Free Republic

"Collusion," anyone?  Bill Gertz of the Free Beacon reports on the efforts, directed at the highest level of the Chinese government, to shape our politics: China's Communist Party is intensifying covert influence operations in the United States that include funding Washington think tanks and coercing Chinese Americans, according to a congressional commission report. The influence operations are conducted by the United Front Work Department, a Central Committee organ that employs tens of thousands of operatives who seek to use both overt and covert operations to promote Communist Party policies. The Party's United Front strategy includes paying several Washington think tanks with the...

Idiots are protesting against the convenience store where Michael Brown stole merchandise and assaulted an employee Before Michael Brown was shot and killed by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, this security footage from Ferguson Market and Liquor showed Brown stealing merchandise and assaulting a store employee. Skip to 1:13https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbPbX76cOVQFour years later, this brand new article form the St. Louis Post-Dispatch says:“Protesters believe that the surveillance clip mischaracterized Brown.”The protestors aren’t saying that the footage was edited, altered, or changed in any way.Instead, they are saying that the footage mischaracterized Brown.They are wrong. Instead, the footage shows exactly what Michael’s Brown’s...

More than 500,000 tickets for the papal Mass in Dublin's Phoenix Park on Sunday were handed out, but apparently, only about 130,000 people showed up. Irish Mirror: Over half a million tickets were snapped up for the event, but it is thought that just 130,000 people turned out. Well wishers waved flags, cheered and reached out to touch the pontiff as he passed on his way to a stage, where he then conducted the religious service for the faithful. During the mass, which was aired live on TV, the Pope asked for forgiveness for the clerical and institutional abuse...

At this very moment, a war rages on in Europe. Many Americans have forgotten or “moved on” from the idea of Russian aggression in Europe, but a very real and tactile conflict exists today that is contributing to a humanitarian crisis not seen in Europe since the Yugoslav civil wars of the 1990s. In the four years since the conflict began, territory in eastern Ukraine has been won, lost and won again, always at great cost. Current estimates number casualties at more than 10,000 with one-third of them being civilians, including 166 Ukrainian children. As a former light infantryman from...

Human beings (and Americans are no exception) like their heroes and villains easily identifiable and the explanation of historical events simple. As such, both Republicans and Democrats have built easily digestible historical narratives regarding American political history since the Civil War. Peculiarly, there seems to be a debate about who gets to own the legacy of Abraham Lincoln. On the left, the meandering and incoherent narrative goes like this. Lincoln and his mighty Union army launched a war against the racist, slave-holding Confederacy to rid America of the abominable institution of slavery and make equal citizens of the former slaves....

‘We will not allow anarchy to reign on our campuses’ The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill will re-install a toppled monument to a Confederate soldier on its campus, a decision the university announced several days after a shrieking mob tore it down from its pedestal and vandalized it. The decision was announced by Thom Goolsby, a member of the university’s Board of Governors, who said that the monument will be reinstated as required by state law, according to the news website Wavy.com. “Criminals who destroyed state property at UNC and police who did nothing will be held accountable,”...

The bombshell letter of “testimony” written by Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, the former apostolic nuncio to the United States, regarding the Vatican’s handling of sexual misconduct allegations against the disgraced former Archbishop of Washington, DC, Theodore McCarrick, has raised more forcefully than ever several questions, including: what did McCarrick’s successor, Cardinal Donald Wuerl, know – and when did he know it? (Snip) Archdiocesan spokesman Ed McFadden confirmed for the Catholic Herald that Cardinal Wuerl did, in fact, cancel the event “at the nuncio’s request”.

Vote Howard Friedman for Orange-Osceola circuit court judge. Please! Do not allow incompetent, boorish Jeff Ashton become a judge of the good people of central Florida! Ashton was instrumental as Casey Anthony's prosecuting attorney in letting the murderer of her own child get off Scot free!! Howard is a great friend and a fantastic judge and attorney. He has been a magistrate for over 14 years hearing domestic type cases so he is very experienced at discerning lies. HOWARD FRIEDMAN - YES! Jeff Ashton - NO! NO! NO!

President Trump endorsed Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey (R) on Monday ahead of the state's primaries. "Governor Doug Ducey of Arizona is doing a great job. It would be really nice to show your support tomorrow by voting for him in Tuesdays Primary," Trump tweeted. "Doug is strong on Crime, the Border, and our Second Amendment. Loves our Military & our Vets. He has my full and complete Endorsement." The endorsement came in a string of tweets, in which Trump doubled down on his support of Rep. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.), who's seeking the Florida governor's mansion, and Florida Gov. Rick Scott...

[This list has been posted before, but this version includes Mr. Surber's astute comments on each horror story.] Jonathan Swan at Axios posted, "Congressional Republicans are getting ready for hell." Hell being a Democratic Party takeover of the House. Swan wrote, "Axios has obtained a spreadsheet that's circulated through Republican circles on and off Capitol Hill — including at least one leadership office — that meticulously previews the investigations Democrats will likely launch if they flip the House." His list of probes (with my comments parenthetically): President Trump’s tax returns (Democrats have had them all along; Obama politicized the IRS...

