Free Republic

COLUMBUS, OHIO—As he runs for governor, Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell has been telling audiences about the values he learned from his parents that guide him to this day. “I was raised in a Bible-believing, church-going, hardworking [family],” Blackwell told me as we drove through downtown Columbus to a campaign event at the Nationwide Arena. “My dad ... worked a couple of jobs. He worked as a meatpacker, and he served parties on the weekends for some of the affluent families in the greater Cincinnati area.” “My mom was, for the most part, a stay-at-home mom,” he said. “She...

America's "Islamofascist" adversaries have successfully established a well-funded and expansive "fifth column" throughout the United States that is devoted to a radical view of Islam. That's according to a former Reagan Defense Department official. Muslim leaders dispute the allegations by Frank Gaffney, who was an assistant secretary of defense for international security policy in the Reagan administration. Gaffney recently told a House international relations subcommittee that funding from radical sources in Saudi Arabia has helped to set up an "apparatus" that "has a substantial organizational footprint all across the United States." Gaffney, now president and CEO of the Center for...

If Democrats are successful in taking over the Senate this November, congressional committees would lurch to the left with Democrat majorities and far-left chairmen. Here are the 10 senators who would inflict the most liberal damage. 10. Sen. Jeff Bingaman (N.M.) – Energy and Natural Resources Lifetime American Conservative Union Rating: 13% The quiet Sen. Bingaman, who is consistently wrong on issues ranging from drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to Kyoto Protocol climate-change requirements, would be dangerous for American energy policy. 9. Sen. Kent Conrad (N.D.) – Budget Lifetime American Conservative Union Rating: 20% One of the Senate’s...

The Democratic National Committee is again calling for Sen. Lincoln Chafee (R-R.I.) to denounce a television ad created by the National Republican Senatorial Committee that criticizes Chafee's primary opponent for supporting a controversial Mexican identification card. The ad criticizes Cranston, R.I., Mayor Steve Laffey for allowing city law enforcement to accept Mexican "Matricula Consular" identification cards that the Department of Justice has said opens the door for terrorists to live in the country undetected. In a news release issued last week, DNC spokesman Damien LaVera said the ad "relies on divisive, misleading innuendo that Mexican immigrants will carry out acts...

Offended by Rocky Anderson's plans to protest President Bush this week, the Utah Republican Party is waging a public-relations campaign urging Utahns to call the mayor and tell him to "stop embarrassing" the state. And while Utahns have listened - flooding City Hall with almost 300 calls and overwhelming the phone system - Anderson hasn't. Salt Lake City's mayor isn't altering his protest plans. "Given the nastiness of some of these people, it actually just bolsters my resolve," said Anderson, who previously alleged that the "real embarrassment" is Utahns' unwavering support of Bush. The GOP acknowledged that its push, sending...

Numerous conservative groups are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to reinstate a Washington state law that requires unions to get permission from non-union employees before spending their mandatory dues on political causes and activities. "No one should be forced to pay for political causes they disagree with," said Michael Reitz, director of the Labor Policy Center with the Olympia, Washington-based Evergreen Freedom Foundation (EFF). "Unions must learn a lesson every first-grader does: You must ask permission before taking something that does not belong to you." EFF filed an amicus brief asking the U.S. Supreme Court to address the issue. The...

"Thank God for C-SPAN" is what we used to say about the channel's habit of airing material that the rest of the media usually won't touch. But C-SPAN's airing of a "9/11 Truth" panel has only served to poison the public debate about the nature of the Islamic fascist threat. The panel featured Webster Tarpley, a former member of the Lyndon LaRouche organization, which specializes in blaming the Zionists, Britain and the Queen of England for the world's problems. LaRouche is a former Marxist and Democratic presidential candidate who served prison time on financial fraud charges. He defended Iraq before...

The immigration reform bills in the Senate and House share little in common, but one thing both chambers agree on is the need to verify potential employees' eligibility to legally work in the United States. Supporters of immigration control say an automated system to do just that is already in place and could be implemented nationwide soon. The Employment Verification Basic Pilot Program (EVP) was created in November 1997. It was originally offered to employers on a voluntary basis in California, Florida, Illinois, New York and Texas but has since been expanded to allow employers in all 50 states to...

Haifa, Israel (CNSNews.com) - The four United Nations peacekeepers killed in an Israeli attack on their outpost were required to stay at that post "until they were ordered by the [U.N.] secretary general to withdraw," said a member of the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization on Wednesday. But the peacekeepers apparently never received such an order, despite the fierce cross-border fighting that erupted in southern Lebanon two weeks ago. The four peacekeepers -- from China, Austria, Canada and Finland -- had taken security precautions and were in a shelter under their bunker when they were killed, said Wicki Dieter, the...

Democrats believe that 2006 must be a year of significant transition in Iraq," says Democrat Party leader Howard Dean. On Thursday, Democrats will have a chance to say exactly what that means to them, when the U.S. House of Representatives begins debating another war resolution. This resolution, introduced by Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.), praises U.S. troops and rejects an "arbitrary date" for withdrawing them from Iraq, the Washington Post reported. According to the Washington Times, the resolution declares that the United States is "committed to the completion of the mission to create a sovereign, free, secure and united Iraq." House...

