Free Republic

Former National Security Adviser John Bolton said on Monday’s broadcast of CNN’s “The Situation Room” that President Donald Trump has been a “useful idiot” in his dealing with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping, and North Korean Kim Jong-un. Anchor Wolf Blitzer asked, “Lieutenant Colonel Vindman also told The Atlantic magazine President Trump is in his words, Vladimir Putin is a useful idiot. Do you agree with that characterization?

In a national panic, Americans permitted executives to take power—to declare states of emergency and to implement lockdowns—and now those executives won’t give that power back. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia often noted that the primary safeguard of our constitutional liberties is the structure of our government. Every banana republic has a bill of rights, he once said, but the strength of the American system is the separation of powers. At the federal level, there are three separate, co-equal branches of government that must operate together for our representative republic to function properly, and this balance of power is mirrored...

CYNICISM GROWING OVER COVID EDICTS Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on why people are ignoring Covid-19 health warnings:Ideally, the public should follow the advice of public health experts in times of a pandemic. They should also listen to news reports, and abide by what their elected officials have to say. Court decisions also merit respect. But when doctors, journalists, politicians and judges act inconsistently, evincing a political bias, cynicism is not only predictable, it is warranted.On July 29, President Trump and his supporters gathered in Midland, Texas for an event. Most wore masks and practiced social distancing, but some...

Cardinal Zen contradicts Hong Kong cardinal: China’s new national security law will hurt freedom of religion 'We can see no benefit, no true religious freedom' from the Vatican's deal with China two years ago, Cardinal Zen says. HONG KONG, June 30, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) ― China has imposed a new security law on Hong Kong that Cardinal Joseph Zen believes will have a deleterious effect on religious freedom. In a Cantonese video produced by the “Catholic Faithful Watching the Hong Kong National Security Law,” Cardinal Zen, 88, said the national security law imposed upon Hong Kong by the mainland government cannot...

MAJOR VICTORY FOR RELIGIOUS LIBERTY: The Merits of the Case With the decision in Soos v. Cuomo, federal district Judge Gary L. Sharpe has removed religious gatherings from the virtual ghetto in which Governor Cuomo, his Attorney General and New York’s Mayor Bill de Blasio had placed them under Cuomo’s crazy-quilt scheme of executive orders by which he is enforcing his increasingly indefensible, and in many applications patently ridiculous, COVID-19 lockdown. Before this decision, religious gatherings alone were confined to 25% of building capacity while secular businesses, manufacturing facilities, nonprofits, office environments of all kinds and even restaurants with permitted...

Christopher Ferrara Represents Priests, Rabbis, Sues de Blasio, Cuomo I haven’t appeared on these pages for a while because, as Special Counsel to the Thomas More Society (TMS), my time has been consumed with filing and prosecuting major litigation against the Governors of New York and New Jersey and the Mayor of New York City over their tyrannical and increasingly ridiculous COVID-19 “lockdown” regimes of executive orders that micromanage literally every aspect of the lives of millions of people on the pretext of a virus that is going the way of all seasonal viral epidemics.Both suits involve an unusual alliance...

The Mask of the Beast As the Wuhan Virus “pandemic” wanes all over the world, following the path of all influenza-like illnesses, the globalist Left labors to contrive new justifications for maintaining the pop-up dictatorships that have arisen in every Western nation on the pretext of the virus. The problem is that the dictators in the Kingdom of COVID — virtually all of them on the Left, especially in the United States — are losing their grip on the masses because the people have had quite enough of their nonsensical regimes of arbitrary and inconsistent restrictions on normal life, as...

While most of the U.S. has begun to reopen, some parts of the country remain under burdensome restrictions that can’t be justified by either science or logic.Most of New York, Michigan and the Washington D.C. metro area remains under lockdown through at least Memorial Day weekend. Some beaches in Virginia and New York reopened over the weekend, but Democratic New York Mayor Bill de Blasio made it clear that swimming is forbidden, saying beachgoers who swim in the ocean will “be taken right out of the water.” “Obviously first and foremost, help make everyone remember don’t go in the water....

Gov. Jay Inslee announced today that Colorado Governor Jared Polis and Nevada Governor Steve Sisolak are joining Washington, Oregon and California in the Western States Pact -- a working group of Western state governors with a shared vision for modifying stay at home orders and fighting COVID-19.

