Free Republic

Link only-http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-04-21/john-mccain-s-fake-fight-with-ted-cruz-over-guns-on-military-bases

This week, Mayor Bill de Blasio traveled from New York, a state with one of the highest levels of income inequality in America, according to research by University of Washington professor Richard Morrill, to Iowa, a state with one of the lowest levels of inequality, in order to lecture Iowans on . . . how to end inequality! While in Iowa, the second-year mayor repeatedly blasted the rich for not paying enough in taxes. In one speech, he mentioned taxes some 20 times. What de Blasio neglected to explain to Iowans, though, is how New York, which already has some...

Perhaps you will find no issue reflecting a greater divide among Utahns that whether LDS Church leaders have too much influence in the Utah Legislature. A new UtahPolicy poll by Dan Jones & Associates finds that three-fourths of the faithful members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints say their church has “about the right amount of influence” on state lawmakers’ political decisions. But when you ask the same influence question of non-Mormons, you find super-majorities – 79 percent of Catholics, 84 percent of Protestants – say the Mormon Church has too much influence on Capitol Hill. Now,...

The chief spokesman for the presidential campaign of Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) said in an on-record interview with Breitbart News that the senator, if elected president, would not require a secured border before he gives legislative and permanent amnesty to recipients of President Barack Obama’s first executive amnesty, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. “No,” Alex Conant said when asked if the border would need to be secured before a President Rubio’s legislative amnesty for recipients of Obama’s 2012 DACA would replace that executive amnesty.

A group of female webcomic artists and online radio hosts have been ejected from the Calgary Expo, a Canadian pop culture convention, after publicly disagreeing with members of a feminist panel discussion. Staff at the expo informed them that they had received reports of ‘harassment’ at the panel, but footage of the discussion shows that no such behaviour took place. Consumers accused the Calgary Expo of engaging in political intolerance, and have begun a boycott of the convention’s sponsors.

The Wikileaks release of Sony Pictures emails is helping to paint a picture of how Everytown For Gun Control, Bloomberg’s central gun grabbing group is promoting itself to potential donors. One new point we picked up was that Bloomberg is dumping $50M annually into the Everytown cesspool of paid political hacks. Email #1 From John Feinblatt of Everytown for Gun Control johnfeinblatt@everytown.org To michael_lynton@spe.sony.com, david.diamond@spe.sony.com FYI: Lynton is the CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment. David Diamond is his secretary.

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse recently had a Huff-Po tantrum. The Rhode Island Democrat was miffed that people criticized him and equally liberal Senate colleagues Barbara Boxer (CA) and Ed Markey (MA) for attacking skeptics of dangerous manmade climate change like Spanish Inquisition tormentors. He says the skeptic community’s “overheated” response mischaracterized their motives and muddled their important messages: Global warming is the most serious threat we face today. Financial incentives can affect behavior, which is why the public and Congress need to know who funded the skeptics’ research. And companies that produce harmful products want to foment uncertainty about well-established health...

Pro-marijuana advocates on Monday gathered at Denver’s Lincoln Park across from the state Capitol for 4/20, the unofficial pot holiday. CBS4 captured time lapse footage leading up to 4:20 p.m. In the video smoke can be seen rising from the crowd after the designated time. The day is for pro-pot political action and the traditional smoke out. The 4/20 celebrations started over the weekend and continued through Monday, April 20.

I am a queer woman planning to get married next year in a state where my marriage will not be legally recognized. It will probably not surprise you to learn that, sometimes, being gay is not easy. Coming out to your family is nervewracking, people yell slurs and threats when you hold hands on the street, and most lesbian movies are just terrible. With all those drawbacks, those of us who spend our lives with a partner of the same sex must really have no choice in the matter -- or so goes the prevailing wisdom of the gay rights...

“It’s not true,” Harf said of the dispatch. She added that there had been no change in the administration’s position regarding phased sanctions relief, but she didn’t seem to realize that this assertion failed to contradict The Journal’s reporting. “They won’t get relief until they take nuclear-related steps,” the State Department spokeswoman added. “And those cannot technically, probably happen on day one.” Well, that’s reassuring.

J.J. Abrams, the director tasked with bringing Star Wars back to the top of the crowded franchise heap, has always been happy to borrow. When he set out to make a new Star Trek and drag that moribund cinematic franchise back into blockbuster territory, he cheerfully swapped in some very familiar visual language to help it over the hill. Early on in the film, James Kirk (Chris Pine), nursing a desire to transcend his farmboy life, rides a motorcycle to see the U.S.S. Enterprise being built at a shipyard, and gazes up at it longingly. Star Wars fans would connect...

