Free Republic

A lot has changed since the General Mining Law was passed in 1872, but very little has changed about the law itself. Those who want it to be modernized say this finally may be the year they get reform. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairman Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., has introduced a reform bill, and House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., already has held a hearing on his own legislation. Attempts over the years to change the law have foundered against the political influence of the mining industry, but members of Congress say prospects for an overhaul are...

Can't we send Dick Cheney back to Wyoming? Shouldn't we chip in and buy him a home where the buffalo roam and there's always room for one more crazy old coot down at the general store? For the final act of his too-long public career, Cheney seems to have decided to become an Old Faithful of self-serving nonsense. His latest in a series of eruptions came Sunday on Face the Nation, when he continued to press his revisionist case for torture — and, for good measure, counseled his beloved Republican Party to marginalize itself even further from public opinion and...

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Far from a secure, undisclosed location, former Vice President Dick Cheney is out in the open and increasing his criticism on the Obama administration and even fellow Republicans. But Ed Rollins, a CNN contributor and GOP strategist, says Cheney's attacks are not helping the Republican image. "While he certainly has a right to defend what they did over the last eight years, since he was the architect of much of it ... at the end of the day, we need to be looking forward, not backwards," Rollins said Monday. "[Powell] is a man of great stature and...

Support bill to stop gun carry inconsistencies in national parks Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senators Mike Enzi and John Barrasso, both R-Wyo., are pushing to protect second amendment rights in every corner of the nation, including a corner of Wyoming – Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks. Both senators are co-sponsoring the Preservation of the Second Amendment in National Parks and National Wildlife Refuges Act, S. 816, which would allow gun owners to carry concealed weapons in national parks if the concealed weapons permit holder is authorized to do so on similar state lands in the state in which the...

A Republican lawmaker has enraged supporters of "hate crimes" legislation for suggesting that the horrible murder of Matthew Shepard was not motivated by anti-homosexual bigotry. Congresswoman Virginia Foxx (R-North Carolina) drew the ire of homosexual activists and other supporters of hate crimes legislation last week when she suggested that the tragic 1998 murder of college student Matthew Shepard was not a hate crime. "We know that young man was killed in the commitment of a robbery. It wasn't because he was gay," Foxx said on the House floor. "The bill was named for him -- the hate crimes bill was...

My my, what a difference a few months can make. Not long ago, gun owners in Wisconsin had reason to fear carrying handguns even though no statute proscribes open carry and the Wisconsin supreme court says that gun carry is a fundamental right. But then gun owners started to stand up. Brad Krause of West Allis went to court and defeated a charge of "disorderly conduct" for open carrying his handgun. Then Jesus Gonzales filed a federal lawsuit against West Milwaukee and Chilton for falsely arresting him for open carry and confiscating his gun. In both cases, city officials counted...

DNC: Buy Cheney a ticket home @ 10:05 am by Eric Zimmermann The Democratic National Committee (DNC) is asking supporters to chip in for a bus ticket to send Dick Cheney back to his home state of Wyoming. In a letter to Democrats today, DNC Executive Director Jen O'Malley Dillon asks for contributions towards the $202 ticket price. I don't know about you, but I think it's time for him to stop sniping from the sidelines and let President Obama usher in the changes Americans demanded after eight years of Cheney's disastrous policies. That's why I want Cheney to go...

It's been said that conservatism has different meanings for different people. It may not be textbook, but without a whole lot of navel gazing, here's what it means to me and what Free Republic is all about: In a word, Freedom! In two words, Preserving Freedom. In a handful of words as stated by our Founding Fathers, to secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our posterity! America was founded on the proposition that all men are created equal by God and that our unalienable rights to Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness are granted directly by God...

Do not believe the nattering nabobs of negativity. The Nationwide Tax Day TEA Party/Tax Revolt was a huge success!! What we need now is MORE and LOUDER!! Obama has no clue. Being confronted by millions of fed-up citizens is new to him. He never expected the otherwise docile American people to rise up against his wannabe Marxist/fascist totalitarian regime. He's now lashing out at us through the Dept of Homeland Security as if We the People are his enemy. Well, we are! And he now knows it. And he's scared witless!! And the media has been reduced to the speechless,...

