Free Republic

With three weeks left, unless we can have some consensus among conservative opinion makers, strategists and activists, talk show hosts on what we MUST do, we might lose this election. My concern is we can post this all day, and Rush can talk ALL day, singing to the choir! It's not ENOUGH! May I suggest several ideas & let's hear from you out there? We need you to vote. 1. Buy TV ads or 30 minutes prime time documentary on Obama's leftist background Earlier, I have emailed a bunch of talk show hosts, imploring them to consider urging their vast...

An ad and a slogan. A sky-rocketing homicide rate , a sewer of corruption that stands as an inspiration to grafters and mob guys everywhere, a state government trying hard to follow suite, deteriorating city services and a failing school system. Are we missing anything? Yes! One of the most stressful cities in the entire country

Okay, I know that there must be some people on here that could actually get some solid ideas to those that matter in the McCain campaign. After watching recent events and seeing John McCain's stump speech in Wisconsin this morning, I am convinced that this is the simple winning strategy for the McCain campaign. Obama is clearly seeing a major benefit from anxious people on the economy, and the McCain internals likely show this in a serious way too. The economy is by a huge margin the single most important issue to the voting public. Obama is just playing out...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 9, 2008 – The changing situation in Afghanistan, particularly increased violence along the Afghan-Pakistan border, warrants a full review of U.S. strategy there to broaden its scope and improve interagency coordination, the top U.S. military officer said yesterday. Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, noted the increased sophistication of al-Qaida and Taliban operatives in the border region during a podcast interview with the Pentagon Channel. Mullen shared concerns expressed by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and others that the border region has become a safe haven for insurgents....

The best tactic I see as a political activist is or talk show hosts & blogs across the country, to call upon their vast audience, to URGE them to each contribute $25-$50 to an "Expose (or knock out) Obama fund, or to some PAC/ 527! It WILL generate EXCITEMENT to the discouraged! They should be designated for TV/radio SPOTS on LIBERAL stations in battleground States. and/or to buy a 15 minute prime time slot 2-3 nights before election for a DOCUMENTED expose on Obama's radical friends, can include appeal from Sen. Thompson, Chuck Norris, talk show hosts I pray together...

Where is the Outrage against Congress? I’m not one to post a vanity, but in this case I think my marketing background and experience in reaching the American public is useful. Question: Doesn’t your skin crawl every time you hear the expression from the Democrats “Are your better off than…blah, blah, blah?” What comes to my mind and many in so called “flyover country” (and I image all over the US) is yeah, I was better off two years ago. What happened in the last two years? Congress has been run by Democrats and the President has caved to their...

First, knock it off with the "corporations are evil" bit.Stop it. Just stop it. That stuff is for Progressives and Populists like Bill O'Reilly.I don't know if you really believe it, or if you think it plays up to the middle, but it's not helping the situation. Wall Street could not - would not - have done what it did if Congress had not first pursued bad policies and ideas that made the problem possible, then made it promising.Knock it off with the bipartisan foolishness. Congress is the prime mover here. It created this mess.The Media has been lying...

Now that the conventions are behind us, the 2008 election is shaping up to be much closer than anyone would have believed months ago. Still, it will be an uphill battle for John McCain as Barack Obama has the advantage this year. If Obama wins, it should be a wake-up call to Republicans that the nation’s political landscape has dramatically changed, making it difficult for Republicans to win national elections. A key factor in the challenge facing Republicans is shifting demographics. States such as Texas, Florida, New Mexico, Arizona and Nevada, once considered solid red states, are now faltering for...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 24, 2008 – The Defense Department is examining its operations and strategy in Afghanistan as part of a broader U.S. governmental review, a senior Pentagon spokesman told reporters today. Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell answers questions from news reporters during a press briefing at the Pentagon, Sept. 24, 2008. DoD photo by U.S. Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Molly A. Burgess  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. The completed Pentagon report and reviews by other U.S. agencies will be presented to the White House’s National Security Council, Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell said. “Various departments within this...

http://www.mikefrancesa.com/wordpress/?p=1259New campaign strategy for John McCain, get some supporters with video camera phones over to Joe Biden rallies, ask him some really liberal questions, expect to get really liberal answers, upload to Youtube, eat popcorn and laugh as Biden continues to sink Obama’s chances. Perhaps you can get somebody to dress up as a far left anti gun activist and ask Biden about guns, would not surprise me to hear Biden say he will be banning all guns in America.

