Free Republic

A heavy police presence in Mountain View Tuesday blocked roads for a controversial foreign dignitary. Police late Tuesday guided drivers around the IFES Portuguese Hall, where Dutch politician Geert Wilders spoke to the Conservative Forum of Silicon Valley. Wilders is widely known for his criticism of Islam, and has repeatedly called for the Quran to be banned in the Netherlands. Wilders is often heavily guarded by private guards, but Mountain View Police were on hand for Tuesday's event. This comes after two gunman fired shots outside an event in Texas earlier this year, where a contest was held to draw...

We've seen protests all across the country after police officers have been accused of shooting people who aren't armed. An activist critical of police undergoes use of force scenarios... YOUTUBE VIDEO LINK

Bowing to pressure from within their party, Democrats in the Legislature on Monday abandoned an attempt to repeal California’s voter-approved ban on affirmative action in the state’s higher education system. Assembly Speaker John Perez said he does not have enough support to place the constitutional amendment before voters in November. Instead, he said lawmakers will form a task force to study the issue of access in higher education. California voters passed Proposition 209 in 1996, banning the use of race and ethnicity in public university admissions, state hiring and contracting. The amendment, SCA5, was initiated to address the drop-off in...

From the racial makeup of University of California classrooms to the number of minority contractors working on BART projects, California's 17-year ban on affirmative action programs has indelibly marked the nation's largest state. But now the debate over whether that experiment has caused more harm than good will take a back seat to a larger national question: Are laws such as California's affirmative-action ban, Proposition 209, unconstitutional, and should be overturned? On Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in a challenge to Michigan's Proposal 2, a 2006 voter-approved law that mirrored Proposition 209 by barring the use of...

Our investigators visited the homes and offices of legislative sponsors of the California Homeless Bill of Rights to find they're not interested in practicing what they preach. Their investigative reward? Homeland Security threatening their fourth amendment rights. Video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1R_En28jaeM

City of Dearborn Apologizes for Arresting Christians at 2010 Arab Festival; Settlement Reached in Lawsuit In June of 2010, a few of us were on our way out of Dearborn's annual Arab International Festival, when some young Muslims began asking us questions, which we were happy to answer. Here's unedited footage of our last 20 minutes or so at the festival: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkfVAeG3rn4 Nearly three years later, thanks to our lawyers Robert Muise and David Yerushalmi, the City of Dearborn has apologized for arresting us. Detroit, Michigan (May 6, 2013) — After more than two years of intense motion practice and...

After all the fuss about an Oregon baker who refused to make a wedding cake for a lesbian couple, the state says there is "not an investigation into this issue." The dispute involves a Portland woman, her fiancee and fiancee's mother. In February, the mom and one of the brides-to-be went to Sweet Cakes by Melissa in Gresham to order a wedding cake. Aaron Klein, who runs the bakery with his wife, says same-sex marriage goes against his Christian faith so he would not make a wedding cake for the couple. After that, the small bakery gained international attention with...

(snip) ...in 2009, when unemployment hit a 70-year high for the state, the California State University-Sacramento study came out. DeVore said the study laid out how California’s energy policy led to the highest gasoline tax and the costliest electricity in the country. No wonder, he said, that “people will move out of California and go to Texas.” DeVore said even Canadians have figured out how to profit off the state’s regulatory culture. “California imports a lot of electricity, but it has to be green,” said DeVore. “BC Power, in British Columbia, which got caught manipulating energy costs in 2001, exports...

Lee Rodgers, Rest in Peace Written by Melanie Morgan I really don't want to write about this, I don't want to think about this, and I don't want it to be true. Lee Rodgers, friend and mentor, is dead. I owe everything that I have in my professional life to Lee Rodgers, who took me under his wing back in 1988 in the halycon days of KGO Radio. Lee was a nighttime talk show host, a former rock and roll DJ, hired by my husband Jack Swanson. He hired him twice, in fact. "Lee Rodgers was a real radio guy....

WWE is saddened to learn of the passing of Brad Armstrong, 51, one of four sons of “Bullet” Bob Armstrong. Brad Armstrong last participated in the ring for the ECW brand in 2006. WWE understands that Brad saw his physician last week for a medical issue and was found unresponsive this morning. WWE extends its sincerest condolences to the entire Armstrong family.

Prop 30: Your Wallet or Your Kids. NO Either approve $36 billion in higher sales and income taxes or else Gov. Brown threatens to shoot the schools. Don't worry, the income taxes are only on the "very wealthy," but it turns out the "very wealthy" include many small businesses filing under sub-chapter S, meaning lower wages, higher prices and fewer jobs. California already has one of the highest overall tax burdens in the country and yet has just approved a budget to spend $8 billion dollars more than it's taking in. Moral of the story: it's the spending stupid. Prop...

