Free Republic

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio is defending his participation in the Gang of Eight’s immigration bill efforts, saying he knows it won’t win him any “parades” among conservatives, but it’s necessary. Speaking Wednesday night with Fox News’s Sean Hannity, Rubio said he understands why conservatives are skeptical of immigration reform. “Look, it’s obvious I didn’t do this for political gain. This is not something that’s going to gain me any parades. People are frustrated, and I do understand it. What I hope they understand is that I studied this issue carefully for almost two years and I concluded that what we...

I’m beginning to realize that we are performing a major injustice when we call all of the events of the past year “scandals”. Scandals are what soap operas base their story lines off of. Scandals are actions of a President and his intern in the Oval Office. I will even admit that breaking into a private office to search for dirt on your opponent can be considered a scandal. However, what we are talking about with this administration is the infringement of American's constitutional rights, the use of the government to target our own citizens, and most importantly, the death...

The Senate voted 82-15 on Tuesday to end debate on a motion to proceed to a comprehensive immigration reform bill. The Senate is expected to continue work on the Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act throughout June. The next vote will be held at 4 p.m. on Tuesday — that will be on the actual motion to proceed to the bill. The four Republican members of the Gang of Eight — Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), John McCain (R-Ariz.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Jeff Flake (R- Ariz.) — were joined by more than 20 other GOP senators in voting...

In a Spanish-language interview Sunday with the network Univision, Sen. Marco Rubio, the leading Republican on the Gang of Eight comprehensive immigration reform group, made his strongest statement yet that legalization of the nation’s estimated 11 million illegal immigrants must happen before any new border security or internal enforcement measures are in place, and will in no way be conditional on any security requirements. “Let’s be clear,” Rubio said. “Nobody is talking about preventing the legalization. The legalization is going to happen. That means the following will happen: First comes the legalization. Then come the measures to secure the border....

Do not suppose that your enemies will be placated by your surrender. You will be pressured to accept openly homosexual scoutmasters, then “transgender” girls who say they are boys or the Prince of Wales or male aliens from Alpha Centauri 3, then girls generally for all your programs, as they’ve done in Canada, only to see their membership go the way of the Church of Canada, since no one will stand up for someone who stands for nothing. 
 You have betrayed your friends to assuage your enemies. May they treat you more handsomely than you have treated us.

“A confidential message from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, reproduced in [Diana] West’s new book, told [White House aide Harry] Hopkins that a ‘continuing’ investigation had discovered that Russian diplomat (and Comintern agent) Vasily Zarubin had made a payment to U.S. Communist Party official Steve Nelson to help place espionage agents ‘in industries engaged in secret war production … so that information could be obtained for transmittal to the Soviet Union.’ This information had come from a ‘bug’ at Nelson’s home in Oakland, California, through which the FBI first learned of the Soviet effort (code-named ‘Enormous’) to obtain the atomic...

... ...Slideshow and Video In the face of what has been happening to our military, the humiliation of our soldiers, the needless blood that has been shed by an enemy we are forbidden to name, we MUST remember when sacrifice meant something; when defeating our enemies was job one. The many whose sacrifices and courage kept us free are leaving us much too quickly and with sadness in their hearts wondering what their sacrifice was for. Remember them this anniversary of D Day and honor them because we are not likely to be allowed to win the victories they...

It seems very odd that the MSM would be participating so vigorously in the reporting on the various scandals that have exploded on the scene since mid last week. I've seen numerous comments scattered about skeptical of the motives behind this uncharacteristic attack by the MSM on the Obama administration. Buried within the Benghazi debacle is information that I believe this administration has carefully kept as obscure as they possibly could for years now, and are now muddying the waters in an effort to keep commentary on the core nature of the Benghazi situation minimalized. The subject they wish to...

The mishandling of Benghazi undermined a prominent Muslim moderate. A significant point made in riveting testimony by Gregory Hicks, the State Department’s former deputy chief of mission in Libya, has largely been missed in the coverage of Wenesday’s Benghazi hearing. It is worth highlighting, not least because doing so illuminates the depth of the Obama administration’s depravity. In its assiduous effort to defraud the American people, for 2012-campaign purposes, into believing that the Benghazi massacre was provoked by an anti-Islamic Internet video — rather than having been a coordinated jihadist attack that undermined President Obama’s claim to have decimated al-Qaeda...

NAVY SEAL TEAM VI FAMILIES TO REVEAL GOVERNMENT’S CULPABILITY IN DEATH OF THEIR SONS IN FATAL HELICOPTER CRASH IN AFGHANISTAN FOLLOWING SUCCESSFUL RAID ON BIN LADEN’S COMPOUND DATE: MAY 9, 2013 PLACE: NATIONAL PRESS CLUB (HOLEMAN LOUNGE) TIME: 9:30 AM-11:30 AM (Washington, D.C.). Three families of Navy SEAL Team 6 special forces servicemen, along with one family of an Army National Guardsman, will appear at a press conference on May 9, 2013, to disclose never before revealed information about how and why their sons along with 26 others died in a fatal helicopter crash in Afghanistan on August 6, 2011,...

