Free Republic

In response to IRS officials today admitting that its agents actively targeted Tea Party groups for increased scrutiny during the 2012 election, TheTeaParty.net, the nation’s largest Tea Party group, and a subject of IRS inquiries over the past year, issued the following statement...

Media critic Howard Kurtz used his CNN show on Sunday to point a finger at himself, apologizing for a story on gay basketball player Jason Collins that he said was riddled with errors and shouldn’t have been written in the first place. The extraordinary edition of CNN’s “Reliable Sources” contained not only his apology but also a session with two other media critics who sharply questioned Kurtz’s credibility. Kurtz wrote in The Daily Beast that Collins, the NBA center who made headlines last week by being the first active player in one of the four major U.S. pro sports leagues...

While the left lectures Americans about the historic breakthrough made by NBA free agent Jason Collins in announcing his sexuality and calls for well-deserved tolerance, they are on full-out attack against ESPN commentator Chris Broussard for expressing his Christian views. And now ESPN has been forced to apologize. ### In response to all this leftist tolerance, ESPN dutifully released a statement apologizing for Broussard’s comments: “We regret that a respectful discussion of personal viewpoints became a distraction from today’s news. ESPN is fully committed to diversity and welcomes Jason Collins’ announcement.” Naturally, Buzzfeed’s Kate Arthur ripped ESPN anyway for not...

Reese Witherspoon said she is "deeply embarrassed" about what she said to police during the arrest of her and her husband during a traffic stop in Atlanta. "Do you know my name?" Witherspoon is quoted as asking the state trooper who stopped the couple. She also said, "You're about to find out who I am" and "You're about to be on national news," according to the arrest report. The Oscar-winning actress released a statement late Sunday apologizing for her behavior to police

Rep. Ralph Hall, the oldest member of the Texas congressional delegation, and Rep. Pete Gallego, its newest member, spoke for their Texas colleagues in the aftermath of the explosions at the Boston Marathon. "My thoughts and prayers are with those in Boston." - Rep. Hall #prayforboston 9:17 PM - 15 Apr 13 Pete Gallego ✔ @RepPeteGallego Listening 2 details re Boston Marathon bombs. Evil like that still boggles my mind. God always sees the truth. Justice comes. 8:55 PM - 15 Apr 13 Rep. Steve Stockman, a Republican from Friendswood, shared those sentiments. Rep. Steve Stockman @SteveWorks4You Please pray for...

Albany Think like a Nazi, the assignment required students. Argue why Jews are evil. Students in some Albany High School English classes were asked this week as part of a persuasive writing assignment to make an abhorrent argument: "You must argue that Jews are evil, and use solid rationale from government propaganda to convince me of your loyalty to the Third Reich!" Students were asked to watch and read Nazi propaganda, then pretend their teacher was a Nazi government official who needed to be convinced of their loyalty. In five paragraphs, they were required to prove that

President Barack Obama called California Attorney General Kamala Harris from Air Force One Thursday to apologize for calling her the "best-looking attorney general in the country." The remarks, made during a fundraiser in California yesterday, sparked a swift backlash among political commentators. New York magazine's Jonathan Chait called the remark "disgraceful," and Los Angeles Times columnist Robin Abcarian characterized it as "more wolfish than sexist." Clearly, Obama's handlers recognized they had a problem on their hands, and Obama called Harris a few hours later to apologize, according to White House Press Secretary Jay Carney. “You know, they are old friends...

Dr. Ben Carson on Friday apologized to Johns Hopkins University for “poorly chosen” comments he made last week in which he seemed to compare gay relationships to pedophilia and bestiality. The pediatric neurosurgeon’s message to the Hopkins community came after a top university official issued a statement calling Carson’s words “offensive” and saying he would meet with students who want Carson removed as commencement speaker.

So Sorry.

