Free Republic

Reclusive billionaire David Koch, a powerful donor in American conservative politics, says he’s a “social liberal.” “I’m basically a libertarian, and I’m a conservative on economic matters, and I’m a social liberal,” Koch told ABC News’ Barbara Walters.... Koch, who supports abortion rights and gay marriage, said he isn’t concerned with candidates he supports who don’t share some of his views. He said his primary concern when choosing a candidate to support is their fiscal policies.

United Nations peacekeepers on Friday fired at a crowd of protesters who were demanding new leadership just days after a government-appointed commission recommended that the country's prime minister resign. Thousands of protesters marched through the capital, Port-au-Prince, as they burned tires and clashed with U.N. troops and police, who also fired tear gas. Read more at http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=e07_1418461116#8MvX3mZS12tKGJ2v.99

Peter Korn, who wrote about an abortion clinic called Lovejoy and how it functioned, said the following about the head nurse’s job: “Lovejoy has gone through 5 head nurses in 4 years. The job is a difficult one, at least partly because of the nature of the 2nd floor operation. On certain days as many as 25 first trimester abortions might be scheduled in one operating room. Women coming in for abortions are often suffering great emotional stress; of those that appear, it is not unusual for half to be late for their appointments, some by as much as 2...

Watching Exodus: Gods and Kings stirred me to read the Biblical account once again.  I’ve read it many, many times in Exodus chapters 2-14.  Reading the story with the Ridley Scott movie fresh in my mind illuminated a few things.  First, that Scott’s version of the account, while weak on the theological aspects of the characters, didn’t do a half bad job at the Biblical story elements (and ludicrously bad at being historically accurate). But that’s not what I want to focus on. If I were to make an Exodus movie, I’d take a different tack than everyone else.  Everyone...

As many women know only too well, finding a dress that fits like a glove is no easy task. But a new dress, created using a 3D printer, may be the answer to every woman's style woes. A design studio have used 3D printing technology to create an innovative dress customised to a woman’s body. The dress, which costs a staggering £1,900 ($3,000) to print, features 2,279 printed panels interconnected by 3,316 hinges. Creators Nervous System call it a ‘4D dress’ as, like fabric, the printed garment can go from a compressed object to its intended shape. Jessica Rosenkrantz, co-founder...

NARAL Pro-Choice America made a shocking move recently. The organization’s president Ilyse Hogue announced how freaked out it is by a new effort to protect preborn children. What’s got NARAL panicked this time is the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act–legislation that would ban abortions after twenty weeks. Part of the impetus comes from Dr. Kawaljeet Anand’s research at the University of Tennessee, as his work suggests that a fetus can suffer pain by week twenty. This is especially relevant in light of what a second trimester abortion typically involves: pulling the fetus apart one piece at a time. While some...

Berlin (AFP) - German police have noted a significant rise in far-right extremism and attacks targeting foreigners, a news report said Sunday, amid national debate about a new Islamophobic movement. The trend is seen as a backlash against a sharp increase in refugees arriving in Germany, Europe's biggest economy and top destination for asylum-seekers and other migrants

Our poor president is misunderstood by an increasingly large portion of the population, as his second shellacking last month showed. Yet his unpopularity is not because of his policies (which were all on the ballot), but because, as MIT professor and multi-million-dollar government consultant Jonathan Gruber has said many times, Americans are just too stupid to understand the nuance that is Obama. Dinesh D’Souza, in his new book, America, says, “America’s suicide, it turns out, is the result of a plan. The plan is not simply one of destruction but also one of reconstruction—it seeks the rebuilding of a different...

OK, please take this in the humorous spirit that it was meant. But let's face it, "Johnny Football" should go back to leading the aerobics classes. And also, we must also face it that Tebow was just OK in a league that needs great out of the gate (watching Manziel EXACTLY reminds me of Tebow).

It’s the holiday season, and you know what that means – it’s the season to give gifts! Not sure what to get that special someone in your life who’s passionate about reproductive freedom and feminism? We’ve got you covered.

