Free Republic

On Monday, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel announced massive cuts to the size of the armed services, slashing the army to its pre-World War II size. In 2011, the army had some 566,000 soldiers; Hagel wants it cut to somewhere between 440,000 and 450,000 troops by 2019. If Congress does not add additional funding, Hagel threatens to slash that number to 420,000 by 2019.

There are, however, some chilling suggestions in politics and government today that draw memories of the last days of that failed German republic. Consider two of the most notorious changes in the German nation as it moved from Weimar Germany to Nazi Germany: the destruction of the sovereignty of state governments and the replacement of the national legislature with unchecked executive power.

A vast country estate, marble-lined mansions, a private golf course and zoo: the unimaginable luxury of the private residence of departed Ukrainian President Victor Yanukovych flung open for all to see. As parliament voted to oust Yanukovych Saturday and he fled to a pro-Russian bastion in east Ukraine after months of bloody protest again his rule, thousands of Ukrainians wondered awestruck around the breathtaking luxury of his abandoned property some 110 miles from Kiev after it was taken by demonstrators. "I am in shock," said retired military servicewoman Natalia Rudented, as she looked out over the manicured lawns studded with...

Evil acts are given an aura of moral legitimacy by noble-sounding socialistic expressions, such as spreading the wealth, income redistribution, caring for the less fortunate, and the will of the majority. Let's have a thought experiment to consider just how much Americans sanction evil.

A vote by workers in Tennessee that could yield the first labor union victory at a foreign-owned auto plant in the U.S. South will be difficult to challenge, no matter the outcome, despite growing controversy over the election. Volkswagen AG employees at the German company's Chattanooga plant on Friday will complete three days of voting that has seen intense political infighting between anti-union forces and the United Auto Workers (UAW) over unionizing the plant.

Lately I see a lot of Marxist propaganda in our country, particularly in the MSM and in education. I know all the slogans because I lived the lies of the communist propaganda for 20 years. I will start with equal pay, social justice, and equality across the board by government fiat. The commie social justice was equality of misery, hunger, poor, cold, and cramped living conditions, scarcity of food, basic needs, electricity, water, and everything else spoiled brats in America take for granted that is produced by a free market model. The Sochi hotel accommodations are a case in point....

The Urban Institute, the IRS’ “trusted partner” for small nonprofit organizations to publicly disclose their financial information, has itself partnered with the radical National Council of La Raza, an open-borders advocacy group pushing immigration reform. Earlier this week, WND broke the story that the IRS is officially directing all U.S. nonprofits whose annual gross receipts are $50,000 or less to file their annual financial information electronically with the liberal Urban Institute.

President Obama has broken many promises. One that he has not broken is his boast that he would "fundamentally transform America." He and his fellow Democrats are on the verge of doing just that by turning us into a nation of loafers. A loafer is an idle person who lives off others. Barack Obama seemingly has no problem with such people. He might even relate to them. He does have a serious problem with his own work ethic, and finds work boring.

“The Hillary Papers” — a large archive of previously unpublished documents allegedly kept by Hillary Clinton’s friend and adviser Diane Blair — are seeing the light of day through a report The Washington Free Beacon posted Sunday night. The archive paints Clinton, a former U.S. senator, U.S. secretary of state, and possible 2016 presidential candidate, as a ‘strong, ambitious, and ruthless Democratic operative,” the Free Beacon concluded. “The Hillary Papers” include “correspondence, diaries, interviews, strategy memos, and contemporaneous accounts of conversations with the Clintons ranging from the mid-1970s to the turn of the millennium.”

While the beatdown on Jesse Myerson’s communist advocacy will continue — compelled by the impersonal forces of history — we can take a brief detour to examine what he wrote after Jared Loughner’s deadly January 2011 shooting spree in Tucson, Arizona. Beyond Blood Libel: A Refudiation of Sarah Palin’s Lone Gunman TheoryYou can read the whole thing, if you have a masochistic appetite for bad writing, but here’s a sample paragraph: "But even if it cannot be demonstrated that Loughner’s act grew out of the right-wing violence-glorifying culture, there remain critical pieces of context for understanding how culpability for violence...

(Update: Obama Applauds!) This photo came across Twitter today, thanks to Jonah Goldberg. It’s from the Winter Olympics opening ceremony in Sochi, Russia. (snip) Rachel Bachman ✔ @Bachscore Follow Russia in the house. #Sochi 1:02 PM - 7 Feb 2014 Update: And more. Look who’s applauding. John Ekdahl @JohnEkdahl Follow 1:28 PM - 7 Feb 2014

Forty-five years ago Hillary Rodham made a fateful decision. It has defined her life. Understanding that moment of decision is essential to understanding Hillary Clinton’s life — the successes and the failures and, perhaps, the future. It would explain the subtly discordant persona that causes the media — even many elite Hillary sympathizers — to present her as some kind of fabulous monster. And it may reveal something of the soul within. Hillary Rodham chose the path of “central power” rather than the path of “personal dignity.” There is some evidence she is not fully at peace with that decision....

Over the years, liberals occasionally get sloppy and let it slip that the inspiration for their vision of America comes directly from a left-wing activist/community organizer and student of Chicago mobsters, Saul Alinsky, author of a handbook for revolutionaries entitled Rules for Radicals. Just prior to his death in 1972, while discussing life after death in a Playboy interview, Alinsky said that, if given the choice between heaven and hell, he'd choose hell.

Attorney General Eric Holder said at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing today that President Obama is open to using an executive action to push through gun-control and/or associated mental health measures that haven’t found approval in Congress. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), one of the top proponents of new gun-control measures in Congress, noted that Obama only made a “very brief” reference to gun violence in his State of the Union address. “But I hope, and I hope you will join me in the view that the president remains completely committed to ending gun violence in this country, adopting common sense...

The Indian American immigrant vs. the radical white son of a one percenter capitalist was quite a spectacle. The Dinesh D'Souza and Bill Ayers debate on Thursday night at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, and sponsored by Young America's Foundation, hands down showed D'Souza has a broad view of history and a love of America as a "wealth creator." In contrast, Ayers has a narrow progressive view where "we [the people] are the sovereign, collective authority."

I was elated but very suspicious when communism failed suddenly in Eastern Europe in 1989. I suspected that the communist elites had decided to go underground to recoup and gain the trust of the west while attempting to rebuild their ranks. The communists’ economic system of surplus was such a dismal failure that it was necessary to hide for a while. People were starving literally and figuratively for capitalism, economic freedom, personal freedom, religious freedom, and a better life for their families. They had reached the breaking point where suffering would change into revolt. The Romanian military finally turned against...

One of the great voices of folk rock...

Some of the nation’s most respected legal teams are asking the Supreme Court to take up a challenge to the indefinite-detention provisions of the National Defense Authorization Act, charging the law has created the framework for a police state.

Marxist leftists have prepared a nightmarish blueprint for American socialism in a new revolutionary "book of imagination." The new book, "Imagine Living in a Socialist USA," was edited by Frances Goldin who praises "life-enhancing socialism" in the preface. The 281 page manifesto showcasea 31 utopian essays written by dangerous criminals, prominent liberals, and self-described communists - all for just $10.11.

It is beneficial to remind ourselves periodicallyof the realities in the struggle between Constitutionalism / Capitalism and Marxism-Leninism. It is a continual struggle, whether we acknowledge it or not. And the enemy of America as a constitutional republic with a capitalistic economic system is Marxism-Leninism, whether it be characterized as communism, socialism, progressivism, leftism, statism, or liberalism (in its current state).