Free Republic

[The writer begins with a quick synopsis of 9/11.] Fast-forward fourteen years to Garland, TX. Jihadists drove a thousand miles to enforce Sharia blasphemy laws. The cop who shot them to death likely prevented a gruesome massacre. We are now being told that this would not have happened and everything would have been okay if Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer had stayed quiet and didn't make any stupid moves, such as, organizing the exhibition of Mohammed cartoons. This is exactly the behavior of passengers on a hijacked plane. We hope that everything will be okay as long as we remain...

David LettermanÂ’s departure isnÂ’t the end of an era. The era of late night talk shows ended a while back. In Johnny CarsonÂ’s final week in the nineties, he played to an audience of twenty million. Lately, Letterman has been lucky to get 2 million. His final shows have played to around 5 million viewers.Late night talk shows still exist, but their intended audience mainly watches viral clips from them the next day. The average age of LettermanÂ’s audience is 54. CBS hopes that the equally smarmy Stephen Colbert will be able to bring his younger audience demo with him,...

State Department deputy spokesperson Marie Harf was widely ridiculed in February for saying [1] of the Islamic State (ISIS): We cannot win this war by killing them, we cannot kill our way out of this war. We need, in the longer term, medium and longer term, to go after the root causes that leads people to join these groups, whether itÂ’s lack of opportunity for jobs. On Wednesday, Barack Obama made it clear that HarfÂ’s ridiculous analysis did not originate with her; rather, she was reflecting the company line. Said [2] Obama: Climate change constitutes a serious threat to...

~ The FReeper Canteen Presents ~ ~ Sunday Chapel ~ MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND 2015 ~ TAPS Canteen Mission Statement Showing support and boosting the morale ofour military and our allies' militaryand family members of the above.Honoring those who have served before. In honor of those who lost their lives while serving our country, we would like to share with you President Ronald Reagan’s 1986 Memorial Day remarks at Arlington National Cemetery: Today is the day we put aside to remember fallen heroes and to pray that no heroes will ever have to die for us again. It’s a day...

Ireland became Saturday the first country in the world to legalize same-sex marriages by popular vote. Within the U.S., Maine, Maryland and Washington in 2012 were the first states to legalize such unions through popular votes. Meanwhile, 37 states and the District of Columbia recognize same-sex marriages, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. A measure to legalize such unions via popular votes could be added to the ballots in the 13 other states during the 2016 general elections, when it conceivably could have the support of at least one presidential candidate, as IrelandÂ’s action motivated one White House...

Sharon Osbourne has collapsed 'from mental and physical fatigue' at her home in Los Angeles and will now take a one month break from her CBS show The Talk. A spokesperson for Ozzy Osbourne's wife said Saturday that the 62-year-old's doctors say she is suffering from 'extreme exhaustion.' 'Sharon has been advised and has agreed to take a month hiatus to recover fully from these recent events,' her rep said. 'Sharon would like to thank everyone at The Talk for granting her this time off and to all friends, family and others for their incredible support.' The rep explained that...

Despite the characterization by police that the afternoon gathering at a Twin Peaks restaurant in Waco, Texas that led to Sunday’s bloody shooting incident was a gathering of criminal biker gangs with violent intent, the meeting appears to have been a legitimate, organized gathering of motorcycle riders meeting to discuss political issues. The group that met was the Texas Confederation of Clubs and Independents (CoC&I) and a look at that group’s website and history gives a very different impression of the group’s purpose and goals than what has been said repeatedly by Waco police Sgt. W. Patrick Swanton.

OKLAHOMA CITY — Ben Carson won the straw poll at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference Saturday, demonstrating his popularity among conservative activists at one of the party’s traditional presidential cattle call events. Carson, a former surgeon who formally launched his underdog campaign this month with an appeal to the GOP’s tea party wing, finished first with 25 percent. He was followed by Scott Walker, who received 20 percent, and Ted Cruz at 16 percent. Chris Christie and Rick Perry tied at 5 percent, with Jeb Bush narrowly behind. Marco Rubio tied with Bobby Jindal and Rand Paul at 4 percent....

I’ve been there. I was 17, drugged and raped. When I learned I was pregnant, my family, counselors, and doctors took control. They intended the best. They wanted to help me. And even though there are literally no studies showing any benefit from abortion, they had total confidence in the social myth that abortion is the best option, even the only option, in cases of sexual assault. Even many pro-lifers approve of abortions in cases of rape. So surely it must be the best choice, right? Not in my case. It just added more layers of trauma, self-doubt, grief and...

“Pitch Perfect 2″ actress Rebel Wilson came under fire earlier this week after an Australian tabloid published a report exposing her real age — 36, not 29. She responded in the best way she knew how — with humor — and deflected the accusations by explaining that she was actually a “100 year old mermaid.” At the time of this first revelation, Salon’s Rachel Kramer Bussel commented that this type of thing was just part and parcel with the experience of being an actor in Hollywood. Creating a mythology is just a way to work your way up, she went...

