Free Republic

Under fast-track, Congress transfers its most basic legislative powers to the Executive for six years. Any yet-unseen global pacts, no matter how sweeping, are guaranteed a “fast-track” to congressional adoption. No amendments. No ability to strike any offending provision. And no chance to apply either the 60- or 67-vote thresholds used for important legislation and treaties.I asked the President how his fast-tracked proposals would impact jobs, wages, and trade deficits. He would not answer. The bill’s promoters also refused to answer when asked whether their proposal would reduce net manufacturing jobs in the United States. That is because they know...

    ***** Tunes For Our Troops ***** ~ Support The Artists ~   Support the artists you hear throughout the Canteen! Click on the links below! Keep the music going! ArtistDirect l  Internet Radio l  AOL Music l  Sonique (Lycos) l  Real Radio Live365 l  971TheRiver  l  GotRadio  l  Wherehouse  l  Target  l Shoutcast AFRTS l  VH1 l XM Radio l  BET l  audiophile l  Virgin Radio l  Soma (Alternative) Acaza l AudioRealm l VH1 l  Yahoo! Launch Music l  Radio Disney l  Live-Radio Net ITunes l Amazon l Salsa Radio l MTV l CMT l Ticketmaster l...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- There's something strange about the U.S. economy in the first three months of every year: It frequently grows at a much slower pace than in the other nine months. And on Friday, the government agency charged with calculating the economy's growth rate said it would adjust its methods in an effort to resolve the problem. The changes could paint a much different picture of the economy's recent performance. Concerns flared when the government said late last month that the economy expanded just 0.2 percent at an annual rate in the first quarter. But many economists have challenged...

Reddit user Soggybrick said he finds it quite funny when he hears his girlfriend Samantha talking in her sleep. So funny, in fact, that he's decided to share some of her most notable lines on the Web. "She just talks sometimes while I'm on the computer late at night," he told ABC News. "So I take notes of them whenever they're absurd or hilarious." Soggybrick, who's actually a man named James living in New Zealand, wrote down and published some of his favorite lines on Reddit, which include the following: I want the little clay things that are spread all...

President Obama sought to reassure American Jews that he fully supports the state of Israel while reiterating the need for a two-state solution at a Northwest Washington synagogue on Friday. Obama spoke at the Adas Israel Synagogue on the inaugural “solidarity sabbath,” a holiday meant to consolidate support for Jews amid rising anti-Semitism that falls toward the end of Jewish Heritage Month. On Friday, lawmakers were slated to appear in congregations across the country to mark the day. ......................... “When we allow anti-Semitism to take root, our souls are destroyed,” Obama said. “It will spread.” The statements follow a wide-ranging...

[PBS] now admits to burying the $75,000 Clinton Cash scandal involving ABC News senior anchor George Stephanopoulos. Friday, as though anything will ever change, PBS ombudsman Michael Getler stepped up and pretty much pled guilty on both counts: The following evening, May 15, Woodruff closed the NewsHour broadcast with a “short editor’s note before we go.” She said: “There have been questions this week about journalists’ contributions to the Clinton Foundation and my name has come up. I want to clarify what happened. In 2010, after the massive earthquake in Haiti, I made a gift of $250 to the Haiti...

Rolling Thunder, Biker Gangs and Human Nature.On Sunday in Washington, D.C.,—Memorial Day weekend— the annual “Rolling Thunder” gathering will draw hundreds of motorcyclists to ride together in a steady roar to honor living and dead war veterans, POWs and MIAs. Except for the bikes, it probably won’t resemble the motorcycle club event of last Sunday in Waco, Texas, that left nine people dead and 170 arrested after a high-noon brawl that included guns, knives, chains and brass knuckles. Nor will it be like the chase up the West Side Highway in Manhattan in September of 2013 that left an SUV...

Did you know that if you took every single penny away from everyone in the United States that it still would not be enough to pay off the national debt? Today, the debt of the federal government exceeds $145,000 per household, and it is getting worse with each passing year. Many believe that if we paid it off a little bit at a time that we could eventually pay it all off, but as you will see below that isn’t going to work either. It has been projected that “mandatory” federal spending on programs such as Social Security, Medicaid and...

Voters determined to have their voice heard on gay marriage turned out in strength Friday for Ireland’s most hard-fought referendum in decades, a contest that pitted the liberal forces of social change against the nation’s conservative Catholic foundation. Polls closed at 10 p.m. after 15 hours of voting that featured long-distance trips by Irish citizens, including thousands of emigrants who returned by aircraft or ferry to take part in the world’s first national vote on gay marriage. Backers of gay marriage had hoped for high turnout, reflecting strong participation by young and first-time voters. Electoral officials said this appeared to...

