Free Republic

The mother of a teen slain at a Jacksonville gas station after he and his friends refused to turn down their music will be among the panelists at a seminar in Orlando about the controversial Stand Your Ground law. Jordan Davis' mother, Lucia McBath, will be among the experts examining whether there is racial disparity in the application or enforcement of Stand Your Ground laws. The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights is hosting the forum, which takes place from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Oct. 17 in the grand ballroom of the Rosen Centre Hotel on International Drive. The forum...

PALM BEACH — No matter what his professional future holds, satellite radio star Howard Stern is planning to move to Palm Beach permanently after the $10 million-renovation of his $52 million-house is completed early next year...One of the sources added that Stern is well aware of the benefits of declaring residency in a no-income tax state like Florida and homesteading his property.

Today a federal appeals court rebuked police in Orange County, Florida, for mounting a warrantless, SWAT-style raid on a barbership under the pretense of assisting state inspectors. "We have twice held, on facts disturbingly similar to those presented here, that a criminal raid executed under the guise of an administrative inspection is constitutionally unreasonable," says the decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit. "We hope that the third time will be the charm." On August 19, 2010, two inspectors from the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation (DBPR) visited the Strictly Skillz Barbershop in Orlando...

Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz is in a behind-the-scenes struggle with the White House, congressional Democrats and Washington insiders who have lost confidence in her as both a unifying leader and reliable party spokesperson at a time when they need her most. Long-simmering doubts about her have reached a peak after two recent public flubs: criticizing the White House’s handling of the border crisis and comparing the tea party to wife beaters. ....One example that sources point to as particularly troubling: Wasserman Schultz repeatedly trying to get the DNC to cover the costs of her wardrobe. In 2012,...

Play With Closed Captions Gov. Rick Scott widened his lead in the gubernatorial race, taking a 5-point lead over Charlie Crist, according to the latest News Channel 8 poll. Scott pulled 44 percent compared with 39 percent for Crist in the poll. Scott actually dropped a point from the 45-44 tally last week, but fared better as Crist lost support and dropped below 40 percent for the first time since the poll started this spring. Libertarian candidate Adrian Wyllie more than doubled his share, taking 7 percent in the survey. Nine percent were undecided. Crist's lead has slipped in Southeast...

Florida State announced on Wednesday that quarterback Jameis Winston will be suspended for the first half of this week's game against No. 22 Clemson due to lewd comments he made on Tuesday. The university released a statement from interim president Garnett S. Stokes and athletic director Stan Wilcox that reads:

In the weeks and months after Trayvon Martin was killed, his mother saw 50 different photos painting him as a thug.. It was as if portraying the slain 17-year-old as something he wasn't — a muscle-bound, tattooed rapper, or a young man wearing his pants low and flipping middle fingers with each hand — somehow justified his death, Sybrina Fulton said. "At first, I thought I was at fault myself. I thought maybe it was the hoodie," she said. But Fulton said she soon came to realize that even in 2012, she didn't have to look to her son's sweatshirt...

A little over a year ago the debate was fierce over whether Florida state prosecutor Angela “Tough on Crime” Corey assigned to prosecute George Zimmerman for killing Trayvon Martin would dump the case. There was good reason for the debate. Zimmerman was not a police officer. But he was seen as the next best or worst thing to it since he had close ties with law enforcement and was a one-time neighborhood watch patrol officer. This automatically bestowed on him the shield that cops have from any charges of misconduct, especially in cases where the victims of their misconduct are...

Executive Director of a Florida Council on Islamic Relations [CAIR] office, Hassan Shilby, took to Twitter last week to rant about how ISIS and Fox News are pretty much the same thing.  #FoxNews and ISIS have something in common: they don't tolerate anything different & their rhetoric invites calls for violence @megynkelly— Hassan Shibly (@HassanShibly) September 12, 2014 #FoxNews claims Islam & Muslims are a threat yet the ones making death threats in America and calling for violence appear to be Fox viewers— Hassan Shibly (@HassanShibly) September 14, 2014 ISIS is beheading people and has slaughtered thousands but sure, lets...

In the next decade, Florida’s biggest cities will add toll lanes to the state’s busiest highways. Nobody knows exactly how much it will cost. Maybe as little as $3 billion. Maybe double that. What’s clear is that when the toll lanes across the state are complete, they will become one of the largest infrastructure projects in state history. There’s little debate that the toll lanes, also called express lanes or managed lanes, make commutes quicker for those willing to pay as much as $10 to use them. But there has been little debate about the need for the projects —...

