Free Republic

As 2013 slouches toward 2014, the political numbers for President Obama just keep getting worse. And – you guessed it – much of that has to do with the Affordable Care Act known as “Obamacare.” A new AP-GfK poll shows major doubts about Obama’s signature legislative achievement. Most troubling for the administration, that’s not just among those needing to sign up for new coverage through the HealthCare.gov website. Perhaps more politically significant, Americans who will continue to get healthcare coverage through their employers blame Obama's healthcare overhaul for their rising premiums and deductibles, according to this poll. Among the findings:...

(RNS) Last month, Lauren Anderson Youngblood, communications manager for the Secular Coalition for America, approached Broderick Johnson, a senior adviser to the Obama campaign, as they both left a conference on religion and the election. The SCA is an umbrella group representing 11 nontheistic organizations. So who, Youngblood asked Johnson, could she reach out to with their concerns about civil rights, access to health care and education? “He said, ‘We don’t view you as a constituency,’” Youngblood said. “He said, ‘We don’t do outreach to that community.’” After Tuesday's election, that may soon change. According to a Pew Forum on...

As we have watched horrified over the last week as parts of London and several other major British cities burned, one unspoken thought was; Are we next? In between all the harrumphing by talking heads going on about either turning the water cannons on the little monsters, or how this is just a protest gone wrong is a simple point: The West has created a generation of feral children. This phenomenon is not unique to Britain, or Europe, as the frustrated mayor of Philadelphia[1], Michael Nutter, demonstrated in the wake of a series of recent racially motivated “flash mobs”. Further...

For every Californian who dreams of importing a kangaroo or ticketing a double-parked ice cream truck, the Legislature might change state law to make you happy. Want to bet? Lawmakers have that covered, too. Cities and counties could allow Texas hold 'em poker without limits - all chips could be bet at once - under one pending proposal. From the oddball to the narrowly crafted, some of the nearly 3,000 bills proposed this year are likely to draw chuckles, raise eyebrows or spark a simple "You've got to be kidding, right?" * AB 972 would ban pregnant women from boxing...

BERLIN, GERMANY (Talon News) -- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-CA) told a German newspaper in an interview published on Saturday that he believes the GOP should move "a little further left" in order to attract new voters and to continue to build the Republican Party base. Since being resoundingly elected during the highly-publicized recall election where former Democratic Gov. Gray Davis was ousted in 2003, Schwarzenegger has remained conservative on fiscal issues, but has openly shown his support for liberal social issues such as gay marriage and abortion, among others. In Germany's Sueddeutsche Zeitung newspaper on Saturday, Schwarzenegger said he sees...