Free Republic

On the surface, the title of this article seems paradoxical. How can any conservative in the USA even contemplate the concept of the government creating a single-payer health insurance system covering all Americans and, in effect, ending private major medical health insurance? In this post I hope to make the conservative case for a single payer incontrovertible for those occupying the centre-right politically. Conservatives are supposed to be the defenders of business. Yet our current health care system works as an albatross around the neck of American business. Likewise, the piecemeal reforms of ObamaCare seem only to make some problems...

The federal lawsuit, filed this week in U.S. District Court in California demands the delegates be freed to "vote their conscience" for presidential nominee at the party's August national convention in Tampa, Fla., rather than being "bound" to vote for a certain candidate, as many state party bylaws require, based on the primary elections and other delegate selection procedures. Courthouse News Service reports at least another 40 additional national convention delegates have asked to join the lawsuit which would bring the total to 160 Delegates. Yet striking down party rules that bind candidates to vote in accordance with the primary...

Romney "agrees" with Rubio. Wants "long term" solution. Full statement in Comments.

Okay, maybe that wasn’t the best metaphor, but he fumbled an important opportunity. The problem with the president’s amnesty decree is not that it “makes it more difficult to reach that long-term solution because an executive order is, of course, just a short-term matter — it can be reversed by subsequent presidents.” The problem is that it’s u-n-c-o-n-s-t-i-t-u-t-i-o-n-a-l. You would expect Allen West and Steve King to be forceful in denouncing this usurpation, but even Amnesty John McCain and Rick “you don’t have a heart” Perry were strong. Heck, Lindsey Graham — Lindsey Graham — denounced the move as “possibly...

Why is Barack Obama’s road to re-election so steep and uncertain at this stage? There are five important reasons. 1. An indefensible record. Every election which features an incumbent is, at least in good measure, a referendum on the record of the incumbent. The problem facing Obama is that he can’t offer a convincing case that his policies have succeeded. Recall that at the outset of his presidency, Obama told NBC’s Matt Lauer, “I will be held accountable. I’ve got four years… If I don’t have this done in three years, then there’s going to be a one-term proposition.” Yet...

Over the weekend, Politico broke the news that Mitt Romney had tapped Mike Leavitt, the former Utah Governor and HHS Secretary under George W. Bush, to lead the transition effort should Romney win the presidency. This is a very worrisome signal to conservatives holding out hope that Romney will live up to his promises to fight for limited government if elected. As Ben Domenech details, Leavitt is one of the few Republicans who has been actively campaigning for governors to implement Obamacare’s health care exchanges at the state level. [....] Leavitt has shown time and again that he is to...

Mitt Romney is in favor of the $700 billion TARP corporate-welfare bailout.

Bruce Willis calls Republican Party nominee Mitt Romney an "embarrassment" in a new interview with Esquire magazine and says he doesn't care which side wins in November. "Yeah, Romney. He's just such a disappointment, an embarrassment," Willis told the magazine. "Chin up, hair up. He's just one of those guys, one of those guys who says he's going to change everything and he'll get in there, and they'll smile at him and introduce themselves: 'We're Congress, we make sure nothing changes,'" Willis went on. "He won't do it. He can't. Everybody wants to be Barack Obama. And what did he...

In advance of the fundraiser with Mitt Romney and Donald Trump on Tuesday, the candidate's senior adviser Eric Fehrnstrom tried to set the line on CNN a short time ago. "I can't speak for Donald Trump," Fehrnstrom said. "But I can tell you that Mitt Romney accepts that President Obama was born in the United States. He doesn't view the place of his birth as an issue in this campaign."

Not that there's anything wrong with that! Keynes' theories remain the essential guide to understanding recessions. The real news in Mitt Romney’s interview with Mark Halperin, as Charles Pierce points out, is that Romney openly repudiated the central argument his party has been making against President Obama for the last three years: that he spent too much money and therefore deepened the economic crisis. Indeed Romney himself had been making this very case as recently as a week ago (“he bailed out the public sector, gave billions of dollars to the companies of his friends, and added almost as much...

Yesterday it was reported by Guy Benson at Townhall.com that former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee, did something he was reluctant to do during his primary fight: He “repudiated” the efforts of a political action committee to attack one of his opponents. On his Thursday radio show, Levin suggested highlighting Rev. Wright was being “repudiated” because it would be interpreted as racist. “In the next six months, this campaign, or however long it goes — listen to me, but don’t listen to me,” Levin said. “Don’t bring up Rev. Wright, because the Obama campaign says if...