Pet owners worldwide, including CFP’s beloved pet Yorkie, ‘Yankee’, can attest by the millions that Fidos have already found Heaven on Earth. The pithy posts of Father John T. Zuhlsdorf (Father Z) are among my favourite on the Internet. Just as I tune in on my much-admired friend Father Paul Nicholson’s inspiring homilies, I read Fr. Z’s blog most every day. Catholic convert Jimmy Akin of Jimmy Akin blog fame is no slouch when it comes to setting the record straight either. In time for Christmas 2014, visions of sugar plums dancing in their heads, has been replaced by visions...

Democrats and Republicans alike are protecting the power structure at all costs, even if it means voting against their platform, and against the United States Constitution they took an oath to protect and defend. Sixty-seven Republicans chose to vote against the $1.1 trillion CR-Omnibus budget bill on December 11, 2014. Despite the refusal of the more conservative Republicans to support the bill, the Republican establishment was able to pull in enough Democrats, 57, to vote for the bill. The bill passed 219 to 206, and the voters that gave the Republican Party a majority going into 2015 saw their leverage...

A tiny projector in the bracelet will cast an image onto the skin then eight long-range proximity sensors will detect every swipe, tap and pinch. The bracelet will also contain a USB port and accelerometer as well as supporting Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.

Every year during December I have been posting the surprising abolitionist history behind some of our most beloved Christmas hymns. Pro-lifers identify closely with those 150 years ago who fought to free another oppressed class of people. This Sunday, Wk 2 of 4, we examine… O Holy Night In 1847, his parish priest asked French poet Placide Cappeau de Roquemaure to compose a Christmas poem. He wrote “Cantique de Noel” while contemplating what it would have been like to be present at Christ’s birth and asked his friend Adolphe-Charles Adam to set it to music. The song became an instant...

The fact remains that Main Street is in trouble. The nation requires an economy in which new businesses are created and existing ones can afford to expand. That is not happening The U.S. was the world’s number one economy prior to World War II, but it took off bigtime after the war and there has not been a day of my long life in which we were not number one—until now. The International Monetary Fund recently released its calculations regarding the world’s economy and concluded that China is the number one economy, producing $17.6 trillion in terms of goods and...

More frightening than anything else: In the nightmare world progressives are designing for civil society, little tots are no longer your little tots. They are government-sought human resources to be raised as tomorrow’s anarchists. “On Wednesday, the White House Summit on Early Education will unveil nearly $1 billion in new “investments” to “expand access to high-quality early childhood education to every child in America” from “birth and continuing to age 5.” It’s a retread of President Obama’s 2013 State of the Union school-spending plan, which was a repackaging of his 2011 Race to the Top — Early Learning Challenge program.”...

It’s a question that will prove crucial next year when Mitch McConnell takes the reins of a new Senate: Just how big is the Ted Cruz caucus? Three votes on the “cromnibus” late Saturday night suggest it could be as large as 22 senators — a dangerously high number for McConnell — or as few as a handful. Let’s break down the three votes — on filibustering the $1.1 trillion package, on Cruz’s point of order aimed at targeting the president’s immigration action, and final passage. The high-water mark for the Texas Republican came on his point of order vote,...

What Ferguson Protesters Did To A Slain Police Officer Will Infuriate You By Kristina Hall Officer Jeremy Henwood was shot and killed while sitting in his police cruiser just moments after he bought a young boy his meal at McDonald’s, because the young man couldn’t afford it. Officer Henwood was a decorated HERO who served several tours of duty in both Iraq and Afghanistan as a Marine combat veteran. In those final moments when he took his wallet out and helped a boy from his community, it truly showed just what kind of man he was. After purchasing the young...

The Lord is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in Him. Lamentations 3:24

EU development ministers met today (12 December) in Brussels and adopted a “perspective” to boost the role of the private sector in the field of development cooperation. But leading NGOs warned that placing the private sector at the center of EU development policy “shows ministers have failed to acknowledge its limitations”. EU ministers adopted Council Conclusions, which contain strong language in favor of engaging more with the private sector. Ministers state that the private sector “is emerging as an increasingly active player in the development field”, and describe its role as “key” for implementing the future sustainable development goals. Ministers...