Free Republic

In presidential campaign ads, President Barack Obama claims that his economic plan includes “$4 trillion in deficit reduction.” For a president who has increased the national debt more than all U.S. presidents from George Washington to George H.W. Bush combined, the claim seems incredible. Indeed, it is. A new analysis of Mr. Obama’s budget reveals the president’s plan would add $10.6 trillion in debt accumulation over the next decade, bringing the U.S. federal debt to a jaw-dropping $25.4 trillion. Still, the president and his surrogates continue to claim the Obama plan would cut spending. “The President’s proposals… include a balanced...

...The entire Democratic Party, from the top down, now looks like Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright. The hatred of America is open. The desire to undo American constitutionalism is explicit. And this exposure will only accelerate in the coming months and years, as the left realizes ever more acutely that its days as an accepted political faction are numbered, and it is forced to take increasingly drastic and sudden measures to achieve its brutal aims before the clock runs out....It has become patently clear that the present Republican Party establishment is not up for this fight. Constitutional conservatives must do...

Obama's Regulatory Czar has resigned: Cass Sunstein, administrator of the powerful Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the White House Office of Management and Budget, will return later this month to his previous post at Harvard Law School, the White House will announce Friday. Obama said of Sunstein: “For the last three and a half years, Cass Sunstein has helped drive a series of historic accomplishments on behalf of the American people." Accomplishments? During the last 3+ years Obama and his "regulatory czar" have issued 106 new major regulations (as of March 2012). ...at a cost of more than...

Two more indicators previewing tomorrow's July jobs report are in today, and neither look particularly good. First, weekly jobless claims went back up again after a sharp drop the week before --- which was amended upward in today's report, too: In the week ending July 28 the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 365,000, an increase of 8,000 from the previous week's revised figure of 357,000. The 4-week moving average was 365,500, a decrease of 2,750 from the previous week's revised average of 368,250.The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.6 percent for the week ending July...

It is election season, after all, so sharing one's political views -- however outlandish they may be -- is to be expected. But how about from a 6-year-old? Isaac Anthony counts down the 10 reasons why he thinks you should not vote for Barack Obama in a YouTube video posted by the conservative website Patriot Update. His list of reasons includes the fact that, in his opinion, Obama is "taking money from people who work hard" and "keeping people on welfare and food stamps." After Anthony delivers reason No. 4, "He wants to take guns away from good guys," he...

WASHINGTON - Former governor Mitt Romney returns from his overseas trip this week to resume talking about a four-letter word that's been missing from Barack Obama's vocabulary: jobs. His mid-election trip abroad hit some bumps in the road but nothing of any consequence that's going to become an issue in a campaign year that is totally fixated on Obama's recession-teetering economy. While Romney was gone, the nation's barely breathing economic growth rate slowed to virtually comatose levels -- 1.5 percent in the second quarter with bleaker forecasts for the next three months in the 1 percent range. Life in Obama's...

RICHMOND, VA (WWBT) - The lunch-hour rush came in force Wednesday for Chick-fil-A's around central Virginia. Lines of vehicles wrapped around several outlets in Chester, Hanover, Mechanicsville, and many other locations for Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day. The movement started when Chick-fil-A took an anti-gay marriage stance two weeks ago and came under fire from gay rights activist groups.

PHOTOS: Chick-Fil-As Across The Country Are Absolutely Jam-Packed Brett LoGiurato and Kim Bhasin Aug. 1, 2012, 4:06 PM By all early accounts, Gov. Mike Huckabee's "Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day" seems like a wild success. Conservatives are lining up in droves. Former Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum is offering his support and urging supporters to visit a restaurant. One Wendy's franchise owner expressed his support for Chick-fil-A at a North Carolina Wendy's. Chick-fil-A originally incurred a backlash when COO Dan Cathy affirmed in an interview that the company did not support gay marriage. "We are very much supportive of the family —...

On his way out to commercial break at 3:24 p.m. Eastern, Studio B host Shep Smith noted that August 1 is "National Badminton Day," and quipped "Forget National Day of Intolerance, let's just stay with badminton."

WASHINGTON, August 1, 2012 (LifeSitenews.com) - Countless lunchgoers posted pictures on their Facebook pages and Twitter showing their Chick-Fil-A stores and drive-thrus stuffed to the gills on Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day, a show of support for CEO Dan Cathy’s Biblical stance on marriage. Conservative leaders from across America described the chicken-crazed chaos. Jim Sedlak of the American Life League said that “our little Chick-Fil-A in Stafford, Virginia was absolutely mobbed at lunch time,” forcing hungry families to journey over from nearby parking lots. “They have a very little parking lot, but it was just absolutely mobbed today. It was terrific,” Sedlak...

