Free Republic

At the behest of AIPAC, Rashida Tlaib was censured by House Republicans for being upset like any human being would be that Israel’s army is allowed to exterminate her people. Since Mike Johnson became House Speaker in October, House Republicans have voted to Stand With Israel no matter what the cost, to send $14.3 billion dollars to Israel, fight anti-Semitism on college campuses and authorize a war with Iran to stop it from acquiring WMD. Rep. Brian Mast, a Republican from Florida, even showed up to work in Congress wearing an IDF uniform. In the House GOP, it has been...

For years, from Mali to Afghanistan, I have worked for peace and risked my life for it. It is therefore not a question of justifying war, but of understanding what led us to it. I notice that the “experts” who take turns on television analyze the situation on the basis of dubious information, most often hypotheses erected as facts—and then we no longer manage to understand what is happening. This is how panics are created. The problem is not so much to know who is right in this conflict, but to question the way our leaders make their decisions. Let’s...

“Today I informed the management at Breitbart News of my immediate resignation,” the reporter at the center of the controversy at the conservative site told BuzzFeed News, the week after Trump’s campaign manager allegedly grabbed her. Breitbart reporter Michelle Fields and editor-at-large Ben Shapiro are resigning from the company over the site’s handling of Donald Trump’s campaign manager’s alleged assault on Fields, BuzzFeed News has learned. Fields and Shapiro informed Breitbart News chairman Steve Bannon of their decision Sunday night. “Today I informed the management at Breitbart News of my immediate resignation,” Fields said in a statement sent to BuzzFeed...

The truth is, the Tea Party anger that boiled over in response to the President Obama’s healthcare plan had been brewing for years due to conservative disappointment with George W. Bush’s policies. Bush created record-breaking deficits, embraced Congressional earmarks, gained passage of an enormous expansion of Medicare entitlements without funding it, nominated Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, and backed McCain-Kennedy comprehensive immigration reform. Principled conservatives like Coulter, Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity spoke out against the direction of the party, to their credit. Conservatives must be careful not to abandon their principles out of blind hated for President Obama....

SOURCES: POLITICO set to reveal details of Romney campaign infighting; Plans to publish portions of speech chief Romney strategist Stevens ordered and scrapped, just days before convention... Developing late...

Obama’s Foreign Policy Of Reconciliation Lies In Tatters The President appears to be rethinking his stance on American interference abroad. Will he let the electorate know before the election? A spectacularly successful White House spin operation saw to it that the only topic for debate in the media after the killing of American ambassador By Janet Daley 15 Sep 2012 What exactly is the nature and intention of Barack Obama’s foreign policy? What has the net effect been of his emphasis on apology and reconciliation with the Muslim world? How does he now see America’s global role? Bizarrely enough, none...

The Wall Street Journal POTOMAC WATCH September 13, 2012, 7:10 p.m. ET Mr. Romney, Trust Your Pants Obama tells Americans the terrible things the Republican will do to them. The Republican remains silent about what he would do. By KIMBERLEY A. STRASSEL In the classic 1968 film "Once Upon a Time in the West," a villainous Henry Fonda shoots one of his lackeys, in part for the sin of wearing both a belt and suspenders. How do you trust a man, muses Fonda, who "can't even trust his own pants?" Mitt Romney is slipping in the polls because, when it...

Some Republicans Try Out a New Campaign Theme: Bipartisanship By JENNIFER STEINHAUER and JONATHAN WEISMAN September 15, 2012 WASHINGTON — A woman who appears in an advertisement supporting Representative Jon Runyan, a New Jersey Republican, boasts about how he works “with both parties.” Richard E. Mourdock of Indiana, whose Senate campaign has been most notable for his derision of legislative compromise as feckless, now says he would “work with anyone.” While out and about on the campaign trail, Representative Bobby Schilling, Republican of Illinois, talks so much about all the great things he has done with Representative Dave Loebsack, a...

Zogby: Romney Running Worse Than McCain in ‘08 13 Sep 2012 David A. Patten President Barack Obama received a surprisingly strong bounce after the Democratic National Convention, and now leads GOP challenger Mitt Romney by nearly 6 points according to a new JZ Analytics poll. The national poll of likely voters shows Obama leading 47.7 percent to 42 percent, and indicates that Romney is not polling well enough among some conservative demographic groups: NASCAR fans, evangelicals, and the so-called “Walmart voters.” According to JZ Analytics pollster John Zogby, Romney is in a somewhat worse position than GOP nominee Sen. John...

