Free Republic

Mosque Makeovers With Your Tax Dollars WASHINGTON, D.C — A Channel 2 Action News investigation found that the State Department is sending millions of dollars to save mosques overseas. This investment has received criticism as the United States makes an effort to slash nearly $4 trillion in government spending. Plenty of outrage following the announcement made Thursday afternoon by a government commission that suggested huge cuts to the budget, including eliminating the interest education for home mortgage. This juxtaposed with United States investing millions to refurbish mosques as a good-will effort in Muslim countries has upset many taxpayer groups. Watch...

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Turkish police have arrested 11 people over the murder of an American woman who disappeared while visiting Istanbul last month, police and the local media reported Sunday. -snip- "We have confirmed that she was murdered by way of impacts on her head," Istanbul police chief Huseyin Capkin told reporters on Sunday. "But we need to conclude the investigation before details emerge." The Milliyet newspaper said she was also stabbed several times in her abdomen, but there was no sign of rape or theft and she was still wearing jewellery when police found her. -snip- Hurriyet speculated that Sierra might have...

Under a bipartisan Senate framework, Democrats say, Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano would have final say over whether the border is secure enough to put 11 million illegal immigrants on a path to citizenship. If Napolitano does not provide the green light for putting illegal immigrants on a pathway to citizenship, the responsibility for judging whether the metrics for border security have been met will be given to her successor. The early debate over immigration reform has yielded two thorny questions: What metrics will be used to determine whether the goals for border security and other safeguards against illegal...

The recently released photograph of President Obama reportedly “Taken at Camp David – the Maryland presidential retreat – on August 4, 2012, his 51st birthday,” is a complete fake. As a lifelong shotgunner, I immediately smelled a rat. Nothing in the photo looks right and upon closer examination, it is a complete fraud. One need go no further than examining the ports on the shotgun. Ports are tiny holes sometimes drilled near the muzzle (the business end of the gun) to release energy and reduce recoil. They serve as a pressure release valve of sorts. One will immediately notice that...

As courageous state legislators enlist in the fight to repel the federal government’s assault on the Second Amendment, the governor of one western state is telling a liberty-minded state representative to stand down. Governor Gary Herbert of Utah recently called a pro-gun rights bill sponsored by a Utah state representative “an exaggeration” and encouraged the lawmaker to “adhere to the law.” This is not the level of support citizens of the Beehive State would expect from the man they elected to lead their state. Herbert was specifically criticizing a measure offered by first-term Representative Brian Greene (R-Pleasant Grove). The bill...

MOMMY BLOGGERS (and their daddy counterparts, too) agree about almost nothing. Some favor co-sleeping; others do not. Some favor banning video games; others do not. Similar disputes surround breast-feeding, vaccines, cursing and whether it’s O.K. to force-feed your child broccoli. But a rare consensus has emerged on at least one topic. What subject could possibly be so clear-cut it has elicited once-in-a-generation unanimity? That parents should stop bragging about their children. That’s right, apparently the civil rights issue of our age is that you have the right to remain silent — and I have the right not to hear about...

GPs are to be forced to hand over confidential records on all their patients’ drinking habits, waist sizes and illnesses. The files will be stored in a giant information bank that privacy campaigners say represents the ‘biggest data grab in NHS history’. They warned the move would end patient confidentiality and hand personal information to third parties.

Just a day before we learned the GDP fell from + 3.2% (the fairy tale told to us before November’s election) to -.01%, for the last quarter of 2012, Louisiana Democrat Senator Mary Landrieu pronounced the Obama Administration’s wild spending “problem” something that was made up by Fox News. Landrieu is one of the head cheer leaders of a new breed of “in-your-face” Democrat who simply deny anything is wrong with our economy – or anything else in America for that matter. “Who are you going to believe; me or your lying eyes?” comes to mind. She is joined by...

On a December day last year, a disturbed 20-year-old murdered his mother. He then drove to an elementary school where he killed 20 young children and six adults, reportedly using several firearms. Something has to be done to stop this sort of massacre from happening again. If that is possible. Or, according to some, something has to be done whether such prevention is possible or not. So immediately politicians who had long supported gun control laws argued that the Newtown atrocity proved the need for those laws. Despite government studies showing that a past assault weapons ban had no impact...

(Vatican Radio) More than six centuries after it was founded by Pope Nicholas V, the Vatican Library announced this week that it has made a first selection of ancient manuscripts available for consultation online. The first 256 documents to be digitalised form part of a broader project to make a large section of this prestigious archive freely available to students, scholars, researchers and teachers. The library, founded in 1451, has been supported in this work of digitalisation by a £2 million grant from the Polonsky Foundation and other sponsors. Speaking to Vatican Radio on Wednesday, the prefect of the Vatican...

