Free Republic

Ed Klein’s blockbuster new best-seller about President Barack Obama chronicles Obama’s insulting snubs of staunch supporter Caroline Kennedy, the sole surviving child of President John F. Kennedy. Caroline even become so disgusted by Obama she called him a “liar and worse.” Klein’s just-released book “Amateur: Barack Obama in the White House” skyrocketed to the No. 1 spot on the New York Times best-seller list in its first week in publication and has remained there for the third week in a row. Klein offers surprising behind-the-scenes details about Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama’s relationship with Caroline and other members of...

WASHINGTON — Army leaders have begun to study the prospect of sending female soldiers to the service's prestigious Ranger school — another step in the effort to broaden opportunities for women in the military. Gen. Raymond Odierno, Army chief of staff, said Wednesday that he's asked senior commanders to provide him with recommendations and a plan this summer. And while he stressed that no decisions have been made, he suggested that Ranger school may be a logical next step for women as they move into more jobs closer to the combat lines. "If we determine that we're going to allow...

How can someone who writes compelling nonfiction be so terrible at fiction? I’ve just read the first few chapters of David Frum’s new novel, “Patriots.” It is bloody awful. It also defeats the purpose that Frum claims he intended for it, which was to write a novel that tells deeper truths than journalism. In fact it retreads ground Frum the journalist has gone over many times before, most notably his increasingly shrill belief that conservatives are nuts. Frum is a former conservative who is now trending liberal and may in fact be headed for the netherworld of Andrew Sullivanville; he...

Former Democratic vice presidential candidate and U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman says he’s not endorsing anyone – Republican or Democrat – for president in November. "I'm going to try to stay out of this one," Lieberman told Chris Wallace on "Fox News Sunday." Lieberman, an independent from Connecticut who caucuses with Democrats, famously endorsed his friend Republican John McCain over Barack Obama in the 2008 election. Wallace joked that that endorsement "didn't work out so well the last time." "I'm not running for re-election," Lieberman countered. "I'm enjoying not being involved in the nastiness of campaigning in America these days." Lieberman...

Yet another new survey shows that Republican supporters know more about politics and political history than Democrats. On eight of 13 questions about politics, Republicans outscored Democrats by an average of 18 percentage points, according to a new Pew survey titled “Partisan Differences in Knowledge.” The Pew survey adds to a wave of surveys and studies showing that GOP-sympathizers are better informed, more intellectually consistent, more open-minded, more empathetic and more receptive to criticism than their fellow Americans who support the Democratic Party. “Republicans fare substantially better than Democrats on several questions in the survey, as is typically the case...

In a lawsuit against three Indiana government officials, a labor union alleged on Wednesday that its constitutional rights under the Thirteenth Amendment — which outlawed “slavery” and “involuntary servitude” — are violated whenever its members are forced to work alongside nonunion employees. The International Union of Operating Engineers, whose members work as heavy equipment operators, mechanics and construction surveyors, sued Indiana’s governor, attorney general, and labor commissioner in February, alleging that the state’s “right to work” law is unconstitutional. Indiana’s law prohibits employers from making union membership a condition of getting or keeping a job. The union’s February lawsuit claimed...

Bailout recipient Bank of America has severed relations with an American company because of a reported bias against their industry. McMillan Group International released an extraordinary statement on Facebook regarding the incident: McMillan Fiberglass Stocks, McMillan Firearms Manufacturing, McMillan Group International have been collectively banking with Bank of America for 12 years. Today Mr. Ray Fox, Senior Vice President, Market Manager, Business Banking, Global Commercial Banking came to my office. He scheduled the meeting as an “account analysis” meeting in order to evaluate the two lines of credit we have with them. He spent five minutes talking about how McMillan...

A breakaway group of traditionalist Catholics may be on the verge of returning into full communion with Rome, bringing a 24-year rift to an end and fulfilling a key goal of Benedict XVI’s pontificate. Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi told journalists April 18 that the Society of St. Pius X had taken an encouraging “step forward” by clarifying its response to a “doctrinal preamble,” a Vatican document that has become the basis of any reconciliation. The society insisted “a step and not a conclusion” had been reached and stressed its clarifications, submitted by the society’s superior general, Bishop Bernard Fellay,...

What's a Schakowsky Republican you ask? Good question.... Probably not much different than many "Chicago Republicans." If you are any bit familiar with the Chicago machine, it is no secret that the Chicago GOP that does exist, along with the state Republican Party itself, is heavily influenced by democrats and democrat operatives. But it looks like one of their operatives got a little sloppy in this year's 2nd Ward Republican Committeeman race. A citizen journalist sends us the following: Mirlinda Vula Feierstein, Candidate for 2nd Ward Republican Committeeman sure has an interesting campaign strategy. In late January, concerned citizens of...

Almost everyone who lives in New York City knows that I am Jewish. Most know that I am a secular Jew who believes in God, the afterlife, reward and punishment, and that I hope to be rewarded. I have spent much of my professional life stressing how important it is for Jews to strengthen the Jewish-Catholic relationship. Jews should also convey their deep appreciation for the support that evangelical Protestants give to both Israel and the American Jewish community. Regrettably, a number of mainstream Protestant churches have been supportive of the Palestinians and Arab causes for years, and hostile to...

