Free Republic

Police arrested a mail carrier after she was found drunk inside a residence while on the job in Marion earlier this month, authorities said Tuesday. Kristine A. Pflughaupt, 46, of Marion, was charged with public intoxication Nov. 3 after she was found sitting on the kitchen floor of a house at 260 Sixth Avenue, eating leftover noodles from Marie O’Kelly’s refrigerator. Marion police Lt. Steve Etzel said Pflughaupt entered the home through an unlocked front door. She apparently was intoxicated when she was dropped off to complete her route, he said. “She was in uniform and had mail and a...

Here's a stimulus success story: In Arizona's 15th congressional district, 30 jobs have been saved or created with just $761,420 in federal stimulus spending. At least that's what the Web site set up by the Obama administration to track the $787 billion stimulus says. There's one problem, though: There is no 15th congressional district in Arizona; the state has only eight districts...

Obama Will Remove Abortion Funding Ban From Health Care Bill Washington, DC -- Top Obama advisor David Axelrod on Sunday confirmed what pro-life advocates already suspected would happen. He said President Barack Obama will work with congressional Democrats to remove the abortion funding ban the House approved in its version of the government-run health care bill. http://www.LifeNews.com/nat5659.html

Move over abortion. Here comes sex-change operations. Republicans may call for a vote on an amendment that would keep Obamacare (Pelosicare) from covering sex-change operations.

GMAC, the former lending arm of General Motors Co., is in talks with the Treasury Department for a third injection of taxpayer aid, a further sign of the U.S. government's entrenchment in the U.S. auto industry. The Treasury Department mandated earlier this year that GMAC Financial Services raise an additional $11.5 billion in capital after undergoing a "stress test" along with 18 other banks. While other banks deemed undercapitalized have been able to raise funds from private investors, GMAC has been forced to go back to the government.

Latin music ‘tends to make us move a little bit ourselves,’ says ObamaWASHINGTON - The White House became "La Casa Blanca" on Tuesday, celebrating Hispanic musical heritage with a South Lawn concert and such guests as Gloria Estefan, George Lopez, the Bachata music group Aventura, Jose Feliciano and more. President Barack Obama said Latin music, while hard to define because it comes in so many forms — from salsa to merengue and Bachata to reggaeton — speaks to everyone in a language they can all understand. "It moves us, and it tends to make us move a little bit ourselves,"...

(CBS) As members of Congress debate a "public option" for health care coverage, they remain safe and secure in their own generous health plan. CBS News correspondent Sharyl Attkisson reports it's subsidized by millions of your tax dollars annually. The government doesn't even keep track the total cost. What exactly does Congress get? Sen. Lindsey Graham agreed to show CBS News first hand, flashing his Blue Cross Blue Shield insurance card. Blue Cross Blue Shield is one of five plans offered to members of Congress. Most Americans, 74 percent are offered only one plan - if their employer offers insurance...

President Obama has opposed any expanded oil drilling off American shores largely on environmental grounds, turning a deaf ear to conservative cries of "Drill, Baby, Drill." But now Obama may start hearing cries of "foul" after the U.S. Export-Import Bank promised Petrobras, Brazil's state-owned oil company, $2 billion in loan guarantees to help finance lucrative drilling off the shores of Rio De Janeiro.

The Obama's are flying a day apart to Copenhagen to pitch Chicago for the 2016 Olympics. I just saw Michelle Obama getting off what they are calling AIR FORCE TWO. The President is arriving tomorrow on AIR FORCE ONE. Think of the carbon footprint these two limousine liberals are spewing all over the planet. And, the average taxpayer is taking it in the shorts on this. But, what the hell, he is the One to follow. Go get ém, lemmings.

She hops on board the backup 747 and flies to Copenhagen SEPARATELY from the prez. $56.5k per hour is $452k x 2 means the taxpayers just paid $904k for the flights there, and including the return the tab is $1.8 MILLION NOT INCLUDING limos, advance security, security while there etc. etc. This is easily going to be $5 MILLION paid for courtesy of the taxpayers of the U.S. to benefit a few people involved in securing the Olympics for Chicago. My question is, is she as narcissistic as the prez that she considers herself self-important and deserves her own adulation...

Wall Street has showered nearly $11 million on the Senate since the beginning of the year, and more than 15 percent of it has gone to a single senator: Democrat Chuck Schumer of New York. Schumer’s $1.65 million take from the financial services industry is nearly twice that of any other senator's — and more than five times what the industry gave to any single Republican senator.

