Free Republic

Whether or not they vote to shut down the government today, Democrats have proven one thing: They are really bad at messaging. Laying out their political narrative on funding the government should have begun on Jan. 3, when this session of Congress began. Instead, as of lunch time on Wednesday, the party was still trying to puzzle out what it’s going to say. That’s just not the way to do it. Democrats need to have a consistent, effective message that everyone can understand. This shouldn’t be that hard. In the Trump administration, they’ve been given the fattest, juiciest target in...

Slightly more than one month into President Trump’s second term, Democrats have yet to figure out how to effectively counter him and make a compelling case to the public. Indeed, despite the multitude of opportunities that Trump has handed Democrats, the party writ large appears unable to muster anything more than “procedural opposition” as M. Gessen described it. To be sure, this is not a new problem, but it is an increasingly urgent one. Since 2016, Democrats have spent more time opposing Donald Trump than they have developing and articulating a clear and compelling vision for the country. As a...

Call it the white house’s dream scenario: In the end, the voters don’t blame Joe Biden. The president’s withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan simply aligns him with everyone else who has given up on the notion that the military could mold a fractious country into a stable democratic ally. The administration is hoping that grisly images of desperate Afghans clinging to a C-17 fade, replaced by...

The state attorneys general of New York and Massachusetts and eight environmental groups that have accused climate change skeptics of lying to the public are now themselves the subject of a congressional probe. The House Science, Space and Technology Committee issued subpoenas to New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey, and the eight green groups after they missed a July 13 deadline to turn over documents related to their “coordinated” attack on climate change skeptics, chairman Lamar Smith (R-TX) announced Wednesday. The subpoenas ordered them to turn over documents “related to coordinated efforts to deprive companies,...

HOW GOOD is your knowledge of the political parties' platforms for November's presidential election?Which party says that the most pressing priorities the nation faces in the next four years are winning the global war against terror, stopping the spread of weapons of mass destruction, and promoting democracy and freedom in the world, starting with a peaceful and stable Iraq?Which party promises to achieve these aims by transforming the U.S. military through technological innovation and investment, adding 40,000 soldiers, doubling the size of the Pentagon's Special Forces, and ending America's dependence on Middle Eastern oil?Here's a clue: This same party says...

Agreat line from Tucker Carlson the other night on Crossfire: Seven of the nine Democrats running for president made a pilgrimage to the Human Rights Campaign yesterday to swear their loyalty to the cause of gay rights, but only partial loyalty, it turns out. Among the major candidates, only one, just one -- that, of course, is Al Sharpton -- believes that gays ought to be allowed to get married. The rest are hypocrites. But that did not prevent them from pandering. According to a remarkable account in "The Washington Post" this morning, these opponents of gay marriage spent most...