Free Republic

entire Wabasha bridge this morning downtown St.Paul(both sides) Wonder hoe much the public works spent putting all these nice, new rainbow flags up? might explain your property tax rates, St.Paulites...

The federal government is spending $152,000 to study “voice therapy” for transgenders, saying it is incumbent to being “accepted as one's preferred gender.” “This study will illuminate the capabilities of the human larynx and inform the relationship between voice production and perception,” states a National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant, awarded to George Washington University. “The long term goal of this research is to inform and provide new directions for Transgender (TG) voice care, thereby improving the lives of TG people who feel their voice is a great obstacle to living as their preferred gender.” “Incomplete gender presentation can negatively...

I’ll say it once again, when you tax something, you get less of it.When you subsidize something, you get more of it.This is a fairly commonly known economic belief. So why are these politicians so surprised the government’s free phone program has grown out of control: What started out as an effort by President Reagan to help poor people in rural areas have a phone in cases of emergency has mushroomed into what critics suspect is a new welfare program.“The cost has gone from $143 million a few years ago to $2.2 billion today,” Republican Louisiana Sen. David Vitter said,...

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — Twenty-four current and former Internal Revenue Service employees have been charged with stealing government benefits, federal prosecutors said Wednesday. The IRS employees were indicted on charges that they illegally received more than $250,000 in benefits including unemployment insurance payments, food stamps, welfare, and housing vouchers, the U.S. attorney’s office in Memphis said in a news release. Prosecutors say 13 of the IRS employees face federal charges of lying about being unemployed while applying for or recertifying their government benefits. They each face up to five years in prison if convicted of making false statements to receive...

“What’s the matter with Kansas?” syndrome of young people voting against their economic interests. Thus follows the constant courting of the hip and cool Beyoncé, Jay-Z, Lena Dunham, Occupy Wall Streeters, and others who blend pop culture, sex, youth, energy, and fad — almost anything to avoid the truth that today’s teenagers are starting out each owing a lifetime share of the national debt amounting to more than three-quarters of a million dollars. Those who ran up the debt enjoyed the borrowing, but won’t be around to pay back their proverbial fair share.

Leave it to my state of California to head off in radical and expensive directions. Legislation has been filed that would require group insurance to cover gay and lesbian infertility treatments just as they do heterosexual. But, as I note elsewhere, AB 460 isn’t limited to a finding of actual infertility. Nor does it require that gays and lesbians have tried to conceive or sire a child using heterosexual means, natural or artificial. Rather–as with heterosexual couples–merely the inability to get pregnant for a year while having active sexual relations is sufficient to demonstrate need for treatment, meaning if the...

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has responded to a letter dated November 13, 2012 from Senator Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) regarding the agency's ammunition purchases. Sen. Coburn published the response on the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs website yesterday, April 1, 2013. The response, dated February 4, 2013, says that DHS buys ammunition in bulk to "significantly lower costs."

Liberals who demand church-state separation would pitch a fit if a public school decided to perform a play that reverently told stories of the Old Testament, whether it was the story of creation, the story of Noah, or Moses or Joseph and his brothers. But somehow, if a public school decides to put on a play mocking God and the Old Testament, that is not a church-state violation. The separation police don't want religious (or atheist) minorities to face religious indoctrination in a public school. But anti-religious indoctrination mocking the Judeo-Christian majority is a glorious festival of free speech. Take,...

This video image from an Internal Revenue Service video shows an IRS employee portraying Mr. Spock. William Shatner has made up his mind about the Star Trek parody video produced by the Internal Revenue Service. He tweeted: "So I watched that IRS video. I am appalled at the utter waste of US tax dollars." If you haven't been paying attention, the IRS released the video last week after CBS News filed a Freedom of Information Act Request. The video, which shows IRS employees boldly going "where no government employee has gone before," was supposed to be used for training purposes.It's...

In the first three months of the year, members of the first family have been on three vacations, averaging a vacation a month. And now it's being reported that the first daughters are on a spring break vacation in the Bahamas. Obama Photo AP / Steven Senne The Obamas began the new year in Hawaii. "President Obama departed Hawaii this morning for Washington, after spending NINE days vacationing with family and friends in his native state. Here’s a quick look at how he spent his vacation," ABC reported on January 6, 2013. "Obama played FIVE rounds of golf with SEVEN...