Wake Up John Kerry, this year's deficit is approaching two trillion dollars. The F-22 was canceled leaving us with a gap where the US will have no new bombers and we are fighting two wars. American citizens are protesting all across the country because spending and taxes are way to high and you have the nerve to add a $20 million dollar pork barrel project to honor Ted Kennedy? That's what the former Democratic Party standard bearer is doing. That military spending bill moving through Congress contains a sneaky outlay for Boston that has nothing to do with national defense....

Acorn CEO: Block on Federal Money ‘Unconstitutional, Wrong’ Nomaan Merchant reports on politics. Acorn CEO Bertha Lewis made it clear she’s not happy with an amendment to a stop-gap funding bill that blocks any money from going to the community organizing group. “To include language in legislation that targets a single organization is unconstitutional and wrong,” Lewis said in a statement. But she saw a silver lining of sorts: “One unintended - and positive - consequence of the witch hunt against ACORN is that it could help rein in the likes of Halliburton and Blackwater and even Wall St. If...

ACORN is using a tangled web of tax-exempt organizations to funnel tax money to itself according to a detailed review released last night by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee.Some or all of them may be nothing more than shell companies used to pass money from the government directly through to ACORN and its affiliates. “This analysis regarding the vast number of charitable organizations that ACORN set up to funnel money to itself raises questions about whether ACORN used the entities to advance the charitable mission of helping poor people get housing, or whether...

No word on where or when this was shot but it was posted to YouTube just two days before The One’s speech to students, which makes me wonder if it was part of some school’s festivities for the screening. I think parents’ fears about their kids being politically indoctrinated are usually overblown, but I’m open to persuasion by compelling evidence — like, for example, this, or the vid you’re about to see. Getting little kids to croon about how awesome the president is troubles me less than the pop quiz the boss posted, mainly because they’re too young to understand...

WASHINGTON — Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid secured a deal today that would give Nevada full, 100 percent funding in the Senate health care bill for an initial expansion of Medicaid. The agreement reached with the committee chairman comes after Reid vowed last week to strike a better deal for Nevada before bringing any legislation to the floor. Reid took heat from Republican Rep. Nathan Deal of Georgia who bemoaned the majority leader’s powerful reach into Senate negotiations to improve the bill for Nevada. The deal would give Nevada full funding for the first five years of the program —...

  From Pennsylvania Right-to-Work:Most readers are already aware of a growing scandal involving the pro-forced unionism Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now (ACORN) in New York, Baltimore, Washington, and now, California. For those who missed it, ACORN representatives were caught on camera giving advice to undercover journalists on how to open an illegal brothel, launder its profits, and commit a host of other illegal activities.According to The Washington Examiner, teacher union officials have contributed over 1.3 million dollars (in mostly forced union dues) to ACORN since 2005.We decided to do a little digging into union financial disclosure forms on...

On August 25th 2009, Big Hollywood’s Patrick Courrielche broke the story of a conference call he attended with other “rising artist and art community luminaries”: On Thursday August 6th, I was invited by the National Endowment for the Arts to attend a conference call scheduled for Monday August 10th hosted by the NEA, the White House Office of Public Engagement, and United We Serve. The call would include “a group of artists, producers, promoters, organizers, influencers, marketers, taste-makers, leaders or just plain cool people to join together and work together to promote a more civically engaged America and celebrate how...

Across the country, motorists are being greeted by signs advertising President Obama's $787 billion stimulus bill, and Republicans aren't happy about it. The large green-and-white highway signs declare, "Project Funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act." Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H describes them as the "signs to nowhere" and tried in vain Wednesday to stop the advertising. Democrats were nearly unanimous in voting to defeat an amendment by Greg that would have prohibited the use of stimulus funds for signs that advertise taxpayer spending on stimulus projects. Only five Democrats crossed the aisle in the 45-52 vote, joining all 40...

An ACORN affiliate has just submitted applications for over $6 million in government funding, despite the controversial videos of the organization’s workers aiding a child prostitution “promoter.” Employees with the Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now (ACORN) in Washington D.C., Baltimore and Brooklyn told uncover investigators posing as a pimp and a prostitute how they could circumvent the law. ACORN has already fired four of the workers. But it claims the tapes have been “doctored” and “edited.” A third video implicating the ACORN workers was released today. Meanwhile, the ACORN Institute, one of many ACORN affiliates, has applied for...