Congratulations FReepers and Patriots! According to Henchster's ongoing tallies, we've surpassed 750,000 participants in our nationwide Tax Day TEA Party/Tax Revolt! Woo hoo!! All 50 states fully engaged! Over 600 cities represented and reports still coming in! Huge turnout, huge SUCCESS!! Elected officials take note: DO NOT TREAD ON ME!! Tyranny, usurpation, corruption, overreaching, big spending, high taxing will no longer be tolerated! We the people are FED-UP and we're not going to take it anymore! Ignore us at your own peril! All Congressional seats, all elected offices throughout the land at risk! Revolution is in the air!!

If the Obama administration has taken flak for suggesting that conservative groups might be home to domestic terrorists, it looks like some House Democrat leaders are willing to go even further: But in an interview on Fox TV in San Francisco, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) chalked up the GOP grass-roots effort as “AstroTurf.” “This initiative is funded by the high end; we call it AstroTurf, it's not really a grass-roots movement. It's AstroTurf by some of the wealthiest people in America to keep the focus on tax cuts for the rich instead of for the great middle class,” Pelosi said....

After the 2010 census has been held, the number of seats held by each state in the U.S. House of Representatives will change. The National Conference of State Legislatures recently estimated what the 2010 reapportionment will mean for each state. Eight states are expected to lose one seat each, in the U.S. House and in the Electoral College. They are Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. States that will gain will be Texas (3 seats), and one each for Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Nevada and Utah. If the bill now pending in Congress to expand the...

Are you ready for a FReepathon!!? Well, it's a new quarter and a new president and he's everything we knew he would be. In less than 90 days he's managed to take an economic downturn and turn it into an unmitigated disaster for good old American capitalism. Never let a good crisis go to waste! The government is now printing money as fast as they can run the presses. Our federal budget is doubling and tripling and the Fed is running with no controls or oversight whatsoever from the congress, pumping trillions more into the "economy." The government now spends...

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service released a formal rule Wednesday to remove gray wolves from the federal endangered list in Montana and Idaho while keeping protections in Wyoming. That state and environmentalists promised to challenge immediately when the formal delisting rule is published Thursday in the Federal Register. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar had said last month that he would uphold the agency's decision to continue managing wolves in Wyoming. State Attorney General Bruce Salzburg said Wyoming will sue over being denied management of wolves. The state has proposed classifying wolves as predators that could be shot on sight in...

Sinclair Oil has reduced crude throughput at its 71,500 b/d refinery in Rawlins, Wyoming, due to a fire at the refinery Sunday, the company said Monday. "The refinery is currently operating at partial capacity and Sinclair is working as quickly as possible to repair the process unit," the company said in a statement. Company officials were not available for immediate comment on the refinery's current run rates. The blaze broke out at a "heater adjacent to a hydro-desulfurization unit" at about 7:10 am MDT (1410 GMT) Sunday, Sinclair said. It was extinguished within 70 minutes and there were no injuries....

HELENA, Mont. (AP) Two Montana Democrats are leading the charge against gun control even helping force the military to continue selling surplus brass to gun aficionados who want cheaper ammunition. U.S. Sens. Max Baucus and Jon Tester are not simply placating gun advocates with a vague promise to vote against gun control in Congress. They are forcing former political foes to recognize that Democrats could be their strongest allies while the party controls Washington D.C. It's creating uncertain bedfellows on an issue that wins or loses races in places like Montana. The pair have been taking the lead on issues...

We've had two good weeks of gubernatorial fun in the Crystal Ball, reviewing the early match-ups for the 2010 midterm Governor battles here and here. Now it's time to examine the remaining sixteen statehouses, all currently controlled by Republicans. ALASKA--Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK): Assuming Palin runs for Governor again instead of challenging U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), as is likely, Palin is close to a shoo-in for a second term, despite her recent troubles in and out of the state. John McCain had been faring poorly in Alaska until Palin was put on the ticket, and then the GOP won...