Candidates who are willing to say "enough is enough" on these matters - and related ones such as affirmative action - are likely to find that they have tapped into an undercurrent of discontent that can sweep them along towards victory in November. More importantly in the long run, they will also find themselves at the forefront of the defence of American liberty in regards to freedom of speech, academic freedom, freedom of worship and parental rights. In other words, they will be doing the right thing.

With top Dems fearing Barack Obama is in a hole, the Obama campaign has made a weird decision. It's going to dig that hole deeper, harder and faster.

This is a fairly complicated turn based strategy game, but if you learn how to play you get to nuke the bajeezus out of your enemies! What's better than that?

Senator Barack Obama will intensify his assault against Senator John McCain, with new television advertisements and more forceful attacks by the candidate and surrogates beginning Friday morning, as he confronts an invigorated Republican presidential ticket and increasing nervousness in the Democratic ranks...

It turns out that Joseph Biden is the poorest member of the Senate, is 65 years old and likely has a huge negative net-worth. His net-worth is listed as From $-302,980 to $277,997 by OpenSecrets.org. He keeps dozens of lines of credit, a new one opened every couple of years and together they add up to huge sums for a guy who has had a better paying job than most for basically his entire adult life.

Gay Democrats talk strategyKristen Wyatt The Associated Press Aspen, CO Colorado DENVER — Gay and lesbian Democrats are gathering early to prepare a strategy for next week's convention, and their marching orders are the same for all states: Make sure other delegates know who you are and what gay voters want this fall. The Stonewall Democrats started a four-day "boot camp" in Denver Thursday. At the top of their agenda for the convention, which starts Monday, are pushing Democrats to fight proposed gay-marriage bans in three states and passing federal anti-discrimination laws. With a record 370 lesbian, gay and transgendered...

In the introduction, Mr. Obama acknowledged his use of pseudonyms, composite characters, approximated dialogue and events out of chronological order. He was writing at a time well before a recent series of publishing scandals involving fabrication in memoirs. “He was trying to be careful of people’s feelings,” said Deborah Baker, the editor on the first paperback edition of the book. “The fact is, it all had a sort of larger truth going on that you couldn’t make up.” Finally there is this last bit and it shows why the Corsi book is a game changer even if it ends up...

Some of us are not puzzled by this at all because many of us Republicans watched a few of the Democratic debates and noted how each time Obama was engaged, he lost a big state to Hillary Clinton. A smile, and a speech off a teleprompter won't save you when you have to engage and argue your ideas with someone else. Every supposed strength of Obama, as you noted, is played up by these interactions and also, as you noted it could and should break the campaign wide open by putting that distance between him and McCain, or putting him...

The media keep calling Obama a rising star, a rock star, and other phrases to try to build him up. They keep trying to give him momentum and build support for him due to their own biases. When Republicans are smart enough to note the process, the media goes nuts trying to cover their own rear. They don't even realize that one of the reasons McCain has gone negative is because it will finally yield some coverage that they have been refusing to give him. They won't cover him in front of a podium speaking about his energy plan. However...

Something I have to ask about some of these figures is does anyone remember what racist is anymore? It seems we have defined the bar for racism down to a mere difference in perception of offense among different groups. This is almost as bad as those reports out of the UK whereby toddlers were being labeled racist if they didn't respond favorably to ethnic food selections. The John McCain Celebrity Ad shows Obama amidst two celebrities who appear to have questionable talent and have proven to be more famous for being famous than anything else. How does linking Obama to...

Barack Obama has a serious problem coming up in the fall election schedule. People are going to ask him to define what HOPE™ and CHANGE™ mean and so far when he has done this, it drops him lower in the polls and always comes off sounding like a gaffe. The reality is that it isnt a gaffe, this nonsense, the substance without style is what he happens to believe folks. He will fly around in Barack One while chastizing you to ensure your tires are properly filled to solve our energy crisis.

Obama is, of course, a hypocrite. His campaign is anything but post-racial. On the contrary, Obama has created at atmosphere of guilt-based voting. You see, one must vote for Obama if he's not racist and if he's interested in a post-racial America. And be careful...don't be fooled! McCain and his cohorts will do everything possible to tell you Obama is BLACK! Now, who is running a post-racial candidacy, exactly?

