Free Republic

Orrin Hatch, the senior senator from Utah, didn't mince words the other day on Hugh Hewitt's national radio show. The Democrats, he said, "play politics very, very tough, they play it well, and they don't give a damn about what's right and what's wrong." He was speaking about battles in Washington, but an even more vivid example can be found in Wisconsin, where the Democrats are still trying to overturn the 2010 elections. Blindsided last fall by the election of Gov. Scott Walker, the loss of both houses of the legislature and the US Senate seat held by ultraliberal Russ...

Behavioral norms, mostly transmitted by example, word of mouth and religious teachings, represent a body of wisdom distilled over the ages through experience and trial and error. They include important thou-shalt-nots such as shalt not murder, shalt not steal, shalt not lie and cheat, but they also include all those courtesies one might call ladylike and gentlemanly conduct.

Who doesn’t know the difference between right and wrong? Yet that essential knowledge, generally assumed to come from parental teaching or religious or legal instruction, could turn out to have a quite different origin. Primatologists like Frans de Waal have long argued that the roots of human morality are evident in social animals like apes and monkeys. The animals’ feelings of empathy and expectations of reciprocity are essential behaviors for mammalian group living and can be regarded as a counterpart of human morality. Marc D. Hauser, a Harvard biologist, has built on this idea to propose that people are born...

Nothing more separates Judeo-Christian values from secular values than the question of whether morality -- what is good or evil -- is absolute or relative. In other words, is there an objective right or wrong, or is right or wrong a matter of personal opinion? In the Judeo-Christian value system, God is the source of moral values and therefore what is moral and immoral transcends personal or societal opinion. Without God, each society or individual makes up its or his/her moral standards. But once individuals or societies become the source of right and wrong, right and wrong, good and evil,...

Bill Clinton didn't ask for my help, but I thought I would volunteer. If I were about to undergo more surgery, I would worry about my mortality and try to make peace with my Maker. Bill, for the sake of your soul, sign this and get it sent out. ===================================================== My fellow Americans, thank you for your kind words and prayers as I am about to again undergo surgery. Because God has given me a second chance, I must clear my conscience. I am so sorry that I disappointed many of my fans. But more than that, I am sorry...

UPDATE POST ELECTION Cowboys still depend on their neighbors for help. They expect their neighbors to call on them in times of need. This is called "neighboring" a practice that has endured since the days of the pioneers. In Washington, DC this is called reaching across the aisle. It is time for all Americans to come together and work on the problems we all face. A COWBOY'S IN THE WHITE HOUSE. MY HEROES HAVE ALWAYS BEEN COWBOYS. It used to tick me off when the Muslim detractors in the Middle East, or the socialist detractors in Europe, Hollywood and others...

Infanticide Promoter: Bush morally stunted Ethicist says president should have 'turned the other cheek' after 9/11. A controversial college professor who thinks parents should be able to kill disabled children says though President Bush makes himself out to be a good Christian leader, he has the moral development of a 13-year-old boy. Peter Singer, professor of bioethics at Princeton University, said in an interview with an Australian newspaper Bush sees the world "very simply, in black and white, as good versus evil, and he thinks that America is the good guy, and therefore whatever America does is right." "That's incredibly...

The wave of corporate fraud did not emerge in a vacuum. It's in part a consequence of a society that refuses to recognize absolute standards of right and wrong Did Scott Sullivan really think he could get away with it? Did the now-fired chief financial officer of WorldCom believe that he could forever disguise nearly $4 billion in expenses? Did he even realize that what he allegedly was doing was objectively wrong? We don't know, because Mr. Sullivan isn't talking to the press, and he pleaded the Fifth Amendment before the House Financial Services Committee last week, along with former...

WHY BE AN ARMED LIBERAL? I’ve actually gotten a fair number of emails asking me this; they presuppose that the only valid position for a liberal is to be disarmed, and the only valid position for a gun owner is to be a conservative. I’m neither. I own guns, and have spent a fair amount of time, energy and money becoming at least moderately competent with them. And let me state bluntly that while the politic thing for shooters to say in public is "I just shoot [trap and skeet] [a few targets] [to hunt birds].", that I do all...

March 14, 2002, 5:05PM Associated Press Russell Yates enters the Harris County Courthouse today for the sentencing phase of the capital murder trial of his wife Andrea Pia Yates. Andrea Yates was found guilty Tuesday in the June, 2001, drowning deaths of three of their five children and faces either life in prison or the death penalty. Andrea Yates' mother pleads with jury for daughter's life Trial's punishment phase under way By CAROL CHRISTIANCopyright 2002 Houston Chronicle An undisclosed witness is expected to be the last to testify Friday before jurors begin deliberating the fate of convicted capital murderer...