According to a report by Dow Jones Newswires, a leasing ban has been included in a U.S. bill that puts more than one million acres of land in Wyoming off-limits to oil and gas exploration and development. The purpose of the ban is to secure more than two million new acres of wilderness. Cleared by the Senate, the bill was given the go-ahead by the U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday when it passed after a 285-140 vote and is expected to be signed into law by President Obama, the report said. Lease holders may not drill in part of...

The state of Wyoming has adopted a resolution to inform Washington bureaucrats and bureaucracies of its opposition to any plans to hold a Constitutional Convention that would recommend changes or alterations to the nation's founding document. House Enrolled Joint Resolution 3 was signed recently by Democratic Gov. Dave Freudenthal. The Wyoming Family Coalition said the measure, sponsored by state Rep. Bob Brechtel, R-Casper, is intended to announce the state's opposition to "any attempts to dismantle the United States Constitution which has generally served the country well for nearly 230 years." WND reported earlier when Wyoming legislators expressed alarm at the...

CHEYENNE, Wyo. – A blizzard shut down major highways Monday in Wyoming and South Dakota, and meteorologists said one mountainous area might get as much as 40 inches of snow. Mount Rushmore National Memorial closed because of the icy, blinding weather in South Dakota's rugged Black Hills. Temperature plummeted as the storm moved eastward and wind gusted to more than 60 mph. Some residents of hard-hit northeast Wyoming said they had heeded forecasts and stocked up on groceries. "We are well prepared for a day or two of blizzard conditions,"

The National Park Service has set a goal of eliminating lead from fishing and hunting gear by 2010. Acting Park Service director Dan Wenk announced the goal Wednesday in Washington. Fragments of lead bullets are suspected to contaminate scavenger birds, like ravens and eagles, and lead used as fishing weights could poison waterfowl and other species. A firearms group was quick to condemn the action. “The National Park Service’s decision is arbitrary, over-reactive and not based on science,” Steve Sanetti, president of the National Shooting Sports Foundation, said in a statement. His group is a trade association for the firearms...

Looking for happiness—it's family-friendly communities for some, tropical paradise or the rugged West for others. A survey of Americans' well-being, conducted by Gallup in partnership with Healthways and America's Health Insurance Plans, gives high marks to Utah, which boasts lots of outdoor recreation for its youthful population. Speaking of outdoor recreation, the islands of Hawaii took second place and Wyoming was third in the poll that rated such variables as mental, physical and economic health.

Tashiana Johnson, 8, holds a sign for her father,Gerard Johnson of Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 7 ________________________________________ GULFPORT — A plane carrying 310 Seabees was greeted by jubilant family members Saturday afternoon when about half a contingent of Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 7 returned from serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. A unit spokesman said no casualties occurred among the Gulfport-based Seabees during their battle-zone tour. They were part of 600 Seabees from NMCB 7 deployed to the Middle East. The remainder are expected to return home in mid-March. --------- Snip The Seabees had originally deployed to Iraq, but later...

Reporting from Washington and Denver -- The Interior Department on Wednesday blocked a Bush administration plan to open parts of the Mountain West for oil shale development, announcing that it would first study the water, power and land-use issues that complicate one of the nation's most abundant but controversial untapped sources of energy. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar canceled shale development leases on federal land in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming and launched a second round of leases in the region limited to research purposes. In doing so, he rebuked what he called former President Bush's "headlong rush" to begin development. "Those...