The Obama campaign is not selling a grand idea. It is selling a grand person. You show he is merely a normal person and that means the ideal they are selling is false and thus will not resonate, no matter how many dollars you toss at it. I hope Republicans will remember this and jump on it. As has been noted by many, the factors out there create an uphill climate for any candidate coming from the right politically. The fact that the left is promising utopia makes this challenge even harder to overcome. Yet showing that the nominee is...

John McCain and Barack Obama have both changed positions in this campaign. That's OK. Voters understand that politicians can and, sometimes, should change their views. After all, voters do. Witness the wide swings in their answers to opinion polls. But before accepting the changes, voters typically ask themselves three questions: Does the candidate admit he's shifting? What's the new information that altered his thinking? Does the change seem reasonable and not calculating?

Washington, D.C. - Here's a new reason for taxpayer dismay: There's increasing evidence that companies may be protesting government contract awards as a strategy to negotiate their way into contracts or to derail an award process already in place. ... In February, IBM protested the Federal Bureau of Investigation's award of a $1 billion contract to Lockheed Martin (nyse: LMT - news - people ). Big Blue dropped its dispute two months later when Lockheed announced it would use IBM as a subcontractor.

Which shows us all exactly what we need to do with regard to defeating him. Repeat it like a chant. Show it in every way possible. Barack Obama is just another politician. He is no different than a John Kerry or an Al Gore. He will manipulate. He will say what is needed to get elected. He will go negative and attack. He will buy the election if it is possible for him to do so. His past shows him to be nothing extraordinary and quite ordinary. Even if every single one of these points is made and lands in...

SACRAMENTO – California's top air-quality agency for the first time on Thursday will reveal a long-awaited strategy for how it expects business and the public to respond to the challenge of dramatically reducing greenhouse gas emissions from factories, power plants and cars. By itself, the draft plan before the Air Resources Board will not impose specific regulations to curb greenhouse gas emissions linked to global warming. Instead, the plan is widely expected to set the course for establishing state policies that will redefine energy use in California. No sector will be excused. The proposal will lay out blueprints for refineries,...

John McCain has set off a firestorm by suggesting that the timing of the withdrawal of US forces from Iraq is "not too important." What is important, he said, are the casualties in Iraq, pointing to long-term US troop presence in Japan, South Korea, and Germany. He should be commended for his "straight talk" in articulating what he believes, despite its unpopularity. But Senator McCain has yet to give the American people clear answers to three fundamental questions: What, exactly, are the political objectives of keeping large numbers of American soldiers in Iraq for years to come? What plausible outcome...

Beyond the Unconventional. The Pentagon has decided on a name for the kind of war we have to be prepared to fight in decades to come. Unconventional? No. A couple of generations ago, the clash of national armies following the rules of the Hague and Geneva Conventions was called conventional war, as against a more terrifying unconventional war, which meant “nuclear” for a time; then that meaning changed to denote “special operations.” Any terminology now rooted in convention would be confusing. Asymmetrical? The meaning of that adjective is “unbalanced,” which carries the wrong connotation; besides, the term has been taken...

Hillary Clinton was for the war on terror including in Iraq, before she had to become against it to attract her Code Pink feminazi core for a White House bid. Barack Obama says he would have been against it from the start, had he been out of his political diapers at the time those tough decisions had to be made. Both are running on ideological hindsight and campaign rhetoric. But 300 million Americans expected President Bush alone to make certain that there would be no second 9/11. He has done just that, no matter how politically uncomfortable leftists have made...

An epochal shift in the immemorial cycle of war is under way, writes retired major general Robert H. Scales, the former commandant of the Army War College. The infantry is back. America’s enemies have learned that they can’t win blitzkrieg- age wars, so they no longer fight them. They have moved the battlefields to cities, jungles, and mountains, where the U.S. military’s techno log­ically superior ma chines are ineffective. “The enemy chooses to fight as infantry because he can win the infantry fight,” Scales says, and America’s experience in Iraq and Afghanistan shows that the nation has no choice but...

Back in 2006 (I believe) a video was posted (I though on Hot Air) that explained the whole Iraq war strategy in a single 4 or 5 minute clip. I featured jihadi's rushing to Iraq because they felt it was the central battle of the War on Terror. And a Map explaining how Iraq was in the key strategic position in the Middle east bordering 6 other strategically important Mid-East States. I just can't recall enough to find it and I need it for a presentation.

