Free Republic

U.S. Republican party officials are putting together a new election year messaging campaign to reach women voters on issues including Obamacare, jobs and education as they seek to gain an advantage in the Nov. 4 congressional elections. About three weeks of internal polling and focus group research has identified jobs and household finances as the most important issues among 1,206 likely women voters, according to the Republican National Committee, which commissioned the surveys along with the National Republican Congressional Campaign. Party officials said Obamacare was also a top issue, with 55 percent of women polled opposing President Barack Obama's signature...

Reince Priebus, the chairman of the Republican National Committee, will speak at the National Association of Black Journalists’ 39th Annual Convention and Career Fair in Boston, July 30 to August 2. "I appreciate President Butler's invitation to address NABJ membership and look forward to discussing our ongoing efforts to engage black voters, expand the dialogue in communities across the country and inform the very journalists who help shape the views of a very important constituency,” said Priebus. He won’t be the only party chairman in attendance. Democratic National Committee chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz will also speak, as well as New...

Joe Scarborough, the MSNBC host who has transformed into one of his generation's most preeminent Rockefeller Republicans, believes Mitt Romney should run for president again in 2016. Speaking to about 300 guests at "a luxury resort in the Rocky Mountains" with other potential GOP presidential hopefuls like Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), Scarborough reportedly urged the establishment donors and insiders to being a “Draft Romney” movement. “This is the only person that can fill the stage,” Scarborough said at a summit hosted by Romney, according to a Washington Post report. Scarborough and other attendees may not...

Eric Cantor, next Republican National Committee chairman? Former RNC chair Michael Steele thinks it's a possibility after the House majority leader was defeated Tuesday in a Virginia Republican primary. "With the upcoming presidential election, there's a lot of interest in Eric Cantor serving as national chairman of the RNC," Steele said Saturday on MSNBC's "Up With Steve Kornacki.""In fact I think he'd be interesting because he started dialogues on poverty and some other issues that were sort of outside of what Republicans have traditionally talked about. So he could bring a very interesting voice into that space," he said. (VIDEO-AT-LINK)

News of poor conditions at a holding center in Arizona for undocumented, unaccompanied minors whipped Sarah Palin into a fury Friday -- so much so that she said she was on the verge of renouncing her ties to the Republican Party. She then accused President Barack Obama of orchestrating the "crisis" in Arizona in order to advance his own immigration reform agenda. "In this case, Obama’s refusal to enforce immigration laws and his blatant suggestion that his chosen illegal activity will be rewarded are proof of his tyrannical tactics," Palin wrote.

Ideology: A Pew study finds the country more polarized than ever, and naturally Republicans are catching the blame. Truth is, it's Democrats who've lurched to extremes. Evidence of Republicans' shift to the far right is supposed to be found in the defeat of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, which prompted the New York Times to editorialize that "In GOP, Far Right Is Too Moderate." Former Clinton adviser Donna Brazile added that "even the candidates who are supposed to be the establishment have been pulled so far to the right by Tea Party challengers that there is no difference in their...

In the space of less than a week, 23-year-old Zachary Werrell went from unknown to boy wonder to angry toddler, depending on who was talking. Werrell, who graduated last year from Haverford College, was lauded for having engineered Tuesday's shocking political defeat of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor. And, as campaign manager of insurgent David Brat, he was criticized Wednesday for scrubbing his Facebook page, which included provocative comments comparing the shooting of Trayvon Martin with abortion. Multiple efforts to reach Werrell were unsuccessful. His teachers at Haverford, the rigorous, liberal-arts-and-Quaker-values institution on the Main Line, described Werrell as a...

Mitt Romney can still draw a crowd. Some top supporters and donors from the former Massachusetts governor's two presidential campaigns are gathering starting Thursday for Romney's retreat in Park City, Utah. They'll be joined by a bunch of political leaders who may hope to follow in Romney's footsteps by winning the Republican presidential nomination. This is the third year in a row that Romney has hosted the event, which is being held at the upscale Stein Ericksen Lodge at the Deer Valley Resort. The first came came during the 2012 presidential campaign as the then-GOP nominee was facing off against...

“All of the investment banks, up in New York and D.C., they should have gone to jail.”That isn’t a quote from an Occupy Wall Street protester or Senator Elizabeth Warren. That’s a common campaign slogan repeated by Dave Brat, the Virginia college professor who scored one of the biggest political upsets in over a century by defeating Majority Leader Eric Cantor in the Republican primary last night.The national media is buzzing about Brat’s victory, but for all of the wrong reasons.Did the Tea Party swoop in and help Brat, as many in the Democratic Party are suggesting? Actually, the Wall Street...

