Free Republic

The Republican Party seems to be struggling to find a candidate it can unite around. One impediment may be a mindset common among some of my fellow Tea Partiers, a false dichotomy that if you are in government you are part of the problem, and if you are not in government, you are part of the solution -- whatever those problems or solutions may be. Herman Cain says, "The folks in Washington have held public office. How's that working out for you?" It's a catchy comeback. But is government tenure, whether recent or not, the reality of the problems in...

MYRTLE BEACH, S.C.--Don’t tell Newt Gingrich, but he’s not running against a general-election campaign against President Obama just yet. The former House speaker campaigns for president with the air of someone with a real shot at the Republican nomination, steadfastly declining to take shots at his GOP rivals on the stump, lobbing criticism at the White House, and describing for audiences what his first presidential press conference would be like. Until recently, it all would have been written off in political circles as the work of an overly active imagination of a famously self-confident politician. But lately, Gingrich has reason...

The Republican presidential nominating process must break out of its "next-in-line" syndrome. The party establishment, unable to comprehend the depth of voter angst, the desire for genuine change, and the true extent of America's current dire predicament, is still stuck in that rut as it continues its unenthusiastic but overt support for Mitt Romney, the current "next-in-line" candidate. This is not the United States of the past sixty years, wherein it mattered relatively little which party occupied the White House or dominated the Congress. While the most dramatic steps in setting the nation on the course that has brought the...

Political experts all agreed over the summer that Newt Gingrich’s candidacy was done. But Gingrich never got the message. In a volatile election cycle, Gingrich has battled his way back into contention, rising to third place in several national and state polls on the force of his ideas and breadth of knowledge of how Washington does and does not work. After nationally televised debates and local town halls, Gingrich has made voters want to give him a second look, especially after he speaks emphatically about American Exceptionalism and about bureaucrats and unelected judges who threaten to undermine it. His fundraising,...

House Republican leaders and the White House are nearing a deal to finally close the books on the 2011 budget—six months into the fiscal year. The White House says it will accept spending cuts of $33 billion, compared to the $62 billion the House passed earlier this year. If House Speaker John Boehner can bring that number closer to $40 billion, so much the better. We share the desire of new Members in Congress who want deeper reductions. But Republicans don't hold the Senate or the White House, and even cuts of this magnitude are bigger than anyone could have...

While making the case for his health reform package, President Obama argued that his proposal would make life easier for small-business owners. Unfortunately, Obamacare threatens to undermine a group of small-business owners that is perhaps more important than any other to his reform effort — doctors in private practice. The number of privately owned medical practices has declined sharply in the past five years. In 2005, at least two-thirds of practices were in private hands. That figure has dropped to less than half today — and is expected to sink below 40 percent by next year. Many doctors, specifically those...

Why is it that lefty men frequently tend to be of slight build, often effeminite, often times speak with a slight lisp, etc.....is it just me?

Cities across the nation are raising property taxes, largely citing rising pension and health-care costs for their employees and retirees. In Pennsylvania, the township of Upper Moreland is bumping up property taxes for residents by 13.6% in 2011. Next door the city of Philadelphia this year increased the tax 9.9%. In New York, Saratoga Springs will collect 4.4% more in property taxes in 2011; Troy will increase taxes by 1.9%. Property-tax increases aren't unusual, in part because the taxes are among the main sources of local revenue. But officials say more and larger increases are taking hold. "This year we...

NEWELL, W. Va. — Governor Joe Manchin is running what seems to be a classic Republican campaign for the US Senate in West Virginia. He blasts “Obamacare,’’ files a lawsuit against environmental laws, and — literally — fires a bullet at a mock-up of climate-change legislation. He boasts of his endorsement by the US Chamber of Commerce, his A rating from the libertarian Cato Institute, and his conservative fiscal credentials. The catch: Manchin is the Democratic nominee. And even this effort to distance himself from President Obama and his own party hasn’t assured him of victory in the Mountain State....

HARRISBURG, Pa. -- A new poll in Pennsylvania's hotly contested race for U.S. Senate shows that Democrat Joe Sestak has apparently wiped out Republican Pat Toomey's lead. The Muhlenberg (MYOO'-len-berg) College/Allentown Morning Call poll released Wednesday shows Sestak supported by 44 percent of likely voters to Toomey's 41 percent. The numbers include people who are leaning toward voting for a candidate but haven't entirely made up their minds. Fifteen percent remain undecided two weeks before the election. Independent polls in recent weeks showed Toomey with a slight lead. Toomey and Sestak are vying to replace five-term Sen. Arlen Specter, whom...

