Free Republic

The Army has no immediate plans to punish Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl for leaving his post in Afghanistan, Secretary of the Army John McHugh said in a statement on Tuesday, putting Bergdahl’s medical and psychological needs first. Bergdahl, a Taliban prisoner for the past five years, was swapped over the weekend for five Talban heavyweights imprisoned at the Guantánamo Bay detention camp. That doesn’t mean Bergdahl is off the hook. Already, the 28-year-old soldier has been called a traitor by members of his platoon in the pages of the New York Daily News and on CNN. Members of his unit have...

For all of the talk about "hope" and "change" — and both were powerful slogans for Obama in 2008 — the core of Obama's appeal to many independents and even some Republicans was the idea that he would restore competence back to the White House after President George W. Bush's eight years, years defined by mistaken intelligence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and a mishandling of the devastating aftermath of Hurricane Katrina on the Gulf Coast. Obama openly embraced the idea that he was the anti-Bush on nothing much more than his commitment to putting the best people in...

If President Barack Obama hoped his deal with the Taliban to bring back Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl would be a political boon in the midst of the VA scandal, he is in for a big surprise. Soon after Obama revealed that Bergdahl was to be released, we learned the president agreed to release five of the most hardcore Taliban fighters from America’s terrorist detention facility in Guantanamo Bay in exchange. “While not as well known as Guantanamo inmates like 9-11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the Taliban 5 were some of the worst outlaws in the U.S. war on terror,” Eli Lake...

Now that Field Marshal Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has won a decisive victory in the Egyptian presidential election (held May 26-28, 2014), the pro-Islamist Western media—such as the BBC and CNN—are downplaying his impressive win. Western media outlets cannot help themselves. They are smitten with their grievance over what they call “the ousting of the first democratically-elected Egyptian president.” Although the election of Mohamed Morsi (Sisi’s predecessor) was full of irregularities, they are wedded to the narrative that their guy was “wronged.” But consider the following: 1. During the 2011 election, Muslim Brotherhood thugs stood at the doors of hundreds, if...

Starting August 1, the left-wing Ohio newspaper, The Toledo Blade, intends to lay off about 130 of its unionized employees due to a permanent shutdown of its Toledo production center that handles printing and inserting. ... In 2013, The Blade lost $8.5 million and has been losing millions for years. As of now there are no plans that will affect the advertising and news-gathering departments. In 2012, The Toledo Blade urged it readers to re-elect President Obama, arguing in part that "He has dealt effectively with economic recession at home

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)MSNBC host Chris Matthews was baffled Friday night by the GOP’s choice to invite “Duck Dynasty” patriarch Phil Robertson to speak at the Republican Leadership Conference. Matthews told his “Hardball” audience that the GOP’s “showing up with this guy from ‘Duck Farm or whatever’ is part of the problem. They’re playing to people who have rebel license plates on their cars. That’s who they’re talking to with this character.” “I guess the GOP is more desperate than I thought to call someone like me,” Robertson had told the audience at RLC on Thursday. MSNBC commentator Michelle Bernard joined Matthews in...

Since Monday, April 14, ABC's Claire Shipman has been touring the network and cable news networks to promote her new book that she co-wrote with Katty Kay entitled "The Confidence Code: The Science and Art of Self Assurance-What Women Should Know." Despite the eight television appearances Shipman has made since last Monday, only two interviews openly acknowledged her marriage to White House Press Secretary Jay Carney.

According to the AP, a CIA agent’s name was leaked by the White House . The AP calls it an “embarrassing flub” even though it was a crime when an aide in the Bush administration leaked the name of part-time agent Valerie Plame. What’s given little attention in the story is the fact that the Washington Post reporter who wrote the story sent his copy to the White House to be checked for “accuracy.” ... First of all, any reporter worth his salt would not depend on the subject he’s reporting on to verify accuracy. That’s just crazy. He’d make...

On May 26 the New York Daily News launched a series about the Santa Barbara tragedy titled "America in Denial." It is a perfect demonstration of how the left plans to deny or downplay many facts in the horrid Santa Barbara attacks while perverting others so they can push gun control.

Bias: President Obama repeatedly claims to know nothing about scandals, blames others for problems and has failed to achieve most of his stated goals. If he were a Republican, what do you think the press would call him? When a reporter asked in a two-part question whether Obama had been "caught by surprise" by the mushrooming scandal at the VA, Obama ignored it. It was a good question. The White House had earlier claimed that Obama only learned about attempts at VA hospitals to falsify records and hide chronic delays after reading about it in the newspaper, despite mounting evidence...

