Free Republic

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- A story that sounds like a movie script is slowly grinding its way to trial. All of the 29 defendants in the massive corruption case involving suspended State Senator Leland Yee and reputed gangster Raymond "Shrimp Boy" Chow appeared in federal court Thursday. With so many defendants, lawyers, and documents, the judge is trying to set up a system to manage what could be an unwieldy trial. What makes it even harder is that not everyone's on the same page. The frustration is beginning to show. There are 29 defendants, even more lawyers, a 137 page...

Gun control has largely been a top down effort. Michael Bloomberg’s latest announcement that he will spend another $50 million to push gun control – 2.5 times the amount spent by the NRA annually on political activities – is all too typical. Last year, gun control groups, largely due to Bloomberg’s money, outspent gun rights groups by about 7.4 to 1 on TV advertising. With a net worth of $31.2 billion, Bloomberg can afford round-the-clock armed bodyguards, but he doesn’t recognize the need for others to have armed protection. Despite his money, mayors belonging to Bloomberg’s Mayors Against Illegal Guns...

The former New York City mayor is dedicating himself to a new group that will organize voters who support gun control; called Everytown for Gun Safety, it will subsume his existing groups (Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense), and it will focus specifically on expanding background checks. His previous approach was to fund ad campaigns in races where gun control was an issue. Here's how he matches up with his arch-rival. Money Bloomberg says he'll be putting at least $50 million into the project this year -- and according to the New York Times, he...

(CNN) -- Michael Bloomberg is investing a chunk of his personal fortune to minimize the influence of the National Rifle Association. The former New York City mayor pledged $50 million to his new group Everytown for Gun Safety, an umbrella organization for his two other gun control groups: Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America. It aims to make the political climate more supportive of gun control. The new organization plans to compete against the NRA by adopting its playbook. The NRA has built an impressive and effective organization that touts millions of members,...

The midterm elections of 2014 are coming up and the anti-Second Amendment forces are starting to step up their attacks on our gun rights. The biggest offender is former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, who is spending $50 million to defeat pro-gun candidates and to destroy the National Rifle Association. He announced his campaign on the Today show where he continued to lie about his intentions of disarming law-abiding citizens. This anti-Constitution jerk is merging his puppet groups, Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, into a new group called Everytown for Gun Safety....

Actually, it’s difficult to choose whether to start with the first paragraph or the last paragraph in this New York Times report on Michael Bloomberg’s latest project. The first paragraph covers Bloomberg’s ongoing efforts to pass gun-control legislation after the failure of his Mayors Against Illegal Guns to move the needle at all on his agenda. Besides, several of the mayors walked out after it became obvious that Bloomberg opposed a lot more than just illegal guns … which are, of course, already illegal.This time Bloomberg wants to spend $50 million to set up a grassroots network to take on...

Say what you will about former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, but don’t you dare accuse of him of being modest. The New York Times reported Tuesday that Bloomberg plans to spend $50 million of his estimated $31 billion fortune this year to combat the National Rifle Association. Speaking of his advocacy of liberal causes like gun-control and preventing New Yorkers from enjoying “Big Gulp” sodas, Bloomberg told the Times, reportedly with a grin, “I am telling you if there is a God, when I get to heaven I’m not stopping to be interviewed.” “I am heading straight in,”...

Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg will spend $50 million this year to build a nationwide grassroots network on gun control in a direct challenge to the National Rifle Association, The New York Times reported. The new lobbying group, called Everytown for Gun Safety, will encompass other gun control groups funded by Bloomberg, Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, the report said. Bloomberg told the Times the strategy will focus on expanding the background check system for gun buyers at the state and national levels. He made nearly $14 million in federal campaign...

Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy said Monday that his standoff with the feds isn’t just about cattle: It’s about an “overpowering” bureaucracy in the U.S. that needs to be disarmed. “I only want to talk to one person in each county across the United States, and here’s what I want to say: County sheriffs, disarm U.S. bureaucracy. County sheriffs, disarm U.S. bureaucrats,” Bundy said on Glenn Beck’s radio show on TheBlaze on Monday. Beck said he invited Bundy on his show after speaking with him Sunday to try to understand the man whose cattle have ignited a flashpoint between federal regulators...