WASHINGTON — U.S. manufacturing shrank for the second straight month in July, further evidence of an economy growing at a sluggish pace. The Institute for Supply Management, a trade group of purchasing managers, said Wednesday that its index of manufacturing activity ticked up to 49.8, from 49.7 in June. The July report also showed factories hired in at a slower pace than June, while new orders declined more slowly. And export orders fell to the lowest level since April 2009, evidence of slower global economic growth.

The Democrats have a Jewish problem, and his name is Barack Obama. Reluctantly, many Jews, loyal Democrats by birth and tradition, have concluded that he’s not The One they thought he was. With even greater reluctance, the White House has concluded that their Jewish problem is real, growing, and they better do something about it. Mitt Romney’s dramatic declaration Sunday in Jerusalem that preventing Iran from building a nuclear weapon is America’s “highest national security priority” and military force should not be excluded, and that he regards Jerusalem as the true capital of Israel, puts in stark relief the difference...

Election 2012: Lech Walesa, the Polish patriot and former president of Poland, and another ally our president has betrayed, endorses the GOP candidate's quest to restore U.S. leadership in the struggle against the world's despots. Walesa knows a thing or too about resisting and defeating collectivist tyranny, and he has no tolerance for those such as President Obama who appease and apologize to it. Unlike Obama, he earned his Nobel Peace Prize by leading the Solidarity movement that brought freedom to a Poland that suffered for decades under the Nazi jackboot, then as part of the Soviet gulag. In May,...

Last week the Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI named Bishop Salvatore J. Cordileone as the new bishop of San Francisco the capital of Gay America. It is no coincidence that Bishop Cordileone chairs the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops Subcommittee on the Defense and Promotion of Marriage. The bishop comes to his new position as an outspoken and persistent critic of Barack Obama’s efforts to nullify Defense of Marriage Act. He vigorously opposes any movement toward recognition of Gay marriage. Bishop Cordileone was a strong advocate of California’s Proposition 8 which, when it was passed in 2008, prohibited Gay marriage...

The Democratic National Committee made headlines this week with the announcement that for the first time, it is moving to include a plank supporting same-sex marriage in the party's convention platform. It appeared to be a bit of an "in your face" to the host state, North Carolina, which just voted by 61 percent for a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. The Democratic Party, though, has been emboldened since President Obama reversed course and came out in favor of same-sex marriage in May. .. Obama has energized the LGBT lobby and Hollywood, raising millions of dollars off the announcement...

Romney and his super PAC have taken millions from funders with strong green streaks — despite the fact that the former Massachusetts governor has run to the right in the primary, proclaiming doubts about global-warming science and trashing President Barack Obama’s greenhouse gas emissions policies. Julian Robertson, founder of the Tiger Management hedge fund, helped put cap-and-trade legislation on the map with $60 million in contributions over the past decade to the Environmental Defense Fund. Now, Robertson has given $1.25 million to Romney’s Restore our Future super PAC, plus the maximum $2,500 to the Romney campaign. Other green-minded financial backers...

Facing declining demand for electricity and stiff federal environmental regulations, coal plant operators are planning to retire 175 coal-fired generators, or 8.5 percent of the total coal-fired capacity in the United States, according to an analysis by the Energy Information Administration (EIA). A record-high 57 generators will shut down in 2012, representing 9 gigawatts of electrical capacity, according to EIA. In 2015, nearly 10 gigawatts of capacity from 61 coal-fired generators will be retired. While many of those coal plants are old and relatively inefficient, the scope of this new planned shutdown is unprecedented. “The coal-fired capacity expected to be...

<p>A generation ago, it was the three I’s. A presidential challenger’s obligatory foreign trip meant Ireland, Italy, and Israel. Mitt Romney’s itinerary is slightly different: Britain, Poland, and Israel.</p> <p>Not quite the naked ethnic appeal of yore. Each destination suggests a somewhat more subtle affinity: Britain, playing to our cultural connectedness with the Downton Abbey folks who’ve been at our side in practically every fight for the last hundred years; Poland, representing the “new Europe,” the Central Europeans so unashamedly pro-American; Israel, appealing to most American Jews but also to an infinitely greater number of passionately sympathetic Evangelical Christians.</p>

Just like the majority of police officers who never have to fire their gun during the course of a career, most civilians will never be shot at while watching a movie, browsing in a shopping mall or attending school. But for those few that do have the misfortune to be an unwilling participant in an ambush here are a few rules of thumb you may find useful.The police can't protect you. The Aurora, CO police force is a fine, highly motivated department - I know because the police association was formerly my client. There were officers already at the...

<p>Growth in the U.S. manufacturing sector slowed in July to the second-weakest level since the country emerged from recession, according to a survey released Tuesday.</p> <p>The Markit flash U.S. manufacturing purchasing managers index dropped to 51.8 from 52.5 in June, which is the worst level since December 2010 and second-worst since late 2009. Any readings above 50 indicate an improvement from the prior month.</p>