Free Republic

Poor Marie Harf. The State Department’s deputy spokesman is being mercilessly mocked for an interview she gave to MSNBC’s Chris Matthews in which she said, of the conflict with the Islamic State: “We cannot win this war by killing them. We cannot kill our way out of this war. We need in the medium to longer term to go after the root causes that leads people to join these groups, whether it’s a lack of opportunity for jobs, whether—”

State Department Spokesperson Marie Harf told Chris Matthews tonight that we cannot win this war with ISIS by killing them. She said we have to get to the root cause of why people are attracted to Jihad — you know like poverty, jobs, etc…

By now, you may know that disgraced Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber, a Democrat, was brought low this week by a scandal concerning his fiancée’s dealings with green energy groups. You may not be aware, however, of exactly the extent to which Kitzhaber’s fiancée, Cylvia Hayes, is a corrupt, serial-marrying tree-hugger with a background of scandals galore. The green energy scandal involved consulting and policy work conducted by Hayes. Reports have revealed that she was advising several state employees on energy policy while simultaneously receiving substantial payments from the Clean Economy Development Center — a direct and obvious conflict of interest.

Former Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta on Sunday slammed Congress on CNN's State of the Union naming them the biggest threat to national security. Host Jim Acosta asked Panetta if President Obama is going to be able to work with Republicans to get his war measure against ISIS passed. But before an answer was provided, Acosta read something Panetta had previously written criticizing the president: “He does, however, lack fire. Too often, in my view, the president relies on the logic of a law professor rather than the passion of a leader. But now, Panetta has changed his tune and...

PBS may also be charged with having broadcast religious propaganda in place of balanced educational, instructional, and public information material, despite elaborate claims to the contrary. The Muslim Brotherhood, in a 1991 memoir, spoke of its "work in America as a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within." The role played by radical individuals in a PBS broadcast and website raises many serious questions, not just for the trustees of PBS, but for national agencies responsible for accuracy in the U.S. media. If PBS does not publicly correct this confusion and revoke its association...

In a joint press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel Monday, President Obama said he believed a deal with Iran on nuclear weapons was possible because Supreme Leader Khamenei said it would be “contrary to their faith to obtain a nuclear weapon.”

Chauncey DeVega, black writer, podcaster, and self-proclaimed "ghetto nerd," shared an essay on Daily Kos in which he reminds those that are horrified by the brutality of ISIS burning Lt. Muath al-Kasasbeh alive to remember that white Americans did the same thing to blacks in the past. "American Exceptionalism blinds those who share its gaze to uncomfortable facts and truths about their own country," wrote DeVega. Adding that just like their Islamic cohorts, "white lynchers" practiced their own "unique cultural ritual" that was just as "gruesome" and "medieval" as ISIS "for almost a century." And instead of making a video...

n his radio show Thursday, Rush Limbaugh unloaded on President Obama for his “high horse” remarks at the National Prayer Breakfast earlier that day in which the president drew a moral equivalence between radical Islamic terror and dark episodes in the history of Christianity. The president’s choice to attack Christianity at an event designed to unite, Limbaugh argued, revealed just how much he resents this country and how actively he is seeking to humble the West. Not only was the speech insulting, suggested Limbaugh, it's dangerous. Saying the president's Prayer Breakfast speech “dots the I, crosses the T” on his...

A Delta Air Lines flight heading from Minneapolis to Las Vegas was forced to make an emergency landing today after the pilot was locked out of the cockpit, airport officials said. The call about Flight 1651 came in around 12:10 p.m. and the plane landed safely at McCarran International Airport around 12:25 p.m., officials told ABC affiliate KTNV. The cockpit door malfunctioned, locking the pilot out of the cockpit, airport officials told KTNV, noting that the first officer made the landing.

Jonathan Chait burned up the Internet this week with his critique of so-called political correctness. Among many responses, Amanda Taub‘s stands out for its denial of Chait’s basic premise. According to Taub: …there’s no such thing as “political correctness.” The term’s in wide use, certainly, but has no actual fixed or specific meaning. What defines it is not what it describes but how it’s used: as a way to dismiss a concern or demand as a frivolous grievance rather than a real issue. This is a curious response. Sure, people use the term in different ways. But Chait provides a...

