Free Republic

Word on South Florida’s political streets is that the local public employee unions are “mystified” about the outcome of the Scott Walker victory over the unions in the Wisconsin recall election. The story is that the local AFL-CIO is so out of touch, it doesn’t really comprehend the significance of what happened, while the Service Employees International Union, a bit more sophisticated, recognized the defeat for what it was: a major loss for its agenda. The union response for the loss is that it was outspent seven-to-one by conservative groups. But data coming from the Center for Public Integrity, a...

The state with the highest racially charged search rate was West Virginia, where 41 percent of voters chose Keith Judd, a white man who is also a convicted felon currently in prison in Texas, over Obama just this May. Louisiana, Pennsylvania, Mississippi, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, South Carolina, Alabama, and New Jersey rounded out the top 10 most-racist areas, according to the search queries used. Even if states that are considered fairly liberal, racism is prevalent enough in certain areas to put the entire state high up on the list. "Other areas with high percentages included western Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio, upstate...

Nearly four years after enthusiastic younger voters poured into polling booths to help push Barack Obama over the finish line and into the Oval Office, their hope has turned to fear and pollster John Zogby says that they are ready to give up on politics. “I truly am worried about today's twenty-somethings,” he frets. “They are our global generation and I have seen them move from hope and grand expectations for themselves and their world to anxiety and disillusionment. We can't afford to lose them,” he adds.

County elections supervisors raised red flags, and then federal authorities weighed in Thursday to demand the state of Florida halt its ongoing push to remove thousands of voters from the rolls. The U.S. Department of Justice sent a letter contending Florida's efforts to identify people who are not U.S. citizens violates federal voting laws.

MADISON — By 2 p.m., the Madison City Clerk’s Office had issued 5,825 absentee ballots, 407 of this in-person. Clerk Maribeth Witzel-Behl had a busy day. She wasn’t alone. High volume absentee ballot requests were coming into elections offices statewide Monday, the first day of early voting in Wisconsin’s recall elections — a little over two weeks away. This was a long time in coming, Witzel-Behl said. “Ever since January, we’ve been getting calls asking about the recall election, when could they get a ballot,” she said. “Absentee requests have been coming in the entire year.” Up until May 8,...

The day after Barack Obama’s election, a physical therapist from the old Soviet union, who came to Staten Island to live in freedom, got a call from her best friend, a fellow Soviet immigrant, who lives in the Russian section of Brooklyn. The caller got one word out before they both started to cry for three minutes. Then the caller speaking Russian said, “We came here to escape them. Where do we go now?” Both women knew the “Them” were Communists and both saw Democrats as no different from Communists. To those who don’t live in either the Brooklyn or...

Demographics will doom Republicans in the out years, Democrats like to say. A coalition of Black and Latino voters along with the socially moderate youth bloc is quickly becoming the left’s safety net, even in tight elections. But as the Washington Post reported Friday, there’s a problem: [T]his is the first time in nearly four decades that the number of registered Hispanics has dropped significantly. That figure fell 5% across the country, to about 11 million, according to the Census Bureau. But in some politically important swing states, the decline among Hispanics, who are considered critical in the 2012 presidential...

The normal expectation would be that high unemployment would hurt the President and his fellow Democrats come the November elections. “Not so,” says Representative Chaka Fattah (D-PA). “Every person who's unemployed or on welfare knows that it's the Democrats who will look out for them.” Fattah asserted. “The flaw in the GOP's reasoning is the mistaken notion that putting more people to work is what voters want,” Fattah said. “What everyone wants is a paycheck. They'll work for it if they have to. But getting one without being forced to work for it is the type of total freedom that...

President Obama’s new campaign pitch is that Americans should have his back. He’s released posters via his campaign for African Americans for Obama; campaign email after campaign email has asked Americans to get Obama’s back. The implication in all of this: Obama has your back, so you should have his.

While the recall fight over Gov. Scott Walker is unique in this state’s history, it’s awfully reminiscent of a Wisconsin campaign just eight years ago that featured a polarizing Republican incumbent, a virtual 50-50 electorate, a campaign climate of bile and anger, high suspense and huge national attention. Does Bush v. Kerry ring a bell? Consider the similarities: Lightning-rod incumbent. Given how much his image has slipped among conservatives, it’s easy to forget the unusually deep affection and energy George W. Bush inspired among Republican voters post-9-11. It went hand in hand with the dislike and loathing he sparked among...

Yet another new survey shows that Republican supporters know more about politics and political history than Democrats. On eight of 13 questions about politics, Republicans outscored Democrats by an average of 18 percentage points, according to a new Pew survey “Partisan Differences in Knowledge.” The Pew survey adds to a wave of surveys and studies showing that GOP-sympathizers are better informed, more intellectually consistent, more open-minded, more empathetic and more receptive to criticism than their fellow Americans who support the Democratic Party. “Republicans fare substantially better than Democrats on several questions in the survey, as is typically the case in...

