Free Republic

President Obama told reporters on Thursday that his meeting with Qatar's emir was cordial and useful, complete with banter about tickets for the 2022 World Cup. But he struck a different tone later that night at a Democratic fundraiser in Chicago, saying Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani isn’t doing enough to promote democracy in his own country, even as the TV news network he sponsors promotes democracy to the entire region. The diplomatic gaffe was the result of the same “open mic” problem widely reported Friday: Obama thought he was speaking in confidence to Democratic donors, but CBS News’s Mark Knoller...

Gov. Jerry Brown of California cited a long list of Republican demands as the reason he dropped his plan for a special election in June to approve tax extensions for the California budget. Los Angeles Gov. Jerry Brown has dropped his plan to broker a bipartisan California budget by asking voters, in a special election in June, to extend taxes to close the state’s $26.4 billion gap by $12 billion. Budget cuts enacted by the Legislature and signed last week covered only $11.2 billion of the deficit. Mr. Brown, who needed just four Republicans to sign off on the special...

In a new book, President Obama talks candidly about race and the presidency African-Americans have been an integral part of the White House since it was built in part by slaves. In Family of Freedom: Presidents and African Americans in the White House, veteran U.S. News White House reporter Kenneth T. Walsh traces this sometimes fraught history from its roots all the way to the Barack Obama presidency. Click here to find out more! As he began his second year in office, Obama's presidency was not going well. His legislation to overhaul the healthcare system was still bogged down in...

A key U.S. official landed in Cairo on Monday to meet with military leaders and discuss the extra aid promised by Washington to help Egypt with its democratic transition. Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs William Burns arrived days after Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton announced Egypt would be receiving an extra $150 million to help with the political transition. The $1.5 billion in foreign aid the U.S. gives annually to Egypt, which is unchanged in the State Department's budget.

U.S. military and intelligence agencies would lose vital air, land and sea assets if Egypt falls into the hands of radical Islamists, as Iran did in 1979, foreign policy analysts say. The U.S. armed forces are entwined with Egypt's military more than with any other Arab country’s. But if Islamists seize Cairo, as the mullahs captured Tehran, this complex relationship unravels. “Let me count the ways,” said Ken Allard, a retired Army colonel and military analyst. “They are our biggest strategic partner in the Middle East. At that point, you’ve lost your biggest Arab partner. Geostrategically, the mind boggles.”

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Senate Republicans will be forced to vote separately on popular provisions of the Obama administration's healthcare reform law if they introduce a bill to repeal it, a senior Democratic lawmaker said on Sunday. Senator Chuck Schumer, who voted for President Barack Obama's 2010 healthcare reform, said Republicans would not be allowed to have an up-or-down vote but instead would be asked to vote on individual components of the new law. "If the Republicans offer an amendment on the floor, then we will require them to vote on the individual protections in the bill that are very popular...

“O Key of David, Come” (Isaiah 22:20-25; Revelation 1:12-13, 17-18; 3:7-13; Luke 1:26-33)O Wisdom, O Adonai, O Root of Jesse. And now today, O Key of David, the fourth of the seven great O Antiphons. You see it there opposite Hymn 357, and it’s also in your bulletin. So let’s begin by praying together the Key of David antiphon: “O Key of David and scepter of the house of Israel, You open and no one can close, You close and no one can open: Come and rescue the prisoners who are in darkness and in the shadow of death.” What...

Sacrosanct tax breaks, including deductions on mortgage interest, remain on the table just weeks before the deficit commission issues recommendations on policies to pare back with the aim of balancing the budget by 2015. The tax benefits are hugely popular with the public but they have drawn the panel's focus, in part because the White House has said these and other breaks cost the government about $1 trillion a year.(Snip)At stake, in addition to the mortgage-interest deductions, are child tax credits and the ability of employees to pay their portion of their health-insurance tab with pretax dollars.

Over the howls of historians, Union Pacific plans to demolish an 1874 cavernous brick warehouse in West Oakland that is one of the last remnants of the transcontinental railroad. Designed for train repair, the towering structure was erected on the heels of the transcontinental railroad's arrival in Oakland, in the days when West Oakland was a national industrial center. "It tells the story of when railroads were the pioneer industry in California, and this was the center of it," said architect Randy Ruiz, one of 30 visitors Union Pacific allowed to tour the building recently. "It represents that can-do American...

