Free Republic

A straight-A college student was fatally struck by a driver suspected of street racing in Los Angeles, cops and distraught relatives said. Arian Rahbar, a 21-year-old junior at the University of Southern California, was killed Saturday afternoon while strolling along a marked crosswalk across Jefferson Boulevard, the Los Angeles Times reported. Rahbar, who had just gotten some food, was sent airborne when he was hit in the south Los Angeles roadway by a Dodge Challenger Hellcat, whose driver had been racing a man in an Infiniti G37, LAPD South Traffic Division Det. Ryan Moreno told the newspaper.

Earlier this week, Rick Perry said, “It’s fun to poke at [Obama] a little bit and say, “Hey, let’s see your grades and your birth certificate.”” And why shouldn’t he find birtherism fun? Racism is supposed to be fun for white people who choose to engage in it. I mean, it’s gotta be fun to be powerful and dominant and flaunt white privilege. Right? In a country where lynchings once doubled an occasion for barbeques — the strangling and perhaps burning of a Black body as the central performance act at a pleasant Southern picnic — why shouldn’t racism be...

CHICAGO (WLS) - Chicago's new top cop says the accessibility to firearms in America is an extension "of government-sponsored racism" that goes back to the days of slavery and Jim Crow. Speaking to parishoners at St. Sabina Church earlier this month, Chicago Police Supt. Garry McCarthy took to the microphone after Father Michael Pfleger spoke about gun control. McCarthy said the topic of race is a sensitive issue "because everybody's afraid of race" but that he wasn't afraid to broach to subject. So here’s what I want to tell you. See, let’s see if we can make a connection here....

Chicago Police Chief Garry McCarthy told parishoners at Saint Sabina Church earlier this month that the easy availability of guns in the United States is the extension of a tradition of "government-sponsored racism" that began with slavery and Jim Crow. McCarthy -— like many urban police officials an advocate of strict gun control -- was speaking at a liberal, activist church whose priest, Father Michael Pfleger, drew national attention for mocking Hillary Clinton in 2008. "This is sensitive. You know, because everybody’s afraid of race. Have you noticed that? Everybody’s afraid of race," McCarthy, a former New York and Newark...

The Affordable Care Act of 2010 employs three major organizational principles: Affordable Care Organizations (ACOs), consolidation of health insurance companies (over time), and Health Insurance Exchanges. The end goal is obvious: A complete federal takeover of individual health care. This 8-page research article lays out the factual basis for the role played by the Exchange to defeat individual liberty. 

Comrades, a new conspiracy theory has emerged but unlike the "birthers", it is one we can and should (and will) embrace. I am talking about the RACERS, or those of us who cling obsessively but correctly to the idea that all criticism of Dear Born-in-Hawaii Leader Obama has no basis in reality but is purely an expression of racism. This term has its origins with an enemy of the people but like any good prog, I don't care, I just take what I think is necessary to promote the common good. Now, many of you reading this are asking (not...

You’ve likely heard it. “If the government can mandate auto insurance, then why do you say it cannot mandate health insurance?”There are at least four major differences (and be sure to read number 4, because it is the most critical):First: The FEDERAL government does not mandate auto insurance. States mandate it. And three states have chosen not to do so. Auto insurance, like health insurance, is a state issue.Second: The mandate for ownership of auto insurance only covers what the driver might do to someone else. It is liability insurance, not collision, comprehensive, glass, or preventive maintenance. To be like...

Everyone will have an opinion about the November 7 vote in the US House. Mine looks ahead to the remaining hurdles. Take heart. This is a long way from finished. Senate and Conference Committee HR 3962, passed by an embarrassingly slim five-vote margin, now moves to the U.S. Senate. Many national talking heads and elected officials are saying it is already dead there. We shall see. Frankly, I never believed the Democrats could pass it out of the House, given the rancor over abortion, immigration, resistance from seniors and the like. The AARP may have sacrificed its future by backing...

Dr. Edward Annis, President of the American Medical Association in 1963, gave a talk to conference attendees just before breakfast on September 2, 1963.[1] I would call it prophetic, and extremely insightful. Unfortunately, politics and the Great Society programs, however, overwhelmed him and the American people in 1965. As a result, Congress passed Medicare and Medicaid. Dr. Annis is no longer living, but his words—almost prophetic—remain. I wish you would pass them on to everyone you know.We think we are so sophisticated and understand so much more than our predecessors. But Dr. Annis had the fundamentals right back then. Only...

Obama's entire life has been devoted to fomenting racial animus Dear Liberals, Please be advised that your Race Card account has been closed. This decision was based on your account history of excessive over-limit spending. Please destroy your card immediately as it will no longer be honored. Sincerely, The American People No president in history came to office with more political capital than Barack Obama. He squandered it like a lottery winner within a few months. If liberals had any sense of irony, they would appreciate the inanity of braying about racism right after America elected a black president. Obama’s...

For the sake of convenience, I’ve decided to call people like Maureen Dowd, who see hidden racism in every complaint about Obama, “racers.” If I could sum up the underpinnings of their position, it would be a riff on Descartes’s proof of existence: “I think, therefore I am.” For racers, it goes something like this: “I think it, therefore it is.” Such thoughts don’t require logic or evidence—just a gut feeling, a hunch, and to racers that makes them real. To understand the extent of the racers’ projections, and read how much they demonize those on the Right, you need...

A man who was competing in a jet boat competition on Lake Ming died after he lost control of his vessel and was thrown to the ground as it went more than 130 mph, authorities said. Edward Jay Wallace, 43, of Las Vegas, was pronounced dead at 8:40 p.m. Saturday from injuries he sustained in the crash earlier that day, according to the Kern County coroner's office. Wallace was competing in the last semifinals race of a National Jet Boat Association weekend event called May Shootout when the throttle on his boat likely got stuck, organizers said. Going more than...

TEHRAN (AFP) - When behind the wheel, Iranian women have to put up with all sorts of verbal abuse from the testosterone-charged types that dominate the Islamic republic's highways -- such as being told to tend to a washing machine rather than a car. But Iran (news - web sites)'s women drivers, most of whom are clearly ill at ease navigating the anarchic road network, now have a national idol: a young woman nicknamed "Little Schumacher". Laleh Seddigh, 28, is fast emerging as one of Iran's foremost race car drivers, leaving the best of the men racers behind in her...