Free Republic

The House overwhelmingly voted down an unconditional increase to the $14.3 trillion debt limit Tuesday, as the Republican majority delivered a symbolic rebuke to President Obama ahead of a meeting at the White House. The vote was 318-97, with 82 Democrats joining every Republican in rejecting legislation that would have authorized $2.4 trillion in additional borrowing by the federal government. Seven Democrats voted present on the legislation. House Republicans scheduled the vote, which occurred after the close of the American markets, to demonstrate to Senate Democrats and the White House that Congress would not increase the debt limit without significant...

Barack Obama's appointed head of the State Department anti-anti-Semitism office is one Hannah Rosenthal. Like other Obama administration diplomats, Rosenthal has apparently decided that her real battle should be against Israel. Rosenthal made waves in Israel this week when she criticized Israel Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren for failing sufficiently to appreciate the phony pro-peace, genuinely anti-Israel organization J Street. Michael Goldfarb asks: Are there not enough anti-Semites to keep Rosenthal busy even for a month before she starts attacking the Jews? I have two related questions: Who is Hannah Rosenthal and what does she have to teach...

US Approved Flight 253 Passenger List, Source Says Mark Hosenball American security agencies reviewed the passenger list for Northwest Airlines flight 253 before it left Amsterdam for Detroit on Christmas day and informed the airline that the flight was cleared to take off for the U.S., a Dutch government spokeswoman tells NEWSWEEK. Judith Sluyter, spokeswoman for the NCTB, the office of Holland's national counter-terrorism coordinator, said that before Flight 253 left Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport, the passenger list was transmitted in full to U.S. authorities for review. Under procedures negotiated between the United States and various foreign countries, U.S. agencies --...