Free Republic

RUSH: Here’s another great piece, another Limbaugh echo. There’s so many Limbaugh echoes out there today that I’m reveling in it here, folks. By the way, from TheHill.com, headline: “Left Says Democrats Caved on Shutdown — Progressives are hammering [Chuck You] Schumer for his agreement … to end the government shutdown on Monday. Even House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has spoken out against the deal, saying there was no reason to support it. ‘I don’t see that there’s any reason — I’m speaking personally and hearing from my members — to support what was put forth,’ Pelosi said…” Pelosi is...

Though federal employees won’t get a paycheck during the governmment shutdown, members of Congress will — unless they specify otherwise. Ten Democratic senators on Friday introduced a bill that would withhold pay for members of Congress during the government shutdown. The legislation comes from Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.), along with Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Ranking Member Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), Bob Casey (D-Pa.), Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.), Joe Manchin (D-W. Va.), Gary Peters (D-Mich.), Tina Smith (D-Minn.), Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) and Jon Tester (D-Mont.). “It’s wrong that members of Congress would still get paid in...

Guess which state has the highest poverty rate in the country? Not Mississippi, New Mexico, or West Virginia, but California, where nearly one out of five residents is poor. That's according to the Census Bureau's Supplemental Poverty Measure, which factors in the cost of housing, food, utilities and clothing, and which includes noncash government assistance as a form of income.

The economic vector of West Virginia (and parts of Pennsylvania and Ohio adjoining it) has reversed course since the election of President Donald Trump, going from depressed (and forgotten) to growing and attracting huge structural investments from overseas. You can see the changes on the ground, not just in dry economic statistics. It is one thing to read about GNP growth roughly doubling since President Trump reformed the oppressive regulatory environment and devoted attention to reviving King Coal to his former majesty in West Virginia (and then some). Casey Jenkins of the Wilkes-Barre Times Leader writes from Wheeling, WV about...

WHEELING — Motorists know age and excessive use are taking a toll on Interstate 70 through Ohio County, but some state lawmakers are concerned drivers may be paying tolls after a proposed $172.5 million rehabilitation on the stretch of highway is completed. Delegates Erikka Storch, R-Ohio, and Patrick McGeehan, R-Hancock, both said they voted against a bill — which ultimately passed — giving the West Virginia Parkways Authority the ability to charge tolls after construction of new roads and major improvements to existing highways because of their concerns about future tolling on Interstate 70. State Senate Majority Leader Ryan Ferns,...

Attorney General Jeff Landry is urging a federal appeals court to reverse an order that is preventing the implementation of President Donald Trump's executive order regulating so-called "sanctuary cities," arguing that such immigrant-friendly jurisdictions "undermine the rule of law and deprive law enforcement of the tools necessary to enforce the law effectively." "We have seen too many crimes occur against our own State’s citizens due to sanctuary city policies; which is why I have been actively fighting back against these policies since taking office," Landry, a Republican, said in a news release announcing that he had joined 10 other attorneys...

Of course it will, Joe.  More than 80 percent of Americans will get a tax cut next year under the new law, with nearly as many taxpayers enjoying relief through at least 2026 (and very likely beyond).  Of the plan's tiny handful of 'losers' (less than five percent), most are high-income earners living in high-tax states who itemize their deductions -- as opposed to taking the now-doubled standard deduction, as 70 percent of filers currently do (a number that will grow).  It...doesn't sound like many West Virginians fit that profile.  Manchin knew all of this, of course, but he voted...

It’s come to this. Morgan Spurlock has issued a dramatic, guilt-fueled, angst-ridden confession entitled, “I Am Part of the Problem.’’ By his own account, the filmmaker, 47, best known for the 2004 documentary take-down of the fast-food industry, “Super Size Me,’’ was extremely, horrifically and chronically naughty. Yet as he tells it, he never sexually assaulted anyone, nor did he touch, grope or kiss any person without invitation or tacit agreement. As Spurlock tells it in an online post, he did not sexually harass, fire, spank or tickle any females over whom he exerted professional or physical power, nor did...

HUNTINGTON, W.Va. — Gov. Jim Justice says he’s going to use the West Virginia National Guard to help Huntington respond to the current rash of violence that has resulted in a number of murders including three this week. Gov. Jim Justice talks with WSAZ-TV Anchor Amanda Barren. “I’m going to call upon our National Guard,” Justice said during a Thursday town hall meeting on WSAZ-TV in Huntington. “Our National Guard has resources that can absolutely combat this thing.” Justice said he couldn’t be specific but said the Guard would be working with other police agencies. “That doesn’t mean setting a...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Lawyers for the Mountain Valley Pipeline say if there are delays in the federal court system, the entire project could be delayed by at least a year. The pipeline developers wrote in a recent court filing that they need access to all the property no later than this coming Feb. 1 to comply with a window for tree clearing required by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “If MVP is unable to gain access to commence work on each respective deadline, construction of the entire MVP project may be delayed for as much as one year given...