1776: Five days after 15,000 British soldiers land on Long Island, Gen. William Howe's forces attack the Patriots garrisoned at Brooklyn Heights. Gen. George Washington's troops are flanked by the Redcoats during the first major battle of the Revolutionary War and suffer some 2,000 casualties before retreating to their redoubt at Brooklyn. Rather than press the attack and smash the rebellion, Howe ordered his troops to prepare for a siege. However, in two days, the entire 10,000-man army slips through the Royal Navy stationed along the East River and evacuates (with their arms and supplies) to Manhattan. Washington is the...

Sheriff's deputies in California conducted a traffic stop and discovered 800 pounds of stolen lemons in a man's car. Photo courtesy of the Riverside County Sheriff's Office ===================================================================== Aug. 27 (UPI) -- A California sheriff's office said deputies conducting a traffic stop arrested a man found to be transporting 800 pounds of stolen lemons. The Riverside County Sheriff's Office said Thermal Station Deputies assigned to the Southern Coachella Valley Community Services District Team were investigating a string of recent agricultural thefts when they conducted the traffic stop Friday. The sheriff's office said Los Angeles resident Dioncio Fierros, 69, was found...

As I watch John McCain’s presidential campaign degenerate into a dark, disgraceful display of veiled racism unworthy of the hero who suffered in Vietnam, I’m reminded of the late J.J. “Jake” Pickle, the venerable congressman who represented Central Texas from 1963 to 1995, and a story he once told me about the toughest vote of his career.

Sen. John McCain, in a final message to the United States written before his death, said the country will emerge from its current political environment "stronger than before." "Do not despair of our present difficulties. We believe always in the promise and greatness of America," the Republican senator and former GOP presidential nominee wrote in a letter read by advisor Rick Davis on Monday. McCain, a longtime lawmaker from Arizona, died Saturday at age 81 after a struggle with brain cancer.

NEW YORK (AP) — The government’s top official overseeing the $1.5 trillion student loan market resigned in protest on Monday, citing what he says is the White House’s open hostility toward protecting the nation’s millions of student loan borrowers. Seth Frotman will be stepping down as student loan ombudsman at the end of the week, according to his resignation letter, which was obtained by The Associated Press. He held that position since 2016, but has been with Consumer Financial Protection Bureau since its inception in 2011. Frotman is the latest high-level departure from the CFPB since Mick Mulvaney, President Donald...

From October 2 to 4, 2018, Fr. Bryan Massingale will lead "a retreat for gay priests, brothers, and deacons" at Siena Retreat Center in Racine, Wisconsin, in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee. The Siena Retreat Center is overseen by the Racine Dominican Sisters. The retreat is sponsored by the dissident pro-gay marriage group New Ways Ministry. Later this year, on November 16-18, 2018, the Siena Retreat Center will also host a conference for "lesbian sisters, congregational leaders, and vocation & formation ministers." The speakers include Cristina L.H. Traina, the chair of religious studies at Northwestern University. Traina is a member of...

Embattled NBC News Chairman Andy Lack is facing the boot from the once-prestigious news division over his mishandling of a series of #MeToo scandals and the Megyn Kelly debacle, sources exclusively confirmed to Page Six. Comcast chiefs have been seeking a replacement for Lack, 71, who is on the ropes after the downfall of his once close-friend Matt Lauer, the Brian Williams wreckage and allegations against legendary anchor Tom Brokaw. And there’s still-lingering questions about why NBC News sat on the infamous “Access Hollywood” “Grab em by the p?-?-?-?y” Donald Trump tape, and why they refused to run Ronan Farrow’s...

Sen. John McCain provides intimate details of how he obtained the infamous so-called Steele dossier in his new book, "The Restless Wave." The Republican senator was attending an annual security conference in Halifax, Nova Scotia shortly after the presidential election in November 2016 when retired a British diplomat approached him. According to McCain, he didn't recall ever having a previous conversation with Sir Andrew Wood, but may have met him before in passing. Chris Brose, a staff member on the Senate Armed Services Committee, and David Kramer, a former assistant secretary of state with Russian expertise, joined McCain and Wood...

Jacksonville mass shooter David Katz, 24, was a Redditor who hated Trump supporters and mocked "mericans" as "retarded." "You trumptards seriously can never stop amazing everyone with how mentally challenged you guys are," Katz wrote late last year on the Pro-Donald Trump r/The_Donald subreddit under the name "ravenchamps."

A federal judge on Monday granted a preliminary injunction to a coalition of states seeking to block a Texas-based company from posting online blueprints for how to make 3D-printed guns. The ruling by U.S. District Judge Robert S. Lasnik followed an initial temporary restraining order he granted in late July that blocked the federal government from implementing terms of a settlement the company, Defense Distributed, struck with the State Department earlier this year that would have allowed founder Cody Wilson to start posting the files again. The ruling Monday means the blockade will continue while the judge considers the broader...