Free Republic

I believe I represent the average Republican voter, or at least a significant slice of the R base. My positions - in no particular order - are as follows: Immigration - Amnesty is a deal breaker. If they are here illegally and we come into contact with them, send them home. Iraq - We were winning, we are winning, and we will win. The various pitfalls and difficulties that we have had do not equal defeat. We need a President to stand firm, and to fire all the traitors(I am not using this word lightly) in the State Department and...

Karl Rove teed off this afternoon on the liberal netroots, the coalition of far-left blogs and advocacy groups who are a new power bloc in the Democratic party. "The Web has given angry and vitriolic people more of a voice in public discourse," said Mr. Rove, who served as one of President Bush's top strategists until he resigned this past summer, and is a noted technology nut. "People in the past who have been on the nutty fringe of political life, who were more or less voiceless, have now been given an inexpensive and easily accessible soapbox, a blog," Mr....

Hundreds of liberal (they'd say progressive) Internet bloggers crawled out of their cybertunnels for face-time and political networking here at the first-ever YearlyKos convention. Named after DailyKos.com, the widely read political Web log by Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, the three-day convention that opened on Thursday is something of a milestone — an event that unites the irreverent and ever-morphing liberal blogophere with mainstream political figures who have begun to recognize the bloggers' potential clout. Billed as "Uniting the Netroots," the convention at the Riviera Hotel promises top Democratic politicians as its headliners, like poli-Web pioneer Howard Dean, the head of the...

Not being in the middle of it all gives me a rather unique advantage. That means I have no one to answer to for my views. I just watch things, and then I talk about them. In other words, this means I don’t have to lie about my biases in order to keep some false sense of objectivity alive for the gullible. In other words, I’m no Chris Matthews. Let me start then with the current batch of presidential hopefuls: Folks - meaning the current Republican candidates - you really need to watch out for Fred Thompson. None of you...

Amway sues to ID bloggers Saturday, October 13, 2007 By Chris Knape The Grand Rapids Press GRAND HAVEN -- The case could be called Amway versus the Internet, or some might argue, Amway versus free speech. The Ada Township-based multi-level marketing giant this week filed a sweeping suit in Ottawa County Circuit Court against 30 people classified as John Does for disparaging the company in blogs, online forums and YouTube videos. The suit, filed by Quixtar, the online version of Alticor Inc.'s Amway business, asks the court for an injunction and damages of more than $25,000 against the anonymous posters....

Republicans like to view Democrats as the party of MoveOn.org -- a lumping of leftists from George Soros to Howard Dean and the blogosphere. Although the fundraising and noise from this umbrella of progressives is noticeable, it has yet to post any real election victory in Nevada or anywhere else. Of course there was Ned Lamont's win in the Connecticut Senate primary two years ago in the effort to unseat Democratic incumbent Joe Lieberman. Yet it did not result in a Sen. Lamont. In New York Times reporter Matt Bai's book "The Argument: Billionaires, Bloggers and the Battle to Remake...

WASHINGTON — Walid Jawad was tired of all the chatter on Middle Eastern blogs and Internet forums in praise of gory attacks carried out by the “noble resistance” in Iraq. So Mr. Jawad, one of two Arabic-speaking members of what the State Department called its Digital Outreach Team, posted his own question: Why was it that many in the Arab world quickly condemned civilian Palestinian deaths but were mute about the endless killing of women and children by suicide bombers in Iraq? Among those who responded was a man named Radad, evidently a Sunni Muslim, who wrote that many of...

<p>Liberaltarian ex-Daily Kos diarist David Weigel and Newsbusters are engaged in a debate over why there is no right-wing Daily Kos.</p> <p>My answer, as articulated here is that there is a conservative Daily Kos, that’s it’s Free Republic, but that it doesn’t really “count” since it’s not a blog, and more critically, it won’t play nicely with the rest of the movement and it doesn’t worship candidates like Kos does.</p>

Liberaltarian ex-Daily Kos diarist David Weigel and Newsbusters are engaged in a debate over why there is no right-wing Daily Kos. My answer, as articulated here is that there is a conservative Daily Kos, that’s it’s Free Republic, but that it doesn’t really “count” since it’s not a blog, and more critically, it won’t play nicely with the rest of the movement and it doesn’t worship candidates like Kos does.There are vast architectural differences between FR and Kos, as critics of this comparison are wont to point out. Most of them are points in Kos’s favor. But fundamentally they were...

WASHINGTON, (AP) -- DailyKos, an influential political Web site that serves as a virtual bulletin board for liberals, qualifies as a media entity exempt from federal campaign finance regulations, the Federal Election Commission said Tuesday. The FEC said the Web site, operated by blogger Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, cannot be regulated as a political committee and can freely post blog entries that support candidates. Conservative blogger John C.A. Bambenek had argued in a complaint last month that the site should comply with campaign finance laws because such entries amounted to "a gift of free advertising and candidate media services." The FEC...