President Trump hosted the National Collegiate Athletic Association champion sports teams at the White House on Friday - or most of them, that is. The event began with the student athletes meeting President Trump in the Rose Garden for photos. "A lot of great athletes," Trump told the press pool. The Marine Corps Marching Band played nearby from the South Lawn, as President Trump joked with athletes, meeting them in groups. When talking with the Ohio State men's volleyball team, the president was seen jokingly smacking a volleyball in the air. While interacting with the West Virginia rifle team in...

CHARLESTON — After news broke that state officials had brokered an $83.7 billion deal with China Energy Investment Corporation to invest in West Virginia’s shale gas and chemical industries, one of the first questions to come up was how soon the Mountain State might see the fruits of the agreement. “We’re going full steam ahead, immediately,” state Commerce Secretary Woody Thrasher said in a telephone call from China. According to U.S. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., Thrasher and others familiar with the memorandum of understanding, ground could be broken within six to eight months on two gas-fired power stations to...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A company owned by Gov. Jim Justice and his family says it wanted to settle a $4 million debt by selling a helicopter, but the lender hasn’t been cooperating. James C. Companies, Justice Aviation — and the governor personally — were sued in the Southern District of New York in September over default on a loan for the companies’ private helicopter. A little more than $4 million is remaining on the loan. The plaintiff, Citizens Asset Finance, wants to foreclose and take back the helicopter. In an answer filed on Friday, lawyers for Justice and his companies...

When Mike Sylvester entered a career training center earlier this year in southwestern Pennsylvania, he found more than one hundred federally funded courses covering everything from computer programming to nursing. He settled instead on something familiar: a coal mining course. "I think there is a coal comeback,” said the 33-year-old son of a miner. Despite broad consensus about coal's bleak future, a years-long effort to diversify the economy of this hard-hit region away from mining is stumbling, with Obama-era jobs retraining classes undersubscribed and future programs at risk under President Donald Trump’s proposed 2018 budget. Trump has promised to revive...

OAK HILL - An investigation is underway in Fayette County, West Virginia after heroin was found in a child's trick-or-treat bag. Oak Hill Police Chief Mike Whisman says it allegedly happened in the Hidden Valley area. He said several hundred children trick-or-treat in this area every Halloween. The child's mother said he was checking her three-year-old's candy when she found the drugs wrapped in a rubber glove.

BURLINGTON, W. Va. — It’s two o’clock in the afternoon on a sunny Saturday in late September, and I’m standing in a grassy field with Dale, a white man in his late 70s. I’m at the Apple Harvest Festival in Burlington, W. Va. To our left, a vendor is hawking T-shirts with images of Confederate flags and high-powered weapons printed on them. “Ban idiots not guns,” one shirt declares. In the background are the acoustic strums and picks of fiddles, banjos and mandolins. But my attention is fixed on Dale, who’s holding forth on the virtues of Donald Trump. “I’ll...

Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, who is up for re-election in 2018, said it "wouldn't be wise" for Hillary Clinton to campaign for him in his home state of West Virginia.He was asked during an interview that aired Sunday on MSNBC's "Kasie DC," if he was a "dead man walking" after President Trump won West Virginia by a wide margin in the 2016 presidential contest. "I sure don't think so," he replied, listing off his prior political posts in the state and saying of himself, "I'm just West Virginia, period. It's not Democrat, Republican to me."Asked if he'd like Clinton to...

West Virginia Attorney General and U.S. Senate candidate Patrick Morrisey spoke with Breitbart News Daily SiriusXM host Alex Marlow on Friday regarding his campaign, including his recent endorsement by pro-President Trump Super PAC Great America Alliance. Morrisey also discussed his tenure as attorney general, saying, “The reason I want to run for Senate is Washington is utterly broken.” He also talked about his record of going after the Obama administration for what he called “stupid regulations.” “We can start to clean up these terribly burdensome regulations. We can make the tax code much simpler, much flatter, so that it works...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Federal regulators have approved two major natural gas pipelines that would start in West Virginia and supply the eastern seaboard. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission granted certificates to both the Atlantic Coast Pipeline and the Mountain Valley Pipeline on Friday evening. The pipelines would transport gas from the Utica and Marcellus shale deposits. One of the commissioners dissented, calling the public interest of the projects into question. Additional necessary permits are pending at the state level in both West Virginia and Virginia. The $5.1 billion Atlantic Coast Pipeline would span 600 miles from Harrison County and across...

HUNTINGTON, WV (AP) - First Lady Melania Trump is coming to West Virginia to visit a drug treatment facility for infants born to addicted mothers. West Virginia Congressman Evan Jenkins says he's grateful that Trump will bring attention to Lily's Place in Huntington on Tuesday, October 10th, 2017.