Free Republic

Dr. Kent Brantly is the Samaritan’s Purse doctor who was transported to Emory hospital in early August 2014 after contracting Ebola in Liberia.  He recently told Greta Van Susteren that he contracted the virus from evaluating patients in the emergency room, outside the isolation unit where they treat Ebola patients. His comments have received little to no attention:     I am convinced I didn't contract Ebola inside the isolation unit. I was still also evaluating patients.  In Liberia. I was taking care of patients in the isolation unit, the Ebola treatment unit, but I was also evaluating patients in...

http://media.townhall.com/townhall/reu/ha/2014/301/72a67c30-6141-4574-bf5e-089df2ca38f7.jpg> WASHINGTON - Americans go to the polls in seven days to cast their votes in a midterm election that's shaping up to be an angry outcry over the disastrous direction of the country. For the past six years, the Democrats have effectively been in charge by virtue of the fact that Barack Obama sits in the White House, setting policy, and his party is in control of the Senate (at least for now) that can block any legislation passed by the House Republicans. But even though Democrats control the major gates of power, Obama and his party have sought...

It was just a week ago when an Oklahoma teen’s picture of her school lunch went viral on social media. It turns out that student is not alone in grumbling about school lunches, an investigation by the Washington Bureau discovered. Since new federal nutrition standards began rolling out in 2012, fewer students are buying school lunches, even though enrollment is going up. The Cox Washington Bureau reviewed U.S. Department of Agriculture documents and found thousands fewer students bought meals when stricter standards kicked in. The rules, championed by first lady Michelle Obama and approved by congress, require more fruits, vegetables,...

Kaci Hickox, a nurse who treated Ebola patients and threatened to sue New Jersey over being quarantined before she was discharged, today threatened to sue Maine if officials there do not lift a 21-day quarantine restriction. “I will go to court to attain my freedom,” Hickox told “Good Morning America" today via Skype from her hometown of Fort Kent, Maine. “I have been completely asymptomatic since I’ve been here. I feel absolutely great.” Maine's health commissioner said Tuesday night the state will "pursue legal authority if necessary" to keep her quarantined. Hickox, 29, arrived at Fort Kent Monday, but is...

Pfc. Due W. Turner is no longer the unknown soldier of Columbia County, Arkansas. At last his name has been added to the monument dedicated to the country's veterans on the courthouse square in Magnolia, Arkansas. That empty space on the list of Columbia County's veterans of World War II had stood waiting to be filled all these years, like a silent sentinel. The committee in charge of the monument, once it learned that one of the county's own had been overlooked all these years, did its duty -- just as Private Turner had done his. At long last, it...

Imagine being torn apart, limb from limb until you bled to death. That would be excruciating pain, right? This is not a mere cruel thought about the medieval act of quartering. A modern day punishment is being inflicted on innocent, vulnerable human beings who can feel pain. The 1999 U.S. Supreme Court case of Stenberg v. Carhart reveals the ugly reality of abortion of pain-capable pre-born children via dismemberment, where the child’s arms and legs are twisted off by the abortionist using a steel clamp. Dr. Carhart, the abortionist on trial, confirmed that the preborn child can be alive at...

A man accused of killing two sheriff's deputies and wounding two other people in a bloody chase through Northern California was arrested nearly a decade ago in Utah, but authorities didn't connect him with his criminal past or previous deportations.

On the way to the airport the other day, my Uber driver, an elderly Russian chap, turned on a Top 40 radio station. Not being one to complain, I actually sat and listened to the lyrics. The song blasting through the speakers of the late-model Honda Civic was titled "Habits." The singer, a young, presumably wealthy Swede named Tove Lo (actual name: Tove Nilsson), warbles about her need to visit sex clubs, do drugs, "binge on all my Twinkies, throw up in the tub." She laments that she "drank up all my money." Why? Well, she explains, "You're gone and...

Ebola is a lot easier to catch than health officials have admitted — and can be contracted by contact with a doorknob contaminated by a sneeze from an infected person an hour or more before, experts told The Post Tuesday. “If you are sniffling and sneezing, you produce microorganisms that can get on stuff in a room. If people touch them, they could be” infected, said Dr. Meryl Nass, of the Institute for Public Accuracy in Washington, DC. Nass pointed to a poster the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention quietly released on its Web site saying the deadly virus...

This past weekend saw the 2014 Faith of Our Fathers conference, held in Knock, Ireland, and organised by the Catholic Voice newspaper. John Smeaton, chief executive of the Society for the Protection of the Unborn Children (SPUC) and the co-founder of Voice of the Family, delivered an address entitled Why defending marriage is a pro-life issue (full text). In his address, Mr Smeaton explained: Statistical evidence on abortion clearly shows that marriage as an institution protects children, both born and unborn. [Also], same-sex marriage represents an attempt to redefine marriage, thus undermining marriage and family life, as a growing body of academic research clearly shows. It is...

