Free Republic

I mourned the untimely passing of actor Philip Seymour Hoffman for the very personal reason that I hoped he would one day get to play Whittaker Chambers in a film version of Chambers’ 1952 masterwork, Witness. Short, heavy set, permanently rumpled, Hoffman would have made a near perfect Chambers to George Clooney’s Alger Hiss, the smooth, handsome, establishment golden boy. Chambers’ 800-page story of his life and their encounter remains the great political book of the twentieth century. Chambers was a deep thinker, a dazzling writer, and a reluctant participant in the most riveting political drama of the era. No...

Vice President Joe Biden used a Black History Month event at his official residence Monday night to decry the rich, both white and black, for stunting economic growth and suggested that “emancipation” is in order. “A lot of wealthy white and black people aren't bad but they control 1 percent of the economy and this cannot stand,” Biden told about 100 guests, including past civil rights activists and NBC weatherman Al Roker. “It's not fair because the business experts are saying that concentration of wealth is stunting growth. So let's do something that's worthy of emancipation,” said Biden, according to...

Does anybody really buy the Left’s faux outrage over former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani’s opinion, offered at a private event for Wisconsin governor Scott Walker last Wednesday, that President Obama does not love America? After all, it’s a matter of orthodoxy on the right that Barack Obama’s opinion of America ranges from mild disapproval to outright hatred. In my own estimation, it is somewhere between. A thought experiment for you: How do you think a spouse, a friend, or a colleague would react if you suggested — in your nicest voice — “I think you’re wonderful, but I...

It’s a timeworn tactic of the Cuban Communists, something any good magician quickly learns: diversion is your best friend. On Monday, as American administration officials, members of Congress and exiles were making lots of noise about the weekend arrest of some 200 dissidents on the island, Raul Castro and Communist Party Central Committee were meeting in Havana to decide the political fate of the nation.

Interesting discussion by Mark of Alinsky's Rules for Radicals. Starts at 26 minutes, 5 seconds. The List: (from The Best of Beck) Saul Alinsky’s 12 Rules for Radicals Here is the complete list from Alinsky. * RULE 1: “Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have.” Power is derived from 2 main sources – money and people. “Have-Nots” must build power from flesh and blood. (These are two things of which there is a plentiful supply. Government and corporations always have a difficult time appealing to people, and usually do so almost exclusively with...

Yesterday’s news became big news on the Fox News Channel last week when former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani brought up the name of President Barack Obama’s childhood mentor, Frank Marshall Davis. It was almost seven years to the day when we published our seminal piece about Davis, “Obama’s Communist Mentor.” Davis was a member of the Communist Party and a suspected Soviet espionage agent. He was included in the FBI’s security index, meaning that Davis could be arrested or detained in the event of a national emergency. The FBI file on Davis documents his anti-white and pro-Soviet views,...

Rudy Giuliani had the unmitigated gall last week to question President Obama’s love of country. This has been a standing question about Obama since he ran for President in 2008. How can you love a country that you believe needs to be fundamentally transformed? It’s not like Obama wants to fundamentally transform the United States into some romanticized version of the past. He wants to fundamentally transform the country into his own image. In many ways he’s been successful. We have a large number of Americans who believe court orders are mere suggestions to be ignored and that the executive...

Was the real reason for Obama’s Executive Order opening Cuba to the United States his desire to fulfill the imprimatur of the Weather Underground to establish Communism in America? A FOIA request forced the FBI to open its top secret archives on the Weather Underground movement. Founded by several urban 1960′s revolutionaries including the husband-wife team of Bill Ayres-Bernardine Dohrn, the WUO grabbed the nation’s attention with its bombings, attacks on police and police headquarters and various acts of domestic terrorism. “The example of the Cuban revolution became the guide for the emerging American student revolutionary” states this FBI vault...

Rudy Giuliani received a brutal backlash of criticism when he claimed on Wednesday that President Obama doesn't love America. But not everyone disagrees with the former New York City mayor. Here’s why.(VIDEO-AT-LINK) On Wednesday, former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani went onstage and said that President Barack Obama does not love America. Speaking at a private dinner, Mr. Giuliani said: “I do not believe, and I know this is a horrible thing to say, but I do not believe that the president loves America,” according to Politico. “Look, this man was brought up basically in a white family, so...

On Saturday, the New York Daily News reported that former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani doubled down on his criticism of Barack Obama, saying the president has been influenced by communism since childhood. According to the Daily News, Giuliani said Obama has been immersed in the statist ideology since he was about nine years old. “The ideas that are troubling me and are leading to this come from Communists with whom he associated since he was 9 years old,” the former mayor told the Daily News. MSNBC host Al Sharpton responded by calling the statement racist, despite Obama's own admission...

