Free Republic

This is the third article to appear on these pages from an IBD subscriber who lived in the Soviet Union until 1980. Click here to read the previous two articles. Whenever I speak about my experiences living in the USSR, my American friends respond that such things can never happen in a democracy like the United States. They don't understand why I am repulsed when I hear the president talk about "sacrificing for the collective good," which sounds so compassionate, as opposed to greedy capitalism. "Sacrifice for the collective good" is one of the founding principles of socialism, where the...

When Obama wrote a book and said he was mentored as a youth by Frank, (Frank Marshall Davis) an avowed Communist, people said it didn't matter. When it was discovered that his grandparents, were strong Socialists, people said it didn't matter. When he admittedly, in his book, said he chose Marxist friends and professors in college, people said it didn't matter. When he sought the endorsement of the Marxist Party in 1996 as he ran for the Illinois Senate, people said it doesn't matter. When he finally completed his transformation of America into a Socialist State, people finally woke up,...

The Real Story Behind Thanksgiving Did you know that the first [Plymouth Colony Pilgrim's] Thanksgiving was a celebration of the triumph of private property and individual initiative?William Bradford was the governor of the original Pilgrim colony, founded at Plymouth in 1621. The colony was first organized on a communal basis, as their financiers required. Land was owned in common. The Pilgrims farmed communally, too, following the "from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs" precept.The results were disastrous. Communism didn't work any better 400 years ago than it does today. By 1623, the colony had...

If it's the right thing to do why do you need a $100 million payoff?The $100 Million Health Care Vote? By Jonathon Karl ABC News November 19, 2009 3:03 PM What does it take to get a wavering senator to vote for health care reform? Here’s a case study. On page 432 of the Reid bill, there is a section increasing federal Medicaid subsidies for “certain states recovering from a major disaster.” The section spends two pages defining which “states” would qualify, saying, among other things, that it would be states that “during the preceding 7 fiscal years” have been...

It was a breath of fresh air to finally hear the Democrats admit to their health care bill as “a lot of show and tell and razzmatazz,” (see Democrat talking points, in reference to my book). At least now we’re all on the same page when discussing the problems with their monstrous government health care “reform” plan. Now, tonight, more disconcerting news – the New York Times reports of new guidelines to scale back cervical cancer screenings. The recommendation from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists comes on the heels of another recommendation to limit breast cancer screenings with...

With the world struggling to come up with an agreement ahead of December's Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen, one important fact has been overlooked: Women are hit hardest by the extreme weather shifts, according to a new UN report. When seas rise, droughts hit and glaciers melt, it is women from the developing world who are likely to come off worst, a report by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) says. "Poor women in poor countries are among the hardest hit by climate change, even though they contributed the least to it," wrote UNFPA Executive Director Thoraya Ahmed Obaid in...

Recently I was in public discussion on the question of poverty in Britain and how to overcome it. The poverty is relative, of course, not real destitution; but there is nonetheless no doubt as to its squalor. Among the panel on which I appeared was a very pleasant member of the Fabian Society, that is to say the society whose goal was to achieve socialism in Britain gradually and by reformist means (it was named after the Roman general, Quintus Fabius Maximus, who wore Hannibal down by attrition rather than by pitched battle). One of the definitions of poverty most...

Reform: Only a Bernie Madoff could believe the Senate's health care bill will extend coverage to 31 million Americans while cutting deficits by $127 billion over 10 years. It would be the first profitable entitlement. But that's what Majority Leader Harry Reid, citing Congressional Budget Office estimates, tells us the 2,074-page bill — said to cost only $849 billion over a decade — would do. Like House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, he seems to be following Vice President Joe Biden's admonition at an AARP town hall meeting that "we've got to spend money to keep from going bankrupt." We suspect Reid's...

The host of a national Catholic TV talk show says that Catholic Bishops have to come clean on their funding of groups that undermine traditional values and promote radical social change. Raymond Arroyo, host of Catholic television network EWTN's "The World Over" program, says that the evidence indicates that groups funded by the Bishops through the Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD) are actually "subverting" Catholic teaching on matters such as homosexual rights and abortion. He regrets that money being spent on such causes is coming at the expense of Catholic schools and hospitals facing funding shortfalls and possible closure....

Just in the nick of time we see some real leadership from the Archbishop of Canterbury. No no, he isn't doing anything crazy to save the Anglican communion like embracing orthodoxy or anything. Canterbury leads us in a different direction, off a cliff. Rowan Williams has come out strongly in favor of the doctrine of higher taxes. Further, he gives us the source of this divinely inspired revelation, Big Brother 11. [Telegraph]Dr Rowan Williams said that taxation should not be seen as a way of stifling business or redistributing wealth but helping to make the world a better place in...

