Free Republic

In the coming two to four years, the Republicans seem ready to engage in a battle royal for the soul of their party. And it sure will be ugly. It looks like a war between the Backward Caucus and the usual Conservative Caucus. Forget the moderate Republicans; most of them were put out to pasture long ago. Parties have seen battles between factions since the founding of the republic: the Whigs, the Bull Moose Party, conservative Democrats, liberal Republicans — plenty of splinter groups to go around. Conservatives took over the Republican Party in the 1970s and northern liberal Republicans...

After two election cycles of Democrats successfully marketing Obamacare to Hispanic voters, the health care law's rocky start could turn into a bargaining chip for Republicans. Hispanic adults have supported President Obama's Affordable Care Act at a rate twice that of whites. More than 10 million Hispanics—roughly one-fourth of the total uninsured population—stand to benefit from the law. An outsize proportion of the eligible Hispanics are the healthy millennials who could make or break universal health care. But glitches on the enrollment site are blocking Hispanics (and everyone else) from signing up for subsidized insurance, while the Spanish-language website has...

In an appearance on MCNBC’s Morning Joe, Nicole Wallace (former George W. Bush adviser and McCain/Palin campaign adviser) ruined all of the gang’s orgasmic revelry of false equivalency over Obama’s bad numbers in the latest NBC/WSJ poll by pointing out that Republicans have even worse numbers, and there seems to be no bottom for the party. Wallace then warned Republicans to stop being about nothing but criticism, “So I think the peril in looking at these numbers for President Obama is to continue down the path of railing against his administration’s policies.” (VIDEO-AT-LINK)The Republican Party’s approval ratings are at an...

If a Democrat wins in Virginia, Chris Christie wins in New Jersey........ The polls indicate so called "moderate democrat" will get redstate Virginia, and so called "moderate republican" will survive in a bluestate.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid should do the job he was elected to do and quit lecturing Republicans, says former Florida GOP Rep. Joe Scarborough. "Harry Reid should really be quiet and go back and do the job that he was hired to do, and, at least, pass one appropriation bill. And then come out lecturing us," Scarborough, the host of MSNBC's "Morning Joe," said on his program Tuesday. "I hear Harry Reid lecturing [House Speaker] John Boehner every day about getting things done. And Harry Reid's Senate that Harry Reid runs, first of all, went four or five years...

Who's to blame for the government shutdown?-- View Results

Obstructionism may play well for House Republicans in safely red districts, but a poll done this week suggests that the government shutdown may actually hurt Representatives in competitive districts. In a poll conducted in 24 House districts over Wednesday, Thursday and Friday by Public Policy Polling, registered voters in 17 of those districts favored a generic Democratic challenger over the incumbent Republican. The Democrats would need to win 17 seats in the 2014 midterm elections to take control of the House. Republicans have felt the brunt of the public’s anger for the standoff over the government shutdown. Polls released last...

Simple and unadulterated hatred for Obama has driven the party to alienate the electorate by shutting the government down over their opposition to Obamacare.As I watched the deadlock over the approval of government expenditure finally lead to a partial shutdown of the US government, I could not help thinking how unfortunate it is that US lawmakers are behaving in ways unbecoming of their great and dynamic democracy. At stake in this incomprehensible showdown between Republicans and Democrats is the much-needed Congressional approval to government expenditure. The Republicans, under the sway of a minority of right-wing diehards, decided to use blackmail...

A striking aspect of the new Pew survey on Jewish Americans is how liberal Jews are. Is it good for the Democrats? You bet.Why do people vote the way to do? For swing voters, the answer is usually the state of the economy. For most, however, voting patterns are surprisingly fixed. People tend to vote for one party consistently over time. For Jewish American voters, the party of choice has been the Democratic party. Conservatives have been trying to crack the code for a number of years on how to get Jewish voters over to their side. Based on the...

Writing from her new home in New York, Louise Mensch argues that Britain needs more politicians like Chris Christie and Arnold Schwarzenegger.It’s strange watching the parallels develop between British and American politics. After the disaster of the 2008 McCain-Palin campaign (think William Hague as Conservative leader), the Republicans were at least respectable under Mitt Romney (think Michael Howard). But they now have no hope of victory, with no light in sight down a long, dark tunnel and a clear need for major reform. The Grand Old Party needs to learn the lessons of Nate Silver and actually read the polls....

Political analyst and Democratic pollster Doug Schoen tells Newsmax that Hillary Clinton is "the front-runner on both sides" if she decides to run for president in 2016. He also opines that Republicans are making a "political mistake" in backing a bill to defund Obamacare. Schoen is the author of the book "Hopelessly Divided: The New Crisis in American Politics and What It Means for 2012 and Beyond."Story continues below video. (VIDEO-AT-LINK)In an exclusive interview with Newsmax TV at the Clinton Global Initiative in New York on Monday, Schoen assesses a potential White House run by Clinton. "First, there is legitimate...

