Free Republic

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Residents of California's largely rural, agrarian and politically conservative far northern counties long ago got used to feeling ignored in the state Capitol and out of sync with major urban areas. The idea of forming their own state has been a topic among local secession dreamers for more than a century. Residents in two counties will have a chance to voice that sentiment next week. Voters in Del Norte and Tehama, with a combined population of about 91,000, will decide June 3 on an advisory measure that asks each county's board of supervisors to join a...

SACRAMENTO (CBS SF) – Supporters of a plan to divide California into six sates can begin collecting signatures to get the proposal on the ballot. Secretary of State Debra Bowen announced that the proposed ballot initiative – known as Six Californias – could move forward Tuesday. Under the plan, from venture capitalist Tim Draper, most of the Bay Area would be considered “Silicon Valley.” Napa, Sonoma and Marin Counties would become part of “North California.”

This is amazing history. Be sure to read the quotes in BOLD at the end. Thomas Jefferson was a very remarkable man who started learning very early in life and never stopped. At 5, began studying under his cousin's tutor. At 9, studied Latin, Greek and French. At 14, studied classical literature and additional languages. At 16, entered the College of William and Mary. Also could write in Greek with one hand while writing the same in Latin with the other. At 19, studied law for 5 years starting under George Wythe. At 23, started his own law practice. At...

Full title: 'Cheese artisans' will feed French premier at outdoor White House State Dinner, followed by Mary J. Blige concert – but please, no dancing: Hollande is sans date! French President Francois Hollande is going stag, but the Obama administration is pulling out all the stops to entertain him with a State Dinner full of pomp, circumstance, gourmet eats, and R&B music. The Bronx singer, rapper and record producer Mary J. Blige will perform after the meal, the White House announced Monday. L'affaire américaine will take place outdoors, in a tent on the South Lawn. Secret Service will have extra...

This will be a strictly informational meeting for those in Northern California who are tired of being ignored by our elected leaders. If you can't make it, please inform a friend or family member who lives in the area who might be interested.Live Oak is conveniently located 45 minutes north of Sacramento, 45 minutes south of Chico, 45 minutes east of Vacaville, 45 minutes west of Auburn (Not to scale. All times approximate).

They were so young, the folks who invented America. James Madison, on July 4, 1776, was 25. James Monroe was 18, Alexander Hamilton, 21, Marquis de Lafayette, 18, Aaron Burr, 20, Betsy Ross, 24, Gilbert Stuart, 20. Ben Franklin, of course, was much older, grander and world famous. But he was the only one. Europeans, peering across the ocean at this new place — this America — wondered why, after 200 years, the American colonies (and now the new American nation) had produced no other men of Franklin's stature, no world class intellectuals, no military geniuses, no great poets or...

It’s certainly not the first time we’ve celebrated cheese around here (see: “Rats Jump Ship; All that Remains is de Brie” - a don’t-miss rerun from the MOTUS vault) butt did you see that we’re having an official Big Cheese Day at the White House?Isn’t every day Big Cheese Day around here? “On Wednesday, January 29th, with a nod to history (and maybe the TV show the West Wing), the Obama Administration is hosting the first-ever virtual "Big Block of Cheese Day," during which dozens of White House officials will take to social media for a day long 'open house'...

<p>Needless to say, none of this has much to do with historical accuracy, which even at its best is an elusive and to some degree an unavoidably subjective thing. Thomas Jefferson was for a long time one of the most potent references in American discourse. I can think of nobody else who has had this role so powerfully as both a negative and a positive symbol. Jefferson’s name is still significant, as witness the relentless efforts of the present regime, which fears the real Jefferson, to destroy him as a favourable image. But, regrettably, Mr. Jefferson is no longer as important as he once was, nor does his name mean what it once did for most Americans. We live in an age of reverence for Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, and Martin Luther King and in a time in which eighteenth- and nineteenth-century America is as remote to most citizens as ancient Persia or China.</p>

I have a couple of concluding thoughts about the ignorant, bigoted screed from Jamie Stiehm and published by US News a couple of days ago, both of them about Thomas Jefferson. In attempting to defend the big-government project of ObamaCare, Stiehm oddly (and ignorantly) invoked the storied libertarian to boost her claims that the government should dictate the expression of faith: Catholics in high places of power have the most trouble, I’ve noticed, practicing the separation of church and state. The pugnacious Catholic Justice, Antonin Scalia, is the most aggressive offender on the Court, but not the only one. Of...

