Free Republic

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — After losing a seven-year legal battle, James Risen, a reporter for The New York Times, reluctantly took the witness stand in federal court here on Monday, but refused to answer any questions that could help the Justice Department identify his confidential sources. Mr. Risen said he would not say anything to help prosecutors bolster their case against Jeffrey A. Sterling, a former C.I.A. officer who is set to go on trial soon on charges of providing classified information to Mr. Risen for his 2006 book, “State of War.” The Justice Department first subpoenaed Mr. Risen to testify...

"Putin is behaving in a very paranoid way. He’s putting a lot of emphasis on increased repression. He’s taking a lot of money out of domestic coffers: health, education, pensions, to support his own inner circle – to keep peace among competing groups. To bail these people out when the social situation in the country is so dire is an act of….it reveals the regime for what it is, and he can only really keep peace by increasing the repression."

Though we were promised a brand new day regarding America’s reputation in the world, the reality has been the opposite. Americans doubt the resolve of our President, as seen by the election results last month. Our nation’s image has suffered, and it is time we reverse this trend. This will not only secure our international standing, it will also secure our nation’s safety. Considering the drumbeat of violence around the world at any given moment – from violence across the Middle East to the devastation caused by Ebola in West Africa – conflict and instability seem to be a repetitive...

Sony Pictures is triumphant today because their release of the North Korea-inspired comedy The Interview by Seth Rogen and James Franco had an estimated sales of $15 million over the weekend from largely online sales. The movie was schedule to be released in about 3,000 theaters, but because of “terror” threats, it was released in a limited number of theaters and online.The revenue is about $5,000 per canceled theater, or about 300 people per theatre. Kind of light traffic for a new release with a great deal of publicity surrounding it. Count it another triumph however for a renegade state...

This is a horrifying development. There are at least 22 active terror cells INSIDE the United States. This is according to an actual FBI map, not just some lunatic fringe, conspiracy theorist. Jamaat ul-Fuqra, which runs the camps, is an Islamic fundamentalist organization related to Al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood terrorist organizations. To make matters worse, the “FBI states that their hands are tied in monitoring their activities despite a training video that is years old, possible murders, and proof of illegal activities.” These are not brand-new camps either. Homeland Security has known about them for years.

A number of private security researchers are increasingly voicing doubts that the hack of Sony‘s computer systems was the work of North Korea. President Obama and the F.B.I. last week accused North Korea of targeting Sony and pledged a “proportional response” just hours before North Korea’s Internet went dark without explanation. But security researchers remain skeptical, with some even likening the government’s claims to those of the Bush administration in the build-up to the Iraq war. Fueling their suspicions is the fact that the government based its findings, in large part, on evidence that it will not release, citing the...

Citing the “dire threat” posed by uninvited intruders, the US Department of Homeland Security is recommending a substantial investment in improved fencing for the White House. “As it stands right now, hostile elements can easily breach the meager barrier that the current fence around the White House presents,” Secretary Jeh Johnson complained. “This is as grave a threat to our nation and its government as could exist. We must take steps to seal off the ease of ingress as a matter of national security.” Administration critics juxtaposed Johnson’s alarm over the inadequacy of the White House fence with his more...

Outgoing Senate Intelligence Committee chair Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said on Friday the U.S. is "going toward bloodshed" and "getting into the arena of major" acts of cyber terrorism. "There can be an attack on the electrical system of the United States, on airport computers of the United States," she said. "We're getting into the arena of major attacks. Right now, it has to do a great deal with private industry. But the cost for private industry is now in the trillions of dollars. And it has to be stopped." Feinstein's comments came after President Obama said Sony Pictures "made a...

Once a Constitutional Republic famed for its pragmatism, the United States has lately become a country notorious for its inconstancy, no longer recognizing that actions have finite and foreseeable consequences. In this space, for example, I recently argued that the release of the “torture report” by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence came perilously close to the constitutional definition of treason by “giving Aid and Comfort” to America’s enemies. Admittedly, that was a tough assessment. But barely a week after the report’s release, the Huffington Post published an article linking those revelations with their most immediate effects on our allies....

Defense: China has just tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile that can deliver up to 10 independently targeted nuclear warheads, using technology given to them on President Clinton's watch to launch communications satellites. The Dec. 13 test of the DF-41 was the third for the new weapon. But it marked the first test of a multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicle, or MIRV, technology and raises by an order of magnitude the nuclear threat to the U.S. as China continues its massive arms buildup. And disturbingly, the threat is in large part of our own making. "The DF-4, which could be...