March 25, 2013 CBS APOLOGIZES TO VETERANS FOLLOWING ‘ANTI-AMERICAN’ EPISODE OF ‘THE AMAZING RACE’ Billy Hallowell CBS has issued an apology over an episode of its series “The Amazing Race� that was decried by some for being “anti-American.� During last week’s show, a number of images and occurrences led to outrage among critics. In addition to visiting a “B-52 Memorial� in Hanoi, Vietnam, contestants were seen watching children sing about socialism while standing in front of a picture of communist leader Ho Chi Minh.The show brought contestants to the memorial — the spot where an American B-52 was shot down...

Florida Atlantic University has issued an apology for a classroom assignment that involving students writing the name “Jesus” on a sheet of paper and then stomping on the paper. The university also said the lesson will never again be used. “We sincerely apologize for any offense this has caused,” the university said in a prepared statement. “Florida Atlantic University respects all religions and welcomes people of all faiths, backgrounds and beliefs.” The university initially defended the Christ-bashing lesson which is included textbook titled, “Intercultural Communication: A Contextual Approach, 5th Edition.” Fox News obtained a synopsis of the lesson taught by...

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu expressed satisfaction on Friday with Israel’s apology for the 2010 Mavi Marmara incident. Davutoglu, who just recently hinted there was a “secret deal” between Israel and Syria, said that all of Turkey's fundamental demands had been met with the apology. Earlier, Netanyahu spoke on the phone with his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and apologized for the deaths of nine Turks during Israel’s 2010 raid on a Gaza-bound flotilla. Channel 10 News reported on Friday the details of the agreement between Israel and Turkey. Netanyahu, in addition to the apology, has agreed to compensate the...

The key bit comes at 2:00 of the video below. We all knew McCain was taking a lot of heat politically for dumping on Paul after his filibuster but I never would have guessed it was enough to squeeze an apology out of him. Good lord. How many times in his life, do you suppose, has Maverick apologized to a libertarian? Either he’s planning to run again for Senate in 2016 and wants to hedge his bets against a Paulian primary uprising in Arizona or he’s come to his senses and realized that his nastiness is doing the interventionist cause...

ROCKVILLE, Md. (CBSDC) – Vice President Joe Biden’s press office has apologized to the University of Maryland following “pure intimidation” demands for a student journalist to delete photos he took of a domestic violence event featuring Biden.

According to Cal Thomas, well-known nationally syndicated columnist, Dr. Ben Carson owes President Obama an apology. Dr. Carson spoke this past week at the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington -- a bipartisan annual event held since 1953, attended by members of Congress and usually the president. President and Mrs. Obama were present this year, and Thomas feels that Dr. Carson was out of line for including in his remarks areas considered public policy -- our national debt, our tax system, our publics schools, our health care. According to Thomas: "Our politics have become so polarized and corrupted that a president...

A former member of the Westboro Baptist Church--a fringe group based in Topeka, Kansas that pickets soldiers' funerals--apologized to the mother of a 21-year-old soldier killed in Afghanistan on a talk show Wednesday. Libby Phelps Alvarez, the former Westboro member, apologized to Sherry and Randy Wyatt for picketing the funerals of fallen soldiers like their son on Anderson Live Wednesday. Alvarez is the granddaughter of Fred Phelps, the group's founder, and has recently left the group. (Other members of the shrinking group have recently publicly defected as well.) "I just feel sad...and, I'm sorry," Alvarez said. "I thought I was...

Chuck Hagel's Record On Gay Rights 1996: ... says he would have voted for the Defense of Marriage Act 1999: ... opposes repealing the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy 2005: ... Hagel calls on the [Nebraska] court to reverse its decidsion, complaining the court had overridden Nebraska voters who opposed gay marriage Chuck Hagel's Apology: Too Little, Too Late Log Cabin Republicans ...

