Free Republic

Former Republican Rep. Ron Paul said Sunday that the United States shares part of the blame in the attack on the Malaysian Airlines passenger jet in eastern Ukraine last week, and that theObama administration may try and use the tragedy as an excuse to attack Russia.

Just days after the tragic crash of a Malaysian Airlines flight over eastern Ukraine, Western politicians and media joined together to gain the maximum propaganda value from the disaster. It had to be Russia; it had to be Putin, they said. President Obama held a press conference to claim - even before an investigation - that it was pro-Russian rebels in the region who were responsible. His ambassador to the UN, Samantha Power, did the same at the UN Security Council - just one day after the crash! While western media outlets rush to repeat government propaganda on the event,...

Former Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul claimed Sunday that the U.S. and European Union may share responsibility for the downing of a Malaysia Airlines plane over Ukraine last week. “While western media outlets rush to repeat government propaganda on the event, there are a few things they will not report,” Paul, a former Republican congressman from Texas, wrote on his website. “They will not report that the crisis in Ukraine started late last year, when the EU and U.S. overthrew the elected Ukrainian president, Viktor Yanukovych. Without U.S.-sponsored ‘regime change,’ it is unlikely that hundreds would have been killed in...

Russian President Vladimir Putin Thursday blamed the Ukrainian government for the crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, saying the state bears some responsibility for fighting that may have led to the jet’s apparent downing by a surface-to-air missile. “I would like to point out in this regard, that this tragedy would not have occurred if there was peace in that land, at least, if hostilities had not resumed in the South-East of Ukraine,” Putin said. “And without question, the state over whose territory this took place, bears responsibility for this awful tragedy.”

An entire nation votes, tens of millions of Americans come out to their local polls to tell Washington it is going in the wrong direction on amnesty and Obama Care, and endless deficits, and cowardice in the face of terrorism…and what do the Republicans leaders do? They give the president everything he could ask for, while turning on one of the few in the Republican ranks that understands we are fighting for the very life of the nation. The Republican Party simply is not up to the task of changing the course of this nation. Too many in the Republican...

In a Spiegel interview, Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk, 40, discusses his country’s division, its war with Russia and why he believes all efforts to find a solution with Vladimir Putin will fail. […] “A military solution would not be the best. My aim is not to start a new offensive against Russian soldiers, but to deter Russia from further aggression. The thing is that the EU is always playing by the rules. Putin is always playing with the rules. At the beginning, many thought that, after annexing Crimea, the beast would calm down. But he continued by supporting the...

Walking today on the Upper West Side, I noticed recently placed phone booth advertisements on 68th & Broadway that featured a picture of Colin Powell with the tagline: “This is what happens when there is no second opinion. Iraq War: No WMDs, 141,802 civilian deaths. Go to RT.com for the second opinion.” RT.com (formerly Russia Today) has similar ads that feature former President George Bush with the same message. In short, the Kremlin-funded Russian TV station is using street advertising in NYC to influence the American people. Read more at http://observer.com/2014/12/putins-new-propaganda-invades-upper-west-side-but-at-least-my-kids-speak-russian/#ixzz3MOnko4Co

Does Rand Paul classify himself as a "free-thinker?" I was looking around to see how he might be associated with that atheist/agnostic group and the word "dignity" came up in the first piece below [that uses the term free-thinker]. So I search "Rand Paul" and "dignity" and found that he uses that word in his speeches. So just wondering what anyone knows about his religious leanings other than his traditional association with the Episcopal church. And does he use "dignity" as a euphemism for "social justice" - "getting along" - as a liberal-libertarian stand in [REPLACEMENT] for religion [Islam, Judaism,...

FORT HUACHUCA — They may be both Republicans and represent Arizona in the upper chamber of Congress but they don’t agree on the recent decision of the Obama Administration of the reestablishing diplomatic relations with Cuba after six decades. After about 90 minutes on Fort Huachuca Thursday, Sen. John McCain and Sen. Jeff Flake discussed the announcement with the Herald/Review during a quick walking interview to a plane waiting to take them to Yuma.

BUENOS AIRES, August 5 (RIA Novosti) – Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro dismissed Tuesday accusations of Moscow’s alleged role in the deadly Malaysian passenger plane crash as “primitive.” “Accusing the Russian Federation of destroying the Malaysian Boeing during the flight is horrifying primitivism,” Castro wrote in an article published in Cuba’s Granma newspaper. “Neither President Vladimir Putin, nor Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov nor other Russian leaders could have ever done such a stupid thing,” Castro stressed. Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 en route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur crashed in eastern Ukraine on July 17. All 298 people on board,...