One of the primary tenets of Medicine is Primum non nocere a Latin phrase that means First, do no harm. The Senate version of the Obamacare bill ignores that phrase and is poised to raise health care costs for all Americans, of all income groups, not only through taxes but via fees on health products that will be passed along to consumers. Below is an outline of the unlucky (for America) 13 New Taxes in Harry Reid's Bill:

Ever heard of "Doctors Without Pay?" Believe it or not, the liberal democrat politicians in the House and the Senate have forgotten about paying doctors in their health care takeover plans. By forgetting about paying doctors, these politicized health plans pretend to cost slightly less than a trillion dollars. And then you remember they've forgotten to pay the doctors!!! Do they really expect doctors to work for nothing? I've heard of lawyers doing an occasional pro bono case, and doctors might do the same on occasion. But, can you imagine case after case after case without pay? That isn't likely...

There are, in public policies, these inconvenient things called the “secondary effects.” These are the unintended consequences of even the best intended laws. Critics of Obama’s national health care program have questioned its intentions from day one. Few doubt the program will lead to a serious rationing of health care (adding 40 million on the system and allegedly lowering spending will have that impact) and will lead to increase taxes for millions of Americans. According to public opinion surveys, the number one issue of most voters is unemployment. This sentiment is backed up by the hard fact that unemployment recently...

Ever wondered what the movie They Live would look like in the time of Obama? You won't have to with this video.

Cicero's Prognosis -- by --THE HONORABLE MILLARD F. CALDWELL Justice - Supreme Court Tallahassee, Florida Presented at the 22nd Annual Meeting of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, Inc. October 7-9, 1965, Columbus, Ohio Reprinted March, 1996 The Roman Republic, the foremost power of its day, had reached its zenith. Its leadership had attained unbounded wealth and unstinted power. The rulers were intolerant of restraint, indifferent to the demands of the middle class, and contemptuous of the Constitution which was designed to curb their ambitions. The time was some 70 years before the birth of Christ. Young Marcus...

He may be an utter failure as a President; a hollow, arrogant, petty, vindictive, malicious, poorly-behaved and ill-spoken, embarassing empty suit of a man, but he's also the world's greatest gun salesman. The UK papers are reporting that sales have nearly tripled for Smith and Wesson, and that the rest of the industry is sharing similar growth. The UK papers say it's because Americans are concerned about growing crime(?), the economy, and terrorism. The real truth is that Americans are buying weapons at a record pace to protect themselves from the government and Mr. Obama.

The one highly visible success of the stimulus bill has been the cash-for-clunkers program. It induced a boom in vehicle sales this summer that clearly would not have happened otherwise. The rest of the stimulus bill has created a lot of jobs — 700,000 to 1.5 million, according to economists’ estimates. But it has done so in thousands of little ways: scattered construction projects, plugged-up school budgets and the like. Politically, these measures are not popular enough to create a groundswell for more of them. And the economy still needs help. So White House officials are now looking at creating...

ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - African leaders agreed on Tuesday on how much cash to demand from the rich world to compensate for the impact of climate change on the continent but kept the figure secret ahead of next month's Copenhagen talks. "We have set a minimum beyond which we will not go," Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, who will represent Africa at the talks, told reporters. "But I am not in a position to tell you what that minimum figure will be." The Geneva-based Global Humanitarian Forum says poor nations bear more than nine-tenths of the human and economic burden...

With Congressional Democrats in near-panic amid forecasts that unemployment will remain high through next November’s midterm elections, a party leader said on Thursday that the House will pass a new “jobs bill” before Dec. 18. With more than half of last winter’s $787 billion package of tax cuts and stimulus spending still in the pipeline, Representative Steny H. Hoyer, the Democratic majority leader from Maryland, said the new measure should not be called another stimulus bill. He indicated that the legislation might include money for public jobs, which many liberals have advocated; tax credits to employers for new hires, an...

Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday expressed regret over US President Barack Obama’s remarks that “the US respects the sovereignty and territorial integrity of China.” “[The remarks] did not clarify the fact that Taiwan does not belong to China and disregarded the fact that the 23 million Taiwanese are under threat from the 1,400-odd missiles [deployed] by China. The result is regrettable,” Tsai said in a statement. Tsai’s remarks came after the US and China issued a joint statement in which Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) underscored the importance of the Taiwan issue in US-China...