While only a few political strategists are predicting a Republican takeover of the Senate in November, Democrats may, in fact, lose the Senate if they cannot win several key races in the West, where incumbents such as Washington's Patty Murray are fighting for their political lives against surprisingly strong GOP challengers. Pollsters and political experts rate the Washington Senate race a tossup, which is hardly good news for Murray as she seeks a fourth term. Other Democrats west of the Mississippi are also in difficult battles. In California, incumbent Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer is in a statistical tie with her...

Dana Key, one-half of the Christian rock group DeGarmo & Key, died at age 56 on Sunday from complications associated with a blood clot. His death was confirmed after singer Todd Agnew posted a goodbye letter to Key on his Web site Monday... ....Key and bandmate Eddie DeGarmo, who have known each other since grade school, began playing as DeGarmo & Key in 1978. Key has also released two solo albums.

White House officials eager to sell the most popular aspects of the health reform law are focusing on four areas to gain votes and popularity for key lawmakers ahead of November's midterm elections. Politico: "Top administration officials, who meet regularly with outside special interest groups to coordinate the public relations effort, have so far focused on expediting and amplifying four key areas of the new law: expanding coverage to young adults, covering sick people with pre-existing conditions or high medical costs, providing tax breaks to small businesses and helping a select group of seniors pay for prescription drugs." Politico reports...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made an impassioned appeal Wednesday for greater US international development aid, saying it was vital to US and global security at a time of growing extremist threats. Development is a "strategic, economic and moral imperative," the top US diplomat said in a speech at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington. "We cannot stop terrorism or defeat the ideologies of violent extremism when hundreds of millions of young people see a future with no jobs, no hope, and no way ever to catch up to the developed world," she said....

BAGHDAD — Iraqi River Police (IRP) conducted operations here on the Tigris River to hone their skills in keeping Iraq’s waterways safe from terrorists, Sept. 1. The mission of the IRP is to provide search and rescue, safety patrol, and counter smuggling operations along the waterways of Iraq. Multi-National Security Transition Command-Iraq advisors, mentors and trainers help the IRP accomplish this mission. There are two advisors at the River Patrol. One is responsible for teaching waterborne operations, how to pilot the boats, and how to use the boats to conduct the operations found in the mission statement. The second advisor...

The mayor of Mount Vernon has made it official. Mayor Bud Norris says he will give the key to his city to conservative talk show host Glenn Beck on September 26. Norris says Beck will deliver a short talk that night and become the first person to receive a key to the city in the six years Norris has been mayor. Protesters from the Skagit County Young Democrats walked outside city hall Tuesday with protest signs, one reading "Change the locks!"

Cross roads are places where decisions are made , But are you standing in the light or in the shade ?! For truly without me you remain in the dark , And your defenses are weak not strong as a tree of oak and its bark , For it is under My shade and My Son , That you arrive on Mt. Zion , So tell me my children what will shall it be ?! The will of your flesh or My Tapestry ? For to carry your cross again and again , Leaves you with a bitter end ,...

The Obama administration will play a key role in reshaping General Motors' board of directors over the next six months, potentially giving it even greater control in the management of the storied American manufacturer.

PICK the odd man out: Barack Obama, Kevin Rudd, John Key. Only one of them, New Zealand’s Prime Minister Key, has any material personal experience of how to make a dollar in the private sector. Rudd may be the wealthiest Prime Minister Australia has had, because of his wife’s admirable business acumen, but even that business is built on government contracts. Rudd’s experience is that of a lifelong public servant and politician, with a short stint as a consultant with KPMG. Obama is the world’s most famous community organiser, lawyer and, since 1996, full-time politician. Only Key - who was...

An American toddler has had a miracle recovery after getting a key lodged in his eye.

Now that the conventions are behind us, the 2008 election is shaping up to be much closer than anyone would have believed months ago. Still, it will be an uphill battle for John McCain as Barack Obama has the advantage this year. If Obama wins, it should be a wake-up call to Republicans that the nation’s political landscape has dramatically changed, making it difficult for Republicans to win national elections. A key factor in the challenge facing Republicans is shifting demographics. States such as Texas, Florida, New Mexico, Arizona and Nevada, once considered solid red states, are now faltering for...