An Egyptian court sentenced 40 backers of ousted Islamist president Mohamed Morsi to up to 15 years in jail Thursday for violence including torching churches, a judicial source said. Followers of Morsi have been the target of a relentless crackdown by the authorities since he was deposed in July 2013 by ex-army chief and now President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. The criminal court in Assiut in southern Egypt sentenced two defendants to 15 years each, while the others were given jail terms ranging from one year to 10, the source said. They were accused of taking part in acts of violence...

The editor of Breitbart Unmasked, a site that I enjoy immensely and find informative, recently told me that supporting Rand Paul disqualifies a person from being labeled a progressive. My rebuttal was that he might be right. However, I also mentioned that Democratic Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia agreed with my latest Congress Blog piece. In the article, I explain why Rand Paul is correct in questioning the legality of President Obama's troop deployments. Sadly, people at UC Berkeley are more interested in protesting Bill Maher than condemning a conflict George McGovern stated weakens our country in the same manner...

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) continued his efforts to expand the GOP’s reach ahead of 2016 on Friday, appearing for an interview on HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher.”Maher, an outspoken anti-theist and liberal, said that he admires Paul for being “the one Republican who is willing to go to places Republicans don’t usually speak.” Throughout the interview, Paul and Maher were largely in agreement on issues such as the War on Drugs, reinstating voting rights for nonviolent felons, how the U.S. should go about defeating the Islamic State and even, to some extent, climate change. (VIDEO-AT-LINK)“I am available to the...

Last night, November 14, 2014, Bill Maher had Kentucky U.S. Senator Rand Paul on his HBO show "Real Time with Bill Maher" and many were shocked to hear Maher say he may help Paul with his 2016 run for President of the United States. Maher said last night, "I am available to the Rand Paul campaign."

LOUISVILLE — There were only two things Mitch McConnell didn't want to talk about Thursday — whether he will run for re-election in 2020 and his eventual legacy. In his first one-on-one interview since his landslide re-election to a sixth term and his expected ascendance to U.S. Senate majority leader, McConnell talked at length with the Herald-Leader about how he wants to use his new role to help Kentucky, a possible run for president by U.S. Sen. Rand Paul and the conventional wisdom that McConnell is unpopular. McConnell, relaxed and in a great mood in his Louisville home, wouldn't say...

Bilderbergers, the Iraq invasion, Alex Jones—the GOP senator has routinely flirted with America's paranoid fringe.This past summer, Rand Paul, the libertarian senator from Kentucky and a potential 2016 presidential wannabe, was the GOP's It Girl. The New York Times Magazine splashed his mug on the cover and asked, "Has the 'Libertarian Moment' Finally Arrived?" It noted that Paul possessed a "supple mind" and was a "preternaturally confident speaker." Washington Post political prognosticator Chris Cillizza pronounced Paul the "most interesting voice in the GOP right now," and Politico gave him the No. 1 spot on its list of the 50 "most...

Paul is the first potential 2016 contender to visit the city.Sen. Rand Paul met with civil rights leaders Friday in Ferguson, Missouri, the city torn apart by racial unrest following the August shooting of an unarmed black teenager by a white police officer. During his visit, the Republican Senator, who is seen as a likely presidential candidate, stated his concerns about long prison sentences for nonviolent crimes, the loss of voting rights for felons and military programs to give unused equipment to local police departments. “I wanted to find out what we could do to make the situation better,” Paul...

Rand Paul won his Senate seat without winning any notable amount of the black vote. In a match up with Hillary Clinton, he’s currently set to take 15% of the black vote. That’s much better than Mitt Romney, but he’s up against Hillary Clinton. Not Barack Obama. And his MSNBC comments about letting businesses discriminate against black people haven’t been in autoplay for eight months, which they would be if he ever won the primaries. After that, he would be lucky to get 1 percent no matter how many trips he makes to Ferguson.So his constant chatter about winning minority...

Sen. Rand Paul is blaming politicians for the unrest in Ferguson, Missouri, arguing that the criminal justice system fuels racial tension by disproportionately targeting African-Americans. The so-called war on drugs has created a culture of violence and put police in a nearly impossible situation," Paul said in an op-ed published for TIME. He acknowledged that the shooting death of Michael Brown by a Ferguson police officer wasn't related to drugs, but argued that outsized penalties for nonviolent drug crimes creates a "tension in some communities that too often results in tragedy." The comments are another attempt by Paul, a Kentucky...

Now that the Ferguson grand jury documents have been made public, even MSNBC has had to quietly drop its fantasy of Michael Brown being gunned down like a dog in the street by Officer Darren Wilson. Instead, MSNBC is defending the looters. On Monday night, MSNBC's Chris Hayes objected to anyone referring to the people who "set fires or looted as 'thugs.'" His guest, former Seattle chief of police Norm Stamper, said, "I could not agree more." (Stamper did such a bang-up job dealing with the World Trade Organization riots in 1999 that he was forced to resign -- which...