, Israel's national security adviser, Yaakov Amidror, was on hand....

New emails and testimony from Department of Homeland Security FOIA officer Catherine Papoi reveal that a former Obama campaign staffer repeatedly asked Papoi and her team to redact portions of “politically sensitive” documents, as well as portions of documents that were already publicly available.Papoi, who came under fire at DHS for complaining that “sensitive” FOIA requests were being vetted by political employees, testified on March 3 that Willard “Clint” Carte, a DHS attorney with the title of “confidential assistant,” attempted to block a FOIA request for DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano’s calendar in which Napolitano’s secretary had referred to Secretary of...

Somewhere along the way, a teacher helped. Yes, with a contract guaranteeing her a job for life, short of actually killing a student. I believe every day they taught my NYC Public School classes, all my teachers were paid through the taxes collected from my parents and others. Just as my Catholic School teachers were paid by my parents when I transferred. Except the Public School teachers were paid to fulfill a contract of which my parents were never a negotiating party. They certainly never received the kickbacks the Democrats received for rubber stamping those contracts, contracts paid not with...