On New Year’s Day, several on-duty plain clothes officers were dining at a Belleville, Ill. Denny’s, when a customer complained to the manager that one of the officers was carrying a gun. The Denny’s manager told the officer she would have to leave or put the gun in her car, as guns are not allowed on their premises. “It’s absolutely a slap in the face I totally agree it’s completely disrespectful,” Belleville Police Captain Don sax said in a KTVI Fox2 report. “I’ve never known anybody that didn’t want a police officer present in an establishment in a business...

The Foreign Ministry has launched a probe into the posting of a Facebook message by the Israel embassy in Ireland that said if Jesus and Mary were alive today in Bethlehem, they would probably be lynched by local Arabs. Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said, "We all agree that it was improper, inappropriate." He said Tuesday that it wasn't clear who posted the message. The post included a picture of Jesus and Mary accompanied by a message saying, “A thought for Christmas ... If Jesus and Mother Mary were alive today, they would, as Jews without security, probably end up being...

My son has been deployed overseas the past two years. My wife and I pray every day for his safety and for the safety of all of America’s sons and daughters serving in the nation’s military. That’s why I find offensive the music video in which Korean pop star PSY appeared in which he wished death upon our men and women in uniform. Like my 23-year-old son, the only child with which my wife and I have been blessed. It’s also why I am angry that PSY has not been disinvited to an upcoming Christmas concert for President Obama, whom,...

<p>He did indeed perform for the troops on Leno’s Thanksgiving show; skip to 3:25 of the first clip below and watch him do the horse dance with full military backing. That looks twice as surreal today as it did then and it looked darned surreal at the time, but his PR team will use it to full effect to buy him some forgiveness with the public. He’ll get leeway too from the fact that he is, after all, the goofy horse-dance guy. A musician known for more introspective work would be held to full account for his political opinions but this is a bit like finding out that LMFAO thinks 9/11 is an inside job. (They don’t. I’m speaking hypothetically.) Between that and the fact that he apologized, sort of, for how the song “could be interpreted,� Obama’s spokesman felt safe enough to say this afternoon that O still plans on attending the upcoming TNT benefit concert at which Psy is scheduled to perform. Fearless prediction: That’ll change if people are still talking about this on Monday, not so much in terms of POTUS’s attendance as Psy’s.</p>

PSY is backtracking on that invisible horse of his. The hugely successful “Gangnam Style” rapper shocked many earlier today when anti-American statements he made at a protest concert in 2004 came to light. Among the incendiary lyrics: “Kill those f—king Yankees who have been torturing Iraqi captives/Kill those f—king Yankees who ordered them to torture/Kill their daughters, mothers, daughter-in-law and fathers/Kill them all slowly and painfully.” …

It only took 40 years. But finally, actress-turned-workout-specialist Jane Fonda has apologized for sitting on a Viet Cong anti-aircraft gun during her 1972 visit to North Vietnam. Fonda, who used her fame to push her radical leftism during her heyday, traveled to Hanoi in 1972 in solidarity with the Viet Cong. While there, she proceeded to blame the US for supposedly bombing a dike system, and did a series of radio broadcasts stating that US leaders were “war criminals.” Those broadcasts were replayed for American POWs being tortured by the Viet Cong. Later, when POWs spoke about their experiences of...

William F. Buckley once noted that he was 19 when the Cold War began at the Yalta conference. The year the Berlin Wall came down, he became a senior citizen. In other words, he explained, anti-Communism was a defining feature of conservatism his entire adult life. Domestically, meanwhile, the right was largely a "leave me alone coalition": Religious and traditional conservatives, overtaxed businessmen, Western libertarians, and others fed up with government social engineering and economic folly. The foreign policy battle against tyrannical statism abroad only buttressed the domestic antagonism toward well-intentioned and occasionally democratic statism at home. The end of...

