Free Republic

Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R-Fla.), who filed legislation banning bump stocks — which allows gun owners to turn semi-automatic weapons into automatic weapons, told Fox News’ “America’s Newsroom” on Tuesday that he supports raising the minimum age to buy semi-automatic weapons, like the one used in the Florida school shooting. “I also support raising the minimum age. If an 18-year-old, a 19-year-old can’t buy a handgun — oh, and by the way, they also can’t buy a beer at a restaurant — why can they buy these powerful long guns that are capable of inflicting so much damage as we saw...

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Setting aside Iran’s ballistic missile threats, support for terrorism and regional destabilization when crafting the nuclear deal was not a concession but “strategic thinking” on the part of the negotiators, former Secretary of State John Kerry said Sunday. As he has done frequently since leaving office, Kerry used the opportunity of the Munich Security Conference to defend, at length, the Obama administration’s 2015 nuclear deal which President Trump has threatened to abandon. Kerry said that the U.S. recognized that the agreement being negotiated was not dealing with other problematic issues, including human rights abuses, missiles, arms shipments, support for Hezbollah,...

Ten Democratic U.S. senators up for reelection in 2018 are in a special category, being from states that Donald Trump won in 2016. Previously, I catalogued five states where Democratic incumbents are considered most vulnerable: Indiana, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota and West Virginia. In the other five, Democratic incumbents are far less vulnerable and, in most instances, should feel confident of reelection. Let’s start with Ohio, which Dems definitely thought they had a decent chance to win in 2016. That proved to be totally wrong. Ohio is increasingly a Republican state; Trump carried it by 8 points, a healthy margin...

~ Freeper Canteen ~ --Canteen Mission Statement-- Showing support and boosting the morale ofour military and our allies' militaryand family members of the above.Honoring those who have served before. Today We Want You To Take The..... What Waffle Topping Are You Quiz Click HERE and take the quiz! To share your results, click on the slateblue "HTML" button, then copy and paste the code into a "Reply" box. Have fun! Please remember that The Canteen is here to support and entertain our troops and veterans and their families, and is family friendly.

Despite some of the toughest gun laws in the country, a former gun smuggler tells NBC Bay Area that illegal firearms will continue to flow into the state as long as guns can be purchased with relative ease in other parts of the country. In fact, the wide disparity in regulations creates a lucrative market for those willing to risk running guns from one state to another, he said. “I was out in a different state, and I just saw how easy it was for people from that state to just get a gun,” he said. The former gun trafficker...

(Nigel Farage at :04) .....is accused by a former Czechoslovakian Communist agent of holding a series of meetings during the 1980's at which information be it important or not was clearly exchanged. And how can be that Mr. Corbyn hasn't said a single word about it. His agent has written this off as being like a bad James Bond movie. How can it be that until Theresa May, the Prime Minister, questioned him and said he needed to be rather more open about this that organizations as worthy as the BBC were not even putting this on their website? Why...

Supreme Court justice says the #MeToo movement is important, but so is due process.Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg thinks colleges and universities are violating the due process rights of students facing sexual misconduct charges. The Atlantic's Jeffrey Rosen asked the Court's second-ever female justice for her thoughts on the #MeToo movement. Unsurprisingly, Ginsburg was happy about the increased public attention being paid to the problems of sexual harassment and gender-based inequality in the workplace. But she was also concerned about protecting the due process rights of the accused—particularly on college campuses: Rosen: What about due process for the accused?...

Baltimore’s highest-ever per capita homicide rate in 2017 also made it the deadliest big city in the country, USA Today reported Monday. Though official data from the FBI won’t be available until later in the year, USA Today reviewed the homicide rates in the nation’s 50 largest cities and Baltimore came out on top. The 342 homicides the city experienced in 2017 were a 17 percent increase over the prior year, and translated to a rate of 56 killed per 100,000 people. That easily outpaced New Orleans and Detroit, which both had about 40 killings per 100,000 people, according to...

Microsoft founder and billionaire Bill Gates says he should pay more in taxes and that the government should require other superwealthy people like him to contribute "significantly higher" amounts. "I need to pay higher taxes," Gates, who is worth over $90 billion, said in an interview with CNN's Fareed Zakaria on Sunday. "I've paid more taxes, over $10 billion, than anyone else, but the government should require the people in my position to pay significantly higher taxes," he said. Gates, the second richest man in the world after Amazon's Jeff Bezos, didn't mince his words when it came to the...

