Free Republic

The CIA is notorious for its disastrous, damaging failures. In the 1950s, the CIA’s meddling in Iran politics led to the Iranian Revolution in 1979, creating a nation that is our implacable enemy. In the 1960s, the CIA carried out the embarrassing Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba. In the 1980s, the CIA it was responsible for the Iran-Contra scandal that nearly wrecked Reagan’s presidency. In the 1980s, the CIA entirely missed the fact that the Soviet Union was collapsing. And in 2001 it was as surprised as anyone by the 9/11 attack. One would think that, with this track...

On Thursday night, conservative radio host Mark Levin attacked Fox News host Bill O’Reilly and the “has-beens” at CNN for their “hit” on Rep. Michele Bachmann after she was caught racing away from a CNN reporter confronting her over factually inaccurate claims about the president’s “lavish” White House living. On Tuesday, CNN reporter Dana Bash attempted to confront Bachmann over her claims that the president has an extraordinarily luxurious lifestyle, but was famously met with deflection and a race away from the camera. On The O’Reilly Factor last night, the eponymous Fox host criticized Bachmann for her “trivial attacks on...

WASHINGTON – While he doesn’t exactly make the lame walk, Senator Rand Paul excels at getting them to talk, and to answer difficult questions essential to the life and liberty of all Americans. The Senator’s most recent principled stand, voiced during his epic filibuster, targeted the Obama Administration’s policy on dishing out the same quick and hasty deaths without charge or trial here at home as they have been overseas. Daring to challenge Attorney General Eric Holder to a duel of wits instantly endeared Senator Paul to countless concerned Americans who are fed up with politics as usual, feel betrayed...

Don't look at me --- I was the one arguing that the state should get out of the marriage business entirely, and that the only true state interest in marriage, from a secular point of view at least, is enforcing paternal responsibility, which has no connection to same-sex relationships. This latest poll from Quinnipiac only surprises me to the extent that Catholic voters seem to be ahead of the general population in redefining the legal definition of marriage while still identifying as Catholic: American voter support for same-sex marriage is inching up and now stands at 47 --- 43 percent,...

American Conservative Union Chairman Al Cardenas said he supported a bipartisan Senate effort at immigration reform, stressing that the proposal must include a way for an estimated 11 million illegal aliens to “come out of the shadows” and be given “a legal status where they can be secure in this country for their future and that of their children.” Cardenas made his remarks on the Spanish-language Telemundo show Enfoque on Sunday, noting that immigration is an issue he plans to stress at the upcoming Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington, D.C., which opens next week. … When asked what...

A professor at Georgetown University wrote a piece in the NY Times advising Catholics to resign from the Catholic Church in light of Pope Benedict's resignation. Paul Elie is a senior fellow in the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs at Georgetown, and he says that Catholics should boycott Mass (a mortal sin) as a way to instigate change, namely selecting a Pope that would introduce radical change. This is just so fitting of a Georgetown professor and the New York Times. Here's some of the most outrageous parts: AT 8 p.m. last night in Vatican City, Benedict...

Following in fellow MSNBC co-host Chris Hayes’s footsteps, the network’s conservative pundit S. E. Cupp has withdrawn from speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference next month over the issue of same-sex marriage and the exclusion of GOProud. Cupp announced her decision to back out on The Cycle earlier this afternoon.

<p>Washington (CNN) - Sen. Rand Paul will call on his fellow Republicans to be more welcoming of immigrants Tuesday night in a speech where he will also sharply criticize President Barack Obama and his congressional colleagues for failing to reduce the nation's debt.</p>

Tory traditionalists in the Cabinet are preparing to back gay marriage despite continuing anger among the party’s grassroots. Justice Secretary Chris Grayling, one of the Government’s most senior Right-wingers, indicated yesterday he will vote in favor of legalizing same-sex unions next week, while Baroness Warsi, who has previously expressed concern, also revealed she is to back the reform. Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith, the standard bearer for the Tory Right, is expected to abstain rather than vote against, and may even back the legislation, according to friends. … Northern Ireland Secretary Owen Paterson is the most implacably opposed...

GOLAN HEIGHTS, Israel — Sen. Rand Paul doesn’t explicitly deny his eight-day visit to the Holy Land represents the launch of a 2016 Republican presidential nomination run. “I consider it as more an effort to become part of an international stage,” the freshman Kentucky Republican said. But at least some of the 40 evangelical Protestant leaders traveling with Mr. Paul think otherwise. “This trip to meet with Israelis, Arabs and Palestinians is absolutely the first step in his 2016 White House campaign,” said David Lane, evangelical political organizer and president of the Los Angeles-based Pastors and Pews. Mr. Paul joined...

