Free Republic

3rd September 1967: Traffic in Sweden switched from driving on the left to driving on the right “Dagen H (H day) was the day on which traffic in Sweden switched from driving on the left-hand side of the road to the right. The change was widely unpopular, The campaign included displaying the Dagen H logo on various commemorative items, including milk cartons, men’s shorts and women’s underwear. Swedish television held a contest for songs about the change; the winning entry was Håll dig till höger, Svensson (‘Keep to the right, Svensson’) by Rock-Boris.”

The military leadership is proving to be a solid ally of President Obama in political Washington, adopting his social revolution and willing to serve as backdrops to the White House's campaign-style drive to win the budget battle with Republicans. The armed forces have launched an unrelenting lobbying effort on Capitol Hill with a flood of briefing charts to defense staffers. They show the damage that automatic budget cuts called "sequestration" would do to the troops -- and to jobs in congressional districts. The charts coincide with the White House push to blame congressional Republicans for the spending cuts, which begin...

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced today he would extend certain benefits to the same-sex partners of U.S military service members. Panetta's statement reads as follows: “Seventeen months ago, the United States military ended the policy of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” We have implemented the repeal of that policy and made clear that discrimination based on sexual orientation has no place in the Department of Defense. “At the time of repeal, I committed to reviewing benefits that had not previously been available to same-sex partners based on existing law and policy. It is a matter of fundamental equity that we...

Oh, the perils of social engineering in a world ruled by the Law of Unintended Consequences! American mush-heads like Tom Friedman of the New York Times may openly pine for an American government that could act as swiftly and arbitrarily as China's (to build high speed rail, shiny new airports, all the result of far-sighted leaders providing the people what they need, unencumbered by property or democratic rights), but the folly of such power is demonstrated by the sorry reality facing China as the result of its heavy-handed meddling in human reproduction. The Wall Street Journal (link may expire) reports...

One of the great priorities of the left is to get Americans out of their cars and onto public transportation. When the masses no longer have access to cars, it clears the streets for the limos of the nomenklatura, just as it did in the old USSR, and still does in North Korea. The best way to accomplish this goal is to push up gasoline prices. Energy Secretary Steven Chu famously hoped that energy prices would double, and President Obama also admitted to wanting energy prices to rise, just not too quickly, lest the frog catch on the water is...

Anyone searching for a parking space in downtown Sacramento on a weekday might conclude that a big percentage of this city's residents is disabled. Bright blue and red placards hang in half of the windshields on some blocks, allowing those cars to park free all day at any meter, regardless of how much time the meter allows or how congested the area is. As placard numbers grow across the state, frustrated officials from Sacramento to Los Angeles say too many users are in fact able-bodied people abusing the system. It's time to put a stop to it, they say. Vehicles...

Under our supposedly postracial president, everything is all about race — including school discipline, which Obama has decreed will be meted out according to skin color: "...Barack Obama is backing a controversial campaign by progressives to regulate schools’ disciplinary actions so that members of major racial and ethnic groups are penalized at equal rates, regardless of individuals’ behavior...." The obvious point is to reward a privileged group that is more likely to behave disruptively. One of the many ham-fisted executive orders through which Obama rules specifically states that “African Americans … disproportionately experience school discipline.” Therefore, they are to be...

Like Bill Murray's character in "Groundhog Day," Rep. Paul Ryan appears condemned to repeat the same experiences over and over again. When Ryan, a Wisconsin Republican, unveiled his House budget proposal this month, you could almost hear strains of "I Got You Babe" - the song that awakens Murray day after day after day. And like the good people of Punxsutawney, Pa., the masses on Capitol Hill seem oblivious to his plight as he patiently treads the same ground one more time. Budget resolutions are required by law, though the Senate hasn't passed one in years. Big and unwieldy, they...

With same-sex marriage laws passing in Maryland and Washington state and New Jersey headed for a fall referendum on the issue, Newt Gingrich said at the Washington state capitol this morning that he's basically comfortable with states enacting gay marriage laws by popular vote. Ginger Gibson sends in the key quote: I think at least they're doing it the right way, which is going through voters, giving them a chance to vote and not having a handful of judges arbitrarily impose their will. I don't agree with it, I would vote no if it were on a referendum where I...

There is a perception lingering about NewtGingrich that he was a critic of PaulRyan's budget plan and therefore a critic of conservative fiscal policy in the House of Representatives. Is that conclusion true? Or is it an oversimplification? Like many misconceptions floating around during a heated political season, it is not true. Let's examine the facts. On April 5, 2011, Representative PaulRyan, the HouseBudgetCommittee chairman, introduced the Republican budget for 2012. Included in that budget was a premium support model for Medicare. This budget was based on a similar plan previously laid out by Ryan called TheRoadmapforAmerica'sFuture. That document had...

