Free Republic

I am stunned that I was stunned by the election. I am a fool. I convinced myself that the polls were not real. I convinced myself that the world I see around me every day is not real. I hoped for a redemptive moment without seeing any penitence. You can't have one without the other. I, along with countless others, have been trying to figure out how President Obama managed to win a second term. Trying to discover the key statistic that would explain the defeat has become a cottage industry over the past week. Every pundit on every side...

We are less than 50 days away from the fiscal cliff, and Congress returns to Washington today with a mission to avoid a fiscal and economic crisis that would easily spin the country into a new recession. Peter Ferrara blasts Obamanomics in general at Forbes today, but also explains the stakes involved for the lame-duck session: Last year I wrote a short book for Encounter called “Obama and the Crash of 2013.” I predicted then that Obama’s policies of increased top tax rates for nearly all major federal taxes, soaring new regulatory burdens, and loose, cheap dollar monetary policies, would...

It didn’t take long. The layoffs and closings are piling up. The saddest thing about compiling this list is that by the time today is over, the list will probably have grown dramatically. The next saddest part is that at least some of these lay off employees voted for Barack Obama because they didn’t believe this would happen. These are more than just headlines. Every number represents real people who have lost their livelihood. Boeing Announces Big Layoffs in Defense Division cut 30% of workforce Anonymous employer in Los Vegas: “I have 114 employees. I’m firing 22” Momentive Inc. plans...

But how does he feel about deacons?Details: He’s got folk rockers Mumford & Sons and the Avett Brothers on his iPod. He’s on Twitter and Facebook. And he’s passionate about poetry, art and classical English literature. But when it comes to Roman Catholic doctrine, Lincoln’s incoming bishop says he’s ready to carry the torch of his predecessors who have made the Lincoln Diocese one of the most traditional in the country. “The Diocese of Lincoln has never suffered an identity crisis,” said Auxiliary Bishop James Conley of the Denver Archdiocese. “In other words, the church in Lincoln has always known...

In the months and weeks leading up to the election, I had been thinking about the situation this country is in by likening it to being on a crashing plane. On the one hand, we had the current pilot who wasn’t able to control the plane, and the fact that it was crashing was due in large part to his piloting incompetence. On the other hand, we had a passenger who had a great deal of piloting experience, who was volunteering to take the controls. In his previous piloting experience, this volunteer had saved another plane from crashing. If we...

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Monday shows that 54% of Likely Voters at least somewhat approve of President Obama's job performance. Forty-five percent (45%) at least somewhat disapprove. That is the president’s highest job approval rating since July 2009

U.S. airlines are facing what threatens to be their most serious pilot shortage since the 1960s, with higher experience requirements for new hires about to take hold just as the industry braces for a wave of retirements. Federal mandates taking effect next summer will require all newly hired pilots to have at least 1,500 hours of prior flight experience—six times the current minimum—raising the cost and time to train new fliers in an era when pay cuts and more-demanding schedules already have made the profession less attractive. Meanwhile, thousands of senior pilots at major airlines soon will start hitting the...

A posting on Gizmodo, a technology weblog that is part of the Gawker Media network, has drawn a lot of attention with a post that purports to show that educated people (and by implication smart people) were more likely to vote for Obama. Titled “The Effect of College Education On the Presidential Election“, it consists mainly of a graphic showing that the ten best educated states in the country (as measured by the percentage of residents over age 25 with bachelor degrees) all voted for Obama, while nine of the ten worst educated states voted for Romney. Gizmodo editor Jose...

Sometimes you have to laugh to keep from crying. That was my first reaction when I saw several versions of this bizarre little story from the tense world of airline travel, especially in the skies around Washington, D.C. This is one of those cases in which I really need to ask GetReligion readers to look at the whole story. Trust me, this will not take long. This is all of the CBS News item. DENVER – A United Airlines flight from Denver landed safely in Washington, D.C. after its crew declared an emergency, reportedly because a passenger began praying in...

Featured Term (selected at random):PUSILLANIMITY Smallness of soul that shrinks from noble or arduous tasks. Its basis may be a lack of humility or ignorance of human dignity in co-operating with divine grace to achieve great things for God's glory. (Etym. Latin pusillus, very small + animus, mind.) All items in this dictionary are from Fr. John Hardon's Modern Catholic Dictionary, © Eternal Life. Used with permission.

