Free Republic

Oklahoma Second Amendment Supporters, particularly OK2A, have been pushing for a reform of the state Constitution's weak protection of the right to keep and bear arms.  The reform has strong support, but has been bottled up in committees.  The reform is needed because current Section II-26 has been ruled by the Oklahoma Supreme Court to offer little serious protection.  Here is the current version: The right of a citizen to keep and bear arms in defense of his home, person, or property, or in aid of the civil power, when thereunto legally summoned, shall never be prohibited; but nothing...

The US House of Representatives Judiciary Committee recently took testimony regarding the dangers posed by an ever expanding administrative state, especially in the hands of a ‘pen and phone’ president. Matthew Spalding, Ph.D. from Hillsdale College explained how a slow, evolutionary coup d'état in the form of an administrative state has overthrown free government. This transfer of lawmaking power away from congress to an oligarchy of unelected experts who rule through executive decree and judicial edict over virtually every aspect of our daily lives, under the guise of merely implementing the technical details of law, constitutes nothing less than a...

Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass) brushed off fears that a runaway national debt could pose a threat to America. "Look, a debt of whatever amount merely records resources that have already been acquired by the government," Markey argued. "The government has already gotten and spent that money for the benefit of America. Whether it ever pays this money back is basically irrelevant." "Let's imagine that, 'horror of horrors,' the government defaults on this debt," Markey continued. "Who's hurt? The people who lent the money to the government by buying bonds can obviously afford to lose this money. People who need their...

An effort by a group of Stanford University students to restore a Western Civilization class requirement has been decisively rejected by the student body, with voting results released Monday showing it mustering less than 15 percent support. The ballot initiative was promoted by members of the school’s conservative-leaning Stanford Review. If passed, it would have called for Stanford to require that all freshmen complete a two-quarter course covering “the politics, history, philosophy, and culture of the Western world.” Stanford once possessed a similar requirement, but eliminated it after a student campaign in the 1980s that denounced it as fostering racism,...

In a Fox News debate, Donald Trump attacked Sen. Ted Cruz’s critical reference to “New York values” with a passionate reference to the terrorist attack on September 11, 2001. As Real Clear Politics reported his remarks: I’ve had more calls on that statement that Ted made, that New York is a great place, it’s got great people, it’s got loving people, wonderful people. When the World Trade Center came down, I saw something that no place on earth could have handled more beautifully, more humanely than New York.

Open carry of modern handguns has been legal for most carry permit holders in Texas for a few months now.  I was able to open carry during my visit in January. During cold weather, opportunities were limited. With a new grandchild to see, I looked forward to Texas exercise without having to conceal my personal defensive firearm.  I open carried from Arizona to Dallas in Texas.  Interactions on the road were minimal. In Van Horn, Texas, I was able to grab the last motel room in town, just about midnight.  I was carrying in an older, Israeli Fobus holser,...

After being mercilessly heckled by agitators from the group “Black Lives Matter,” former President Bill Clinton accused them of “defending murderers and drug dealers.” The BLM protesters objected to the former president’s support for 1994’s Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, which they contend disproportionately penalizes minorities. Clinton’s argument that “this law puts blacks who prey upon other blacks, who kill other blacks behind bars and saves the lives of countless would-be black victims. Those attacking this law can’t really pose as advocates for black lives. They are advocates for criminals.” Concerned that the former president has “drifted off...

The United State District Court for the Northern Mariana Islands recently ruled that existing gun laws, written by a peace corps volunteer in the 1970's, are unconstitutional, and violate the Second Amendment, in several provisions. The House and Senate of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands reacted to the Court ruling by passing an extremely restrictive bill, S. B. No. 19-94(pdf), entitled "To regulate the possession of firearms in the Commonwealth.", in a special session on 5 April, 2016.  The bill passed the Senate unanimously.  The short title is the SAFE Act (Special Act for Firearms Enforcement), perhaps...

Thursday, April 07, 2016 How Bernie Sanders Sold His Soul to the Left Posted by Daniel Greenfield Win or lose, the Sanders campaign has its story. Bernie Sanders is the authentic candidate; the unapologetic progressive who pushes the left’s agenda without worrying about offending anyone. Bernie doesn’t pander. Just look at him glaring into the camera, angrily delivering the same “smash capitalism” stump speech and then waiting for the local college students to take selfies with him. You may disagree with him. But he’s authentic, a curmudgeon who says whatever he really thinks. And if you believe that, there’s a...

The graphic display above does a superb job of conveying the progress that Second Amendment supporters have made in restoring a practical right to carry arms in the United States.  The right to keep and bear arms, codified in the Second Amendment, has been under attack in the United States since the 1830s, as power hungry governments found ways to infringe on the right under various pretexes, excuses, and fearmongering. First came the attacks on the concealed carry of arms.  This was justified under the pretext that it gave an unfair advantage to people with nefarious purposes.  It was...

