Free Republic

Thousands of Muslims gathered on Capitol Hill Friday for a massive Islamic service to pray “for the soul of America.” It was estimated that the nation’s capital hosted some 50,000 Muslims for a traditional Friday prayer ritual. Organizers said they are moderate Muslims and the “Day of Islamic Unity” was to “inspire a new generation of Muslims.” Their Web site states, “our time has come.” CBN News Terrorism Analyst Erick Stakelbeck was at the event. Click play for his analysis followed by a response from two Christian ministers on the mass gathering.

Taking the “Green Car Challenge” on Thursday night’s Jay Leno Show, a svelte Rush Limbaugh -- declining to don a helmet -- hopped into the electric Ford Focus on Leno’s track behind his NBC studio in Burbank, but instead of driving around the hanging cut outs of Al Gore and Ed Begley Jr., Limbaugh ran right into them. Then, to Leno’s cries of “Oh, c’mon!”, a delighted Limbaugh accepted the penalty against his time score and stopped, backed up and smashed into them again. Limbaugh’s maneuvering ensured a lower score (greater time) than the three previous contestants since Leno’s show...

New York Democratic Governor David Paterson is firing back at the Obama White House after reports the president does not want Paterson to run for election next year. The governor said: "They haven’t exactly been able to govern in the first year of their administration the way other administrations have."A Paterson aide is downplaying the remarks, saying the governor was not demeaning Obama’s record.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's decision to go to the Senate floor on Tuesday to call out the Obama administration for using the full power of a federal regulatory agency to suppress free speech -- specifically, to silence Humana's predictions about the impact of proposed ObamaCare cuts to the Medicare Advantage program -- led ABC, but not CBS or NBC, to air a story on the “gag order.” ABC's story began with a McConnell soundbite (“'Shut up,' the government says, 'don't communicate with your customers. Be quiet and get in line,'”), before reporter Jonathan Karl explained McConnell was referring to...

Facing the increasing likelihood of losses in the 2010 midterm congressional and gubernatorial elections, President Obama and his fellow Democrats are returning to a tried-and-true campaign strategy - run against former President George W. Bush. In speech after speech since taking office, Mr. Obama has pointed back to the problems he inherited from the Bush administration when he took office. And earlier this month, Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine catalogued a slew of perceived Bush failures to the delight of supporters. Already, Democratic gubernatorial candidates in Virginia and New Jersey are testing the strategy - so far, however, unsuccessfully....

Polls show shift toward GOP Across the country, amid the heat swell of the ongoing health care debate, many of the nation’s gray panthers have a new fire growing in their bellies, attending town halls, writing letters, and shifting the balance of political power as polls show them moving to the GOP. They are not just making themselves heard on their key issues of Medicare and insurance, but giving their legislators a piece of their mind that a way of life is slipping away. “They” are seniors like Jerry Johnson, a 75-year-old retired yacht salesman from Tallahassee, Fla. He says...

A brave bank customer in America has taken on a wannabee robber, and it’s all been filmed. Security video shows a man wearing a hood and mask demanding money from a row of cashiers. But as he tried to grab the cash, he was tackled from behind!

A street recently uncovered in the capital’s City of David was, metaphorically, “the last seam of independent Jews in Jerusalem,” Uri Goldflam of Shalhevet Education and Consulting said on Wednesday. The street connects the Jews who lost their Second Commonwealth independence in 70 CE, and the Jewish people today, Goldflam said. “The symbolism... After Jews hid beneath the stairs from the Romans, and now as a free people, Jews can again walk above the street. After 2,000 years, the steps are not silent anymore.” The one-to-two-meter wide section of a stepped street believed to be Jerusalem’s central thoroughfare during the...

ORANGEVALE, Calif. -- A 15-year-old girl who allegedly worships Satan was arrested Tuesday on suspicion of lighting a fire at her Orangevale church. The blaze occurred at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints at the corner of Hazel and Cherry avenues. Christian Pebbles of Sacramento Metropolitan Fire District said the teen made it clear why she started the blaze, which damaged church pews. “She hates the church and she worships the devil,” Pebbles said. “That’s the reason why.” Pebbles said the teen was taken into custody on suspicion of felony arson. “Well, you know, kids sometimes don’t always...

Iranian opposition leaders have reportedly been forced to flee violent rallies in Tehran - as the country’s president insisted the Holocaust was a lie. Tens of thousands of reformists in Tehran mounted their first protests since mid-July against the re-election of hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. They were defying warnings from top officials not to demonstrate during an annual rally in support of Palestinians. As Mr Ahmadinejad gave a speech at Tehran university declaring the Holocaust a “myth", protesters chanted “Death to the dictator” in nearby streets. Hardline supporters of the regime mounted counter-demonstrations, leading to bloody clashes between the two sides,...

