Free Republic

Hickenlooper: Staffer promised I’d sign gun law I never thought would pass, and by the way, it’s totally ineffective! “I think a lot of people didn’t know how much emotion was gonna come out of the high-capacity magazines. [We] probably would have looked for something different or a different approach. One of my staff made the commitment that we would sign it it got passed. To be honest, no one in our office thought it would get through the legislature. If we’d known it was going to divide the state so intensely, I think we probably would have thought about...

At yesterday's CNN Town Hall with Hillary Clinton, a Maryland teacher named Gail Santa Maria expressed concern about school shootings and asked whether "reinstating the ban on assault weapons and banning high capacity magazines would do any good?" Hillary broke in and said: "Yes, I do. I do." That got loud, sustained applause from the very friendly audience. Gail Santa Maria had put one thing in question form, and that was enough to send Hillary Clinton into her "guns" riff. When Hillary got to the end of that riff, Gail Santa Maria said: "My question is, why does anyone..." And...

This is a disturbing statement from a woman who’d like to head the federal government. Noah mentioned this quote in his commentary on the room to Hillary’s left. Gun control is one of few issues where she sent a signal to the party’s liberal base that she might be more boldly liberal than Obama. But this isn’t just an appeal to the Left on policy. It’s an appeal to the Left’s routine and increasing tendency to equate political speech they don’t like with physical violence. See, bothersome political speech with which you disagree is prized and protected. But violence against...

The IRS—remember those jaunty folks?—announced Friday that it can't find two years of emails from Lois Lerner to the Departments of Justice or Treasury. And none to the White House or Democrats on Capitol Hill. An agency spokesman blames a computer crash. Never underestimate government incompetence, but how convenient. The former IRS Director of Exempt Organizations was at the center of the IRS targeting of conservative groups and still won't testify before Congress. Now we'll never know whose orders she was following, or what directions she was giving. If the Reagan White House had ever offered up this excuse, John...

With just seven little words, the freakout began: “The government holds a monopoly on violence.” These were written by David Brat, a professor of economics at Virginia’s Randolph-Macon College and, now, the Republican party’s nominee for the state’s seventh congressional district. “Unusual” and “eye-opening” was the New York Daily News’s petty verdict. In the Wall Street Journal, Reid Epstein insinuated darkly that the claim cast Brat as a modern-day fascist. And, for his part, Politico’s Ben White suggested that the candidate’s remarks “on Neitzsche and the government monopoly on violence don’t make a whole lot of sense.” As is its...

All eyes have been on ISIS as the jihadist group, in a matter of days, cut Iraq in half and declared its own state in the cities it captured. With fewer than 10,000 fighters ISIS forced the retreat of the better-armed Iraqi army forces many times its size. Their incredible success on the battlefield has fed into a growing lore about the group: the small band of fanatics that can take down a country. The truth is more basic and it's something ISIS doesn't want to admit--they weren't acting alone. It wasn't having God on their side that let ISIS...

The New York Times today reports on a disturbing development at Bowdoin College: For 40 years, evangelicals at Bowdoin College have gathered periodically to study the Bible together, to pray and to worship. They are a tiny minority on the liberal arts college campus, but they have been a part of the school’s community, gathering in the chapel, the dining center, the dorms. After this summer, the Bowdoin Christian Fellowship will no longer be recognized by the college. Already, the college has disabled the electronic key cards of the group’s longtime volunteer advisers. … The students, who plan to meet...

Video Shows Conn. Teen Begging Mass. Judge To Let Her Go Home BOSTON (CBS) – The family of a Connecticut teenager at the center of a custody dispute with the state of Massachusetts has posted a video showing the teen pleading for the judge to let her go home. The video shows Justina Pelletier asking Governor Patrick and Judge Joseph Johnston to let her move back with her family. “All I really want to be with is my family and my friends and that’s all I want is to be with my family and friends back home,” she says. “You...

Weeks ago it was revealed the Department of Justice was working with the FDIC to provide new monetary regulations that would halt the sale of guns by licensed gun dealers. Though Obama maintains that he only wants to enforce “reasonable, common sense” gun control, when you peak behind the curtain it’s easy to see this is just a magic trick he’s using to distract Americans from what’s really happening. So how is Obama going to finally starve Americans of access to firearms? It’s called “Operation Chokepoint.” Operation Chokepoint is a devious means of shutting down gun stores by blocking them...

