Free Republic

When government officials assume office, we hear a lot about their “great integrity” and “high character.” Maybe the beltway press is working from a different dictionary, but in my 15 years in Washington, I've yet to see it. When was the last time a high-ranking government official resigned in protest or disgust? That's not a rhetorical question. Peter Edelman, a top Health and Human Services bureaucrat, resigned when President Clinton signed welfare reform in the mid-‘90s. But no one in the Clinton administration batted an eye when the president lied to his cabinet officials about his affair with Monica Lewinsky,...

Jihadist Capital Of The Balkans The government estimates that more than 300 Kosovars have traveled to the Middle East to wage jihad, or Islamic holy war. That makes this predominately Muslim country of under 2 million people, which unilaterally declared its independence from Serbia in 2008, Europe's biggest contributor per capita of IS foot soldiers. IS Recruiter One product of the radicalization in Kacanik is Lavdrim Muhaxheri, a 25-year-old IS recruiter who fights in Syria. He has been described as one of IS's top leaders. Last year, Muhaxheri sent shockwaves around Kosovo when he posted photos on Facebook of himself...

As I hoped would happen, American Thinker’s series on TWA Flight 800 has prompted individuals with first hand knowledge to come forward. “Mark Johnson” is one. An air traffic controller (ATC), he worked the night of July 17, 1996 -- the night TWA Flight 800 was destroyed -- at the New York Terminal Radar Approach Control (TRACON) located in Westbury, New York. Johnson has provided me with his real name, and I have confirmed that he was in a position to know what he says he knows. He requested that I use an alias because he has children who depend...

Growing up in the White House isn't as different as you might think — at least, not according to Chelsea Clinton. In an interview with The Alli Simpson Show on Radio Disney, the former first daughter said she's "very grateful" to her parents for giving her "about as normal as possible" of an upbringing as they could.Former POTUS Bill Clinton and former FLOTUS, now presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton encouraged their daughter to do typical teenager-y stuff. "...my parents welcomed my friends to come over," Chelsea recalled, "and my friends would spend the night and we would play hide-and-go-seek...

Kosovo is Clinton Country: a 10-foot-high statue of Bill overlooks “Bill Clinton Boulevard” in the capital city of Pristina. Hillary is also memorialized in what has become the crime capital of Europe: right off the street named for her husband is a store named “Hillary,” featuring women’s clothing modeled after the putative Democratic party nominee for President. Pantsuits figure prominently. As Vice puts it: “While former President Bill Clinton has had a boulevard named after him, it’s without a doubt that his wife’s the real star out here.” Why is that? As Gail Sheehy pointed out in her biography of...

Haitian activists protested outside of the Clinton Foundation in New York over the loss of “billions of dollars” that was meant to help rebuild after the devastating 2010 earthquake. The activists are claiming the money was stolen through the Haiti Reconstruction Commission that was headed by Bill Clinton. In January 2015, the Clinton Foundation was the target of protests for wasting more than $10 billion and awarding contracts to non-Haitian companies. The activists also said Haiti as a cover for foreign governments to funnel kickbacks of hundreds of millions of dollars to the Clinton Foundation. They believe that this was...

Streaming through California as the presidential primary comes to a close, Hillary Clinton looked past Bernie Sanders last week and moved to claim ground on economic issues for the general election ahead. First, with Donald Trump rising in national polls, Clinton amplified her criticism of his business record, accusing the New York businessman of rooting for the 2008 housing market collapse so that he could profit from it. Second, she sought to remind voters that it was a Clinton who was president during the 1990s, an extended period of economic prosperity. While dispatching her husband, Bill, to campaign for her...

<p>Lee County Deputies said a 15-year-old South Fort Myers High School girl had sex with multiple male students in the bathroom of the school.</p> <p>"Shock. Disbelief. Concern. Sad," Eric Struble said. He's a parent to two 15-year-old girls.</p> <p>The incident report said the girl admitted to having sex with multiple male students in the bathroom, and 25 male students were identified going inside the bathroom during the timeframe the girl was inside.</p>

Beijing will soon be able to launch nuclear missiles from the sea. And that's going to make it harder to deter any future Chinese aggression. -- China's about to join an exclusive club for nuclear powers. After decades of development, 2016 could be the year the Chinese navy finally sends its ballistic-missile submarines-"SSBN" is the Pentagon’s designation-to sea for the first time for operational patrols with live, nuclear-tipped rockets. (link to full story) http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/05/19/china-s-nuclear-subs-are-ready-to-terrorize-the-sea.html

Hamza Bin Laden, the son of former al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, is calling for the targeting of Jewish and Western interests and the building of an army to “liberate Jerusalem.” US Jewish institutions on alert following calls for attacks from bin Laden’s son.

