Free Republic

2013 has not been a pleasant year if you work for the federal government. You’ve been subject to pay freezes, furloughs and shutdowns. One of you got yelled at by a Tea Party Republican at the World War II memorial. And if Congress passes the budget deal announced Tuesday night by Rep. Paul Ryan and Sen. Patty Murray – a big if – you will get a final Christmas present: You’ll have to pay more into your pension, an effective wage cut that just adds to the $114 billion, with a “B,” federal employees have already given back to the...

WASHINGTON — Democrats and Republicans have sparred for the past few months over what should be done about staffers’ healthcare: should they go on the healthcare exchanges, as a provision in Obamacare seems to require, or should they stay on the healthcare plan they have now, where they receive an employer subsidy help defray the costs? The deadline for members to make that decision arrived at 5 p.m. on Halloween. Members could either designate staff as “official,” in which case they would be required to go on the exchanges, or “unofficial,” in which case they could remain on the Federal...

Sen. David Vitter wants to put the klieg lights on any member of Congress who decides that certain staff members are not “official,” a maneuver that would exempt the employee from entering a health exchange tied to Obamacare as mandated by the 2010 law. Mr. Vitter, Louisiana Republican, filed the Show Your Exemption Act on Thursday to force lawmakers to reveal how they designate each of their staffers. Sen. Chuck Grassley, Iowa Republican, wrote an amendment to the Affordable Care Act that placed members of Congress and their staffs in the state-based insurance markets, or exchanges, set up by the...

If House Republicans get their way in budget talks, White House spokesman Jay Carney may be forced to make good on his pledge to sign up for Obamacare if his private insurance plan is dropped. House GOP leaders have pressed during the government shutdown fight to significantly delay or defund the president's signature healthcare reform laws. But with those efforts failing to take hold, Republicans on Tuesday shifted fears and are seeking to extract a different health care concession: Forcing members of Congress, President Obama and top White House officials to enroll in the law's insurance exchanges without subsidies. Carney...

How fitting that Senator Ted Cruz’s 21-hour anti-Obamacare speech on the Senate floor in Washington, D.C., happened to coincide with the opening of the U.N. General Assembly and the annual meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative in New York City. Rarely is the distance separating the caste that rules our world from its few, heavily despised critics so literal.

Former Alaska governor and vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, who has fiercely fought crony capitalism and the permanent political class, absolutely blistered the White House Correspondents Dinner on Saturday, tweeting that the dinner was "pathetic" and that "DC assclowns" were throwing "themselves a #nerdprom" while "the rest of America is out there working our assess off." @SarahPalinUSA: That #WHCD was pathetic. The rest of America is out there working our asses off while these DC assclowns throw themselves a #nerdprom In recent years, Washington veterans have expressed similar concerns. Tom Brokaw has compared Washington to "Versailles," Ron Fournier has said...

Big Government programs never seem to have any definite objectives. There are no victory conditions, no exit strategies, no test a program could fail that would result in its termination. This is one of the many reasons it is obscene for socialists to appropriate the language of business and “investment” to peddle their schemes. Investment is voluntary, and every investor envisions some level of failure that would prompt him to pull the plug on a bad investment. By contrast, government programs go on forever, we’re told it’s impossible to pass terminal judgment against them, and we are not allowed to...

Americans are waking up today to the worst “case of the Mondays” they’ll have all year: It’s Tax Day. Most Americans dread Tax Day, and for good reasons. Beyond the huge tab Americans pay to the government, the tax code is so complex that it’s difficult to figure out what we owe to the IRS. This is a pain for taxpayers and a huge drain on the economy. According to the federal Taxpayer Advocate in its 2012 report, Americans’ cost of complying with today’s complex tax code totaled $168 billion in 2010. That’s almost as large as the impact of...

The office of U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., issued a statement Wednesday denying allegations a Florida doctor who is a friend lined up prostitutes for him. The FBI Tuesday raided the office Dr. Salomon Melgen, an eye doctor practicing in West Palm Beach, Fla., who is the target of an Internal Revenue Service lien for more than $11 million, The Miami Herald reported. The newspaper said federal investigators were believed to be looking into Melgen's finances as well as the allegations about prostitutes. "Dr. Melgen has been a friend and political supporter of Senator Menendez for many years," the statement...

Washington, D.C., residents watch more porn than the rest of America: study • Research from PornHub.com says residents of the nation’s capital watch 14.18 online videos per person in a year. Hawaii is second, with 7.57 per year. Politics has always been dirty, but a new study takes the expression to a level so stimulating that it’s hard to believe. Residents of Washington, D.C., watch nearly twice as much online pornography as people in any of the 50 states, according to a study published by XXX site PornHub.com. Horndogs in the nation’s capital consumed online pornography at a rate of...