For four years, hidden cameras recorded Madison Reed's most private moments, beginning when she was just 13 years old. The cameras, placed by a neighbor in the teenager's bedroom and in a beach house, are now gone, but the painful memories remain. "It's disgusting," Madison said. "I don't like to think about it, but I think about it all the time. Like all day." According to law enforcement investigators, Bradley McCollum, a family friend, set up a camera at his Clatsop County beach house in 2010 to secretly record Reed as she visited with McCollum's family. In 2014, he added...

President Obama should think before bowing to Saudi Arabia's new king in his Tuesday visit. King Salman has a history of funding al-Qaida, and his son has been accused of knowing in advance about the 9/11 attacks. When it comes to jihadism, Salman bin Abdulaziz al Saud is more of a hardliner than his older brother, King Abdullah, who died last week of a lung infection. As such, any commitment he makes to helping the U.S. destroy al-Qaida and Islamic State terrorists should be viewed with great suspicion. The 79-year-old Salman once ran a Saudi charity tied to al-Qaida and...

A leading Islamic organisation has called on the United Nations to make "contempt of religions" illegal and urged the West to protect Muslim communities following the attack on French magazine Charlie Hebdo. The Qatar-based International Union of Muslim Scholars, headed by influential preacher Yusuf al-Qaradawi, appealed to Muslims to continue peaceful protests against images of the Prophet Mohammed but "not to resort to any violence".

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, who bent state government to his will for more than 20 years as one of New York's most powerful and canny politicians, was arrested Thursday on charges of taking nearly $4 million in payoffs and kickbacks. The 70-year-old Democrat was taken into custody by the FBI on federal conspiracy and bribery charges that carry up to 100 years in prison and could cost him his political seat. He was released on $200,000 bail.

MSNBC host Ed Schultz delivered a highly-charged monolog to his dwindling audience Monday night focusing on the blockbuster film American Sniper. The movie may have garnered an armful of Oscar nominations and brought in a record $105 million over the MLK holiday weekend, but to Schultz, the film was "disturbing" and highlights "the normalization of Islamophobia" in America. Schultz went on to say the film "underscores how many lives we have ruined because of doing something that was terribly wrong."

[Snip]Bettweiser tells us he found the film rolls in late 2014 at an auction in Ohio. About half the rolls were labeled with various location names (i.e. Boston Harbor, Lucky Strike Beach, LaHavre Harbor).

See list. Sooooo true!

Two Albuquerque police officers were charged with murder Monday in the shooting death of a knife-wielding homeless man that led to violent protests and brought new scrutiny to the police department amid a federal investigation. The decision to bring murder charges occurred at a time when police tactics are under intense review nationwide, fueled by the fatal shooting of an unarmed 18-year-old in Ferguson, Missouri, and the chokehold death of another unarmed man in New York City. Grand juries declined to charge officers in those cases, leading to large protests. Acknowledging the frustration over the secrecy of the proceedings in...

According to the latest census data, African Americans make up just over 13% of the US population. That means out of the 317 million people living in the USA, there are about 41 million blacks -- just over the total population of California. However, looking at the popular culture you'd never know that. Black music dominates popular music. Black culture is how most people define "cool." And most of all, what might offend blacks dominates popular culture, media, education, and entertainment. Fred Reed writes:

A man shot and killed three people and injured a fourth in Moscow, Idaho on Saturday afternoon. Police identified the suspect as John Lee, 29, of Moscow. The deceased victims include Moscow businessman David Trail, 76, Arby's restaurant manager Belinda Niebuhr, 47, and the suspect's adoptive mother and Moscow Family Medicine Physician's Assistant Terri Grzebielski, 61. Also injured in the assault was Seattle resident Michael Chin, 39. Information developed by law enforcement indicates that Lee shot Grzebielski at her residence in the 400 block of Veatch Street in Moscow.