Free Republic

Should at any time we feel ourselves to be alone, or for the secular world to be so overwhelming and powerful as to render spiritual life redundant, we can reflect on the difficulties of our predecessors and be inspired by their cheerfulness and joy in the face of tremendous privations. As mentioned before, the mid 1920’s was a period of ferocious attacks upon the Church by the Bolsheviks, both clergy and laity. Many of the faithful were executed or imprisoned in the Gulag for extended periods on nonsensical charges. The Solovetsky Island concentration camp (Solovki for short), formerly a remote...

Racism is caused when the liberal mostly white establishment anoints left-wing radicals as black leaders. The truth is that most blacks in America are conservative patriotic religious people. Black radicals such as Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson and historic figures such as Malcolm X and the Black Panthers are turned into cultural icons by left-wingers with ulterior motives. No wonder there is racism in America. The establishment left plucks radicals out of obscurity, grooms them, lavishes them with money and fame and holds them up as representing all black people. We don’t hear much from the majority of blacks who...

Here Are The Two Soviet Propaganda Posters Hanging In The White House Press Secretary's Home Washingtonian MOM magazine's spring issue has a profile of White House Press Secretary Jay Carney's wife, ABC News contributor Claire Shipman, that features a picture taken inside their home. In the background of the photo, you can see two framed Soviet-era propaganda posters. One of Carney's posters is a version of this iconic design by artist Dmitry Moor with a soldier pointing his finger alongside text that says "Have YOU Enlisted?" in Russian: The other poster features a female factory worker. According to this eBay...

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney and his family are featured in a worshipful profile in this month's Washingtonian magazine. It's the sort of adoring journalistic exercise reserved for only the most handsome of the power elite. In it you can find out details about the Carney dog (a cousin to presidential pooch Sonny!), and how much the press secretary's tie costs ($135). But keen observers may notice the kitchen decor in the photo: Soviet propaganda posters. They really are the perfect pop of color whether you are the dour and sincere Nikita Khrushchev or the cheeky press-wrangler for a...

The website has grown exponentially. I recommend everyone check it out. This is mostly a vanity but I feel it is worth checking out. I am looking forward to more movies and books and essays. Ayn Rand is not my hero but she had a lot of insight to give us Americans. Are we not even going to consider her views? Time will tell.

Since 1924 visitors from around the globe have flocked to Moscow's famous Red Square to view the body of former revolutionary leader Vladimir Lenin. But now, the Bolshevik could be relocating six feet under if the Russian people have their way with him.

November 7, 1917: Communist Revolution in Russia In response to Russia’s defeat on the front, Czar Nicholas II was dethroned in a revolution in March 1917 and a new government of mixed liberal-conservative complexion came into being. As political deadlock and defeats on the front continued, the socialists gained in popularity and their radical wing, the Bolshevik party, under Lenin, called for immediate peace and apportionment of land to the peasants. In November 1917, the Bolsheviks seized power. The new government concluded an armistice with Germany in December 1917 and a separate peace treaty with Germany in March 1918, but...

Obama & Dems Ready to Ram Obamacare Down America’s Throat (Video) March 3, 2010 Jim Hoft It’s for the greater good. President Obama is holding a press conference today at 1:45 PM EST. Obama rejected GOP calls to start over on the democrat’s health care bill today, saying the delay could last a decade or more. He brought the lab coat props with him. “We Can’t Walk Away, America’s Waiting For Us To Act, Let’s Get It Done!”

Obama denies being an ideologue or a Bolshevik, why? Is he ashamed of his heritage and convictions, are just intent on keeping his motivations covert until the right time to spring his true nature upon us. Or is there a technicality that we need to grasp? Perhaps we should analyze the term Bolshevik. Historically, the Bolsheviks were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP), founded by Vladimir Lenin, they split from the Menshevik faction in 1903, during the Second Party Congress. They eventually gained control during the October phase of the Revolution in 1917. Bolshevik...