In a second reversal of the Bush administration, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said Wednesday he is scrapping leases for oil-shale development on federal land in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming. Salazar rescinded a lease offer made last month for research, development and demonstration projects that could have led to oil-shale works on 1.9 million acres in the three states, greatly expanding the program. "I am withdrawing that Jan. 14 solicitation because in my view it was a midnight decision, and it was flawed," Salazar told reporters on a teleconference call from Washington, D.C

The State of Wyoming has announced they are dropping reciprocity with fifteen states because their "concealed firearm permit statutes are not sufficiently similar to Wyoming’s." Ohio was one of only eight states kept. As listed on their website: The Wyoming Attorney General holds that if a misdemeanor drug conviction disqualifies a Wyoming resident, it also needs to disqualify an out-of-state permit holder. Due to the difference in how each state handles controlled substance convictions, Wyoming is also limited in our ability to maintain reciprocity with states we may have previously. Wyoming recognizes concealed firearm permits from the following states. Accordingly,...

Forest supervisors for the Bridger-Teton, Shoshone and Caribou-Targhee national forests signed a letter to loggers noting that forest health is being threatened by insects and large wildfires. The letter and an accompanying questionnaire asks loggers and wood industry officials for information about their operations in order to gauge their ability to remove dead and dying trees.

Just throwing out a handful of ideas for discussion: How to develop local chapters/conservative grassroots groups. Develop a conservative platform and a plan for recruiting, training, supporting and electing conservative candidates. Develop ideas for building an effective nationwide conservative grassroots network. How to combat the Fairness Doctrine? Install offshore servers? Private BBS? Email/Phone/Fax lists? Shortwave radio? Local/personal networking? Working with other conservative groups, political parties? Would a FReeper PAC be feasible? Practical? Effective? Would a FReeper 527 organization be feasible? Practical? Effective? How to infiltrate/influence local political organizations? Select and fund delegates for a national convention should our membership decide...

A few weeks ago, I posted a thread asking how many of you would be interested in holding a centralized FReeper meeting somewhere in the middle of the country, possibly on an airline hub so a maximum number of FReepers could attend. Lots of people sounded interested, but only if it were held closer to home and preferably within driving distance. Ok, if one big central meeting is not feasible, I posted another thread asking about regional meetings. Sounds like a lot more people are interested in this, but everyone's asking when one will be scheduled in their area. Well,...

Say goodbye to hope and change. It's time to embrace the politics of doom and gloom. MSNBC host Contessa Brewer, in an interview that seemed a lot like a lobbying campaign for the stimulus set for a vote in the U.S. Senate, quizzed Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., about the possibility that his vote against a stimulus bill could send the country spiraling into a Depression - and endanger the public's footwear. "But if it fails, if it fails and our economy implodes and we see ourselves stuffing cardboard back in our shoes like they did in the Depression era, are...

Congratulations to all who objected to the appointment of this tax cheating crook and put up a fight! Cracks are forming in the great Obamassiah's defenses. Keep the pressure on!! Click the link above to support our fight against Marxism, or mail checks to: Free Republic, LLC PO Box 9771 Fresno, CA 93794 Thank you all very much!!

If enacted, the Senate stimulus bill would fund over $100 billion in new government construction projects with the goal of providing additional jobs to unemployed Americans. The House-passed stimulus bill contains explicit language to bar employment of illegal immigrants in these construction projects. However, the Senate bill deliberately omits this language. If the Senate version of the bill becomes law, a great number of the workers employed in government construction programs will, in fact, be illegal immigrants. About one out of seven (or 15 percent) of workers employed in construction in the U.S. is an illegal immigrant.[1] Unless strong mechanisms...

In December 2008, Michigan and Rhode Island reported the highest jobless rates, 10.6 and 10.0 percent, respectively; Wyoming posted the lowest unemployment rate among the states. The Rhode Island rate was the highest in its series. (All state series begin in 1976.) Four additional states recorded rates of 9.0 percent or more: South Carolina, 9.5 percent; California, 9.3 percent; Nevada, 9.1 percent; and Oregon, 9.0 percent. Wyoming posted the lowest unemployment rate, 3.4 percent, followed closely by North Dakota at 3.5 percent. Overall, 10 states and the District of Columbia registered significantly higher jobless rates than the U.S. figure of...

