Free Republic

<p>Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Ryan Larsen. I’m a truth lover, chess player and avid political junkie. I co-founded WhyRomney.com, which is dedicated to correcting distortions and inaccuracies perpetrated against Mitt Romney.</p> <p>Before WhyRomney, I wrote for Lyingliar.com. At Lyingliar, we debunked all of Al Franken’s big attacks, from his “Chelsea Clinton is a dog” smear against Rush, to his “Peabody” smear against O’Reilly.</p>

<p>The editors at Red State and Free Republic (among others) have had the wool pulled over their eyes. They seem to actually believe the lies originally propagated by supporters of President Obama and, in some cases, even by President Obama himself. Now, for some reason, these editors/moderators are so insecure in their prejudice against Gov. Romney that they ban people who openly support Gov. Romney. Free Republic (mostly because of it’s owner Jim Robinson) has purged all of the Romney supporters they could from the site in two waves of purges over the last few years. The anti-Romney and anti-Mormon bigotry evident at Free Republic now is absolutely sickening.</p>

Sometimes it seems as if the GOP Establishment is sleepwalking off a cliff. In 1996, having scored the stunning victories of the off-year congressional elections, the GOP suits dutifully lined up behind the impossible Bob Dole. From the moment Americans realized their choices would be Clinton or Dole, "Bubba" was never behind one day in the polls. It's looking like déjà Dole all over again. Mitt Romney is the proverbial GOP next-in-liner. After the Tea Party helped Republicans score major victories in '10, the GOP Establishment is hunting desperately for a way to lose the very next election. Mitt Romney...

The large Republican presidential field, along with the dramatic surges and collapses of several of its candidates, may ultimately be much ado about nothing. That, at least, is the conclusion of the Republican strategists surveyed in this week's National Journal Political Insiders Poll, who almost unanimously identified Mitt Romney as the most likely candidate to win the nomination. In the five times the GOP Insiders have been asked that question in 2011, Romney has never surrendered the top spot.

The large Republican presidential field, along with the dramatic surges and collapses of several of its candidates, may ultimately be much ado about nothing. That, at least, is the conclusion of the Republican strategists surveyed in this week's National Journal Political Insiders Poll, who almost unanimously identified Mitt Romney as the most likely candidate to win the nomination. In the five times the GOP Insiders have been asked that question in 2011, Romney has never surrendered the top spot.

Barack Obama's new ally: Rick Perry By: Alexander Burns and Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Martin October 27, 2011 President Barack Obama’s political machine is increasingly making common cause with Texas Gov. Rick Perry against a shared enemy: Mitt Romney. Romney is the opponent Democrats most fear, and whom Obama strategists view as the near-certain Republican nominee. Yet even among strategists who assume Romney will be Obama’s opponent, Perry’s newly feisty performance on the campaign trail has raised hopes that he may drag out the primary fight and bloody Romney ahead of the main event. Obama supporters aren’t exactly coordinating attacks...

By Steven Shepard October 26, 2011 | 4:00 PM | 762 Comments Share Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney leads in new CNN/Time polls of the first four states on the Republican presidential nominating calendar -- Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Florida -- though in Iowa and South Carolina, Herman Cain runs a close second. Cain, the former CEO of Godfather's Pizza, runs second in each of the four states, and in three of the four states, Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, runs third. Notably, the best that Texas Gov. Rick Perry can manage in any of the states is a...

Last week the New York Times ran a piece on the efforts of Massachusetts’ politicians to rein in ration health care as costs in that state have skyrocketed in the wake of RomneyCare. One part of the article stood out like a major contusion: Those who led the 2006 effort to expand coverage readily acknowledge that they deferred the more daunting task of cost control for another day

Today, Mitt Romney refused to take a position on the big battle in Ohio over the ballot initiative to repeal Governor John Kasich’s law rolling back the collective bargaining rights of public employees. The fight is a hugely important one to conservatives, with right wing money flowing into the state, and conservative bloggers erupted in fury at Romney, asking how it is that he can be running for president when he isn’t willing to take a firm stand against the scourge of public employees. [snip] Governors who are willing to risk serious unpopularity in order to roll back the bargaining...

Here's the problem with Romney's repeated assertion that he never suggested applying Romneycare nationwide: It just isn't true. At a GOP debate in Des Moines, Iowa, on Aug. 5, 2007, here's what Mitt Romney had to say about his preferred federal approach to health care policy: Look, it's critical to insure more people in this country. It doesn't make sense to have 45 million people without insurance. It's not good for them because they don't get good preventative care and disease management, just as these folks have spoken about. But it's not good for the rest of the citizens either,...

