Free Republic

Forget what you've heard about a glut of new houses on the market. For three years, Dallas-Fort Worth builders have sold more homes than they have constructed. So the inventory of finished new houses has fallen so low that homebuyers may encounter a shortage when next year's market kicks off.

This is on Fox for hours now, the truck being chased (slowly - a`la OJ) in TX for not paying at a gas station. Can't believe there's no article/discussion about it.

BATON ROUGE -- Gov. Bobby Jindal traveled to a Houston suburb Thursday night to raise money for his 2011 re-election campaign, according to his staff. The event in Katy, Texas, continued a string of out-of-state fundraisers for Jindal, who has traveled from coast to coast collecting money despite having no announced opponents. Jindal also has raised money for Republican political candidates.

DALLAS – A 19-year-old Italy resident was arrested by federal authorities after he attempted to blow up a prominent downtown Dallas skyscraper last Thursday. Italy, a town of 2,000 located south of Waxahachie, was home to the Jordanian born Hosam Maher Husein Smadi, who worked at a Shell gas station on Interstate Highway 35 and lived in a Monolithic dome house in town. Smadi was arrested in a sting operation when the phony bombs the Federal Bureau of Investigations provided to him to detonate failed to go off. FBI agents, in widely reported news accounts, monitored Smadi for several months...

Stock-market champion Warren Buffett was identified this afternoon as a $2,400 donor to Houston Mayor Bill White’s U.S. Senate campaign in a note from White’s campaign otherwise touting his successes raising money online. White spokeswoman Katy Bacon said Buffett also is poised to give again to White if there’s a special-election runoff. Buffett, who hails from Nebraska, doesn’t show up on the Texas Ethics Commission Web site as a past donor to Texas candidates for state office, though he ponied up to Democratic presidential hopefuls Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama last year and to Democratic Senate candidates including Al Franken...

A cowboy from Texas attends a social function where Barack Obama is trying to gather more support for his Health Plan. Once he discovers the cowboy is from President Bush's home area, he starts to belittle him by talking in a southern drawl and single syllable words. As he was doing that, he kept swatting at some flies that were buzzing around his head. The cowboy says, "Y'all havin' some problem with them circle flies?" Obama stopped talking and said, "Well, yes, if that's what they're called, but I've never heard of circle flies." "Well Sir," the cowboy replies, "circle...

The Texas Department of Transportation is pulling the last plug on the Trans-Texas Corridor, Gov. Rick Perry's embattled plan to build a toll-road network across the state. The agency said earlier this year it was scaling down the project and dropping the name "Trans-Texas Corridor." Now, transportation officials say it's fully dead. Transportation Commissioner Bill Meadows told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram of the decision in a report posted online Tuesday. The news comes a day after Perry's Republican primary opponent, Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, secured the coveted endorsement of the powerful Texas Farm Bureau — a vocal opponent of the...

Bozo came too close to the kids and got shot; not the famous clown, but a dog named "Bozo." Students at Bebensee Elementary School in Arlington were outside on a bus drill, when two dogs ran onto school grounds. Arlington police were chasing the two dogs when Bozo the boxer started getting aggressive. "They told us to get in line so we can get in the building," said Kayla Kilgore, a second-grader at the school. But when Bozo started nipping at police, an officer was forced to pull his gun and shoot Bozo, police said. "I just heard a gunshot,...

Note: The following text is a quote: Department of Justice Office of Public Affairs FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Friday, October 2, 2009 Three Gang Members Plead Guilty to Murder and Drug Conspiracy Charges; Two Others Sentenced on Drug Charges Three members of the violent gang known as the Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation (ALKQN) pleaded guilty today to charges related to their participation in a drive-by shooting and a drug conspiracy, and two other members were sentenced for their roles in a drug conspiracy. Robert Allen Ramirez, aka "Nesyo," 27, of Big Spring, Texas; Eduardo Daniel Mares, aka "Pitt," 21,...

A Dallas judge ruled Thursday that Texas' ban on gay marriage is unconstitutional as she cleared the way for two gay men to divorce, the Dallas Morning News reported. State District Judge Tena Callahan said the state’s bans on same-sex marriage violates the constitutional guarantee to equal protection under the law. While the Texas attorney general had stepped into the case to say that because a gay marriage isn’t recognized in Texas, a Texas court can’t dissolve one through divorce, Tena denied the intervention. The two Dallas men in the case married three years ago in Massachusetts, the first state...