The United States and China, the world's first and third largest economies, have pledged to rebalance each other's economy and move in tandem on forward-looking monetary polices for a strong and durable global economic recovery, according to a China-US joint statement released in Beijing on Tuesday. The statement, issued after talks between Chinese President Hu Jintao and his US counterpart Barack Obama, has climaxed the latter's first China trip since he took office in January. "China will continue to implement the policies to adjust economic structure, raise household incomes, expand domestic demand to increase contribution of consumption to GDP growth...

Left-wing media matters Cliff Kincaid, November 17, 2009 A professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Robert W. McChesney has said that “media reform” should be part of the march toward socialism in America and that capitalism has to be dismantled “brick by brick.” Van Jones, the ousted communist “Green Jobs Czar” of the Obama Administration, served with McChesney on the board of Free Press, a George Soros-funded organization, in 2007 and 2008. Despite its socialist orientation, Free Press is financially supported by extremely wealthy individuals such as George Soros, the leftist billionaire, and Marcy Carsey, one of the creators...

Conservatives are lining up some fine arguments against the strange health care beast being shepherded through Congress this season. Oddly, however, as the public as a whole turns against the Obama Administration on health care and other issues, the critics have neglected the young adult constituency that voted 66 percent for Mr. Obama last fall and are the least engaged now in the health care debate. Move them and you will move the debate substantially. So far, the critics are not making the effort. They attack rationing, Medicate cuts that threaten seniors, lack of controls on tort excesses and much...

When it comes to paying for a health care overhaul, Americans see just one way to go: Tax the rich. That finding from a new Associated Press poll will be welcome news for House Democrats, who proposed doing just that in their sweeping remake of the U.S. medical system, which passed earlier this month and would extend coverage to millions of uninsured Americans. The poll found participants sour on other ways of paying for the health overhaul that is being considered in Congress, including taxing insurers on high-value coverage packages derided by President Barack Obama and Democrats as "Cadillac plans."...

Friday, the 13th. 2012. 200,000. You have five seconds. Connect them all. Here's the deal. It's the apocalypse. It's gotta be. The movie "2012," chronicling the end of the earth, debuts this Friday, the 13th. A date that those making at least 200,000 bucks a year might mistake for Groundhog Day, since, for them, everyday's kind of like Friday, the 13th. Because it seems everyday they're a target. Today, they just became a bigger one. See a trend here? Need to pay for stimulus? Hike their top rate five points? Need more money for health care? Hike it "another" five...

A country's consuls are usually low-key diplomats who handle issues like visa applications. But under President Hugo Chávez, two Venezuelan consuls in the United States have been anything but low-profile. One drew the FBI's attention for his close links to Puerto Rican pro-independence militants. Another sparked concerns over his ties to a website that has published several anti-semitic rants. Chávez has long been an exuberant salesman for ``21st Century Socialism,'' regularly bashing the U.S. ``empire'' and its ``lackeys,'' like Colombia next door and Israel farther afield. And his government has spent tens of millions of dollars selling that vision abroad....

Today many in the United States are crying out to President Obama and Government to do more and more to fix our social ills. The notion that Big Government has all our answers and the solutions we need in this very chaotic and unstable world is fairy tale. It is one that is rooted in the personal belief that Fallen Man through and by the efforts of Big Government or "Socialism" can bring security and comfort to it's inhabitants. There is no man made ideology or system that can ever usher in a world Utopia of perfection and bliss. These...

Abstract: This paper questions criminal law's strong presumption of free will. Part I assesses the ways in which environment, nurture, and society influence human action. Part II briefly surveys studies from the fields of genetics and neuroscience which call into question strong assumptions of free will and suggest explanations for propensities toward criminal activity. Part III discusses other "causes" of criminal activity including addiction, economic deprivation, gender, and culture. In light of Parts I through III, Part IV assesses criminal responsibility and the legitimacy of punishment. Part V considers the the possibility of determining propensity from criminal activity based on...

The Obama Administration is developing a new socialist constitution for America to replace the original Constitution written by our Founders. Every single one of these huge bills being rammed through congress is simply another article of the Obama constitution which allows no amendments by Republicans. The people need to understand that these huge 1000 to 2000 page bills - the 111 Congress agenda - are all parts of one master blueprint for a new socialist government. The master plan has been split up into different component pieces so that the people won’t notice how they will all fit back together...

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BOCA RATON — Confused Palm Beach County voters helped thwart Al Gore's 2000 bid to become president of the United States, but he was introduced as "president of the planet" when he returned here Saturday night to deliver an environmental lecture. The former vice president spoke on climate change at the Mizner Park Amphitheater to a crowd of about 800. More than 200 protesters gathered across the street from the event, and their boos and chants could be heard inside the amphitheater as Gore began his presentation. Gore lost Florida, and the White House, by 537 votes to George W....

