Free Republic

For the third time in 36 years, the Republican National Committee will accept a shared leadership arrangement with a U.S. senator as party general chairman and an RNC member as the full-time chairman. Meeting in Washington D.C., the 167-member RNC today made official the White House’s choice of Florida Sen. Mel Martinez as general chairman of the party and Kentucky Republican National Committeeman Mike Duncan as full-time chairman. But it won’t be with enthusiasm that the RNC gives its approval to the Martinez-Duncan team. As one committee member arriving in Washington for the RNC winter meeting told me, “We’re like...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Senate, eager to stanch the flow of illegal immigrants, signaled overwhelming support Monday for President Bush's plan to dispatch National Guard troops to states along the Mexican border. No tour of duty could last longer than 21 days and troops would be excluded from "search, seizure, arrest or similar activity." They would support the Border Patrol, which has primary responsibility for intercepting illegal immigrants. The vote was 83-10 on an amendment by Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., to authorize governors to order their states' National Guard units to perform annual duty training in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona...

So it has come to this: A group of Senate Republicans has proposed $100 rebates to low-income people to ease their "pain at the gas pump." They also are entertaining the possibility of higher taxes on oil industry profits, as if government does a better job of spending money than private industry. Have they forgotten the last time government imposed a "windfall profits tax" from 1980 to '88? Oil production fell (but demand grew) as "big oil" had less incentive to explore. A history of this bad idea can be found on The Tax History Project Web page www.taxhistory.org. A...