A University of Texas at Austin staff member who checked into the hospital over the weekend has died of the H1N1 virus, commonly known as swine flu. Linda Duran, 42, worked at UT for 15-years as a service worker. The university says she had underlying health problems but they would not say what. Funeral serves were set for Friday October 2 at Weed-Corley-Fish Chapel at 10 a.m. This is the first known H1N1 death at UT. Last week, more than 1,000 students came into the student health center -- 92 of those were confirmed flu cases. Since the beginning of...

In an age when smoking has been outlawed in most public places – government buildings, bars and pool halls – a person's home is one of the few places you can puff in peace. Until now. A Dallas woman has filed a lawsuit seeking six figures from a former neighbor and landlord for damage she says was caused by cigarette smoke wafting through adjoining walls of her high-end townhome.

by Debra Medina - Conservative Republican Candidate for Governor of Texas “What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms." -- Thomas Jefferson to William Stephens Smith,1787. ME 6:373, Papers 12:356 In a world moving more and more rapidly towards globalization, perhaps we’d do well to review exactly what insures freedom. What is it that makes one free? What sets a free man apart from one enslaved? The founders would argue insuring a well-armed people was the surest way to defend...

By RICK CASEY Copyright 2009 Houston Chronicle Sept. 29, 2009, 7:45PMYou know those ads that promise to show you how to make thousands of dollars working at home on your personal computer? They're mainly bogus, of course. But Gov. Rick Perry, ever dedicated to helping the Texas economy, has come up with a program to allow Texans to do just that. It's sort of a campaign version of Facebook meets Amway. The Dallas Morning News called attention Tuesday to the program, which is described at hq.rickperry.org/about, a Perry campaign Web site. ..........“Our goal is to field the biggest grass-roots...

Kay Bailey Hutchison is running for governor here in Texas. Face it, she has not been a part of the solution in Washington, she has been a part of the problem. She has done nothing to control run away spending. She has supported and even offered bills that added to the deficit. Hutchison is no conservative. She is part of the problem here in America.

Police are looking for a man convicted of an Arlington rape more than 10 years ago in connection with the recent rape an 11-year-old girl in Oklahoma City. Melvin Urbina, 33, was sentenced to two years in prison for the 1998 sexual assault of an Arlington woman. He was deported to Mexico after his release in 2001. He returned to the United States illegally and worked in Oklahoma City. Police want to question Urbina about the July 25 sexual assault of a girl who was trying to find some extra chairs for the guests at her godfather’s wedding anniversary party...

State GOP chair resigns to work for Perry By Jason Embry | Saturday, September 26, 2009, 01:35 PM Tina Benkiser will leave her post as chairwoman of the Texas Republican Party next month so she can join Gov. Rick Perry’s campaign as a senior adviser. In announcing her move, Benkiser called Perry the “only true conservative” in the race — a clear shot at U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, who is challenging Perry for the Republican nomination. While the move was unexpected, it makes sense that Benkiser would back Perry. She comes straight from the social conservative base that...

A 33-year old man from Malmö has been sentenced to ten years in prison by a US court for sexually assaulting a 16-year-old he met online. The man travelled to the city of Corpus Christi in Texas in October 2008 and was arrested ten days later by police in a hotel room. The girl, who had ran away from home, was found in the room partially clothed. Hotel personnel raised the alarm after recognising the girl from a missing persons poster. According to Texas law, the age of consent is 17 years old. The Swede pleaded guilty on eight counts...

The French national railway SNCF has filed a detailed proposal with the Federal Railroad Administration stating an interest in operating high-speed rail in Texas. The route in question would run from DFW through Austin and into San Antonio. It would not be the Gulf Coast route that's been on the USDOT's official list of 10 prospective HSR corridors or the much-promoted Dallas-Houston link (including the Texas T-Bone). But Houston could be in the distance. From Yonah Freemark on the TransportPolitic blog: At $13.8 billion in construction costs, SNCF expects benefits to outweigh public infrastructure costs by 170% over a period...

Gov. Rick Perry never had much money growing up, and he has spent most of his adult life in public office, drawing a part-time salary as a legislator and relatively modest earnings in statewide office for the last quarter century. But thanks to his investments and a series of private land deals, some that took advantage of his political connections, Perry has squeaked over the millionaire line, records examined by The Associated Press show. Perry's Democratic opponents have suggested that Perry traded on his power and influence to turn a buck. Now that he is in a tough primary for...

