Free Republic

Fun Gun Reviews Presents: "3 Top Semi-Auto DA Pistols". Comparing the Sig P226, Sphinx SDP and the HK P30 pistols and thoughts about what places them at the top of the heap over lesser expensive handguns.

Left Silent as Muslim Cabbies Reject Gay Games Ads By Julio Severo According to FoxNews, 25 Muslim drivers dispatched to Cleveland Hopkins International Airport are refusing to drive cabs adorned with advertising for the Gay Games, which will be held on Aug. 9-16 in the region. The drivers said that their decision was based on their religious convictions. Ann Gynn, a spokeswoman for the Gay Games, said the protest is an “isolated” case, meaning that drivers of other religions (especially Christianity, considering that this religion is still dominant in the U.S.) did not complain about making involuntary propaganda for...

Just a few more definitions of words and idioms that mean something else in Illinois, posted as a public service to the consumers of news. Absentee Landlord: A landlord with sense. Bean: A huge fun-house mirror in downtown Chicago, providing tourists with the warped view of the business district that only lifelong Illinoisans come by naturally. Billy Club: An entertainment venue for billy goats. Billy Goat: A stadium’s pet peeve. (Alternate definition: Someone who uses a collar and leash for a purpose unusual for the neighborhood). Budget: Underestimated spending that you admit to. (Alternate definition: A justification for tax increases)....

Alpha Technology has a new development update and its Viper scrypt board seems to be making headway. The British ASIC maker said it has completed the schematics for the ATX power distribution board and of the AC power metering board. Those of the actual ASIC board are not complete yet, but Alpha said it is “almost” done. In addition, the company has finalised the design of the enclosure and WebGUI user interface. ... In any case, the advent of powerful and immensely efficient scrypt ASICs is not good news for GPU miners, as the ASICs will render GPU-based miners uncompetitive...

Further definitions of common words and phrases that mean something else in Illinois, presented here at no charge, as a public service to the news consumer... ALDERMAN: A large and garish hat, occasionally with an even louder person underneath. BRIBERY: One of the few part-time jobs that can be practiced concurrently with one’s full-time job, leaving evenings and weekends free. (Alternate definition: the primary determinant in the award of competitive bids). CHICAGO RIVER: A 19th Century engineering experiment in reversing the flow of water out of Chicago, toward the southern states. This was to be duplicated in the 20th and...

Friday, April 11, 2014 The Truth About Buying Gold And Silver Every day, the radio airways and cable news broadcasts are filled with advertising from "gold bug" companies who are trying to convince you to buy both gold and silver. There are dozens of them: Goldline, Lear Capital, Rosland, Merit, and so on. All of whom claim that, by holding these precious metals, you are being protected against inflation as a result of massive government spending and the devaluation of the dollar, or, protected against another recession, depression, or stock market crash. The problem is that all of those claims...

The price of bitcoin recovered from a low of roughly $380 and rose past $420 at press time on 11th April, on the news that Zhou Xiaochuan, the governor of the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), had issued new statements potentially clarifying the central bank’s position on bitcoin. According to reports, during Boao Forum, Xiaochuan offered his opinion on the nascent technology, saying that China would not seek to ban bitcoin and other digital currencies entirely.

Federal Air Marshalls Director Resigns Over SIG Selling Scheme By Robert Farago on April 11, 2014 “The director of the Federal Air Marshal Service [FAMS] is resigning after being investigated for his role in an alleged operation to acquire guns for officials’ personal use, FoxNews.com has learned. Director Robert Bray’s home was raided in December in connection with the ongoing probe. Law enforcement and congressional sources told FoxNews.com that Bray’s recently announced resignation, which is effective in June, is directly related to the investigation.

The "blood moons", or so they are called, are a set of eclipses taking place over the next year. There have been several books written about them; even a DVD or two produced about them. But, are they what we think they are? If not, is this a gigantic, prophetic, misunderstanding of astronomical proportions?

US Congressman Steve Stockman of Texas is preparing to introduce a new bill, the ‘Virtual Currency Tax Reform Act’, which, if passed, would tax bitcoins as currency instead of property. Currently, the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) views bitcoin and other digital currencies as property. When someone sells their bitcoin or makes a purchase in bitcoin, they are subject to a 15% capital gains tax. Any wages paid out in digital currencies must also be reported to federal tax authorities.

For the U.S., Jerusalem Has No Connection with Israel By Julio Severo A recent Jerusalem Post article notes, “Since the founding of Israel, U.S. presidents have declined to state a position on the status of Jerusalem.” For the U.S. government and its leftist Christian presidents, Jerusalem has no country. Yet, why are even U.S. conservative presidents included in this negative picture?             For God’s Word, those born in Jerusalem are always born in Israel. But why does the United States, a nation founded on Christian principles and capable of providing great leadership to the world, choose to ignore Israel’s special...