Envisioning America’s future Michelle Obama has wished for young Americans to go on to public services. If she were a First Lady of Indonesia; no plea would be needed, everyone there wishes to be a bureaucrat. I know the humiliation of bureaucratization. Its prohibitions of independently applying your intelligence and talent, prevents individual achievement. Consequently, personal ambitions must be shared with others, to prove that collectivism is the society’s mind set. Socialist society is agitating because the bureaucratized hierarchical status of those on top disadvantages others. Furthermore, the upper class children are the gods and goddess of the nation’s future;...

A radical Muslim cleric alleged to have inspired the Fort Hood gunman has been praised in the past as “a preacher of peace” by a prominent SNP candidate with close links to Alex Salmond. The FBI is investigating communications between Major Nidal Hasan, who killed 13 people at the US Army base in Texas, and Imam Anwar al-Awlaki, a US-born Muslim cleric now based in Yemen. Mr Awlaki has a large following in Britain and counts prominent mainstream Muslims among his supporters. In 2006 Osama Saeed, who has been selected as the SNP candidate for Glasgow Central for the next...

Should the “greatest good for the greatest number” be the guiding principle behind health care? As I have said before on Breakpoint, much of the hype and even hysteria surrounding the H1N1 flu strain is unwarranted. That’s not to say that the swine flu’s potential impact isn’t devastating—it is, but not in the way cable news would have us think. And now the Florida Department of Health has issued a set of guidelines that instructs hospitals on what to do “if the state is overwhelmed by [H1N1] cases.” The guidelines recommend that hospitals bar “patients with incurable cancer, end-stage multiple...

The South Dakota Family Policy Council sponsored a speech tonight at First Assembly of God in Rapid City by Kitty Werthmann of Eagle Forum in South Dakota. The presentation was entitled “Socialism vs Freedom” and was a part of the SDFPC “Heritage Under Attack” series. Werthmann is the head of the South Dakota chapter of Eagle Forum, and was born in Austria. Werthmann lived for seven years under the Nazi rule of Austria, eventually coming to the United States in 1950 to become a naturalized citizen in 1962. She said conditions in 1930’s Austria were very difficult. Unemployment was high,...

We welcome every single patriotic American who mourns the destruction of freedom and liberty to join us in a nationwide protest against all things Socialist. This event is an all out, no holds barred, tell it like it is, in your face protest designed to give liberty and freedom- loving American citizens and patriots an opportunity to voice just how fed up we are with BIG GOVERNMENT, BIG SPENDING, BIG DEBT, BIG BAILOUT, and BIG MEDIA COMPLICITY.

In Obamanopoly, players start out with money, a house, health insurance, a retirement plan and savings accounts. Some have small businesses; others have farms and work for themselves. Many are working at their career of choice. Unfortunately, instead of watching their wealth grow, players watch it disappear. Obamanopoly is a game of luck. It’s also a game of war as players from the private sector fight to hold onto their assets while racing to reach the vault that contains Obama’s long-form birth certificate. During play, Obama, Congress and the Department of Justice – a government of endless dishonesty and lacking...

Hugo Chavez is stirring trouble with Colombia to disguise domestic failures and Venezuela would be "mad" to enter a conflict with its neighbor. Perez said the Venezuelan leader's recent controversial exhortation to his army to "prepare for war" was a political smoke screen. "He is obviously trying to distract attention from the immense failure of his government after 10 years in power," Perez said at his home in San Cristobal, capital of Tachira. "In Venezuela today, there is neither electricity nor water on a permanent basis. The crime figures are battering us all. The country has gone backward enormously in...

It started out as a mild virus initiated by the left of center intellectuals of academia. But, like every virus from computer carried to influenza, it spread rapidly through schools, hospitals, civil service, the media, companies, governance and the armed forces. Political correctness has poisoned all of America. The famed author of children’s books, Anthony Browne has also written a telling examination of political correctness in The Retreat of Reason. Says Browne, “Political correctness is the ‘heresy of liberalism’ under which reliance on reason has been replaced on the emotional appeal of an argument. Adopting certain positions makes the politically...

In July, when Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger called for a "Commission on the 21st Century Economy," it was hoped the group of experts could provide a way to finally resolve California's budget woes. When the commission issued its report at the end of September, however, the recommendations fell to the floor with a resounding thud. Defenders of California's status quo in the state legislature in effect said "no way." Today, California is a by-the-numbers state tragedy. Unemployment is higher than 12.2 percent as of September. Business costs are almost 23 percent higher than other states on average. Migration out of the...