Rep. Bernard Sanders (I-Vt.) challenged liberals attending the "Take Back America" conference to take on the "right-wing nuts" on talk radio and demand that local radio stations and newspapers provide "alternative points of view." "The fight to allow people to hear different points of view is as important as any other fight, so I would urge people at the grassroots to start taking on the local media," Sanders said during a panel discussion Wednesday on the topic of media reform. "If you have a right-wing station in your community, you've got to go up to those people and say, 'You've...

- Former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson, whose wife was at the center of a CIA leak case that led to the indictment of Vice President Cheney's top aide, argued Wednesday that the U.S. needs to bring Iraqi insurgents and their "foreign patrons" to the conference table for negotiations. During a panel discussion at the liberal Take Back America conference in Washington, D.C., Wilson said diplomatic efforts to establish Iraq as a democratic power in the region should also include "the Egyptians, the Jordanians, the Saudis, the Iranians ... the Turks, probably some leading powers from Europe and Russia, all of...

Liberal activists speaking at the "Take Back America" Conference in Washington, D.C., Tuesday said a "human Congress" and a "Peoples Emergency Management Agency" are needed to help rebuild New Orleans because of the federal government's alleged failures both before and after Hurricane Katrina. They also accused the Bush administration of diverting funding that should be used to rebuild New Orleans "overseas to an unjust war" in Iraq. Rev. Lennox Yearwood, national coordinator for the Gulf Coast Renewal Campaign, called Katrina the "lunch-counter logo for the 21st Century," a reference to discrimination against African-Americans who were refused seating at lunch counters...

In Ann Coulter's latest book, she asserts that "liberalism contains all the attributes of what is generally known as 'religion,'" including a creation mythology (evolution), priests (public school teachers) and a holy sacrament (abortion). "Godless: The Church of Liberalism," is the fifth book written by the best-selling author and commentator. "Godless" hits store shelves on June 6, 2006 (6/6/06, a date she deliberately chose since the numbers correspond to the mark of the beast.)

Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean said Wednesday that there is no comparison between the ethical problems faced by U.S. Rep. William Jefferson (D- La.) and what he termed the Republican "culture of corruption" in the nation's capital. A GOP spokesman dismissed Dean's criticism as "trying to sell a fundamentally flawed campaign slogan." "There's a difference between the involvement of Congressman Jefferson in activities for which there's been no indictment and the culture of corruption that extends throughout the White House, the vice president's office and both houses of Congress," Dean said during a press conference at the DNC headquarters...

Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said his committee will hold an oversight hearing next week on constitutional questions raised by the FBI raid on Rep. William Jefferson's congressional office last Saturday night. "Members of Congress must follow the law and be held accountable just like everyone else. By no means, should Rep. Jefferson's alleged conduct be condoned, but there is a constitutional way for justice to be served. The FBI's unprecedented Saturday night raid of Rep. Jefferson's Capitol Hill office raises profoundly disturbing constitutional questions that must be addressed," Sensenbrenner said in a press release....

The U.S. Senate may be much more receptive to President Bush's "guest worker" program for illegal immigrants, but a member of the president's own party is warning that Congress is "blissfully ignorant" about the impact of such a program. Critics of the president's guest worker program, which is included in Senate immigration reform legislation, but not in the House version, call it amnesty for the estimated 10 to 12 million people who broke the law when they crossed the U.S. border. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) claims that the program, sponsored in the Senate by fellow Republicans Chuck Hagel of Nebraska...

For the cast of NBC's exiting drama "The West Wing," nostalgia came at a price the network was unwilling to pay. When NBC announced in January that it was canceling the political drama after seven seasons, it said the final episode in May would be accompanied by a retrospective on the series' history. Instead, NBC is airing a repeat of "The West Wing" pilot on Sunday prior to the final episode, where the Democrat portrayed by Jimmy Smits is inaugurated as the next president. NBC had no official comment on the switch of plans. However, the network couldn't reach an...

PHOENIX (AP) - Hispanic groups on Tuesday filed a lawsuit asking a federal court to block and declare unconstitutional voter identification requirements imposed under a 2004 voter-approved state law. Voter registration drives are being hindered by the law's mandate for registrants to submit documents proving their citizenship, the lawsuit said. Also, the requirement to show specific types of ID when voting at polling places could keep citizens from exercising their voting rights, the suit claimed. The suit was filed by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Chicanos Por La Causa, Friendly House, Valle del Sol, Southwest Voter Registration...

LOS ANGELES, May 9 -- The same coalition of labor leaders, Latino activists, Catholic priests and radio deejays responsible for massive pro-immigrant demonstrations in Los Angeles described a new coordinated campaign on Tuesday that they hope will register 1 million new voters before the November elections. Under the umbrella of the newly formed We Are America Alliance, organizers will make similar announcements in New York, Chicago and other cities, including a news conference in Washington on Wednesday. In Los Angeles, they gave details for the first time of a strategy voiced repeatedly during marches: "Ahora marchamos, mañana votamos" -- Today...