...."It's good to be out," he said as he strolled across the Ellipse, suit jacket tossed over his shoulder. "The bear is loose."... He also ran into a very excited woman named Karen. "Oh my gosh, this is like the best day of my life," Karen said. She then posed for a photo with Obama.

Hillary Clinton claims she is unfairly under attack from the GOP and called on her friends at the liberal main stream media to help. Ambassador Stevens begged for help for four days before he was tortured and murdered; Hillary ignored his pleas. Even after the fatal attacks began in Benghazi on the four Americans; Hillary ignored them. Why, because she was covering up illegal and imperialistic American gun running in Benghazi. But let Hillary be held accountable by the GOP and she hollers for and gets help from the liberal media who discredits and ignores those stories that have the...

Fresh off promises from CNN boss Jeff Zucker that the channel will pursue more stories on global warming — whether their audience likes it or not — CNN anchor Carol Costello presided over a segment with two religious figures agreeing that to deny climate change is to sin against God. But Costello did much more than just moderate the “debate,” railing against “deniers” and questioning whether they’re “reading the Bible.” In the eye-popping intro to the segment — which aired during CNN’s “Newsroom”, not an opinion program — Costello pulls no punches while savaging those who dare to question the...

Sometimes partisan media gets so caught up in political wing nut warfare that it can’t get its head out of its own @$$. Take Salon editor-at-large Joan Walsh, a liberal journalist who made fun of former VP hopeful Sarah Palin last night for listing a Salon story, along with several others, in a Facebook post. Palin was making a point that possible 2016 presidential contender Hillary Clinton‘s so-called brain illness is being looked into just like the media tore into her for a rumor suggesting that Trig wasn’t really her baby. She linked to a number of postings — some...

The hosts of The Five today took on the media double standard in covering Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin, based on Palin’s Facebook post calling out said double standard, with Greg Gutfeld surmising that unlike Clinton, Palin was fair game because to the media, she’s “not human.” Gutfeld argued, “They treated her like an alien cartoon, because no one in the media had ever come into contact with anybody like Sarah Palin, yet they were constantly surrounded by people like Hillary Clinton, which are petulant progressives with a thirst for power.” And it’s not just on issues of health, he...

CNN President Jeff Zucker declared his network would “not going to be shamed” into covering Benghazi and other stories without “real news value” at an awards dinner Monday. Capital New York reports that Zucker explained CNN’s post-plane plans during an interview at the Deadline Club’s annual dinner on Monday night. “I don’t think there’s any question about our commitment to breaking news, as evidenced by all the questions about the plane,” Zucker told The New York Times’ Bill Carter (RELATED: The five most ridiculous aspects of CNN’s missing Malaysian flight coverage). “So we’re still there whenever that happens,” he continued,...

Documents obtained by the Washington Times revealed that the Bush Administration warned the Obama Administration about problems within the Veterans Administration as early as 2008, yet both the ABC and NBC evening news broadcasts ignored the story on Monday, May 19. Of the big three networks, only the CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley covered the new revelations in the VA scandal. CBS News host Scott Pelley noted that “The Bush White House was so concerned about this back in 2008 that it warned the incoming Obama Administration.”

Another Republican is now weighing in on Hillary Clinton’s health. Sarah Palin slammed the mainstream media for treating Clinton with a double standard after Republican strategist Karl Rove raised controversial concerns about the likely presidential candidate’s health. “Thank goodness liberals are consistent in refusing to apply double standards, thanks to their disdain for hypocrisy – so they’ll come through once again,” the former vice presidential candidate wrote sarcastically on her Facebook page Monday evening. ”Rest assured these self-designated protectors of what they obviously believe is the ‘weaker sex’ needing protection in the political arena will elevate political discourse.” Palin doubled...

The media practically wept with pride and joy yesterday as former President Bill Clinton attacked Karl Rove for raising the issue of Hillary Clinton's fall and subsequent recovery from blood clot and concussion in early 2013. Newsbusters points out that NBC News devoted 63 seconds of their 22 minute broadcast to let Bill stand by his woman. Using phrases like "shades of the old political warrior," Brian Williams nearly revealed his pompoms from beneath the anchor desk while cheering on the disbarred Clinton's well-rehearsed response to Rove.

When people ask why I came out politically though it will (maybe has already) cost me readers I say “so you know you’re not alone.” And also so that I don’t have to lie to myself, till I think I’m crazy. This might not seem important. But it is. To gaslight an entire society you have to get them to keep silent. You have to convince people that everyone sane believes what you do. Those other people? Oh, those are fringe voices, those are crazy and/or stupid. The good people are all with us. (And btw, every time I post...