<p>A Connecticut community college suspended a student veteran for his aggressive questioning of Democratic Gov. Dannel Malloy during a public forum, prompting a First Amendment advocacy group to condemn the college for its flagrant disrespect for free speech and due process.</p>

Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy (D) signed what the Hartford Courant called “the toughest assault weapons legislation in the nation” last year. It required owners of semi-automatic firearms to register all firearms designated as “assault weapons” with the state government, along with any “high capacity” magazines they may own, by December 31, 2013. The Malloy regime expected Connecticut residents to register somewhere between 372,000-400,000 firearms, and roughly 2 million firearm magazines that held more than 10 rounds before January 1. What they got instead was defiance.

Open Carry Event in Texas, where open carry of modern handguns is not legal in most cases In July of 2013, an open carrier in Wisconsin narrowly avoided being "SWATted" by police.  He was well known in the area and had friends on the local police force.   They contacted him after he was accused of flashing a gun at the clerk of a convenience store. In the same incident, another innocent citizen was stopped by police at gunpoint and ordered out of their car because of bad information supplied by the clerk. Here is updated information: The open...

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management announced today that it was ending its effort to seize Cliven Bundy’s herd of cattle that has been illegally grazing on federal land. The reason the BLM suspended the cattle round up was to protect the safety of federal employees and members of the general public. Bundy and a smattering of his right-wing supporters have threatened to wage a range war if the government continues with its effort to enforce the law. Let that sink in for a minute. The government is halting their efforts to enforce the law because of the threats being...

LAS VEGAS (AP) - The Nevada Republican Party stripped opposition to abortion and gay marriage from its platform Saturday as state convention delegates instead focused on judging fellow Republicans on their worthiness to serve in office and adherence to GOP values. The platform, with few changes, was adopted overwhelmingly as the Las Vegas convention stretched late into the evening. The vote mirrors that of the Clark County GOP, which voted earlier to remove platform language defining marriage as between a man and a woman and statements opposing abortion. Many Republicans are re-evaluating their strong stances on conservative social issues as...

Local radio is reporting that there has been a shooting at the Overland Park, Kansas Jewish Community Center around 1:00 p.m. Central time. Man walking up to people asking if they are Jewish and boom. News conference at 5:00. Evidently CNN is reporting.

Guess who's all of a sudden standing up for law and order? Why, it's radical environmentalists, who despite their general disdain for lawful behavior have felt compelled to speak out in support of the Bureau of Land Management's attempts to round up Cliven Bundy's cattle and ultimately force the Nevada rancher to abandon his family's century-old business. Martin Griffith at the Associated Press relayed the comments of one such group in a Sunday report in the aftermath of the BLM's abandonment of its roundup efforts, in Griffith's words, "after hundreds of states' rights protesters, some of them armed militia members,...

As tensions rose and a standoff ensued between Bureau of Land Management (BLM) agents and Cliven Bundy and his family on April 11th and 12th, one thing was evident: through the Second Amendment, the Founding Fathers guaranteed that Bundy could be armed to protect his life and property. KLAS-TV described a meeting between armed federal agents and armed Bundy family members during one of the highest points of tension. No guns were misused nor were any used offensively. However, guns were present because of our Founding Fathers' forethought. We do not have guns for the purposes of sporting or hunting--although...

The shooting in the Kansas City area on Sunday at Jewish facilities that killed three was a horrifying reminder of the dangers some hate groups pose. Attorney Gen. Eric Holder on Monday morning issued a statement on the matter. “I was horrified to learn of this weekend’s tragic shootings outside Kansas City. These senseless acts of violence are all the more heartbreaking as they were perpetrated on the eve of the solemn occasion of Passover. “Justice Department prosecutors will work with their state and local counterparts to provide all available support and to determine whether the federal hate crimes statute...

Bundy Ranch Standoff: Meet the BLM thug who tackled a 57-year old woman. (See my post entitled, “Margaret Bundy Houston Tells Town Board of Being Tackled by BLM: Feds Take Cattle Watering System.”) His name is Michael Roop. Roop is a State Staff Ranger for BLM, Oregon and to put it mildly, on the internet, this punk with a gun, badge, pepper spray and a K-9 is trending.

On April 9th, a large group of Democrat representatives sent a letter asking President Obama to prohibit the importation of "military style, semiautomatic firearms." Led by Reps. John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI) and Eliot Engel (D-NY), the letter was signed by "about 80" Democrats. According to The Washington Times, Conyers and Engel are basing their request on the 1968 Gun Control Act, which they claim gives Obama "broad authority to prohibit guns and ammunition from being imported into the country." The exception would be if the products are "generally recognized as particularly suitable for or readily adaptable to sporting purposes." The...