More than 100 faculty members at the University of San Diego have presented their president with an ultimatum: Reinstate a canceled visiting fellowship for a British theologian or face potential public questioning of your capability to lead. The faculty of the Catholic university's College of Arts and Sciences made the move Tuesday in response to president Mary Lyons' cancellation of a fellowship for Tina Beattie, a theologian known for her work in contemporary ethical issues. Beattie was scheduled to begin a fellowship at the university's Frances G. Harpst Center for Catholic Thought and Culture on Tuesday. Lyons, who alleges the...

How much sense does this make? And if you have any common sense, you’ll answer “none.” An 18-year-old can openly carry a loaded gun in Overland Park without going through background checks by the state or additional firearms safety training required for concealed carry. But a person 21 or older would have to jump through such training and safety hoops to conceal and carry. Yes, the younger, more likely less mature gun owner is freer to pack heat openly. It’s the latest twist for Overland Park around the contentious open-carry gun law. A 7 p.m. meeting Wednesday of the city’s...

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WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama urged policy makers to rewrite the rules governing U.S. finance, unveiling far-reaching proposals that would affect nearly every aspect of banking and markets. The White House hopes Congress can complete work on the plan by year's end. But it is sure to face opposition both from some on the right who say it threatens to throttle free markets and others on the left who say it doesn't go far enough. Some in Congress are cautioning against haste. The proposals are the latest instance of the administration seeking to expand its reach in the private sector....

<p>A score of people this past week have asked me about the three million Republicans allegedly "missing" at the polls this year. For starters, if the Washington Post is to be believed, Mitt Romney received 1.3 million fewer votes than John McCain did in 2008, not 3 million. For the record, Obama received 7.5 million fewer votes in 2012 than he did in 2008.</p>

The future looks bright, but Hector Rivero is worried. The demand for energy workers is up, driven by the shale oil and gas boom and the coming surge of retiring baby boomers, which could force some companies to replace up to half of their workers within the next 15 years. That means a need for everything from technicians and maintenance workers to engineers and CEOs. “It’s a good problem to have,” said Rivero, president of the Texas Chemical Council. “But we’re concerned. We see challenges in the education system.” He thinks the state’s emphasis on academics over vocational education has...

The United States will overtake Saudi Arabia to become the world's biggest oil producer before 2020, and will be energy independent 10 years later, according to a new forecast by the International Energy Agency. The recent resurgence in oil and gas production, and efforts to make the transport sector more efficient, are radically reshaping the nation's energy market, reported Paris-based IEA in its World Energy Outlook. North America would become a net exporter of oil around 2030, the global organization said. "The United States, which currently imports around 20% of its total energy needs, becomes all but self sufficient in...

U.S. officials in Libya have begun to look for recruits whom they plan to train to form Libya's new army, a former commander of Libyan rebels who toppled Muammar Qaddafi said on Tuesday. ----- A team of about 10 Americans from the embassy in Tripoli visited a paramilitary base in the eastern city of Benghazi 10 days ago to interview and get to know potential recruits, according to militia commander Fathi al-Obeidi. “The American team asked us for a tour of our base and we granted them permission to walk around freely,” he told Reuters. “They stood with many of...

Colorado police departments are collecting hundreds of rape kits, but a CALL7 Investigation found many of those are not tested. And experts and victims tell us that is a problem because those kits may allow police to identify serial rapists by putting any DNA into a national database. Kelly Binder says she was drugged and raped two years ago by a man she met at a bar in downtown Denver. She is upset police didn't test her rape kit because she is concerned her attacker could still be raping other people. ... Binder feels like she's been victimized twice --...

Each year I drive across the eastern half of the country twice, including the states of Ohio and Indiana. Without benefit of signage it would be hard to tell them apart. Each has an industrial base in the north and a heartland dedicated largely to agriculture. Each state is 86 percent white and has a Republican governor. Over the last 25 years, I think I have stopped at every McDonald's on 1-70 and 1-71, and the service is uniformly upbeat and amiable along the whole route. In 2008 both states voted for Barack Obama for president, Ohio by four percent,...