WWE® and John Cena® Go Pink with Susan G. Komen for the Cure® STAMFORD, Conn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- WWE (WWE) today announced a partnership with Susan G. Komen for the Cure featuring WWE Superstar John Cena co-branded, pink and black ring gear, which will be debuted at tonight’s Night of Champions pay-per-view event in Boston. Cena will wear the Special Edition gear through October in honor of breast cancer awareness month. Fans can purchase the merchandise, including co-branded hats, t-shirts, headbands and wristbands, at live events and online at WWEShop.com, and WWE will donate 100 percent of its profits (at least 30...

Wrestling legend and World Wrestling Entertainment announcer Jerry "The King" Lawler has been hospitalized after collapsing during a show in Montreal on Monday night, the show's producers announced. "Lawler suffered a heart attack while commentating during last night's broadcast of Monday Night Raw in Montreal," a statement on WWE's website said. "We are hopeful Jerry makes a full recovery and returns to WWE in the near future. Our thoughts are with Jerry and his family." Lawler passed out at ringside and was given CPR in the locker room of the arena before being taken to a hospital, co-host Michael Cole...

Chicken was in high demand Thursday in the Bay Area, as San Jose's first Chick-fil-A restaurant celebrated its grand opening. Located on the corner of First Street and Headquarters Drive, the store marks the fast food chain's first stand-alone restaurant in the Silicon Valley. Before this one, the closest Chick-fil-A was in Fairfield, and many years ago there was a location in the Sunnyvale Town Center shopping center. The chain intends to open another Bay Area franchise in Walnut Creek in October. Not even a sprinkle of protesters, rallying against Chick-fil-A CEO Dan Cathy's recent anti-gay marriage statements, could darken...

November 2012 Statewide Ballot Measures Proposition 30 Initiative Constitutional Amendment 1578. (12-0009) - Final Random Sample Update - 06/20/12 Temporary Taxes to Fund Education. Guaranteed Local Public Safety Funding. Initiative Constitutional Amendment. Qualified: 06/20/12 Proponent: Thomas A. Willis c/o Karen Getman (510) 346-6200 Increases personal income tax on annual earnings over $250,000 for seven years. Increases sales and use tax by ¼ cent for four years. Allocates temporary tax revenues 89 percent to K-12 schools and 11 percent to community colleges. Bars use of funds for administrative costs, but provides local school governing boards discretion to decide, in open meetings...

Bruce McPherson said Tuesday he is dropping his GOP party affiliation and listing no preference, joining a growing bloc of California voters who've renounced party identification... (snip) An abortion rights supporter who's willing to discuss new taxes, McPherson was known as a moderate during his 11 years in the Legislature. During the years, he has endorsed local Democrats such as Fred Keeley, Henry Mello and Sam Farr. (snip) McPherson said he did not consider registering as a Democrat. "No, because I think the far left of the Democrats is in the same situation as the far right of the Republican...

Diverse appointments to superior, appeals courts Gov. Jerry Brown appointed a former State Bar leader to a judgeship in Contra Costa County on Friday. He also nominated a former San Francisco school board attorney as the first Latino on the state appeals court in San Jose, and chose a Los Angeles prosecutor as California's first Muslim judge... (snip) Halim Dhanidina, 39, of Los Angeles to the Los Angeles County Superior Court. Dhanidina has been a deputy district attorney since 1998 and will be the first Muslim on the bench in California, said Aziza Hasan of the Muslim Public Affairs Council....

STAMFORD, CONNECTICUT, May 9, 2012, (LifeSiteNews.com) – WWE wrestling superstar C.M. Punk strikes an aggressive pose inside the ring, but it seems he saved his hardest blows for supporters of the traditional family. On Monday, the grappler told his Twitter followers he opposed North Carolina’s constitutional amendment to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman, which passed in a landslide on Tuesday. One of his followers responded, “Man was meant for woman, and even the thought of homo’s make me sick.” Punk then replied, “Kill yourself.” He told another supporter of the nuclear family to “drink...

Let’s take a page from those Tennessee firemen we heard about a few times last year – the ones who stood idly by as houses burned to the ground because their owners had refused to pay a measly $75 fee. We can apply this same logic to climate change. We know who the active denialists are – not the people who buy the lies, mind you, but the people who create the lies. Let’s start keeping track of them now, and when the famines come, let’s make them pay. Let’s let their houses burn until the innocent are rescued*. Let’s...

California Assemblyman Nathan Fletcher said he's leaving the Republican Party to become an independent barely two months before voters in the nation's eighth-largest city decide whether to elect him mayor. The move may enliven an already contested race that features a crowded Republican field in a city where Democrats hold a clear advantage in voter registration. Fletcher has lagged in recent polls that show a large number of undecided voters. Fletcher, 35, has broken ranks with Republicans several times since joining the Assembly in 2009 and said he struggled with his party affiliation during his two terms in Sacramento. "In...