C-SPAN continues its LIVE coverage of the 39th annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) Saturday in Washington. The last of the 3-day conference wraps up today with speeches by Grover Norquist and Sarah Palin. Also speaking today, Chairman of National Republican Senatorial Committee Sen. John Cornyn. On Friday, the three top GOP candidates for the Republican nomination -- former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum -- addressed the conference. Rep. Ron Paul was invited to speak this year but instead stayed on the campaign trail. More than 10,000 conservatives are in...

< snip > ..... If Republicans have an opening this year, it is with the white working class, a crowd the Democratic Party has been hemorrhaging for decades. Barack Obama did better than John Kerry or Al Gore with these voters, though even he earned just 43% of their vote. ..... < snip > ..... The white working class will make up as much as 55% of the vote in states like Ohio and Pennsylvania. ..... < snip > ..... And so at the heart of the Santorum agenda are policies designed to give special handouts to the working class,...

SNIP SNIP Local government planning should, first of all, protect the private property rights of its citizens. The legitimate function of local planning is to facilitate the safe and coordinated exercise of the free market in real estate and commerce. Social engineering, on the other hand, is the result of professional planners creating a vision of what they think a community should be in the future. What the landowners may want is not a factor in the design. What the planners think the broader community will want, such as open space and protected wildlife areas, outweighs private property rights or...

British viewers will see seven episodes, the last of which deals with global warming and the threat to the natural world posed by man. However, viewers in other countries, including the United States, will only see six episodes. The environmental programme has been relegated by the BBC to an “optional extra” alongside a behind-the-scenes documentary which foreign networks can ignore. Campaigners said the decision not to incorporate the episode on global warming as part of the main package was “unhelpful”. They added that it would allow those countries which are sceptical of climate change to “censor” the issue. ....It was...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Army 1st Lt. Ashley White died on the front lines in southern Afghanistan last weekend, the first casualty in what the Army says is a new and vital wartime attempt to gain the trust of Afghan women. White, like other female soldiers working with special operations teams, was brought in to do things that would be awkward or impossible for her male teammates. Frisking burqa-clad women, for example. Her death, in a bomb explosion in the Taliban heartland of Kandahar, underscores the risks of placing women with elite U.S. special operations teams working in remote villages.

Social policy often does more harm than good, says one of the last of the original neocons.The Obama administration is entering a field not cultivated on a major scale since the 1960s: social policy. Unlike safety-net entitlements, such as health insurance and cash welfare, social policy—or social engineering, to use the more critical term—uses government action to try to change and improve people and their neighborhoods. For instance, the Obama administration’s Promise Neighborhoods are supposed to replicate, in 21 cities, what the Harlem Children’s Zone has done in Manhattan—to “create plans to provide cradle-to-career services that improve the educational achievement...

The New York Times ran a banner front page headline on September 14, 2011 titled “U.S. Scrambles to Avert Palestinian Vote at U.N.” The Times headline should have read, “The Obama Administration Scrambles to Avoid Its Own Self-Fulfilling Prophesy.” Next week, the United Nations General Assembly will almost certainly approve an upgrade of the status of the Palestinian Authority from nonvoting “observer entity” to “observer state,” placing it on par with the Holy See. This will happen whether or not the Palestinians try for full UN member state status, which would first require approval by the Security Council. President Obama...

This video deconstructs the social engineering done by the NAZI's in their PR campaign in Germany and the sourrounding nations before and during WWII. The same tactics are being used today, primarily by liberals. Folks, we need to know how to recognize these insideous and disgusting tactics, and call on the carpet those who use them. Spread the word, help educate others about these tactics and how they are being used today. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23X14HS4gLk&feature=player_embedded#!

If Michael Crichton had lived to write a follow-up to State of Fear, the plotline might well have gone like this: at a top secret, state of the art laboratory in Switzerland, scientists finally discover the true cause of “global warming”. It’s the sun, stupid. More specifically – as the Danish physicist Henrik Svensmark has long postulated – it’s the result of cosmic rays which act as a seed for cloud formation. The scientists working on the project are naturally euphoric: this is a major breakthrough which will not only overturn decades of misguided conjecture on so-called Man Made Global...

Poverty rose significantly in America last year. That’s what the government says. Common sense, however, says something different. Common sense says that, compared to the standard of history and the rest of the world, there is no poverty in America. Don’t shoot me yet. I’m not saying people don’t have it hard. I’m not saying people don’t have financial catastrophes. I’m not saying there isn’t an economic underclass. I’m not saying people don’t go to bed wondering where they’re going to find the money they need. I know about financial hard times. And I know about doing without. But I...

