Free Republic

Illinois today became the last state in the country to legalize the concealed carry of guns after both the House and Senate rejected Gov. Pat Quinn’s attempt to rewrite the compromise bill. Senators voted 41-17 to override Quinn’s amendatory veto of the bill. Earlier in the day, the House voted 77-31 to overturn the governor’s rewrite. The measure now becomes law, though the actual ability of gun owners to carry a concealed firearm remains months away. The action by the Democratic General Assembly was a major repudiation of the actions of the state’s Democratic governor. Supporters of the compromise legislation...

The Illinois House, with no debate, voted 77-31 today to override Gov. Pat Quinn’s changes to a compromise plan to regulate the concealed carrying of firearms in the state. The state Senate must also vote to override Quinn’s rewrite of the bill for the measure to become law. That vote is expected later today.

Unreal: Brutal home invasion beating of a young mother of 2 caught on nanny-cam while her daughter watched helplessly.

In politics, scale matters. If government spent 1 percent of GDP annually, we’d probably still have waste, fraud, abuse, self-dealing, and all the rest of it, but it would matter less to people. From a moral point of view, a little misuse of public resources is no different from a lot of it, but adults know that the world is not a perfect place and that we’d be lucky to have problems that bug us symbolically or as a matter of principle while causing us very little trouble in fact. That is the inadequately appreciated background to the current dispute...

Helicopter pilot spots a model plane stuck in trees. What he does next makes one little boy's day.

Last nights Academy Award winning best actress Jennifer Lawrence discusses her fall while accepting her Oscar with a reporter who asked what she was thinking at that moment: “A bad word that I can’t say...

It’s been nearly three months since Jesse Jackson Jr. resigned from Congress, but now NBC News confirms that Jackson has signed papers in a plea deal within the past several days. Jackson’s case is being handled by the US Attorney’s office in Washington DC. While no public announcement is expected today, those with knowledge of the investigation believe the loose ends now deal with Jackson’s wife, former Alderman Sandi Jackson, and whether or not she is ultimately charged. Under the terms of the deal Jackson signed, he pleads guilty and his fate – as to jail time – would be...

fter smearing movement conservative icon Brent Bozell as a "hater" who has a "sordid history of hating Karl Rove," Jonathan Collegio of American Crossroads mocked a group of prominent conservatives who wrote a letter to Crossroads GPS President Steven Law demanding Collegio be fired. “I’ve been trying to get my friends to sign it, because it’ll make for a funnier story once I get it framed,” Collegio said, in response to the letter to the Washington Examiner. “It would be flattering, if it weren’t so absurd.” In an interview with Breitbart News editor Larry O'Connor on WMAL's "Mornings on the...

Commentator Bill Kristol laughed off attempts of the "establishment" to "come to the rescue" of the Tea Party on Fox News last night. Kristol said that the "establishment" candidates lost the election, not the Tea Party.

Some big names in the hunting media and vending have stood up to the organizers of the Eastern Sports and Outdoors Show. Following the tragic shooting in December at Sandy Hook School in Connecticut, and President Obama’s sweeping executive orders on gun violence, many states and organizations have themselves pushed for changes in certain gun and ammunition restrictions. Reed Exhibitions, organizers of the show in Pennsylvania, followed suit and imposed restrictions on the display of assault weapons and high capacity ammunition magazines. From their web site: “As a hunting-focused event, we welcome exhibitors who wish to showcase products and firearms...

If you were a child of the 50's,60's,70's or early 80's this is a salute to you.Check out our Facebook page. www.facebook.com/jonesandcrane.

<p>As you probably know, grassroots conservatives are up in arms over the fact that some conservatives Members were “purged” from committee assignments.</p> <p>Now, it seems Republican leadership is aiming to make matters even worse.</p>

The FCC is moving forward with a controversial plan to entice broadcasters to give up their airwaves so they can later be auctioned off to carriers who need more spectrum to deliver mobile broadband. FCC officials expect the auction in 2014. Chairman Julius Genachowski The Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission plans to share his thinking around how the agency will conduct an auction that would take airwaves from TV broadcasters and make them available for mobile broadband. The plan to entice TV broadcasters who are currently using airwaves to give them up to the FCC, which then auctions those...

As Republicans ponder how to win over Hispanics in future election cycles, there may be a light at the end of the tunnel. A poll of Illinois Hispanics conducted by pollster Mike McKeon found that a majority shared views generally considered to be sympathetic to the Republican party. The poll found Hispanics in the conservative camp on social issues in particular. Fifty-one percent said they opposed legalizing gay marriage, compared to just 40 percent who favored legalization. Fifty-six percent called themselves pro-life, while just 33 percent said they were pro-choice. A small plurality of those surveyed said they did not...

For many years the major TV networks in the U.S. would each create a "fall campaign" to build their promotion efforts around. The campaigns included custom graphics and a song, which could be either an established hit or an original composition. A full length version of the song would be produced with special lyrics, and become the sound track for a lengthy video designed to introduce the new fall programming line-up at the annual affiliates convention. In 1979, ABC-TV secured the rights to use the song "Still the One", which was an appropriate campaign theme because they were the #1...

Citing a longstanding battle with upper management over journalistic practices at their Bangor TV stations, news co-anchors Cindy Michaels and Tony Consiglio announced their resignations at the end of Tuesday’s 6 p.m. newscast. Michaels and Consiglio, who have a combined 12½ years’ service at WVII (Channel 7) and sister station WFVX (Channel 22), shocked staff members and viewers with their joint resignations Tuesday evening. “I just wanted to know that I was doing the best job I could and was being honest and ethical as a journalist, and I thought there were times when I wasn’t able to do that,”...

A retired Soviet lieutenant colonel whose self-control prevented a nuclear war from being triggered by a long-classified accident in 1983 was named on Friday a recipient of a German anti-war prize. Stanislav Petrov, 73, won the fourth Dresden-Preis (Dresden Prize), which comes complete with a check for 25,000 euro ($32,000), prize organizers said on their website, Friendsofdresden-deutschland.com. The prize is to be bestowed at a ceremony in Dresden on Feb. 17, the anniversary of the Dresden bombing in 1945, the organizers said. Ironically for a military officer, Petrov shot to fame for ignoring his direct responsibilities. The officer served at...

The South Tampa woman connected to the Petraeus scandal called police to her home several times in the last few days, and at least once tried to invoke "diplomatic protection." Media from around the world have convened at the two-story Bayshore Boulevard home of Scott and Jill Kelley. Jill is the socialite mother of three whose FBI complaint about harassing emails eventually led investigators to uncover the CIA director's affair with his biographer, Paula Broadwell, and is now linked to the name of a second top general. The Kelleys have kept a low profile since news of the scandal broke,...

Never give in.

PIEDMONT, Oklahoma - A 3 year old gets his mom in trouble with the law when he gets a ticket from police. Now the little boy's mother will have to pay thousands of dollars for what the toddler did in their own front yard. Dillan is being potty trained. His mother says he wasn't playing outside and wasn't near the facilities, so he unzipped. News 9 was told before he could pee, a Piedmont police officer stopped him. It's a bathroom break that cost mom $2,500. "Dillan pulled down his pants to pee outside. I guess and the cop pulled...