A loose accusation of his being a socialist has trailed Obama for years.... But the evidence exists, if not in plain sight then in the archives — for example, the archived files of the Democratic Socialists of America.... That, along with some misleading admissions in [] Dreams from My Father, makes it clear that Obama attended the 1983 and 1984 Socialist Scholars conferences.... A detailed account of these conferences (along with many other events from Obama’s radical past) and the evidence for Obama’s attendance at them can be found in my new book, Radical-in-Chief: Barack Obama and the Untold Story...

In late October 2008, when I wrote here at National Review Online that Obama had been a member of the New Party, his campaign sharply denied it, calling my claim a “crackpot smear.” Fight the Smears, an official Obama-campaign website, staunchly maintained that “Barack has been a member of only one political party, the Democratic Party.” I rebutted this, but the debate was never taken up by the mainstream press. Recently obtained evidence from the updated records of Illinois ACORN at the Wisconsin Historical Society now definitively establishes that Obama was a member of the New Party. He also signed...

Climate change is a threat to our very existence. Wherever we live and whatever we do. We all contribute to it. And we all have a responsibility to do something about it. But there is hope. Last week at the Geneva Climate Change Talks, 194 countries came together and agreed on a negotiating text as the basis for the final agreement they hope to reach at the Paris Climate Summit in December. Every country's position has been included. A good foundation for a collective global pledge to confront the threat to our future. It is about your life. Let's help...

Trying to explain his controversial comments that President Obama doesn’t love America, Rudy Giuliani said Friday that he believes the President has been influenced by communism and socialism. “Look, this man was brought up basically in a white family, so whatever he learned or didn’t learn, I attribute this more to the influence of communism and socialism” than to his race, Giuliani told the Daily News. “I don’t (see) this President as being particularly a product of African-American society or something like that. He isn’t,” the former mayor added. “Logically, think about his background. . . The ideas that are...

BUSTED: We Have Axelrod’s Father’s Communist Party Membership #ObamaLovesAmerica Gotnews.com has exclusively discovered David Axelrod’s father’s Communist Party membership. David Axelrod’s book, “Believer: My Forty Years in Politics,” details his very close relationship with his father, Joseph. He repeatedly told Charlie Rose that his father believed in the American dream. In fact, Axelrod’s father, Joseph, was a card-carrying communist. He’s listed as a member of the Communist Party for the 1936 general election. Axelrod briefly mentions his father’s Communist views in his book but only in passing and in a section about how he got to visit the former Soviet Union. Axelrod...

A New Jersey-based company has struck the first publicly announced deal under reforms enacted this year that allow U.S. telecom firms to do business with Cuba. IDT Corp.’s deal with Cuban state telecoms firm ETECSA will affect its sales of international calling cards to immigrant communities in the U.S. and its business connecting calls between phone companies in different countries, CEO Bill Pereira told The Associated Press on Friday. […] Outside experts blame the high cost of calls in and out of Cuba, among the world’s most expensive, on the country’s use of its monopoly on telecommunications to generate badly...

We understand that Nancy Pelosi is married to a very successful businessman in California. We are very happy that the Pelosi family has enjoyed the fruits of capitalism. Of course, they've enjoyed those fruits because they live in a country that respects property rights and does not confiscate businesses. This week, Rep Pelosi went to Cuba and stayed at the Hotel Saratoga. Let me share this from our good friends at Capitol Hill Cubans: "The Hotel Saratoga is a beautiful neoclassical structure in Old Havana. It was purchased in 1939 by Blanco Lopez and Co., headed by Jose Blanco and...

Russia agreed to provide military training for three leftist regimes in Latin America and increase military visits and exercises following a visit last week to the region by Moscow’s Defense Minister Sergei Shoygu, Pentagon officials said. Shoygu met with defense and military leaders in Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua and signed several agreements on warship visits and military training during the visit, which ran from Feb. 11 to 14. It is not clear whether any new arms deals were completed during the visit. Defense officials said the Russian leader is seeking bases in the region for strategic bomber flights that Shoygu...

Gerardo Hernandez, a spy for Communist Cuba and the man responsible for the murder of four humanitarian workers (three of whom were American citizens) over international waters, was freed from prison last year by the Obama administration, due in part to the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). This was revealed at a February 6, 2015, celebration of Hernandez’s release, along with two of his fellow Cuban agents (collectively known as the “Cuban 5.. At the beginning of the event, an IPS official thanked all who who took part in the 17-year campaign and singled out a number of organizations that...