Coal-state lawmakers, accusing President Obama of using a back door to impose strict emissions limits on power plants, are rallying to slam that door shut -- claiming the plan would cost jobs and jack up electric bills. In Kentucky, West Virginia, and other states that rely on coal to fuel their own economies -- and that help generate power for everybody else -- officials vowed Monday to introduce legislation halting the newly announced EPA plan. Under the draft regulation unveiled Monday, carbon emissions at fossil fuel-burning power plants would be cut 30 percent by 2030. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., calling...

This blog is — was, shall remain — a friend to gay people. I hope it’s a friend to any person who wants to do whatever gives him joy and hurts no one else. Many of my fellow Christians tell me that homosexuality is a sin. Maybe so, but it’s not my sin. And on the off-chance the Gospels mean what they say and I will one day stand before the throne of God and be judged on whether I loved Him and my neighbor, whether I did what I could for the hungry, thirsty, sick, weak, enchained… well, let’s...

What President Obama has been pushing for, and moving toward, is more insidious: government control of the economy, while leaving ownership in private hands. That way, politicians get to call the shots but, when their bright ideas lead to disaster, they can always blame those who own businesses in the private sector.

"The lawlessness of Hitler's Germany, beneath a veneer of legal forms, was absolute. As Goering put it, "The law and the will of the Fuhrer are one." Hans Frank: "Our constitution is the will of the Fuhrer." Hitler worked entirely through decrees and ordinances, as opposed to law, here again resembling Lenin, who never showed the slightest interest in constitution-making."

An emergency dispatcher who made disparaging remarks about Oprah Winfrey during the Maya Angelou 911 call has been suspended. John Ruckh was heard on the 911 tape saying that Oprah, a friend of Angelou's had "fallen out of grace" after a controversial interview in which Oprah expressed her thoughts about race in America. "Unfortunately, I work in a high-profile job and everything's recorded," Ruckh told the Winston-Salem Journal. "This is in no way a racial slur, slander, associated conversation ... I really hate that this happened at the time that it did, because this is taking away from Maya Angelou's...

Benjamin Franklin is looking prophetic: “There is scarce a king in a hundred who would not, if he could, follow the example of Pharaoh – get first all the people’s money, then all their lands and then make them and their children servants forever. ... I am apprehensive that the government of the states may, in future times, end in a monarchy.” No, we’re not there. Yet. But decide for yourself whether these trends move us toward more personal freedom, or increasingly consolidated government power. Who imposed a national health care mandate, even though most people opposed the idea? Since...

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. (AP) -- About four years ago, the Google team trying to develop cars driven by computers - not people - concluded that sooner than later, the technology would be ready for the masses. There was one big problem: No state had even considered whether driverless cars should be legal. And yet this week, Google said it wants to give Californians access to a small fleet of prototypes it will make without a steering wheel or pedals. The plan is possible because, by this time next year, driverless cars will be legal in the tech giant's home state.

Right Sector leader Dmytro Yarosh has said that representatives of his organization will contribute to ensuring security at voting stations in eastern Ukraine. ...

As Common Core opponents increasingly gain ground, the initiative’s supporters are articulating more of the social engineering ideology that is at the heart of the nationalized standards. Kimberly Morin of Manchester Political Buzz Examiner reports that teacher David Pook, who claims to have “helped write the standards,” said during a recent Common Core debate at St. Anselm’s College in Manchester, New Hampshire, that Common Core was necessary because of “white privilege.” (VIDEO-AT-LINK)Pook said: "The reason why I helped write the standards and the reason why I am here today is that as a white male in society, I’ve been given...

It’s now clear that the end of the Soviet Union heralded an era of democratic complacency. Without a rival system to test them, democratic governments have decayed across the globe.... [....] The answer is to use Lee Kuan Yew means to achieve Jeffersonian ends — to become less democratic at the national level in order to become more democratic at the local level. At the national level, American politics has become neurotically democratic. Politicians are campaigning all the time and can scarcely think beyond the news cycle. Legislators are terrified of offending this or that industry lobby, activist group or...

Seinfeld’s Soup Nazi was downright benevolent compared to the Lunch Nazi: Sounding a new aggressive tone, first lady Michelle Obama vowed in a private conference call Monday to fight industry efforts at rolling back healthy school-lunch standards, an issue that could come up for a vote on Capitol Hill this week. It isn’t just “industry” that doesn’t want the national menu dictated by the Bitter Half. The kids who have to eat the widely caboosed authoritarian’s notion of healthy meals don’t like it either. Even liberal New York City dropped her school lunch scheme after determining it to be a...