Free Republic

JW Obtains IRS Documents Showing Lerner in Contact With DOJ about Potential Prosecution of Tax-Exempt Groups APRIL 16, 2014 May 9, 2013, email reveals IRS plans to meet with Department of Justice over whether to prosecute groups that “lied” about plans for political activity (Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch today released a new batch of internal IRS documents revealing that former IRS official Lois Lerner communicated with the Department of Justice (DOJ) about whether it was possible to criminally prosecute certain tax-exempt entities. The documents were obtained as a result of an October 2013 Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act...

Earlier this week, Sen. Jeff Sessions said that the president was deliberately dismantling our law enforcement system. Megyn Kelly of Fox News asked Rep. Gowdy about that. Rep. Trey Gowdy, a former prosecutor, agrees with Sen. Sessions that the president is systematically dismantling the nation’s laws, but he believes it is to win elections not to pursue an agenda. They [the administration] do however fundamentally view their role differently, he added. Attorney General Eric Holder recently claimed that illegal immigration is a civil right, if that is so, Gowdy says, that is like saying you and I have the right...

Military dive teams worked the dark, cold waters of the Yellow Sea on Wednesday night in a desperate effort to find nearly 300 people who remained missing after the ferry they were taking to a South Korean island resort sank with breathtaking speed. -excerpt- The bulk of those aboard were students and teachers from Seoul's Ansan Danwon High School heading to a four-day trip to Jeju, a resort island considered the Hawaii of Korea. More than 300 students and more than a dozen teachers from the school were on board, according to officials.

Here’s something from the “Did you know that?” category. Did you know that abortions are apparently eligible for a tax deduction? That appears to be true, so says the IRS.irs From the Washington Examiner, in a list of odd tax deductions: Have an abortion, get a tax deduction! How strange that pro-abortion advocates aren’t using this as a selling point. Hmmm. Oh, and while they hyperventilate over Hobby Lobby not wanting to provide every type of birth control without a co-pay, it turns out that birth control pills can be deducted if prescribed by a doctor. Also, you can deduct...

Megyn Kelly’s "Kelly File" is a great news show. She’s incisive, informed and customarily handles the toughest guest with aplomb. But her lengthy interview of Facebook C.O.O. Sheryl Sandberg about her second book in the Lean In series Lean In: For Graduates was a head shaker. Amazing that she of all people allowed Sandberg to restring the same old, same old, shamed, and shopworn feminist myths about women and girls and then jangle it in front of her viewing audience like something new out of the box. Indeed Kelly all but genuflected in front of this woman. Kept her on...

The College Board on Wednesday will release many details of its revised SAT, including sample questions and explanations of the research, goals and specifications behind them. “We are committed to a clear and open SAT, and today is the first step in that commitment,” said Cyndie Schmeiser, the College Board’s chief of assessment, in a conference call on Monday, previewing the changes to be introduced in the spring of 2016. She said the 211-page test specifications and supporting materials being shared publicly include “everything a student needs to know to walk into that test and not be surprised.” The overall...

While the cold air was rushing in last evening @dendenator from Sommerville tweeted me asking me if there would be 1 to 3 inches of snow. I quickly replied, no, you might be lucky if you see a flake. Well, I guess there was an abundance of luck this morning as the ground has become coated with snow in many places. The good news is we didn’t see 1 to 3 inches of snow, the bad news is early commuters will have to use winter driving skills one more time. Cold air has been pouring into the country for the...

Excellent interview (youtube video) with Toomas Hendrik Ilves, President of Estonia, who grew up in New Jersey and he doesn't even have a Jersey accent. :-) Do yourself a favor and watch it.

House Democrats, who are stepping up the pressure on Republicans to take up comprehensive immigration reform legislation, said Tuesday the Obama administration is getting ready to take executive action on the matter very soon.Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson earlier this month told House Democrats he'll take action in the next few weeks on “fixes” to immigration law, most likely dealing with deportation.“He gave us a time frame, and there are some fixes that are going to be coming sooner, which is in the next few weeks. And then there are some broader policy changes that will be coming later this...

Narendra Modi, the odds on favourite for prime minister who is running under the banner of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), has suffered a major blow. His right hand man, Amit Shah (pictured), has been barred from future campaign rallies after making a number of anti-Muslim statements. A close Modi aide for years, Shah was in charge of his campaign in Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state. In announcing its decision on Sunday, the Election Commission said that Shah's statements promoted "hatred and ill will" between religions. It also urged police to press criminal charges.The politician, among other...

A Republican lawmaker has introduced legislation that would cut off pay to Attorney General Eric Holder and other federal officials who have been held in contempt of Congress. Rep. Blake Farenthold, R-Texas, introduced the "Contempt Act" on Tuesday, less than a week after alluding to the measure during a contentious House Judiciary Committee hearing where Holder faced criticism from GOP lawmakers. "The American people should not be footing the bill for federal employees who stonewall Congress or rewarding government officials’ bad behavior," Farenthold said in a statement. "If the average American failed to do his or her job, he or...

