Free Republic

Today's selection -- from Collapse of Antiquity by Michael Hudson. One of the famed political conflicts of ancient Rome was between Lucius Sirgius Catiline and Marcus Tullius Cicero. According to the historian and economist Michael Hudson, that conflict centered on the oppressive debts held by Romans, Catiline’s intention to cancel those debts, and Cicero’s opposition to debt cancellation. According to the World History Encyclopedia: “The year 63 BCE saw Rome as a city of almost one million residents, governing an empire that ranged from Hispania in the west to Syria in Middle East and from Gaul in the north to...

CHICAGO — A Cicero woman who helped numerous undocumented immigrants from Guatemala illegally enter the United States pleaded guilty today to a federal labor trafficking charge.CONCEPCION MALINEK, 50, pleaded guilty to one count of labor trafficking.  The charge is punishable by up to 20 years in federal prison.  U.S. District Judge Edmond E. Chang set sentencing for Oct. 20, 2020, at 3:00 p.m.The guilty plea was announced by John R. Lausch, Jr., United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois; and Emmerson Buie, Jr., Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago office of the FBI.  Valuable assistance was provided by...

It was a chaotic afternoon in Cicero Monday. CBS 2 learned two bystanders were shot and killed by what police are calling outside agitators near 50th Avenue and Cermak Road. It was one of several incidents in Cicero. Two men were hauled out by police after they were found hiding in the back of a looted liquor store. Surveillance video showed at least a dozen looters ransacking the store. Viewing the video, you will quickly lose count of how many looters were seen busting into El Patron Liquor Store in Cicero. They jumped the counter, trashed display cases, and broke...

Reason #7: RELIGION Saint Augustine in his Confessions tells us that after many years of wandering in the desert of indecision, it was Cicero who led him to Christ. Cicero’s Hortensius set him on the path to Christian conversion by implanting in him a longing for the immortality of wisdom. The text of Hortensius did not make it to the modern world and thus is probably the most famous lost treatise in world literature. Wouldn’t we all love to read this work that St. Augustine praises so highly? Well, I have read a lot of Cicero and, like most writers,...

Samantha | Age 22 | Old Bridge, New Jersey | Last Voted: 2016 2016 was such a disillusioning experience. Going into the election, I was so proud to be in this country at this moment, so proud to be voting for Hillary Clinton. I had my Clinton sweatshirt on all day. I was on Twitter telling people that if they didn’t vote they were dead to me — like the whole thing. Watching the results come in, it was just disheartening. My faith in the whole system was crushed pretty quickly. That was the first general election I could vote...

Former CIA Director John Brennan Quotes Cicero While DOJ Expands IG FISA Abuse Investigation…

John Brennan just recently tweeted“"Any man can make mistakes, but only an idiot persists in his error.” Marcus Tullius Cicero, (106-43 BC)" Marcus tullius Cicero was declared an enemy of the Roman Empire and was then executed. Is John Brennan making veiled threats?

[1] I. Quo usque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra? quam diu etiam furor iste tuus nos eludet? quem ad finem sese effrenata iactabit audacia? Nihilne te nocturnum praesidium Palati, nihil urbis vigiliae, nihil timor populi, nihil concursus bonorum omnium, nihil hic munitissimus habendi senatus locus, nihil horum ora voltusque moverunt? Patere tua consilia non sentis, constrictam iam horum omnium scientia teneri coniurationem tuam non vides? Quid proxima, quid superiore nocte egeris, ubi fueris, quos convocaveris, quid consilii ceperis, quem nostrum ignorare arbitraris? [2] O tempora, o mores! Senatus haec intellegit. Consul videt; hic tamen vivit. Vivit? immo vero etiam in...

You can imagine my shock as a Catholic when I read a passage from the father of the modern, pro-abortion population control movement where he denounces faithful Catholics as “terrorist[s].”  Here is what pro-abort population controller Dr. Paul Ehrlich in his 2014 book Hope on Earth: A Conversation:  “Thus you have ‘God-fearing’ people trying to maintain their rigid positions, especially trying to control the lives of women. I consider that their rigid opposition to something so basic, so critical to the future of life on Earth, as controlling reproduction to be just as unethical as any major affront to the...

