Free Republic

For close to 20 years now, I’ve been observing and reporting on a disturbing trend in law enforcement – the federalization and militarization of local police forces. Until recently, practically no one noticed what was happening. But with the focus on police shootings and the civil disturbances that have followed – sometimes involving tanks, military-style gear and Kevlar – it’s hard not to notice that local cops don’t exactly look like Officer Joe Bolton anymore. It was none other than Al Sharpton (I won’t call him reverend) who suggested recently that the answer to the use of excessive force by...

Iowa Rep. Steve King took President Obama to task Saturday, blaming him for the conditions that caused civil unrest in Baltimore and Ferguson. “President Obama has consistently driven wedges between people. And he perceives a difference on race, maybe on ethnicity, well yes on ethnicity, sexual orientation—wedge after wedge after wedge. I didn’t really imagine they were going to drive a wedge between the law and law-breakers,” King told reporters at the South Carolina Freedom Summit in Greenville. King cited the example of Obama’s “Beer Summit” early in his first term with Cambridge, Mass., police Sgt. James Crowley and Harvard...

Less than 24 hours after two officers were gunned down in Mississippi, the sheriff of Milwaukee County — a frequent guest on Fox News — blamed the killing on President Barack Obama on Twitter, saying the president “started this war on police.” Earlier Sunday, Sheriff David A. Clarke, noted the shooting that claimed the lives on two officers, 34-year-old Benjamin Deen and 25-year-old Liquori Tate, in Hattiesburg. The sheriff re-tweeted: “Basic traffic stop in Hattiesburg, 2 Police Officers assassinated. The post Ferguson targeting of our Cops continues.”

First Lady Michelle Obama urged students at Tuskegee University, a historically black university in Alabama, to remain involved in civic life during a time of tension regarding race relations across the country. At the school's commencement address, the First Lady listed scenarios in which African-Americans feel they encounter systemic discrimination, such as "nagging worries that you're going to get stopped or pulled over for absolutely no reason." She said those feelings are "real," but disengaging is not an option. "I want to be very clear that those feelings are not an excuse to just throw up our hands and give...

Black Panther leaders are planning ways to make the chaos last and spread across the nation. Two leaders of the New Black Panther Party, Chief of Staff Michelle Williams and King Samir Shabazz, are calling Baltimore rioters for even more violence against whites. (SNIP) During an appearance on Shabazz’s radio show, Williams regularly made fun of “crackers” and black conservatives. Agreeing with her, Shabazz went a step further and made a terrifying threat: he called on blacks to firebomb nurseries so that they can kill as many white babies as possible. Shabazz added that this was a good suggestion because...

Investigators have arrested a St. Louis- area truck driving school employee in the murder of an Illinois student who was found slain after posting his car for sale on Craigslist, reports CBS St. Louis. The body of 19-year-old Taylor Clark was found at the M.T.C. Truck Center in Hazelwood, Mo. Tuesday, about 400 feet from the red 2007 Nissan 350ZX he had posted for sale and 25 miles west of where he was last seen by his girlfriend Monday in Glen Carbon, Ill. gordon2.jpg Michael Gordon CBS ST. LOUIS Police say the employee, 24-year-old Michael Gordon, fatally shot the Southern...

Dorian Johnson, the man who was with Michael Brown Jr. when Brown was fatally shot by a Ferguson police officer last summer, has been arrested on suspicion of drug charges and resisting arrest, St. Louis police said. Johnson was arrested on Wednesday and police are pursuing charges. The specifics of where and when he was arrested have not yet been released. Johnson was walking with Michael Brown Jr. on Aug. 9 when the two were approached by Ferguson police Officer Darren Wilson. The encounter ended with Brown fatally shot and led to months of protests and unrest in Ferguson. Johnson...

ST. LOUIS • Dorian Johnson, the man who was with Michael Brown Jr. when Brown was fatally shot by a Ferguson police officer last summer, has been arrested on suspicion of drug charges and resisting arrest, St. Louis police said. Johnson was arrested on Wednesday and police are pursuing charges. The specifics of where and when he was arrested have not yet been released.

To some, a makeshift shrine in the middle of the Ferguson street where Michael Brown was killed last summer is a hallowed symbol of a new civil rights movement over race and policing. To others, it has served its purpose and is now more of an eyesore and a road hazard. Within hours of Brown’s Aug. 9 shooting death by a white police officer, people began placing stuffed animals, candles and other tributes in the middle of Canfield Drive, where the unarmed black 18-year-old’s body lay for about four hours before it was removed. […] Ferguson Mayor James Knowles III,...

The guy who started the entire “Hands Up Don’t Shoot” lie is now trying to cash in on the death of his friend Mike Brown, because why not? Beats workin’. From ABC News: A witness to a police officer’s fatal shooting of Michael Brown last summer in Ferguson, Missouri, has filed a lawsuit alleging that he was wrongly stopped and fired on during the encounter on a city street. The lawsuit, filed last week by Dorian Johnson, claims that the officer, Darren Wilson, fired at him and Brown as they ran away from him on Aug. 9. The lawsuit claims...