Employees at refineries across the nation will report for work at the beginning of the week, after progress was made in contract negotiations between union leaders and Royal Dutch Shell, the lead negotiator out of more than 30 oil companies. Details of the negotiations were kept under wraps, but the deal staved off a strike at almost 90 plants nationwide, representing almost 64 percent of U.S. refining capacity

Well, the good news is that we're two/thirds of the way there! January and February are paid for! Now working on March. And we've got all of February and March to git 'er done! Woo hoo!! With Obama recycling all the Clintonites, we'll need FR NOW more than ever! So, if you haven't done so already, please punch that donate link and make it happen!! Thank you for your support!! James

CODY -- A Cody man has been cited for public intoxication while riding his horse on a busy street during a weekend snowstorm. Police received a call at 4 p.m. Sunday from a motorist who was concerned that Benjamin Daniels, 28, was creating a road hazard by riding his horse in conditions of poor visibility. An officer stopped Daniels to explain that drivers were having difficulty spotting his slow-moving white horse as he was riding along Yellowstone Avenue near Wal-Mart, said Assistant Police Chief George Menig. As police continued to observe Daniels, it was clear that he was "highly intoxicated,"...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 21, 2009 – Wyoming’s committee for Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve has been busy for 18 months preparing businesses that will be hard-hit by the largest reserve deployment in state history. The state is readying nearly 1,000 troops -- more than half of its Army National Guard soldiers and more than a third of its total Guard force -- for deployment to Iraq and Kuwait in April. The impact has been felt throughout the nation’s least-populous state, and nearly every community is affected, top leaders say. “The effect is pretty much the same everywhere, but...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 21, 2009 – As Wyoming prepares for the largest National Guard deployment in state history, much of the planning has gone into helping those who will be left behind for a year in communities scattered across the rural state. Nearly 1,000 soldiers will deploy in April to Iraq and Kuwait, leaving behind thousands of families and extended family members in nearly every community in the state. “A lot of people think of the ‘spouse’ when they think of military family programs. Not everybody’s married,” William Breckenridge, the state Family Support Program director, said. “We work in terms...

<p>CHEYENNE -- A bill that would require Wyoming judges to warn defendants that they would lose their federal gun rights by pleading guilty to misdemeanor domestic violence charges received preliminary approval in the state Senate on Monday.</p> <p>The Senate unanimously approved Senate File 70, sponsored by Sen. Cale Case, R-Lander. The bill would also classify misdemeanor domestic violence as a serious offense requiring defendants to have lawyers.</p>

Wyoming legislators have introduced three bills that critics say would hurt abortion rights in Wyoming, prompting an abortion rights group to gear up to fight against the proposals. One bill would require doctors to perform ultrasound examinations and show pregnant women the features of their fetus before performing an abortion. Another bill would require anyone who performs an abortion to file a state report specifying, among other information, whether the pregnancy resulted from sexual assault. Fines would be imposed on anyone who failed to comply. A third bill would change the state's criminal statutes to expand the definition of a...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 16, 2009 – As the sun went down over the bluffs in Douglas, Wyo., Jan. 9, Army Col. Richard K. Knowlton was practicing his roping skills in the gymnasium of the local Army National Guard armory. Army Col. Richard K. Knowlton, commander of the Wyoming Army National Guard’s 115th Fires Brigade, talks to families at a community meeting at the armory in Douglas, Wyo., Jan. 9, 2009. Knowlton led a statewide information campaign to prepare families and business and community leaders for the largest single deployment in the state’s history. DoD photo by Fred W. Baker III  (Click...

The federal government opened Wednesday the second round of land leases for oil shale research in the western United States. The Bureau of Land Management is soliciting nominations for parcels to be leased in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming, according to the agency's news release. "Broadening the scope of research into oil shale technologies will help accelerate the development of these vast western resources, and as a result lessen our dependence on foreign sources of energy," James Caswell, bureau's director said in a news release. The bureau is part of the U.S. Department of Interior. President-elect Barack Obama's pick for Secretary...

