Free Republic

During the reign of the monothelite Emperor Constans II (630-668), Saint Maximus the Confessor was exiled three times, but before the third time an incident took place that earned him the title of "Confessor". To put an end to his teaching and writing about the Orthodox faith against Monothelitism, the Emperor ordered that his tongue be cut out and his right hand severed. Then as he was carried off to his third exile from Constantinople to the Caucasus, it was ordered that his severed members be hung around his neck as he was paraded through Constantinople. Saint Maximus reposed...

Cruz tries for a respectable showing in Iowa with Trump and the governor against him There are few things that energy-policy experts of all political stripes can agree on - but one of them is that mandates and subsidies to promote the use of corn ethanol (a policy first implemented by Jimmy Carter) are wasteful boondoggles that harm our environment and food supply while imposing billions of dollars of hidden costs on consumers. However, most energy-policy experts are not running for president in the Iowa caucuses. Ted Cruz, however, is running in the Iowa caucuses, and this week he found...

A teacher at the University of North Carolina-Greensboro requires students in her class to write an 8-page commitment to social justice — pupils who take her class because it’s a required course to earn a K-12 teaching credential. An assignment in instructor Revital Zilonka’s “Institution of Education” class tells future North Carolina teachers that “by the end of the semester, you are required to write your own personal/professional commitment to social justice,” the syllabus states. The class mandates a list of feminist and Marxist readings, and students’ “commitment” is expected to be up to eight pages long and delve into...

A widely touted study claiming right-wing extremism is more deadly than Islamic terrorism in the United States has been debunked by a history professor who shows that, in actuality, there have been 62 Americans killed by Islamic terrorists in the U.S. for every one American killed by right-wing extremists. Professor Andrew Holt of Florida State College at Jacksonville recently published his analysis that discredits the widespread sentiment that right-wing attackers are the deadliest domestic terrorists in the U.S. "If you include the death totals from 9/11 in such a calculation, then there have been around 62 people killed in the...

The U.S. Department of Education announced Wednesday it will publish detailed information about religious schools that receive federal permission to discriminate based on sex, gender identity and sexual orientation, despite receiving federal funds. That information is likely to put some religious schools in the hot seat for policies that aren't flattering in today's social climate -- including colleges in or near Portland. The decision came after a handful of senators -- including Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Jeff Merkley, D-Ore. -- called for greater transparency regarding Title IX exemptions.

This 2016 election will be a changing of the guard.  Not only will a host of GOPe and RAT policitians be sent packing, plenty of GOPe commentators will be forced to close their laptops and go home.   From the start of Trump's campaign launch, George Will has been one of his loudest critics.   And that's perfectly fine.   It's a free country. But why should someone like Will be put on a pedestal?   How is his analysis any sharper than that of the many anonymous experts who contribute fine commentary on FR?

There are images of Iowa farms, the New Hampshire seacoast, coffee shops, kitchen tables and thousands and thousands of inspired Bernie Sanders supporters, in intimate settings and at the large-scale rallies that have come to define his campaign. The new 60-second television spot reaches it's crescendo as Simon & Garfunkel sing "they've all come to look for America" while an expanding grid of people who've all come to see Sanders flashes on the screen. The Vermont senator has produced a powerful closing ad that evokes President Obama's promise of hope-and-change from 2008 -- and it's one that's certain to create...

Do You Have Amnesty in that Basket? Did Ted Cruz support an immigration solution that involved legalizing the 11 million or so illegals now in the U.S.? When we last left this dispute, Cruz staffers were denying it. True, a New York Times article had asserted that Cruz was carving out a "middle ground" on immigration, offering illegals legalization (work permits that would allow them to stay here) but making stopping short of the citizenship offered in the Senate's "Gang of 8" bill: Asked about what to do with the people here illegally, however, he stressed that he had never...

TAMPA, Florida, January 21, 2015 (LifeSiteNews) – Is the procreative impossibility of homosexual activity the same as heterosexuals being biologically infertile? Stetson University law professor Joseph Morrissey is suing for a tax deduction of $36,538 for in vitro fertilization treatments and the cost of a surrogate to carry twin boys for himself and his male partner. In denying Morrissey's claim, the IRS explained that for tax deductions, the medical services must be provided to the taxpayer, his spouse, or his dependent. Therefore, a surrogate does not qualify, and neither does IVF for someone other than the filer, his spouse, or...

Donald Trump holds a sizable lead among Arizona Republicans, according to a new poll. Trump gets 38.3 percent in the Arizona survey of 771 voters by pollster Michael Noble’s MBQF Consulting. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz is second with 15.6 percent giving Trump close to a 23-point lead in the Grand Canyon State. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio is third with 11.4 percent followed by Ben Carson (7.1 percent) and Jeb Bush (7 percent). Noble said no other GOP candidate gets more than 5 percent, and 10 percent of voters polled are undecided. Trump has touted his private sector and real estate...