Part of the story about who would feel the payroll tax on employers contained in the House-passed health care bill has gone missing. The media coverage I've seen and the Congressional rhetoric I've heard focuses on the small business lead by an entrepreneur who started the company. That's part of the story, but it isn't the whole story. The Joint Tax Committee's "technical explanation" makes clear that this is a tax on all employers, both for-profit and not-for-profit. (See the discussion that starts on page 31, under the opaque title "Responsibilities of Nonelecting Employers".) A lot of non-profits do not...

In an ironic twist that leaves you scratching your head, ACORN has sued the Federal Government, claiming that the bills cutting their funding were unconstitutional. If religion is the last refuge of a scoundrel, I guess we can now say that the Constitution is the last refuge of the community organizer. It's almost surreal to see them try and protect their criminal conspiracy with the very document they work so hard to undermine.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. consumer sentiment fell in early November to the weakest in three months amid grim expectations for job and income prospects, a survey showed on Friday. "Confidence tumbled in early November due to the grim financial realities faced by consumers as well as weaker economic prospects for the year ahead -- importantly, the decline in confidence was already in place before the announced increase in the unemployment rate to 10.2 percent on November 6," the Reuters/University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers statement said.

Former President George W. Bush, outlining plans for a new public policy institute, on Thursday said America must fight the temptation to allow the federal government to take control of the private sector, declaring that too much government intervention will squelch economic recovery and expansion. (snip) In his speech, which set out his goals for a new policy institute focused on economic growth, education, human freedom and global health, Mr. Bush said he entered politics because "because I saw society drifting away from the values at the heart of the American Dream."

LONDON (Reuters) - U.N. negotiators will next month put farming onto the radar of climate regulations for the first time, but governments face aggressive lobbies and gaps in the science proving the extent of agricultural emissions. "They're lucky to have got away with it this far, it should be included in a U.S. climate bill and in Copenhagen," said Robert Goodland, formerly of the World Bank and co-author of a report which last month caused a stir by estimating that farm livestock account for 51 percent of all global greenhouse gases. The estimate included carbon emissions from burning trees to...

The NEA’s (National Education Association’s, a.k.a. Nefarious Elitist A****’) recommended reading list includes two books by Brother O mentor and communist community organizer Saul Alinsky that advocate the violent overthrow of the U.S. government. The Democrat-controlled teachers’ union praises Alinsky’s Reveille for Radicals and Rules for Radicals as “an inspiration to anyone contemplating action in their community! And to every organizer!” The following book quotations are from the NEA website: “The Radical does not sit frozen by cold objectivity. He sees injustice and strikes at it with hot passion. He is a man of decision and action. “Society has good...

Last April, The Heritage Foundation released a WebMemo titled "The Dirty Dozen: 12 New Policies That Undermine Civil Society."[1] Seven months later, many of these policies being advocated by Congress and the President have moved closer to becoming law. In addition, several new issues have emerged that deserve illumination. Taken as a whole, these policies serve to undermine traditional families, devalue life and human dignity, and weaken civil society in American life. National PolicyMassive Expansion of the Welfare State. Within his first two years in office, President Obama will have increased spending on means-tested programs for the poor by 30...

Given the recent announcement that the government's measure of unemployment has hit 10.2 percent, and given that the official House version of Obama's healthcare plan, HR 3962, has now passed, a close examination of the effects of "Obamacare" on the labor market is important. It will be no surprise to readers of this site to learn that the Democrats' bill will seriously harm precisely those poor and uninsured citizens it is ostensibly designed to help. The harm will come by compounding mass unemployment and depriving these citizens of consumption choices. Obamacare as Labor Tax According to pages 269–273 of the...

Nov 12, 2009 — What propelled Mao Zhedong to become the biggest mass murderer in world history?  Let a professor of Chinese history answer the question.  James Pusey (Bucknell U), writing in Nature this week for a series on “Global Darwin,”1 was explaining the vacuum left by the collapse of the reform movement in the early 20th century.  A “group of intellectuals” found Marxism attractive.  It was the fittest ideology: Many tried to fill it: Sun, Jiang Jieshi (Chiang Kaishek) and, finally, the small group of intellectuals who, in indignation at the betrayal at Versailles, found in Marxism what seemed...

God bless Gov. Rick Perry. As a Texan currently in a new location (once a true Texan, always a Texan), I miss the great state of Texas more and more each day. So many people out there are fearful of calling a spade a spade. But, not Gov. Perry.