So Yellowstone, the super volcano, is again rumbling? Mercury has been detected throughout the national park (not a good sign) for quite sometime and along with it the ground under Yellowstone Lake is rising. More than 250 earthquakes reported during a 24-hour period ... Scientists monitoring Yellowstone have stated that it has entered into what they have described as a "red zone." Remember Mount St. Helens? The feds warned folks in the region around the mountain to vacate, and most did. Some (a few) didn't. It's been reported that the feds will issue a vacate order to the inhabitants of...

CHEYENNE -- Some Wyoming lawmakers want to make certain that people accused of misdemeanor domestic violence realize that pleading guilty would cost them their federal gun rights. A bill drafted for the upcoming legislative session would require judges to inform defendants that a misdemeanor domestic violence conviction would cost them their gun rights. The bill would also classify misdemeanor domestic violence as a serious offense requiring defendants to have lawyers. Sen. Cale Case, R-Lander, is the bill's main sponsor. He was also the author of a 2004 state law that sought to establish a procedure for misdemeanor domestic violence convicts...

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) - Run for your lives ... Yellowstone's going to explode! Hundreds of small earthquakes at Yellowstone National Park in recent weeks have been an unsettling reminder for some people that underneath the park's famous geysers and majestic scenery lurks one of the world's biggest volcanoes. In the ancient past, the volcano has erupted 1,000 times more powerfully than the 1980 blast at Mount St. Helens, hurling ash as far away as Louisiana. No eruption that big has occurred while humans have walked the earth, however, and geologists say even a minor lava flow is extremely unlikely any...

President George W. Bush's "after-life," as Laura Bush calls the post-presidency, is shaping up to be pretty comfortable, with a Dallas office, staffers, Secret Service protection, a travel budget, medical coverage and a $196,700 annual pension, all at taxpayers' expense. However, Bush will be the first president not to benefit from one former lifetime benefit: Secret Service protection. "He'll be the first one to receive it for 10 years," said Malcolm Wiley, Secret Service spokesman. Congress changed the law in the 1990s so that any president elected after Jan. 1, 1997, and his or her spouse will receive the federal...

A Yellowstone earthquake update: 1) The rumbling continues, including 3.5, 3.0 and 3.2 quakes just today 2) Here is some more Jake Lowenstern (the Yellowstone volcano scientist) analysis (via TIME): Jake Lowenstern, Ph.D.,YVO's chief scientist, who also is part of the USGS Volcano Hazards Team, told TIME that it doesn't appear a supervolcano event is imminent. "We don't think the amount of magma exists that would create one of these large eruptions of the past," he said. "It is still possible to have a volcanic eruption comparable to other volcanoes. But we would expect to see more and larger quakes,...

We who live along Montana's Yellowstone River are downstream from a simmering caldera, a geologic hot spot that has become especially active recently. Indeed, Yellowstone National Park contains the floor of a gigantic volcanic cauldron, one that rises and sinks with the forces that lie beneath — hence the picturesque geysers and steam holes. But a wave of recent earthquake activity is raising fears that have their origins 642,000 years ago, when a Yellowstone "supervolcano" exploded so violently that it created the caldera itself. Today, such an explosion — 1,000 times more powerful than the explosion of Mount St. Helens...

NEW YORK (CBS) ― [Click to zoom.] Click to enlarge Yellowstone remains very geologically active — and its famous geysers and hot springs are a reminder that a pool of magma still exists five to 10 miles underground. (File) CBS 1 of 1 Close numSlides of totalImages Related Stories * Yellowstone Earthquakes May Be 'Precursory' Events (12/30/2008) * Author: Yellowstone Park A Ticking Bomb (7/28/2008) * Wolves Of Yellowstone Spur Love And Hate (7/18/2007) * Yellowstone Bulge May Cause Thermal Unrest (3/2/2006) Related Links * Lowenstern Interview With Blogger * Yellowstone Earthquake Map The recent "swarm" of small earthquake tremors...