MESA, Ariz. (AP)- An Arizona high school student is facing a felony charge after police say he exposed himself in a football team picture that ended up in the school yearbook. Mesa police say 19-year-old Hunter Osborn was arrested after they were alerted to the picture over the weekend. A police document says the Red Mountain High School team photo shows Osborn exposing his penis through the top of his waistband.

Washington -- Over the last few days, former President Bill Clinton displayed one of the salient weaknesses of our contemporary politicians. He did this even while reminding Americans of, some would say, his rare lapses in true leadership: his 1994 bipartisan legislation to lower crimes rates in cities. When confronted by low-information Black Lives Matter activists during his speech in Philadelphia last week, he wilted. It took him 24 hours, but eventually, after an eloquent defense of his 1994 leadership, he groveled, whimpering, "I almost want to apologize." Why apologize, Mr. President? The incarceration of criminals that followed that 1994...

Since history’s earliest recordings, mankind has more often than not chosen to ignore the issue of sexuality rather than discuss and embrace its inherent presence in the individual’s everyday life. This exact course of action has, in addition to other factors, contributed to today’s prevalence of sexual assaults on college campuses nationwide. Now more than ever, college students are under an enormous amount of pressure to look and feel sexually appealing. Many would argue this affects women more than men, but in my experience, everyone is fairly preoccupied with their physical appearance – and whether they choose to admit...

N. Korean Long-range Missile Launch [Video from State TV] Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVogypIs2Lk

North Korea, which in recent weeks has conducted a nuclear test and fired a long-range rocket in defiance of United Nations sanctions, has also resumed its efforts to produce weapons-grade nuclear material, National Intelligence Director James Clapper told Congress Tuesday. A North Korean uranium enrichment facility has been expanded, and a plutonium reactor, closed in 2007, is back up and running, Clapper testified to the Senate Armed Services Committee. The reactor could begin to recover plutonium "within a matter of weeks to months," he said. The dictatorship's growing menace also includes a growth in the "size and sophistication of its...

The North Koreans appear to have successfully detonated a hydrogen bomb in January 2016 and promise more excitement to come. Immediately after the bang the government news agency bragged that the nation was now "capable of wiping out the whole territory of the U.S. all at once."This only slightly distracted mainstream politicos in other nations. North Korea might have gotten a bigger, badder reaction had it elected instead to drive steamrollers over groups of homosexuals or Muslims or women. At least Bernie Sanders, though closer in kinship to the North Korean brand of monarchical socialism than to, say, Ronald Reagan, noticed the bomb. World leaders only pause long...

Pierre Louis Opont, president of Haiti's electoral council, said the runoff vote was being pushed back for security reasons. But he did not say when the election, already postponed twice before, would be rescheduled. The announcement led to jubilation from demonstrators marching to oppose the election. They danced on the streets of the capital Port-au-Prince, but the mood quickly darkened. Gunshots were fired as protesters clashed with police. The postponement is nevertheless expected to ease unrest after days of protests in the deeply impoverished country of about 10 million people, at pains to rebuild from a devastating earthquake six years...

The seat of government in the capital, Pristina, briefly caught fire after it came under a hail of petrol bombs. Firefighters quickly doused the flames and police used tear gas to drive back several thousand opposition demonstrators. They were protesting against a European Union-brokered deal to give Kosovo's ethnic Serb minority greater local government powers and the possibility of financing from Belgrade. Opposition leaders say the government should resign over the accord and call an early election. ... Kosovo's government has accused opposition party leaders of organizing the violence and attempting to drag the country into "crime and anarchy." "The...

Online dating behemoth OkCupid is adding a feature tailor-made for polyamorous people. The new setting, which became available for some beta users in December, allows users who are listed as “seeing someone,” “married,” or “in an open relationship” on the platform to link their profiles and search for other people to join their relationship. It will be rolled out to all users on Friday. A screenshot of the new feature obtained by The Atlantic shows a stock photo of a sample user listed as “in an open relationship” with another, whose profile is linked below his.

Dame Sally Davies has written to all GPs and pharmacies to ensure they are prescribing the correct drugs after the rise of "super-gonorrhoea" in Leeds. Her warning comes after concerns were raised that some patients were not getting both of the antibiotics needed to clear the infection. Sexual health doctors said gonorrhoea was "rapidly" developing resistance. A highly drug-resistant strain of gonorrhoea was detected in the north of England in March.