Free Republic

[Catholic Caucus] The LGBT Political Campaign Behind Pope Francis' Election By David Martin  With theologians and bishops aghast over what some are calling ‘the most terrible schism the world has ever seen,’ it behooves the Catholic hierarchy to take a closer look at the 2013 papal election since it appears to have raised to the Chair of Peter “a man, not canonically elected.”  To recap, on the eve of the 2013 conclave, Cardinal Óscar Rodríguez Maradiaga who was one of the key kingmakers for the papal election was busily on the phone with cardinal electors from the Honduran embassy in Rome. His frenzied...

Former mob boss Michael Franzese tells the story of his wealthy and wily past as well as his powerful transformation to a motivator with a strong anti-crime message.

FULL TITLE: 'The best horse did NOT win!' Trump blasts controversial Kentucky Derby reversal as 'political correctness' after winning horse is disqualified for 'impeding' another's path President Donald Trump added his outrage on sunday to the national dustup over Saturday's controversial Kentuky Derby finish, complaining that disqualifying the apparent winning horse for interfering with another is a sign of 'political correctness' run amok. 'The Kentuky [sic] Derby decision was not a good one. It was a rough and tumble race on a wet and sloppy track, actually, a beautiful thing to watch,' Trump wrote on Twitter. 'Only in these days...

Today’s long-awaited announcement that former Vice President Joe Biden is running for president is expected to instantly catapult Lunch Bucket Joe to front-runner status in a crowded Democrat primary field. For weeks, polls have shown the 76-year-old serial groper holding steady as the 2020 favorite of more than a quarter of his party’s voters. CNBC’s Christina Wilkie reports a Monmouth University poll of Democrats nationwide, released Tuesday, shows Biden leads the rest of the party’s field, with 27% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning voters saying they would support him for the Democratic nomination. In the same poll a month ago, Biden...

[Catholic Caucus] Chicago’s Homomafia Chicago in the 1920s — think Al Capone, gangsters in dapper suits, illegal gambling, bootleg liquor and Tommy guns. It turns out that in nearly 100 years, not much has changed in the Windy City except the new gangsters wear priests' collars and homosexuality and sex abuse are the currency and trade of this homomafia with Cdl. Blase Cupich as their don. He's becoming a central figure in the American Church despite the warnings of Abp. Carlo Maria Viganò, who maintains his appointment as archbishop of Chicago was personally orchestrated by homosexual-abuser Theodore McCarrick. He rightly earned scorn for...

Longtime Colombo under-boss John “Sonny” Franzese is the living embodiment of the ultimate mob rule — bragging in an interview about refusing to rat despite it making him the oldest federal prisoner at the age of 100. Wheelchair-bound Franzese, now 102 and living in a nursing home, told Newsday about his life of crime — and how he stuck to the “Goodfellas” adage of “Never rat on your friends, and always keep your mouth shut” despite facing 50 years behind bars.

[Catholic Caucus] Exclusive: Inside the election of Pope Francis he following excerpts are drawn from The Election of Pope Francis: An Inside Account of the Conclave That Changed History (Orbis Books, 2019), by Gerard O’Connell, America’s Vatican correspondent. We join O’Connell’s tale on March 13, after the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI on Feb. 28, 2013, and the calling of a conclave to elect his successor. Those 115 cardinals eligible to vote in a papal conclave have gathered in Rome and have been sequestered under heavy security in the Sistine Chapel inside the Vatican, where they will conduct secret votes...

The construction worker charged in the murder of Gambino godfather Francesco “Franky Boy” Cali seemed unhinged leading up to the brazen hit, friends told The Post on Tuesday. Anthony Comello — who showed up for his first court appearance Monday with “MAGA forever” and references to the conservative QAnon movement scrawled on his hand — managed the Instagram account “realamericasvoice_” which is filled with anti-Democrat and pro-President Trump posts, said the pals, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Suspected mob boss killer tried to make a citizen's arrest of de Blasio “He had a secret Instagram. He used to post...

Anthony Comello, the 24-year-old arrested in New Jersey Saturday for allegedly gunning down a mob boss in Staten Island last week, will return to New York to face the murder charge against him. Comello waived his extradition rights Monday during a hearing in Ocean County Superior Court before Judge Wendel Daniels. He is expected to appear in court in Staten Island next Monday, March 25. “He willingly, knowingly and voluntarily returns to New York to face these charges,” Brian Neary, a New Jersey attorney representing Comello Monday, told reporters after the hearing. He described Comello, who said only “yes, sir”...

Lisa Page, a key cog in the Obama Administration’s conspiracy to derail Trump’s campaign and sabotage him after he won the election, testified to Congress that it was Attorney General Loretta Lynch who ordered FBI Director James Comey to exonerate Hillary Clinton for mishandling classified government communications. For her part, Lynch denied that she explicitly ordered Comey to do anything. “I just passed on the message given to me by Bill Clinton in our tarmac meeting. He said that Hillary really wanted to be president and that anyone who messed that up would regret it, possibly to the point of...

