Free Republic

<p>As the U.S. engages in a national debate over the militarization of the police, federal data shows that government agencies charged with largely administrative roles are spending tens of millions of taxpayer dollars to purchase SWAT and military-style equipment.</p> <p>Since FY 2006, 44 traditionally administrative agencies have spent over $71 million on items like body armor, riot helmets and shields, cannon launchers and police firearms and ammunition, according to federal spending data from watchdog group OpenTheBooks.com.</p>

After dozens of unsuccessful attempts to repeal all or part of President Barack Obama's signature health care law, Congressional Republicans on Wednesday finally succeeded in getting a repeal bill to the president's desk.

The official and public indifference to the continued persecution and murder of Christians in the Middle East is a scandal of enormous proportions. Only a few Internet websites are devoted to the rescue of persecuted Christians. The media, like the president, is blind to outrage. Expressions of concern by the leaders of the West are few. The fact is that Christians face more persecution, in more countries, than any other religious group.U.S. Christian sources estimate that 180 Christians are killed in 60 countries monthly merely for their faith. Many of these are in maniacal environments, such as in North Korea....

After years of lying and deceiving the international community, the United Nations nuclear watchdog issued a significant report placing the spotlight on Iran seeking to obtain nuclear weapons. While there are arguments over how long Iran actually went down this path, with various reports referring to 2003, 2009 and now even beyond that, it should not be forgotten that Iran has lied all along and claimed of never seeking the mother of all weapons. The International Atomic Energy Agency (AIEA) has now confirmed that Tehran actually had a nuclear weapons program and continued its efforts in this regard at least...

Obama's call for disarmament in the threat of facing the Soviet Union.

A former Department of Homeland Security agent says that an investigation he was conducting into a fundamentalist Islamic group operating in the U.S. may have helped stop San Bernardino jihadi Syed Farook had the government not shut down his probe. During an interview with Fox News' Megyn Kelly on Thursday, Philip Haney said that in 2012 as an agent with U.S. Customs and Border Protection's National Targeting Center, he opened an investigation into a Sunni Islamic group called, Tablighi Jamaat, a subset of the fundamentalist Deobandi movement. But Haney said that just a year into the investigation it was shut...

It is Margaret Atwood's 76th birthday, and her 2009 novel 'The Year of the Flood' seems an appropriate way to sum up the crude market this year. We await the weekly EIA inventory report this morning, with oil inventories less than 4 million barrels shy of the record of 490.9 mn bbls seen earlier in the year (...in itself an 80-year high). While a near-2 million barrel build is expected from today's report, last night's API report has put the putty cat among the pigeons by yielding a surprise draw of 0.4 mn bbls. The API report also showed a...

Tuesday on Newsmax TV’s “The Steve Malzberg Show,” Ben Stein, a former speechwriter for Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, actor and author, Ben Stein said President Barack Obama “has a real strong hatred of America.”Stein said, “Mr. Obama has been wrong from day one about ISIS. He called them a JV team, he said that they weren’t really serious or important. He has not in any sense addressed their threat. And he is a bad joke, as the leader of the most important nation in the world, he’s a bad joke.”

...snip... For more than two months now, Arabs have been volunteering to attack and to kill Jews all over Israel. These attacks are vicious. ...snap... Where is our America ally? For an answer, Obama ignores ubiquitous Palestinian calls to kill Jews. He tells us that the only real solution to this hate is “two states for two people; a democratic Jewish state living side-by-side in peace and security with a viable, independent and sovereign Palestinian state” (ibid). That’s ridiculous. Palestinian’ aren’t talking about two states. They’re not talking about peace. They’re not talking about side-by-side. They’re talking about murdering Jews....

Michelle Obama got the wind taken out of her sails recently when some photos surfaced that expose her school lunch plan for the disaster it is. When 13 year-old Tanner Glenney received his lunch from his Texas middle school cafeteria on taco day, he was shocked by what he saw. He took pictures to show his mother Shelley, and she was enraged to see that there was barely a teaspoon of meat inside her son’s taco. “I first thought it had to be a mistake or the kids were messing around,” Shelley Glenney said. “And then when he told me...