According to the Times, the Romney team has decided not to assail Obama's "likability," for fear personal attacks will backfire with independents. Message to the Republican establishment:  do not muzzle those of us who want to focus on Obama's troubling history with angry Marxists, black and white, including Reverend Wright and Bill Ayers.   This is not about race.  It is about knowing who Obama is, understanding what he has already done to our country, and what he is capable of doing.  The issue of Rev erend Wright is not peripheral, it is central.  It gets to the heart of the...

Mitt Romney’s campaign manager rejected efforts to use President Obama’s former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, in ads attacking the president, as reportedly planned by a “super PAC” working toward electing Mr. Romney in November. “Unlike the Obama campaign, Gov. Romney is running a campaign based on jobs and the economy, and we encourage everyone else to do the same,” the campaign manager, Matt Rhoades, said in a statement on Thursday morning. “President Obama’s team said they would ‘kill Romney,’ and, just last week, David Axelrod referred to individuals opposing the president as ‘contract killers.’ It’s clear President Obama’s team...

Levin is livid over the fact that Romney repudiated anything to do with bringing up Rev. Wright in this campaign even though in the primaries he went full throttle against Newt Gingrich, even with false attack ads:

Mitt Romney says he rejects efforts to use President Barack Obama's former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, in ads attacking the president, insisting the campaign should remain focused on the economy. "I repudiate the effort by that PAC to promote an ad strategy of the nature they've described," Romney said in an interview with Townhall.com. "I would like to see this campaign focus on the economy, on getting people back to work, on seeing rising incomes and growing prosperity—particularly for those in the middle class of America."

Some of Mitt Romney's best moments on the 2012 campaign trail have come during town hall meetings when the candidate, long criticized as too uptight on the stump, strays off script to take questions from voters. But the freewheeling nature of voter forums can have its drawbacks. Romney has faced hostile questions on everything from his wealth to his religion. And on Monday, he experienced another awkward moment, when a supporter stood and declared that President Barack Obama should be "tried for treason." The comment came during a town hall meeting in Cleveland. Taking the microphone, a woman told Romney...

Romney Backs Student Loan Proposal Obama Supports By KASIE HUNT ASTON, Pa. (AP) — Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney on Monday embraced a student loan proposal that President Barack Obama is selling on the campaign trail and refused to endorse Sen. Marco Rubio's conservative immigration plan aimed at helping young illegal immigrants. The two policy positions signaled an effort by Romney to move to the political center as he works to court critical general election swing voters — including young voters and Hispanic voters — after a brutal primary fight. "I think young voters in this country have to vote...

Half of all Americans now express unfavorable views of Mitt Romney, a new high for the GOP presidential hopeful in Washington Post-ABC News polling. The deteriorating public impressions of the former Massachusetts governor foreshadow a significant obstacle for him as he tries to shift the focus of his campaign toward a potential match-up against President Obama. Romney’s negative numbers have jumped around this election cycle, but the overall pattern is similar to his trajectory four years ago: As he became better known, his unfavorables shot up far more rapidly than his positive numbers. Negative impressions are up eight percentage points...

Left-wing pundits and politicos continue to insist that Mitt Romney has yet to express what he wants to accomplish as President. Somehow they seem to ignore his call for a 20% across the board tax cut, repeal of ObamaCare, and enactment of a comprehensive energy plan. Maybe they didn’t notice his plans to balance the budget and strengthen the military, and thus gain greater respect and trust around the world. But for some reason, President Obama hasn’t been pressed at all to state what he wants to accomplish if he were given four more years in the White House. Through...

Governor Romney’s campaign is catching some flak because a top aide implied that many of the candidate’s positions have been insincere and that Romney will erase those views (like an Etch-a-Sketch) and return to his statist roots as the general election begins. I’m surprised that anyone’s surprised. Hasn’t anybody been paying attention to his comments and track record on issues such as the value-added tax, healthcare, Social Security reform, budget savings, ethanol subsidies, Keynesian economics, and the minimum wage? In any event, people should be more agitated by his recent defense of the corrupt TARP bailouts. [...] This is going...