Sorry, fact checkers at Associated Press: you are wrong about Barack Obama’s claim that Mitt Romney’s accusation that Obama went on an “apology tour” was a “whopper” (of a lie). You sniffed, “Romney has repeatedly and wrongly accused the president of traveling the world early in his presidency and apologizing for U.S. behavior. Obama didn’t say ‘sorry’ in those travels.” An “Apology Tour” does not mean Obama had to literally say the word "sorry" during those visits. But as my Guide Book on Obama’s 2009 Cairo speech details, on numerous stops Obama said things like America “has shown arrogance” (Strasbourg,...

President Barack Obama has finished the second leg of his international confession tour. In less than 100 days, he has apologized on three continents for what he views as the sins of America and his predecessors. Mr. Obama told the French (the French!) that America "has shown arrogance and been dismissive, even derisive" toward Europe. In Prague, he said America has "a moral responsibility to act" on arms control because only the U.S. had "used a nuclear weapon." In London, he said that decisions about the world financial system were no longer made by "just Roosevelt and Churchill sitting in...

Romney for President released a new television advertisement titled “Apology Tour.” After taking office in 2009, President Barack Obama went on an apology tour around the world. He even said that America had “dictated” to other nations. Last night Mitt Romney responded, “Mr. President, America doesn’t dictate to other nations; we have freed other nations from dictators.”

Yesterday, the President and Secretary of State of the United States of America went on Pakistani television to apologize. In a commercial containing clips from their Washington press conferences, subtitled in Urdu, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton said “sorry” to the mad hordes attacking the American embassy in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad and deplored the infamous anti-Muslim14-minute YouTube video. “We absolutely reject its content and message,” said Clinton in the advertisements, which ended with the seal of the American embassy in Pakistan. U.S. taxpayers footed the bill for this high-level official apology to the tune of $70,000. This is...

Tanden, now president of the Center for American Progress, suggested in her mea culpa that it was a poor choice of words. "I was trying to say how President Obama, who I admire greatly, is a private person, but I deeply regret how I said it. I apologize," she wrote. There was another revealing part of her interview that she didn't address in her apology. Tanden also suggested that the president's renewing relations with Clinton was not genuine, but rather a calculated political move. “Obama engineered this reconciliation, and I think the whole time he was, like, ‘Why do I...

Teacher in T-shirt case reads letter at assembly Within hours of Samantha Pawlucy's return to Charles Carroll High School, the teacher she said publicly humiliated her over a Romney T-shirt returned as well, reading from a letter at a brief assembly. Lynette Gaymon, Pawlucy's former geometry teacher, visited the school Tuesday morning, the district's spokesperson confirmed. The teacher read from a letter she wrote, originally distributed to teachers with the intention of having it read aloud to students, a person attending the assembly said. Instead, the teacher came to the Port Richmond school to personally address students. "What I meant...

David Limbaugh: Obama 'is psychologically incapable of admitting his mistakes' Do you know what’s scarier than the possibility President Obama could be re-elected? It’s that in a second term, he would double down on his failed policies. Don’t take my word for it; he’s admitted it on the campaign stump. In a speech to his fellow cultural icons in Hollywood, he said, “Everything we fought for in 2008 is on the line here in 2012. And I need your help to finish what we started. … We’ve come too far to turn back now.” Note that Obama did not say...

The president of Priority Chevrolet apologized Wednesday for the arrest of a customer in June whom the dealership mistakenly undercharged for an SUV and who resisted the company's efforts to get him to sign a new, costlier contract. Dennis Ellmer said he's heard from Chesapeake police that one of his managers told an officer that Danny Sawyer of Chesapeake had stolen a 2012 Chevrolet Traverse. "I owe Mr. Sawyer a big apology," said Ellmer, who manages the entire Priority Auto Group - which includes 11 dealerships in Virginia and North Carolina. He said his staff erred when they sold the...

