Free Republic

The ability to appreciate the merits of the other side of a question, John Stuart Mill asserted in his 1859 classic, “On Liberty,” is a hallmark of the liberal spirit. By this measure, Peter Beinart’s new book, “The Crisis of Zionism,” which has become a cause célèbre among progressives, marks another step in the parting of ways between progressives and that old-fashioned and indispensable liberalism that recognized that multiple perspectives were vital resources to a free society. Fittingly, the book was released late last month, during oral arguments before the Supreme Court over the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act...

If one wanted to destroy America, all one would need to do is break the country into parts and chisel away at each segment, bit by bit. Tuesday‘s episode of The Glenn Beck Program laid out America’s core components and described how each one is being undermined and thus, destroyed. But who is doing the destroying? Glenn contends that those seeking to dismantle the American way are “no longer progressives.” Instead, the left has successfully morphed into what it had always intended to be: Full-fledged Communists. “Progressives can say mission accomplished. Now it’s phase two.”Invoking Stuart Chase’s “The Road We...

Not long ago I made an entry titled "Woodrow Wilson absolutely hated the principles of the Founding Fathers", well, I am no fan of any progressive. They are all dangerous to me. So Wilson attacks the founding and I'm going to call it as it is. The same is said for Roosevelt. Progressivism is America's cancer and it's not just in one party. I came across an article on The Heritage Foundation titled "Progressivism: Still Dangerous After All These Years, which is primarily about Roosevelt. In it, they highlight one of the things that came out of Roosevelt's pie hole:(Direct...

At the Occupy Strategy Session at New York University, all the usual suspects are once again targeting capitalism. This isn't surprising, anybody who digs into the roots of all this 'Occupy' stuff will quickly see that it's all based on progressivism and central planning - with a hint of socialism, a hint of communism, and they have even teamed up with Islamists. But this business about the incompatibility of capitalism and democracy. What makes that true? In 1887, Woodrow Wilson wrote an essay titled "Socialism and Democracy", and in my original entry I wrote an observation about mobs. We've all...

Royal Meeker, who was an advisor and long time ally(details, see chapter 4) to Woodrow Wilson, wrote the following: (page 544) In M. Colson's view the poor are poor through their own laziness, inability or thriftlessness; the rich are rich because of their own or their ancestors' virtues. The laws of property and of inheritance are almost above criticism. Any attempt to ameliorate the condition of those living at or below the minimum of subsistence must result in such an increase of the poorer classes that the result will inevitably be a larger number of miserable wretches living at or...

As has been reported by Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin, there's an alliance of sorts between Mitt Romney (aka---Mitt Trotsky) and Ron Paul (aka---RuPaul, Jew hater Ron Paul, Dr. Demento, Crazy Uncle Ron, Iran Paul, and Dr. Newsletter). In other words, Mittiots like Ann Coulter and Matt Drudge are now marching under RuPaul's Swastika, while Paultards like Screwy Lewy Rockwell are now marching under Trotsky's Hammer and Sickle. (Poland is very, very nervous right now.) In the past 20 debates, RuPaul and Mitt Trotsky have never had one cross word for each other, while both attacked every Conservative that dared...

MADISON, Wis. (AP) -- Longtime Democratic Secretary of State Doug La Follette plans to file paperwork on Thursday that would allow him to run for governor if a recall election is ordered against Republican Gov. Scott Walker. La Follette said Wednesday he still hasn't decided whether he will actually get into the race. But he says he wants to create a campaign committee so he can better gauge interest in him running and better determine if he would be a strong candidate. Former Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk and state Sen. Kathleen Vinehout have announced they are running. La Follette...

“We have to look at the root cause of why the economy is struggling as much as it is,” Santorum said. “Government intervention. Government regulation. Government taxation. Government is crushing and destroying the American spirit and the American free enterprise system.” Santorum said that government spending was impinging on personal freedoms and ultimately chipping away at what made the country great. “When the government gets as big as it’s gotten and starts to take over more of your life, then you get smaller as the individual, you get weaker, you lose control over your lives. You lose the rights that...

At the Maldives' National Museum, smashed Buddhist statues are testament to the rise of Islamic extremism and Taliban-style intolerance in a country famous as a laid-back holiday destination. On Tuesday, as protesters backed by mutinous police toppled president Mohamed Nasheed, a handful of men stormed the Chinese-built museum and destroyed its display of priceless artefacts from the nation's pre-Islamic era. "They have effectively erased all evidence of our Buddhist past," a senior museum official told AFP at the now shuttered building in the capital Male, asking not to be named out of fear for his own safety. "We lost all...