Not a lot of things have gone the Democrats' way this year, but dozens of their House candidates are getting a late boost from an unusual source: the National Rifle Association. So far this year, the NRA has endorsed 58 incumbent House Democrats, including more than a dozen in seats that both parties view as critical to winning a majority. The endorsements aren't the result of a sudden love for a party with which the NRA is often at odds. Rather, the powerful group adheres to what it calls "an incumbent-friendly" policy, which holds that if two candidates are equally...

IT IS ONE of the enduring puzzles surrounding the bailout of General Motors: Why did retired salaried personnel of a former GM division, Delphi, receive a fraction of their promised pension benefits, while Delphi's retired hourly personnel, members of the United Auto Workers, got 100 percent, paid for in part by the "new" taxpayer-supported GM? For months, this has been a simmering cause celebre on the right, with critics accusing the Obama administration of paying off its union backers -- and echoing white-collar retirees' demand for the same deal the UAW got. Now, at the insistence of Republicans in Congress,...

The special inspector for taxpayer bailout funds is looking into whether the Obama administration pressed General Motors in bankruptcy to backstop the pensions of the union retirees of a former division, Delphi. The inquiry could clarify a lingering mystery of G.M.’s forced restructuring last year: both unionized and white-collar workers earned pensions while at Delphi, a G.M. spinoff also in bankruptcy, but when the federal government took over their failing pension plans, only Delphi’s white-collar retirees suffered painful benefit cuts. Neil M. Barofsky, the special inspector general for the Treasury Department’s bailout programs, said he intended to find out “whether...

If elections have consequences, so do strategies of opportunism that hitch a ride on popular paranoia. From the day this president was inaugurated, the GOP has fed off the forces that coalesced into the angry astringency of the Tea Party movement. First the GOP maintained lockstep opposition to the stimulus, despite support from Republican economists. Republicans then proliferated lies about health reform — from the chimera of rationing to the nonexistent death panels. They next stoked the fires by pretending that the legislation to crack down on Wall Street was instead a giveaway to Wall Street. Shrunken and narrowed, the...

(Reuters) - Florida Governor Charlie Crist's strategy of taking the best ideas from Democrats and Republicans in his campaign as an independent for a Senate seat is failing. The slight edge Crist held over Republican "Tea Party" favorite Marco Rubio in August has evaporated and turned into a wide deficit as he courts what appears to be a fast- shrinking moderate vote. A Reuters/Ipsos poll on Wednesday showed Rubio far ahead in the three-way race to succeed Republican Senator George LeMieux, with support from 40 percent of likely voters. Crist had 26 percent while Democrat Kendrick Meek had 21 percent....

Last year, former RPOF Chairman Jim Greer made national news by raising a ruckus about President Barack Obama’s speech to school kids. Greer complained that Obama was trying “indoctrinate” children. Well, a year later, Greer’s been forced out as party chairman, is facing criminal charges over his handling of RPOF finances and is engaged in a scorched-earth campaign with his former associates. Over the weekend, the party said it might sue Greer — and Gov. Charlie Crist — to get back money spent inappropriately. So how did Greer respond? With a text message today slamming the GOP and saying he...

LAKE WYLIE South Carolina’s longest-serving congressman pointed to his experience Tuesday in asking voters to give him a 15th term, while his challenger said the incumbent’s support of the health care overhaul and other Democratic agenda items was the reason to replace him. It was the first debate for Democratic U.S. Rep. John Spratt and freshman state Sen. Mick Mulvaney, and it won’t be viewed by anyone other than the 200 or so people attending the $30-per-person event in a gated, Lake Wylie community just south of Charlotte. Spratt’s campaign asked that no video or audio recordings be allowed, which...

This race will be about one thing: Rick Scott paid the largest fine in U.S. history for "robbing seniors". Sink and the Dems and the media will not differentiate between Scott and his company. This race will not be about issues - it will be about Rick Scott and about how he is a so-called felon. Yes - I know he won the primary, but this ain't good.

HARRISBURG, Pa. — Former Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel — a Republican — is throwing his support behind Democrat Joe Sestak in Pennsylvania's U.S. Senate race. Hagel told The Associated Press on Monday that Sestak has demonstrated during his two terms in Congress that he puts what's best for the country before the interests of his party. He said Sestak's courage and integrity as a legislator are qualities the nation needs more of. He refused to comment on the candidacy of Sestak's opponent, Republican Pat Toomey, a former congressman. The men are seeking the seat long held by Sen. Arlen Specter,...

1. Polls show Democrats at or near historic lows, but it shows the same for Republicans - and often times Republicans are lower (I'm speaking of the "party" fav/non-fav numbers). Will that not be a big hamper on us making historic gains this year? 2. Will "tea party candidates" really be a boon to Democrats? Or is that just ruling class/media spin? The polls seem to show the Dems with better chances against Angle than Lowden/Tarkanian, and also better against Rand Paul than against Trey Grayson. Ideologically, I'm MUCH closer to the tea party candidates, but in this day and...