I’ve argued many times that the politician Mitt Romney most closely resembles is John Kerry, primarily due to the Mittster’s legendary penchant for flip-flopping, a trait Kerry is also known for. I stand by my Kerry comparison, but Jonah Goldberg has an excellent point when he compares Romney to another Massachusetts politician: Michael Dukakis. Meanwhile, the Republicans seem to have become Dukakified. It was Michael Dukakis, the 1988 Democratic presidential nominee, who insisted that the election should be entirely about “competence, not ideology.” Romney has avoided saying that in so many words, but it’s certainly how he’s campaigning. After running to the right in...

Former congressman Virgil Goode Jr. has qualified for the presidential ballot in Virginia, the State Board of Elections ruled Tuesday, adding a potential obstacle to Republican Mitt Romney’s hopes of winning the pivotal state. The state Republican party has already challenged the eligibility of Goode, who is the Constitution Party’s nominee, and could still get him knocked off the ballot.

The past 48 hours has been a whirlwind of activity for grassroots activist across the nation, especially here in Tampa Bay. Activist have diligently pushed for state delegations to oppose proposed changes to RNC rules. Last night there was great optimism after the RNC agreed to compromise on the rule changes in an effort to avoid a floor fight. Unfortunately as a result of that compromise, RNC proposed rule 12, which would allow the RNC to rewrite the rules post convention, free of delegate and grassroots influence, will likely stand. This new rule could be a huge blow to the...

“Deadly assault weapons … are not made for recreation or self-defense. They are instruments of destruction with the sole purpose of hunting down and killing people.” - Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney --IMAGE HERE-- As the Republican National Convention comes to a close, it is time for me to live up to the promise I made when I wrote about Why gun owners should fear a second term for President Obama. That promise was to give the Republican nominee the same skeptical scrutiny that I gave to President Obama. And just as in that previous article, I am limiting my discussion...

Watch Julie McCarty, President of the NE Tarrant [County TX] Tea Party and delegate to the Republican National Convention. Over strong grassroots opposition, Rule No. 12 was passed which gives the Republican National Committee the authority to change any rule between convention sessions. According to McCarty, “This rule was deliberately designed to suppress grassroots efforts.” "It is the Establishment Republicans saying to the grassroots, 'we do not want to hear from you, we want to do things our own way.'” They were able to defeat Rule 15. Under this rule, delegates to the National Convention would have no longer been...

We libertarians love to rail about government, and rightly so. But, tyrannical government can’t survive if people refuse to comply with its illegitimate demands. Ultimately, the actions of government reflect the willingness of the people it oppresses to comply with its dictates. Ultimately, we have no one to blame but ourselves if we continue to live in tyranny. This uncomfortable fact is perfectly illustrated in the newly released movie Compliance, which tells the chilling story of just how far ordinary people will go to obey a figure of authority. Watch the movie trailers here. . .

Determined to neuter the grassroots and head off future insurgencies like those of Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, and Ron Paul, Republican party bosses have pulled off an audacious coup, high-handedly turning the GOP into a much more top-down, centralized party. Boehner with gavel Yesterday, the Republican National Committee in Tampa adopted some rules changes that shift power from the state parties and the grassroots to the RNC and the GOP presidential nominee. Former Governor John Sununu of New Hampshire touted the new rules as providing “a strong governing framework” for the party over the next four years. But in fact...

Surprise! I’m the first to admit that Mitt Romney wasn’t my first choice for president. I think the majority of the Republican Party was with me on this one. I was on the Rick Perry train, which turned out t be an epic failure. However, the primaries are over and Mitt came out on top. However, given that a lot of conservatives may still be suspicious of Romney’s shoddy conservative credentials, it doesn’t help that the RNC goodie bag contains a copy of his book No Apologies, which endorses his decision, as Governor of Massachusetts, to institute an individual mandate...

Is the tea party changing the Republican Party from the inside -- or selling out to the GOP? As Republicans prepare to officially roll out Mitt Romney as their party's presidential nominee at the Republican National Convention this week, major tea party groups and figures have descended on Tampa, Florida, to schmooze with party bigwigs and rally for Romney. But Romney's conservative credentials have long been viewed with suspicion by the movement. So it came as a surprise when, before at least one event, tea party organizers committed what some activists would consider heresy: seeking approval from establishment Republicans to...

The latest line of attack from the left against Ryan. He needs to own it, and agree it was the wrong thing to do; chalk it up to a youngster's misguided party loyalty. The more R&R distance themselves from Bush's Keynesian flights of fancy the better.

I was riding around in the car, listening to XM Radio and had FOX News with Megan Kelly's show on. She was interviewing some guy and said (paraphrase) she's hearing from people in the know who are discussing this behind closed doors that Obama will be re-elected for sure and gee, how would four more years of Obama affect the crapola you and I are talking about? What are we to think about this statement by Ms. Kelly? Complete rubbish?