[This post begins a series on how the United States can move beyond our current political, economic and social impasse to create a new kind of society. The series continues Via Meadia's examination of the demise of the blue social model and its effects on American politics and culture.]The frustration and bitterness that fills American politics these days reflects the failure of our current social, political and economic institutions and practices to deliver the results that Americans want and expect. It’s comparable to the frustration and fear that swept through the country in the late 19th and early 20th century...

For the better part of a decade, companies like Google and IAC/InterActiveCorp have been pushing for the federal government to regulate the Internet in the name of net neutrality, and I’ve been fighting them every step of the way. We beat them in Congress. We beat them in the courts. We beat them in public opinion. But we lost to them on a 3-2 party line vote at the Federal Communications Commission, led by long-time IAC/InterActiveCorp general counsel turned FCC chairman Julius Genachowski. The FCC’s unlawful order gives that commission the self-appointed power to regulate how the broadband networks that...

In a major step towards global centralization of election processes, the world's dominant Internet voting company has purchased the USA's dominant election results reporting company. When you view your local or state election results on the Internet, on portals which often appear to be owned by the county elections division, in over 525 US jurisdictions you are actually redirected to a private corporate site controlled by SOE software, which operates under the name ClarityElections.com. The good news is that this firm promptly reports precinct-level detail in downloadable spreadsheet format. As reported by BlackBoxVoting.org in 2008, the bad news is that...

Praying for their full recovery.

NBC's Andrea Mitchell on New Year's Day made it clear to Nightly News viewers that her Obama-loving network will continue using the race card to assist the current White House resident's reelection. In a brief segment about the upcoming Iowa caucuses, Mitchell said "the rap" on the Hawkeye state is that "it doesn't represent the rest of the country - too white, too evangelical, too rural" Read more: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2012/01/02/andrea-mitchell-iowa-too-white-too-evangelical-too-rural#ixzz1iMDxZzyc

Several people have become interested in a quite controversial topic called "AGENDA 21." They have requested being on a ping list for this topic. While I do not have time to do a thorough treatment of this subject, nor am I in any way an expert, I am willing at least for a time,to ping people as I run across articles which might pertain to this concern. It might be good to start with an examination of just what it is or might be. To kick this discussion and exploration off,I did a Google search (just for fun) on "Agenda...

While terms such as "socialism," "capitalism" and "progressive" have traditionally elicited strong responses from the American public -- whether it be from conservatives who decry the evils of socialism or liberals who insist capitalism promotes economic inequality -- the recent Occupy Wall Street protests have brought the issue to the forefront of the national conversation in recent months. Socialism v. Capitalism Despite, or perhaps because of, some of the protesters' support of democratic socialist policies, socialism remains the most politically polarizing term in the U.S., according to a new analysis of political rhetoric from the Pew Research Center, a fact...

Starting in 2012, the government will charge a new fee to your health insurance plan for research to find out which drugs, medical procedures, tests and treatments work best. But what will Americans do with the answers? The goal of the research, part of a little-known provision of President Barack Obama's health care law, is to answer such basic questions as whether that new prescription drug advertised on TV really works better than an old generic costing much less. But in the politically charged environment surrounding health care, the idea of medical effectiveness research is eyed with suspicion. The insurance...

The Club for Growth wrote a white paper on Governor Romney back in 2007. Most of the information below is from that repory, but since Romney has been outspoken on several issues then, weve updated his record to reflect those positions. ...During his initial 2002 campaign Romney refused to sign an anti-tax pledge, but he pledged to balance the budget without raising taxes and touted his fulfillment of that pledge throughout his term. But the details suggest that he broke his verbal committment. Romney did not impose any broad-based tax hikes he imposed a slew of fee hikes. He opposed...

Sorting out the Progressive movement and its constituent ideologies can be difficult in that the very term “progressive” is burdened with contested meanings. Rather than work along lines agreeable to presently out-of-office politicians hoping to regain power by denouncing long-dead Progressives, we begin with some deep background. One portent of Progressivism is found in the Liberal Republican movement of the 1870s. Prone to Paris Commune panics, distressed by strikes and labor trouble, such reformers as Charles Francis Adams (descended from John Adams), Francis Amasa Walker (Boston laissez-faire economist and Indian manager), and E. L. Godkin (Anglo-Irish editor of The Nation)...

A well-informed, interested public is often hailed as the 'ideal' of democracy. But a new Princeton study suggests that the opposite could be the case - and that people who have no interest at all could be vital to the working of a democratic society. The uninformed are essential to democracy because their apathy helps to dilute the effect of powerful minority interests - for instance, highly educated elites - who would otherwise dominate public life.