A top Cherokee official demanded today that U.S. Sen. Scott Brown apologize for his campaign staff’s “uneducated, unenlightened and racist portrayal” of Native Americans in an online video shot at a campaign event in Dorchester over the weekend. “The Cherokee Nation is disappointed in and denounces the disrespectful actions of staffers and supporters of Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown,” Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Bill John Baker said in a statement. “The conduct of these individuals goes far beyond what is appropriate and proper in political discourse. The use of stereotypical ‘war whoop chants’ and ‘tomahawk chops’ are offensive and downright racist....

A Pennsylvania school district has apologized and made significant changes to a high school marching band’s halftime show that commemorated the Russian Revolution with red flags, military-style outfits and giant hammers and sickles. The New Oxford High School Marching band’s show will no longer be called “St. Petersburg: 1917″ and the performance will no longer include the hammers and sickles, according to a statement from Rebecca Harbaugh, the superintendent for the Conewago Valley School District.

(AP) TEHRAN, Iran - A senior commander in Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guard warned that Iran will target U.S. bases in the region in the event of war with Israel, raising the prospect of a broader conflict that would force other countries to get involved, Iranian state television reported Sunday. The comments by Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, who heads the Guard's aerospace division, came amid tension over Iran's nuclear program and Israel's suggestion that it might unilaterally strike Iranian nuclear facilities to scuttle what the United States and its allies believe are efforts to build a bomb. Tehran says its nuclear...

I strolled into my neighborhood Hallmark store looking for an appropriate card to send to some Middle East Muslims expressing my condolences for grievances they may have against my country and against Jews who might have offended them throughout the years. I saw the birthday cards, the grieving cards, those celebrating weddings, and others, but none fit my search. Neither did the clerk recall ever having seen such a card. I called her attention to the many apologies that President Obama has made to Muslims, and she agreed that there would seem to be a need for cards of this...

September 22, 2012 OBAMA TO CONDEMN CHRISTIAN FILMMAKER BEFORE UNITED NATIONS John Nolte Not only are we seeing the White House and State Department call more attention to the Mohammed-mocking "Innocence of Muslims" than any terrorist network ever could've hoped for, but the President's indefensible scapegoating of the film and filmmaker to draw attention and blame away from U.S. security failures apparently knows no bounds. Next week, Obama will denounce the film in a speech before the United Nations General Assembly:National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor previews the president's speech to the UN General Assembly next week: "UNGA always provides...

Obama Record: Four Americans are killed in Libya, our consulate burned and our Egyptian embassy stormed on the anniversary of 9/11 after we apologize for a film allegedly "insulting to Islam." Arab Spring, Mr. President? Maybe President Obama shouldn't have skipped all those national intelligence briefings. The burning of our Libyan consulate in Benghazi, the murder of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three others, including two U.S. Marines, and the storming of our embassy in Egypt after our diplomats apologized for a film made in the U.S. should show just who is the foreign policy novice in the 2012 presidential...

Bush Doctrine vs. Obama Doctrine: Preemptive Action vs. Preemptive Apology Preemptive Self Defense vs. Preemptive Self Deprecation Preemptive Use of Force vs. Preemptive Saving Face Preemptive Strike vs. Preemptive "Soooorry" Premeptive Defense vs. Preemptive Deflection Preemptive Attack vs. Preemptive Attack on Republicans Anyone care to add more?

Embassy Attacks: As our Mideast policy once again crashes and burns, the president promises a tough response at a Las Vegas fundraiser and the press coordinates attacks on the candidate who says our emperor has no clothes. If the scenes in Benghazi and Cairo seem eerily familiar, they should. They are similar to the days before our embassy in Tehran was seized in 1979 and held for 444 days, the rotten fruit of a policy that deposed a loyal friend in the name of human rights and instead brought the world a government of, by and for fanatics in Iran...