A Congressional oversight panel warns taxpayers are facing huge losses on the government’s $81 billion auto industry bailout. Elizabeth Warren, the panel’s chair, discusses the findings. * The report said that a $5.4 billion portion of the $10.5 billion owed by Chrysler is “highly unlikely” to be repaid. * Full recovery of the $50 billion sunk into GM would require the company’s stock to reach unprecedented heights. * The report also recommended that the Treasury Department provide a legal analysis justifying the use of financial rescue funds for the automakers. * In all, the government has invested $74 billion in...

Must go to the site for audio and see the Glenn Beck links too. http://www.washingtontimes.com/weblogs/watercooler/2009/sep/01/official-dishonesty-national-endowment-arts/

Since launching three weeks ago, the White House Reality Check website on healthcare reform has been updated several times to debunk a growing number of alleged myths about the Democrats' plan. But the site is still silent on conservatives' charge that the plan will use taxpayer money to cover abortions. It's a stunning omission, given how much the government-funded abortion allegation has dominated this month's congressional town hall meetings on healthcare reform—and given that President Obama himself has called the charge a myth. "You've heard that this is all going to mean government funding of abortion," he said recently. "Not...

State officials are examining whether public money has been improperly used to pay for Islamic mosques on charter school campuses in Blaine and Inver Grove Heights. Chas Anderson, deputy commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Education, said officials will study Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy's (TiZA) use of state "lease aid'' grants, which were created more than a decade ago to help charter schools rent adequate facilities. "If it is subsidizing a mosque, in our view, that would be a violation of state and federal law,'' Anderson said. The probe is the latest in a series of church-vs.-state conflicts involving TiZA...

The White House booked 400 (FOUR HUNDRED) hotel rooms at the Big Sky Resort for Barack Obama's overnight visit last week for a town hall meeting in nearby Bozeman, Montana. Two floors were completely taken over, including the penthouse suites.While the national news media is ignoring the story, local media let the news slip in their gushing stories of how thrilling it was to have Obama in their midst.The Bozeman Daily Chronicle reported on Tuesday on Obama's visit, quoting Big Sky Resort spokesman Dax Schieffer:The First Family stayed in one of the eight penthouses on the tenth floor of Big...

Here is video today of Fox News breaking away from President Obama's Town Hall Meeting in New Hampshire, and saying it appeared the crowd assembled was more of a "campaign stop." The fox analyst said it is clear the atmosphere was very "friendly," and that it had been prepared by staff that way. Fox carried the President's opening statement and the first few questions, all of which were total "softballs," including one from what looked like a nine year old girl. . . . . (Watch Video)

The first family will be jetting out of town for some R&R on the Massachusetts island of Martha's Vineyard the last week in August. The Obamas will spend their vacation at the Blue Heron Farm, a private estate in Chilmark, the Martha's Vineyard Times reported Thursday. The estate sold for more than $20 million in 2005, boasts a renovated 10,000-plus-square-foot historic farmhouse and has more than 30 acres of privacy, according to the Boston Herald, a bonus for the Secret Service and aides who want to keep away paparazzi and curious onlookers. The Vineyard Gazette reported that the property features...

The civil case against a Florida hospital draws to a close this week. A relative of an illegal alien sued Martin Memorial Medical Center when it repatriated the man after treating him for nearly three years at an un-reimbursed cost of $1.5 million. The relative/legal guardian wants an unspecified six-figure judgment for alleged false imprisonment and nearly $1 million in economic damages for the medical care he has not received since 2003. That’s when Martin Memorial paid $30,000 to charter a jet to take Luis Jimenez to a medical facility in Guatemala. Jimenez now lives with his mother. Carol Plato,...

It's now more than 50 years since the revolution began. Sexual "liberation" has been endlessly ballyhooed by the national media, promoted in the movies, embraced by Playboy guys and Cosmo girls as a freedom more delicious than Eden's apple. No American under 40 can honestly remember a time when sex on TV was taboo, when "living together" meant married, when "gay" meant happy, and when almost every child lived with both parents.   If truth be told, the revolution has been a disaster. Before the push to loosen America's sexual mores really got under way in the 1950s, the...

In an effort to gauge the overall condition of blacks in contemporary America, Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman turned yesterday to a pair of longtime haters of the United States: (a) Carl Dix, a founding member of the Revolutionary Communist Party, a Maoist vanguard dedicated to promoting civil unrest in the United States; and (b) Princeton University professor Cornel West, an avowed Marxist with close personal and ideological ties to the racial arsonist Al Sharpton and the Jew-hating leader of the Nation of Islam, Louis Farrakhan.