The late Christopher Lasch once wrote that public affairs generally and journalism in particular suffered not from too little information but from entirely too much. What was needed, he argued, was robust debate. Lasch, a historian by training but a cultural critic by inclination, was writing in 1990, when the Internet was not yet a part of everyday life and bloggers did not exist. Bloggers now are everywhere among us, and no one asks if we don't need more full-throated advocacy on the Internet. The blogosphere is the loudest corner of the Internet, noisy with disputation, manifesto-like postings and an...

Should a website post the best ideas for successful terrorist plots? Should we even discuss publicly how to stop terrorist attacks? This week, New York Times blogger Steven Levitt publicly posted terrorist plot suggestions. He claims that “by getting these ideas out in the open, it gives terror fighters a chance to consider and plan for these scenarios before they occur.” Levitt clearly assumes that terrorists have already figured out the best ideas, but that our side has not. If anything, the reverse is probably true. There are vastly more Americans than terrorists possessing detailed information on American infrastructure, traffic...

With his clenched fists, wild eyes and gnashing teeth he has become the face of Muslim fury, protesting against the enemies of Islam. Shakeel Ahmad Bhat has been on the frontline of political activism in Srinagar, India, for more than a decade. His constant presence, captured by photographers and beamed across the world, has caught the imagination of rightwing bloggers who have dubbed him Islamic Rage Boy and turned him into an internet phenomenon. Typing his nickname into a search engine yields more than 75,000 results. He has inspired a cartoon character and merchandise. But the 30-year-old Kashmiri activist is...

Right Wing News emailed more than 230 right-of-center bloggers and asked them to send us a ranked list 1-5 of the candidates that they would most like to take the Republican nomination for President in 2008 and the 1-5 candidates they'd least like to see as the Republican nominee in 2008. Representatives from the following 59 blogs responded... Aaron's CC, The Absurd Report, The American Princess, The Anchoress, Argghhhh!, AtlanticBlog, Atlas Shrugs, The Baseball Crank, Betsy's Page, Bit's Blog, BizzyBlog, Black Velvet Bruce Li, Blogs of War, Blonde Sagacity, Boi From Troy, Conservative Grapevine, dcthornton.com, Dr. Melissa Clouthier, Eckernet, Euphoric...

<p>I taped a segment on the O'Reilly Factor for airing tonight to defend Free Republic against charges that it is a hate site. The segment will air in the 'D block' around 8:35 p.m. EDT and rerun at 11 p.m. and 4 a.m. EDT.</p>

The Council on American-Islamic Relations has begun filing complaints with the FBI about comments on this blog and others (not front page posts). I know this because I’ve spoken with two different agents recently about LGF comments that were reported to the FBI by CAIR. Just thought you might like to know too. The premier Islamist front group is starting to go after the blogosphere, using the tools provided by our own society.

ALL OVER America, millions of voters don't know -- or care -- that Mike Gravel has an "artistic" side or that Hillary Clinton likes Celine Dion. Yes, it's hard to believe if you're a tuned-in, turned-on popular culture vulture umbilically connected to the blogosphere/videosphere. But cross the country and ask normal people about the latest Gravel ad and they'd think you don't know how to pronounce the word for tiny pebbles. Ask working folks about "You and I," the campaign song selected by Clinton in her recent Sopranos-spoof video, and most will shrug indifferently. Everyday people, in other words, are...

The Wall Street Journal says the Republicans' prospects for 2008 are looking "dim," with Americans giving the GOP "their most negative assessment in the two-decade history" of the Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll. Maybe this will help: As the Politico reports, the National Republican Senatorial Committee has come up with a 39-page playbook to teach GOP candidates how to weather the not-so-new new-media world. "Rapid response and explanation of a position or vote to friendly blogs can ensure center-right solidarity behind your defense," the playbook says. "The paradigmatic example of the failure to do is the 'macaca' moment. Conservative blogs,...

As if he hasn't teased voters enough about his likely presidential bid, TV's Fred Thompson is now blogging for support and hinting that his backers will soon hear more about his plans. He went up on the Pajamas Media site this week to thank supporters for giving him six victories in the PJM Presidential Straw Polls. "So," he blogged, "I hear you all have been talking about me." Referring to the poll, the former Tennessee senator said, "The Pajamas Media poll is certainly good news, especially when, for a lot of politicians, encouragement to run from three relatives and an...

Nominations for The 2006 Weblog Awards are now open. Go to the master nomination post to start nominating blogs in 46 categories. There's a bunch of new categories this year, but the number of finalists in each category will drop from 15 to 10 (with a few exceptions). As always, we're always looking for volunteers to help with the finalist selection process. Linkable logos are available in a variety of sizes, so start spreading the word!