"..........This systematic pusillanimity is not a new phenomenon. Other examples: the refusal by the Obama administration to criticize the Iranian regime when it put down the “Green Revolution” in 2009; the administration’s eagerness to “reset” relations with an increasingly hostile Russia; its secret negotiations with the Taliban even as the group continued its attacks on U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan; the refusal to meet with any Egyptian opposition groups other than the Muslim Brotherhood. Obama is hardly the first president to seek rapprochement with our adversaries and reconciliation with our enemies, of course. But his determination to make nice—even in the...

I have been granted a rare opportunity to embark on a new endeavor as CEO of the National Center for Policy Analysis, a national think tank headquartered in Dallas. After serving my country for 22 years of honorable active duty service in a military career and a term in US House of Representatives, I now have a new mission: leading one of America’s premier public policy research centers into its fourth decade. Our objective is to create the preeminent free-market, public policy group in America. My years in and following elected office have brought me to a deeply held conviction:...

A spokesperson for the Treasury Department told the Washington Free Beacon that survival kits being ordered for government workers at every major bank in the United States are for “emergency preparedness.” .......“The solicitation is to replace aging kits and provide kits at additional location out of a preponderance of caution,” Collins added. Once the government finds a bidder, each of OCC’s 3,814 employees will receive a survival kit, which will come in a fanny-pack or backpack that can fit all of the items, including a 33-piece personal first aid kit with “decongestant tablets,” a variety of bandages, and medicines. The...

My cell phone has been going off for hours with messages and angry conversations with fellow Cuban-Americans and conservatives in the U.S. I hear this question over and over: what did the U.S. get out of this deal? The answer is nothing, unless you are one of those who believes that the Castro regime is about to reform the economy, allow an independent media, and hold multi-party elections. I have a unique perspective on this issue. I can address it as a Cuban-American and as a U.S. citizen. In other words, I want the best for those on the island...

With the release of Democrat Senator Diane Feinstein’s report on the CIA’s Enhanced Interrogation program, a forty million dollar joke has been perpetrated on the American people, curtesy of the California senator. As U.S. military bases and diplomatic facilities around the world are placed on high alert for possible attacks by Muslims further inflamed by the declassified details of the report, the costs of Senator Feinstein’s ‘knock knock joke’ will continue to spiral upwards as we’re forced to ramp up additional security precautions to address the threat. Millions more will be spent, and unfortunately lives will probably be lost so...

Defense Threat: China conducts its third test in a year of a hypersonic glide vehicle designed to evade our missile and other defense systems, including the Aegis defense system guarding our carrier battle groups. As we downsize our military, scale back weapons procurement and development, China proceeds at top speed towards weapons designed to counter our once-huge technical advantage and qualitative superiority. Case in point is the third flight test of a hypersonic glide vehicle (HGV), dubbed the WU-14 by the Pentagon, following earlier tests on Jan. 9 and Aug. 7 of this year. The U.S. Navy is particularly concerned,...

During her recent speech before a half empty auditorium at Georgetown University, former Secretary of State and Democrat Party frontrunner for the White House in 2016, Hillary Clinton suggested that we try to see things from our enemy’s perspective. And I quote, “Showing respect even for one's enemies. Trying to understand, in so far as psychologically possible, empathize with their perspective and point of view.” Suggesting that we must “empathize” with the likes of ISIS, Boko Harum, al Qaeda, Iran and North Korea to name just a few seems a bit of a stretch. But I guess we must take...

“Today marks a very important next step, shifting from saying the right things to doing the right things, putting into action the steps that are necessary not only to protect women and children but to find ways of utilizing women as makers and keepers of peace,” says Hillary Rodham Clinton, in reference to the newly launched National Action Plan Academy........SMART POWER “This is what we call Smart Power, using every possible tool…leaving no one on the sidelines, showing respect even for one’s enemies, trying to understand, and insofar as is psychologically possible, empathize with their perspective and point of view,...

"....Conversely, the scathing disdain [Obama] shows those who disagree with him ...or whom he considers not on his team—in power or intellect—is of a man whose anger seethes so close to the surface he wears it on his starched long sleeve.Of course politicians get angry, but it is generally after long and frustrating negotiations where someone is not playing by the rules.But Obama seems to be always angry...........Instead, and like an angry teen-ager who defaces walls with graffiti,he effaces the Constitution instead with his feckless and reckless Executive Orders,no matter the consequences.He is Homo politicus on steroids.And why did he...

Alarm over the growth of the national security state seems to wane among liberals when Democrats are in the White House but the sheer magnitude of the enterprise should be of concern to all no matter which party is in nominal control of the executive branch. When Thomas Jefferson was president, “the entire executive branch consisted of 132 people,” Michael Glennon, a law professor at Tufts University, said recently at the Cato Institute. “The White House staff consisted of one person: Jefferson’s personal secretary.” Today, on the national security side alone, “This little apparatus that Truman set up consists of...