Free Republic

2 days after Gandhi's birthday, I publish a comparison of his thought and the ideas and practices of a few American conservatives. "The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong." (cf TR's favourite proverb: "Speak softly and carry a big stick."?) “The future depends on what you do today.” ("It is no coincidence that the century of total war coincided with the century of central banking." - Ron Paul) "Non-cooperation with evil is as much a duty as is cooperation with good." ("The most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and...

Without freedom of speech no problem can be addressed let alone solved. Freedom of speech underpins all other freedoms and comes to us from God. Logos. The Word. Rationality. Discourse. ONLY LOGOS LIVES.

n 2022, Jon Lauck published The Good Country: A History of the American Midwest, 1800-1900. His book describes a wonderful range of things to love about the 19th-century Midwest: its democratic civic ethos, the enduring Midwestern commitment to antislavery that resulted from the Northwest Ordinance’s original prohibition of the practice, and the wildfire-spread of co-educational colleges in the region. Lauck also adorns his book with wonderful quotations, which illustrate points such as the Midwestern love of literature that made it the talk of every table. “When William Dean Howells was visiting Representative James A. Garfield in Hiram, Ohio, in the...

In the Land of White Death, by Valerian Albanov, English translation published in 2000 by Random House, 205 pages. Original published in Russian in 1917. This is the story of an ill-fated ship, as written by one of only two survivors, the officer who was the navigator of the Santa Clara. The ship went to sea ill prepared, without key provisions and trained personnel. Trapped in Arctic ice for two years, the navigator lead a group attempting to reach land over the pack ice. This is his story, a direct, first person account of survival against daunting obstacles.The dismal fate...

America’s educational institutions used to adhere to objective standards of excellence. Students and faculty members had to strive and were rewarded (or not) according to their performance. What their background might be or where their ancestors lived didn’t matter. That was true until a corrosive idea called “disparate impact” began taking hold in the country some 50 years ago. What that meant was that objective standards were objectionable if they resulted in poorer performance by certain racial groups. The obsession with disparate impact was kick-started by the Supreme Court’s 1971 Griggs v. Duke Power decision and has been growing in...

On September 17, in 1180 A.D., poet, composer and nun Hildegard Von Bingen died. Hildegard created the word Viriditas to describe the intrinsic ability to heal of plants, people and God. The word derives from the Latin adjective viridis meaning green. I believe that Hildegard's profoundly poetic imagination would also have had in mind the Latin noun vir meaning man. My thoughts today on Hildegard's language lead me to think she thought of men as being green in a truly healing way. God Bless Hildegard Von Bingen.

With so many Americans now saying that they prefer to live under socialism than capitalism, it’s good to get a strong reminder about the true nature of socialist regimes. I’ve just read a book that does so. When I was much younger – in the 1960s and 70s – there was quite a lot of news about Cuba: Fidel Castro’s seizure of power, the Bay of Pigs debacle, the Cuban Missile Crisis, people escaping by sea (and many perishing in the attempt), suggestions that Castro was behind JFK’s assassination, and so on. Today, however, one hears rather little about Cuba,...

Five years ago, after 30 years working in midwifery, I came up with the principles reprinted below. Why do I repost this today? A. "Telehealth" is causing skyrocketing abortions in Colorado. (https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/4178731/posts) B. A Wyoming judge cannot define "woman" so a sorority must accept a trans "woman" whom the sorority does not want to accept. (https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/4178718/posts) C. A Canadian woman seeking treatment for suicidal thoughts is asked to consider euthanasia. (https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/4178754/posts) The above looks insane to me. Sanity is what most people think is normal: "1. Men, women and children need to live with love. This love is an indispensable...

In 1951, Swedish actress Ulla Jacobsson preceded Marilyn Monroe by three years in her free celebration of her female form on camera. In classical Latin her first name "Ulla" meant "any female". She died in Vienna on August 20, 1982. Jacqueline Susann, author "Valley Of The Dolls" and "The Love Machine" about fictional television producer Robin Stone, was born on August 20, 1918 in Wynnewood, Pennsylvania. "Love shouldn't make a beggar of one. I wouldn't want love if I had to beg for it, to barter or qualify it. And I should despise it if anyone ever begged for my...

Ron Paul, who is, in my view, perhaps the single greatest living libertarian politician in the world, was born in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, on August 20, 1935. He came to my attention through his “what if” speech on YouTube. I consider it to be a truly great poem. I throw up for contrast with some of Paul’s thought a book title from Paleoconservative Pat Buchanan: “Churchill, Hitler and The Unnecessary War: How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World.” To what extent would his fellow libertarian, Ron Paul, agree? Here is a taste of Paul’s thought: “There is...