Prior to its maiden voyage 100 years ago this week, the Titanic's captain proclaimed, “I cannot conceive of any vital disaster happening to this vessel.” Yet hubris, misaligned priorities and bad planning conspired to sink the Titanic. The same mismanagement and arrogance afflict the Titanic-like health care law (the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act) that passed through icy congressional waters in 2010. Given lethal icebergs en route, both Capt. Edward Smith and America's lawmakers would undoubtedly Think Again before declaring “Full speed ahead.” If polled, Titanic's passengers would've preferred slower navigation (and more lifeboats) to the record-breaking speed favored...

People are funny about some things. A person who believes he controls his own destiny is sometimes the same person who won’t get involved in politics. He literally bristles at the suggestion that he can’t have it both ways. An occasional theme running through BizPac Review’s pages highlights the puzzling logic of such people, who sit back and let the political train run them over. To me, such people have their heads stuck so far in the sand that only their behinds are visible. They’re part of the problem. Here’s why: The function of politics -- and its highest form,...

Recent polling has shown huge gaps between the Political Class and Mainstream Americans on issues ranging from immigration to health care to the virtues of free markets. The gap is just as big when it comes to the traditional right direction/wrong track polling question. A Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that 67% of Political Class voters believe the United States is generally heading in the right direction. However, things look a lot different to Mainstream Americans. Among these voters, 84% say the country has gotten off on the wrong track. Twenty-four percent (24%) of Mainstream voters consider fiscal policy...

The New York Times recently ran an "analysis" article entitled, "Debt Problem's Sure Cure: Economic Growth." This is something that falls into the category of "Gee, why didn't I think of that?" All you need is growth, so let's go get us some growth! That will take care of everything! Journalist Catherine Rampell asserts, There is, in theory, a happy solution to our debt troubles. It's called economic growth. No need to raise taxes or cut programs. Just get the economy growing the way it used to. Rampell admits that this is a dicey proposition. She holds to the belief...

Despite Government propaganda and manipulated statistics to the contrary, our economy continues to deteriorate. For every "green shoot" highlighted by the Government and its lackey media, multiple contra-examples are cited by independent analysts. To continue to deny reality risks credibility. Perhaps that is why S&P, arguably a sock-puppet of Wall Street, on Monday made its announcement regarding the financial condition of the US. As reported by the Wall Street Journal: "Standard & Poor's Ratings Services Inc. cut its outlook on the U.S. to negative, increasing the likelihood of a potential downgrade from its triple-A rating, as the path from large...

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, James Taranto describes the growing bloodlust of the progressive left: " America's liberal left is preoccupied with salacious fantasies of political violence. These take two forms: dreams of leftist insurrection, and nightmares of reactionary bloodshed." Taranto goes on to report that a sympathetic mainstream media suppresses and/or whitewashes the former type of fantasy while treating the latter as if it reflects reality. (The Politics of Bloodlust, The Wall Street Journal, Jan. 27, 2011) There are five things we must understand about the West's Progressive Liberal "elite" if we are to make sense of their...

Eliot Spitzer's resurrection -- from the disgraced gov ernor better known as Cli ent 9 to CNN talk-show host -- has the political class buzzing about him running for mayor in 2013. Wilder still, one of his former targets is talking about running against him. Former New York Stock Exchange chief Dick Grasso -- one of the highest-profile targets of Spitzer's uneven assault on Wall Street -- has quietly been telling friends that he's leaning toward challenging Spitzer as a Republican (particularly if Police Commissioner Ray Kelly doesn't seek the GOP nomination himself, as some speculate he will). Sure, Grasso...

From Andrew Romano's great new profile of a Mitch Daniels he portrays as pragmatic and principled (kind of oxymoronic, but one of Daniels' principles appears to be pragmatism). To wit, his suggestions: Let’s raise the retirement age, he says. Let’s reduce Social Security for the rich. And let’s reconsider our military commitments, too. When I ask about taxes—in 2005 Daniels proposed a hike on the $100,000-plus crowd, which his own party promptly torpedoed—he refuses to revert to Republican talking points. “At some stage there could well be a tax increase,” he says with a sigh. “They say we can’t have...

Via RCP. Don’t misunderstand: This is 100 percent nonpartisan criticism, he insists. It could have been written at any point in the last 10 years. "According to polls, Americans are in a mood to hold their breath until they turn blue. Voters appear to be so fed up with the Democrats that they’re ready to toss them out in favor of the Republicans — for whom, according to those same polls, the nation has even greater contempt. This isn’t an “electoral wave,” it’s a temper tantrum…" "In the punditry business, it’s considered bad form to question the essential wisdom of...

At the end of June, the nation witnessed firsthand the behavior of California Congressman, Fortney "Pete" Stark, towards what he clearly regards as the commoners in his district. This video received over 259,000 hits from a populace tired of being told by elected officials across the land to "talk to the hand." Stark's contemptuous behavior just reared its ugly head once again this past Saturday, July 24th at another town hall meeting in his district. (video link) As evidenced by the endless repertoire of snarky comments and silly hand gestures, Fortney "Pete" Stark is consistently contemptuous of the good people...