Free Republic

A 68-year-old Wisconsin man who falsely claimed to be a Navy SEAL wounded four times in Vietnam has been sentenced to four years in prison for theft and faking paperwork. U.S. prosecutors say Kenneth E. Jozwiak produced fake discharge paperwork in 2014 to get U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs pension benefits intended for low-income wartime veterans. In 2014, Jozwiak submitted a discharge certificate that claimed he served as a Navy SEAL from 1965 to 1968 and was awarded the Bronze Star and Purple Heart. All -- including the four Purple Hearts for combat injuries — were totally false, according to...

Big Government: President Trump's budget is taking its share of hits for supposedly indulging in fanciful accounting, unrealistic assumptions and proposing massive cuts to vital safety-net programs. How much of that is true? You decide. Trump's budget plan proposes to balance the federal budget in 10 years and do so entirely through spending restraint. That alone is enough to raise the hackles of the Washington, D.C., swamp creatures. But critics have other complaints. The main ones: It relies on unrealistic economic projections. Critics say Trump's budget numbers rest on a rosy scenario of future economic growth. The New York Times...

Pope Francis on Wednesday gave President Trump a copy of his 2015 encyclical letter on the environment and climate change. Trump responded to the gifts by saying: "Well, I'll be reading them," according to pool reports. The Trump administration has been pushing to roll back Obama-era regulations on the environment. Trump on Wednesday met with Pope Francis at the Vatican. At the beginning of the meeting, the president said it was a "great honor" to be meeting with the pope. The meeting lasted about 30 minutes. Trump said after its conclusion that it was a "fantastic meeting." Trump in March...

If faculty cannot bail out on and disparage diversity training, students don't stand a chance: Resistance is futile. "I exhort you not to attend this training," Paul Griffiths, then a professor at the Duke Divinity School urged his colleagues via the campus e-mail. "Don't lay waste your time by doing so." "It'll be, I predict with confidence, intellectually flaccid: there'll be bromides, clichés, and amen-corner rah-rahs in plenty. When (if) it gets beyond that, its illiberal roots and totalitarian tendencies will show. Events of this sort are definitively anti-intellectual. (Re)trainings of intellectuals by bureaucrats and apparatchiks have a long and...

A recent front-page story in The Wall Street Journal proclaims that 3 percent economic growth isn't achievable. We are told that 2 to 2.5 percent growth is the best we can do, because of low labor-force and productivity growth. If that were true it would be dismal news for the country. The long-term growth path for the U.S. economy from 1950 to 2000 was 3.3 percent. Now we can't even strive for a number below the average? Almost every year he was in office, President Barack Obama forecast that he would achieve more than 3 percent growth -- but...

How many innocent people — including children — does a Muslim terrorist have to murder before it becomes the lead story on TV news? Apparently more than 22, judging from what happened in the aftermath of the latest savagery in Manchester, England, Monday night. So here was MSNBC, with Comrade Chris Matthews speaking over a live video feed from the blood-spattered Ariana Grande concert, the live screams of the terrified young girls in the background, as he says with disinterest:

Concord resident Marta Gonzalez, an immigrant from Mexico, said troubles with her building manager started last summer. After a series of rent increases that drove up monthly rates by $200 to $300 every time a lease ended, Gonzalez, a member of the nonprofit Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, and other residents in the complex began to organize an effort to stabilize the rents there.

Countries around the world offered their support and condolences to the United Kingdom after the devastating terror attack in Manchester on Monday evening. In Dubai the Burj Khalifa was emblazoned with the Union Jack, in Zagreb, Croatia a fountain was illuminated with the colours of the United Kingdom flag and in Rome the Rome the Colosseum went dark in tribute. At Yankee Stadium, 'God Save the Queen' was played along with 'The Star-Spangled Banner' before New York hosted the Kansas City Royals.

Middlebury College announced on Tuesday that it has completed the process of sanctioning students who participated in the disruptions of Charles Murray's lecture. According to the school, 67 students have been disciplined for their roles in the protest that obstructed Murray's speech, but the police department failed to identify any specific individuals responsible for putting a professor in a neck brace.

They are targeting children now. The Muslims who blew up that concert knew who they were targeting. They did it deliberately. The terrorist group released statements in several languages through its central media body praising the atrocity, claiming more than 100 “crusaders” were killed or wounded at the “shameless” concert. Thoughts and prayers are all well and good, but it’s time to hold the British government accountable. Where is the resistance? Why isn’t anyone trying to stop it? Why arrest nationalists and not Islamic fundamentalists? The answer is simple. Our governments are filled with traitors. They hate us. They want...

