Free Republic

California Rep. Nancy Pelosi has continued her jet-setting ways despite relinquishing her leadership post and pushing for aggressive climate policies, according to a Fox News Digital review of campaign finance records. The former Democratic leader's campaign disbursed $43,663.80 on private jet travel with Advanced Aviation in March and appears to be the biggest private jet spender during the first quarter of the year, her filings show. Pelosi has now spent nearly $700,000 on charter aircraft in recent years, primarily with Advanced Aviation, her longtime preferred company. Based just outside of Washington D.C., in Northern Virginia, Advanced Aviation offers aircraft ranging...

Michigan governor frequently broke her own COVID rules at home.. Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer (D.) was spotted late Friday night without a mask in the standing-room only area of a popular Washington, D.C., cocktail bar, hours before she pulled out of an early-morning canvas for flailing Democratic Virginia gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe. A video shared with the Washington Free Beacon shows Whitmer, who has repeatedly come under fire for breaking her own coronavirus restrictions, socializing in the crowded bar at the Hotel Washington. A hotel staffer who spoke with the Free Beacon noted that bar patrons are required to wear...

A hotshot banker dumped his model girlfriend, and she got the ultimate revenge — by driving his precious Mercedes into the backyard pool, he said. Modal Trigger Kristina Kuchma Russian-born model Kristina Kuchma was furious with Guy Gentile for breaking up with her during a dinner out near his Bahamas home, rather than fund her marketing business venture. “Lier!” Kuchma, 24, texted Gentile in broken English on Saturday night after the dirty deed. “You told me you will help me to start a business! That were your words! Now you want to be an investor??? Well investor I have a...

A number of prominent Democrats have pledged to spend the week learning how the other half lives. All have agreed to take the Live the Wage challenge, which entails limiting your cash outlay on food and transportation to $77 a week. The idea was developed by Brad Woodhouse, president of the labor-funded group Americans United for Change, who, according to the Washington Free Beacon, called on Congress to take the challenge. -- So how are the participants making out? Judging from a tweet by Illinois Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky, it’s tough living down here among the hoi polloi. The tweet, which...

This happened before Grayson voted out in 2011 but let me say this is one of the only times I like his questioning. Rep. Alan Grayson questions the FED inspector General where $9 Trillion dollars went… and Inspector General Elizabeth Coleman hasn’t a clue…Dunno whether to laugh or cry – I am still getting over the shock and have watched 4 times – LISTEN carefully to what she says – THEY HAVE NO JURISDICTION to investigate the fed!!! Only their programs? -- You must see the video to understand what this is about.

A veteran Republican says the religious right has taken over, and turned his party into anti-intellectual nutsHaving observed politics up close and personal for most of my adult lifetime, I have come to the conclusion that the rise of politicized religious fundamentalism may have been the key ingredient in the transformation of the Republican Party. Politicized religion provides a substrate of beliefs that rationalizes—at least in the minds of its followers—all three of the GOP’s main tenets: wealth worship, war worship, and the permanent culture war. Religious cranks ceased to be a minor public nuisance in this country beginning in...

Dinners were served in the basement. Ambassadors, generals with many stars, senior White House officials and closely read columnists — all would walk past the yellowing kitchen, which looked as if it hadn’t been updated since the Ford administration, and down a narrow flight of stairs into the dimly lighted dining room. Guests were arrayed around the table according to rank, with the most important ones squeezed in the center. Although the Old World meals could be quite elaborate — venison paté, duck in bitter orange — they were prepared and served entirely by the host, a stickler for protocol...

Shoppers will be bombarded with messages at supermarket check-outs about eating fruit and vegetables, under plans being considered by Ministers. Trolleys could even come with a painted line marking where customers should put their healthy produce as part of the proposals which critics will see as an expansion of the nanny state. Unhealthy options – such as crisps and pies – may be placed on higher shelves than low-calorie and high-fibre foods to dissuade shoppers from buying them. The proposals are part of the Coalition’s attempt to ‘nudge’ Britons towards healthy choices and are the brainchild of the Behavioural Insight...

...But for voters of all stripes, Tuesday’s primaries should illuminate the growling face of a new fringe in American politics — and provide the incentive for level-headed voters to become enthusiastic about the midterm election. Republican leaders have to decide if they want the tiny fraction of furious voters who have showed up at the primary polls to steer them into the swamp for years ahead. They have a chance to repudiate the worst of the Tea Party crowd and show that they can govern without appealing to the basest political instincts. So far, they have preferred to greedily capitalize...

