Free Republic

Determined to overcome a recent 9-0 US Supreme Court ruling against the state’s “buffer zones” surrounding abortion clinics, the Massachusetts Legislature enacted a new, more severe buffer zone statute. The penalty for violating the new buffer zone is a fine of up to $50,000 and incarceration of up to three years in jail. Governor Deval Patrick (D) praised “the courage of our legislators who have stood up against judicial tyranny. The right to an abortion is a human right. Women seeking to exercise this right should not be impeded by the unwanted messages of its opponents assaulting their ears on...

Crossing the Wrong Kind of Activists Friday evening About an hour after I first notice the Business Insider article, I check my email again from my phone. I see that the once laudatory President of the NYYRC has lost his nerve. He noticed the Business Insider article, and asked me to immediately remove the post from the site. The problem, he says, is the sentence that questions Obama’s relationship with the Emir of Qatar. (Which, I may add, linked not to anything sexual, but purely policy/political.) I’m not home when I receive this email. The article on BI quoted mine...

Outraged by the surging popularity of anti-Clinton books overtaking sales of Hillary Clinton’s State Department memoir, Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill offered his opinion that “in a just world such despicable nonsense would neither be allowed nor enabled.” The “despicable nonsense” books Merrill is saying ought to be censored include The First Family Detail by Ronald Kessler, Clinton, Inc. by Daniel Halper and Blood Feud by Ed Klein. “It is a travesty that books like these are outselling a historically important work by a major player in contemporary American history,” Merrill complained. “Their authors are comparative nobodies trying to get rich...

The IRS recently settled a case against it brought by the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF). As part of the settlement, the IRS has agreed to monitor church sermons for political content. The suit was filed because FFRF apparently did not like an event called Pulpit Freedom Sunday. Apparently once a year a number of pastors preach on political topics, presumably to rebel against the never enforced Federal prohibition on 501(c)(3) political activities. Technically it is illegal for tax exempt non-profits to engage in political activities, presumably this includes commenting on politics from the pulpit. To date there isn’t a...

Eric Holder, Attorney General, issued some stinging criticisms of Sarah Palin this weekend. Palin, a failed GOP vice presidential candidate and professional media provocateur, has recently been trying to garner the public’s attention again with a series of calls for the impeachment of President Barack Obama. “She wasn’t a particularly good vice presidential candidate,” Holder said. “She’s an even worse judge of who ought to be impeached and why.” The Attorney General’s comments are part of a larger assault on the stubborn gridlock caused by congressional republicans and their obstinate refusal to work with the president, even to the...

A High School in California has insisted that it has a right to ban the mention of God in a student’s graduation speech paradoxically claiming the Constitution gives them that power. In July 18-year-old Brooks Hamby refused to follow the schools ban order and thanked Jesus in his speech anyway sending the school into fits of apoplexy. A California school district says it will not apologize to a teenager who defied its orders and mentioned God in his graduation speech. Attorneys representing the Brawley Union High School District have written a 10-page letter defending the school’s right not only to...

Nevermind for the moment that I have been posting – for the last year or so – sourced, circumstantial evidence that the United States has a dirty deal with Qatar and the Muslim Brotherhood, and by extension, IS[IS]. Nevermind that I provided sourced evidence that NATO contracts with heroin smugglers for the Taliban, through the Pakistani National Logistics Cell. I was asked by the President of this club to self-censor, and remove the article. I received an email requesting this, but was not near a computer. By the time I got home, at which point I could respond to the...

It was just another high school graduation in one more streamer-bedecked gym, with all the usual trappings, the procession, the band, the beach balls, the decorated caps, the parents, the dignitaries. Except it wasn’t ordinary at all: it was as powerful a statement of faith from both a student and from the crowd itself as you will ever see.

Representative Henry Cuellar (D., Texas) hasn’t been shy about speaking out against the Obama administration’s handling of the border crisis, and that apparently earned him a phone call from the someone at the White House. “Yes, I have,” Cuellar said on Fox & Friends on Wednesday when asked if he had received a talking-to. “But let me just say that I’m more concerned not about who gets angry at me at the White House; I’m more concerned about my constituents who want to find a practical solution to this question that we’re facing down there at the border.” “Who called...

BBC report: “Impartiality in science coverage does not simply lie in reflecting a wide range of views, but depends on the varying degree of prominence (due weight) such views should be given.” LONDON, July 7 (UPI) --In an internal report released today by the BBC trust addressing the broadcaster's impartiality in science reporting and the gender balance of its contributors and presenters, the BBC has officially taken the position that it will be giving climate change deniers less airtime in an effort to provide more accurate reporting that better reflects the weighted view of the scientific community. When they set...