Iraq’s Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki must have Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and other cut-and-run liberal members of the U.S. Congress as his military advisors. What else explains his dismal performance in Basra, where he retreated from his raids against Shiite militants after anti-U.S. cleric Moqtada al-Sadr merely hinted retaliation if Iraqi security forces continued to arrest his many followers? Before his assault on the city, al-Maliki issued an “ultimatum” to Shiite militias to disarm. “Any gunman who does not do that will be an outlaw,” he said. Shortly after, he softened his rhetoric and offered money to militants who turned...

BISMARCK – Sen. Hillary Clinton’s decision to speak in Grand Forks Friday, within hours of rival Sen. Barack Obama’s address to North Dakota Democrats, may lie with the party’s nonbinding Feb. 5 caucus results, some Democrats say. Or it could just be that she’s pleasing supporters who have been asking her to come here “for weeks and weeks and weeks,” another said. Or maybe it has more to do with Obama and Clinton both realizing they will reach thousands of Democrats in three states in a little more than 24 hours in a swing through the Dakotas and its western...

Her only hope of getting the key committee to vote out a “majority report” supporting her position rests on her ability to persuade an as-yet-undetermined number of the 25 members appointed to the committee by party Chairman Howard Dean to cast votes for her position. The DNC’s Credentials Committee consists of 144 pledged members (Florida and Michigan are not included) plus the 25 party leaders and elected officials appointed by Dean. The 25 Dean appointees include a mix of Dean loyalists, Obama supporters and at least several individuals who have endorsed Clinton. "If the formal process of seating a delegation...

Barack Obama says: “John McCain is determined to carry out four more years of George Bush’s failed policies.” Obama is a politician, so it’s normal that he’d choose to repeat the lines that some of his followers want to hear. But before people buy that argument, I’d ask them to read three speeches.--snip--...he signaled that the foreign policy debate of the coming months will be very different from the one of the past six years. Anybody who thinks McCain is merely continuing the Bush agenda is not paying attention.

On April 11, 2007, Arizona Senator John McCain gave a major speech on the Iraq War at the Virginia Military Institute. When he took the stage at VMI, the Iraq troop surge had yet to be fully implemented. Some questioned whether McCain's strong and early support for President Bush's surge policy – labeled by some the "McCain Surge" as result of the senator's early advocacy of the tactic – when the American people were becoming dissatisfied with the country's involvement in Iraq would doom his presidential campaign. During the speech, McCain addressed this criticism head on. "Will this nation's elected...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Here is Bud in Burlington, Indiana. Bud, thanks for waiting, and welcome. CALLER: ... Indiana. Anyway Rush -- RUSH: Wait, what did I say? CALLER: I don't... I couldn't understand, but it was actually communist Bloomington Indiana. So... (silence) Are you still there? RUSH: Yeah, I'm here. CALLER: Anyway, I'd like to really quickly thank you for two things. First off, unlike the so-called moderates who called in yesterday complaining about your recommendation for Republicans voting in Democrat primaries -- RUSH: Yes? CALLER: -- I want to thank you, because I don't know if you're aware of...

The Washington Post reports that John McCain's unexpected rise from the politically dead has created a big problem for the Democrats. They saw an opportunity to win the presidency by turning the interior West into a blue zone, using the Hispanic vote to overwhelm the GOP in one of its traditional strongholds. McCain has thrown a wrench into those plans, and Barack Obama may also present a problem: For Democrats, 2008 was supposed to be the year of the Mountain West, when three years of relentless Republican attacks on undocumented immigrants would fuel a backlash among Hispanics that would change...

How Republicans Can Win Monday, January 7, 2008 9:29 AM By: John L. Perry Article Font Size Two possibilities for saving the Republican Party loom large in 2008: Pick a candidate who can realign both parties. Do it in a brokered convention. Sounds impossible? Not at all. In fact, there is a better likelihood of both things happening this year than in any presidential-election year since 1980, when Ronald Reagan sculpted his revolutionary coalition of social, economic, and national-security conservatives. He did it by showing enough independents and “Reagan Democrats” that their best interests lay in a political party led...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 14, 2008 – The U.S. strategy in Afghanistan is sound and can work, but the challenge lies in executing that strategy and sustaining success over time, a Defense Department official told Congress today. James Shinn, assistant secretary of defense for Asian and Pacific security affairs, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee in response to two recent reports that contend the U.S. strategy in Afghanistan needs to be fundamentally changed. Shinn described the strategy in Afghanistan as one of clearing, holding and building. The coalition has done very well in the clearing aspect of the strategy, he said,...

