Free Republic

Greetings Everyone; I do hope everyone is doin fairly well. I do know & understand that I should be posting here more, but life gets in the way [a lot around here] Anyway, we have talked in the past about reading,reference & entertainment, when things get real ugly & bad out there. Well Providence has "smiled" upon me [again]. I have been fortunate to meet [on line for now] a Mr. Ron Foster. He is a "Prepper" novelist. He has written a lot of books about different aspects of prepping & dealing with disasters. This is from his Amazon page;...

What are the highlights and weaknesses of "Hillary's America", both the book and the movie?

Marooned On Ug - The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 1 To assist King Jogogle-Zadester in governing, he is given a parliament, the Uggard word for which is gabagab, but its usefulness is greatly circumscribed by the Blubosh, or Constitution, which requires that every measure, in order to become a law, shall have an affirmative majority of the actual members, yet forbids any member to vote who has not a distinct pecuniary interest in the result.  I was once greatly amused by a spirited contest over a matter of harbor improvement, each of two proposed harbors having its advocates. ...

George Orwell's 1984 had three slogans that were repeated constantly.  They were counter factual, they showed that people were repeatedly told and were expected to believe the most outrageous, anti-rational, contradictory lies in order to inculcate obedience. The same is true in the United States of today.  Political Correctness is what we are expected to believe without any rational examination.  We are expected to believe direct contradictions as a matter of public policy.  The irrational assumptions of that policy may not be challenged. We are constantly lied to and expected to accept the lies. I posit that Orwell's three...

As a writer, editor, mother, and book lover for as long as I can remember, every time I stepped foot in the room called "Library Media Center" at Greenville High School, a little bit of my heart was broken. I began to think of the space as a giant metaphor for everything wrong with education. As a former educator, it gave me insight into where students in rural America are often coming from in terms of literacy. It has always been part of my teaching philosophy that you meet the student where he or she is and you build from...

June 9, 1870. Charles Dickens sat writing at his desk. He had been laboring more than was his custom on his latest book. Though the story was progressing well, Mr. Dickens was not feeling well. His left hand clawed at the air. His left foot dragged on the ground. And though he had recently retired from public performances with a final reading from Pickwick, his pen scarcely ceased its scratching. A profound and perplexing mystery was unfolding beneath that pen and Mr. Dickens’ knew it well. If only his readers might know it as well.It had been five years...

Piss Christ? Piss Koran! Part Four: Resolution by Matthew Bracken “Your call, smart guy.” The phone connection made a click and the line went dead. (The rest is at the Gates of Vienna link above.) Mike wasn’t a kid. He knew that he wouldn’t live forever. He’d had enough brushes with death to understand that a healthy old age was not guaranteed in the contract. He’d been standing next to men who had stepped the wrong way, and fallen. He’d helped pull a man’s body off a concrete footer where he’d been impaled on an uncapped rebar stake. Just two...

Piss Christ? Piss Koran! — Part 3: Crisis (This is the third installment of a story by Matthew Bracken, which is being serialized here in four parts.) As the two SWAT commandos slid down their ropes, the chopper lifted for a moment, and one of them was dragged against the crane’s guy wire. He was flicked from his descent line, but he managed to grab hold of the thick steel cable. The helicopter dropped again, its rotors nearly intersecting the cable, but it banked away, dipped its nose, shot forward and corkscrewed downward, the other commando swinging out below its...

Stephen King is considered something of an expert when it comes to horror, but it seems that, for the author of It, nothing is scarier than Donald Trump. Except for maybe his supporters. In an interview with the Rolling Stone, King was candidly political, expressing dismay over the rise of Trump, as well as disappointment in the electorate that catapulted the former reality television star and real estate mogul into the Republican candidacy for president. ““I am very disappointed in the country. I think that he’s sort of the last stand of a sort of American male who feels like...

Piss Christ? Piss Koran! — Part Two This is the second installment of a story by Matthew Bracken, which is being serialized on Gates of Vienna in several parts. (Part One) http://gatesofvienna.net/2016/06/piss-christ-piss-koran-part-one/ Piss Christ? Piss Koran! Part Two: Morning Light by Matthew Bracken At seven minutes after six, Mike closed his notebook and put the bottle of apple juice behind his pack and near the bottom of his poncho shanty. Then he took a Sony portable AM/FM radio the size of a cigarette pack from a cargo pocket of his trousers. It already had a wire for a single ear...

