Free Republic

The Greek market may be shocked and defaults of various debt instruments may emerge. While Americans are eagerly signing petitions to ban the American flag on the heels of Louis Farrakhan’s Nation of Islam leader call to ban the Stars and Stripes “due to its links to racism” or are busily banning anything attached in any way to the Confederate flag and our history, the United States and the world are in serious financial trouble driven by out-of-control debt, particularly the most visible nation of all, Greece. Healthcare for illegals, gay marriage, and other non-stop crises occupy American overwhelmed minds,...

James McConnell's prosecution is one of a growing number of examples in which British authorities — who routinely ignore incendiary speech by Muslim extremists — are using hate speech laws to silence Christians. "My church funds medical care for 1,200 Muslim children in Kenya and Ethiopia. I've no hatred in my heart for Muslims... I believe in freedom of speech. I'm going to keep on preaching the gospel. I have nothing against Muslims, I have never hated Muslims, I have never hated anyone. But I am against what Muslims believe. They have the right to say what they believe in...

This video shows the dramatic moment a soldier from the Queen's Guard turned his rifle on a tourist who grabbed him outside Windsor Castle. Friends are heard giggling as the Asian man marches alongside the serviceman - who is thought to be from the Scots Guards regiment - and rests his hand on the soldier's shoulder. But the grin is soon wiped off the tourist's face as the soldier suddenly points his weapon directly at the man, barking: 'Get back from the Queen's Guard!'

LONDON — A current member of Britain’s House of Lords “violated, raped, and tortured” children inside the Houses of Parliament, it was claimed last night in one of the most shocking accusations yet to be heard in the country’s growing VIP sex-abuse scandal. Britain’s public prosecutor ruled earlier this year that similar cases of sexual assault should not be brought against the alleged perpetrator, Lord Janner, because he was suffering from dementia. Police recommended the Labour Lord face trial on charges of six rapes and 16 sexual assaults alleged to have taken place between 1969 and 1998, but prosecutors decided...

Put your jigsaw puzzle skills to the test with this archeological treasure Project: The Pictish Puzzle The Picts were a group of people that lived in Scotland during the Late Iron Age. You're probably familiar with their signature artwork: highly stylized animals, beautiful spirals, and intricate knots, all carved into stone, or worked in metal. And it's one of the most famous and beautiful Pictish stones that National Museums Scotland wants you to put back together. The Hilton of Cadboll Stone was carved between 700 and 800 AD. On one side (shown above) you can see a hunting scene. On...

.. The three sisters missing with their children from their Bradford homes, like the 17-year-old Dewsbury boy who reportedly detonated a suicide bomb in Iraq last week, doubtless thought they were fulfilling an Islamic duty, but devoutness alone explains little. That points to a more general observation. Although the number of British Muslims who have travelled to northern Syria and Iraq is substantial (700, according to the most recent official estimate), it isn’t disproportionate. They get noticed because their facility with English makes them effective propagandists – terrifyingly so, in the case of the murderous “Jihadi John” – but Muslims...

Tomorrow, you can hardly have failed to notice, marks the 800th anniversary of Magna Carta, the document famously issued by King John at Runnymede on June 15, 1215. Most people are understandably a little hazy about the charter’s contents (it runs to 63 clauses and over 4,000 words). But they are aware that it was a “good thing” – a significant step in the direction of the liberties we enjoy today.

MI6 has pulled its spies out of 'hostile countries' and America's intelligence agencies are on high alert after Russia and China cracked encrypted files leaked by fugitive whistleblower Edward Snowden. The top-secret documents contain information that could lead to the identification of British and American spies, according to senior officials in Downing Street, the Home Office and the security services. A senior Home Office official accused Snowden - the former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor responsible for the biggest confidential information leak in US history - of having 'blood on his hands' after they gained access to over one million...

FULL TITLE: New blood test blamed as women choosing to abort babies with Down’s syndrome and other serious disabilities soars 34% in three years More women than ever are choosing to abort babies with genetic abnormalities after the introduction of new blood tests that allow the conditions to be more easily detected during pregnancy. An investigation into figures published by the Department of Health reveals the number of abortions carried out because babies were found to have Down’s syndrome or other serious disabilities has increased by 34 per cent in just three years since 2011. Last year, nearly 3,100 women...

A £30,000 scheme to teach schoolchildren how to use Wikipedia has been condemned as a waste of taxpayers’ money. An IT expert is being paid the sum by a council to visit schools and show pupils aged 13 and 14 how to “critically engage” with the online encyclopedia. The children will be taught how to search for entries and look for mistakes and bias in articles. The scheme is set to begin at secondary schools in Leicester later this year. Council leaders say searching for information online and evaluating its reliability is “an essential skill for all citizens”. But Chris...