MICHAEL WANG, a young Californian, came second in his class of 1,002 students; his ACT score was 36, the maximum possible; he sang at Barack Obama’s inauguration; he got third place in a national piano contest; he was in the top 150 of a national maths competition; he was in several national debating-competition finals. But when it came to his university application he faced a serious disappointment for the first time in his glittering career. He was rejected by six of the seven Ivy League colleges to which he applied. “I saw people less qualified than me get better offers,”...

RUSH: Los Angeles. This is the LA Times: "LA to Declare 'State of Emergency' on Homelessness, Commit $100 Million -- Los Angeles elected leaders," as opposed to the unelected leaders, "announced yesterday that they would declare a 'state of emergency' and devote up to $100 million" toward housing and other services for homeless people. I know. I mean, there's all kinds of lines here just waiting. Why don't they disguise themselves as immigrants? Why don't they go pitch their tent or their shopping cart, whatever, near the border like they're immigrants. "The proposal, which was presented at the City Hall...

A Breitbart News review of State Department and Homeland Security data reveals that the United States already admits more than a quarter of a million Muslim migrants each year. President Obama intends to add another 10,000 Syrian migrants on top of that. In 2013 alone, 117,423 migrants from Muslim-majority countries were permanently resettled within the United States— having been given lawful permanent resident status. Additionally in 2013, the United States voluntarily admitted an extra 122,921 temporary migrants from Muslim countries as foreign students and foreign workers as well as 39,932 refugees and asylees from Muslim countries. Thus, twelve years after...

Columnist and author of “Wealth, Poverty and Politics: An International Perspective,” Thomas Sowell argued that allowing refugees from the Middle East and Africa into the US “fits in wonderfully” with President Obama’s desire to “to redistribute that [America’s] wealth and power” on Friday’s “Sean Hannity Show.” Sowell stated, “I guess for the president, I think it’s a fairly simple thing, this is a man who acts as a citizen of the world, and who has expressed, on numerous occasions, a belief that the United States has too much wealth, power, etc. And that the answer is to redistribute that wealth...

It’s being called a “revolt” by intelligence pros who are paid to give their honest assessment of the ISIS war—but are instead seeing their reports turned into happy talk. More than 50 intelligence analysts working out of the U.S. military's Central Command have formally complained that their reports on ISIS and al Qaeda’s branch in Syria were being inappropriately altered by senior officials, The Daily Beast has learned. The complaints spurred the Pentagon’s inspector general to open an investigation into the alleged manipulation of intelligence. The fact that so many people complained suggests there are deep-rooted, systemic problems in how...

Donald Trump's six-page platform on immigration may not be, as Ann Coulter wrote, "the greatest political document since the Magna Carta." But given the issue's role in elevating the candidate to leading Republican polls, it merits serious attention. And at least some of the platform's planks are serious. Trump calls for nationwide use, presumably mandatory, of E-Verify, the government system that is supposed to enable prospective employers to verify a job applicant's immigration status. He also calls for completion of a visa tracking system. About half of the nation's estimated 11.3 million illegal immigrants (Pew Research Center estimates, not significantly...

JOSE Amaya Guardado didn’t stand a chance. First, they hacked him with a machete. Then, they buried him alive out in the forest. And to celebrate the crime, two of his attackers then had sex beside the shallow grave, where he was still breathing. This horrific crime, committed by four students against their fellow classmate, has shocked the US state of Florida.

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump praised Senator Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) as a “very solid guy,” who “has given us some great ideas.”

Last night, the wife and I were watching O’Reilly and he had Professor John Yoo on talking about the 14th Amendment. He said (and I had to rewind to confirm) either: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, ARE subject to the jurisdiction thereof…” Or “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, OR subject to the jurisdiction thereof…” I thought he said “OR”, but mom thought it might be “ARE”.  Anywho…. Since it actually says “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, AND subject to the jurisdiction thereof…”, I have to wonder why he misquoted it.

The DHS has been releasing illegal immigrants with violent criminal records back into local U.S. communities, where they have often gone on to commit violent crimes against American citizens, according to new disclosures by a leading lawmaker and local law enforcement agencies. Rep. Matt Salmon (R., Ariz.) and law enforcement officials petitioned the Obama administration to end a policy that enables illegal immigrants with criminal records to be released back into the US. Arizona law enforcement officials announced on Tuesday that three illegal aliens with violent criminal records had been released by DHS and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) back...