We know satanists believe abortion is sacred as we have documented several times. Now, a St Louis, Missouri Satanic Temple is raising funds to get a woman an abortion. According to sources, the Satanic Temple has raised enough money via the GoFundMe crowdsourcing website to pay for a southwest Missouri woman to travel to St. Louis for an abortion. The GoFundMe site has since been removed. The elusive “Mary” for which the fund was created, has, with the help of the Satanists created a “Satanic Religious exemption form” which reads in part: My body is inviolable and subject to...

While Obama Inc. targets conservative groups, it isn’t going to annoy the guy who bought its boss his spot in the White House. Soros’ wealth increased tremendously during Obama’s time in office. And much of it came from dodging taxes. You know, the taxes he insists that middle class peons and small business owners need to be socked with. George Soros likes to say the rich should pay more taxes. A substantial part of his wealth, though, comes from delaying them. While building a record as one of the world’s greatest investors, the 84-year-old billionaire used a loophole that allowed...

Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon vetoed Republican legislation Thursday that would drop thousands of low-income families from Missouri’s welfare rolls by paring back benefits to what he said would be one of the shortest time periods in the nation. But Nixon’s veto may be only a last-grasp attempt to stop the tougher restrictions. Republicans, who hold overwhelming legislative majorities, said they expect to get the two-thirds vote needed in each chamber to override his veto. Missouri’s legislation would reduce the lifetime limit for receiving TANF benefits from five years—which is the national norm—to three years and nine months, starting Jan. 1....

At least two people were shot in separate incidents in Ferguson, Missouri, on late Tuesday and early Wednesday as hundreds of demonstrators gathered in support of protests in Baltimore. "Police are having a difficult time investigating because of the rocks being thrown at them," said Jeff Small, a spokesman for the city of Ferguson. "At this point police are not sure if the (shootings are) linked to the protest or not." St. Louis Alderman Antonio French posted video on his Twitter account. Multiple gunshots can be heard as people flee in panic.

As National Guard troops responded to rioting in Baltimore, President Barack Obama said Tuesday that there have been too many troubling police interactions with black citizens across American in what he called "a slow-rolling crisis." But he said there was no excuse for rioters to engage in senseless violence. Obama said people in Baltimore who stole from businesses and burned buildings and cars should be treated as criminals. "They aren't protesting, they aren't making a statement, they're stealing," Obama said. Obama spoke at a White House press conference with the Japanese prime minister the day after violence broke out 40...

An analysis of social media traffic in downtown Baltimore Monday has unearthed striking connections to the protests in Ferguson, Mo. last year, according to a leading data mining firm that shared its findings exclusively with Fox News.

EXCLUSIVE - An analysis of social media traffic in downtown Baltimore Monday has unearthed striking connections to the protests in Ferguson, Mo. last year, according to a leading data mining firm that shared its findings exclusively with Fox News. The firm, which asked to remain anonymous because of its government work, found between 20 and 50 social media accounts in Baltimore that were also tied to the peak period of violence in Ferguson. While further analysis is being conducted on the data, it suggests the presence of "professional protesters" or anarchists taking advantage of Freddie Gray's death to incite more...

The new mayor of a Missouri city [next to Ferguson] had a tough first day on the job when she was met by police at City Hall and informed she had been suspended over allegations of voter fraud. Betty McCray, the newly elected mayor of the city of Kinloch, was met in the parking lot at City Hall Thursday by police officers and the city attorney holding articles of impeachment, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported. “You can’t come in as mayor,” attorney James Robinson told McCray. “You have been suspended.” McCray, however, was defiant, telling Robinson, “You may be the...

Betty McCray, newly-elected mayor of Kinloch, Missouri, showed up at City Hall this week to get to work. But when she arrived, the police wouldn’t let her in the door. The reason why? Those non-existent illegal voters who cast ballots for the candidate. The election, which was held April 7, was hotly contested and the results have been questioned by McCray’s opponents. However, the St. Louis County Board of Elections certified the results and swore McCray in after city officials refused to. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that deputies met her in the parking lot, and she was served with articles of impeachment by...

ST. LOUIS (KMOX) – The family of Michael Brown announced they will file a civil suit against the City of Ferguson. They will claim wrongful death of Michael Brown Jr. Members of the Brown legal team plan a press conference Thursday at the St. Louis County Courthouse in Clayton. Attorneys Benjamin Crump, Anthony Gray and Daryl Parks said they would have no statement before the press conference. The attorneys said six weeks ago, that while a county grand jury and the Justice Department accepted Wilson’s claim of self-defense, “We do not accept his self-defense” One of the attorney’s says the...