Free Republic

One thing that makes the U.S. great: no two states are the same. That diversity leads to distinct strengths and weaknesses, but how can you know what makes North Dakota different from South Dakota, besides a made-up line separating them? Well, in the interest of showing that every state sucks in some way, we picked out one key area where each is most deficient. This is what every state is the worst at.

We have some bad news for American conservatives: The leaders of our party, the once Grand Old Party, are trying to figure out a way to win elections without us, and if or when they do, they will abandon us like yesterday’s trash. If you have any question about this, you need not look any further than this National Journal story from yesterday, reporting that former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush has “announced” on his Facebook page that he is “actively exploring” a presidential bid in 2016. Spoiler alert: Jeb Bush is not your dad’s conservative. We’re not sure if “actively...

A lawsuit 17 states have brought against the Obama administration’s immigration actions offers a promising restraint against presidential power grabs. December 8, 2014 By Gabriel Malor Led by Texas Attorney General and soon-to-be-governor Greg Abbott, 17 states have sued the United States and the Department of Homeland Security because of the Obama administration’s immigration action. Before we dig into the lawsuit, let us stipulate that the best option for curtailing President Obama’s dubious immigration power grab is action from Congress to roll back his unilateral changes and to address an immigration system that all sides agree has failed. But absent...

Eighteen states, led by Texas, filed a lawsuit today with the U.S. District Court in the Southern District of Texas challenging President Obama's executive action on immigration. The suit claims that the White House overstepped its authority by granting amnesty and work permits for 5 million illegal aliens. After filing the federal suit, Texas Attorney General and Governor-elect Greg Abbott wrote in a statement that President Obama's executive amnesty "tramples the U.S. Constitution's Take Care Clause and federal law."Also included in Attorney General Abbott's statement were the states' legal challenges to President Obama's executive action: The executive action on immigration...

Few Americans who entered polling booths for the Nov. 4 election and pulled the lever for their favorite candidate for Senate realize that for most of American history, senators were chosen by the state legislatures. It wasn’t until 1913 that the 17thAmendment was passed, granting American voters the constitutional right of directly electing their senators.While this important amendment may seem innocuous, the reality is that few other changes to our Constitution have had the same detrimental effect on our nation than this single, nearly forgotten alteration.The passage of the 17th Amendment was driven largely by the populist movement of the...

“I don’t want to say they’re unsafe, but they’re dangerous.” That was how President Obama’s former transportation secretary Ray LaHood described America’s roads and bridges in a pre-Thanksgiving interview on CBS’s 60 Minutes. The high-profile story left viewers with the distinct impression that America’s roads and bridges are crumbling, and politicians were to blame. First, let’s dispense with the notion that travel in America is a life-jeopardizing experience. According to the Federal Highway Administration’s own 2013 report, the number of structurally deficient and functionally obsolete bridges has decreased every year since 2000. This same report also shows that fatalities and...

When St. Louis County Prosecutor Robert P. McCulloch explained that some exonerating testimony in the shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, came from several African-American eyewitnesses who described Brown as having charged police officer Darren Wilson before he fired the fatal shots, it was a powerful moment. Such testimony was consistent with physical evidence establishing that Wilson had not fired at Brown's back as repeatedly and poisonously alleged. Indeed, it would seem that the aggressor in this fatal encounter was not Wilson, but rather Brown. According to evidence the grand jury sifted and assessed, it seems that Wilson...

Every party in opposition goes a little crazy. For Republicans in the early Obama era, insanity took the form of the Sarah Palin spasm. Veteran politicos took the former Alaska governor seriously as a national figure. Republican primary voters nominated the likes of Todd Akin, Christine O'Donnell and Sharron Angle. Glenn Beck seemed important enough to hold a big rally at the Lincoln Memorial. Fortunately, serious parties eventually pull back from the fever swamps. That’s what’s happening to the Republican Party. It has re-established itself as the nation’s dominant governing party. Republicans now control 69 of 99 state legislative bodies....

House Republicans will have their largest majority since the 1930s next year, but that doesn't mean Speaker John Boehner's (R-Ohio) job will be easy.The House GOP leadership's struggles in keeping members in line over the past four years have been well documented. Some of the incoming freshmen will likely join the ranks of conservatives who frequently oppose leadership initiatives.Among the new freshmen, for instance, is one congressman-elect who has called Hillary Clinton the "anti-Christ," another who has suggested Muslims don't deserve First Amendment rights, and yet another who has declared himself open to the idea of the United States invading...

