Free Republic

Conservatives have failed to see that arguments do not matter. My whole career in the classroom has been guided by one principle. Namely, that it is my job is to introduce young people to the goodness, the beauty, and the wisdom of excellent works of literature, art, and human thought, without regard to any political use to which knowledge of these works might be put. I detest when literature is wrenched away from its essence, which is to delight us in its teaching us about ourselves and the world, and is commandeered for one or another kind of gain. It...

One man's Independence, another man's Treason.

Counterfactuals, like "conspiracy theories," are frowned upon by those who look guilty when they are posed. Here are three to chew on during the holidays:...Some people despise "what if" hypotheticals. What if those people are the same ones who can't face the overwhelming evidence for their own hypocrisy?

Baldwin said he pulled the hammer back and released it and the pistol fired without pulling the trigger. The pistol was a replica Pietta, but we don't know now if it had a transfer bar. Assume it doesn't. Has anyone here ever had that happen, or have known that it happened?

It took half a century to get a chance to say the words. Just “thank you.” That’s all. For Jim Roberts, this desire had become a fixation, part of a years-long process of coming to terms with the darkness he’d seen as an Army lieutenant in the Vietnam War. The women he wanted to thank were “Donut Dollies,” two among 600 women working with the American Red Cross who traveled to Vietnam to give a few hours of respite to troops longing for home, to play word games or just sit and chat. A forced landing by a helicopter with...

The roughly 900 U.S. troops who are currently deployed to Syria are mostly invisible to Congress, the media, and the American public. Syria is just the latest forgotten battlefield in the Global War on Terrorism. The troops who went there have succeeded in destroying the Islamic State group’s former caliphate, but ISIS fighters are waging the type of insurgency that the American military has a bad track record of defeating. For the time being, American forces are keeping a lid on the situation and protecting their Kurdish allies from Turkey, who considers them terrorists. But the mission is stuck in...

It was mid-July when the 1st Combined Arms Battalion of the 194th Armor Regiment first sent soldiers to the Afghan capital in Kabul. Back in Kuwait Task Force 1-194, better known as ‘Task Force Bastard,’ was planning for contingencies if things went south at the embassy and airport, to include over-the-horizon support to aid in a Noncombatant Evacuation Operation (NEO). Together with our counterparts at 2nd Brigade, 10th Mountain Division we wanted to get the lay of the land. So signal officer Capt. Vince Struble, plans officer Capt. Andrew Hanson, and Charlie Company 1st Sgt. Christopher O’Shea went to Hamid...

From the sermon: “You cannot remove the founding principles of a society and think that society will continue on.” Father Jeffrey F. Kirby Our Lady of Grace Catholic Church, Indian Land SC

WASHINGTON, D.C.—Ignorant Republicans rioted yesterday but didn't even snag any free big-screen TVs out of the deal, sources at the Capitol Building reported. The short-sighted protesters stormed the Capitol without stealing a bunch of stuff, prompting many to question whether they really understand the purpose of a peaceful protest at all. "Look at these morons, rioting at the Capitol when there's a perfectly good Target just down the street," said one CNN reporter. "If they'd looted a bunch of local businesses in the name of social justice or whatever, we'd be covering this protest a heck of a lot differently,...

The question: At one apology per second, how long will it take RGB's spirit (spook) to apologize to 62,000,000 slaughtered victims of Roe v Wade.

Do these lives matter - Mekhi James, Sincere Gaston and Lena Marie Nunez ? If so, what are you going to do about their loss? /****************End of email********************/ For your reference: https://www.foxnews.com/us/children-shot-dead-wounded-one-week-in-chicago

§8. Respect for flag No disrespect should be shown to the flag of the United States of America; the flag should not be dipped to any person or thing. Regimental colors, State flags, and organization or institutional flags are to be dipped as a mark of honor. ... (d) The flag should never be used as wearing apparel, bedding, or drapery. ...

Despite some unfavorable polling, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi still thinks the Occupy movement has been politically helpful to Democrats. In an interview with TPM on Friday, she said there’s no recent precedent for the sort of election House Democrats are going into. In 1994 and 2010, Congressional Republicans ran against Washington controlled by Democrats. In 2006, Congressional Democrats ran against Republican corruption and President George W. Bush. This time around, President Obama will carry the national message for the party while individual candidates use it as they see fit to win in their districts. That national message, Pelosi said,...

“American politics is dominated by an enduring myth,” writes author Peter Collier—the myth “that Democrats are the party of the common man, the voiceless, the powerless, the poor. That if you care about what happens to the least among us, you will cast your vote in the Democratic column.” But as Collier also points out, the vast majority of America’s voiceless, powerless, and impoverished people are concentrated in cities that have been run exclusively by Democrats for decades—even generations—without interruption. These are cities where stratospheric rates of crime, poverty, unemployment, out-of-wedlock births, homes without fathers and failed school systems have...

A black business owner who invested his life savings into what is now a looted and destroyed sports bar cried on camera as he lamented, “I don’t know what I’m gonna do.” A news report describes how the Minneapolis bar owner was attempting to clean up when thugs tried to break in again during filming and loot his safe. “I don’t know what I’m gonna do, I worked so hard to get here, so hard,” the owner says as he cries. #MinneapolisRiot This isn’t even protesting anymore. Swear people go too far pic.twitter.com/gNCjWwzOmz — kreeche (@FatherKee) May 29, 2020 The...

In my lifetime, there was another deadly flu epidemic in the United States. The flu spread from Hong Kong to the United States, arriving December 1968 and peaking a year later. It ultimately killed 100,000 people in the U.S., mostly over the age of 65, and one million worldwide. Lifespan in the US in those days was 70 whereas it is 78 today. Population was 200 million as compared with 328 million today. If it would be possible to extrapolate the death data based on population and demographics, we might be looking at a quarter million deaths today from this...

U.S.—The majority of the nation is "totally in favor" of Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez boycotting her job permanently. After the congresswoman called for a job boycott once the economy opens back up, everyone said they were totally OK with it, as long as it's just her and maybe some of her associates who are boycotting their jobs forever. Approval of her job boycott was directly connected to her being the one who is doing the boycotting. "Please, never go back to work, AOC, for the good of the nation," said laid-off oil worker Pete Vik. "Heck, we're even fine if you...

Instead of the “Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA),” we should rename it to the Federal Initiative to Spy on Americans Act, because that’s exactly what this unconstitutional surveillance program does. Our government should not spy on Americans. They should feel confident their privacy is protected and that neither the government nor any agent affiliated with the government are abusing Americans’ constitutional rights. That’s why I oppose H.R. 6172, the USA FREEDOM Reauthorization Act. When your house has foundational problems, you don’t slap a new coat of paint on the window shutters and say the problem is fixed. Instead, you call...

The Saudi military member gunman who killed three U.S. sailors at Naval Air Station Pensacola posted disturbing messages on social media months before the attack, according to a law enforcement assessment. 'The countdown has started,' was the cryptic message posted by Saudi Air Force 2nd Lt. Mohammed Alshamrani on September 11, 2019, according to a Joint Intelligence Bulletin reported by ABC News. The 21-year-old Saudi national also defended jihad on social media and referred to non-Muslims as 'infidels', according to the report.