Members of the Secret Service have been conducting exercises in helicopters over Chicago in preparation for President Barack Obama's visit Thursday, officials said today. Obama is scheduled to attend a dinner with political supporters and a fundraiser for the Democratic National Committee, his first Chicago political event since his election last fall. After a stop in Ohio, the president will head to Chicago for a private dinner organized by fundraiser Penny Pritzker, then plans to join members of the Chicago Bulls for a hotel event to raise money for fellow Democrats.Photos by Ed Dragomer.More photos here

The Chicago Police Department has spent at least $2.2 million to secure President Barack Obama's Kenwood residence since he was elected in November, according to documents released Monday by the city. The department will be reimbursed by the federal government for more than $1.5 million of those costs. But the expense of protecting the president's home since his January inauguration -- nearly $650,000 through the end of April -- is not currently scheduled to be paid back, according to the city's response to a Freedom of Information Act request from the Tribune.

Since taking office, President Obama has racked up more miles to his name than most astronauts. According to Fox News, "in his first six months in office, President Obama has traveled abroad the equivalent of twice around the world." It's no surprise that the unseasoned and untested Frequent-Flier-In-Chief needs to get some ink in his passport, but the real question is, besides helping Obama brush up on his romance languages, what has he really accomplished overseas? The answer: not much. At each summit, foreign leaders have been more interested in getting Obama's autograph than his thoughts on missile defense. When...

PHOENIX -- A Social Security Administration motivational management conference held at a high-end Valley resort last week cost $700,000, the SSA told the ABC15 Investigators. Costs for the conference at the Arizona Biltmore Resort & Spa included airfare, hotel entertainment, dancers, motivational speakers, and food, an administration official said. A spokesperson outside the SSA's Phoenix office declined to comment. A spokesperson from the SSA's regional office said the conference was essential, that teleconferencing was not an option, and that all 675 managers needed to meet in person. The SSA provided ABC15 with a list of courses provided at the conference,...

Medical tourism usually involves U.S. citizens going abroad to obtain low-cost care for serious conditions. Now one Tucson, Arizona hospital is fighting back by marketing its delivery room to Mexican mothers-to-be. And those who choose to come north to give birth get something extra no other country can offer: U.S. citizenship for their child. According to the Arizona Daily Star, for almost 30 years hospitals in the Southwest have served expectant mothers from other countries that come here to give birth, taking advantage of the Immigration and Nationality Act that makes anyone born in the U.S. a citizen.

(AP Photo/El Monte Police Department) It all started out with a kick to the head. True, the suspect was not exactly one to elicit sympathy, but that's not the point. A free society cannot tolerate police acting outside the law to administer physical punishment. Except Dean Scoville, "Associate Editor of Police Magazine and a retired patrol supervisor and investigator with the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department," disagrees with that: There was a time when post pursuit ass-kickings were obligatory. Cops knew it, suspects knew it, and there are enough old timers on both sides of the fence that will verify the...

WASHINGTON – Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee may have trouble keeping the promise she made at Michael Jackson's public memorial for a House resolution that "forever" honors the late pop star. Jackson Lee, a Texas Democrat, took the stage Tuesday at the Staples Center in Los Angeles and hoisted a framed copy of the resolution, embossed with a gold seal. The measure will be debated on the House floor, she said. For that framed, embossed resolution to be completely legit, it must first get past some opposition. Rep. Peter King, a New York Republican who called Jackson a "pervert, child molester,...

Save those Chicago-style hot dogs for the next South Lawn picnic. The leader of the free world wants his Hawaii grinds. In a nod to his first home state, President Barack Obama will host the first-ever Hawaii-style luau on the White House lawn, complete with real Island cuisine, hula and music. The Thursday luau is pretty much all the Hawaii-born-and-raised president's idea—his revamping, of sorts, of the annual White House Congressional picnic for members of Congress and their families. Award-winning Hawaii-based chef Alan Wong is crafting the luau’s menu of contemporary Hawaiian cuisine, making use of as much Island-grown produce...

With Chicago officials in Switzerland promoting Chicago's 2016 Olympic bid at an important site selection meeting, the Chicago Sun-Times has learned that President Obama is creating a new White House Office of Olympic, Paralympic and Youth Sport. According to the White House, 'this permanent White House office will promote the values of the Olympic Movement and encourage increased youth participation in athletics. The primary function of the Office will be to enhance awareness of the Olympic Movement through promotion of its fundamental principles at the federal level." From the White House... President Obama Announces New White House Office of Olympic,...

