Free Republic

The Department of Homeland Security has asked Catholic churches in California to temporarily house and feed groups of Central American migrants until 2016, according to an official at the diocese of San Bernardino.But any unpaid cooperation is legally questionable, because it may be intended to bypass Congress’ authority to fund — or to not fund — federal agencies’ new practice of distributing the flood of migrant families to homes across the country.The department “has reached out to the diocese and the bishop, and asked us to shelter families in transition,” Maria Christina Mendez, at the Office of Hispanic Affairs, told...

************************************************************** 3. If you like being insulted, do we have a Virginia gun store for you! ************************************************************** A VCDL member brought to our attention a “No loaded guns” sign on the door of Absolute Outdoors in New Kent. EM Ed Levine sent them an email to confirm that policy. First, let me say that many gun stores have a “no loaded guns” policy. That’s because, unlike pretty much any other public place around, people are actually drawing guns and handling them in a gun store. That said, many stores have a better policy of saying that a person can have...

Today is Statehood Day for the Commonwealth of Virginia, the 10th state to join the Union in 1788. Today is also the birthday of General Henry Arnold, the only man to hold the rank of five-star general in two different services - the Army and the Air Force. He was taught how to fly by the Wright Brothers, and eventually founded the RAND Corporation and was one of the founders of Pan Am.

The House of Delegates sustained five budget vetoes of Gov. Terry McAuliffe, while refusing to consider vetoes related to funding for expansion of Medicaid and filling of judgeships as constitutionally invalid. The House overrode one gubernatorial veto on a 70-27 vote, preventing McAuliffe from stripping funding for a new advisory council on conflicts of interest and ethics. House Speaker William J. Howell, R-Stafford, ruled that McAuliffe could not veto amendments made to the budget on June 12 that stripped sum-sufficient funding for Medicaid expansion and inserted new language that requires the General Assembly to approve any appropriation of federal funding...

Truth is one of the most powerful forces on earth. And perhaps the force most feared by compromised politicians. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor's crushing defeat came at the hands of a virtual unknown college professor, one who overcame a 26 to 1 funding disadvantage in which 377 Political Action Committees (PACs) contributed to Cantor’s 2014 campaign vs. 0 (zero) PAC contributions into Brat's 2014 campaign. It's been borderline hilarious watching so many media talking heads, politicians and campaign consultants grasp at explanatory straws. It reminds me of Mark Twain's quote, "If you don't read the newspaper, you're uninformed. If...

The other night, in the wake of Eric Cantor’s epic loss to Dave Brat, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews appeared with the left-wing news channel’s new kid on the block, Ronan Farrow. Farrow was talking about how surprised he was that a Tea Party guy like Brat could be seemed to be so smart. After all, it’s simply shocking that someone so conservative is capable of making cogent arguments! -SNIP- Hell may have frozen over, because Matthews is just plain sick of people looking down on the Tea Party: -SNIP- This looking down our noses at the Tea Party people has got...

The White House will be so disappointed. Obama officials were really counting on McAuliffe to make this Medicaid expansion happen in good time, and McAuliffe in turn was really counting on his boozing-and-schmoozing skills to translate into his own made-up version of bipartisan governance. He has so far been remarkably unsuccessful at persuading either Republican legislators or Virginian voters to come around to his way of thinking on the proposed expansion, and there’s been some speculation that McAuliffe might keep up a budget standoff that could lead to the shutdown of the Virginia state government this summer — but...

RICHMOND— Gov. Terry McAuliffe plans to expand Medicaid by executive action, he said Friday, sidestepping a Republican-controlled General Assembly that has blocked expansion through legislative action. McAuliffe also said he will veto sections of the state budget, including language meant to block expansion by fiat. His administration is looking at a number of options - which the governor did not detail - and expects to have a formal plan by September. The move leads Virginia into complex legal ground on arguably the most divisive political issue in the state. The governor said he'll allow most the spending plan to become...

BRISTOL, VA (WJHL) - A Virginia newspaper reports a possible use for the vacant Virginia Intermont facility. As the country is faced with a surge in minors arriving on their own from Central America, federal Department of Health and Human Service officials are scrambling to find places to house the children. The Richmond Times-Dispatch reports that U.S officials are in talks of temporarily sheltering unaccompanied immigrant children on the campus of shuttered Saint Paul’s College in Lawrenceville. Among the discussions, is the possibility of housing the children at Virginia Intermont College in Bristol. According to Richmond Times-Dispatch, federal Department of...

irginia Governor Terry McAuliffe (D) on Friday said he would sign the state’s two-year budget but veto an amendment that would prevent him from expanding Medicaid under ObamaCare. McAuliffe plans to move forward with an expansion of Medicaid in his state under the new healthcare law. He also will scrap a proposed legislative commission on Medicaid reform, according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch. The Virginia Democrat has ordered Secretary of Health and Human Resources Bill Hazel to propose a Medicaid expansion plan by Sept. 1. McAuliffe promised he would expand Medicaid when he was running for governor. “We have the right...