Suspected drug hitmen burst into a Mexican radio station and shot dead a journalist in front of his colleagues in the latest brazen attack on the media, authorities and a Mexican newspaper said on Thursday. Gunmen shot Norberto Miranda, 44, several times in the rural town of Nuevo Casas Grandes in Chihuahua state near the U.S. border on Wednesday night. "His body was found full of bullets in the radio's offices," said a spokesman for the Chihuahua attorney general's office. The newspaper El Diario said Miranda, who was well-known locally, had recently reported on growing drug violence in the remote...

In a world moving more and more rapidly towards globalization, perhaps we’d do well to review exactly what insures freedom. What is it that makes one free? What sets a free man apart from one enslaved? Do we still hold these truths to be self evident, “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed?” Surely, if it is government’s job...

A man who idolized American born Taliban soldier John Walker Lindh and a Jordanian national who frequented extremist Web sites are charged in unrelated cases after attempting to detonate what they thought were bombs outside an Illinois courthouse and a Texas skyscraper, federal officials said. Federal officials said Thursday that the cases are not connected to each other or the major terrorism investigation under way in Colorado and New York. Michael C. Finton, 29, who also went by the name Talib Islam, was arrested Wednesday in Springfield, Ill., after federal officials said he attempted to set off explosives in a...

Channel 33 news is reporting that a suspected terrorist has been arrested along with an "inert" car bomb in downtown Dallas. The is a Muslim jihadi. Details as I find them.

By CHRISTOPHER SHERMAN and ALICIA A. CALDWELL, Associated Press Writers Christopher Sherman And Alicia A. Caldwell, Associated Press Writers – Thu Sep 24, 3:37 pm ET McALLEN, Texas – Rancher Mike Landry recently came upon a group of unarmed men dressed in camouflage burglarizing his guest house and stealing a truck from his 11,000 acres in Terrell County, rugged country bordering the Rio Grande in West Texas. A couple of shots over their heads from his hunting rifle kept nine of them, all Mexican citizens, in place until Border Patrol agents arrived. "It has really gotten to be pretty spooky,"...

An exclusive interview with Daniel Miller, President of The Texas Nationalist Movement The Texas Nationalist Movement supports Texas secession, and the establishment of a free and independent Texas. This movement has garnered an amazing amount of attention and has resulted in some very, let’s call it lively, commentary. One of the themes repeated often in the negative commentary is that the Texas Nationalist Movement is motivated by racism and a hate specifically for Barack Obama. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, the TNM is not an Obama thing. It’s not a Democrat thing. It’s not a GOP...

Calling Texas Freepers! My husband and I lived in the Wichita Falls area several years ago (he was stationed at Sheppard AFB) and we absolutely fell in love with Texas. Since then, he has gotten out of the Army, had a great job, and gotten laid off. Now, 6 months and a whole lot of job searching later, he has 2 job opportunities in Texas. One in Dallas, the other in Houston. Both are excellent job opportunities with very similar salary packages. I have never been to Houston, and only into Dallas for the airport and Nascar track so really...

Litigation: The Founding Fathers envisioned the states as laboratories for ideas and choices. If the administration needs a demonstration project for successful tort reform, it need look no further than Mississippi. When President Obama said during his health care speech to Congress that he would "look into" malpractice reform and support "demonstration projects" at the state level, Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi, a Republican, responded: "If they want a demonstration project, come down to Mississippi. I'll show you a demonstration project." Mississippi enacted tort reform in 2004, including caps on medical malpractice awards. As a result, the number of medical...

North America's largest freshwater fish, the predatory alligator gar, is now protected to preserve its numbers, as Kevin Connolly discovered on a fishing trip in Texas. We are at the top of the food chain - the most dangerous predators on the lazy Navidad River, where it crawls stealthily around the town of Lolita, Texas, as though hoping to amble on unnoticed to the Gulf of Mexico. By local standards, I must admit we did not really look the part. The alligators that slumbered in the quiet creeks and pools around us bristled with a quiet sense of menace, and...

As the 2010 gubernatorial race unfolds in Texas, battle lines are clearly drawn between two candidates -- Gov. Rick Perry and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison: both of whom are Republicans, but only one of whom is a conservative. Perry is known as being pro-gun, pro-life, pro-traditional family, and the longest serving governor in the state’s history, while Hutchison is pro-gun (most of the time), pro-choice, and one of the Republican senators who went against the Bush Administration and the CIA in supporting Sen. John McCain’s 2005 Anti-Torture Amendment -- the amendment Rush Limbaugh correctly described as “the terrorists’ bill of...