BALTIMORE, Maryland (AFP) – President Barack Obama Friday chided Republicans for portraying his health reform plan as a "Bolshevik plot" and for saying he wanted to do "crazy stuff that is going to destroy America." In a highly unusual televised question-and-answer session, Obama told his foes they should not just oppose him for political gain, warning that elected officials should care more about jobs of voters than their own. "I'm not a pundit, I'm just a president. So take it for what it's worth -- but I don't believe that the American people want us to focus on our job...

BALTIMORE – President Barack Obama is accusing Republicans of portraying health care overhaul legislation as a "Bolshevik plot." ... The 1917 revolution in Russia brought the Bolsheviks to power. Vladimir Lenin and Josef Stalin were among the leaders.

Benito Mussolini has an infamous place in modern history, as well he should. Nearly everyone knows Mussolini as the dictator of Fascist Italy and the ally of Nazi Germany in the Second World War. But that is only part of the story.  Mussolini began his political career as an avowed Marxist (defined as the atheist philosophy which holds that capitalism is bad because it enriches a few capitalists to the detriment of masses of laborers and that laborers should take control of all means of production — in order, in theory though not in practice, to be fair to the...

Inside the Stalin Archives by Jonathan Brent. As he wanders through the streets of St. Petersburg contemplating murder, the hero of Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment notices “that special Petersburg stench” which seems to be everywhere. Somehow, that stench constitutes the atmosphere in which lethal and repulsive ideas arise.When Jonathan Brent arrived in Moscow, he detected the same stench. It was 1992, just after the fall of the Soviet Union, and Brent seized a unique opportunity that, if not for him, would doubtless have been missed. He came to negotiate a deal to publish sensitive and secret documents from the Central...

Ukraine's Pursuit of Genocide Designation Upsets Russians Who Say Others Died, Too MOSCOW -- Relations between Russia and Ukraine, bedeviled by disputes over natural gas supplies and NATO expansion, have lately been roiled by one of the great tragedies of Soviet history: the famine of 1932-33, which left millions dead from starvation and related diseases. Ukraine is seeking international recognition of the famine, which Ukrainians call Holodomor -- or death by hunger -- as an act of genocide. When Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin forced peasants off their homesteads and into collective farms, special military units requisitioned grain and other food...

Meeker's most ambitious proposal is to ask residential users to limit consumption to 25 gallons each per day

MOSCOW - There is a "high degree of probability" that bone fragments found recently near the Russian city of Yekaterinburg are those of a daughter and son of the last czar, forensics experts said Friday. If confirmed, the find would fill in a missing chapter in the story of the doomed Romanovs, who were killed after the violent 1917 Bolshevik Revolution ushered in more than 70 years of Communist rule. The fragments were found by archaeologists in a burned field near the Ural Mountains city where Czar Nicholas II, his wife, Alexandra, and their five children were held prisoner by...

MANCHESTER, N.H. (AP) -- Presidential hopeful Hillary Rodham Clinton outlined a broad economic vision Tuesday, saying it's time to replace an "on your own" society with one based on shared responsibility and prosperity. The Democratic senator said what the Bush administration touts as an "ownership society" really is an "on your own" society that has widened the gap between rich and poor. "I prefer a 'we're all in it together' society," she said. "I believe our government can once again work for all Americans. It can promote the great American tradition of opportunity for all and special privileges for none."...

As she sees it now, she spent her 20s working too hard, never saying no to anything and succumbing to "the bad side of American psychology". "I love the English way, which is not as capitalistic as it is in America. People don't talk about work and money; they talk about interesting things at dinner parties. I like living here because I don't tap into the bad side of American psychology..."

Since the elections, some have claimed that the victories of a few 'moderate' Democrats represents movement of the Democratic Party towards the center. I'm not convinced. Certainly, some of the newly elected Democrats have been somewhat more conservative on social issues, but it's very hard to see how that will lead to more conservative policies. If you think the Kennedy and Pelosi wing of the Democratic Party are suddenly going to submit, e.g., pro-gun or anti-abortion legislation, you haven't been paying attention. Instead, the occasional, putative 'conservatism' from some new Democrats has been a cover for their economic views —...