Free Republic

Kristol announced that he would become The Weekly Standard’s editor-at-large, “continuing to write weekly editorials and contribute to the website.” Steve Hayes and Richard Starr would take over the day-to-day operations of the website, Kristol wrote. Under Kristol’s editorship, The Weekly Standard has been the central publication for neoconservatives, including Kristol’s father, the so-called “godfather” of neoconservativism, Irving Kristol. During the election season, Kristol was a leading voice in the #NeverTrump camp and searched publicly for months for a conservative alternative to Trump

Yes, we will likely survive 8 years of President Obama, but the country does have a BREAKING POINT. And we are there. Losing one more election tips the Supreme Court into Democrat hands (along with what’s left on our side on the lower courts). At that point our side will simply have NO RECOURSE to stop Hillary. Congress has already been reduced to an ‘advisory’ role by Obama - he considers the laws passed by Congress to be suggestions, open to his interpretations, with his right to enforce, re-write, or ignore as he wishes. With the courts in their hands,...

Moderators, I hope you'll permit the vanity. I wanted to solicit opinion from FReepers on the remaining NeverTrumpers. What amuses me is the degree to which the NeverTrumper disdain for Trump seems to be personal. It goes well beyond the superficial pettiness of a faculty lounge dispute, and seems bitter and vindictive. With some evidence (not much of which I can post here), I'll posit three motives: Personal slight against one or more NeverTrumpers, perhaps an ancient slight Trump has not paid sufficient fealty to the Conservo-sphere of writers and political consultants He has not hired Mike Murphy or Matthew...

The Republican elites are not going down without a fight. Donald Trump shattered the GOP primary record this year by more than a million votes. He was running against 16 challengers – another record. But that won’t stop the GOP elites from trying to steal the nomination. The Weekly Standard today called on delegates to steal the nomination from Donald Trump at the Republican Convention this month.The traitors would rather see Hillary win than support Donald Trump.Bill Kristol at The Weekly Standard reported: This election cycle hasn’t been kind to Republican big shots. Their favorite presidential candidates—Jeb Bush, Scott Walker...

So I just stopped by the Corner blog at National Review Online to see their reaction to Trump's speech today. To my surprise, there wasn't a single post commenting on it. The NR writers spent the day posting about Brexit, and about Rubio's senate run, and about a picture of Trump they don't like. But not a word about Trump's speech. If that isn't proof that Trump hit a home run today, I don't know what is.

unday on ABC’s “This Week,” Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol commented on Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s chances in the general election and said that he was “afraid” presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump could win.

Realville, as Rush often says, is where he lives. That’s a place without blinkers or rose-colored glasses. That’s actually where we all live, though some of us prefer to deny it. That is, until reality bites. Then our wishful thinking or willful ignorance dashes upon the hard rock of unforgiving reality. The crackup always smarts. Thus is the case with the 2016 presidential election. There’s Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. In other words, there’s Column A and Column B. That’s the choice. Column C is fairyland. Come November, tens of millions of voters will flock to the polls to choose...

Glenn Beck: Why Do Conservative Pundits Support Trump? Glenn Beck wants to stage a conservative intervention. The former Fox News host and prominent conservative commentator is confounded that so many Republican voters are attracted to Donald Trump. And Beck is particularly bewildered by the conservative pundits who are hooked on the bombastic real estate mogul. "Why are big name 'conservatives' supporting him?" Beck asked wrote in a Facebook post on Thursday. Beck went on to name names, calling out some of Trump's biggest boosters in conservative media: Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Michael Savage. "I am not talking...

White House press secretary Josh Earnest insisted that President Obama's endorsement of Hillary Clinton will not "sway" the ongoing FBI investigation into Clinton. [Snip] Later this afternoon, according to the White House, Obama is meeting with the attorney general. The meeting is "closed press."

The Weekly Standard published “An Open Letter to Mitt Romney” on Tuesday night, begging the former Republican presidential nominee to launch a third-party bid. “[T]hese are extraordinary times, and your nation still has need of your service. I respectfully implore you to run for president as an independent candidate in 2016,” Jay Cost wrote. Cost slams presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s “Nixonian paranoia” of “enemies” and calls her Republican counterpart, Donald Trump, “a sympathizer with the nativist ‘alt-right.’ ” “They do not see Americans as Americans,” the letter continues. “They see each of us as potential allies or foes,...

The conservative Weekly Standard’s editor Bill Kristol’s failed third-party candidate, David French, is now claiming presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump’s campaign intimidated him not to run — but won’t provide evidence to support his allegation. French, with little to no name recognition, is a staff writer for the conservative National Review and was tapped by Kristol to run as a third-party candidate to stop Trump in the general election. French said on Tuesday during an appearance on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that Trump “unlocked something terrible in this country.”

Here is a sentence I never thought I’d type: After days of prayer, reflection, and serious study of the possibilities, I am not going to run as an independent candidate for president of the United States. I gave it serious thought — as a pretty darn obscure lawyer, writer, and veteran — only because we live in historic times. Never before have both parties failed so spectacularly, producing two dishonest, deceitful candidates who should be disqualified from running for town council, much less leader of the free world.

Republican National Committee (RNC) chairman Reince Priebus quickly put down efforts by Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol to launch an independent bid for president from National Review columnist David French on Thursday morning.

While Donald Trump has called on the GOP to become a “worker’s party”— a development Sen. Jeff Sessions called for two years ago, ironically, in the pages of the National Review— French has defended the idea that white working-class communities “deserve to die.”

The "Never Trump" movement died on Tuesday night. That's when the loose affiliation of Republican pundits and conservative thinkers, banded together by their shared distaste for Donald Trump as the GOP nominee, leaked the news to Bloomberg that conservative lawyer David French was the secret third party candidate they have been working to recruit into the 2016 race as an alternative to the real estate mogul. The French news ended days of frantic speculation set off by a tweet -- yes, this is the world we now live in -- by Weekly Standard editor and "Never Trump" leader Bill Kristol....

Donald Trump had a strong warning for Republicans after Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol said, a “strong independent candidate” is coming. Donald Trump’s warning to GOP after new weekend threat of independent candidate is HARSH, but true Read more: http://www.bizpacreview.com/2016/05/30/donald-trumps-message-to-gop-after-weekend-threat-of-independent-candidate-is-harsh-but-true-346233#ixzz4ABBmTxCO

Oh really? Let's game it out and see Of all the arguments offered by the #NeverTrumpers, the one most often put forward and least explained is this one: Even if Trump would be a marginally better president than Hillary, it will wouldn’t be worth electing him because a Trump presidency would be the death of the conservative movement. The increasingly hysterical Ben Shapiro explains it thusly:

The chairman of the Hillary Clinton campaign, John Podesta, has released a statement framing the general election match-up. “Fundamentally, our next president will need to do two things: keep our nation safe in a dangerous world and help working families get ahead here at home. Donald Trump is not prepared to do either," Podesta's statement reads. "Throughout this campaign, Donald Trump has demonstrated that he's too divisive and lacks the temperament to lead our nation and the free world. With so much at stake, Donald Trump is simply too big of a risk.

Reprinted from Breitbart. While millions of Republican primary voters have chosen Donald Trump as the party’s nominee, Bill Kristol and a small but well-heeled group of Washington insiders are preparing a third party effort to block Trump’s path to the White House. Their plan is to run a candidate who could win three states and enough votes in the electoral college to deny both parties the needed majority.

Thursday on MSNBC, while discussing Speaker of the House Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) meeting with presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, Bill Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard, told members of the Republican Party that reunifying the party would mean “capitulation.”