Over the last few years, Taylor Swift has become one of the two or three biggest pop stars in the world. She has accumulated no fewer than four homes (including a $3.5 million place in Beverly Hills and a $20 million Tribeca penthouse) and drawn enormous press and media attention. She’s still on the cover of lots of magazines and we’ll probably see her there far into the future. On its release last year, her “1989” record became the biggest selling album in more than a decade, at a time in which record sales have been way down. She became,...

“Today, there’s nothing new under the sun,” intoned hallowed PBS filmmaker Ken Burns as he lamented the persistence of racial inequality in the United States in a commencement address at Washington University in St. Louis. So reported USA Today College. Recalling the lofty text of the Declaration of Independence, Burns reminded his audience that Jefferson, the declaration’s author, owned more than 100 slaves. Jefferson’s hypocrisy is alive and well today, opined Burns, in the form of “color-blindness” that he believes ignores the reality of structural racism. Burns -- a dogmatic liberal who made a shameless Ted Kennedy-boosting Democratic convention film...

Last month a brilliant Amy Schumer sketch came up with a perfect, darkly comic phrase to describe the Hollywood phenomenon of beautiful actresses being put out to pasture after they're deemed too old: "Last F-able Day." Julia Louis-Dreyfuss explained it this way: "In every actress' life, the media decides when you finally reach the point where you're not believably f-able any more." In the skit, Tina Fey says, "Nobody really overtly tells you, but there are signs." But someone in Hollywood decided to be very upfront with Maggie Gyllenhaal that, essentially, her day has passed. Gyllenhaal didn't name names but...

Since its creation in 2001, the Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation has raised close to $2 billion from a vast global network that includes corporate titans, political donors, foreign governments and other wealthy interests, according to a Washington Post review of public records and newly released contribution data. The total, representing cash and pledges reported in tax filings, includes $262 million that was raised in 2013 — the year Hillary Rodham Clinton stepped down as secretary of state and began to devote her energies to the foundation and to a likely second run for president. The financial success of...

The “ice princess” dress looked so innocent in the discount store, no idea what it was in for. It wasn’t a Disney-sanctioned, Elsa from “Frozen” dress, but it looked the part — an ankle-length number with a powder-blue velvet bodice, cerulean skirt accented by silver swirls, a white gauzy cape down the back and a plastic diamond gem centered just below the collar. Grace, nearly four, had been talking about being Elsa next Halloween since last Halloween. For $14.99, I figured I’d get a jump on her costume. It’s odd that I would buy a princess dress for my daughter,...

The American mainstream media is filled to the brim with liars, frauds, partisans, cheats, plagiarists, and those who tolerate, defend and enable all of them. There is no American institution — not the NFL, not the tobacco companies, not any corporation or enterprise regularly targeted by the media — that engages in anywhere near the amount of fraud and dishonesty that serially oozes from Our Media Overlords. Forget bias for a moment. Forget mistakes and misstatements and stupid or nasty things said during live telecasts. There isn’t enough Internet to begin to list the countless instances of left-wing bias and...

DUBLIN, Republic of Ireland – A pro-gay marriage Irish Senator has told journalists at Dublin Castle he hopes today’s vote will lead to change across the world, just as Ireland inspired the Bolshevik revolution of 1917. Senator David Norris (IND), was talking about how Ireland was a “small island on the edge of Europe” but that it could have a much wider impact. The example he cited was the General Post Office (GPO) uprising in Dublin in Easter 1916. A group took over the GPO and fought against the British Army to maintain control of it for several days. The...

He flashed gang signs in selfies, posted a photo of a Smith & Wesson on his Facebook page, and had a rap sheet even a veteran street gangster could be proud of. And now he’s been murdered — at age 14. Bronx seventh-grader Christopher Duran was stalked and gunned down on a sidewalk near his Bronx home Friday morning — the victim, cops believe, of gang violence. “He was a gangbanger,” one law-enforcement source said of Christopher, a child known in his Morrisania neighborhood as already well on the road to doom when he was shot dead. “He terrorized the...

As things heat up on "The Bachelorette," Kaitlyn Bristowe is being put in the hot seat! On Tuesday night's episode, viewers were shocked when an extended promo for this season revealed that the newly crowned Bachelorette slept with one of her suitors weeks before the "fantasy suite" stage of the dating competition. In light of this scandalous revelation, Bristowe sat with ET's Nancy O'Dell on Wednesday to reveal why she's "not ashamed" of what was caught on the "Bachelorette" cameras. "I don’t think that's a crazy thing to sleep with somebody when you're trying to be in a relationship with...

The vast majority of people who bought health insurance through ObamaCare exchanges are satisfied with their plans, according to a new national survey.People overwhelmingly said they felt positively about their choices of doctors and hospitals and their copays for appointments and prescriptions, delivering good news for the Obama administration one year into the law's rollout.More surprisingly, that satisfaction also extended to people’s monthly premiums and annual deductibles, according to data from the Kaiser Family Foundation.Sixty percent of ObamaCare customers said they were satisfied or very satisfied with their monthly premium costs — more than people who bought coverage before the...