Free Republic

A small and largely unnoticed spat among the transition planners for the president-elect, Barack Obama, broke out last week. It was the first genuinely passionate debate among the Obamaites and it centres on a terribly difficult and terribly important decision that will be among the first that Obama has to make. How does he deal with the legacy of criminal actions of his predecessor’s administration when it comes to detention, interrogation, abuse and torture of terror suspects? That has long hovered in the back of the minds of those of us who supported Obama, in large part because he alone...

Many members of Congress believe they know what the car company of the future should look like. “A business model based on gas — a gas-guzzling past — is unacceptable,” Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., said recently. “We need a business model based on cars of the future, and we already know what that future is: the plug-in hybrid electric car.” But the car company Schumer and other lawmakers envision for the future could turn out to be a money-losing operation, not part of a “sustainable U. S. auto industry” that President-elect Barack Obama and most members of Congress say...

The Mumbai, India terrorist attacks should serve as a reminder that terrorism is real, tangible, and a threat everywhere...waiting only for the right opportunity to explode. And, try as we all do to engage in denial, the reality is that it is only a matter of time before a Mumbai-style event occurs on American soil. Back in 1993, right after the first World Trade Center bombing, I was talking with a friend of mine who was raised in Israel. I opined that it would be a relatively simple matter for terrorists to stage simultaneous attacks on, say, a dozen shopping...

The New York Times, the New York Daily News, Newsday, U.S.A Today, ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, FOX News and a host of other news organizations recently reported that gun sales across the country increased 10 percent after Barack Obama defeated John McCain. Many of the gun shop owners that were interviewed on camera stated they had never seen sales increase to this level in 15 to 20 years. Those purchasing guns said they were doing so because of a growing fear that the spiraling economy will force desperate people to commit criminal acts. Others bought them because they believe an...

The late Samuel T. Francis once lamented that Americans don’t have two ideologically distinct parties. Rather we have an evil party (the “liberals”) and a stupid party (the “conservatives”). Occasionally there is a synthesis of evil and stupidity. This is otherwise known as “bipartisanship”. To see the confluence of evil and stupidity at work, check out these remarks by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid in an interview with the Detroit Free Press: Q: With more Democrats in the Senate and the House and a Democrat in the White House, how do you see congressional efforts playing out on such issues...

The publishing industry is betting on Barack Obama like no president in decades. Since Election Day alone, more than half a dozen book deals have been signed to exploit Obamania. Two dozen books in the works range from the serious to the silly. There are retrospective ticktocks on how Obama won office and prospective looks at his first year in the White House. There is a biography on Obama’s father, a compilation of essays on Obama and race, and others tilting toward the celebratory with photographic montages. There are children’s books, of course, and a style guide on Michelle Obama,...

It started with the fist bump seen ’round the world. Soon there were stories of rousing family Scrabble battles and date nights, in spite of election mayhem. Then President-elect Barack Obama referred to his wife Michelle as “the love of my life” during his election night victory speech, embracing her tightly and kissing her afterwards, while millions of people worldwide watched. “They took a moment to face each other, to kiss and hold one another, regardless of the magnitude and spectacle of the night,” said Camille Washington, a Bay Area blogger on Soulbounce.com, a music and culture site. “That says...

During the 2008 Democratic primary debate in Philadelphia, April 16, 2008, here is how Barack Obama responded to a question pertaining to the right to keep and bear arms (emphasis added): Q: Is the D.C. law prohibiting ownership of handguns consistent with an individual’s right to bear arms? A: As a general principle, I believe that the Constitution confers an individual right to bear arms. But just because you have an individual right does not mean that the state or local government can’t constrain the exercise of that right, in the same way that we have a right to private...

It happens like clockwork every time the presidency changes hands, especially when it changes parties: Retired colonels and majors, soi-disant “defense analysts” and tenured bureaucratic insiders whose opinions have been unfashionable under the ancien regime emerge to craft a series of Bold Recommendations On Reforming Defense. The latest Group of 13 from the Center for Defense Information throws on the mantle of “non-partisanship” - CDI’s mantra includes increasing international cooperation (read: the perenially effective UN); reduced reliance on unilateral military power to resolve conflict (read: passing the Global Test); reduced reliance on nuclear weapons (read: a second chance to lose...

The subprime mortgage crisis is only the Sarajevo which caused the financial collapse. The real reason is the massive explosion of debt at all levels and in all forms that has engulfed the world. Since 1992, the total of debt in the world has gone from a level equal to global GDP to a level that is now 3.7 times as much as global GDP. This debt explosion, explained in Charles Morris’ book (no relation) The Trillion Dollar Meltdown, consists not only of mortgages, but bonds for corporations that can’t repay them, credit cards for consumers who are neck deep...