The Post reports that Walker now says, “In terms of legal immigration, how we need to approach that going forward is saying … the next president and the next Congress need to make decisions about a legal immigration system that’s based on, first and foremost, protecting American workers and American wages.” He went on to cite favorably Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) on the subject. The notion that legal immigration hurts the economy and native workers has been rebutted repeatedly and is widely disparaged by a host of pro-growth conservatives and scholars.....AshLee Strong, spokeswoman for Walker’s Our American Revival PAC, tells...

A friend sends along an email attachment—a handwritten letter by his 8-year-old son, Peter. It’s addressed to First Lady Michelle Obama. “It all started because he saw something about school lunches [and] how ketchup is bad for you, and that Michelle Obama wants to limit the amount of ketchup” in schools, my friend explained. When the boy’s mother reminded him he attends a private school, making the ketchup rationing a nonissue, “He said something about wanting to ‘give a voice to the voiceless.’”But ketchup is actually the least of the boy’s concerns, as he then continues onto foreign policy, the...

The EPA is moving full steam ahead with their plans to clamp down on coal production in the name of reducing carbon emissions, regardless of how it impacts American energy independence or the costs which will be passed on to consumers. (And “full steam ahead” is probably an apt bit of gallows humor in this case, since we may be back to running on wood burning steam engines soon if the EPA has their way.) But that might change now that the D.C. circuit court has heard arguments from 26 state Attorneys General who are seeking to preemptively stop the...

A U.S. aircraft carrier and its warplanes are shadowing an Iranian convoy approaching Yemen, Pentagon sources told Fox News, amid suspicions that the ships may be carrying weapons for rebel fighters. Sources told Fox News that the USS Theodore Roosevelt is not only tracking the convoy, but also launching F/A-18 Hornets to conduct "manned reconnaissance" of the estimated nine ships in the Iranian convoy. The movements escalate a standoff in the waters off Yemen, even as the U.S. and other world powers are trying to hammer out a diplomatic deal with Iran on its nuclear program. Already, the U.S. and...

It appears that Herr Schaeuble will be left in the cold as following comments from the Greek energy minister that a deal is coming soon: -RUSSIA MAY SIGN GAS LINK ACCORD W/GREECE TODAY: ROSSIYA 24 According to Gazprom's CEO comments on Greek TV, following his meeting with Greek PM Tsipras, Russia will guarantee 47BCM/YR of gas via Greece with the link to be built by a Russian-European group at a cost of around E2 billion. SNIP As a reminder, Russia is not acting out of the kindness of his heart, but merely engaging in another calculated move, one which kills...

As one executive puts it, if Star Wars: The Force Awakens doesn't score the biggest debut ever when it hits theaters Dec. 18, he'll "run up and down Sunset Boulevard naked." So how high could J.J. Abrams' reboot fly? The top U.S. opening is The Avengers, which launched to $207.4 million in May 2012 from 4,349 theaters. Disney's sequel, Avengers: Age of Ultron (May 1), could become the new champ, but many believe Force Awakens has every chance of outrunning them both, even with the distraction of Christmas. Globally it could rake in nearly $540 million, topping the three-day record...

Wall Street's six biggest banks have cut nearly 80,000 jobs over the past 5 years, according to Bloomberg. The majority of the cuts have come from Bank of America. That's over both the past 5 years and the past 12 months, as well as in the first quarter of 2015. Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley added jobs in the first quarter of 2015, but 4,000 jobs were still cut across Wall Street last quarter. Bloomberg looked at data from JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, and Bank of America. Over the past 5 years, JPMorgan has...

Racy lingerie retailer Frederick’s of Hollywood is seeking bankruptcy protection in federal court after closing all of its stores and switching to an online-only business, which it intends to sell to the highest bidder. The privately held company says competition, decreased mall foot traffic and onerous leases helped push it into a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing.

Schlumberger, the world's largest oilfield service provider, said it plans to cut its global workforce by another 11,000 jobs over coming months. Schlumberger has slashed its worldwide workforce by 15 percent total. The company, which has headquarters in Houston, Paris and Hague, announced its plans last week, part of sweeping layoffs across the oilfield service industry as drilling rig counts in North American plummet amid low oil prices. Competitors Halliburton and Baker Hughes have also announced layoffs. Schlumberger, which employed 126,000 worldwide at the height of oil prices last summer, did not provide specifics as to where layoffs would occur...