The primary reason Communism doesn’t work is that it goes against the very nature of man. In Communism there is simply no motivation for anyone to work hard. When there is a zero correlation between the amount or quality of work you do and the compensation you receive, your motivation to work hard, or maybe work at all, simply evaporates. This is particularly true given that the compensation for the slacker at the next desk is equally without correlation as he continues to get the same salary regardless of whether he actually gets anything done or not. And while Communism...

Alright it appears this is the 40-year review of SNL. The actual review begins in a bit over a half an hour, but there is a lead-in one-hour segment which is going on now. I've already seen Sarah Palin interviewed, and her nemesis Tina Fey as well. Eddie Murphy seems to have a knock-out main squeeze, when he was just interviewed.

Members of the Russian parliament are creating a task force to estimate the damages inflicted on Russia by Germany during WWII, in a bid to demand financial compensation from the German state almost 70 years after the end of the conflict, Russian daily newspaper Izvestia reported on Tuesday. The initiative is a direct response to trade sanctions imposed on Russia by the US and EU, for its annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in March and continuous support of separatist fighters in Eastern Ukraine since, according to Mikhail Degyaterov, an MP from the Liberal Democrat Party of Russia, who has proposed...

Russian tanks descending on Warsaw and Berlin? Missiles lobbed at Washington and London? Such are the scenarios aired by a Russian national television program in response to suggestions that world leaders mark the defeat of Nazi Germany somewhere other than in Moscow. In a recent segment broadcast by the St. Petersburg-based Channel 5 station, presenter Nika Strizhak and a reporter suggest sending Russian tanks, fighter jets, and nuclear missiles to Western capitals should world leaders snub Russia's celebration of the 70th anniversary of Victory Day in May. "It's a very intriguing idea to move our Victory Day parade to London...

Economic Systems: The alarmists keep telling us their concern about global warming is all about man's stewardship of the environment. But we know that's not true. A United Nations official has now confirmed this. At a news conference last week in Brussels, Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of U.N.'s Framework Convention on Climate Change, admitted that the goal of environmental activists is not to save the world from ecological calamity but to destroy capitalism.

Economic Systems: The alarmists keep telling us their concern about global warming is all about man's stewardship of the environment. But we know that's not true. A United Nations official has now confirmed this. At a news conference last week in Brussels, Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of U.N.'s Framework Convention on Climate Change, admitted that the goal of environmental activists is not to save the world from ecological calamity but to destroy capitalism. "This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change...

http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2015/02/12/questions-emerge-over-statement-brian-williams-made-in-socal/

A massive shutdown of America’s supply chain is now in progress because of a labor dispute between dockworkers and their employers. The average dock worker, according to Zero Hedge, makes about $145,000 per year plus some $80,000 per year in benefits, but apparently their overtime pay is insufficient, which has led to widespread strikes at the nation’s busiest ports in Los Angeles and Long Beach. The ports are now being partially shut down for at least the next four days, but the months-long dispute has already led to hundreds of container ships and tractor-trailers being left in limbo (see pictures...

For some time, an argument has been made that the liberal left, in refusing to examine the problems of Islam, has betrayed its Enlightenment roots. That is, while secular, feminist, and protective of free speech in dealing with its Western peers, the liberal left has been accused of abandoning its heritage in its quest for political correctness regarding Muslims. In truth, however, the left has a distinguished background of courting Islam as a weapon against Western capitalism. Its most representative figures from the past did so frankly, as the following rehearsal of their statements demonstrates. Karl Marx supported the Ottoman...

The United Nation’s climate chief says that reordering the global economy to fight climate change is the “most difficult” task the international body has ever undertaken. “This is probably the most difficult task we have ever given ourselves, which is to intentionally transform the economic development model, for the first time in human history,” Christiana Figueres, who heads up the U.N.’s Framework Convention on Climate Change, told reporters. “This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that...

"This is probably the most difficult task we have ever given ourselves, which is to intentionally transform the economic development model, for the first time in human history. This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for the, at least, 150 years, since the industrial revolution." Those were the words spoken on Feb. 4 by Christiana Figueres, the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), under the auspices...

Trojan condoms now cost a month's wages for an average person in Venezuela. A box of 36 condoms can cost upwards of $755 for Venezuelans. A long line in supermarkets for corn, milk and sugar has been customary for a few years in the country, and the skyrocketed price for common goods like condoms in the country stems from the flailing economy and the shortage of goods throughout the nation, according to a report by Bloomberg Business. Venezuelans are facing inflation of more than 60 percent, exacerbated by falling oil prices that have reduced the country's oil export earnings. Venezuela's...