In his Republic, Cicero produced one of history's staunchest defenses for a career in politics. Composed in the late 50s B.C. while the Roman republic enjoyed a period of precarious stability under the triumvirate of Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus, and styled after the famous work of Plato, the Republic first addressed the claims of those who want nothing to do with governing the state, and would prefer a quiet life unsullied by politics. Politicians, after all, tend to be "worthless," according to these critics. Moreover, who would want to try to rule a capricious citizenry, or subject themselves to "foul...

RTX22LO4 Why does Ted Cruz, left, make so many references to Cicero, right? And what does that mean for his hopes in the 2016 presidential election? REUTERS U.S.TED CRUZCICERO Ted Cruz's onstage appearance with Sean Hannity was going well. It was February 2015, and Cruz, like all the other GOP hopefuls, was at the Conservative Political Action Conference near Washington, D.C., being lobbed softballs by the Fox News talking head. Hannity was playing a little word game. "I'm going to ask you about three people, first words that come to your mind," Hannity said. "Barack Hussein Obama," Hannity prompted. Cruz...

<p>A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within”, stated Marcus Tullius Cicero.</p>

Thursday on the Senate floor Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) used the words of philosopher and politician Marcus Cicero who advocated to return to a Republican government after the Roman Emperor Julius Caesar died. Cruz addressed the speech to President Obama using the words of Cicero saying: The words of Cicero powerfully relevant 2,077 years later. When, President Obama, do you mean to cease abusing our patience? How long is that madness of yours still to mock us? When is there to be an end to that unbridled audacity of yours swaggering about as it does now? Do not the nightly...

The Wisdom of Cicero is Timeless

Sen. Ted Cruz took to the Senate floor Thursday to deliver a slightly changed version of a very old speech as a form of protest against President Obama's planned executive action on immigration. The Texas Republican, in a four-minute address, gave a gently edited version of Cicero's first oration against Cataline. Obama was substituted for Cataline, the U.S./Mexico border was swapped in for the Palatine Hill, "women" was added to references to men, "pen and phone" made an appearance, "execution" was changed to "defeat" and the IRS scandal showed up near the end. The video is above, and the text...

Exact Quote;Traitor: "A Nation Can Survive It's Fools, and Even the Ambitious, But it Can Not Survive Treason From Within"

A man who was charged with shooting a 15-year-old girl and her mother outside of their Romeoville home this week had threatened to rape and kidnap the girl last year and was ordered by a judge to stay away from them, according to court documents. Erick M. Maya, 23, of the 5600 block of Park Avenue in Cicero was charged with two counts of attempted murder, two counts of aggravated battery with a firearm and one count of unlawful use of a weapon by a felon, said Will County State’s Attorney James Glasgow. Maya had a previous dating relationship with...

Charges have been filed in the death of a Cicero restaurant owner who was shot in the chest after he confronted a robber who was holding a gun to his wife's head near the cash register, police said this morning. Matthew A. Brown-Turner, 25, has been charged with murder and attempted armed robbery in the fatal shooting of Giovanni Donancricchia, 64, early Thursday morning. He is due in bond court this morning.

You’re probably aware that the Supreme Court is hearing cases on the constitutionality of laws defining marriage as a relationship between a man and a woman. You’ve probably also heard talking heads insist that public opinion has shifted, that same-sex marriage is inevitable, and 50 years from now everyone will wonder what the big deal was. This is for those of you who may be a bit unsettled by all of it. You’re not crazy. The world may be going mad, but not for the first time. In the words of the apostle Paul, “professing to be wise they became...

The Vatican Library is losing its walls. Its 89,000 historic manuscripts are being made available online for access by scholars world-wide courtesy of EMC. The library, properly known as the Vatican Apostolic Library, is located in the Vatican City and is one of the oldest libraries in the world, established formally in 1475 but thought to have functioned for a long time before that. The library's function is to be a resource for scholars researching history, law, philosophy, science and theology.The Abyss of Hell by Sandro Botticelli in the Vatican Library It stores some 89,000 manuscripts, including 8,900 incunabula, manuscripts...