Ancient Caesarea's water arch collapsed, putting its preservation at risk; The 1,870-year-old structure, built by Emperor Hadrian, was renowned for its precise design and impressive attention to detail at the time The historical water arch in Caesarea suffered a collapse during the early hours of Friday. This arch stands on the Aqueduct Beach, a popular bathing spot. Representatives from the Antiquities Authority were present at the site this morning, and a team from the Antiquities Authority's Conservation Directorate is expected to evaluate the extent of the damage on Sunday. The collapsed portion of the arch, a 1,870-year-old addition built during...

Eric Hoffer was a longshoreman-turned-philosopher. In 1941, he wrote “My writing is done in railroad yards while waiting for a freight, in the fields while waiting for a truck, and at noon after lunch. Towns are too distracting.” Ten years later, Hoffer’s masterpiece The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements was published when he was in his late forties. Its unexpected success led him to later be appointed an adjunct professor at University of California, Berkeley. A slim volume, The True Believer was a favorite of President Dwight Eisenhower, who regularly gifted copies to friends. The British...

Arma Virumque Me Cano. Rewriting Vergil, I sing of weapons, and of myself as a man. In this land where, as freedom fighter Steve of Wonthaggi tells it, " ......... men have been decommissioned of traditional roles. ....... (Some people) want us to be demonised as non accepting, small minded , woman-bashing shits." That isn't what we are. It is misandry. Lest We Forget.

I have never seen anything like this. The US Treasury 10Y-2Y yield curve is deep in inversion and has had a negative slope for 265 straight days. Bidenomics is born under a bad sign! On the commodities front, heating oil is up almost 2% this morning and nickel (an important element in Biden’s green energy mandates) is up 1.78%. On the crypto front, Bitcoin is up 0.47% and Dogecoin is up 5.58%. You can always buy Kamala’s Own Word Salad Dressing!

Jane Austen, who died at 41 years of age on the 18th of July, 1817, might be one of the most conservative writers ever. "Sense and Sensibility" (published in 1811) is set in the 1790's in southern England, while the Reign Of Terror gripped France and while Vermont, Kentucky, and Tennessee became states in America. A quote: “I wish, as well as everybody else, to be perfectly happy; but, like everybody else, it must be in my own way.” (Sense And Sensibility) “I hate to hear you talk about all women as if they were fine ladies instead of rational...

Thomas Sowell, now 93 years old, is one of the most esteemed and prolific authors and social commentators today. Trained as an economist at Harvard and the University of Chicago, he has written more than thirty books, and from 1991 to 2016, he had a nationally syndicated column. Sowell’s readers and admirers include the Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker and the former heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson. Pinker has characterized Sowell as the most underrated author in history. He also stated that, “Sowell is a libertarian conservative, which makes him taboo in mainstream intellectual circles, but even those who disagree are...

Devout Catholic Norris was born in San Francisco on the 16th July 1880. When she was 19 years old, her parents died and she became the head of her family. She went on to become one of the highest paid female writers in America: "Prayer is not asking for what you think you want, but asking to be changed in ways you can't imagine." "For grace to be grace, it must give us things we didn't know we needed and take us places where we didn't know we didn't want to go. As we stumble through the crazily altered landscape...

Jean Twenge, a psychology professor at San Diego State, has been sounding the alarm for years that the mental health of American young people is falling apart under the influence of smartphones and social media. She’s bulwarked her case impressively in her 2023 book Generations: The Real Differences Between Gen Z, Millennials, Gen X, Boomers, and Silents―and What They Mean for America’s Future. Granted, I’m not a fan of generational labels since I can never remember what the arbitrary terms are or what birth years they cover. Indeed, even the pundits specializing in generation-watching can’t agree. For example, Twenge defines...

There have been quite a few books written incorporating the “ivory tower” shorthand for American higher education. The latest is by Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Will Bunch—After the Ivory Tower Falls. That interesting title caught my eye. I have been arguing for many years that higher education is an overinflated bubble that’s due to burst or at least deflate. What does this author have to say about the prospects for American higher education? As I investigated further, I found that the book has been recommended by people with deep leftist sympathies, including Duke history professor Nancy MacLean and Democratic Congressman Ro...

You know, you’d think that after the Bud Light fiasco and the massive push-back Target received over their controversial child-themed transgender merch and association with a clothing designer who has used satanic imagery to “make a point” about alleged anti-LGBTQ “hate” that the struggling retailer would have learned that wading into the culture wars was not a good idea from a business standpoint.But in another one we can file under “lessons not learned,” conservative commentator Mark Levin announced on his Twitter feed Wednesday that his publisher had been alerted by Target that they would not be selling his upcoming book...