AUSTIN, Texas - After further evaluation of the right shoulder injury that Longhorn senior linebacker Jared Norton sustained in UT’s season-opening victory over ULM, it was determined that he will need to have season ending surgery, Texas’ Head Athletic Trainer for Football Kenny Boyd said on Monday.

Weekend highlights and the day ahead Gov. Rick Perry and U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison aren’t doing a very good job of hiding their personal displeasure that the other is running for governor. A race between two well-funded — I mean, really well-funded — politicians for an office this big would be heated no matter the personal relationship of the candidates. And yet it can’t help matters that, if you listen closely, it’s clear that Perry and Hutchison each feel that the other has no business running. You could say that each has expressed a certain entitlement to the...

As faithful Longhorn fans go, my friends are right up there. They may prefer to remember the Longhorn wins but they will reluctantly recall the losses. Like the loss to Texas Tech last season. But that’s old news, as you know it’s always the next game that counts. As for this game, the story goes… The first quarter started with a flag against Tech. But Tech’s QB, Taylor Potts got his team moving quickly with the Horns’ defense seemingly dragging their feet. It almost looked like the Horns’ defense was playing scared. However, as soon as Longhorn fans start to...

Protesters organize outside democratic fundraiser in Austin9/19/2009 5:53 PM By: News 8 Austin Staff House Speaker Nancy Pelosi attended a democratic fundraiser in Central Austin Saturday. Her visit was met with a small group of grass roots protesters, who said while they are glad she is visiting the Texas Capitol, they are not happy with her policies. They said Pelosi has lead unprecedented excesses of the federal government, and has shown a lack of respect to the American people. "We think that all politicians need to be more responsive to the people and we're asking both republicans and democrats to...

I know I am a racist, but. . . . Sent to Texas Gov. Rick Perry Friday -— anyone else want to join me in this? ----------------------------------------------- COST CUTTING IDEA - I have noticed that the federal government is looking at taxes to increase costs on high calorie items in order to increase overall health. While I am totally against telling Americans what they can buy with their own hard earned money, this new push suggested to me that we might finally be able to change the Lone Star Card program so that the card can not be used for...

HOW TEXAS CAN SAVE AMERICA FROM WASHINGTON Written by Governor Rick Perry Thursday, 17 September 2009 As the federal government continuously churns out ideas and policies that drive our nation deeper and deeper in debt, citizens and taxpayers are right to be worried. From federal "stimulus" bills that force state governments to change laws, raise taxes and increase spending, to cap and trade proposals that will run our energy industry into the ground, to emerging plans for an unprecedented and unsustainable expansion of government health care, it is clear that the swollen river of our federal government has overflowed its...

AUSTIN – Drivers in the Dallas area have seen their insurance rates jump by double digits from a year ago, while homeowners have seen a more modest increase of around 5 percent, according to new rate figures compiled by the Texas Department of Insurance. The rate comparisons indicated a wide range of rates, with one company charging as little as $230 in Irving and another company charging as much as $1,215 in all six ZIP codes. Insurance industry representatives said the higher rates reflect medical costs that have gone up sharply despite the slow economy "I can't fathom any justification...

Houston year-over-year job loss nearly 100,000 Houston-area employers sharply pared their payrolls, cutting 95,100 jobs between August 2008 and August 2009, the Texas Workforce Commission reported today. That represents a 3.6 percent loss of jobs over that one-year period. “We’re still bleeding,” said Joel Wagher, labor market analyst for Workforce Solutions, which manages employment services, education and training for the area. “We’ve lost jobs in almost every major sector except for education and health services,” said Wagher

After weeks of speculation and buzz, it was reported this morning in the Houston Chronicle newspaper that Farouk Shami has announced he is running for the Democratic nomination of governor of the state of Texas. In an exclusive interview in the September issue of MODERN SALON, Farouk hinted at the possibility. When MODERN Editor in Chief Laurel Smoke asked about rumors surrounding Shami’s political ambitions, he answered, “Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.” A few weeks ago, Shami hosted thousands of guests, including current Texas governor Rick Perry and Houston Mayor Bill White, for the ribbon cutting of CHI USA, a...

I am looking for a list of conservatives colleges in Texas, specially states universities around the San Antonio area, any recommendations? My daughter will be ready for college in about 3 yrs, and I am doing my research and planning to start visiting them. I also would like to know what colleges are the ones we should avoid at all costs.