Texas Governor Rick Perry lost his cool, lost respect, and lost some supporters in Las Vegas. He might have also lost a prime opportunity to shape his image and get back on top in the race for the GOP nomination.

In a new web site, in a controversial ad that was launched and then quickly pulled from sight, and in Tuesday’s now infamous debate touching episode, Republican presidential front-runner Mitt Romney is handling rival Rick Perry as if the Texas governor’s poll numbers were not at a paltry single-digit. With mounting evidence, he is, in short, treating Perry like Perry has Herman Cain’s numbers. [snip] If Romney can fatally weaken Perry now, it would allow him to dominate in the early primaries. Strategically, a strong showing in the Iowa caucuses would be followed by an anticipated victory in the New...

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said Friday he was “concerned” about the infighting in his party during the 2012 Republican presidential primary and called on the candidates to ease up on each other. “I think they should be more respectful,” McCain said on CBS’ Early Show. “I am a bit concerned because, obviously, the people who are making this judgment [GOP primary voters] aren’t as much interested in seeing fighting as they are in judging the candidate’s knowledge, expertise and talent.”

Mitt Romney told reporters in Iowa Thursday that President Barack Obama deserves credit for the downfall of Muammar Qadhafi. Continue Reading Exiting a campaign stop in Council Bluffs, Romney answered a shouted question about whether Obama deserves some credit for the outcome in Libya. "Yes, yes, absolutely," Romney said, as he darted out a back door. Earlier in the day, Romney's campaign said it was the Libyan rebels, more than the Obama administration, that deserved praise for ousting the dictator.

Lauren and Nick Destito had a wonderful life in Plainville. They paid their bills and raised two sons in a lovely four-bedroom colonial that they were just eight years away from owning outright. But the economy collapsed in 2008 and soon crushed the small tree and landscaping business the couple had run since 1984. Now, the state of Massachusetts is grinding the Destitos into the dirt. The reason: the health insurance the Destitos bought, paid $750 monthly premiums on and repeatedly used at doctor visits apparently does not pass muster with the state’s mandatory universal health insurance law. Now the...

Not a single vote has been cast in the Republican presidential primary. Not one. Yet, the Republican Party establishment has decided for us that Mitt Romney is the 2012 anointed one. Why? Well, he's a veteran campaigner, or he has become a household name. Or some variation that leads to the bottom-line rationale that "It's his turn." The GOP machine tries mightily to formulate the parameters of intra-party debate so that candidates gather in a virtual cartoon-depicted assembly line, each awaiting "his [or her] turn." Let's give the GOP veteran operators their due. These are folks who have done much...

TREYNOR, Iowa – Mitt Romney today returned to Iowa, a state that delivered a crippling blow to his candidacy in 2008, exuding a certain amount of confidence. “There’s a good shot I might become the next president of the United States,” he told community leaders here at a business roundtable at Treynor State Bank. “It’s not a sure thing, but it’s a good shot.” Romney has generally not focused his campaign on Iowa, a state that he staked much of his candidacy four years ago only to lose both the caucus vote and, perhaps more importantly, the game of expectations....

The GOP could face a revolt from within its tea party grassroots base if it nominates an establishment candidate without true conservative, anti-big government values, one of America’s leading conservative pundits tells Newsmax.TV in an exclusive interview. Specifically, columnist and former Republican presidential candidate Pat Buchanan told Newsmax that the nomination of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, the architect of a state insurance plan that many say inspired Obamacare, could prompt the tea party movement to form a third party. “It’s a real possibility because the tea party folks and the Republican conservatives and social conservatives and others are very...

This is a bruising left hook to the Mitt Romney Campaign. Now we know why the seemingly unimportant exchange over the illegal immigrant hiring.

After seven debates and many more missed opportunities, the other GOP candidates finally pressed Mitt Romney on his Massachusetts health-care record in a serious way on Tuesday night. Let's extend the scrutiny and try to sort the substance from the merely polemical, because the policy stakes ........(skip) The exchange began when Rick Santorum scored Mr. Romney for lacking health-care "credibility," since the 2006 Bay State reform "was the basis for ObamaCare." If the first claim is for primary voters to decide, no one who knows anything about health policy on the left or right would deny the second: When Democrats...