Free Republic

Determined to neuter the grassroots and head off future insurgencies like those of Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, and Ron Paul, Republican party bosses have pulled off an audacious coup, high-handedly turning the GOP into a much more top-down, centralized party. Boehner with gavel Yesterday, the Republican National Committee in Tampa adopted some rules changes that shift power from the state parties and the grassroots to the RNC and the GOP presidential nominee. Former Governor John Sununu of New Hampshire touted the new rules as providing “a strong governing framework” for the party over the next four years. But in fact...

Is the tea party changing the Republican Party from the inside -- or selling out to the GOP? As Republicans prepare to officially roll out Mitt Romney as their party's presidential nominee at the Republican National Convention this week, major tea party groups and figures have descended on Tampa, Florida, to schmooze with party bigwigs and rally for Romney. But Romney's conservative credentials have long been viewed with suspicion by the movement. So it came as a surprise when, before at least one event, tea party organizers committed what some activists would consider heresy: seeking approval from establishment Republicans to...

The Republican Party’s platform committee declared war on pornography ahead of this week’s Republican National Convention in Tampa, Fla. In a Monday morning press release, advocacy group Morality in Media revealed that “new language replaces previous platform wording, which only opposed child pornography.” According to MIM, the new wording will read, “Current laws on all forms of pornography and obscenity need to be vigorously enforced.” The party platform was drafted by a 112-member committee and will be unveiled early this week. Existing obscenity laws “not only prohibit distribution of hardcore pornography on the Internet but also on hotel/motel TV, on...