From Andrew Romano's great new profile of a Mitch Daniels he portrays as pragmatic and principled (kind of oxymoronic, but one of Daniels' principles appears to be pragmatism). To wit, his suggestions: Let’s raise the retirement age, he says. Let’s reduce Social Security for the rich. And let’s reconsider our military commitments, too. When I ask about taxes—in 2005 Daniels proposed a hike on the $100,000-plus crowd, which his own party promptly torpedoed—he refuses to revert to Republican talking points. “At some stage there could well be a tax increase,” he says with a sigh. “They say we can’t have...

Via RCP. Don’t misunderstand: This is 100 percent nonpartisan criticism, he insists. It could have been written at any point in the last 10 years. "According to polls, Americans are in a mood to hold their breath until they turn blue. Voters appear to be so fed up with the Democrats that they’re ready to toss them out in favor of the Republicans — for whom, according to those same polls, the nation has even greater contempt. This isn’t an “electoral wave,” it’s a temper tantrum…" "In the punditry business, it’s considered bad form to question the essential wisdom of...

WASHINGTON – Dallas' top Democratic donors will cut big checks to share dinner later this month with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Most will be motivated by a desire to protect the party's congressional majority. Lisa Blue will have an extra reason: to say thanks for Pelosi's efforts when her husband, Fred Baron, was dying of bone marrow cancer. His only option was an experimental drug whose manufacturer refused to give permission to use it for Baron's condition. "He was a big fan of hers, and now I am as well," Blue said. Baron, the "King of Toxic Torts," built a...

First Lady Michelle Obama took a lot of grief for her decision to vacation in Spain last week, a glitzy getaway that prompted one New York Daily News columnist to liken her to Marie Antoinette. But now we're learning more about the trip, which, despite the furor over its alleged excess, seems to have been launched with good intentions. According to the Chicago Sun-Times' Lynn Sweet, the first lady made the trip because she wanted to spend time with her best friend, Chicago physician Anita Blanchard, who lost her father this summer. Blanchard (who is married to President Obama's best...

Here is video of CBS News Anchor Katie Couric during the 2008 Presidential Campaign being caught on video mocking Sarah Palin and her family during a practice session just days before the Republican National Convention. Couric is seen mocking the name of Palin’s son “Track” after reading his name, and later doing the same with the name of Palin’s hometown – Wasilla, Alaska. The video is instructive in that it shows the behind-the-scenes bias against Palin that was actually quite obvious during broadcasts as well.

New e-mail messages published by the Daily Caller Thursday show a coordinated effort by the JournoList's members to destroy Sarah Palin the moment she was named John McCain's running mate on August 29, 2008. Some even discussed how the former Alaska governor's decision to have a Down Syndrome baby rather than abort it could be used against her. As the attacks ensued, the Nation's Chris Hayes wrote, "Keep the ideas coming! Have to go on TV to talk about this in a few min and need all the help I can get." Witness America's so-called journalists conspiring to destroy a...

Stephen H. Schneider, a Stanford University climate scientist who for decades built the case that global warming, while laden with complexity, justified an aggressive response, has died. Ralph Cicerone, the president of the National Academy of Sciences, of which Schneider was a longtime member, said he had confirmed the news. Schneider, who was 65, spent decades studying the forces influencing climate and the policy implications of human-driven warming, as well as pressing the case for action to curb emissions of greenhouse gases even as he battled and subdued a rare cancer in recent years. In an e-mail message to a...

When the administration slapped the wrist of one of its top technology officials this spring for violating Barack Obama’s ethics pledge, a spokesman claimed the breaches were isolated incidents. But a Daily Caller investigation reveals a cavalier attitude at the Obama White House toward longstanding safeguards designed to prevent abuses of the Presidential Records Act and other laws – including acts that carry serious legal implications. Two sources say a top White House technology official, Chief Information Officer Brook Colangelo, routinely asked technology vendors for special deals based on his position as a public official.

Irate with a reporter's question on the effectiveness of the city's handgun ban, Chicago Mayor Richard Daley offered to give a first-hand lesson following the shooting of an off-duty police officer. Oh, it's been very effective," Daley said, according to MyFoxChicago.com. "If I put this up your butt, you'll find out how effective it is. If I put a round up your … you'll know."

Parents who were outraged that the Palmdale School District had surveyed students about sex are asking a federal appeals court to reconsider its Nov. 2 decision dismissing their lawsuit. While the surveys asked students how often they thought about sex, among other questions, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said parents of public school children have no "fundamental right" to be the exclusive provider of sexual information to their children. The parents maintained they had the sole right "to control the upbringing of their children by introducing them to matters of and relating to sex." The court has no...