Another underreported fact from Tuesday's election is the extraordinary night Republicans had in winning state legislative seats. The GOP now controls two thirds of state legislative houses – 66 of 99 (Nebraska's legislature is unicameral).  They upped the number of states where they control both house and senate to 24 – one more than they had before the election.  And according to this article in Vox, they cut the number of Democratic-held legislatures from 14 to 7. Republicans made historic gains in state legislatures in 2010. They held on in many states in 2012, or made up for losses...

This could be the nicest thing you read today, via the Wall Street Journal: A West Virginia University freshman who did most of her campaigning out of her dorm room became the youngest state lawmaker in the nation Tuesday. Republican Saira Blair, a fiscally conservative 18-year-old, will represent a small district in West Virginia’s eastern panhandle, about 1½ hours outside Washington, D.C., after defeating her Democratic opponent 63% to 30%, according to the Associated Press. A third candidate got 7% of the vote. In a statement, Ms. Blair thanked her supporters and family, as well as her opponents for running...

In the following post, I am going to go through what happened last night for those finding it hard to follow, perhaps because they don't know who is who etc. I will go systematically through the highlights and lowlights of the governor's races, US Senate races, US House races, and state legislature makeup, picking out the ones I was watching out for in particular. I will then state the big winners and losers of the night in general Finally, my opinion on where we should go next, how to improve on successes and not repeat failures. Without further ado, and...

Map of Flyover Country

MSM reports of individual States protocol and subsequent monitoring of travelers from West Africa for Ebola ALABAMA MontgomeryAdvertiser: Alabama monitors 3 from Ebola outbreak areas October 30, 2014 Alabamas13: Gov. Bentley and State Health Officer address Alabama’s Ebola plan ALASKA BuffaloNews: A look at Ebola guidelines in some states October 31, 2014 State health officials in Alaska are finishing a plan that will outline the steps for when to put someone in quarantine or how to manage a patient who is off Alaska's limited road system, said Dr. Joe McLaughlin, the state's chief epidemiologist. Anyone who traveled to the hardest...

RUSH: Okay. So let me see if I understand this. The states want to set up their own Ebola quarantines. Why would they want to do that? That's because they don't trust the federal government's quarantine protocols, right? That means they don't trust the CDC. That means they don't trust Obama, the Ebola czar, who has yet to make an appearance. They had a 27-member meeting, though, they had an Ebola meeting with 27 people, problem solved. So one week before the election we have here a bunch of states that are deciding to do their own quarantines, and the...

The White House pushed back against the governors of New York, New Jersey, Illinois and other states that instituted procedures to forcibly quarantine medical workers returning from West Africa, deepening an emotional debate brought on by recent Ebola cases in the U.S. [snip] It wasn’t clear what action the (Obama) administration could take to end the quarantines. New York Gov. (Andrew Cuomo) on Sunday night gave the first new details about how his state’s quarantine would work, ( noting that individuals would be allowed to stay in their homes for 21 days).

(CNSNews.com) – Individuals from West African nations who travel to airports in six U.S. states will be tracked for 21 days for signs of Ebola, but it will be up to individual states to decide what to do if these travelers fail to self-report, the White House said Wednesday. White House spokesman Josh Earnest called it “an additional layer that will be based upon an effort to share information with state and local health authorities so they can put in place the measures that they believe would be most effective in protecting the populations of their states.” Screening has already...

t’s a movement that’s been building in recent years: efforts by states to reclaim their constitutional authority by declaring Washington’s health care laws, gun control or other restrictions simply don’t apply within their boundaries. After all, the Constitution stipulates that, except for a couple of dozen specific issues such as national defense, the powers in the U.S. rest with the states. Now a new lawsuit contends states can regain their authority by returning to the practice of having state legislatures elect U.S. senators, as the Constitution originally required. The case is being brought by author, columnist, commentator and activist Devvy...

Last night I attended the premiere of this movie, which is a riveting documentary on the conditions at the border. It contains interviews with the agents, ranchers and citizens explaining the dangers that continue to head north to the heartland. It shows the violence, the tragedy and the lawlessness that results from our government's indifference to the needed border security Despite all I thought I knew, this movie is an eye-opener. The full movie is available for viewing at the home link. It is fully sponsored by the Tea Party Patriots. You don't have to pay a penny. Bump this...

According to National Nurses United, 76 percent of nurses surveyed say their hospital has not communicated to them any policy regarding potential admission of Ebola patients, 85 percent say their hospital has not provided education sessions where nurses can ask questions, and just over one-third say their hospital has insufficient supplies of face shields and impermeable gowns.