A heckler was escorted by uniformed officers from President Obama’s speech to students at the University of Maryland College Park on Thursday after he briefly interrupted the president’s defense of his health care program. The young man, wearing a grey polo shirt and a beret, began yelling from his second-row seat at the university’s cavernous basketball arena. “Obama you’re a liar. Obama, your health care kills children. Abortion is murder,” he yelled. As the man was being escorted out, another man in the crowd grabbed his beret and tossed it, earning himself a police escort out of the arena. The...

Editor's Note: Audio for the video at right is available here. We have written often about Mark Lloyd, who has since his July 29 appointment been reveling in the position created just for him, "Chief Diversity Officer" at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). As we have repeatedly stated, Chief Diversity Officer Lloyd is virulently anti-capitalist, almost myopically racially fixated and exuberantly pro-regulation. (It will come as no surprise to those who follow the work of the Media Research Center to learn that Lloyd was also at one time, prior to attending law school, an Emmy Award-winning journalist and producer for...

HOUSTON -- A northwest Houston homeowner shot a burglar after he found him inside his home Monday morning, police told KPRC Local 2. Investigators said the homeowner, Mark Brown, returned to his house in the 8500 block of Norton at about 9:30 a.m. when he heard someone inside. Brown grabbed a shotgun hidden under a bed and found the burglar in a bedroom, police said. The homeowner fired several shots after the burglar rushed at him from a closet. The burglar was hit three times, according to investigators. The burglar, whose name was not released, died at the scene. Milton...

CHICAGO (Reuters) - A vaccine helped block the high felt by cocaine users in 38 percent of people who took it, U.S. researchers said on Monday, offering promise of a new approach to treating those addicted to the drug. The aim is to prevent cocaine’s rewarding effects -- the high -- in order to reduce cravings that trigger drug relapses. “The concept works,” Dr. Thomas Kosten of Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, whose study appears in the Archives of General Psychiatry, said in a statement. Cocaine molecules on their own are too small to draw the attention of...

The Republican who ousted the Democratic leader of the Senate in 2004 says Harry Reid finds himself in a similar predicament of representing a conservative-leaning state but leading a liberal party. Sen. John Thune made Senate history when he unseated Sen. Tom Daschle by exploiting the gap between Mr. Daschle’s interests in Washington and those of his home state of South Dakota. That’s exactly where Mr. Reid, the Senate majority leader, is now, he said. “In the case of Senator Daschle, he was leading a left-of-center caucus and representing a right-of-center state - it was very difficult to reconcile those...

BERKELEY, Calif., Oct. 3 (UPI) -- Officials in Berkeley, Calif., say they want men to stop having casual sex buggery in Aquatic Park. William Rogers, director of parks recreation and waterfront, said the fact the south side of the Berkeley park has become a well-known location for public sex buggery is hurting the city, The Oakland (Calif.) Tribune reported Saturday. “It’s ultimately a quality-of-life issue for residents, our staff and the wildlife being displaced,” Rogers said. “There are very good historic reasons why venues like this exist, but this is a public park, and it needs to get addressed.” Parks...

As a convert to Christianity from the general cultural agnosticism, one of the most important questions that Christianity answers for me is "what is my place in the world?". The Bible shows me the direct lineage I have in faith to great men like Abraham. Understanding that you are a man - you have a vertical relationship with God, the creator of the universe - your rights and responsibilities come from Him, not from some bureaucrat's desk - is a life-changing understanding. Most of the Church has drifted into religious behavior (particularly in Europe, but also in America) and society...

COPENHAGEN, Sept 30 (Reuters) - Tokyo governor Shintaro Ishihara warned on Wednesday the 2016 Olympics could be the last Games, with global warming an immediate threat to mankind. Tokyo is bidding to host the 2016 summer Olympics with Chicago, Rio de Janeiro and Madrid also in the running. The International Olympic Committee will elect the winning candidate during its session on Oct. 2 in the Danish capital. "It could be that the 2016 Games are the last Olympics in the history of mankind," Ishihara told reporters at a Tokyo 2016 press event ahead of the vote. "Global warming is getting...

Three suspects arrested in Sutter County after an attempted home burglary ran into the worst of luck - a homeowner with experience fighting off intruders. Two women and a man, all Sacramento residents, broke into an isolated house at about 2 p.m. Monday in the 3900 block of O’Banion Road west of Yuba City, according to Sheriff J. Paul Parker. The owner, David Massey, armed himself with a handgun and discovered one woman in his kitchen while the other woman and the man fled out the back door, Parker said. The suspects got into a Ford Explorer parked on the...

Pastor Lawrence Adams knows how to handle a gun after spending 25 years as a Detroit police officer, many at the department’s training academy. That experience helped Sunday evening when the retired lieutenant was confronted by a burglar at his Detroit church. When the intruder began swinging an object at him, Pastor Adams pulled a handgun and shot the man in the abdomen. Police say the pastor was not injured and is licensed to carry the handgun.