Malia Obama went to a famous L.A. restaurant Monday night -- a restaurant regularly frequented by celebs and paparazzi -- and when the White House found out a photog took her pic, they went into DEFCON 1 to KILL the photos. The 16-year-old went to Gjelina in Venice, CA with some friends. The photog got the pic as Malia walked out and then sent it to the AKM-GSI agency to sell. The agency posted the pic on its website for media outlets to purchase, but several hours later The First Lady's Office called AKM-GSI and asked them to please take...

Wholesale retailer Costco announced Tuesday evening that they have reversed a decision to remove conservative filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza’s bestselling book from stores, following an outcry from thousands of angry customers. “Costco is not a book store. Our book shelf space is very limited,” a statement posted on Facebook said. “We exercise discipline in the best utilization of that limited space based solely on what our members are buying. We can’t carry every title that our members are interested in reading. We are constantly monitoring book sales, and make decisions to pull books off the shelves frequently based on sales volume...

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<p>Back in the days when Vladimir Putin was first launching his crackdown on Russian mainstream media, killing and arresting reporters and publishers and seizing or shutting down publications, the Russia apologists rationalized his actions by claiming that the Russian Internet was free and always would be, and would counter any state propaganda.  It’s now clear that these statements were made simply ruse to induce the defenders of free speech to drop their guard and allow Putin to take over mainstream media unchallenged. It worked like a charm. And now we can clearly see how utterly false these statements were as Putin systematically exterminates the Runet.</p>

Facebook Flags Images of Pro-Life Father Loving Unborn Child as “Violent” by Carole Novielli | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com | 7/7/2014 A Black pro-life organization has had three Facebook images flagged as “graphic violence!”One of those images depicts a father loving his unborn child.Two of the three images are anything but violent. One is a 4th of July meme and the other says “We will not be silenced!”  LifeNews blogger Ryan Bomberger is an Emmy® Award-winning Creative Professional who founded The Radiance Foundation (TRF), a life-affirming 501(c)(3), along with his wife, Bethany. Working in conjunction with noted national civil rights...

Google's right to be forgotten system is woefully inadequate and censoring things it shouldn't. We decided to make a number of right to be forgotten claims to see what would happen. One request was to remove search listings for an automated online profile page that contained someone's name and Twitter handle. There are loads of websites that collate information about people and spew out automated profiles – 192.com and Peekyou.com being two examples. These websites might be annoying, but should they ever be censored from search results if all they are doing is collating publicly available information? None of the information...

Google has removed over 70,000 Internet links, amid accusations it is trying to promote critical reactions to a EU court ruling by targeting major media outlets. The US firm on Thursday (3 July) said it was getting around 1,000 “right to be forgotten” requests a day. The EU court in Luxembourg in May ruled the search giant should delete links on searches done on the basis of a person’s name if found “inadequate, irrelevant or no longer relevant.” …

The European Union's new law giving people a "right to be forgotten," which requires Google to remove links to information about them, is having exactly the effect its critics predicted: It is censoring the internet, giving new tools that help the rich and powerful (and ordinary folk) hide negative information about them, and letting criminals make their histories disappear. Exhibit A: Google was required to delete a link to this BBC article about Stan O'Neal, the former CEO of Merrill Lynch. O'Neal led the bank in the mid-2000s, a period when it became dangerously over-exposed to the looming mortgage crisis....

Sparked by fears that “many dedicated incumbents could be run out of office by well-financed campaigns by dangerously anti-government factions,” Senator Tom Udall (D-NM) and 42 Democratic co-sponsors have drafted a Constitutional Amendment that aims to curb free speech. “Right now as long as a person has enough money to afford it he can take out an ad, publish a broadside, or fund a TV spot against a sitting member of the Government,” Udall pointed out. “The men and women who have devoted their lives to serving the citizens of this great republic don’t deserve this kind of treatment.” Under...

Radio presenter Michael Smith dumped after comments about the Prophet Mohammed,” ABC News Australia, June 29, 2014 Sydney talkback radio host Michael Smith has been told he will no longer be filling in on 2GB after making controversial comments about the Prophet Mohammed. The former 2UE presenter made the comments on Thursday during his regular guest spot with 2GB host Ben Fordham. Smith was discussing the recent controversy over a talk the Festival of Dangerous Ideas had booked – and later cancelled – with a Muslim activist, titled Honour Killings Are Morally Justified. He compared the festival’s invitation to Uthman...