The Vermont senator is now seen as 'electable' by a majority of Americans, while Hillary Clinton's lead among likely Democratic voters has narrowed to 9 points Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has seen a rise in his Iowa and New Hampshire poll numbers -- and with the Iowa caucuses less than two weeks away, his national support is growing, too. In the latest Economist/YouGov Poll, he trails national frontrunner Hillary Clinton by just nine points among likely Democratic primary voters -- the closest margin yet. Sanders has always been well-liked, compared with Clinton. This poll is no exception. More than half...

Officials insist this has nothing to do with Muslims. Following a recent influx of refugees, most of which are Muslim, a city in Denmark is reportedly making pork mandatory on municipal menus. The council motion narrowly passed in Randers, a principally Lutheran county in Denmark, the Associated Press reports. It was proposed by the populist Danish People's Party, which has maintained an anti-immigration stance in the midst of the refugee crisis. Frank Noergaard, a council member as well as a member of the DPP, insisted that this move is not an attack on Muslims, who are religiously prohibited from eating...

Thanks to the kindness of strangers, a 93-year-old American veteran will be reunited with his girlfriend from World War II after a separation that spanned continents and seven decades. Norwood Thomas will fly next month, free of charge, to Australia, where he will visit his former wartime sweetheart Joyce Morris, who is 88.

Tbilisi, January 21, 2016 On January 19, 2016, the feast of Holy Theophany, the 42nd mass baptism of infants took place at the Holy Trinity Cathedral in Tbilisi. 659 infants became new godchildren of His Holiness Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II of All Georgia. In 2008 Ilia II announced that he would become godfather of every third and subsequent baby born into a family whose parents were married in the Church. This decision was caused by the demographic crisis in Georgia at that time. In connection with this, many Georgian residents recall the story once related by the saint of our...

What could go wrong? The Obama administration pushed its project to empty the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay to a new level today. CNN’s Jake Tapper reported that the Department of Defense announced the release of a full-fledged member of al-Qaeda to Bosnia — one of the men who presented a threat to commercial airliners before getting captured in 2002 by purportedly inventing the shoe bomb: DOD announces transfer of Gitmo detainee Tariq Mahmoud Ahmed Al Sawah to Bosnia. Member of AQ who developed IEDs to use v commercial planes— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) January 21, 2016 The Miami Herald...

The Obama administration has released one of al Qaeda’s most skilled explosives experts, a man personally praised by Osama bin Laden and who created the shoe-bomb design that was used unsuccessfully to bring down an airliner in 2001. The Pentagon said on Thursday that Egyptian Tariq Mahmoud Ahmed Al Sawah, who may have known of the September 11, 2001 plot, was transferred to the government of Bosnia. Al Sawah fought with the Bosnia army in the early 1990s and eventually made his way to Afghanistan in 2000. Like other members of al Qaeda, al-Sawah began his terrorism career as a...

Billionaire prophet of doom George Soros said the European Union is on the “verge of collapse” as it faces five or six crises at once. “The Greek crisis taught the European authorities the art of muddling through one crisis after another. This practice is popularly known as kicking the can down the road, although it would be more accurate to describe it as kicking a ball uphill so that it keeps rolling back down,” Soros said in an interview with The New York Review of Books.

Live stream of the Donald Trump rally in Las Vegas, NV at South Point on January 21, 2016 at 1:00 PM PST.

In July of 2008 Obam asaid he would be POTUS for "the next 8-10 years" (see http://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/warner-todd-huston/2008/07/20/obama-ill-be-president-next-8-10-years ). That implies that something would happen to keep him POTUS for 2 years beyond his 2nd term. It would have to be some kind of cataclysmic emergency toward the end of his 2nd term. Over his 2 terms Obama has made sure that our southern border is wide open, knowing that our Islamist enemies have targeted us through that hole. He has gotten rid of secular Middle East leaders who have support our anti-terrorist activities and replaced them with Muslim Brotherhood, ISIS,...

A senior member of Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas's inner circle has insisted that any "two-state solution" with Israel would merely be a "phase" in the ultimate dismantlement of the State of Israel. Fatah Central Committee member Tawfiq Tirawi made the comments in a recent interview with Ma'an TV - the same interview in which he made widely-publicized comments defending Nazi leader Adolf Hitler as "not corrupt" and calling him "daring." Tirawi began by expressing satisfaction with the ongoing "intifada" - referring to the wave of terrorist attacks against Israelis - which he said had succeeded in "uniting the Palestinian...