General Motors CEO Dan Akerson said his company and his industry would be helped, not hurt, if consumers paid higher gas taxes. In an interview published in Tuesday's Detroit News, Akerson floated the idea of a $1 a gallon increase in the gas tax as a way to encourage buyers to purchase smaller, more fuel efficient cars. Greg Martin, spokesman for GM's Washington office, confirmed that the quotes reflect Akerson's and GM's view. Akerson said he would support a jump in the gas tax if it came instead of tighter fuel economy regulations that GM (GM, Fortune 500) and other...

California students are not required to know about the World Trade Center attacks. Or President Barack Obama's election as the nation's first African American president. Or the fight over gay marriage, or fallout over foreclosures, or Gov. Gray Davis' recall, or the 2001 energy crisis. California's academic content standards for history and social studies have not been revised since their adoption in 1998 – but there's a push by lawmakers to change that. Assemblyman Mike Feuer has crafted legislation aimed at updating the aging standards, developed before the war on terror, iPhones or the state's energy crisis. "You can't have...

Newt Gingrich had plenty of people on the Right scratching their heads after his attack on Paul Ryan’s budget plan as conservative “social engineering,� but Republicans weren’t the only ones mystified. The attack also puzzled Jay Newton-Small at Time. Two weeks ago, Gingrich told her that he would have voted for the plan offered by the “brave� Republican Representative: The former speaker sang Ryan’s praises for being a “brave” “man of ideas,” like Gingrich himself.“But would you have voted for Ryan’s plan?” I pressed.“Sure,” Gingrich replied.“Do you think it would actually save the health care system?”“No, I think it’s the...

MIT researcher Deb Roy wanted to understand how his infant son learned language -- so he wired up his house with videocameras to catch every moment (with exceptions) of his son's life, then parsed 90,000 hours of home video to watch "gaaaa" slowly turn into "water." Astonishing, data-rich research with deep implications for how we learn.

Recently a former Ramapo High School teacher ran afoul of the law by giving a sexually explicit book to a high school girl. The ex-teacher was arrested and charged with endangering the welfare of a child, among other things. Meanwhile, Clarkstown high school students are reading a book that contains all kinds of sexually explicit episodes, including graphic depictions of heterosexual and homosexual encounters, forced oral sex, masturbation, and bestiality. But there is no outcry from the masses in Clarkstown, because this book (which I will not name, to deny it undeserved publicity) is part of the high school English...

During her first foreign trip in 2011, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) slammed President Obama's green energy policy as a "social engineering" project that hurts the U.S. economy. Palin -- a potential 2012 presidential candidate -- said that she favors an "all of the above" energy plan that includes domestic oil drilling and nuclear power. Without mentioning it by name, she criticized the Obama administration for restricting domestic drilling and said that his green jobs agenda is fatally flawed. This push for green energy at the expense of conventional, reliable sources is not a credible energy policy," Palin said...

With all the bad press the TSA has received recently, we can't be sure if the acronym stands for Transportation Security Administration, Touches Sensitive Areas, or Truly Scandalous Attention. But, for sure, its pat-downs and sci-fi radiation screeners give many of us another good reason to avoid the increasingly unfriendly skies. Yet while the TSA right now has supplanted the IRS as the bureaucracy we most love to hate, its policies are merely part of a longstanding cultural trend: the failure to recognize that the good of the many outweighs the good of the few. It's the same reason why...

Is the American Dream getting smaller? Are we defining down the tools of opportunity and the pleasures of prosperity? President Obama's flippant dismissal of American Exceptionalism last year stirred a lot of criticism because it suggested he did not believe the United States held a special place in the world. It also suggested America's unique history is, to the President, no big deal. Now with fellow travelers exercising power at all levels of government, progressives can do more than just belittle the idea of American Exceptionalism. They can enact policies to make America unexceptional -- diminishing our quality of life...

The latest Senate energy bill, quietly unveiled last week, looks like sweet compromise on radical measures like cap and trade, but buried within is a bitter poison pill that will could be swallowed in a vote that may come this week. Unlike the 1,200-page House of Representatives energy bill, which passed last year, this scaled-down proposal does not call for an 83-percent reduction in greenhouse gases (or any reduction in greenhouse gases) and contains no mention of a cap-and-trade scheme. Also contrary to the House bill, this one does not provide a family of four earning up to $55,000 with...

