Free Republic

Schools that do everything parents should are not schools. They're orphanages. The city fathers of Buffalo, New York are considering what they call “public boarding schools,” “where students as young as first or second grade would be assured proper meals, uniforms, after-school tutoring and activities.” “We have teachers and union leaders telling us, ‘The problem is with the homes; these kids are in dysfunctional homes,'” Buffalo school board member Carl Paladino told the Huffington Post. The “Buffalo Institute of Growth would supplement a college-style academic schedule with life skills and social activities that would keep students on campus seven days...

559 122 1 Total: 682 In a recent article in The Harvard Crimson, a student shared her story of having an abortion after her boyfriend broke up with her. She writes, “All I desperately wanted was to have my boyfriend back. I wanted him to hold me and let me cry into his chest, for him to tell me that everything was okay even though it wasn’t. But by the time I found out the truth, it was too late to get him back. He had started dating another girl two months after we broke up. I couldn’t tell him....

A Chinese attorney who escaped house arrest in his home country for his efforts to protect women from forced abortion for violating the government’s one-child policy said on Thursday that in the 35 years since the practice hundreds of millions of babies have been killed. “Over the past 35 years, China has killed a total of 360 to 400 million young lives as a result of its inhumane and violent birth control policies,” Chen Guangcheng, now senior fellow at Catholic University of America said at a hearing of the Congressional Executive Commission on China. “During a six-month period of 2005,...

WASHINGTON — During a training course on defending against knife attacks, a young Salt Lake City police officer asked a question: “How close can somebody get to me before I’m justified in using deadly force?” Dennis Tueller, the instructor in that class more than three decades ago, decided to find out. In the fall of 1982, he performed a rudimentary series of tests and concluded that an armed attacker who bolted toward an officer could clear 21 feet in the time it took most officers to draw, aim and fire their weapon. The next spring, Mr. Tueller published his findings...

A competitor belly flops into a muddy watering hole during the dive competition at the 2015 National RedNeck Games on Saturday in Augusta, US.

Even though the Communist Party of China is officially atheist, and the central government was once wary of religion, subtle signs and increasing activities show there is a changing attitude towards religion in order to unite China and its neighbors. In March last year, Chinese President Xi Jinping stood in the offices of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in Paris, and extolled the profound impact Buddhism has had on China. "Buddhism originated in ancient India," said Xi, the leader of the officially atheist Communist Party of China. "After it was introduced into China, the religion went...

NEW YORK (AP) -- Two New York City cops approach a gray sedan with a suspected drunken driver slumped over the wheel. They ask him to get out, and that's when the trouble begins. The suspect, dressed in a rumpled suit, curses and hollers at the officers because he doesn't want to go to jail. He refuses to be handcuffed and backs away, yelling, "Can't we work this out?"

When political commentators note that there is no justification for sexual violence, they aren’t adhering to doctrinal feminism but the tenets of civilized Western thought. No woman, a responsible citizen would say, invites violence merely because their assailant was uncontrollably stimulated by their victim’s choice of attire. This is such a bedrock principle of human decency that it barely needs to be said. Only the most brutish and crude among us would contend otherwise. Why then does it appear vogue to imply that a terrorist attack on a Texas American Freedom Defense Initiative event organized by the group’s president, Pamela...

Circling the Drain in Baltimore Commentary for 3 May 2015 The NSA has made a coloring book for kids. Why not? Our intelligence community has been catering to adult children for the last fifty years. Political correctness at the NSA, as with the CIA, long ago reached a level incompatible with national security. The NSA even has an Earth Day mascot/cartoon character. As a provocation, political correctness is a scheme for neutralizing and discrediting America’s most important institutions. Long ago James Burnham explained that latter-day liberalism is the ideology of Western suicide. And who, in the end, will fight for...

Everyone in Moscow tells you that if you want to understand Russia's foreign policy and its view of its place the world, the person you need to talk to is Fyodor Lukyanov. Lukyanov is the chair of Russia's Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, as well as the editor-in-chief of the journal Russia in Global Affairs, which are something like the Russian equivalents of America's Council on Foreign Relations and Foreign Affairs — though the Russian versions are considered much closer to the state and its worldview.

The United States comes up constantly when you talk to Russians about their country's place in the world. But the conversations tend to go a lot differently than many Americans might expect. In the US, the common view is that Russians feel aggrieved by the loss of the Soviet Union and all the respect that came with being a global superpower. Russia's acts of aggression in Europe, in this telling, are all about challenging the American-led order as a way to prove Russia's might and importance. This aggression is wildly popular among Russians, many Americans believe, because it makes them...