Obama Record: Four Americans are killed in Libya, our consulate burned and our Egyptian embassy stormed on the anniversary of 9/11 after we apologize for a film allegedly "insulting to Islam." Arab Spring, Mr. President? Maybe President Obama shouldn't have skipped all those national intelligence briefings. The burning of our Libyan consulate in Benghazi, the murder of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three others, including two U.S. Marines, and the storming of our embassy in Egypt after our diplomats apologized for a film made in the U.S. should show just who is the foreign policy novice in the 2012 presidential...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: So we're waiting. We're waiting to see what the new Egyptian government does, how they react to the incident. All you need to know is that the new president of Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood guy (Morsi is his name), has demanded that our government prosecute the filmmakers. We're learning more about the filmmaker. It's some kook. It's a freak. It's a longtime troublemaker. He ought not be given the time of day, and the fact of the matter is that this is not about the movie. I do believe that the masses in Egypt and in Benghazi...

Hillary from the US-DOS: SOS is basically repackaging the original Cairo Embassy apology. Via a weak attempt to explain the US First Amendment to "offended muslims"... ...As she loudly disdains "the film" that caused the riots. Contributor/analyst comments: "The two-parts pandering... ...one-part outrage (at the film-makers)"

A timeline of yesterday's events shows that it took the Obama administration 16 hours to disavow a statement posted on the US Embassy in Cairo website. It appears that the administration's failure to correct the embassy and the doubling down by embassy staff 13 hours after the statement was published prompted Mitt Romney's curt comments about the administration's response. Here is a partial timeline of events. All times are Eastern Standard Time (EST), 6 hours earlier than Cairo time. 5:50AM - Cairo Embassy publishes a statement on its website which rejects those who "abuse" free speech. This is a reference...

Mitt Romney has criticized the Obama administration’s craven response to today’s embassy attacks: >>>I’m outraged by the attacks on American diplomatic missions in Libya and Egypt and by the death of an American consulate worker in Benghazi. It’s disgraceful that the Obama Administration’s first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks.<<< Meanwhile an Obama administration official told Politico that, >>>the statement by Embassy Cairo was not cleared by Washington and does not reflect the views of the United States government.<<< Which raises the question, How? Are we to...

Via Daily Caller: “That statement is an embarrassment. That is a hostage statement. That’s a mob of al-Qaeda sympathizers in Egypt, forcing the United States make a statement essentially of apology, on 9/11 of all days, for something we’re not responsible. I would issue a statement saying to the mob, ‘go to hell.’ The way America works, the way democracy works is that everybody has a right to express themselves. We don’t police our speech. And you ought to apologize to the United States for storming the embassy and the violation of the ultimate sacred principle of democracy, which is...

The White House is disavowing a statement from their own Cairo embassy that apologized for anti-Muslim activity in the United States. "The statement by Embassy Cairo was not cleared by Washington and does not reflect the views of the United States government," a senior administration official told POLITICO. The U.S. embassy in Cairo put out a statement early Tuesday that apologized for an anti-Muslim film being circulated by an Israeli-American real estate developer. "The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims – as we condemn efforts...

Shortly after the court in Norway sentenced Anders Behring Breivik, who murdered 77 people just over a year ago, to 21 years in prison, he apologized for not having murdered more people. Asked whether he intends to appeal the sentence that was handed down to him, Breivik said, “Since I do not recognize the authority of the court, I cannot recognize the legitimacy of the punishment it gave me. Accordingly, I cannot appeal.” When he was asked on Friday whether he wants to apologize or express remorse for his actions, Breivik responded, “I definitely want to apologize. I apologize to...

Prediction: If the GOP establishment doesn’t follow Republican Rep. Todd Akin’s example with a big, fat apology – to Akin – the whole party goes down in flames come November. I don’t mean every Republican will lose, but there is great political peril in not sealing the hole in Republican armor that has opened in Missouri and instead permitting it to remain a Democratic pressure point. Further, “for the good of the country” (the mantra accompanying the party-wide chorus of pleas to Akin to drop out of his U.S. Senate race), Republicans must resume funding Akin’s viable campaign ASAP, after...