Attempt to end the “old boy network” Equality Minister wants businesses to be ordered to disclose what they are doing to improve gender equality in the ranks of senior management. Her move, which is backed by Gordon Brown, comes on top of provisions in the controversial Equality Bill that allow employers to give jobs to women in favour of men with the same qualifications. However, it is likely to be resisted by business leaders who resent more Government interference in their recruitment practices, and who argue that women are under-represented among executives because they value their families more than their...

Philadelphia tore down 21. Chicago leveled 79. Baltimore took down 21 as well, and when six of them came down in one day in 1995, it threw a parade. Since the 1990s, public housing high-rise buildings have come tumbling down by the dozens across the country as cities replaced them with smaller suburban-style homes that did not carry the stigma of looming urban despair and poverty.

Revolt in Westchester After a coercive housing settlement, angry voters toss out their county executive. 4 November 2009 Other issues, especially taxes, no doubt ranked high in the minds of Westchester County voters, who last night in a stunning upset threw out incumbent county executive Andy Spano in favor of Republican challenger Rob Astorino by an impressive 58–42 margin. But it didn’t help that county residents felt strong-armed by the federal government and private litigants into a controversial lawsuit settlement on low-income housing that cuts deeply into the county’s tradition of suburban home rule on development issues—or that Spano reacted...

The term “social engineering” never fit an entity better than it does the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). This intrusive, tenacious organization has spent years attempting to recast and transform American society to fit its own peculiar ideals. Its directors are missionaries in the full sense of the word, in that they relentlessly work to stamp onto the hearts and minds of the public a distinctive belief system, which teaches what is evil and what is not. This month, the Federation for Immigration Reform (FAIR) has published an excellent analysis of the SPLC’s attack on FAIR and other immigration reform...

Women should be allowed to serve aboard America's fleet of nuclear submarines, the nation's top military officer, Adm. Michael Mullen, quietly has told the Senate Armed Services Committee. If the Navy agrees to it, this would be a huge policy change and potentially a significant expansion of career opportunities for female officers and sailors. Women have been barred by Navy policy from submarines, even as the sea service began 15 years ago to integrate females into other seagoing combat roles including aboard surface warships and in fighter jets. Mullen, former chief of naval operations and a career surface warfare officer,...

The National Security Agency is facing renewed scrutiny over the extent of its domestic surveillance program, with critics in Congress saying its recent intercepts of the private telephone calls and e-mail messages of Americans are broader than previously acknowledged, current and former officials said. The agency's monitoring of domestic e-mail messages, in particular, has posed longstanding legal and logistical difficulties, the officials said. Since April, when it was disclosed that the intercepts of some private communications of Americans went beyond legal limits in late 2008 and early 2009, several Congressional committees have been investigating. Those inquiries have led to concerns...

Psychological State of the Union Many Americans don’t feel the thrill associated with President Obama’s “Change” as it has an adverse effect on their “Psychological State of the Union”. They liked their country the way it was before it lurched to the political Left. For those who mourn and grieve the loss of their Country there needs to be some consideration of their emotional, psychological and mental health. After all, these are the people who bought into the “American Dream”. They fought in wars and went to a job they may not have enjoyed to put sustenance on the table...

RALEIGH, NC -- Venessa Mills is fighting a legal battle for the heart and soul of homeschooling in North Carolina. As reported on World Net Daily, on Friday, March 6, Judge Ned W. Mangum stripped her of the right to homeschool, and ordered her three children to enter public school. http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=91397 Mills was forced to defend her right to homeschool during divorce proceedings brought on by her husband's unfaithfulness. Mr. Mills admitted, under oath, to repeatedly committing adultery. Even with abundant evidence showing the Mills children are well adjusted and well educated, Judge Mangum ruled overwhelmingly against Mrs. Mills on...

Hello, I am a long time reader and very rare poster, I apologize if I'm putting this in the wrong area. I don't think I've ever created a thread here before... Anyways, I am a college student and have been asked by student.com to become a "News & Politics" blog writer. I've been around that site since I was 15 or so(22 now) and accepted, and I was wondering if free republic would be willing to look over my articles before I post them? I'd appreciate your criticism much more than the criticism of high school students. I know you...

Lincoln, NE (AHN) - Nebraska Sen. Tony Fulton filed the Ultrasound Bill which seeks to require a pregnant woman contemplating abortion to undergo an ultrasound and see her fetus before she undergoes the procedure.Fulton explained that the aim of the legislation is to have an informed consent, especially for young women who are on the verge of making grave choices prior to an abortion. Nebraska is just one of 11 states contemplating on a mandated ultrasound. The other states include Indiana and Texas. Earlier, Wyoming legislators attempted to pass a similar law, but were defeated on the state House committee...

more as it becomes available...

