Free Republic

On Monday, President Donald Trump's legal defense team filed a 109-page brief (171 pages long including appendices) urging the U.S. Senate to reject the Democrats' articles of impeachment. The letter deconstructed the impeachment case and denounced the very charges as "an affront to the Constitution." "The Articles of Impeachment now before the Senate are an affront to the Constitution and to our democratic institutions. The Articles themselves—and the rigged process that brought them here—are a brazenly political act by House Democrats that must be rejected," the lawyers wrote. "They debase the grave power of impeachment and disdain the solemn responsibility...

The World Economic Forum said on Monday, one day before the event kicks off in Davos, Switzerland, that: "The climate crisis is going to be one of the dominant themes this week." **SNIP** But as the world's financial elite, political leaders, and celebrities descend on the small town, the question is whether their transport choices can at all work with what the event - and many of those leaders - say they want to achieve for the planet. The World Economic Forum recorded more than 600 plane journeys that can be attributed to Davos in 2019 - a figure that...

Thousands of gun-rights activists and other groups amassed at the Virginia State Capitol in Richmond on Monday before the rally dispersed. According to local reports, in a later update, there was one arrest, and the demonstration was described as peaceful. There were fears that some militia groups would attempt to carry out acts of violence during the demonstration, which was held in opposition to proposed laws in the state legislature that would further restrict gun ownership. Those reported threats prompted Gov. Ralph Northam, a Democrat, to declare a state of emergency that banned all weapons on the Capitol’s grounds until...

Not that you’d generally be able to tell by watching CNN or MSNBC, but there’s actually been quite a bit of good news lately. And it’s not just retail sales, Wall Street and historic low unemployment. In a surprising reversal of recent trends, the number of illegal border crossings observed in Arizona this winter is down. And I mean way down. We’re talking a reduction of more than 90 percent over the previous year during the same period. (Associated Press) Illegal crossings plummeted across the border after the Trump administration made more asylum-seekers wait in Mexico for hearings in...

By KrisAnne Hall, JD As we remember Martin Luther King, Jr., let’s also remember he was denied the right to keep and bear arms, and many states, including some run by Republicans, are pushing more gun restrictions. They have forgotten or never learned that the right to keep and bear arms is an essential protection for Life and Liberty. Samuel Adams wrote in 1792: “Among the Natural Rights of the Colonists are these First life, secondly liberty, third property, together with the right to defend them in the best manner possible.” Adams continued his point by noting that these rights...

Award Winning Actor Robert De Niro really does make it hard for a politically engaged conservative who has enjoyed his movies to like him anymore. In the era of Trump, we’ve all come to expect political rants from De Niro as he accepts industry awards or gives interviews for television and in print. He did it again during the 26th Annual Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards Sunday. De Niro was honored with the SAG Life Achievement Award. Typically, the honoree fakes enough humility to convince the audience that he or she is just a regular person lucky enough to...

Now that we seem to be starting to get a handle on the immigration crisis on the southern border, reports have surfaced indicating that President Trump will turn his attention to another thorn in our side on the immigration front. This one doesn’t crop up in the news quite as often, but so-called “birth tourism” is a very real thing and it results in a lot of children winding up with US citizenship even though neither they nor their parents have any legitimate ties to our country. (Some estimates put the figure at 33,000 babies per year being born...

I read here (Spanish Minister) that a Spanish government official is worried that Spain needs eight or nine million immigrants to keep the country from diving into a demographic tailspin......The conventional wisdom is to bring in African and Middle Eastern migrants by the shipload. Of course, there is opposition from hateful, ignorant Spanish citizens who whine about the inevitable disappearance of European culture from large swaths of the country..... What a thorny problem. Where can Spain get its hands on millions of migrants? Those bureaucrats must be saved. Where, oh, where?

Hall of Fame quarterback Jim Kelly is getting slammed to the turf on Twitter for supporting Republican Beth Parlato in her bid to replace former Rep. Chris Collins for New York’s 27th District seat in Congress. Kelly’s tweet on Saturday endorsing Parlato brought a blitz of replies, some of which sacked the beloved former Buffalo Bill for entering the political fray in support of a conservative candidate aligned with President Trump. Kelly’s inclusion of Trump’s twitter handle in his tweet appeared to attract the most ire. “Nooo. You just went there. The minute you mentioned Trump I’m out,” replied Kim...

