Free Republic

On May 2, Native American community members and Interfaith supporters, including clergy leaders, demonstrated outside of Mission Dolores in San Francisco to oppose the impending canonization of Junipero Serra by the Catholic church. Pope Francis has reaffirmed his decision to name Junipero Serra a saint, despite strong opposition from Native Americans who say the man is responsible for the killing of hundreds of thousands of Indigenous people when he helped to establish and then presided over the California mission system in the 1700s. "My ancestors were directly enslaved at Mission Dolores here, and at Mission San Jose in Fremont, and...

As a commentary guy, I'm rarely in the business of breaking news. But seeing as my show is out of Detroit, and I've done a lot of work in Dearborn... I managed to catch something that everyone else has missed. Please watch the video and support the site, but I've included a block-quote below. “She is a hatemonger. She is drawing incitement and violence.” … “Let me talk a little bit about ISIS. ISIS is a hate group exactly like Pamela Geller. She is drawing killers, she makes killers, she is inviting killers to come in.” … “She is worse...

At the end of the process, we will have a large number of regulations that meet the criteria for being pointless, stupid or tyrannical. Let’s just ignore them and go on about our lives as if they didn’t exist. I propose two frameworks for implementing this strategy. The first would be a legal foundation functioning much as the Legal Services Corporation does for the poor, except that its money will come from private donors, not the government. ... The other framework would be occupational defense funds. Let’s take advantage of professional expertise and pride of vocation to drive standards of...

(Breitbart) – Barack Obama makes a habit of castigating police for their misbehavior, and by his actions, it could easily be assumed that he is disinterested in engendering any sympathy for police, even those killed in the line of duty, while he fans the flames of anti-police rage by honoring those killed by police. As Instapundit points out in comparing Obama’s actions vis-à-vis police, Obama honored Freddie Gray — who, according to CNN, had over 20 criminal cases filed against him before his death in police custody — by sending Cabinet Secretary Broderick Johnson, chair of the Obama administration’s My...

NSA telephone metadata program Following last Thursday’s federal appeals court decision, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) has issued a legal sidebar on the possible impacts of this Second Circuit ruling against bulk collection on USA PATRIOT Act reauthorization: On May 7, 2015, a federal appeals court issued a decision in American Civil Liberties Union v. Clapper that could have significant implications for both the telephone metadata collection program operated by the National Security Agency (NSA) and the legislative debate surrounding consideration of the USA FREEDOM Act of 2015 (H.R. 2048 S. 1123) currently taking place in the House and the...

Legal configuration, 14" barrel.  Shockwave Technologies Raptor Grip installed A major controversy during the NRA Annual Meeting was the regulatory box the ATF had constructed for themselves with regulatory letters and the law.   I was surprised to learn that firearms that fired shotgun shells with a bore of more than .5 inches, and a barrel length less than 18 inches,  could legally be purchased and possessed without all the complex regulatory burden and $200 tax required by the National Firearms Act, the Gun Control Act of 1968, and all the following changes. The firearm pictured above is based...

National media ignores story since it doesn't fit racist police brutality narrative. Al Sharpton won’t be heading to Mississippi, and for that I’m sure all of Mississippi can take some comfort. Geraldo Rivera won’t be showing up either, nor can we expect burning drug stores and video of one brave mother whooping her son for acting like a moron. But two innocent police officers who were just trying to make a routine traffic stop are dead. The murders occurred on Sunday, and four suspects have already been arrested. Now the usual media pattern for stories like this is tell you...

Team Hillary is pushing Julian Castro as her VP nominee. “The Republicans are making a big push for the Hispanic vote, so that makes Castro an obvious pick.” Julian Castro, and his twin brother, Congressman Joaquin, were early backers of 2008 Clinton......the odds of Mrs. Clinton picking another woman for the ticket are “zero” .... which eliminates Wendy Davis, the liberal darling of Texas Democrats. --SNIP--That leaves Julian Castro. At just 40 years old, he’s a a two-term mayor of San Antonio, Texas, and is Obama’s HUD Secy. The Castro brothers — twins born to a single mother whose grandmother...

....Mercury‘s debut was the perfect solo album, in that it became a outlet for his inclination toward non-rock music away from Queen and never threatened his group’s integrity. In fact, it may have gotten Queen back on track. Released on April 29, 1985, Mr. Bad Guy.... Mr. Bad Guy became a labor of love, as Mercury took almost two years to pick and choose which portions of his Queen legacy intrigued him most.

Perhaps the problem is too many auditors, reviewers and assessors chasing too few programs As the F-35 fighter program continues to make successful progress, critics of the joint strike fighter procurement are unrelenting in their attacks. In a recent commentary, Dr. Daniel Goure—a Vice President with the Lexington Institute, a nonprofit public-policy research organization headquartered in Arlington, Virginia—takes issue with the hysteria and injects some realism and balanced perspective back into the debate: Somewhere along the way, government auditors and the Washington press corps got the mistaken idea that the program to design and develop the most complex fighter aircraft...