In an interview with Ezra Klein of Vox, President Obama said traditional market forces that used to redistribute income are failing and the time for government to do it instead has arrived. The interview, which ran today, was conducted January 23. Touting what he referred to as inclusive capitalism, Obama made the case for what actually sounds a lot like socialism. So part of our job is, what can government do directly through tax policy? What we’ve proposed, for example, in terms of capital gains — that would make a big difference in our capacity to give a tax break...

New Stalin monument in Russia-occupied Crimea At a time when each day brings fresh evidence that Russia is headed in a very dangerous direction and many news items that leave one shaking one’s head or feeling the need to say “I’m not making this up,” there are nonetheless some “smaller” stories that must not be ignored because of the long shadows they cast on the future. Three in the last several days fall into this category and are thus mentioned here, not because they provide a comprehensive picture of what is happening but because they point to trends already well-established...

“� у ва� негров линчуют” is a bitter Soviet-era punch line meaning, roughly, “But in your country they lynch Negroes.” There were a million Cold War variations on the joke: The Soviet farm minister meets his U.S. counterpart, who inquires about whether the heroic Soviet farmers are meeting their five-year plans. Asked about each crop in turn, the Soviet minister is forced to sheepishly admit that they are woefully behind on every goal, and then demands: “But what about the blacks in the South?” A U.S. car salesman asks a Soviet counterpart how many months the typical Soviet citizen must...

So here’s Obama’s opinion: Ukraine should not get military aid from the West because even with American help, Russia would still mop the floor with them. And this, according to the Times, is what Obama thinks will intimidate Putin into signing a peace treaty. I’ll offer the president some free advice: telling Putin the world is too weak to stop him isn’t very intimidating. Yet even if the West got Putin to sign on to a new agreement, nothing will have been accomplished. Putin has been violating the last ceasefire agreement, because there’s no one to enforce it. What Obama,...

President Barack Obama’s eagerness to cut deals with Cuba at almost any cost could yield a “strategic disaster” in which the Russian military winds up controlling Guantanamo Bay, Cuba scholar Jaime Suchlicki told “MidPoint” host Ed Berliner on Newsmax TV. The historic re-start of diplomatic and economic ties with Cuba ordered by Obama does not alter the fact that the communist nation’s rulers neither want nor feel they need improved relations with the United States, said Suchlicki, director of the Cuban Institute at the University of Miami. Just look at all the demands issued by Cuban leader Raul Castro, said...

Has anyone noticed that the nation’s leftist socialists are using the very same tactic with Islamic Terrorists [ISIS] as they incessantly use with the Nazis and other Socialists? Talk to any of the Leftists on the national socialist scene and they will go incandescent if you accurately attribute that the Nazi were socialists. It’s part of their freaking name for Pete’s sake: German Nationalsozialistische [deutsche Arbeiter-Partei] (National SOCIALIST [German Workers' Party])But that doesn’t deter leftists from denying reality. They will also deny that the USSR was Socialist… Even though THAT is also in their very name: Union of Soviet SOCIALIST...

The 2nd Amendment. While it was designed to be the last line of defense against a tyrannical government, it inadvertently is also a deterrent for radical Progressives who wish to fundamentally change our Constitutional Republic. Case in point. In 1988 Progressive author, Bob Zimmerman, ran for a Hawaiian Congressional seat and was soundly defeated. In 2015 Mr. Zimmerman has written a free “book” titled Common Sense. He modeled it after the historic pamphlet written by Thomas Paine which shared the same title. But instead of embracing individual Liberty, Mr. Zimmerman uses the words of the Founders to push a centralized,...

Russia is on a path to greater nationalization of private business, and the country has become a "value trap," Hermitage Capital Management CEO William Browder told CNBC on Tuesday. As a result, there is little value to be found in the country for investors, the outspoken critic of President Vladimir Putin said in a CNBC "Squawk Box" interview. "It's a value trap right now. Low price-to-earnings ratio only helps you if you get those earnings in the end," Browder said. "None of that money is going to come to you. You're either going to lose it from capital controls, from...

Food prices are out of control in Russia. So now, Russian officials are even thinking about putting a price cap on "essential food products," reports the Moscow Times. "We will see how to efficiently place [the restrictions] into law," the deputy prime minister Arkady Dvorkovich said. He also added that the government may give "the state competition watchdog more power in enforcing existing retail market regulations," reports the Moscow Times.