Let’s face it. It’s tough being in the minority. Any ideas they have for improving the lives of Americans, or improving the performance of government, or improving the economy are ignored by the majority. “I won,” President Obama told Republicans a few days after he took office as they sought to have some input into the developing stimulus package.And that’s the way it’s been since then. During the debate over Obamacare, the president and Democrats continuously told the lie that his plan had to be passed because the Republicans had no ideas of their own. Not only were there...

Less than twenty-four hours after the shockwaves of Eric Cantor’s defeat, the House Republican Party has decided to ignore the results as a meaningless anomaly. They will expedite a leadership election to affirm the status quo with Cantor’s right hand, Kevin McCarthy, picked as Majority Leader. McCarthy is squishy on a host of issues, bad on immigration, and not a friend of conservatives. House Republicans looked on the biggest electoral surprise of the year and are giving it the middle finger.

Did I just hear this right? Dave Brat has a big lead over Cantor right now...only %40 of the vote left to count and he's got a huge lead 57-43 GOOOOOO BRAT!!! Let's hope he pull this out!

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) wave to the crowd June 27, 2008 in Unity, New Hampshire. Obama and Clinton appeared together in a show of unity for Obama's presidential campaign. Almost exactly six years ago, when Hillary Clinton finally conceded the Democratic presidential nomination to Barack Obama, she bore the scars of years of partisan warfare that he had soared above. As Clinton unofficially embarks upon her second presidential campaign with the release of her book, the two figures have nearly reversed roles. Now Obama is a figure brought low by accumulated...

Now that primary season is almost over, some establishment Republicans are looking for retribution Ted Cruz has not made himself a popular man in Washington, D.C. The Texas Republican would argue that’s the point. But even for a Senator—an elected office with the backing of an entire state—ticking off powerful people can have consequences. In his first two years in Washington, Cruz has managed to help force a government shutdown, undermine the GOP’s chances of taking over the Senate and force uncomfortable votes for his fellow Republicans. Not to mention the verbal bombs he lobs on a regular basis, many...

Saturday, June 07, 2014 The Long March Through the Republican Party Posted by Daniel Greenfield @ the Sultan Knish blog The Tea Party's epitaph has been written. A confident Republican establishment is now prepared to possibly take the Senate in 2014 and then lose it again in 2016 to another wave of historical change. In its defense the establishment, a motley collection of men paid by special interest groups whose future involves lucrative lobbying and even more lucrative consulting for the midterm election of 2018 where they will run on opposition to HillaryCare, can point to all the stupid and...

We are looking at an unprecedented time in our nation’s history. With any nation that has a two-party system of government, it is inevitable that the party out of power will feel some kind of animosity toward the party in power. In fact, it is natural. As the party not in power, it is your goal to convince your nation that the party in power is somehow and some way being detrimental to the country through their policy decisions. These decisions could be related to a nation’s safety and security, a nation’s economy, a nation’s immigration system, and a nation’s...

At the behest of House Judiciary Committee Chairman Cale Keable, D-Burrillville, the Rhode Island House has finally voted to ratify the 17th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which reqired direct election of U.S. Senators. Before the amendment took effect in 1913, senators were elected by state legislators. That system was widely criticized for breeding corruption as senate aspirants bribed lawmakers to secure the votes needed to win senate seats. The ceremonial resolution approved by the House doesn’t change anything, Keable acknowledged, but he said it does send a message ``that Rhode Island values democracy.’’ Rhode Island never ratified the 17th...

Freedom comes at a price. People in the USA have the right to be stupid, just as the rest of us have the right to mock them or shun them. But when they form into a know-nothing, obfuscating, and obstructionist political party, the true cost of freedom begins to be experienced. There are millions of people who are fiercely dedicated to the downfall of the United States of America and they are living among us. Operating in full view of their families, friends, neighbors, and coworkers, this cabal works every day to destroy the basic values upon which this country...

Steve Lonegan is a wonderful family man and patriot. He would have been a superb member of the House. But the DC RINOs, led by John Boehner, were opposed to him. You see, he would have been an independent conservative and they cannot stand that in the Capitol Building. So, the RINOs put up a candidate against Lonegan who they can control, and will control, and who loaned his campaign millions to use in an endless series of attack ads. This is the new modus operandi of the RINOs in all the races across the country. During the course of...

Earlier this week Politico featured a David Lampo piece, "Gay Marriage Will Destroy the GOP." Politico is exactly right that gay marriage will destroy the GOP – but for precisely the opposite reason Lampo imagines. In his article, Lampo argues that if the GOP does not embrace gay marriage, it is doomed. The truth of the matter is exactly the opposite: it is embracing gay marriage that will doom the GOP and consign it to the ash heap of history. Politico wants us to believe the tide of history is inevitable, and the GOP either must get on board the...