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Many U.S. troops in Iraq were overjoyed to see President Barack Obama take his oath, but some were unhappy about one thing the Democrat has promised to do: permit gay and lesbian soldiers to serve openly. Obama said during his campaign he opposed a 1993 law stating that homosexuals are not eligible to work in the U.S. military, widely referred to as the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" rule. This month, Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs, when asked whether the new administration planned to scrap the law, replied on the president's transition website: "You don't hear politicians give a...

Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. endorsed a $2.30 tax increase on a pack of cigarettes this morning, giving Utah the highest state cigarette tax in the country with a goal of wiping out the remaining state sales tax on food. "I think that's a perfectly fair tradeoff," the governor said after publicly embracing the tax hike for the first time and going further than previous legislative proposals. Huntsman's target would more than quadruple the existing 70-cent tax on a pack of smokes. Legislative leaders were open to the idea, and said it will be among the topics discussed in the upcoming...

The ostensible subject was Caroline Kennedy. But in the course of, you know, discussing Kennedy's foundering effort to, you know, be anointed senator, Mika Brzezinski said something of more enduring interest. The Morning Joe co-host provided a telling glimpse into the liberal mindset, as Brzezinski cast her vote for Big Mommy government. Host Joe Scarborough observed that New York Gov. David Paterson was letting Kennedy twist in the wind. Rather than spending his time taxing everything in sight, the guv would be better off appointing Caroline or someone else, so the new senator could hit the ground running once Hillary...

Governor Paterson says he can raise $404 million in state revenues with a 15% tax on soft drinks (but not diet sodas, juices, milk, or water). The relevant section of the statute reads: "Create Sales Tax on Soft Drinks. Imposes an additional 18 percent rate of sales and compensating use taxes on fruit drinks that contain less than seventy percent of natural fruit juice and non-dietetic soft drinks, sodas and beverages. By increasing the price, it will discourage individuals, especially children and teenagers, from excessive consumption of these beverages. Revenues will be directed for health care initiatives." And here’s the...

In the social circles of the New York Times editorialists, it's OK to have one kid. Two is pushing the envelope. Three or more is tacky, and a threat to the survival of the planet. That being so, there's really no reason to let any car bigger than a Prius be built. Doing so just encourages the unenlightened to overbreed. And so it is that in its editorial of today, the Grey-but-barren Lady suggests that as a condition of the Detroit bailout, "Congress could consider demanding that Detroit simply phase out S.U.V.’s and vans by a certain date."

Social engineering by government always ends in disaster. Social engineering occurs when government passes laws and regulations that force citizens to behave the way government thinks they should behave. Prohibition is a great example of social engineering. In 1919, government decided that its citizens should not drink "intoxicating liquors." This "government-knows-best" idea produced more than a decade of lawlessness far worse than citizen intoxication. Prohibition was repealed in 1933. Free people in a free market always produce the best products, most efficiently, at the lowest price. Every time government "engineering" intrudes into the market, products, efficiency, price – and consumers...

We're beginning to get a sense of what the next four years will look like. It won't be a conservative era, that's for sure. Nor will it, despite appearances to the contrary, be a reprise of the Clinton era. Bill Clinton's version of economic liberalism meant slightly higher tax rates on income and capital, a slightly more burdensome regulatory apparatus, lower deficits, and a commitment to free trade. The public sector didn't meddle too much in the private sector. It was content, for the most part, to sit back and enjoy the tax revenue that the tech boom poured in....

A neighborhood grocery-store clerk was shot dead yesterday afternoon on a tranquil block in the shadows of Martin Luther King Jr. High School, and police are scrambling to determine the motive and identification of the gunman, while tracking down other weekend homicides.

Two UCLA economists say they have figured out why the Great Depression dragged on for almost 15 years, and they blame a suspect previously thought to be beyond reproach: President Franklin D. Roosevelt. After scrutinizing Roosevelt's record for four years, Harold L. Cole and Lee E. Ohanian conclude in a new study that New Deal policies signed into law 71 years ago thwarted economic recovery for seven long years. "Why the Great Depression lasted so long has always been a great mystery, and because we never really knew the reason, we have always worried whether we would have another 10-...

While the state has seen demographic shifts in suburban school districts, the isolation and intense concentration of minority students in the 31 Abbott school districts is worse today than it was 20 years ago.  That's the basis for a "friend of the court" brief filed jointly by the New Jersey Black Issues Convention and the Hispanic Directors Association, two influential umbrella organizations. They are among nine groups challenging the state's overhaul of the school funding formula that guaranteed additional aid to the state's neediest districts. Locally, Paterson, Passaic and Garfield are classified as Abbott districts.   The court is scheduled...