Free Republic

Starbucks admits that the initiative was birthed out of a company forum in which employees discussed racial tensions across America due to “police killing unarmed black men in Ferguson.”

After years of blocking U.N. efforts to pressure Israelis and Palestinians into accepting a lasting two-state solution, the United States is edging closer toward supporting a U.N. Security Council resolution that would call for the resumption of political talks to conclude a final peace settlement, according to Western diplomats. The move follows Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s decisive re-election Tuesday after the incumbent publicly abandoned his commitment to negotiate a Palestinian state — the basis of more than 20 years of U.S. diplomatic efforts — and promised to continue the construction of settlements on occupied territory. The development also reflects...

Secretary of State John Kerry compared himself to Winston Churchill, Abraham Lincoln and other great historical luminaries for having the courage and tenacity to tackle the most heinous enemy plaguing mankind — climate change. “My heroes are people who dared to take on great challenges without knowing for certain what the outcome would be,” Kerry said in an address to the Atlantic Council on Thursday. “Lincoln took risks, Gandhi took risks, Churchill took risks, Dr. King took risks, Mandela took risks, but that doesn’t mean that every risk-taker is a role model.”

Highlights: "Having aligned with everyone from Castro to the Supreme Leader of Iran (a country which rapes teenage girls so that they don’t die as virgins, and stones teenage rape victims), Obama has to make it seem as if it’s the Republicans who are the traitors." "During his original campaign, Obama said, “We cannot allow Iran to get a nuclear weapon." Bill Clinton said during his first term in office, 'North Korea cannot be allowed to develop a nuclear bomb.' North Korea could and did. Bill Clinton knew all along that it could and would." "Clinton and Obama didn’t accidentally...

Making the ultimate statement in Korean relations, Gloria Steinem and other prominent women on Wednesday announced their plans for a rare and risky walk across the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea to call for reunification. The DMZ is the world's most fortified border, with the two countries still technically at war. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers face off across the heavily mined zone. Organizers of the effort called WomenCrossDMZ.org on Wednesday said they hope for 30 women, including two Nobel Peace laureates, to cross from North Korea to South Korea on May 24, which is International Women's Day...

The American College of Physicians, combined with the American Bar Association and eight other professional organizations, has issued a call for action to stem the national crisis in firearm deaths and injuries. In a white paper published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, they point out that more than 32,000 deaths a year are the result of gun violence. The United States has the most gun deaths of any industrialized nation. In addition, the number of injuries caused by guns is more than double the death number. The Children's Safety Network estimated that in 2010, gun violence cost $174 billion....

The federal government is now the enemy of the good people of the United States. "File charges against the 47 U.S. Senators in violation of The Logan Act in attempting to undermine a nuclear agreement. "On March 9th, 2015, forty-seven United States Senators committed a treasonous offense when they decided to violate the Logan Act, a 1799 law which forbids unauthorized citizens from negotiating with foreign governments. Violation of the Logan Act is a felony, punishable under federal law with imprisonment of up to three years."

At one point on Tuesday, Mrs. Clinton said the emails she had deleted contained “personal communications from my husband and me.” But on Sunday, a spokesman for Mr. Clinton told reporters that the former president had “sent two emails in his life.” After the news conference, Mrs. Clinton’s office provided several new details about the email account and what she has provided to the State Department. More than 100 government officials knew about Mrs. Clinton’s use of private email, her office said. (The White House spokesman, Josh Earnest, said Monday that President Obama exchanged emails with Mrs. Clinton, saw that...

A friend recently sent out a link to an article in the Greensboro (NC) News and Record, in which a left-wing columnist by the name of Susan Ladd decries the notion of American exceptionalism. To her, the idea that the United States of America is better than anyone else, or has even been a positive force for good in world history, is "hypocritical" and just plain wrong. She is appalled that people would protest against the recent revisions of the AP History curriculum, a revision which was developed by left-wing activists and which leaves out large chunks of actual American...

As the chart ... shows, Catholicism is the most common religious tradition in 17 states, while white evangelical Protestants are first in 15 states, mostly in the South. The religiously unaffiliated are the most common religious group in 13 states, mostly in the Pacific Northwest and the Northeast. Three states are outliers: Utah, which is 56 percent Mormon, the largest percentage of one single religious tradition, and Iowa and North Dakota, where white mainline Protestants are the dominant religious tradition.