It was big news when Roger Ailes died. Everyone in his industry acknowledged that a serious, even transcendent force in American media and politics had passed away. Without Fox News over these last 20 years, the shape of American politics would be far different. The heretofore unanimously liberal media suddenly had a counterweight, and, much to their horror, this uppity network soon had surpassed all of its rivals in cable news -- combined. The era of unchallenged liberal enlightenment was over. Ailes was accused of making American dumber, angrier and more bigoted. One notable Ailes critic really stretched reality beyond...

The photos and the video and the sounds have become all too familiar. A flash of light – a massive explosion – horrified screams of the dying and wounded. This time in Manchester, England – at a concert filled with young teenagers and their parents. What was supposed to be a night of music and dancing and childhood frivolity – ended in carnage. "Horrific, horrific injuries. Terrible," President Trump said. "Dozens of innocent people, beautiful young children savagely murdered in this heinous attack upon humanity." An untold number of children and their parents were massacred by Islamic radicals - killed...

Mustafa al-Tha'i worked in secret at night, using his brushes and pencils to record the violence he saw during the day under the Islamic State group's brutal reign in Iraq. The bloodied body of a man suspended by a foot, another lying in a pool of blood with his severed head on his back, a woman with her face burned by acid -- these are just some of the scenes captured by Tha'i. The 240 paintings and drawings -- which Tha'i composed from the time IS seized his hometown of Hammam al-Alil, south of Mosul, in 2014 until Iraqi forces...

Millions of people love Apple computers and wouldn't be caught using a PC. By contrast, there are many millions of PC users who feel the same way about Apple computers. Many men like double-breasted suits, but I wouldn't be caught dead in one. Some people swear by Cadillac cars, but my favorite is Mercedes-Benz. Despite these strongly held preferences, there's no conflict. We never see Apple computer lovers picketing firms that serve PC lovers. Mercedes-Benz lovers don't battle Cadillac lovers. In free markets, people with strong differences in preferences get along and often are good friends. The reason is simple....

The New York Times' hostility to industry gets worse every day. Last week, the Times ran a big picture of a bay in Alaska with the headline "In Reversal, E.P.A. Eases Path for a Mine Near Alaska's Bristol Bay." While this was just another of their stories about how Donald Trump will poison America, it caught my eye because of the big photo and because I once reported on that mine. Attempted mine, I should say. No holes have been dug. I reported on Pebble Mine because the EPA rejected the mine even before its environmental impact statement was submitted....

For now, everyone knows the sonorous name and cherubic face of 8-year-old Saffie Rose Roussos. She's the littlest known victim of Monday night's jihad attack in Manchester, England. Her doe-eyed image spread as rapidly across social media as the #PrayForManchester hashtags and Twitter condolences from celebrities. But I guarantee you that beautiful Saffie Rose will evaporate from the memories of those most loudly proclaiming "Never forget" faster than a dewdrop in the desert. Look no further for proof of the West's incurable terror attack amnesia than the reaction to the Manchester massacre. Reporters, politicians and pundits expressed shock at the...

A man with a knife has been arrested near Buckingham Palace, as Britain remains on critical terror alert amid fears Manchester suicide bomber Salman Abedi did not act alone. The man was detained by police on The Mall just moments before the Queen passed by in a car on her way to an engagement with the Duke of Edinburgh at St Paul's Cathedral.

UK to deploy troops after attack, risk now ‘critical’: May,” Reuters, May 23, 2017: Britain’s armed forces will be deployed to boost security, Prime Minister Theresa May said on Tuesday, as the country raised its terror threat to the highest level of “critical” after a suicide attack in Manchester that killed 22 people, including children. May said members of the armed forces would be positioned at key sites to free up police for patrols and military personnel might be deployed at public events such as concerts and sports events as a further attack was seen as potentially imminent. May said...

Sean Hannity announced tonight on his Fox News show that he will no longer discuss the July, 2016 murder of DNC staffer Seth Rich — for now, anyway. “I totally completely understand how upset… how hard this is on this family, especially over the recent coverage of Seth’s death,” Hannity said, adding that he had reached out personally to the Rich family to offer his condolences. “Out of respect for the family’s wishes, I am not discussing this matter at this time,” Hannity said. You can see Hannity’s comments in the video above. Hannity’s announcement came after he received considerable...

Celebrating their success in retaining blue-collar jobs is one way Republicans are winning the votes of working-class Americans. Whew! For once, one of my predictions was correct: Donald Trump had a great visit to Saudi Arabia. It was a great visit for him, it was a great visit for the Saudis and the other Arab Gulf states, and—last but not least—it was a great visit for magical, glowing orbs. I want to spend a little time talking about one of the reasons why the trip went so well. I’ll warn you: This is a somewhat taboo subject for progressive foreign-policy...