In early December the independent and very liberal National Catholic Reporter weekly newspaper published a long, carefully reasoned editorial declaring that “The Ordination of Women Would Correct an Injustice.” If the Church were deliberately perpetrating an injustice in the matter of ordination, of course, it would be a serious matter. The NCR editorial was a response to the earlier “excommunication, dismissal, and laicization” of Roy Bourgeois, who as a Maryknoll priest had long and defiantly—and in spite of numerous warnings—engaged in what was officially described as a “campaign against the teachings of the Catholic Church”—he repeatedly and obstinately engaged in...

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists announced its support last month for selling oral contraceptives over the counter without a prescription in the United States. I agree with this opinion, which if embraced by the federal government would take contraception out of the political arena. As a conservative Republican, I believe that we have been stupid to let the Democrats demagogue the contraceptives issue and pretend, during debates about health-care insurance, that Republicans are somehow against birth control. It's a disingenuous political argument they make. As an unapologetic pro-life Republican, I also believe that every adult (18 years old...

Bobby Jindal wants you to be able to get your contraceptives over the counter, and that’s just the first step. “Democrats have wrongly accused Republicans of being against birth control and against allowing people to use it,” the Louisiana governor writes in the Wall Street Journal today. “That’s hogwash.”

Sean Hannity and Ann Coulter SH: So are you saying that, for PR purposes, that they should give in to Obama on the tax rate? AC: Not exactly, I--Well, yeah, I guess I am. SH: You're saying capitulate to Obama? We don't have a revenue problem, Ann. AC: We lost the election, Sean. Hannity seems genuinely flummoxed by Coulter's capitulatory attitude, but does she have a point? Recent polling has been gruesome for Republicans. Not only does an overall double-digit plurality favor raising taxes on "the rich," support for extending all current tax rates has plummeted by nearly 30 percentage...

Published: February 6, 2008 Pentagon Aide's Invitations Contradicted U.S. PolicySteven EmersonAt the urging of a subordinate, Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordon England scheduled at least two meetings with foreign emissaries in direct contradiction of U.S. policy at the time. The meetings date back to 2005. They involved a Lebanese ambassador considered a proxy for the Syrian government and a leading member of Syria's Muslim Brotherhood.U.S. policy at the time was not to engage in talks with either man, because they represent groups with whom the United States was not to communicate. The meetings were organized by England's special assistant for...

Rush is right! And the GOP-e along with the Morrises, the George Wills, etc, failed in their predictions. Morris admitted he had egg on his face, but I did not see George Will admit this. Maybe he did, but I didn't see it. Are the now obsolete? Are the Krauthammers, the O'Reillys, the Vannitys, Rollins, etc also obsolete? Is Vannity still going to continue having the same ol same ol on his show? And what about the other shows on FOX News? Are they going to continue having RINOS/CINO guests/hosts on their shows? Mitt Romney got fewer votes than McCain...

Mary Wright has been a devout Catholic and a Democrat her whole life, both erecting Obama signs in her yard and giving out communion in her parish. It never felt like a conflict to her, until this year. That's because she recently received a letter from a fellow parishioner targeting her for her support of President Obama. "I don't really know you," it said, "but I wonder how you can support a president who has attacked our church, and supports abortion on demand for all nine months of pregnancy." As Wright has discovered, it's nearly impossible to spend time in...

The truth is, the Tea Party anger that boiled over in response to the President Obama’s healthcare plan had been brewing for years due to conservative disappointment with George W. Bush’s policies. Bush created record-breaking deficits, embraced Congressional earmarks, gained passage of an enormous expansion of Medicare entitlements without funding it, nominated Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, and backed McCain-Kennedy comprehensive immigration reform. Principled conservatives like Coulter, Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity spoke out against the direction of the party, to their credit. Conservatives must be careful not to abandon their principles out of blind hated for President Obama....

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul said Monday that Republicans can win in New England and on the West Coast if they’re willing to drop a “we need to bomb everybody tomorrow” foreign policy. “I think one of the problems we face, as a Republican party, is that we’re behind the eight-ball to begin with,” Paul said on CBS’ “This Morning.” “We’re not winning the West Coast. We’re not winning New England. Maybe we need to embrace more Ron Paul Republicans, more libertarian Republicans. … It means people who are little bit less aggressive on foreign policy. They believe in defending the...

Sister Simone Campbell has become a minor celebrity over the last few months. Her 15 minutes began back in April when her social-justice lobbying outfit, NETWORK, earned a rare public rebuke from the Vatican for, ironically, its inadequate understanding of social justice. Capitalizing on the fawning media attention she received, Sister Simone and a few of her fellow progressive friends embarked on a highly publicized bus tour of the Midwest — Nuns on the Bus, they called it — during which they slammed Paul Ryan’s budget for being incompatible with Catholic social teaching. Sister Simone’s crusade against Paul Ryan has...