..... Australia’s most senior Salafist cleric says if he knew then what he does now, he wouldn’t have come at all. On a Saturday night in Coolaroo, an industrial northern Melbourne suburb where more people consider themselves Muslim than any other religion, the sheik speaks with disappointment, a tinge of bitterness and overwhelmingly a deep sense of dismay. He says he feels like a foreigner in his own country. ..... “If I knew that one day this would happen in Australia, I swear by the almighty God I will never step foot in my — in your — country,” he...

Having conquered the genre of Jewish heavy metal, I now move on to Arthurian heavy metal, and I'm not talking about plate armo(u)r. For those of you not familiar with my work (i.e., the entire world minus maybe a dozen people), for the moment I write music under the name Hopalong Ginsberg. In the future I hope to write it under a cute redhead. If you'd like a free MP3 download of Nimue, click here or here. Click here if you're suffering from a cute deficiency.[Thanks to martin_fierro for the gif!]

My Dispensational Upbringing I have been taught Dispensationalism from my mother’s womb. I was born in a dispensational environment. It was assumed at my church to be a part of the Gospel. There was never another option presented. It made sense. It helped me put together the Scriptures in a way that cleared up so much confusion. And, to be honest, the emphasis on the coming tribulation, current events that prove the Bible’s prophecy, the fear that the Antichrist may be alive today (who is he?) was all quite exciting. But what might be the biggest attraction for me...

*Updated with more e-mail reaction An e-mail FOIA batch released by the State Department Friday included a bizarre transcript of an October 2012 interview that Wall Street Journal reporter Monica Langley had with then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. The source of the email and transcript, State Department Communications Director Caroline Alder, commented, “This will be exciting when it’s FOIA’d…but will give you a sense of the interaction.”

Paul Bedard of the Washington Examiner noticed the rather curious way Hillary Clinton’s book “Hard Choices” is being displayed in the window of Kramerbooks in Washington, D.C.:

(Reuters) - A Maryland mother was found early on Friday pushing her dead 3-year-old boy on a park swing, authorities said. Deputies responded to a call around 7 a.m. to check on a woman who witnesses said had been pushing a child for hours on a swing at Wills Memorial Park in La Plata, about 35 miles (55 km) south of Washington, D.C., said Charles County Sheriff's Office spokeswoman Diane Richardson.

'I Can't Be Racist Because I'm an Ethnic Minority Woman', Says Goldsmiths University Diversity Officer Bahar MustafaA student union officer who banned white people and men from an event promoting equality has claimed she "cannot be racist" because she is an ethnic minority woman. Goldsmiths University's student union welfare and diversity officer Bahar Mustafa sparked a backlash when she told white people and men they should not attend an event on "diversifying the curriculum". She wrote on Facebook: “Invite loads of BME Women and non-binary people!! Also, if you’ve been invited and you’re a man and/or white PLEASE DON’T COME...

Donald Trump hasn’t announced a run for president quite yet, but that isn’t stopping him from hurling stink bombs at fellow Republicans — calling Mitt Romney “a choker,” Marco Rubio “a horror show” and Jeb Bush “a nice person,” who’s still “a total fool.” Not that he can’t stand any of them. http://nypost.com/2015/05/22/trump-calls-romney-a-choker-says-jeb-is-total-fool/

Senator Ted Cruz was the first Republican to officially announce his campaign to run for the presidency in 2016. Since coming onto the national stage he has been a very high profile and outspoken member of the Senate and has very strong name recognition and support among conservatives in the country. Hailing from Texas, the largest Republican-leaning state in the union and the only large population state that is all but guaranteed to vote GOP, his campaign is enticing for the promise of how many electoral votes he can deliver. He is also the first major Hispanic candidate to run...

On Al Sharpton's MSNBC show today, former DNC Chairman Ed Rendell dared congressional Republicans to recall Hillary Clinton to testify about Benghazi. Calling her a "tough cookie," Rendell vowed that "Hillary will put them in short pants." Paging Camille Paglia . . . Rendell surely thought he was paying Hillary a compliment. But is this really the Hillary persona that Dems want to project: that of a woman who makes little boys out of grown men? View the video here.

[Admin Mod: shortened the overly long title and misspelled words: I Can Already Predict, I Can Even Guarantee It 100%, The U.S Will Loose To ISIS] I can already predict, I can even guarantee it 100%, the U.S. will lose to ISIS because the current U.S. Administration and the mess in Syria and Iraq is now proven to be a foresight of fools. I will start in Palmyra, biblical Tadmor, as it is still called today by all Arabs, it was a place where Shiite-Sunni tensions simmered for centuries. It is a mainly Sunni tribal city where a local Sunni...