It’s spring break, and President Obama’s daughters are off on yet another vacation. While the U.S. economy could use a little help, according to Breitbart News, the Obama girls are spending their time – and taxpayers’ dime – in the Bahamas. The girls’ visit to the Atlantis resort was not publicly announced, but Breitbart says its sources have confirmed the information, verified also through sightings posted on social media:

For the past four years, American taxpayers have paid nearly $400,000 so that Yale University could study the sexual conflict of waterfowl and “plasticity in duck penis length.”

Las Vegas Township Constable John Bonaventura will not face criminal charges related to his arrest last week on suspicion of driving under the influence, Clark County District Attorney Steve Wolfson said. In a statement, Wolfson said that although Bonaventura’s preliminary breath test showed he was over the legal blood-alcohol limit when he was pulled over Feb. 12, that test is not admissible in court. An arrest report indicates he registered a level of 0.099 on that test. A second, admissible breath test showed Bonaventura’s blood-alcohol level at 0.069, below the legal limit of 0.08. That test was administered at the...

AUSTIN – You know America is changing when leftists have even infiltrated Texas schools. According to the website txcscopereview.com, a lesson plan for 6th graders in government schools reads as follows: Notice socialist/communist nations use symbolism on their flags representing various aspects of their economic system. Imagine a new socialist nation is creating a flag and you have been put in charge of creating a flag. Use symbolism to represent aspects of socialism/communism on your flag. What kind of symbolism/colors would you use?

Foes of same-sex marriage are laboring to pay the tab for an epic legal case now before the U.S. Supreme Court, as the movement suffers from fundraising shortfalls that could sap its strength in future battles. ProtectMarriage dot com, the advocacy group defending a California gay marriage ban now under review by the high court, showed a $2 million deficit in its legal fund at the end of 2011 - the third year in a row that expenses exceeded donations, federal tax records show.... "Unless the pace of donations starts to pick up right away, we could soon be forced...

Bears re-reading as Obama begins his Second Assault upon the United States. ==================================================== Yeah, that's what NASA should be all about. "Charlie Bolden: Stealth Middle East Diplomat?," by Keith Cowing at NASA Watch, July 2 (thanks to Weasel Zippers): Bolden: I am here in the region - its sort of the first anniversary of President Barack Obama's visit to Cairo - and his speech there when he gave what has now become known as Obama's "Cairo Initiative" where he announced that he wanted this to become a new beginning of the relationship between the United States and the Muslim world....

A new video game featuring a black alien female superhero delivered to Earth to fight global warming is about to hit the market thanks to a $100,000 grant from the Obama administration. The National Endowment for the Arts is funding the Spelman College of Atlanta, Ga.'s multi-episode game called "HERadventure." In the grant announcement made last year, the NEA said the story "focuses on a young female superhero sent to Earth to save her own planet from devastation because of climate changes caused by social issues impacting women and girls." The game is set to debut on March 8 on...

Run>Hide>Fight. Your guide to surviving an active shooter event. This is a video the city of Houston put together on what to do should you (a citizen) run across an active shooter, such as the guy in the movie theater. They were just finishing it when the Colorado shootings occurred. If you haven’t seen it……it is well worth the watch and worth sharing with your family and friends as well. DHS sponsored video, worth watching. They sorta gloss over the gun free zone sign on the door. I'd be somewhat inclined to spray the fire extinguisher in the shooter's face,...

In a landmark settlement, the Pentagon has agreed to give full back pay to U.S. service members who were discharged due to their sexual orientation under the military's “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. The payouts will be granted to service members dismissed from the military under the now-repealed policy on or after November 2004. “This means so much to those of us who dedicated ourselves to the military, only to be forced out against our will for being who we are,” former Air Force Staff Sgt. Richard Collins said in a statement from the American Civil Liberties Union, which brought...

<p>Some opinions only get attention because they come from people with advanced degrees who make their living on the taxpayer dime. That’s certainly the case for Hugo Schwyzer, a history and gender studies professor at Pasadena City College.</p> <p>He has a history of blaming white men for most of the mass killings that take place in the United States. Friday’s tragic shootings in Newtown, Connecticut gave him a great opportunity to spout his nonsense once again.</p>