Free Republic

The Afternoon Campaign Update (Because The Campaign Never Ends) By now, most of you have heard that, in her town hall event on the Collaboration News Network (CNN), Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren endorsed the idea of completely eliminating the Electoral College, because of course she did. “Every vote matters and the way we can make that happen is that we can have national voting, and that means get rid of the Electoral College,” Warren told the audience, “I believe we need a constitutional amendment that protects the right to vote for every American citizen and makes sure that vote gets...

United States – -(AmmoLand.com)- Much of the focus on Second Amendment issues tends to be at the federal level. There are good reasons for this focus: Federal law sets the baseline for laws affecting our Second Amendment rights. Federal judges can overturn anti-Second Amendment state laws. The President can appoint new federal judges, and also can set the tone for what happens in the executive branch. We have been very fortunate to have President Donald Trump these last two years. Some may nitpick about the bump-stock ban via the regulatory process, but that is far better than the legislation anti-Second...

Ranking Member Doug Collins: I’m confident every lawmaker in this room agrees that our democracy depends on protecting voting rights and election integrity. Congress has the authority to prohibit discriminatory treatment in voting based on race or ethnicity as part of its duty to ensure the sanctity of every vote. Unfortunately, this bill actively undermines these goals. The bill before us today federalizes elections in ways that have nothing to do with outlawing discrimination. Instead, it federalizes elections in ways that actually disenfranchise state voters. H.R. 1 would deprive state voters of their own right to determine their state’s voting...

The democrats say the states have a right to defy the federal government when it comes to NOT enforcing immigration laws they don't like. Does this mean the more conservative states have a right to defy the federal government in regards to enforcing laws they don't like? 'Legalized' abortion on demand or same-sex marriage, for example. How about gun control laws? Is there any federal law that states MUST enforce even if they don't like it? Can cities and states pass sanctuary one man, one woman marriage laws? Sanctuary pro-life laws? Sanctuary gun rights laws? Sanctuary free religion laws? Sanctuary...

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D.-Calif.) introduced the first piece of legislation for the newly convened 116th Congress and it is a political reform bill that includes a provision that would force states to allow convicted felons to vote as long as they were no longer actually in prison. “H.R. 1 will create automatic voter registration across the country; ensure that individuals who have completed felony sentences have their full rights restored; expand early voting and simplify absentee voting; and modernize the U.S. voting system,” says a summary of the bill released by Pelosi. A subsection of the bill is called...

I was recently thinking, what would happen if a conservative city/county/state decided to make a statement about the other cities/counties/states that are "sanctuary zones" and pass law that would read like the following: "As long as a sanctuary city/county/state area exists where the ICE agents are turned away by their local authorities, we reserve the right to refuse law enforcement service to ANY OTHER federal agency under the Equal protection under the Law provision of the 14th amendment. These agencies that we may refuse local cooperation with include but are not limited to the Following agencies: IRS, EPA, DEA, BATF,...

The Senate is expected to vote Tuesday on an amendment that would federally legalize marijuana by allowing states to regulate their own medical and recreational pot markets. But even one senator can block a vote on the amendment, which would address a longstanding conflict between federal and state law. Sen. Cory Gardner, D-Colo., is seeking to attach the measure to the First Step Act, a bundle of prison, prisoner re-entry, and sentencing reforms that senators voted 81-12 to advance Monday.

Wisconsin’s Democratic Gov.-elect Tony Evers said Sunday he’s not optimistic that outgoing governor Scott Walker will veto bills approved by the Republican-dominated Legislature that would limit the new governor’s power. Speaking on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Evers said he talked by telephone with Walker recently and appealed to him to veto the legislation, but that Walker was noncommittal. Evers, who will be sworn in Jan. 7 after narrowly defeating the two-term Republican last month, said Wisconsin voters did not elect him to fight over administrative powers with the GOP legislative majority. He said the lame-duck legislation approved by lawmakers after...

Common Core sucked all the energy, money, and motivation right out of desperately needed potential reforms to U.S. public schools for a decade, and for nothing. It’s been about nine years since the Obama administration lured states into adopting Common Core sight unseen, with promises it would improve student achievement. Like President Obama’s other big promises — “If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor” — this one’s been proven a scam. “If you set and enforce rigorous and challenging standards and assessments; if you put outstanding teachers at the front of the classroom; if you turn around...

The landmark law governing adoptions of Native American children, designed to keep them within Native American families, has been struck down as unconstitutional by a federal judge in Texas. In an Oct. 4 ruling that has stunned Native American rights advocates, U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor found that the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 illegally gives Native American families preferential treatment in adoption proceedings for Native American children based on race, in violation of the Fifth Amendment’s equal protection guarantee. Additionally, O’Connor ruled that the law violated the 10th Amendment’s federalism guarantees, specifically the so-called “anti-commandeering” principle established by...