The 50th Anniversary of the Bloody Sunday march was held in Selma, Alabama on Saturday. The New York Times cropped out the George and Laura Bush. Discrimination still exists in America. MRC reported:

“Is Liberalism Exhausted?” Jonah Goldberg wondered recently at National Review, surveying a movement that seems to have run out of intellectual gas after six years of dragging Barack Obama uphill. [...] All true, but to quote Obama’s presumptive successor on the Democrat ticket in 2016: “What difference, at this point, does it make?”It’s true that liberalism doesn't have anything exciting and new to offer – even its plans for the Internet are drawn from 1930s telephone legislation – but the only thing the Left is really tired of is selling its ideas to skeptics. It’s largely given up on that effort in exchange for...

In modern America, we face an enemy which is implacable in its desire to subvert, overthrow, and destroy our traditional American way of life. This enemy goes by many names – the Left-wing, progressives, political correctness, cultural Marxists – but one name which they have applied to themselves seems to best sum up what their intentions are: “social justice warriors.” These people refer to themselves this way because they believe it is their purpose in life to crusade against the “evils” that they think pervade America – “racism, sexism, homophobia, intolerance” and all the rest. The practical effect of all...

stu•pe•fy (v.) – to put into a state of little or no sensibility; benumb the faculties of; put into a stupor; also, to overwhelm with amazement; astound; astonish. In searching for one word to describe the state of affairs in America at the present time, I kept coming back to the word "stupefying." For my purposes here, this is an incredibly useful word for illustrating what Barack Obama, and the left-wing in general, have done to our country. One half of the country is stupefied in the sense of the first definition – they are in a state of little...

Everyone in Washington is talking about Hillary Clinton's use of a personal e-mail account during her four years as secretary of State and her homebrew computer server. Everyone, that is, except for many Senate Democrats. As operatives, strategists and opposition research groups rush to her defense, some Washington Senate Democrats are remaining silent for the moment, saying they've been too busy with the week's packed schedule to be fully briefed on the crisis du jour. Democrats have a difficult line to walk. They don't want to be seen hitting their strongest contender to keep the White House, but that does...

It’s time to consider whether Gov. Scott Walker is intentionally employing the brazenly dishonest tactics of Sen. Joe McCarthy, who previously held the title as the most dangerous national politician to come out of Wisconsin. Since the 1950s, right-wing Sen. McCarthy has been the worst stain on both Wisconsin politics and the Republican Party nationally. McCarthy achieved that distinction by getting an entire, shameful era in U.S. politics—the McCarthy Era—named after him. McCarthyism turned the ’50s into a reckless, anti-Communist witch hunt as Wisconsin’s Republican senator made wildly irresponsible, untruthful accusations about Communists subverting our government (the moderate Eisenhower administration!),...

In spite of the overwhelming success of American Sniper, it received only one Oscar out of the six categories for which it was nominated. It was a consolation prize most likely—one that allowed the Academy to maintain their façade of integrity, while not causing Hollywood liberals' heads to explode. But this isn’t about the public sensation the film has become. It’s about another phenomenon: the predictable reactions that came from the left. There’s no need to detail or recap the antagonism. But now that the furor of angry and confused criticism is beginning to subside to non-toxic levels, I think...

In late 2014, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed a rule that would further ratchet down national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) for ground level ozone from the current level of 75 parts per billion (ppb) to a range of 65 to 70 ppb. Notably, the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) declared the proposal to be the most expensive regulation ever imposed on the country. A study recently conducted by NERA Economic Consulting and commissioned by NAM confirms NAM’s earlier statement. Specifically, the study reveals that reducing the current ozone standard to 65 ppb would reduce U.S. gross...

Buyer’s remorse is already setting in for Google and other ‘net neutrality’ proponents. When Google’s Eric Schmidt called White House officials a few weeks ago to oppose President Obama ’s demand that the Internet be regulated as a utility, they told him to buzz off. The chairman of the company that led lobbying for “net neutrality” learned the Obama plan made in its name instead micromanages the Internet. Mr. Schmidt is not the only liberal mugged by the reality of Obamanet... as details leak out, liberals have joined the opposition to ending the Internet as we know it. The Progressive...