Folks, there still may be a slim chance to force a deadlocked convention. I'm no election math wizard, but I believe it's still mathematically possible for McCain to NOT receive the requisite number of delegates to win the nomination. But it would require a great turnout of passionate conservative voters in the remaining primary states to accomplish. The trick would be for all remaining primary conservative voters to vote for their favorite candidate as if he were still in the race. Fred's name is still on the ballot. So is Hunter's and Romney's. Shoot, vote for Huckabee, Paul or even...

Memo to Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, Mike Pence of Indiana, and John Thune of South Dakota, and perhaps to Butch Otter of Idaho, too: It's time for you gentlemen to run for president. Yes, of the United States. Yes, this year. Here's the situation: Mainstream conservatives are being routed in this year's presidential contests. And if John McCain or, less likely, Mike Huckabee goes into the Republican National Convention in Minneapolis with a first-ballot majority, the conservative movement will be completely shut out of a general election presidential campaign for the first time since 1976. For the movement that has...

Judging from his campaign schedule and media reports, it appears the Romney campaign has decided to cut paid media, dial back any last-minute campaigning in South Carolina, and try to survive a likely third-place finish there by winning Saturday's Nevada caucus. It's an understandable move, but a risky one that may prove to be a big strategic mistake in the overall race. First, it means Romney must now win Nevada. He is favored there - he's well organized and southern Nevada has a large LDS population - but you never know for sure in a caucus. Second, by pulling back...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 10, 2008 – President Bush’s new strategy for Iraq, announced one year ago today during a televised speech to the nation, is accomplishing many of its goals and laying important groundwork for initiatives yet to be fulfilled, military and defense officials agree. Bush unveiled the strategy amid growing sectarian violence that he acknowledged had overwhelmed Iraqis’ political gains and created an “unacceptable” situation in Iraq. The plan called for more than 20,000 additional U.S. troops on the ground in Baghdad and Anbar province, increased responsibility for the Iraqi government and Iraqi security forces, and more diplomatic and...

Hillary Clinton stands behind no Democratic presidential candidate in her scorn for George W. Bush – but that isn’t stopping her from implementing Mr. Bush’s 2000 primary strategy. In one notable consequence of the front-loaded 2008 political calendar, she implemented it before the New Hampshire primary, not after. Recall that in 2000, John McCain smashed Mr. Bush in New Hampshire by dominating the votes of independents. But Mr. Bush wore down Mr. McCain in subsequent contests with a two-pronged strategy. He co-opted the Arizona senator’s “reform” mantra by calling himself the reformer who would actually produce results, and sharply criticized...

This is a story about success and failure. It is a story about Iraq, and of something much bigger than Iraq. It is, perhaps, a small look into what makes victory, and defeat. It is a tale of infantrymen, of brave soldiers in dusty alleys a world away. It is a story of generals and strategies, too. But to understand our newfound success there, to know perhaps a little of how we achieved it and most importantly, how to keep it, we need to move away from that Mesopotamian desert and those boots on the ground, and back to a...

A New Direction in Homeland Security? by: Bethany Stotts, October 16, 2007 At the inception of the Department of Homeland Security, the DHS was presented with what national security specialist and Vice President of the Center for National Policy (CNP) Scott Bates termed a “herculean task,” the duty to synthesize a “pandemic of plans” into a cohesive, comprehensive national security strategy. The Bush Administration has issued two such strategies. However, some national security experts question whether the newest strategy publication marks a real change in national policy. “I think to call [National Strategy for Homeland Security] a strategy is really...

If ever there was a clearer example of selective reporting and bias by the media, here is the best example to date. The left is translating and selectively quoting LTG (Ret) Ricardo Sanchez' comments during the October 12 Military Reporters and Editors Luncheon in Washington D.C. "Former top general rips Bush’s Iraq policy" is not exactly what happened here, yet if you were to accept their editorializing, that's what many are going to come away with. See a pattern? So what did General Sanchez say, and what did he mean by it? Let me take a stab at it...

New Maritime Strategy by: Nirmala Punnusami, October 09, 2007 A two-day conference entitled, “A New Maritime Strategy” at The Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center on September 26, 2007, organized by The Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, hosted a multiplicity of panelists, many in uniform, who spoke about several crucial issues, ranging from rationale for a new maritime strategy to the need for developing critical skills for naval personnel to meet 21st century challenges. The Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for Information Plans and Strategy from the United States Navy, Vice Admiral John C. Morgan Jr. set the...