Free Republic

This is an absolute classic out of the Dem/MSM playbook. Take a huge, expensive, inefficient, government program. Find someone with a heartwrenching story who is helped by it. Highlight that story as if it represents the essence of the program in question. Bonus points if you can get someone to choke up on camera. Reporters noticed that after Kavanaugh was confirmed, the Democrats shifted the agenda to health care as the central issue of the midterms. And thus it was that today's Morning Joe featured a segment in which NBC reporter Morgan Radford traveled to Ohio ahead of President Trump's...

When Afsaneh got a call from her local bridal shop in San Jose letting her know that the simple, ruffled, elegant gown she had carefully chosen weeks ago was ready for pickup, she was excited that the final pieces of her spring wedding were falling into place. Within a week of the call, President Trump signed an executive order temporarily banning travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries, including one where she emigrated from in her early 20s and where her fiance, Sepehr, lives: Iran.

KNOXVILLE (WATE) - A temporary increase in food stamps expires October 31, meaning for millions of Americans, the benefits that help put food on the table won't stretch as far as they have for the past four years. Food stamps, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, go to 47 million Americans a month. Almost half of them children and teenagers. The monthly benefits, which go to one in seven Americans, fluctuate based on factors including food prices, income and inflation. Those could affect people right here in East Tennessee as 1.3 million Tennesseans receive food stamps at a cost of about...

The New York Times Business section responded to the Florida court decision on ObamaCare not by addressing the issues but by tugging at the heartstrings: "With a court decision on Monday declaring the health care law unconstitutional and Republicans intent on repealing at least parts of it, thousands of Americans with major illnesses are facing the renewed prospect of losing their health insurance coverage. "'We've got to protect people from catastrophic health problems,' said Ron Pollack, the executive director of Families USA...Protecting people from facing these extremes is one of the main goals of the law, according to its proponents."...

For those who don't remember, this link will give you some background into what california has had to deal with. My idea is this: California's farmers were hit very hard when the water got shut off, why not have their stories be heard on the EIB network? I certainly don't remember any progressive journalist rushing out there to have their story reported on.

RUSH: Oh, don't misunderstand now, I'm not talking about a bunch of people quitting. What I mean by sob story, I want people to call this program whose stories are the result of federal government action and legislation forcing them to take a new direction that they maybe didn't want to have to take, shutting down their business, making it impossible to run their business with high taxes or what have you. The purpose here is to illustrate the details of the program, not to create a bunch of whiners, we're not doing that.

After pleading guilty to entering the country illegally, the Mexican immigrant from Veracruz told a federal judge here last week he came to the U.S. to earn money to pay for his mother's funeral. "It doesn't matter if you're trying to pay off funeral expenses or take care of a sick family member," said U.S. Magistrate Diana Saldaña, referring to another immigrant. "When you cross the Rio Grande, you're going to be spending time in prison if the Border Patrol finds you — that's the bottom line." The frank exchange between judge and immigrant has become a daily occurrence since...

WASHINGTON - At 23, Mariana should be carefree. She is finishing up her undergraduate degree at the University of California, Los Angeles, and has been accepted to a master's program at Harvard University's education school. But life is not so simple for Mariana, who insisted that only her first name be published because she is illegally in the United States and worries she could be deported to Guatemala, where she was born. "I'm even afraid of eating an apple in the library because I'm afraid of getting caught," she said. Mariana also worries about how she will pay her tuition...

STILLMORE, GA. – As Department of Homeland Security agents in black SUVs tooled up and down the dirt avenues of Stillmore, Ga., hundreds of undocumented people scattered into the woods like "flushed quail," one witness said. Many of those who weren't arrested fled, some to Kentucky. One family hid for two nights in a tree. As night sets now, a sprinkling of solitary lights glow from once-crowded trailer parks. Since the Labor Day raid, Stillmore, where the wishful sign at the city limit reads "A town that is still growing," has shrunk by at least a third after more...

Del Norte Vista, CA (APUPI) In a case reminiscent of the famous Bakke decision, a California high school senior is suing the University of California over their refusal to admit him to their prestigious Berkely campus, despite his sterling biography and SAT score of over 1700, under the Americans With Disabilities Act. Todd Hepplewitt, an honors student at Caca Fuego High, in Del Norte Vista, is claiming that, in today's society, he's handicapped by his lack of hardship in life. He contends that the difficulty of making it in a victimized society, and getting no government or institutional support, is...