In the first major press conference since his stunning primary victory over House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) on June 10, Virginia's 7th Congressional District Republican nominee Dave Brat focused on the unifying "mainstream American principles we all believe in." Speaking outside his Glenn Allen headquarters in suburban Richmond Thursday morning, Brat noted that his supporters, volunteers, and campaign staffers "are coming from all corners of the Republican party and beyond. We've got long-time Republicans of all stripes. We have Tea Partiers, independents, and libertarians on board." "This is precisely what this campaign is all about from the beginning. We're...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)Former Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer chose an interesting path and offered puzzling critiques since he tossed his name in the hat for a potential presidential run in 2016. But comments the Democrat made about Rep. Eric Cantor and Sen. Dianne Feinstein in a lengthy profile published by National Journal have probably knocked him off that path. In the piece, Schweitzer shared his perceptions on Cantor's sexuality while discussing the Virginia Republican's shocking loss last week against an unknown primary candidate. “If you were just a regular person, you turned on the TV, and you saw Eric Cantor talking, I would...

Lawrenceville, Virginia’s 1,500 residents have just learned how progressives operate. The impoverished and majority black community had no say when the head of the Health and Human Services green lighted the transport of 500 illegal immigrant kids up to age 17 from shelters in the Southwest to St. Paul’s College in the southern Virginia town.Officials of St. Paul’s, a historically black college shut down last year, agreed on June 13 to house the kids for at least five months. Federal government personnel toured the “quaint campus” the day before signing a contract. The $100,000 per month taxpayer-funded bribe the HHS...

The big political news from last week was David Brat’s upset win over Eric Cantor for Congress. Brat is an economics professor at Randolph Macon and from his research it’s clear that he has strong political views embedded in his economics. It’s perfectly fine to be a political economist, but when it leads to an obviously flawed understanding and presentation of reality then it becomes a real problem in my opinion. For instance, in his website Brat says the following: “Our national debt has skyrocketed, reaching over $17 trillion dollars. What our leaders in Washington fail to mention is...

The Eric Cantor debacle in Virginia last week demanded a storyline, which was no heavy lifting. In the GOP primary a political newbie had wiped the floor with the majority leader of the U.S. House of Representatives. Bring on the analysts to find the narrative in the rebuke administered, a rather remote if hard-working political power broker linked more frequently -- here comes the dichotomy -- with Wall Street than Main Street. Cantor, on these terms, updated Cardinal Wolsey's Shakespearean lament from "Henry VIII": "Had I but served my district with half the zeal/I served the Chamber of Commerce...

The Obama administration’s plan to temporarily shelter hundreds of illegal minors at Saint Paul’s College, Lawrenceville, Virginia is on hold.....the White House has continued to see its efforts to house the children throughout the country be thwarted by local opposition. As many as 500 children were to start arriving at a recently closed historically black college. But HHS' plans were stymied, at least temporarily, after town and county officials objected to the short notice and complete lack of community input. “We were stunned,” said Robert F. Pecht III, president of the Lawrenceville Town Council, who learned of the plan Friday...

Like former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) and former Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas), Dave Brat sends a shock through the New York/Washington axis. His victory shows a classic denial of political reality by the political establishment. It comes because the establishment holds fast to "the way we were" and won't let go. 'Twas ever thus, but all the money, all the influence, all the mainstream propaganda from Hollywood and the Eastern press cannot hold it back. The new century rises to new themes; the old falls away to ruins. I have been saying here that what we have been seeing...

It’s now clear why the primary defeat of the House majority leader, Eric Cantor, came so completely out of the blue last week: Beltway blindness that put a focus on fund-raising, power-brokering and partisan back-and-forth created a reality distortion field that obscured the will of the people. But that affliction was not Mr. Cantor’s alone; it is shared by the political press. Reporters and commentators might want to pause and wipe the egg off their faces before they go on camera to cluck-cluck about how Mr. Cantor, Republican of Virginia, missed signs of the insurgency that took him out. There...

U.S. officials are in discussions to temporarily shelter unaccompanied immigrant children on the campus of shuttered Saint Paul’s College in Lawrenceville. Faced with a surge in the numbers of minors arriving on their own from Central America, representatives of the federal Department of Health and Human Services visited the campus this week and are nearing an agreement to use Saint Paul’s facilities for at least six months, sources in Brunswick County said.

Former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is the new president of the Senate Conservatives Fund. "One of Virginia's strongest grass-roots conservatives is joining our team," Matt Hoskins, the organization's executive director, said in a statement Wednesday on its website. Hoskins also referenced House Majority Leader Eric Cantor's loss in the state's Republican primary on Tuesday, calling it "a major victor for freedom" for "the grass-roots in Virginia." Cantor, 51, who resigned his leadership post Wednesday, lost to little-known college professor David Brat, 49, a political newcomer who was backed by the tea party. It was one of the biggest political...