Like many liberal criticisms of market-based solutions to public policy problems, the idea of privatized armies is likely to conjure images of rogue mercenaries advertising in the back of Soldier of Fortune magazine. However, many of today’s paid civilian soldiers are highly skilled and professional former Navy SEALs, Army Rangers, and Marines. They often are employed by private contractors because of their effectiveness as support staff, training instructors, security personnel, and occasionally as combat-ready operators. They are trained and ready to kill the enemy, not “degrade” him. Such contractors have been instrumental in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; filling...

MILFORD >> Mohammad A. Chaudhry, 52, Tuesday admitted throwing boiling hot oil on a woman as she slept last year in West Haven, leaving her looking “‘as though her skin was melting off,’” her son told authorities, Assistant State’s Attorney Amy L. Bepko said. The victim required four skin grafts and 29 days in the hospital. She suffered third-degree burns over 15 percent of her upper body, Bepko told Judge Frank Iannotti. Chaudhry, of West Haven, also pleaded guilty to having a fellow prison inmate write a letter to one of his children, in violation of a court order. The...

NOTE: Readers may require a barf bag to get through this post.  If you’re on an airplane, check the seatback pocket in front of you.  If you’re anywhere else … good luck. What do you think of when you hear the word “magical"?  Childlike wonder?  Fairy dust?  Unicorns?  Santa Claus?  Disneyland?  Narnia?  How about abortion? No?  Well, writer Shelby Hodge disagrees with you.  In a fawning article for Culturebeat Houston, she recently covered Planned Parenthood of the Gulf Coast’s annual fundraising gala, giving her piece the unbelievably adulating title, “Magical Planned Parenthood gala transcends party lines and raises $1.3 million.”...

What day is it?" "It's today," squeaked Piglet. "My favorite day," said Pooh. As a proud member of the "don't just do something, sit there" school of politics, I don't fret much about partisanship and gridlock. Partisanship and gridlock aren't bugs of our constitutional system, they're features. And while everyone likes to see their preferred policies sail through Congress, on the whole I think we've been well served by those features for two centuries. That said, in the spirit of compromise so lacking in Washington, I would like to offer a suggestion for how to fix the alleged dysfunction in...

In Case You Had Any Doubts About What the Freedom From Religion Foundation Really Is Michael Egnor October 29, 2014 4:35 AM | Permalink The Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) is planning to distribute some... literature... to public high school students in Florida: An atheist group is planning to distribute a pamphlet in several Florida public high schools that depicts an illustration of a cartoon Bible sexually assaulting a young woman.According to a report by Brittany Hughes at CNSNews.com, the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) plans to hand out a pamphlet entitled "An X-Rated Book: Sex and Obscenity in the...

Liberals have this terrible and annoying habit of congratulating themselves for their intellectual heft merely because they hold liberal views. Once this arrogant notion reigns, it's tough for liberals to acknowledge when one of their own says something so remarkably untrue and stupid that it makes you wonder just how ignorant is the liberal really. At an event for Massachusetts gubernatorial candidate Martha Coakley in Boston on Oct. 24, Hillary Clinton told the assembled Democratic faithful: "Don't let anybody tell you that, you know, it's corporations and businesses that create jobs." This makes about as much sense as "Don't let...

I'm told that the public is "angry" at today's politicians. Eighty-two percent disapprove of the job Congress is doing. So will Tuesday's election bring a big shakeup? No. Congressional reelection rates never drop below 85 percent. The last big "wave" election was 1994, when Democrats lost control of both houses. The media called it a "revolution," and the late Peter Jennings from ABC likened Americans to 2-year-olds throwing a tantrum. Even that year, the reelection rate was 90 percent.Matt Kibbe of the group FreedomWorks and Hadley Heath Manning of Independent Women's Forum came on my show to say they don't...

Google Maps a few weeks ago identified much of North Philadelphia as "Temple Town." Temple University's encroachments upon North Philadelphia should no longer be shocking for it is real. While Temple University has officially denied any connection to this renaming, it appears clear that Temple University and developers are carving out a white enclave that in effect is no longer North Philadelphia. Most black folks will be unwelcomed. What Temple wants is a white enclave of racial and class privilege. This makes Temple University and its developer friend not just gentrifiers, but guilty of resegregating Philadelphia on the model of...

Elton John called Pope Francis "my hero" for his compassion and push to accept gays in the Catholic church, at his annual AIDS benefit. John hosted the event, "An Enduring Vision: A Benefit for the Elton John AIDS Foundation," Tuesday night in Manhattan. He said Francis is pushing boundaries in the church and told the crowd: "Make this man a saint now, OK?"

In order to be a big-government liberal, mental gymnastics and verbal tap-dancing must come naturally. In an impressive display of verbal flexibility, a Health and Human Services official explained that Obamacare is really just a benevolent feature of a loving government that is completely incapable of coercion or force. According to Joanne Grossie from the HHS, no one is being “forced” into the public exchanges. She even insisted that people who have found themselves kicked off their previous healthcare plans are actually quite lucky; because their previous plans were obviously inadequate clunkers that catered only to their gullibility and stupidity…...