Free Republic

Control.If an article could consist of one word this article would be finished.The government knows that it’s in trouble, in more trouble than the administrations that came before it. Government spending is out of control and the fact that the country is still actually afloat is simply down to the privately owned, and inappropriately named, Federal Reserve buying up government debt like it’s going out of fashion.The government knows that more and more people are waking up to the possibility that we are going to face a major crisis in our lifetime. Awakened people are far more difficult people...

Michelle Obama was not elected to office, and while, by definition, her husband did not usurp the position he dishonors, his bigoted, racialist wife is usurping authority and inflicting additional financial injury upon an already suffering people. Michelle Obama’s latest foray into the public spotlight was last week when she announced “her” proposed changes “to U.S. food labeling rules that seek to tackle the fact that the average serving sizes used to calculate calorie intake have lost track with the reality of modern American appetites.” She coldly stated, “This will be the new norm for providing consumers with the information...

Russia Now Has More Than 6,000 Airborne, Naval Forces in Crimea, Official Says

“Your failure to be informed does not make me a wacko.”—John Loeffler . ...Its website, “UN Water,” proclaimed at the January 8-10, 2013 conference, “Preparing for the 2013 International Year. Water Cooperation: Making it Happen!” How is this going to happen? It is called “water diplomacy,” forming private-public partnerships, “supporting all stakeholders, including those in governments, international organizations, private sector, civil society, and academia at an appropriate level while considering cultural aspects in different cooperation initiatives.” It sounds purposefully complex and confusing but it is just another arm of the United Nations’ ever encroaching agenda. The United Nations has been...

The rise in the number of mobile device theft all across the United States has prompted several Senators to introduce a smartphone kill switch on the federal level. This past Thursday, a proposed law called the Smartphone Theft Prevention Act was introduced by Democratic Senators Barbara Mikulski (MD), Amy Klobuchar (MN), Richard Blumenthal (CT), and Mazie Hirono (HI).

John Podesta, the former Clinton Administration chief of staff who is spearheading President Barack Obama’s aggressive strategy of government-by-regulation, has also been helping United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon with an even more ambitious job: setting the stage to radically transform the world’s economic, environmental and social agenda. That effort—a colossal and sweeping form of global behavior modification--is supposed to get a new kick-start at a special U.N. summit of world leaders to be convened by Ban in New York City on September 25. Its supporters hope that effort will end next year in a new international treaty that will...

The US Army is considering replacing thousands of soldiers with robots as it deals with sweeping troop cuts. A senior American officer has said he is considering shrinking the size of the Army’s brigade combat teams by a quarter and replacing the lost troops with robots and remote-controlled vehicles. The American military is still far from fielding armies of Terminator-type robotic killers, though. Ideas under discussion instead include proposals to see manned trucks and transporters replaced by supply trains of robot vehicles. Generals are studying proposals as the US Army is to slim down from 540,000 to about 490,000 soldiers...

A couple of weeks back, when news appeared of Mr. Obama’s executive order to “expand” so called background checks to confirm the mental health of firearm purchasers, it seemed on the surface to be somewhat innocuous. Making it more difficult for a “mentally unstable” person to obtain a firearm does, on the surface, sound reasonable, does it not? It does until one considers two critically important factors.

President Barack Obama announced Friday that John Podesta, his new "counselor" and the political operative responsible for creating the institutional left in Washington, will be the appointed "to lead a comprehensive review of big data and privacy" in the aftermath of revelations about the National Security Agency's electronic spying programs. When he joined the White House last month, Podesta's focus was said to be "climate change." The president's speech contained little news. It was a classic Obama set-piece, designed to demonstrate that he understands both sides of a complex argument, while delegating

Obama Aides: He Didn't Know Extent of NSA Surveillance "I think it was disturbing to most people, and I think he found it disturbing.” President Obama doesn’t merely claim ignorance of the IRS’ targeting of politically conservative groups or the Department of Justice’s targeting of journalists: according to The New York Times, Obama was also ignorant of the extent of NSA surveillance. According to the Times, “aides said Mr. Obama was surprised to learn after leaks by Edward J. Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor, just how far the surveillance had gone.” David Plouffe, Obama’s advisor, said, “Things seem...