Smoking cannabis ages the brain by an average of 2.8 years, new research suggests. This is compared to four years in schizophrenia patients, according to the largest study of its kind. Brain ageing is defined as reduced blood flow through the organ. Excessive alcohol also ages the organ by 0.6 years, the research adds. Lead author Dr Daniel Amen, founder of Amen Clinics, said: 'The cannabis abuse finding was especially important, as our culture is starting to see marijuana as an innocuous substance. This study should give us pause about it.' Reduced brain blood flow has previously been linked to...

Elizabeth Warren, meet Clarence Thomas. Senator Warren, a Democrat of Massachusetts, was in the headlines recently for joining with Senator Cory Gardner, a Republican who represents Colorado, to introduce the Strengthening the Tenth Amendment Through Entrusting States Act. That legislation would, as Warren put it in a tweet, “let states, territories, & tribes decide for themselves how best to regulate marijuana — without federal interference.” Justice Thomas is Warren’s natural ally on the issue. He wrote an emphatic dissent in the 2005 Supreme Court case Gonzalez v. Raich. Gonzalez was President George W. Bush’s attorney general Alberto Gonzalez, and Angel...

Senator Warren, a Democrat of Massachusetts, is in the headlines for joining with Senator Cory Gardner, a Republican who represents Colorado, to introduce the Strengthening the Tenth Amendment Through Entrusting States Act. That legislation would, as Warren put it in a tweet, “let states, territories, & tribes decide for themselves how best to regulate marijuana — without federal interference.” Justice Thomas is Warren’s natural ally on the issue. He wrote an emphatic dissent in the 2005 Supreme Court case Gonzalez v. Raich. Alberto Gonzalez was President George W. Bush’s attorney general, and Angel Raich is an Oakland, Calif., woman who...

Sens. Cory Gardner, a Colorado Republican, and Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat, introduced a bill Thursday intended to protect the laws of states that have legalized some form of marijuana from federal intervention. The Strengthening the Tenth Amendment Through Entrusting States (STATES) Act would ensure that states can make and enforce their own laws pertaining to the production and distribution of marijuana as long as states comply with a few federally-mandated basic protections. Currently, 46 states and additional territories have laws permitting medical and/or recreational marijuana. Both Colorado and Massachusetts have legalized recreational marijuana. But on the federal level, the...

Cannabis activists paraded down Pennsylvania Avenue with flags, banners, a 51-foot inflatable joint, and a plan to get high at 4:20 p.m. two years ago in a last-ditch bid to convince President Barack Obama to administratively legalize marijuana. Attendees blew smoke through a shofar, took selfies, and reveled in a communal cloud as police watched, but the rally didn't sway Obama, who left office with pot still a Schedule I drug under the Controlled Substances Act, meaning illegal for any purpose outside limited research. "I think he will go down among potheads as fitting the stereotype as someone who was...

President Trump called Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner this week to tell him there will be no crackdown on states that legalized marijuana for recreational use. Trump also said he will support legislation to allow state autonomy under federal law, which currently makes pot possession for any reason outside limited research a crime. Gardner, a Republican, won the assurances by blocking Justice Department nominations after Attorney General Jeff Sessions withdrew the so-called Cole Memo in January.

As California's Summer Gas Is Approaching $4.00/gal what can we expect from President Trump and changes to onerous EPA regulations? Part of gasoline’s price increase is largely seasonal, as refiners tend to process less crude oil into fuel during maintenance and are starting to transition to summer-grade gasoline, which is more expensive to make. According to analysts prices will likely climb further as the weather warms and driving picks up. We need to get gas prices under control in order to MAGA.

In a state consumed by conservation and environmental issues, one highly endangered species has long gone unnoticed and unprotected – the California Conservative. Is it still possible to rescue them from the brink of extinction? Can their numbers be revived? And can they thrive here once again? While the nation continues to view California as a homogeneous voting block of individuals in lock step with an increasingly progressive liberal agenda, for Common Sense Californians up and down the left coast state, there’s a sense that a different tide is rising. The ripple began in Los Alamitos where the city council...

Binge drinking across the United States is at an all time high. Yet, a new report from the Wall Street investment firm Cowen & Company shows that this dangerous alcoholic behavior is on the decline in states that have legalized the leaf in a manner similar to alcohol.It was just a month ago that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published new data suggesting that more Americans are now engaging in regular binge drinking. What was once considered a foolish exploit of College students has now apparently infiltrated citizens from every demographic and all walks of life. [...]But the investment analysts at...

SAN FRANCISCO — Texas and more than a dozen other states led by Republican governors are supporting the Trump administration in its lawsuit over California’s so-called sanctuary laws that protect people in the U.S. illegally. In a court filing Monday, the states say the laws are designed to interfere with or block federal immigration enforcement, and California doesn’t have that authority.