...Crist spoke to over 1,000 voters on Saturday night, in Downtown Orlando about his faith and vision for the future of Florida.... The group in attendance came in the bus loads, and the venue was at capacity. They leaned to the left as they cheered Crist’s pledge to raise the minimum wage, healthcare, and supporting policies popular with the dreamers. “I did all of this as a Republican” Crist said “Imagine what I’ll do as a Democrat!”. "....I was raised a Methodist. Raised with three sisters. It makes you appreciate women more and their rights. This I know about God....

Someone is going to get “unfriended” on Facebook real soon. From WKMG-TV in Orlando, Fla.: According to police, Patricia Denault poured herself a shot of Fireball cinnamon whiskey and took a picture of her son taking a sip. She posted that picture on Facebook, but someone saw that picture and called the police. "Me taking a picture and putting it on Facebook, I thought it was funny," Denault said. Denault was arrested on Wednesday, charged with child neglect after she said three uniformed officers and Child Protective Services came to her house and interviewed her kids. (snip)

...Obama will visit U.S. Central Command, headquartered at MacDill Air Force Base, on Wednesday for a briefing from his commanders on battle plans against the Sunni insurgent group Islamic State. ....White House officials made it clear that there would also be no U.S. military forces on the ground in Syria to coordinate airstrikes, nor have any done so in Iraq. But as the President continues to coalesce U.S. and international efforts to “degrade and ultimately defeat” IS, and Pentagon officials say they are making headway against IS in Iraq, two former Centcom commanders offer mixed reviews of his plans. “I...

Charlie Crist is siding with the teachers union — not African-American ministers — over a new lawsuit that seeks to dismantle the state’s major school-choice program..... Crist made his choice clear Wednesday when he refused to heed the request of a major Panhandle civil-rights leader, the Rev. H.K. Matthews, who asked the Democrat to “publicly denounce” a new teacher union-led lawsuit that seeks to dismantle the major school-choice program. “You cannot stay silent on this lawsuit,” Matthews wrote. “These families deserve to know if you support or oppose the lawsuit to evict 70,000 poor — and mostly minority — children...

George Zimmerman is in the news again, and to no surprise it's not in a positive way. This Saturday news report shares that the man acquitted of murdering Trayvon Martin was recently involved in a road rage incident. Lake Mary Police said that the unidentified victim called 911 before and during the incident. He said that Zimmerman pulled up to him and said "Why are you pointing a finger at me?" When the man pulled into a parking lot, Zimmerman allegedly followed him as he was calling police, but left before the cops showed up on the scene. The man...

Marco Rubio: Let’s Reject The Veiled Isolationism Of Obama And Clinton Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on Google PlusShare via EmailMore Options By Marco Rubio September 12 Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) is a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. President Obama’s call on Wednesday for the United States to lead an international military campaign in the Middle East has the potential to begin a departure from the isolationism that he and former secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton have advocated during their years in office. There is a risk, however, that the...

Avoiding another Murrieta is the driving reason behind the Obama Administration secretly inserting thousands of illegal children (UACs) into school districts nationwide as a new school year begins. The fact that many districts are hard pressed to handle their own children is of no particular concern to the Regime. Four states– TX, CA, FL, and VA show up on a Numbers USA code map as having received the brunt of the 37,477 UACs so far this year. (1) Transparency, an empty campaign word Obama used way back in ’08 to vault into America’s White House, is a joke. Children entering...

(93-PHOTOS-AT-LINK) Evidence photos released by the Fourth Circuit Court State Attorney's Office and the lawyers for George Zimmerman in the shooting death of teen Trayvon Martin. Sanford resident Zimmerman has been charged with second-degree murder...

ORLANDO -- Health officials say there’s only been about 100 confirmed cases of the upper-respiratory Enterovirus D68 since it was identified in the 1960s. But in the past few weeks, hundreds of children in at least 12 states have been hospitalized with a serious respiratory infection, and doctors believe it’s a resurgence of the virus. The early symptoms of EV-D68 are much like the common cold. Doctors said this virus can last longer, and cause major breathing problems, especially in children with asthma. “Even patients with no prior respiratory illnesses, this virus has caused some asthma-like symptoms,” said Dr. Federico...

#BREAKING: A potential case of #Ebola is being treated at a Miami-area hospital, officials from @CDCgov confirmed. http://on.nbc6.com/A1i24K6