Free Republic

Mayor John Whitmire proposing a 5% cut across the board, except for fire and police departments.. Tax hikes and increased fees for parking and city services are likely .. The Mayor of Houston says the city is 'broke' after overspending for decades. Experts say the problem has existed for years, but COVID handouts from the federal government helped mask them. ... A tax hike through a bond is expected in November. ... The city has been struggling to make firefighters whole, from meeting its contractual obligation to their pension, to paying backpay and wage hikes that have been promised years...

Senate Democrats were left red-faced at a hearing on climate change as their 'expert witness' proved to be anything but when faced by veteran senator John Kennedy. Budget Chairman Sheldon Whitehouse invited Olympic skier Gus Schumacher to give his perspective as the committee considered the impact of climate change on the recreation industry. But it was all downhill for the 23-year-old as he struggled to answer basic questions and could not remember his tweets claiming the war on drugs was designed to jail black people, and calling for the police to be abolished. The excruciating exchange continued with Schumacher insisting...

Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy is inarguably the most witty person in the U.S. Senate. With a folksy quip or quotation always at the ready, Kennedy can effortlessly dismantle an opponent’s argument with his deadpan delivery while keeping the whole room in stitches. And the reason why his delivery hits so well is that he makes sense — the common kind, which has become almost extinct in these woke times. For example, discussing some of his Democratic colleagues who support transgender athletes in women’s sports on Fox News’ “The Story,” Kennedy once said, “One of my Democratic colleague’s witnesses testified that...

The results of the Louisiana Republican primary are in and Trump won the day. Louisiana is a ‘winner takes all’ state, so Trump also won every delegate. Trump won Louisiana in the general elections of 2016 and 2020. Former President Trump, the likely GOP nominee, has won the Louisiana Republican presidential primary, Decision Desk HQ projected. Trump went into the Louisiana primary with 1,636 pledged delegates and won all 47 delegates available Saturday. The state awards its delegates in a “winner-take-all” manner. The former president has already crossed the threshold needed to clinch the party’s nomination, setting up a rematch...

Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) gave us another amusing demonstration of his ability to humiliate Joe Biden’s unqualified judicial nominees during Wednesday's confirmation hearing. United States District Judge Nancy Maldonado of the Northern District of Illinois, who has been nominated by Joe Biden for a spot on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, had previously signed a brief supporting a ban on "assault weapons" in Illinois state courts in the 2010s, yet, when he asked her to define "assault weapons,” she couldn’t. “You said, ‘assault weapons may be banned because they’re extraordinarily dangerous and are not appropriate...

SHREVEPORT, La. (KTAL/KMSS) — A state representative will introduce a bill before the Louisiana Legislature that could establish gold and silver as the state’s currency. Generations have passed since legal tender was last created in the state of Louisiana, but Representative Raymond Crews, a pro-gun, pro-life, combat veteran Republican from District 8, is submitting HB 714 for consideration. If passed, the bill will once again establish gold and silver as currency in the state. Prior to its closure, the U.S. Mint in New Orleans stamped more than 427 million gold and silver coins. The last time it minted coins was...

Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry campaigned on a pro-Constitutional Carry platform last fall, and the former Attorney General wasted no time at all to fulfill his campaign promise. Just a little more than two weeks after a permitless carry bill was formally introduced in a special session on crime and public safety, Landry put pen to paper today and officially made concealed carry licenses optional in the Sportsmans Paradise. ""Today, we join 27 other states in passing Constitutional Carry. I promised the folks of Louisiana that I would champion Constitutional Carry into law, and within two months, I have honored that...

Louisiana will likely become the twenty-eighth state to restore Constitutional Carry (permitless carry). South Carolina is in the process of rectifying versions of a (permitless) Constitutional Carry bill in a conference committee. There is a good chance South Carolina will pass a bill acceptable to both the South Carolina House and Senate. Louisiana already passed a Constitutional Carry bill in 2021. The bill passed with veto-proof majorities, but Governor Bel Edwards (D) was able to sustain a veto with a combination of arm-twisting and promises.In 2023, Louisiana voters elected Governor Jeff Landry (R). Governor Landry has promised to sign a...

Kenner Police arrested a man accused of raping a juvenile and an armed robbery. Kenner PD say they began their investigation and were able to determine Angel Matias Castellanos-Orellana, 19, was the suspect in the rape of a 14-year-old girl. Castellanos-Orellana was arrested on Sunday, Feb. 25, after police responded to a call of an armed robbery in the 2600 block of Phoenix Street. The victim of the armed robbery was stabbed by Castellanos-Orellana and was transported to the local hospital, where they were in stable condition. Slidell PD say Castellanos-Orellana is an undocumented immigrant and is in the United...

During a Feb. 9 home game, every member of the Ragin’ Cajuns softball team stood to honor their country as the national anthem was played. Most of Cal’s players also stood to honor their country, but six of them took a knee. The action didn’t go over so well in the South. (Snip) Eventually, the shouting became so widespread that most of the verbal grief the Cal ladies were receiving was could not be made out.But the booing was heard loud and clear. It appeared as if all or most of those in attendance eventually realized what was happening and...