In 1776, the Tories timidly hid behind closed doors where it was safe and popular. They wallowed in pessimism and lamented that nothing could be done. The British were too strong. Why make a big fuss? But the rebels – men like Samuel Adams and John Hancock, Patrick Henry and Paul Revere – would have none of it. They possessed only a rag-tag army, but they knew they had moral truth on their side, and that the British Gargantua would fall precisely because of that. Entrenched authority has to justify itself morally and philosophically. And that is something that today’s...

Springfield, Ills, April 6, 1859 Messrs. Henry L. Pierce, & others. Gentlemen Your kind note inviting me to attend a Festival in Boston, on the 13th. Inst. in honor of the birth-day of Thomas Jefferson, was duly received. My engagements are such that I can not attend. Bearing in mind that about seventy years ago, two great political parties were first formed in this country, that Thomas Jefferson was the head of one of them, and Boston the head-quarters of the other, it is both curious and interesting that those supposed to descend politically from the party opposed to Jefferson...

The powers of government should be so divided and balanced among several bodies of magistracy, as that no one could transcend their legal limits, without being effectually checked and restrained by the others. ~ Thomas Jefferson writing in Notes on the State of Virginia Some historians are either woefully ignorant about our Republic or intentionally deceitful. You're reading false claims that the House of Representatives "shutdown the government" . . .

The intense political polarization of the United States is most clearly reflected by the dysfunctional nature of the federal government. At a more local scale, it is seen as well in the growing movement to create new states by splitting existing ones. Most of these cases involve the desire of people in rural, conservative counties to secede from the more liberal states in which they are currently located. A front-page story in the October 7 edition of the New York Times, for example, highlights a drive to devise a new state of “Northern Colorado.” Eleven Colorado counties will vote on...

This is the third and final installment of my (limited) review of A.E. Harvey’s book, Is Scripture Still Holy? Coming of Age with the New Testament. Prior installments can be found here and here. As we have seen in prior posts, Harvey’s book is designed to critique the traditional Christian doctrine of the inspiration of Scripture. After arguing that (a) Scripture isn’t revelation anyway, only Jesus is God’s revelation; and (b) since humans were involved in writing and transmitting Scripture, then it is unreliable and likely corrupted, one might wonder whether Harvey tries to salvage any authority for the Bible...

At the core of America’s founding was a simple, yet literally revolutionary, idea: that all people deserve to be free because they are created by God in His image, and that our rights come from God, not government. This was articulated in the most important sentence in America’s founding, the second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Those 36 words are sometimes called the best-known...

YREKA (CBS/AP) – Supervisors in a far Northern California county where residents are fed up with what they see as a lack of representation at the state capitol and overregulation have voted in favor of separating from the state. . . They want other rural counties in Northern California and Southern Oregon to join them in the creation of a new state called the State of Jefferson.

Since 52% of American voters were foolish enough to buy the story that Barack Hussein Obama is some sort of "liberal messiah," I thought it would be interesting to compare the belief systems of America's father of liberalism and author of our Declaration of Independence, with the Marxist belief system of the false messiah. And since today's liberals have so much trouble properly interpreting our Founders' simple message to future generations, I am under no illusion that these facts will carry anymore weight with modern Marxists than Article II - Section I of the Constitution, which clearly states that Barack...

The following fhatestimony3 is my testimony to the House Financial Services committee on Wednesday at 9am. I. Introduction Chairman Hensarling and distinguished members of the committee, thank you for the invitation to testify at today’s hearing on “Examining the Proper Role of the Federal Housing Administration in our Mortgage Insurance Market” and to provide my perspective on the ongoing mortgage debacle, the resulting decline in the private mortgage insurance market and the need to return the FHA’s share of the insurance market back to pre-bubble levels. I am Anthony B. Sanders, Senior Scholar at George Mason University. The Federal Housing...

Over three programs and two days, ABC devoted 15 minutes to a fawning profile of Hillary Clinton. On Wednesday's Nightline, Cynthia McFadden even compared the outgoing Secretary of State to Thomas Jefferson, hinting that Clinton could follow his footsteps to the White House. McFadden lauded, "There was a time not so very long ago when Hillary Clinton was seen as one of the most divisive figures in American politics." Noting Clinton's high approval rating, she announced this view was "changing." VideoIn an interview that, just coincidentally occurred in front of a statue of Jefferson, the reporter embarrassingly hyped, "As Jefferson...