Piss Christ? Piss Koran! Part One: Dark Till Dawn Mike Dolan came out of the subway, hit the sidewalk and set out down the west side of 6th Avenue with a purposeful stride. Midtown Manhattan never truly sleeps, particularly just before a Monday morning, but compared to what it would be like in a couple of hours, it was geared way down. No tourists yet, mostly delivery trucks and vans. All lanes were northbound, because it was 6th Avenue. Mike was showered and clean shaven, every item on him and in his possession carefully considered. The white hard hat on...

I remember reading about Marley Dias previously. She's back in the news: Rescue people in another galaxy? Escape from a tower with a dragon's help? Visit England, China, and India, and still be back for dinnertime? That's all in a day's read for 11-year-old Marley Dias, who was featured in TODAY's "Can-Do Kids" series on Tuesday. "When I get lost in a book, it's just, like, magical!" Dias told TODAY's Jenna Bush Hager. The New Jersey sixth grader's love for reading was profound but not blind. After spending years of her life stepping into new worlds with every turn...

Glenn Beck guest: 'What patriot' will remove Trump from office? 'I am about to suggest something very bad. It is a hypothetical' Talk-radio host Glenn Beck has already had at least one visit from the Secret Service this election cycle over perceived threats on the life of GOP front runner Donald Trump made on his show, and he may be in store for another. During Wednesday’s broadcast Beck interviewed best-selling suspense author Brad Thor and the pair discussed their concerns Trump, if elected, would abuse his presidential authority with little chance of being stopped by Congress. Their “hypothetical” solution sounded...

When I tell people I'm moving to Berlin for the summer, I usually get one of two reactions: 1. Berlin! Such a cool city. I'm jealous! 2. Why? I would never step foot in Germany. Berlin made headlines among Israelis when the "Milky controversy" broke out in 2014. An Israeli Berliner bragged how cheap the cost of living is in Berlin compared to Israel, if grocery receipts are the judge. According to the chocolate pudding index (the Israeli brand being “Milky), the difference is 300 percent. My calculations are not necessarily financial, although I don’t think I could afford living...

You know, I’m feeling it this year, as a new mama to 7, like none other, the complex range of emotions for Mother’s Day. For a surprising number of us, it’s a tender day—a reminder of the mother we lost or the mother who couldn’t be or the mom we needed when we were kids. Or it’s an awkward day spent wondering if a partner will help our kids celebrate us. Or it’s a day of aching for the unfulfilled role of mother—a role we do not yet hold or may never hold. And for a few, Mother’s Day ushers...

Two Republican presidential candidates and both Democratic candidates are on Time Magazine's list of The 100 Most Influential People of 2016. The magazine placed them and other notable American politicians from both parties among a list of artists, athletes, world leaders, and celebrities. They are on the list because, according to the magazine, "they each embody a breakthrough: they broke the rules, broke a record, broke the silence, broke the boundaries to reveal what they're capable of." "To expect Donald Trump to conform to the 'norms' of business and politics is like expecting a square peg to fit in a...

Melissa Harris-Perry has joined Elle.com, where she will serve as editor-at-large. Elle.com editorial director Leah Chernikoff says Harris-Perry “will focus on the intersection of race, gender, politics, and yes, even fashion, telling the often-overlooked stories of women and girls of color.” Harris-Perry left MSNBC after an internal memo became public in February. In the memo, Harris-Perry accused NBC News chairman Andy Lack and MSNBC president Phil Griffin of taking away her weekend morning discussion program. “I will not be used as a tool for their purposes,” she wrote. “I am not a token, mammy, or little brown bobble head.” “Joining...

Combining literary narrative and raw reflection, September Vaudrey walks through one of life’s worst losses―the death of a child―and slowly becomes open to watching for the unexpected ways God carries her through it. It’s a story of love and tragedy in tandem; a deeply personal memoir from a life forever changed by one empty place. And at its core, Colors of Goodbye calls to the deepest part of our spirits to know that death is not the and that life can be beautiful still.

"Social Justice Warriors have plagued mankind for more than 150 years, but only in the last 30 years has their ideology become dominant in the West. Having invaded one institution of the cultural high ground after another, from corporations and churches to video games and government, there is nowhere that remains entirely free of their intolerant thought and speech policing." - Vox Day, SJWs Always Lie: Taking Down the Thought Police Stefan Molyneux and Vox Day discuss the Michelle Fields/Corey Lewandowski/Breitbart situation, Donald Trump's presidential campaign, GamerGate, common trends among social justice warriors and much much more! SJWs Always Lie:...