This was posted on one of GaryNorth.com forums. The battle for America’s political soul is always fought on the battlefield of federal politics. That’s why conservatives lose, generation after generation.” Dr. North, would you please elaborate on this, why you believe the battle for America’s political soul is fought in Federal politics and why it is that conservatives continue to lose, generation after generation? From the time of the ratification of the United States Constitution, American politics shifted to the national level. One of the things that I realized late in my career, even though I had been trained as...

Don't want Obama re-elected?Then don't vote for Mitt Romney in the primaries!Obama is 100% unacceptable. Romney and Paul are also 100% unacceptable.Having just received a 2012 Congressional District Census questioner in the mail for our 1st congressional district, two of the questions went as follows:"Do you plan on voting in the 2012 Presidential election?"[my answer]: -Yes"If yes, do you plan on voting for Barack Obama or the Republican Nominee?[my answer]: - you left out the option of a write-in vote. If Mitt Romney is the GOP nominee, the establishment's darling, then this voter will be making a write-in vote for Sarah Palin.Sean Hannity,...

With victories now in three key Great Lakes primaries – Illinois, Ohio and Michigan – Mitt Romney can make it four straight in Wisconsin April 3 and deal another big blow to Rick Santorum’s presidential prospects. But Romney could find Wisconsin a tougher challenge than he faced in Illinois Tuesday, thanks to differences in the political makeup of these two neighboring states. Romney was boosted in Illinois by big margins among upper-income, college-educated and suburban voters -- groups he has won across the industrial Midwest. But those voters have a smaller political footprint in Wisconsin than they do in Illinois....

Do Wavering Obama Voters Think the Man They Voted For Is Naïve? How do you persuade someone who voted for Barack Obama in 2008 to vote for the Republican option in 2012? ... a lot of Obama voters must be persuaded that they made the wrong choice in 2008, and that it isn’t their fault. Monday I spoke to a smart political mind who had been watching focus groups of wavering Obama voters in swing states, and he said that one word that those voters kept coming back to, again and again, was “naïve.” (The term was to describe the...

Traffic jam: 2012 presidential campaigns test drive car ads in search for votersBy Geneva Sands - 03/10/12 01:35 PM ET Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign has taken a cue from Detroit in trying to win over voters through the all-American love affair with the car. Romney has released at least ten campaign videos that feature cars, including three that show the former Massachusetts governor behind the wheel. He’s not alone, either. President Obama’s campaign showcased classic and modern cars in an ad last month that touted Obama’s support of the auto industry, one of the White House’s chief talking points for...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Tennesseans cast 40 percent fewer ballots going into the last day of early voting Tuesday compared with the presidential primary in 2008. Nearly 153,000 people had voted through Monday, with 79 percent of ballots cast in the Republican presidential primary. But without a challenger to Democratic President Barack Obama, voting totals are far off the state record set in 2008. Turnout is 73 percent higher than during Republican President George W. Bush's re-election in 2004. Early voting has been heaviest in Knox County, where more than 11,000 people have voted in the Republican primary, compared with only...

PUBLIC SCHEDULE Herman Cain / Jackie Gingrich Cushman Bus Tour Friday 3/2 FRANKLIN, TN 5:30pm Central - Franklin: VIP Dinner at Zolo's 20 attendees (possible donor opportunity) Contact Monty Lankford for Reservations - 615-498-3328 monty@leadersoftennessee.org 7:00pm Central - Franklin City Club, public reception / rally 130 9th Ave South, Franklin Tn 37064 FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC Saturday 3/3 CHATTANOOGA, TN Contact Charles Harvey 703-309-6948 9:30am - 10:00am Eastern - Chattanooga: VIP Kick Off at Gingrich Head Quarters (Meet n Greet / Load Bus) 1 Park Place, Lee Hwy, Ste 300 Chattanooga TN FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC...

Nearly 2 million dead Americans are still on active voter registries, and 1 in every 8 registrations in the United States is invalid or has major inaccuracies, according to a new study. Research released Tuesday by the Pew Center on the States shows that the country is spending more on voter registration while getting worse results than other nations such as Canada. The study points to antiquated systems that don’t reflect modern technology and fail to address the biggest obstacles to maintaining accurate, up-to-date voter-registry databases. Almost 3 million Americans are actively registered to vote in multiple states, while about...

The 9th Circuit Federal Appeals Court upheld District Court Judge Vaughn Walker’s overturning of the voter-approved amendment (Proposition 8) banning the state’s recognition of same-sex “marriage.” “Voters have no right to amend their state’s constitution in ways that contradict clearly established federal policies,” the Court wrote in its decision. “To allow such ‘willy-nilly’ revisions on a state-by-state basis would lead to a patchwork of divergent laws across the nation. Things that are permitted in some states might be disallowed in others. Uniformity and equality of rights throughout the 50 states would be sacrificed to a misguided notion of state and...