Free Republic

The Obama administration is working around the clock to come up with ways to punish Vladimir Putin for invading Ukraine. But will any of them work? Behind the scenes, Obama administration officials are preparing a series of possible battle plans for a potential economic assault on Russia in response to its invasion of Ukraine, an administration source close to the issue told The Daily Beast. Among the possible targets for these financial attacks: everyone from high-ranking Russian military officials to government leaders to top businessmen to Russian-speaking separatists in Ukraine. It’s all part of the work to prepare an executive...

Top lawmakers on the House and Senate Armed Services said Thursday that the world would be better off if the Cold War was still on—and if Obama wasn’t cutting the defense budget. The current crisis in the Ukraine and the looming crisis on the Korean Peninsula would be much easier to manage if the Cold War was still going strong, according to House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon and Senate Armed Services Ranking Republican James Inhofe. “I look back wistfully at the Cold War,” Inhofe said Thursday at a breakfast meeting with reporters. “There were two superpowers, they knew...

Life in the White House imitated Parks and Rec recently, as the identity of a staffer who ran an anonymous Twitter account critical of the administration emerged. But the real-life plot diverged from the show when the White House staffer, Jofi Joseph, was promptly fired instead of having a warm moment with Amy Poehler. Joseph, a director in the White House's National Security Staff, ran the @NatSecWonk stream, popular in foreign policy circles for its unabashed trolling of the administration, its allies, and various other political types. "I'm a fan of Obama, but his continuing reliance and dependence upon a...