President Barack Obama is attempting to lower the rate of “births” — and separately, pregnancies — among blacks and Latinos.The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lists reducing “births” as one of the top goals of Obama’s “Teen Pregnancy Prevention Initiative.”The language on the CDC’s website makes clear that the program seeks to reduce the rate of both pregnancies and “births” among minorities.Specifically, the CDC says the “purpose of this program is to demonstrate the effectiveness of innovative, multicomponent, communitywide initiatives in reducing rates of teen pregnancy and births in communities with the highest rates, with a focus on reaching African American...

Buried deep on the website of the U.S. Census Bureau is a number every American citizen, and especially those entrusted with public office, should know. It is 86,429,000.That is the number of Americans who in 2012 got up every morning and went to work — in the private sector — and did it week after week after week.These are the people who built America, and these are the people who can sustain it as a free country. The liberal media has not made them famous like the polar bear, but they are truly a threatened species.It is not a rancher...

Sylvia Mathews Burwell, President Obama’s nominee to lead the country’s health care overhaul, remains entangled in a lawsuit brought by shareholders of MetLife accusing her of misleading investors as a director of one of the country’s biggest insurance companies. The federal lawsuit, filed in New York, says the company used a Social Security death index to stop making payments when beneficiaries died, but the company wasn’t as diligent about using the database to track deaths of its policyholders, which triggers payouts, the lawsuit said. Last year, a judge refused to toss a federal lawsuit against the company, including claims against...

Washington (CNN) -- A new video shows what looks like the largest and most dangerous gathering of al Qaeda in years. And the CIA and the Pentagon either didn't know about it or couldn't get a drone there in time to strike. U.S. officials won't comment on that, but every frame of the video is now being analyzed by the United States. In the middle of the clip, the man known as al Qaeda's crown prince, Nasir al-Wuhayshi, appears brazenly out in the open, greeting followers in Yemen. Al-Wuhayshi, the No. 2 leader of al Qaeda globally and the head...

On April 6, Eurasianist storm troopers operating under Kremlin coordination launched assaults, seizing government buildings in Donetsk, Kharkiv, Lugansk, and several smaller cities in eastern Ukraine; declared themselves to be the assemblies of independent governments; and immediately invited Russian troops to invade and annex their respective fictional statelets. There can be no doubt that many of the thousands of invaders involved were in fact Eurasianist storm troopers, and not, as reported by some media outlets, “pro-Russian protesters.” They carried the outward-radiating eight-arrowed flag of Putinist ideologue Aleksandr Dugin’s fascist Eurasianist movement and shouted and displayed its slogan for the operation,...

A federal planning group has delivered what could be a fatal blow to the Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial Commission's controversial design for honoring the former president and World War II hero.Nine full-time, taxpayer-funded employees and a board of aging political leaders have spent the better part of a decade planning the memorial to President Eisenhower, but the National Capital Planning Commission rejected their proposal nearly two weeks ago.Other national memorial planners held open design competitions, but the EMC quickly settled on Frank Gehry -- the distinctive, modernist designer of Los Angeles' theme park-esque Walt Disney Concert Hall and an old...

On April 15th the New York Police Department (NYPD) announced that its Muslim surveillance unit had been disbanded.The surveillance unit came "under fire by community activists who accused the department of abusing civil rights."According to the Associated Press, the surveillance unit "relied on plainclothes officers to eavesdrop on people in bookstores, restaurants, and mosques." Starting in 2011, "the AP documented that police had systematically spied on Muslim neighborhoods, listened in on sermons, infiltrated colleges, and photographed law-abiding citizens as part of a broad effort to watch communities where terror cells might operate."

The Defense Department, under pressure from Congress to re-examine the way it handles sexual assault cases, announced Tuesday a comprehensive review of the entire military justice system. “It’s been over 30 years since the military code of justice was reviewed. It’s simply time,” said Lt. Col. J. Todd Breasseale, a Pentagon spokesman. “Sexual assault will certainly be part of the compendium of issues that will be looked at, but it’s by no means the sole issue.” Members of Congress and women’s groups have been strongly critical of how the military handles sexual assault cases, particularly the authority that military officers...

An effort by Washington to build housing for Haitians in the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake has fallen short and exceeded costs, a U.S. government report said Tuesday. The audit by the Office of the Inspector General for the U.S. Agency for International Development said the project to build 4,000 houses outside Haiti's capital resulted in the construction of only 816. The U.S. plan also sought to provide "home sites" on which others would pay for the construction of houses. This, too, fell short, with USAID completing engineering and design services for only 2,300 home sites out of a projected...