Taxed Enough Already? This new tax increase – the internet sales tax – must be stopped in the House. The Senate just passed it, and many Senators want to justify their tax increase vote by claiming that it will somehow “level the playing field” for brick and mortar retailers. This isn’t legit. This is actually a boon to the big online powerhouses like Amazon who can afford the insane paperwork that comes with complying with government’s newest tax. The smaller mid-size online operations and smaller brick and mortar businesses, many family-owned with small staffs, who want to have larger online...

I want my money back. Last October, I gave $2,500 to support Heidi Heitkamp’s campaign to become North Dakota’s junior senator. A few weeks later, she won a surprise victory. I have had a long career in government and politics, but I don’t donate heavily to political campaigns. When I contribute, it’s because I know the candidate well or am really impressed with the person. Heidi Heitkamp was one of the latter: She struck me as strong-willed, principled and an independent thinker. But this week, Heitkamp betrayed those hopes. She voted to block legislation to make gun background checks more...

Sellout is worse than the Feinstein gun ban! Urgent action required. It is urgent that every gun owner call their Senators today and demand that they oppose the “See a Shrink, Lose your Guns” sell-out bill that is being authored by Senators Pat Toomey (R) and Joe Manchin (D) - but which also has Chuck Schumer’s fingerprints all over it. See a Shrink, Lose your Guns. The anti-gun ”ranters” have spent the last week telling us that Republican Senators can’t filibuster Harry Reid’s gun control bill; that they can’t cut off debate to a bill they haven’t seen yet. “Let...

[Summary: To dumb down the public schools, our elite educators often rely on sophistry.] Disingenuous. Paradox. Counterintuitive. Sophistry. Counterproductive. These five words always fascinated me. They suggest unexpected warps in a common-sense grasp of the world. Something is out of kilter, weird, defective, or whacko. American public education in the 20th century--which has been characterized as “deliberate dumbing down”--is impossible to discuss without constant recourse to these quirky words. They point to deception, but done with art and flair. Rod Sterling captured the resulting sense of disorientation: “You unlock this door...Beyond it is another dimension....You’re moving into a land of...

Rush Limbaugh on his radio show discussed an article which stated that there is no respected voice in the national arena articulating conservatism. Such an advocate for conservatism is crucial to reversing the direction of America as Obama drives us toward socialism while low-info voters gleefully sing Kumbaya in the backseat. Well excuse me for pointing out the obvious, but we had an extraordinary advocate for conservatism, and look what happened to her. Judas on our side betrayed her -- sold her reputation for 30 seconds of fame and favor with the media. Even now, folks on our side are...

Republic of Korea: For the record. Pak Ku'n-hye (Park Geun-hye) of the New Frontier Party won South Korea's presidential election on 19 December, media reported. She is the daughter of Park Chung-hee and the first woman elected to be president of the Republic of Korea. That should confound the North! North Korea-Iran: According to a Japanese news service, an Iranian lawmaker told the service that North Korea informed Iran in October of its plan to launch a satellite. The head of an Iranian parliamentary delegation to North Korea, Hamid Reza Taraghi, revealed talks took place mid-October with the North's delegates...

President Obama fired back at critics who have accused his administration of orchestrating a cover up over the September attacks in Libya. “I do take offense with some suggestion that in any way, we haven’t tried to make sure that the American people knew as the information was coming in what we believed," Obama told MSNBC's "Morning Joe" in an interview that aired Monday. (snip) “If we find out we that there was a big breakdown, and somebody didn’t do their job, they’ll be held accountable,” Obama said. “Ultimately, as commander-in-chief, I’m responsible, and I don’t shy away from that...

Reaching Out To Illegal Immigrants A Core Strategy For LAPD Chief LAPD Chief Charlie Beck's policies involving illegal immigrants have made him a lightning rod for criticism. He says his approach "makes absolute law enforcement sense. Any one of these things I’ve done is directly tied to public safety.” (Anne Cusack / Los Angeles Times / April 7, 2011) By Joel Rubin October 23, 2012 A decade ago, Charlie Beck watched as William J. Bratton arrived in Los Angeles and began rebuilding a department deeply tarnished by the Rodney King beating, riots and corruption scandals. Bratton made many changes as...

A new American Jewish Committee poll conducted in September found that Israel came in a distant fourth among issues that registered Jewish voters listed as "most important" to them, with 61.5% listing the economy, 16.1% listing health care, 4.7% listing abortion, and 4.5% listing US-Israel relations. Just 1.3% named Iran’s nuclear program as most important. It is shocking that for Jews in the US the right to an abortion, which is a 40 year old federally protected right ingrained in American society, is a more important issue than the Jewish state and the real existential threat Israel is facing from...

TREASON