[Catholic Caucus] Bishop Sacrifices Cleric to Caesar Pro-gay prelate backs cops who 'illegally' disrupted Mass SONCINO, Italy (ChurchMilitant.com) - An Italian bishop notorious for his hostility to the Latin Mass is censuring a courageous priest who continued celebrating Mass despite paramilitary police ordering him to stop.   Bishop Antonio Napolioni, an LGBT advocate, denounced Fr. Lino Viola on the Cremona diocese website for failing "to comply with the current emergency legislation that prohibits the celebration of the Mass in the presence of the faithful." Refusing to condemn Sunday's heavy-handed police raid on the church, Napolioni instead "underlined with regret" that the priest's behavior was "in contradiction with the civil and canonical...

[Catholic Caucus] Archbishop Laments About "Annoying Letters" There is discontent among Catholics because of the coronavirus Mass ban, Salzburg Archbishop Franz Lackner, Austria, admitted in his April 19 homily (video below). He reported that some become "aggressive," and write "annoying letters." But Lackner generously notified that "I accept this.” According to him, the Mass ban could be seen as an "empty tomb," and as "having fished the whole night without catching anything." This could contribute to "an increased longing for Jesus," he believes.

[Catholic Caucus] German bishop criticizes Catholics asking for Sacraments as ‘whining, belligerent’ Bishop Feige of Magdeburg offered an almost purely secular response to COVID-19 pandemic and its consequences for Catholics. MAGDEBURG, Germany, April 21, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) – German Bishop Gerhard Feige has offered an almost purely secular response to the coronavirus pandemic and the desire of Catholic faithful to attend Mass and receive the Eucharist. The bishop of Magdeburg asked, “And in the face of the hardships and suffering of those who have to fear for their own lives or the lives of relatives, who hardly see an economic perspective...

I'm starting a thread so that we can collect specific examples of Mayors, County Executives, and Governors exceeding their authority or otherwise improperly curtailing your freedom. This whole thing was a test, and many governors failed. Mayors certainly did. This thread is to pile up specific examples of these excesses so that the weight of them perhaps can be brought to bear on some of these . . . statesmen and women. I'll start: In my city the mayor decided to ban construction activity, and yet the city road crews were out in force getting the roads build (under city...

Ignored or buried in this global pandemic panic is the giant risk we have already taken not to the economy, as horrible as that is, but to our essential liberties. This is not theoretical anymore. Forget the President. Since when does every governor, mayor, county executive and dog catcher in the country have unlimited powers over peoples’ lives in a time of crisis? Since never, at least if the Constitution has any relevance anymore. But in this crisis, in which fear has driven public policy, they are all acting as though they do. And the question is whether the American...

Sen. Bernie Sanders has a long history of siding with America's enemies. From the very beginning of his political career, as mayor of Burlington, Vt., he fought to forge friendships with our foes.

[Catholic Caucus] Italian Priest Defies Mass Ban, Faces Prosecutor’s Rap Fr. Antonio Lunghi reported to police in coronavirus-hit Northern Italy ROME (ChurchMilitant.com) - An 88-year-old priest is being sanctioned for celebrating Sunday Mass as local authorities with the tacit consent of the church's hierarchy are using heavy-handed tactics to crack down on priests defying the ban on public Masses in coronavirus-hit parts of Northern Italy.  Father Antonio Lunghi was reported to the public prosecutor for offering Mass in the parish church of Castello d'Agogna, a village of just over a thousand inhabitants in the province of Pavia. Sources say that the ringing of...

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.), frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination, has come under fire for his inability to stop praising authoritarian communist regimes. "When dictatorships, whether it is the Chinese or the Cubans, do something good, you acknowledge that," Sanders said during the Democratic debate in South Carolina on Tuesday. The socialist septuagenarian has been particularly enamored of late with the "massive literacy program" implemented in Cuba under Fidel Castro, citing them as evidence that it's "unfair to simply say everything [in Cuba] is bad." Regrettably, the candidate's narrow focus on the educational achievements of his fellow communists is...

start at 6:24 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJcHn0aqGGI

Why did Evo Morales find such favour at the Vatican? Evo Morales, who fled to Mexico after resigning as president, may not be missed in Bolivia but his absence will be felt at the Vatican. One of the most curious aspects of the first Latin American pontificate is that Morales enjoyed the status he did. He was the Holy Father’s favourite leader in the Americas. Which was passing strange, as he was a tyrant. Morales, the first indigenous president of Bolivia, took office in 2006. A leftist populist, he was part of the socialist/ communist rise in Latin America:...

Over at PJ Media, my friend Roger L. Simon makes some sage observations about the proper conduct of foreign policy among great powers in general and, in particular, about the behavior of President Trump with respect to this important arena of human endeavor. Roger’s first point has two parts, a strophe, as it were, and an antistrophe. The strophe involves a patent moral dimension. We should not conceal—from others or from ourselves—the moral caliber of the leaders with whom we deal. Besides the United States, the world’s only other colossus is China. Not only does it preside over the second...