The volatile 2010 Republican Primary race for governor in Texas has become a toss-up, with Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison currently inching ahead of incumbent Rick Perry by two points – 40% to 38%. A new Rasmussen Reports Election 2010 telephone survey of Texas GOP Primary voters finds just three percent (3%) support Debra Medina, a tea party activist who joined the GOP race this month. But 19% are not sure who they favor.

David Barton needs our prayers as he prepares and delivers a presentation on Thursday that could affect the textbooks for Texas and for many other states. Read more details below: This is a request for prayer for David Barton, the founder of Wallbuilders (http://www.wallbuilders.com/ ) and his presentation this Thursday, that could affect the textbooks for Texas and many other states. It is hard to believe all of the things that could influence our children, if some of the proposed text books don't get exposed and turned down. Please pray for great strength, wisdom, and favor, for this man of...

In his address last week, President Obama said he had talked to some doctors and learned that medical procedures were being done that may not be necessary due to fear of medical malpractice lawsuits, and he entertained the idea of tort reform, saying we could try it in some states with pilot projects. But there's no need for a pilot project. Texas enacted malpractice reform years ago. The president would benefit from a phone call to Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R)....

Some may remember that due to the job market I had planned on leaving California for Boston for work. Fortunately God had better things planned for me and provided me with work in Dallas, TX (Lewisville to be exact). So I was wondering if any Freepers had any hints on where to live in the area, general comments on places to go with a young family (3 kids under the age of 5), etc. I think we're going to love Texas (minus the weather - we're coming from CA)! Thanks for the help FRiends! This is exciting AND scary, I've...

Perhaps the most notable thing about the “Sovereignty or Secession” rally at the state Capitol on Monday was the absence of any remotely mainstream speakers. That little problem in presentation did not escape the event’s organizers from the Texas Nationalist Movement. In fact, several speakers bitterly complained that neither Gov. Rick Perry nor a single one of the 70-plus supporters of Rep. Brandon Creighton’s HCR 50, a resolution asserting Texas’ “sovereignty” from the federal government, made an appearance. Back in April, Perry flirted with the idea of secession when he told reporters after a Tax Day tea party event: “There’s...

SNIPPET: "The Tablighi Jamaat (TJ) name has come up before in connection with terrorism plots, including the October 2002 Portland Seven and the September 2002 Lackawanna Six cases in the United States, as well as the August 2006 plot to bomb airliners en route from London to the United States, the July 7, 2005, London Underground bombings and the July 2007 attempted bombings in London and Glasgow, Scotland. Over the past several years we also have received several queries about TJ from U.S. law enforcement officials who are concerned about the group’s presence and activities in the United States. U.S....

A Brownsville man, who called himself Don Juan, and his girlfriend have pleaded guilty to smuggling undocumented immigrants into the United States to prostitute them. Juan Luis Coronado, 37, aka Juan Hernandez, and Lee Ann Zieger, aka as Lee Ann Motilla, 40, entered the guilty pleas Wednesday, the same day their trial was scheduled to begin. Coronado pleaded guilty to one count of attempting to import a minor for prostitution purposes. Zieger, also of Brownsville, pleaded guilty to two counts of harboring aliens for prostitution, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said. The two will be sentenced Dec. 8. Coronado remained in...

NB: Ron Paul does not officially endorse candidates in primaries running against incumbents. Saying her two high-profile rivals have dropped the ball for Texas, Wharton County GOP chairwoman Debra Medina announced her campaign Saturday for the Republican nomination for governor. "We've done little to move in the right direction. Some may even say we've lost yardage," Medina said during a rally at the Westin Galleria. "I'm ready to take the field as quarterback, for a time, for Texas." Medina, a top volunteer in Rep. Ron Paul's presidential campaign, joins powerhouse Republicans Rick Perry and Kay Bailey Hutchison as candidates in...

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WASHINGTON (September 12, 2009)--President Barack Obama will hold a Presidential Forum on community service on Oct. 16 hosted by former President George H.W. Bush and the Points of Light Institute at the George Bush Presidential Library Center on the campus of Texas A&M University. The event builds upon President Obama's "United We Serve" call to service challenging all Americans to help lay a new foundation for growth in this country by engaging in sustained, meaningful community service. It will also celebrate the contributions of more than 4,500 Daily Point of Light award winners and honor President Bush's legacy of service...