The Colombo family boss Carmine "The Snake" Persico died last week. The last tie to the 'Golden Age' of the mafia is gone. And maybe so is the Italian mob's stranglehold on the American imagination. “Michael Corleone says hello.” That line from an iconic scene in “The Godfather 2” is uttered just before an attempted hit on the character Frank Pantageli. The garroting in a bar is broken up by a beat cop who just happens to walk in. The incident is not entirely fiction. In August 1961, Carmine “the Snake” Persico tried to take out Larry Gallo in a...

The Gottis are back in town — and the bloodshed could just be beginning. Police are taking a serious look at whether Gambino crime family boss Francesco “Franky Boy” Cali was whacked in an internal war for control — with one of John Gotti’s brothers and a key associate fresh out of prison and possibly looking to seize power, law enforcement sources told The Post on Thursday. While the motive for the Wednesday hit on Cali outside his Staten Island home remains under investigation, cops were probing whether it was part of a brewing American-vs.-Sicilian power struggle — with Gene...

A man said by federal prosecutors to have been a top leader of New York's notorious Gambino crime family was shot and killed Wednesday on Staten Island. Francesco "Franky Boy" Cali, 53, was found with multiple gunshot wounds to his body at his home in the borough's Todt Hill section just after 9 p.m.

Menacing-looking vultures are taking over a town in South Jersey and residents want them to buzz off. Hordes of vultures have been hanging around in Mount Holly. Residents want them gone but not everybody feels that way as environmentalists say the vultures are an important part of the ecosystem.

Jersey's real-life Sopranos By Ted Sherman | Posted February 10, 2019 at 11:30 AM | Updated February 10, 2019 at 06:11 PM 0 shares 56 Comments (Dwight J. Johnson | Star-Ledger file photo) This is an updated version of a post that was originally published Aug. 13, 2015. David Chase, who brought to life the fictional tale of a New Jersey crime family in “The Sopranos,” has a new story to tell. Said to be a prequel to his HBO series of mob boss Tony Soprano, “The Many Saints of Newark," is set in the 1960s, during the Newark riots....

Carmine J. Persico, the unpredictable leader of the New York-based Colombo crime family who the authorities believe had a strong hand in the assassinations of the mob bosses Albert Anastasia and Joey Gallo, died a prisoner on Thursday in a hospital in Durham, N.C. He was 85. His lawyer, Benson Weintraub, confirmed the death, at Duke University Medical Center, but said he did not know the cause. Mr. Persico was serving a combined 139-year sentence at a nearby federal prison, in Butner, N.C. Mr. Weintraub had been representing Mr. Persico in litigation against the Bureau of Prisons. Mr. Persico contended...

Witness to the Mob is a made-for-TV film which premiered on Sunday, May 10 (1998), and concluded on Monday, May 11. Based on a true story, the film follows the rise of Sammy Gravano in ranks in the Gambino crime family, one of the “Five Families” of the New York Cosa Nostra that dominates organized crime activities in New York City, his turning to government witness in the legal trials of John Gotti and his life in federal Witness Protection Program.The film is based on the book about Gravano, titled Underboss, written by Peter Maas.CastNicholas Turturro – Sammy Gravano Tom...

[Catholic Caucus] Francis Allies Reveal Their Plans for Revolutionary Change On March 3, 2013, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor—an alumnus of the St. Gallen mafia—met with then-Cardinal Bergoglio over risotto and wine. It was the evening before the pre-conclave general congregations—as Murphy-O’Connor recalls in his memoirs—and the old friends were discussing “the sort of person we felt the cardinals should elect.”A day earlier, an anonymous cardinal had been quoted saying, “Four years of Bergoglio would be enough to change things.” Later, Murphy-O’Connor would utter that same phrase, adding: “But pray to God we have him for much longer than that.”Murphy-O’Connor was, as...

Gore's, Talbott's Red Russian roots How they 'Hammer'-ed out Washington-Moscow policy Posted: October 3, 2000 Loutchansky's name surfaced again last year, when the Washington Post revealed that first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton's two brothers, Tony Rodham and Hugh Rodham, were involved in a $118 million scheme to grow and export hazelnuts in the former Soviet republic of Georgia. Their partner in the venture was Aslan Abashidze, who said his financial adviser was Loutchansky. Abashidze is a reputed member of a Russian organized crime family.The Rodham brothers at first balked and then agreed to national security adviser Sandy Berger's request that...

New York City Councilman Ruben Diaz Sr. is in major trouble. In fact, he may be expelled from the NYC Council.   What exactly did Councilman Diaz do? Did he assault someone, commit larceny or voter fraud? Not exactly. He said the following, which is in a sense being treated worse than the above crimes: “The City Council is controlled by the homosexual community.” Diaz also stated that openly-gay council speaker Corey Johnson is married to a man. In response, Johnson demanded that Diaz apologize for his “homophobic” remarks, which “have no place in New York City.” Even Diaz’ own son,...