In a week that will be dominated by the debt ceiling and Republican efforts to defund Obamacare, there will be an irresistible desire to view the outcome as having real political consequences for 2014 and the next presidential race. Let me offer a different view: nothing that happens this week will have much impact come Election Day next year or beyond. Why? Little of this week’s melodrama is likely to affect the quality of life of most Americans. As Sen. Rand Paul observed, Obamacare is overwhelmingly likely to continue. The debt ceiling will be raised. Some politicians will have a...

My assertion that there’s a 70% chance that the GOP controls White House, Senate, and House in 2017 has attracted a lot of pushback. And it’s certainly possible that I’m wrong! Here’s my thinking, for what it’s worth: Since the Civil War, only two Democratic presidents have been succeeded by another Democrat. Both of them–FDR and JFK–accomplished this by dying in office. Since World War II, only four presidents have been succeeded by a member of their party. As I mentioned above, two of them accomplished this by dying in office. One of them accomplished this by resigning in disgrace...

LET Rand Paul have his epic filibuster and Ted Cruz his scowling threats to shut down the government. Let Chris Christie thunder to a second term as the governor of New Jersey, his hubris flowering as his ultimate designs on the White House take shape. Jeb Bush, lying low in the subtropics of Florida, has something they don’t: the unalloyed affection of many of the Republican Party’s most influential moneymen, who are waiting for word on what he’ll do, hoping that he’ll seek the 2016 presidential nomination and noting with amusement how far he has drifted off fickle pundits’ radar,...

One word, my friends: RINOgeddon. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that Christie earns 21% support when Republican voters are asked whom they would vote for if the party’s primary in their state were held today. Florida Senator Marco Rubio runs a close second with 18% of the GOP vote, followed by former Florida Governor Jeb Bush at 16% and Kentucky Senator Rand Paul with 15% of the vote. Congressman Paul Ryan, the unsuccessful Republican vice presidential candidate in 2012, picks up 13% of the Republican vote, with Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker dead last at six percent (6%)....

Rent free in their empty heads. There would be no home field advantage in Alaska for Sarah Palin if the former governor made a run for the White House in 2016, according to a new poll released Friday. Hillary Clinton, the front runner for the Democrats in 2016, would beat Palin 49-40 in a hypothetical match-up, according to a survey from Democratic firm Public Policy Polling. Palin is the only potential GOP candidate Clinton topped in poll. Despite it being her home state, only 18 percent of Alaskans think Palin should make a bid for the White House in 2016,...

In a recent poll of Alaska voters, George Zimmerman -- who was recently acquitted in the shooting death of Florida teen Trayvon Martin -- got a surprising 2 percent support as a hypothetical Republican presidential candidate. The newest Alaska survey from Public Policy Polling shows Hillary Clinton's only chance of winning the state in 2016 would be in a matchup against Republican Sarah Palin, where Clinton would lead 49/40 percent. Clinton trails all other Republican candidates in the survey. Out in front, Chris Christie leads her by 8 points at 46/38, Jeb Bush leads at 49/42, Rand Paul is up...

In a wide-ranging interview with The New Republic published Tuesday, Sen John McCain (R-AZ) praised former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, his running mate in the 2008 presidential race, for "exciting" the GOP base in a way the senator couldn't achieve. Asked if it "bothered" him when people said his legacy was choosing Palin as his running mate in 2008, McCain said "no." "We were four points down when I chose her and three points up afterwards," he told the magazine. "She held her own and, some people said, won a debate with the vice president. She did everything I ever...

Gotta figure her lead would be even bigger without Joe Miller in the field here. Her nomination for the taking? Alaska should be a top tier pick up opportunity for Senate Republicans next year…but their top choice of a candidate is Sarah Palin. 36% of GOP primary voters in the state say they’d like Palin to be their standard bearer against Mark Begich to 26% for Mead Treadwell, 15% for Dan Sullivan, and 12% for Joe Miller. Palin leads mostly based on her strength with ‘very conservative’ voters where she gets 43% to 20% for Treadwell, but she also leads...

Fox News just released a nationwide poll in generall in keeping with many others, finding voters are unhappy with the economy and want Obamacare repealed. But what's truly eye-opening are the comparisons of partisan opinions of President Barack Obama and George Zimmerman, who was acquitted July 13 of second-degree murder and manslaughter charges for shooting unarmed Miami Gardens 17-year-old Trayvon Martin on Feb. 26, 2012. Republicans have a more-favorable opinion of Zimmerman, a figure of sympathy to a number of conservatives, than Obama. That's right: The Democratic occupant of the White House is held in less favorable regard by Republicans...