The actual history of communism -- the agony of the millions whose lives were destroyed by it -- is almost entirely missing from American cinema. The reason for this rests in Hollywood's own convoluted political history, a history that includes the "back story" of communism's own largely uncharted offensive in the studios. The cinema's great potential for persuasion excited Joseph Stalin and the Communist Party of the United States of America (CPUSA), which Stalin controlled. "One of the most pressing tasks confronting the Communist Party in the field of propaganda," wrote the indefatigable Comintern agent Willi Muenzenberg in a 1925 Daily Worker article, "is...

I was humbled and honored to see on various global news networks how my action movies that were pirated into Romania when it was a communist country inspired generations and set the stage for revolution against former dictator Nicolae Ceausescu. However, the total truth is that without the common people rising up, rebelling and supporting freedom, change and democracy, the motivation from my movies would have been short-lived or even missing in action. Here's a sample of headline news from around the globe this past week: BBC News: "Talking Movies: How Chuck Norris changed Romania." Fox News: "'Chuck Norris vs....

Promising to help America’s middle class, President Barack Obama on Monday sent Congress a record $4 trillion budget that would hammer corporate profits overseas and raise taxes on the wealthy while boosting tax credits for families and the working poor. Obama’s budget also would steer hundreds of billions of dollars to the nation’s crumbling infrastructure of roads and bridges, help provide two years of free community college and reverse the across-the-board, automatic budget cuts that have slammed the Pentagon and nearly every government department. In the face of certain opposition from Republicans, an optimistic Obama hailed a “breakthrough year for...

Bill Browder rose from rebellious grandson of the former head of the Communist Party USA, Earl Browder, to the leading foreign capitalist in Russia, as the founder and CEO of the high-flying hedge fund Hermitage Capital Management. But his rise was matched by a brutal and deadly fall, in which the Russian government would steal and destroy Browder’s company, and physically threaten its employees, culminating in the imprisonment, torture and death of Browder’s lawyer Sergei Magnitsky — the man for whom on account of Browder’s lobbying, the Magnitsky Act was named. Browder and a deceased Magnitsky would both be convicted...

In what some are saying may be a move to lock up progressive support for a possible 2016 presidential run, Vice-President Joe Biden declared that if he were running this country everything would be free. “You know how we’ve all heard that the best things in life are free, well, that clearly hasn’t been the case,” Biden observed. “Almost everything people want costs money. And a lot of people just don’t have enough money to fully partake of this nation’s abundance.” Biden criticized past efforts to try to solve the problem by handing out government benefits to the poor. “No...

Soaring crime in Caracas throughout 2014 has given it the unenviable ranking of second most violent city in the world, with a murder rate of 155 for every 100,000 inhabitants, according to Mexican NGO Security, Justice, and Peace. In the Venezuelan capital, not even the state’s security forces are safe: during the first 29 days of 2015, criminals murdered 13 of the city’s uniformed officers. Circumstances varied, but in the majority of cases, the perpetrators killed police to steal their firearms. “The criminal sees the policeman not as a figure of authority, but as an equal, and he doesn’t respect...

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro says the owners of an unnamed chain of shops have been arrested for artificially creating long queues. Mr Maduro said the owners had reduced the number of employees working on cash tills in order to create queues and "annoy the Venezuelan people". He has accused Venezuela's business elite of boycotting his government. The opposition blames the socialist policies of the past 16 years for the worsening economic crisis. "Yesterday we detected that a famous chain of stores was conspiring, irritating the people," said Mr Maduro. "We came, we normalized sales, we summoned the owners, we arrested...

Mary Noriega heard there would be chicken. She hated being herded “like cattle,” she said, standing for hours in a line of more than 1,500 people hoping to buy food, as soldiers with side arms checked identification cards to make sure no one tried to buy basic items more than once or twice a week. But Ms. Noriega, a laboratory assistant with three children, said she had no choice, ticking off the inventory in her depleted refrigerator: coffee and corn flour. Things had gotten so bad, she said, that she had begun bartering with neighbors to put food on the...

John Bachtell, chairman of the National Committee of the Communist Party USA, has penned a 2,000-plus-word essay explaining to his True Believers why the party has chosen to use the Democrats as its vehicle. Eric Owens of the Daily Caller noticed and excerpted some of the gems from the cant-laden prose, but let me offer my own summary.

An internal ruling made by the Venezuelan Ministry of Defense, published on Tuesday, January 27, in state newsletter Gaceta Oficial, legalizes the use of lethal weapons by the national armed forces (FANB) against protesters. [snip] Under Venezuelan law, the Defense Ministry does not have the authority to override or ignore the Constitution and the norms contained therein. María Esperanza Hermida, coordinator for enforcement in Venezuelan NGO (Provea) argued that the measure violates the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), as well as transferring competencies to the military which are the...