A black man gets elected president and half the country dives for the panic room, buying up guns and squirreling away supplies like fatalists awaiting the End of Days. That's an exaggeration, of course. Barack Obama is biracial, not black. And it's not half the country diving, but a goodly portion of us, judging by soaring gun sales post-Election Day that have even hit Hampton Roads. "Stock up on guns, ammunition, and canned goods," a reader named "Church Slave" suggests in our online Topix system. "And maybe a candy bar or two." I'm no stranger to the idea of laying...

One rule of employee relations? Never hire someone you can't afford to fire. Barack Obama's offer to let Hillary Clinton be secretary of state has already been marked down as a brilliant co-option of his former rival. But nothing comes for free, and the question is just how big a price Mr. Obama will pay in the end. For now, he is getting only praise for his surprise pick. The move fits neatly into the media narrative that Mr. Obama is drafting a team that will challenge his thinking. It's also being described as a gesture that could heal party...

DES MOINES, Iowa - Want an example of the change Barack Obama is bringing to the country? Check out cookie sales at Baby Boomers Cafe in Des Moines. Ever since word got out of the president-elect and his family's fondness for Baby Boomers' chocolate chunk cookies, the small downtown restaurant can't get them out of the oven fast enough. "Two months ago I was giving these cookies away," co-owner Rodney Maxfield said. "Now, it's like 'I need two dozen cookies. I need four-dozen cookies."' The Obamas became frequent visitors to the cafe during the summer of 2007 when the Illinois...

Former Georgia Senator Max Cleland, who lost an arm and two legs while serving the nation in Vietnam, is being considered by President-elect Obama for the post of Secretary of Veterans Affairs according to reports from NBC News and the Associated Press [Sources: MSNBC.com, "The Obama cabinet speculation list", November 26, 2008; Associated Press, "Obama weighs names for top posts", November 26, 2008]. In 1977, President Carter named Cleland as the head of the Veterans Administration making him the youngest person and first Vietnam vet to hold the job. After President Carter lost his re-election bid in 1980, Cleland left...

There are some heated conversations under way in the progressive blogosphere, including some at thenation.com, in which our own writers as well as people like Glenn Greenwald, Jane Hamsher, David Sirota and Digby are debating why Barack Obama has so far appointed few progressives to his cabinet. It's worth checking them out. I think that we progressives need to be as clear-eyed, tough and pragmatic about Obama as he is about us. President-elect Obama is a centrist at a time when centrism means energy independence and green jobs and universal healthcare and massive economic stimulus programs and government intervention in...

South Carolina becomes the first state in the country to hold a sales tax holiday only for guns, starting today. And Beaufort County gun shops said they're prepared for big sales -- not only because of the holiday but due to a rising fear that a Barack Obama administration will curtail gun rights. Bob Oberst, owner of the Palmetto State Shooting Center in Okatie, said customers have made plans to come by his store today and Saturday to make tax-free purchases. "Gun sales are up substantially, and I think primarily because of the recent election," Oberst said. "People are deathly...

Local residents concerned that the election of Barack Obama and a Democratic-controlled Congress will translate into stricter gun laws are buying more guns. But sales are not as brisk as in other states, possibly because California already has some of the strictest gun laws on the books. "I'd say we're up in the sales of guns about 30 percent," said Paul Berezay, store manager of Big 5 Sporting Goods in Salinas. "People evidently think because of the election, guns are going to go away. They don't seem to know that California is already one of the strictest states when it...

It's become a cause for some: to let Barack Obama keep his BlackBerry when he takes office. What stands in the way? The primary concern has been the Presidential Records Act, which requires all presidential documents to be put in the official record. Now, realistically, no matter what people say, it's not so much about national security as it is as making sure that if a "Watergate" happens, We The People have plenty of evidence to back it up. Ans as that's the issue, what's the problem. We can track his cell phone calls. We can track his emails. So...

Ever walk into a Starbucks and see a bunch of people sitting there debating textbook theories and solving all the world’s problems over a mocha java? If so, then you’ve visited a University of Starbucks campus. These are precisely the kind of people who have gotten America into the current economic mess. That’s because when there’s a serious problem to deal with, their instinct is to theorize and philosophize. If their corduroys were on fire, they would sit there pondering the nature and deeper meaning of the flames. Now, the sophisticated intelligentsia of Team Grande Venti – which means something...

Barack Obama and George W. Bush seem to have come away from their study of the Great Depression with similar conclusions: To wit: After the Crash of 1929, the Federal Reserve did not move fast enough to save the banks and inject cash into the economy. Second, the New Deal, far from being wastrel deficit spending, was not bold enough. So it was that America wallowed in depression for a decade until the unbridled spending and mammoth deficits of World War II pulled us out. Bush and Obama seem determined not to make the same mistake. We are all Keynesians...