A Houma, Louisiana, homeowner heard strange noises shortly after 5 a.m. Tuesday and went downstairs to find an alleged intruder, whom he shot in the forehead. 4WWL reported the alleged intruder, 34-year-old Dex Herbert, fled after being shot. Police used a K9 to find Herbert a few blocks away holed up in another house. WGNO noted a second suspect, a female named Tye Corbitt, was discovered in the same house as Herbert. She was allegedly holding a handgun when police located her and she was also arrested.

Harvard philosophy professor Dr. Cornel West weighed in on the ongoing protests in reaction to George Floyd's death in police custody -- and the violence and destruction that have taken place in cities across the U.S. over the past several days. West noted that "black faces in high places" were not able to create needed change because they succumbed to the "capitalist economy" and "militarized nation-state." "The Black Lives Matter movement emerged under a black president, black attorney general, and black homeland security and they couldn't deliver," West said about the Obama administration during a CNN interview Friday night.

Sen. Bernie Sanders endorser and black radical Professor Cornel West explicitly advocated “violence that must flow from below” in a seldom seen video released in January 2015. The comments came in an address to a French institute dedicated to the work of writer Frantz Fanon, one of the thought leaders of the Black Power movement and an acknowledged influence on President Barack Obama.

Civil rights activist and philosopher Cornel West on Monday endorsed Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders for president. "I endorse Brother @BernieSanders because he is a long-distance runner with integrity in the struggle for justice for over 50 years," West tweeted late Monday night. West went on to say that it's time for Sanders' "prophetic voice to be heard across our crisis-ridden country." While West has been a long time supporter of Sanders (and "not a Hillary Clinton fan at all"), the endorsement comes weeks after Black Lives Matter activists disrupted a Sanders event in Seattle, taking the podium from the self...

Reacting to President Obama's use of the n-word on Marc Maron's podcast, (Princeton / Harvard Professor) Cornel West called him the first "niggerized" president in an appearance on CNN. West criticized Obama as "a person who is afraid and intimidated when it comes to putting a spotlight on white supremacy." "Too many black people are niggerized," West said Monday on CNN. "I would say the first black president has become the first niggerized black president." "A niggerized black person is a black person who is afraid and scared and intimidated when it comes to putting a spotlight on white supremacy...

Professor Cornel West appeared on CNN International this afternoon to give his take on Ferguson, and said right at the outset, “Ferguson signifies the end of the age of Obama. It’s a very sad end. We began with tremendous hope and we end with great despair.” He went on to cite a “Jim Crow criminal justice system” that doesn’t seek justice for young black and brown people, and said adamantly there is both a race and a class war going on against that group in America right now. CNNI anchor Hala Gorani asked West why he’s “so harsh” on the

Activist Cornel West says he was disappointed in President Obama's response to this week's shootings in of black men by police in Minnesota and Louisiana. "I thought it was weak," West said, according to The Washington Post. "He's always got to explain to white America how black people are feeling. Black people don't feel as if we're being treated unequally — it's a fact that we're being treated unequally. He sort of always has to serve in this translating role. That's how he rolls, but that's not how I roll." West said while Obama called Thursday's attacks on Dallas police...

A federal court ruled Thursday that Louisiana’s state House and Senate district maps dilute black voting strength in violation of the Voting Rights Act, and has ordered the maps to be redrawn. The ruling by U.S. District Chief Judge Shelly Dick came just weeks after Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry signed on Jan. 22 a bill creating a new congressional map that establishes a second majority-black district. The new map reshapes Louisiana’s 6th District, that of Rep. Garret Graves (R-La.), giving it a black population of around 56 percent and making it the state’s second majority-black district. In her ruling on...

Republican Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy stumped judicial nominee Robin M. Meriweather on Wednesday with a question about how the Court of Federal Claims works. President Joe Biden nominated Meriweather to be a judge on the Court of Federal Claims in early January. Kennedy first began his line of questioning by asking how many motions Meriweather has argued in the court of federal claims. Meriweather said she’s argued “hundreds of motions involving complex civil claims in numerous courts, the court of federal claims is not one of those courts.” “Okay, so the answer is zero?” Kennedy asked. “That is correct, senator.”...

The Louisiana Legislature adjourned from its special session on Friday, passing new congressional districts as required by a federal court order. Lawmakers also sent to Gov. Jeff Landry's desk for a possible signature a bill that would close the state's open primary system. Senate Bill 8, sponsored by Sen. Glen Womack, R-Madisonville, and preferred by Landry, would transform Republican U.S. Rep. Garret Graves’ 6th Congressional District into a second Black-majority district. The House favored it 86-16 and the Senate agreed to the lower chamber's changes 27-11. Lawmakers also passed an appropriation bill for SB8 that would provide $1.4 million to...