“Todd Myers is an eco-mythbuster. He exposes trends among modern environmentalists that are based more on ‘feel-good’ sentimentality than on scientific reality. If you truly care about the environment, then you should read this book.” Alex B. Berezow, Ph.D., Editor of RealClearScience.com Wherever we turn, politicians, businesses and activists are promoting the latest fashionable “green” policy or product. Green buildings, biofuels, electric cars, compact fluorescent lightbulbs and a variety of other technologies are touted as the next key step in protecting the environment and promoting a sustainable future. Increasingly, however, scientific and economic information regarding environmental problems takes a back...

His advisers call it "the SEC strategy." Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee is plotting a route to the Republican presidential nomination that could easily be mistaken for the sports bracket of a Southeastern Conference super fan. As he seeks to avoid a repeat of the spectacular flameout of his 2008 run, Huckabee is pinning his hopes on the 11 contiguous states that run from Florida to Missouri and Texas to South Carolina. His advisers and allies call it “the SEC strategy,” for the college sports conference that tracks the same map....

When charges were announced Friday against Alicia White for the death of Freddie Gray, her phone started buzzing from journalists and bail bondsmen. The problem was, they were calling the wrong Alicia White. The elementary school cafeteria manager from East Baltimore was not the Baltimore Police sergeant charged with manslaughter in the high-profile police custody death - even though court records listed her. The Sun was among those who contacted the other White on Friday based on the information in court records, seeking comment from her or her family. "The middle initial was off. Her address, her height, her weight,...

April 28, 2015 In a message today, Pope Bergoglio said precisely the following: “How much I would like us to kneel in veneration before the poor in church.” Quite frankly, I’d like us to kneel before Jesus Christ, Our Saviour, particularly in front of Our Eucharistic Jesus, SEEING THAT POPE BERGOGLIO DOESN’T KNEEL AT THE CONSECRATION, AS HE SHOULD DO, AND, HE DOESN’T KNEEL AT EUCHARISTIC ADORATION EITHER!!! I say this specifically, as I have had to deal every day with gravely ill and suffering dear ones, in whom I am aware of the presence of Our Lord. And I...

(1) "The Police Force Is Populated with Unstable War Veterans". (2) CNN Anchor Warns Baltimore Protester About Cops: “You Know How They Are”. (3) CNN During Monday’s Riot: "There shouldn’t be calm tonight. Black people are dying in the streets. They’ve been dying in the streets for months, years, decades, centuries". (4) The Police are "An Occupying Force In the Hood". (5) CNN Reporter Intentionally Provokes Confrontation with Baltimore Cop: "Are We Under Martial Law"?

Let’s establish a funding site and use GoFundMe to finance the startup. That way, money can be raised for conservative causes and keep the money in conservative hands. There's nothing in GoFundMe’s ever-changing rules that would stop a funding program to start a competing funding company.

Jeb Bush has already set himself apart from the rest of his rivals in the Republican presidential primary race with a well-known name and record fundraising. But how has he set himself apart on the issues? So far, immigration seems to be his biggest break. Unlike Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Florida), Bush is not calling for America to “secure the border first.” Unlike Sen. Ted Cruz, Bush believes that many undocumented immigrants should be able to apply for citizenship, not permanently relegated to an underclass of workers and residents who can’t vote. The quotes below will give you an idea why...

The Big Store. For generations, it was as synonymous with Christmas and fashion as it was Detroit. The store at Woodward and Gratiot avenues was absolutely massive, evolving with the Motor City until it became the tallest department store in the world. By the time it finished growing, the store’s size almost defied belief. A quick list of facts, many courtesy of the Detroit Historical Museum: The store was 2,124,316 square feet, making it second in size among department stores to only Macy’s in New York. Even then, Macy’s is only 26,000 square feet bigger. The store was spread out...

Healthcare For Those In U.S. Illegally Could Cost California $740 Million A Year Sen. Ricardo Lara's bill, SB 4, would extend Medi-Cal coverage to people in the country illegally. By MELANIE MASON Senate analyst estimates cost of Medi-Cal expansion bill ranges from $280 million to $740 million annually Estimated price tag of SB 4 would drop if President Obama's deportation relief order stands Extending state-subsidized healthcare coverage to people in the country illegally could cost California as much as $740 million annually, according to a Senate fiscal analysis released Monday. The report affixes a price tag to the proposal for...