Dallas Mayor Pro Tem Dwaine Caraway on Monday urged the National Rifle Association to move its upcoming annual convention elsewhere in light of last week’s mass school shooting in Parkland, Florida. Mr. Caraway, who represents District 4 on the Dallas City Council, told reporters Monday that the NRA would be “met with opposition” if it continues with its annual meeting of members event, scheduled for May 3-6 at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center. “There will be marches and demonstrations should they come to Dallas,” Mr. Caraway said, local ABC affiliate WFAA reported.

HARRISONBURG, Va. (WHSV) — Employees of F&M Bank were surprised on Tuesday to learn they would receive a bonus, which the institution attributes to additional earnings expected as a result of the GOP tax plan. "This is an opportunity we haven't seen during my career, as far as cuts in corporate tax rates," said Executive Vice President Neil Hayslett. "Rather than just banking all that, so to speak, we wanted to share it with the employees." The GOP tax plan cut the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent. Those who work more than 30 hours a week...

"We're not compromising school safety. We're really saving the lives of kids," boasted Michaelle Valbrun-Pope, executive director of Student Support Initiatives for Broward County Public Schools, in August 2017. Valbrun-Pope was referring to what an article by Jeffrey Benzing in Public Source calls the "Broward County Solution." As Benzing relates, Broward County used to lead the state of Florida in sending students to the state's juvenile justice system. County leaders responded with a perfectly progressive solution: "lower arrests by not making arrests."Authorities agreed to treat twelve different misdemeanor offenses as school-related issues, not criminal ones. The results impressed the people...

In reality, Israel's gun policy is living proof of the arguments the American gun lobby has been making for years. Wednesday's horrific shooting in Florida has reignited the gun rights debate in the United States over the Second Amendment to the US Constitution, adopted in 1791, which states:: "... the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." ....After a particularly bloody Jerusalem shooting attack that killed four, then-Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan drastically changed the gun laws in order to significantly raise the number of armed civilians on the streets. Instantly, graduates of Special...

    ~The FReeper Canteen Presents~ Road Trip: Pine Bluff Arsenal, ArkansasThe Pine Bluff Arsenal (PBA) is a United States Army installation located in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. PBA is one of the six Army installations in the United States which stores chemical weapons. PBA supplies specialized production, storage, maintenance and distribution of readiness products, and delivers technical services to the Armed Forces and Homeland Security. PBA also designs, manufactures and refurbishes smoke, riot control, and incendiary munitions, as well as chemical/biological defense operations items. It serves as a technology center for illuminating and infrared munitions and is also the...

"Here’s an image from Kentucky, this morning. To all American gun owners, this is a wakeup call. They’re coming after us. Like and share to spread the word."

A poll published on Monday by the newspaper Bild put the Alternative for Germany (AfD) at 16 percent, showing that they are currently more popular than the Social Democrats (SPD). The poll, conducted by INSA, put the AfD at 16 percent, just ahead of the SPD at 15.5 percent. The poll marks the lowest support ever achieved by the SPD, traditionally one of the two major parties of German politics. According to the poll, Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats are the most popular party in the country and would secure 32 percent of the vote were elections to be held tomorrow....

Prop. 57, approved by voters in 2016, promised to reduce the state's overcrowded prisons by expanding parole eligibility for nonviolent criminals, and by encouraging inmates to take part in rehabilitation, therapy, and vocational programs. The cases include those of Alfredo "Freddy" Casillas, who took part in the murder of a rival gang member in Burbank, and Luis Steven Flores, who went to prison for assault with a deadly weapon with a semi-automatic firearm, and served time for battery on a peace officer, as well as battery on another inmate. They, along with other prisoners with violent histories, became eligible for...

The star of 'The Marriage of Maria Braun' and 'Lilli Marleen' says the anti-harassment movement has led to "people touching each other less” and recalls being slapped by director Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Iconic German actress Hanna Schygulla (The Marriage of Maria Braun, Lilli Marleen) has become the latest prominent figure to push back against the #MeToo movement. Schygulla revealed that she herself had been the victim of violence while shooting a movie with late German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder, but appeared to side with #MeToo critics. “When I started making films, Fassbinder slapped me in the face and said I...

[JURIST] The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) released two [Goodlatte, PDF] letters [Nunes, PDF] on Thursday stating that it would consider requests from two Congressional Representatives to release the hearing transcripts which caused former Trump advisor Carter Page to be put under surveillance. Representative Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) wrote to the FISC in January requesting the transcripts, and Representative Devin Nunes (R-CA) [official websites] sent a second letter at the beginning of February. Judge Rosemary Collyer wrote in her response that "the Court has never previously received a request from Congress for the contents of any specific FISA application or order,...