United States the Biggest Money Printing Loser Interest-Rates / US Interest RatesFebruary 02, 2013 - 10:46 AM GMT By: Peter Schiff In Switzerland, it's not just the clocks that are cuckoo. Over the past four years Swiss politicians and central bankers have gone on an unprecedented buying spree of foreign exchange reserves. In 2012, their cache swelled to as much as $420 billion worth of various currencies, primarily the euro. This figure is a seven-fold increase since 2008 and equates to 70% of the country's annual GDP. The sum translates to $200,000 per family of four, enough to keep the...

Nearly two-thirds of them voted to give weapons to the Egyptian government. I’m done grumbling about how President Obama is empowering America’s enemies. After all, it is not just Obama. When it comes to abetting the Muslim Brotherhood, Republicans are right there with him. Not all of them, of course. This week, for example, Senator Rand Paul proposed an amendment that would have prohibited our government from transferring F-16 aircraft and Abrams tanks to Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood–dominated government. This lunatic plan is not just an Obama initiative. It is also a GOP brainstorm — of a piece with 2011’s Libya...

In July of 2012, Janet Napolitano’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) produced a “show and tell” video instructing Americans on the best course of action should they suddenly find themselves in an “active shooter” situation. Entitled Run, Hide, Fight, the Big Sis-approved, 6 minute epic provided potential victims with crucial advice, such as “run away,” and “remain out of sight of the shooter.” Naturally, that’s the sort of counsel only government can provide. (1) Noticeably absent from the DHS tutorial, however, was any discussion of REAL weapons in the hands of prospective victims. Apparently firearms were not permitted in the...

"Any1 who would run out to buy an assault rifle after the Newtown massacre has very little left in their body or soul worth protecting. ;^\" Hey, gun owners: There’s “very little” about your life and even your very soul “worth protecting” if you bought an assault rifle after the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre, according to funnyman Jim Carrey. Because, you know, he values life and stuff. The emoticon at the end of his tweet just shows how much he cares. “Dumb and Dumber” doesn’t begin to cover this one. And Much like Musket Morgan, we’re guessing Carrey couldn’t...

More taking firearms classes in anticipation of concealed-carry By LAUREN LEONE-CROSS The State Journal-Register Posted Feb 02, 2013 @ 10:00 PM The growing possibility that Illinois will enact a concealed-carry law has certified firearms instructors like Greg Powell busier than usual. He taught two classes in Decatur on Saturday. Ninety-five people attended his morning class and 80 people were registered for his afternoon class. “Usually our classes run 20 to 30 people,” Powell said before Saturday’s events. Powell, of Marion, and his wife Patricia Snyder are National Rifle Association-certified instructors and Utah and Florida concealed-carry certified instructors. They offer courses...

Christian faith and an impulse to charity are “intimately linked” and can never be in conflict, Pope Benedict XVI writes in his Lenten Message for 2013. In his message-entitled "Believing in Charity Calls Forth Charity”—the Pope reminds readers that during the Year of Faith he has called upon Catholics to reflect on the fundamental doctrines of faith. Faith, he writes, is a “personal adherence…to the revelation of God’s gratuitous and ‘passionate’ love for us, fully revealed in Jesus Christ.” The Christian response to God’s love, the Pope says, “is always open-ended; love is never ‘finished’ or ‘complete.’” Rather, Christians find...

n 2012, Republicans ran against the massive cuts to defense that might occur in early 2013 under the congressionally mandated budget sequester. At an Oct. 23 presidential debate, President Obama responded that his opponent, Mitt Romney, was blowing the risk out of proportion: The cuts, he said, “will not happen.” Well, those cuts are now scheduled to take effect on March 1 — and, by the look of things, they will. The GOP has changed its tune; the Republican majority in the House seems content to let them happen. Meanwhile, President Obama, whose defense secretary has warned in the direst...

"Why this fat cat likes Obama's tax plan" was the headline of a full-page ad La Jolla, Calif., investor Norman Lizt took out in The New York Times in August. No, it wasn't really an endorsement. Lizt wrote that he has been a successful investor over the years, but if Americans re-elected President Barack Obama and his proposed tax hike became law, Lizt would face a marginal tax rate of "well over 50 percent." He wrote, "This represents the crossing of an inviolate threshold to me and is entirely unacceptable." Lizt explained that he liked Obama's tax plan because it...

Some of you younger folks might not remember this, but there was a time when the media questioned Power. No, really, once upon a time, the media saw it as its duty to be forever questioning and skeptical of Power, especially when Power was in pursuit of more power. Today, however, the White House released a photo that purports to show Obama (love that tucked-in shirt) shooting skeet last August. Except… he's shooting straight ahead, which means that there's either a barn door somewhere in need of some patching, or Obama is such an awesome skeet shooter, he hits them...