Anthony Manson is a serial burglar. During the Christmas shopping season, Manson did his shopping by stealing packages from Brooklyn apartment buildings, helped in no small way by the Andrew Cuomo Criminal Enhancement Act, otherwise known as the new bail reform law. Manson, 50, was arrested for nine burglaries in Prospect Lefferts-Gardens and Crown Heights on Dec. 23, according to police. He appeared before a judge on Christmas and was released—only to be arrested again for six more burglaries on Jan. 3, police said. Of course, he was released once again, and then decided to visit a Manhattan sunglass store...

A photo surfaced Sunday (Jan. 19) on Weibo showing People's Liberation Army (PLA) soldiers sitting next to a map of Taiwan that appears to indicate a southerly route for China's invasion of Taiwan, first going through Kinmen and Penghu, before landing troops in southern Taiwan. After President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) enjoyed a landslide victory in Taiwan's elections on Jan. 11, Communist China has been doubling down on its rhetoric about the tattered "one country, two systems" framework and adhering to the "1992 Consensus" — expressing its opposition to "Taiwan independence" despite the fact that Taiwan has never been a part...

An annual tradition in Russia is to mark the Baptism of Christ by cutting cross shaped holes in the iced over rivers and lakes and for the faithful to take a quick plunge while making the sign of the cross.

An elderly man shouting obscenities crashed a live MSNBC shot Monday as protesters gathered in Richmond, Virginia, for a gun rights rally. The man jumped into view behind NBC reporter Gabe Gutierrez, who was speaking to MSNBC host Hallie Jackson in the studio at the time.

Good Afternoon And Welcome To The Sean Hannity Show!

RUSH: Now, you know I have always believed that the Democrats have known that Trump was not gonna be convicted in an impeachment trial in the Senate. So why do this? What’s the purpose? The worst thing that could happen is for Trump to be acquitted. I mean, here they’ve got this three-year investment into Trump being a traitor and a Russian spy, a Russian agent, whatever else they have said he is. With all of it, they don’t have an impeachable offense. They’ve got these two really pathetic articles of impeachment — and in order to keep the base...

"In a patriarchal society, masculine gender identity is often moulded by violently toxic stereotypes," read the show notes. Shrunken sweaters, animal motifs, Peter Pan collars, Mary Jane shoes, and quilting details all achieved his shunning of masculine stereotypes. "Toxic masculinity, in fact, nourishes abuse, violence and sexism," the show notes continued. "And not only that. It condemns men themselves to conform to an imposed phallocratic virility in order to be socially accepted. In other words, toxic masculinity produces oppressors and victims at the same time."

Conference goers now have to be wary that robots will identify them everywhere they go. Corporations can now rent Chinese-made CloudMinds robots that can identify everyone on the conference floor. (To learn more about CloudMinds and China click here & here.) CloudMinds mission is to “make helpful robot services possible and to make them safe, secure and affordable.” While their hidden mission is to help governments identify everyone. According to CloudMinds “About Us” page, their so-called values are to convince employees, moms, dads and their children to trust rentable emotion and facial recognition robots. We make helpful robot Their rent-a-robot...

President Trump's reelection campaign manager Brad Parscale told Fox News' "Bill Hemmer Reports" Monday that the forthcoming Senate impeachment trial was unlikely to have any impact at the polls this November, and may even help the president's chances. "As soon as the president runs on any of the ballots, against any of their policies, he performs greatly against them, better than [even against Hillary] Clinton [in 2016]," Parscale said. " ... He is so far ahead of where he was in 2016 against Clinton, he is so far ahead of these other candidates in fundraising and in numbers ... and...

RUSH: This is a CNN story. I assume all of you know who Jeffrey Epstein is — uh, was. Jeffrey Epstein was what? He was the king of pedophiles. He was also the king of the Democrats. He was the king of Democrat partying, the king of Democrat fundraising. This guy was flying Democrats all over to his properties in Paris, in the Virgin Islands, in his New York apartment, and he was engaging in pedophilia and enabling them to engage in whatever action/activity they wanted to that he was providing. So Jeffrey Epstein is dead. That’s not what this...

January is no time for splishing and splashing, even in the Sunshine State. Vacationers looking to escape winter weather by taking a trip to Florida are in for some bad news: cold weather is on the way. In fact, things are about to get so cold that some of the state’s water parks are shutting down. Universal Studios tweeted out that its Volcano Bay water park will be closed Monday through Wednesday due to the unusual wave of cold weather slated to hit. Arctic air is funneling into Florida starting Monday, causing the coldest temperatures of the winter so far,...