In testimony before a congressional committee investigating the murders of military personnel at military facilities, Army Chief of Staff General Mark Milley told Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) that he was opposed to letting troops carry personal weapons to defend themselves. "Let me assure Congress that our higher ranking officers are well protected by the existing procedures," the General said. "Base commanders have a contingent of armed guards between themselves and any potential assailant. I am confident that no intruders could get to them without themselves being shot." "What about lower ranking soldiers?" Lee asked. "They don't have guards assigned to...

The Nazi propaganda machine was introduced into school curricula, intensifying Islamic anti-Semitism. The violent Islamic intolerance of the “infidel” was reflected by the highly ignored and misrepresented persecution and expulsion of 820,000 Jewish refugees from Arab lands, which exceeded the scope of the Palestinian Arab refugees, occurred well before the 1948-49 Arab war on Israel, and persisted following the war. On November 14, 1947, before the war, Egypt’s representative to the UN, Heykal Pasha warned: “The partitioning of Palestine shall be responsible for the massacre of a large number Jews…. It might endanger a million Jews living in Moslem countries…...

Our previously Free Republic continues to reel from a one hundred and three year old mistake: the 17th Amendment. Pardon me if I don’t celebrate today’s anniversary. Republican theory demands the consent of the governed. From ancient Greece, republican Rome, Saxon Germany, and even in the English kingdom from which we declared our Independence, the component members of their societies had a place at the lawmaking table. Greek ecclesia, Roman tribunes and senators, Saxon Micklegemots, English commons, lords and king, encompassed the totality of their societies. By this, the consent of the governed was present in every law. Unlike simpler...

Wisconsin started issuing concealed carry permits in November of 2011 In the last 53 months, they have issued 300,000 concealed carry permits.  The permit holders have been exceptionally law abiding.  Only one permit holder has been convicted of manslaughter when carrying a handgun under the provisions of the permit.  He plead self defense, but a jury ruled it manslaughter.  That is a homicide rate lower than that of Japan! The average number for 2012 was over 105,000.  The average for 2013 was 175,000, and 223,000 for 2014, and 260,000 for 2015.  In the first four full years of the...

Why so much emphasis on the results of the Wisconsin primary in which Trump’s lead narrowed by a mere 30 delegates? Let’s put Trump’s loss into perspective by considering conditions unique to that State. We all know Trump faced a negative onslaught from Wisconsin talk radio, with Levin & Limbaugh offering their own body slams. Not to mention Walker, Ryan, Priebus attacking Trump while exalting Cruz, day in and day out. Trump couldn’t breathe in or glance sideways without someone castigating him. Yes, he did commit some unforced errors, but this would be typical of any campaign. I was raised...

The America we live in, our nation, our people, our society, is not the America most of us were born in at all. The uniquely American forms are all there, all untouched, all reassuring, the football games, the local bars, the movies, the concerts, and the holidays. But the spirit, which most of us never noticed because we made the lifelong mistake of identifying it with the forms, has been fundamentally transformed. The transformation has occurred through the slowly creeping separation of not only the government from the people, but the people themselves from their country. It has taken place...

What would your reaction be if you heard that Congress was set in 2007 to bestow ‘natural born’ citizenship on ALL anchor babies through their Immigration Reform legislation. (110th Congress) S. 1348Shocked? Outraged? Ambivalent?What if you heard that Congress was moving to change Immigration & Naturalization laws so the every child born overseas to 1 citizen parent & 1 foreign parent would forever be deemed a ‘natural born’ citizen. (101st Congress) H.R. 1380, (99th Congress) H.R. 2535, Shocked? Outraged? Ambivalent?What if Congress had a bill waiting to come out of committee in February of 2008 that would change the citizenship...

On the heels of a Marquette University poll showing Sen. Ted Cruz taking a 10-point lead in Wisconsin, Donald Trump once again whined on Wednesday that the “establishment” is trying to take the nomination away from him, citing the Louisiana delegate allocation which gave Cruz more delegates even though Trump got more votes. as Exhibit A. As Breitbart News reported: With less than a week to go until the Wisconsin primary, Trump came out swinging -- against Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), against the Establishment lining up behind Cruz in order to keep Trump below 1,237 delegates so they can broker...

If you think President Richard Nixon was paranoid to the point of having an enemies list, consider the Donald J. Trump statement following his crushing defeat by Sen. Ted Cruz in the Wisconsin primary. Trump did not make the statement personally, lest he provide enough ad hominem sound bites to last a generation. Rather he and his myth of invincibility hid from the camera he usually loves. The statement blaming his loss on everybody and everything but himself, and with the first word after his name being a lie, reads...

Tuesday, April 05, 2016 Castro's American Victims Posted by Daniel Greenfield In 1972, Ishmael Muslim Ali LaBeet and four other killers walked into the Fountain Valley golf club in the Virgin Islands. They rounded up four Florida tourists and four employees, forced them to kneel on the ground, and opened fire. That was how the Fountain Valley Massacre began. Afterward LaBeet and his fellow murderers were swarmed by civil rights attorneys eager to claim that their clients had been tortured into confessing. But the claims of torture were undermined by LaBeet. At his trial, Ishmael LaBeet yelled, "I killed them...