Listen Live: Sound Off Connecticut with Jim Vicevich 9 a.m. to noon ET (Daily Thread)Sound Off Connecticut is a popular conservative/libertarian call in talk show hosted by Jim Vicevich weekday mornings from 9 a.m. to noon ET. Although based in Connecticut, the show welcomes callers from all over the United States! This is your chance to sound off America! Call into the show toll free (800) 966-9842! Listen to the LIVE AUDIO STREAM at http://wtic.com - it's free and NO registration is required! If you're in southern New England listen over the air to WTIC 1080 AM, the 50,000 watt...

If we abandon Godliness, we will surely abandon liberty, for without morality, we are incapable of freedom Benjamin Franklin said that only a “virtuous people are capable of freedom.” Franklin understood the importance of a moral society, and how secularism may seem free on the surface, but that a society that abandons the Laws of Nature by Nature’s God ultimately leads themselves to bondage, under human masters and tyrannical statism. The Founding Fathers recognized the truth about human nature, primarily viewing it from a classical Christian angle. Our rights are self-evident, but so is the fact that while humans are...

DETROIT - Police searched a state senator's home Sunday after he was accused of firing a shotgun following a fight with his girlfriend. Sources told Local 4 state Sen. Virgil Smith, who represents the fourth district, fired several shots into the woman's car. Investigators walked out of state Smith's home with what appeared to be a shotgun wrapped in a garbage bag. Investigators with Detroit police placed it in the backseat of an unmarked car. Around 1 a.m. Sunday police were called to Smith's home for reports of shots fired Sources told Local 4 that early Sunday morning Smith and...

The former head of Michigan's largest teachers union was able to spike her pension by basing it on a union executive salary rather than her past earnings as a teacher. This special deal means taxpayers are on the hook for part of the extra $100,000 in annual pension benefits. Former Michigan Education Association President Iris Salters draws an annual pension of $140,000 from the state of Michigan. That's in line with longtime educators who reached the top of their profession — from school district superintendents to community college presidents. However, Salters didn’t get her six-figure government pension payout from reaching...

The Maersk Tigris was released Thursday, more than a week after the ship was seized by Iran in the Strait of Hormuz, according to a statement from the shipping company. The cargo vessel was transiting the Strait of Hormuz on April 28 when Iranian military vessels fired warning shots at the ship and directed it to proceed into Iranian waters. The ship and crew has been held ever since over a business dispute with Maersk Line. “The release follows a constructive dialogue with the Iranian authorities, including the Ports & Maritime Organization, and the provision of a letter of undertaking...

Saida Grundy is an “incoming Assistant Professor of Sociology and African-American Studies at Boston University”, according to her bio on BU’s African American Studies Department’s website. Among other things, she is an active Twitter user, having racked up over 57,000 tweets. It would be beyond a chore to go through everything that she has ever put on Twitter, however, we at SoCawlege went through her timeline for just the past three to four months. And if that was any indication, BU has a problem on their hands.

Siemens, the German industrial giant, said on Thursday that it would cut 4,500 jobs as it reacts to a slump in oil prices that has eroded its sales of equipment to the energy industry. Lower oil prices have generally been a boon to the eurozone economy, freeing up cash that consumers can spend on other things. But in the case of Siemens, the effect is the opposite because of its large business supplying producers of oil, gas and electricity. Siemens said it needed to cut jobs and reduce costs because of “the persistently difficult environment in the global power generation...

The green energy movement in America is dead. May it rest in peace. No, a majority of American energy over the next 20 years is not going to come from windmills and solar panels. One important lesson to be learned from the green energy fad’s rapid and expensive demise is that central planning doesn’t work. What crushed green energy was the boom in shale oil and gas along with the steep decline in the price of fossil fuel that few saw coming just a few years ago. An International Energy Agency report concedes that green energy is in fast retreat...

After a day of fishing in the Irish Sea, Paul Murphy was about to head for home when his trawler, the Karen, suddenly shuddered to a halt. A loud bang gave way to the sound of cables tensing. But when the Karen started moving again, it was being dragged backward, fast and at an angle.

When Houston’s Swift Energy Co. reported first-quarter results Thursday, it offered a glimpse at the level of cost-cutting oil and gas companies are making in the Eagle Ford Shale. “We are seeing cost concessions in some cases greater than we originally budgeted,” said Terry Swift, president and CEO, said in a call with analysts. Swift’s average drilling cost this year is $2.6 million per well, down from $3.2 million last year. And its most recent Eagle Ford well was drilled for $2.2 million. Its lease operating costs dropped 16 percent from the previous quarter. Swift on Thursday reported its first-quarter...