In a Tuesday night debate over the Kirk-Menendez bill to add sanctions against Iran and its nuclear program, Senator Diane Feinstein (D-Ca) sparked controversy when she announced that "we cannot let Israel determine when and where the United States goes to war." The bill includes a provision that would support Israel in the event that it carries out a preemptive strike against Iran. Feinstein chairs the Select Committee on Intelligence and is considered pro-Israel, but her remarks, which echo those of anti-Israel critics, have provoked outrage. The Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) called on her to apologize, noting that the...

(CNN) - It may have been the least productive year for Congress in history, at least in terms of passing laws – fewer than 60 of which made it through the House and Senate and were signed by President Barack Obama. Across the country, however, state lawmakers were busy getting more than 40,000 bills passed, ones that tackle everything from drones to food stamp benefits. In Illinois for example, teenagers will no longer get to use tanning beds without a doctor's note. If you live in Delaware, visit the shark fin buffet while you can, a new law will make...

Freedom: It's bad enough that the president's health insurance takeover costs more, breaks his pledge of letting you keep your plan and diminishes choice. It actually restricts your travels too. 'We have never had to put a wall up to keep our people in." Those words from President John F. Kennedy in June 1963, standing at the Berlin Wall, neatly illustrated the moral superiority of the free West over the Soviet bloc. But Americans are now about to find themselves grappling with their own bureaucratic Berlin Wall. The American Thinker's Stella Paul has exposed the virtually unnoticed fact that within...

CNN's Piers Morgan admitted that he is fighting U.S. gun laws despite it being "not my country" and "not my constitution." In an interview with TV Newser, the CNN host explained, "It's not my country, it's not my constitution, but I'm a resident here, and I'm therefore governed by the same constitutional rights as anybody else." He also went on another mini-gun control rant on Tuesday night:

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.” - C. S. Lewis, author of The Chronicles of Narnia and many other works of literature. It is one of the great mysteries that, for progressives, also called liberals,...

A plan to squeeze most residents of the San Francisco Bay Area into multifamily housing offers a test case of whether land-use bureaucracies nationwide, encouraged by the Obama administration, should be allowed to transform American lifestyles under the pretext of combating climate change. Currently, 56 percent of households in the nine-county Bay Area live in single-family homes. That number would drop to 48 percent by 2030, under a high-density development blueprint called Plan Bay Area, recently enacted by the Association of Bay Area Governments and the region’s Metropolitan Transportation Commission. Plan Bay Area has already drawn several legal challenges, and...

h/t Kirby

Microsoft founder Bill Gates and his wife Melinda have "contributed $25,000 apiece" to Washington's Initiative 594, which would effectively ban private gun sales in the state. The Washington Alliance for Gun Responsibility (WAGR) is pushing the initiative, claiming it "makes sure anyone buying a gun in Washington State passes the same background check, no matter where where they buy the gun and no matter whom they buy it from."

Sometimes, when I write about Obamacare and the catastrophic effect it's going to have on the economy, the healthcare system and society itself, I get correspondence from people who say things like, "In your position, you don't have anything to worry about." In the first place, nobody in America, except Congress and Obama's chosen ones, are going to be exempt from the ruinous ramifications of this ill-conceived bit of socialism, myself included.

Did you know that the Obama administration is negotiating a super secret “trade agreement” that is so sensitive that he isn’t even allowing members of Congress to see it? The Trans-Pacific Partnership is being called the “NAFTA of the Pacific” and “NAFTA on steroids”, but the truth is that it is so much more than just a trade agreement. This treaty has 29 chapters, but only 5 of them have to do with trade. Most Americans don’t realize this, but this treaty will fundamentally change our laws regarding Internet freedom, health care, the trading of derivatives, copyright issues, food...