As President Barack Obama flies Monday to Chicago for a midday speech on health-care reform, the round trip on Air Force One will run about $236,000, according to government estimates of the operating costs for one of the top symbols, and perks, of the presidency. But that does not include such expenses as Secret Service protection, motorcades and helicopter transports. After landing at O'Hare International Airport, Obama is scheduled to spend about 2 1/2 hours here. To avoid snarling traffic on the Kennedy Expressway, he likely will be taken from the airport by helicopter to a location near the Hyatt...

Twenty-five culturally significant recordings — including a 70-year-old radio broadcast of Marian Anderson's recital at the Lincoln Memorial, Dylan Thomas reading of "A Child's Christmas in Wales" and Winston Churchill's post-World War II speech that coined the term Iron Curtain — will be preserved in a special sound archive. Every year the Librarian of Congress selects sound recordings to include in the National Recording Registry. This year's batch, being announced Wednesday, also includes signature performances from several artists such as Etta James' "At Last!," The Who's "My Generation" and Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner doing their 2000-year-old man routine. The...

America's First Family seems to have taken London to its heart as Michelle Obama extended her stay in the city by a day. Mrs Obama and her daughters Malia, 10, and Sasha, eight, visited Harrods last night after a party on the Harry Potter film set with the actors and author JK Rowling. Their whistlestop tour has seen them take in the Houses of Parliament, Downing Street, Westminster Abbey, a West End musical and fish and chips at a pub. They arrived on Monday on what was meant to be a 48-hour unofficial visit. They were expected to return home...

We Can Stop the European Bank Bailout. Barack Obama wants to bail out European banks. No, it is no joke. He really wants to. He is going to send the International Monetary Fund billions of dollars that will then be used to do in Europe what Obama has done here.We can stop it. House Republicans are going to vote in a block to oppose this, which means around thirty Democrats are needed. The Blue Dog Democrats are logical targets. Those Democrats who represent districts that tilt Republican can be pressured. And among them, the freshman Blue Dogs can really be...

In New York yesterday, Joe Biden, Obama's overseer of the spending of the "stimulus" package, acknowledged the following: ... some of this money is going to be wasted ... Obama's words in February: ... unprecedented responsibility and accountability on the spending. Without waste, without inefficiency, without fraud...

Neuroscientists found woman's partner status relevant for her interest in the opposite sex A study by neuroscientist Heather Rupp and her team found that a woman's partner status influenced her interest in the opposite sex. In the study¹, published in the March issue of Human Nature, women both with and without sexual partners showed little difference in their subjective ratings of photos of men when considering such measures as masculinity and attractiveness. However, the women who did not have sexual partners spent more time evaluating photos of men, demonstrating a greater interest in the photos. No such difference was found...

Most of us recognize the name Richard Wagoner but for those who don’t, he was the CEO from General Motors that Obama fired after he flew a private jet to the District on his way to beg for taxpayer bailout money. That’s why it’s taxing to know Mr. President spent thousands of your hard earned dollars to fly his truly on a date....

WASHINGTON -- White House spokesman Robert Gibbs is declining to say what it cost for President Obama and his wife, Michelle, to eat dinner and take in a play in New York over the weekend. Asked if he would outline the costs, Gibbs said Monday the Obamas would have preferred using a commercial airline shuttle to New York and back but the Secret Service would not allow such unprotected travel.

The business world is crawling with affable, industrious, intelligent people with nothing to distinguish them from ten thousand other affable, industrious and intelligent people, but who very much would like to be rich. Except by winning the equivalent of a lottery or marrying up, their chances of becoming rich are quite poor. They joint a fraternity at college to make contacts, and went to business school to network. They have no friends, only contacts, as their entire social life from freshman year onward has been a struggle to get to know people who might help them. They live in silent...

WASHINGTON (Dow Jones)--U.S. President Barack Obama envisions spending $1 billion for the creation of a new agency to oversee a national direct-deposit retirement savings system, according to White House budget documents released Thursday. According to the fiscal year 2010 budget, up to $1 billion will go toward the agency's creation, with expenses for the agency's initial start-up budgeted at $200 million. The agency would be charged with overseeing the formation of a retirement program that would require employers who do not offer a pension program to implement a direct-deposit retirement savings system. The Obama administration is aiming for the direct...

President Barack Obama and the U.S. Congress have set aside more than $7 billion to build broadband Internet networks to bring high speed computer access to every U.S. home. Policy makers say construction of the network and its use will help create jobs in the global digital economy. The goal is to deliver affordable broadband service to people in rural and underserved communities. Growing number of older Americans using Internet "The first thing basically that I do when I get on the Internet is generally I go directly to my email," Mona Hunnicutt explains. Hunnicutt, 58, spends more than two...