Driving to my office this morning, a car covered with more than half a dozen bumper stickers. From top to bottom, the three on the right side of the trunk: God Bless the Whole World. No Exceptions. It’s Never Right to Hit a Child. Keep Abortion Legal.

Talkin’ about my generation”: the Who song once expressed the hope and self confidence of the Baby Boomers as they reached biological if not emotional maturity. It was an attack on the older generation, a defense of the young, but it includes an ominous refrain: “Hope I die before I get old.” Already, perhaps, the shadow of generational failure hung over the twenty something Boomers. Those shadows have darkened considerably as the Boomer sun moves past the meridian and an unmistakable air of twilight infiltrates into the declining hours of the long Boomer day. Talking about our generation is not...

Jay-Z's Occupy Wall Street T-shirt line has been pulled from Rocawear’s website just days after critics slammed the millionaire rapper for cashing in on the movement without promising to share a penny of profits with the 99%. The shirts, stamped with the phrase, “Occupy All Streets,” first appeared when Russell Simmons tweeted a picture of Jay-Z wearing one backstage at a concert. Rocawear announced on Thursday that it planned to sell the T-shirts for $22, but any trace of garments has now been wiped from the brand’s site. Backlash sparked when Jay-Z’s camp announced it had no plans to share...

Everybody’s been too damn polite about this nonsense: The “Occupy” movement, whether displaying itself on Wall Street or in the streets of Oakland (which has, with unspeakable cowardice, embraced it) is anything but an exercise of our blessed First Amendment. “Occupy” is nothing but a pack of louts, thieves, and rapists, an unruly mob, fed by Woodstock-era nostalgia and putrid false righteousness. These clowns can do nothing but harm America. “Occupy” is nothing short of a clumsy, poorly-expressed attempt at anarchy, to the extent that the “movement” – HAH! Some “movement”, except if the word “bowel” is attached - is...

Andrew Breitbart, famous for using the Internet to take down former Congressman Anthony Weiner and liberal organizations like ACORN, has Michael Moore in his crosshairs, metaphorically speaking. Breitbart, seizing on Moore’s embrace of Occupy Wall Street and his denial that he’s among the richest 1 percent of Americans, has posted five photos of Moore’s lavish vacation home on Lake Torch in Michigan. he blogger-provocateur also included a copy of the Antrim County property tax assessment, though with the address redacted, and apparently Moore’s “summer tax amount” owed on the property is $15,849. “No one begrudges Moore his wealth, but it...

A few millennia from now, when archaeologists from an ascendant Brazil or Turkey or wherever sift the shards of American civilization and find the ruins of the Big House in Ann Arbor, Mich., they will wonder why a 109,901-seat entertainment venue was attached to an institution of higher education. Today, the accelerating preposterousness of big-time college football is again provoking furrowed brows and pursed lips. But there probably were few of either among the 20 million who Saturday night watched Alabama's student-athletes play those of LSU. These teams' head coaches' salaries are $4.6 million and $3.75 million, respectively, and their...

Very notable news, via Vatican expert Sandro Magister, following the aftermath of the Justice & Peace’s ill-advised white paper (emphasis mine) Precisely when the G20 summit in Cannes was coming to its weak and uncertain conclusion, on that same Friday, November 4 at the Vatican, a smaller summit convened in the secretariat of state was doing damage control on the latest of many moments of confusion in the Roman curia. In the hot seat was the document on the global financial crisis released ten days earlier by the pontifical council for justice and peace. A document that had disturbed many,...

All this brouhaha over Joe Paterno is obscuring the real problem. According to the Grand Jury report about the abuse of young boys by Jerry Sandusky, he was caught in the act at least twice by grown men. These men backed out of the room and did nothing to save the boy being raped. What kind of world do we live in that a man would turn his back on a criminal act being perpetrated on anyone - let alone a child? Mike McQueary, one of the men in question, is being criticized for not calling police. Calling police? A...

Will Baby Boomers be the last generation to enjoy the modern concept of a leisure-filled retirement? It's a worthy question to ponder in light of a new Pew Research Center report showing a growing wealth gap between young and old in the United States. Using government data over the last 25 years, Pew found that households headed by those over 65 have made "dramatic gains" in economic well-being, while those headed by younger adults have fallen steadily behind. In 2009, elderly households possessed 42 percent more median net worth than their same-age counterparts had in 1984. Young adults veered in...

Republican House members are increasingly separating themselves from Grover Norquist and Americans for Tax Reform, the interest group he leads. Specifically they’re disconnecting from ATR’s pledge to oppose any tax increase, The Hill reports. While some congressmen signed the pledge recently, others did so years ago. Norquist began the pledge in 1986. ATR cites 238 House signers of its Taxpayer Protection Pledge, but several House Republicans accuse the group of being underhanded about it and want to remove their names from the list. On its Internet display of the pledge’s signers, which includes all but six House Republicans, Americans for...