The Lionel Pincus & Princess Firyal Map Division is very proud to announce the release of more than 20,000 cartographic works as high resolution downloads. We believe these maps have no known US copyright restrictions.* To the extent that some jurisdictions grant NYPL an additional copyright in the digital reproductions of these maps, NYPL is distributing these images under a Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication. The maps can be viewed through the New York Public Library’s Digital Collections page, and downloaded (!), through the Map Warper. First, create an account, then click a map title and...

The most repeated prophecy in the entirety of the Gospel record is often hidden behind the definitive article. The definitive articles from the Greek text have been translated: THIS, THAT, and THE - but they all definitively define THE PROPHET who was prophesied by Moses. This is THE PROPHET the Almighty promised to send, and THAT PROPHET is the one who would speak only that which he heard from heaven. It is THIS PROPHET that we must shema (hear and obey). There is not a more repeated prophetic declaration in the Gospel record than the recognition that Yeshua is THAT...

Why Does The Christian Post Espouse Leftism in Brazil? By Julio Severo The U.S. version of The Christian Post rightly addressed the recent World Vision flap on gay “marriage” by quoting prominent evangelical leaders. Their responses were mostly conservative. The first World Vision (WV) stance favoring this faux marriage was universally disapproved among conservative Christians. Its repentance was welcome. In no way, the Christian Post condemned these conservative leaders and their views. In a strange twist, the Brazilian version of The Christian Post decided not only to publish nothing from its U.S. version on the WV flap, but it...

Does the IRS really want to you to track your capital gains on bitcoin every time you buy a sandwich or a sweater in the digital currency? After our analysis of the Internal Revenue Service guidelines on bitcoin, released in March, some people expressed surprise. They were amazed that the IRS could seriously be applying capital gains rules to something that the bitcoin community sees as a currency, and which in many cases uses as such. “This can’t be good for bitcoin”, said one commenter privately to Coindesk. ” If it’s not a currency, then how are you supposed to...

For Judges to judge, there must be a standard against which all actions are judged. The Book of Judges is preceded by Moses’ reiteration of the Torah just before the nation of Israel proceeds into the Promised Land. The law, the standard of righteousness by which Israel is to govern themselves as a people, is repeated and amplified one last time before the death of Moses. It is in this final instruction of Moses that we find the context to the Book of The Judges, which is a prophetic shadow picture of the day and hour in which we live.

A new report by researchers at ETH Zurich University in Switzerland has concluded that the now-bankrupt Japan-based bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox may have lost only 386 bitcoins ($203,000) due to issues stemming from transaction malleability. The finding provides new evidence that Mt. Gox’s continued claims that issues with the Bitcoin protocol were the primary reason for its insolvency are perhaps misleading or untrue. Released on 26th March, the report was authored by Christian Decker and Professor Roger Wattenhofer, both of the university’s Distributed Computing Group (DCG). Overall, the authors found that only 302,000 bitcoins could have ever been involved in...

After Pressure, World Vision Reverses Policy on Hiring Gays By Julio Severo After a backlash from Evangelicals, World Vision, an international nonprofit ministry, has reversed its decision to allow those in same-sex marriages to be employed. Organization board leaders said in a letter to supporters Wednesday that they had made a “mistake” by changing its policy. “We are brokenhearted over the pain and confusion we have caused many of our friends, who saw this decision as a reversal of our strong commitment to Biblical authority,” the board said in the letter. The quick reversal was result of a firestorm...

World Vision to Hire Married Gay Christians By Julio Severo The prominent Christian relief agency World Vision said Monday it will hire Christians who are in homosexual marriages, a dramatic policy change on one of the most divisive moral issues facing Christian churches. World Vision President Richard Stearns told that his organization will be changing its employment policies with regard to individuals in a homosexual lifestyle. The organization previously required its some 1,100 employees at the American branch to abide by a policy that required fidelity within marriage and abstinence outside of marriage, and only recognized marriage between a...

The Bitcoin Tipping Point is coming and it will be the Big Bang of disruption in financial services, money and payments as we know them! I often think about the “tipping-point” in Bitcoin’s journey to mass adoption and regularly as myself several questions. When will it be noticeable and what will trigger it? Has it already begun or if not, how far away are we? How do you define or measure “mass adoption” of Bitcoin? A bitcoin meme of Morpheus and Neo posted online recently got me thinking again about how Bitcoin’s true exit most likely itself. Once a significant...