Free Republic

With the Iowa caucus beginning in just over two weeks and the New Hampshire primary hot on its heels, Gov. Ron DeSantis' once-promising bid to be the Republican Party's 2024 presidential bid seems to be already over. As the (Huffing and Puffington Post) is reporting, the clamor for DeSantis to be the face of the party went nowhere as Donald Trump not only hung onto conservative voters but pulled away from the Florida governor despite DeSantis' political operation that proved to be ineffective — when it wasn't being plagued with infighting and layoffs. Now, with well over $160 million spent...

DeSantis’ campaign and super PAC have spent more than $160 million to boost him, and he spent the better part of 2023 on the road. “If I could have one thing change, I wish Trump hadn’t been indicted on any of this stuff,” he told the Christian Broadcasting Network last week. “It sucked out a lot of oxygen.” “He tried to ‘out-Trump’ Trump among Trump supporters instead of going for the ‘maybe Trump/move on from Trump’ voters, and it was a fatal strategic choice,” Cullen said. Polling shows that his numbers were strongest before he actively began campaigning for president...

At his post-victory news conference Wednesday morning, Governor elect Jerry Brown showed why he won the election with a million votes to spare. He's steeped in the issues, he listens to what is happening on the ground, and he's not afraid to mix it up. Now, I don't agree with Brown on a number of issues. But in the course of the campaign, I rarely got the feeling that Meg Whitman was listening to anyone other than her consultants or that she was even curious. California needs a strong governor; Whitman showed them a wind-up doll. Worse, the former eBay...

Jail sentences were handed down today to an Irish family, who had netted tens of millions of pounds worth of goods in a series of burglaries dating back 20 years.Yesterday, after a crime spree that spanned 20 years and targeted the homes of the rich and famous, five members of a notorious Irish gypsy gang were finally locked away. The Johnsons, famed for stealing antiques worth tens of millions of pounds from stately homes, were known to reside on caravan sites across the south-west of England. It was from these poor man's homes that they meticulously researched and planned their...