Visitors to women-only night told to only wear 'Islamically appropriate' attire Only female lifeguards will be on duty and the park will provide a prayer room Park says 'female-only' event is not specific to any ethnic or religious group' A water park has been accused of stirring up religious tension by holding a women-only night aimed at Muslims where bikinis are banned. Visitors to WaterWorld have been told they must cover up with ‘Islamically appropriate’ attire, and that the venue’s windows will be blacked out to protect their modesty. Female-only lifeguards will patrol the pool and the centre will...

Our friends in London have new delight… appropriately close to where Tyburn Tree stood, near Marble Arch.From ihorror.com: There’s a new statue on public display in London that is meant to “inspire” and “delight” those who pass it on their daily commute, though we’re thinking words like “terrify,” “horrify” and “petrify” are more fitting for this particular piece of art.It’s called ‘She Guardian,’ and Russian artist Dashi Namdakov has spent the last two years sculpting the towering figure out of four massive tons of bronze. Measuring 36-feet high, the artist says the attention-grabbing piece expresses a sense of maternal protectiveness, which...

Veteran actor and gay rights activist Patrick Stewart has defended a Christian bakery which was found guilty of discrimination for refusing to bake a cake with a pro-gay marriage slogan. Last month, a judge ruled that Ashers Baking Company in Northern Ireland had discriminated against a gay customer by refusing to make a cake with the words “support gay marriage”, along with a picture of Bert and Ernie from Sesame Street. Gareth Lee commissioned the cake for an event to mark International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia. The bakery initially accepted the order, but called Mr. Lee two days later...

Support is growing within the Church of England to rewrite its official liturgy to refer to God as female following the selection of the first women bishops. Growing numbers of priests already insert words such as “she” and “mother” informally into traditional service texts as part of a move to make the language of worship more inclusive, it has been claimed. But calls for a full overhaul of liturgy to recognise the equal status of women have already been discussed informally at a senior level.

It’s Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR) time again, in which we follow the new custom of making all defence policy shortly after an election without debate – thereby humanely relieving ministers of any need to justify their actions. Things are dire in the Armed Forces. The RAF is down to embarrassingly few operational bombers and has no submarine-hunting planes at all. The Army is yet again stripping itself of soldiers. The Navy is shortly to receive aircraft carriers, but they can carry only vertical-lift jets. We used to have some of those, but we got rid of them in...

A 16-year-old boy has been arrested over the murder of a woman in a Burka and a young father. The unnamed teenager was apprehended on the Salary Brook Trail in Colchester – the same trail where Saudi student Nahid Almanea was stabbed to death last June – at about 11am on Tuesday on suspicion of possession of an offensive weapon. Today, Essex Police said he had now been arrested on suspicion of the murder of Ms Almanea and that of James Attfield, who died after being stabbed more than 100 times in a park in the town in March last...

The latest dispatch from the United Kingdom’s ongoing campaign to eliminate all forms of armed self-defense seems too incredible to be true. Unfortunately, after tracking down the origin of a publicly distributed statement regarding self-defense products on the country’s “Ask the Police” website, we can confirm that British subjects continue to live at the mercy of their potential attackers. Even to the point of baffling absurdity. The statement appears in the Frequently Asked Questions section of www.askthe.police.uk – a site that is operated by the Police National Legal Database. Information provided by the PNLD and its site are used by...

A pair of RAF Lakenheath based USAF F-15E Strike Eagles that were bristling with live bombs and air-to-air missiles, along five KC-135R tankers, flew on a secretive and grueling 12 hour mission over the Southern Mediterranean on Monday, May 25th, Memorial Day. Multiple radio interceptors and plane spotters state that four F-15E’s, callsigns ABLE 01 through 04, took off from their home base at RAF Lakenheath laden with yellow banded (live) AIM-9M sidewinders, AIM-120 AMRAAMS and no less than seven 500lb Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAMs). These aircraft were accompanied by five KC-135Rs tankers, callsign QUID 91 through 95, that...

Former UK Chief of Staff Lord Dannatt has called for a ground invasion against Islamic State (ISIS) on Monday, claiming that the cultural and security impact of the group calls for an international armed effort to expand beyond the current airstrike campaign. "The capture and likely destruction of the 2,000-year-old Roman colonnades at Palmyra, Syria, by Islamic State constitutes a potential cultural crime on a gigantic scale," Dannatt wrote in the Daily Mail. "These majestic ruins represent thousands of years of human civilisation and there is now surely no doubting just how great a threat IS [ISIS - ed.] poses...

David Cameron more the doubled the Tories' support among ethnic minorities at the election – securing more than a million ethnic votes for the first time in the party's history. In 2010, when the Tories failed to secure an overall majority, just 16 per cent of black and ethnic minority voters backed the Conservatives. But in this month's election, Tory support among Britain's ethnic minority communities more than doubled to 33 per cent, according to research published today. David Cameron - pictured visiting the Sikh's holy Golden Temple in Amritsar, India, in 2013 - more the doubled the Tories' support...