Free Republic

he first apology by Rush Limbaugh, posted on his website over the weekend, sounded forced, qualified, almost defensive. The second, broadcast live on his Monday show, sounded sincere and heartfelt. Rush Limbaugh did something not usually associated with either himself or bombastic talk radio. He apologized for calling a woman a "slut" and a "prostitute." The woman, 30-year-old Sandra Fluke, a law student at Georgetown University, wants the Catholic school to pay for contraceptives in its insurance policy because, she says, she and her friends cannot afford the cost otherwise. Apparently Fluke is not aware that contraceptive pills, according to...

"Success with Honor" is the motto of Penn State's athletic program. They got it half right. The alleged sexual abuse of young boys by former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky is disgusting, outrageous, and immoral. That so many at the school's highest level allegedly engaged either in covering up serial abuses, or turned a blind eye to them in order to maintain the "integrity" of the football program and its legendary coach, Joe Paterno, adds insult to unfathomable injury. Baseball may still be called the national pastime, but football has become the national religion. College football is played on Saturday, the...

If ever there was a time when "see, I told you so" was warranted, it is now as the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reports this week that Iran is close to developing a nuclear weapon. That so many in the State Department over several administrations could deceive themselves into believing claims by the Iranians that their intentions are nothing but peaceful and their sole objective is to develop more sources of electricity for their country reminds me of the Munich Agreement of 1938. British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain met with Adolf Hitler, thought they had an agreement concerning Czechoslovakia,...

The world -- or at least the large part of it that hates Israel and wishes it would go away -- moves a step nearer that goal this week when the United Nations votes on whether to recognize a Palestinian state. The vote violates the Declaration of Principles signed by the PLO in 1993, which committed the terrorist group and precursor to the Palestinian Authority to direct negotiations with Israel over a future state. This violation is further evidence the Palestinian side cannot be trusted to live up to signed agreements and promises. Caroline Glick, whose column appears in these...

As defined by Collins English Dictionary, a bigot is "a person who is intolerant of any ideas other than his or her own, especially on religion, politics, or race." In contemporary culture, those who claim to tolerate everything are intolerant of ideas that come from perspectives other than their own, especially when those ideas are rooted in conservative politics or evangelical faith.

Perry's job creation record is formidable. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 32,000 new jobs were created in Texas in June, more than in any other state. Proving his policies were not a one-off, between June 2010 and June 2011 Texas added 220,000 new jobs, again more than the other "57 states," as President Obama might say. Perry is no "let's all get along" conservative. He wants to make a political difference, mentioning the revival of the 10th Amendment, which guarantees states' rights, as the way to reduce encroaching federal power: "America is not going to move forward until...

"Ding dong the witch is dead!" As crowds gathered outside the White House, at the site of Ground Zero, and in other public places to cheer news of the death of Osama bin Laden, President Obama said in a late Sunday night address from the White House, "Justice has been done." To one man justice has been done, but not to the terrorist movement itself, which is bigger than any one man and whose franchise headquarters appears to have moved now to Yemen. At the end, bin Laden died a coward, hiding in a fortified mansion in Abbottabad, Pakistan. This...

In bridge, a trump card is held in reserve for winning a trick. In politics, Donald Trump is anything but reserved and appears to think he might trick enough voters to win the next presidential election. There's plenty to draw on when critiquing a possible Trump candidacy. His multiple marriages (three) and affairs provide fodder for the media and contrast poorly with President Barack Obama's "family values" image as husband of one wife and father of young daughters, whom he clearly loves. In recent weeks, Trump has been trying to gain a toehold in the evangelical community, which is especially...

If the resignations at National Public Radio continue at last week's pace, there may be no need for Congress to defund the aging dinosaur, because there will be no one left there to turn the lights on. The latest is Betsy Liley, NPR's director of institutional giving. Conservative activist James O'Keefe secretly recorded phone conversations between Liley and a man masquerading as a potential donor from a fictitious group called the Muslim Education Action Center, which the man said had ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. The fake donor said his group was worried about a government audit. Liley told him...

On the centenary of Ronald Reagan's birth, I pause for another historic event: agreement with President Obama, who says of his predecessor in USA Today, "Ronald Wilson Reagan was a believer ... he recognized that each of us has the power -- as individuals and as a nation -- to shape our own destiny. He had faith in the American promise; in the importance of reaffirming values like hard work and personal responsibility; and in his own unique ability to inspire others to greatness." Precisely! I suspect Reagan would be embarrassed by the attempts to elevate him to political sainthood....

The turmoil in Egypt must not be seen in isolation from other events in the world. Neither is it an aberration. It is the next scene in a long-running play whose final act is the domination of the world by radical Islamists. The Obama administration has been delusional in its belief that dictators and religious fanatics can be coddled. It has also been dangerously wrong in thinking exposure to our way of life will make them more like us. In fact, such exposure has confirmed what they have been taught: that America and the West are secularists who mock God,...

I don't often watch the weekend talk shows. When I do, I'm usually shocked by what passes as conventional wisdom. It's as if some of the pundits on these shows spend the week in a sound-proof, thought-proof room, then are programmed with inanities 15 minutes before the red light goes on. There's no escaping it. ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, MSNBC and, yes, Fox, too. Let me give you just one example from this past weekend. On Saturday, I listened in amazement to Jane Hall of American University say the following on "Fox News Watch" in explaining why she thought the...

After months of dithering by the White House about the "Ground Zero Mosque" in lower Manhattan, President Obama endorsed the project at an Iftar dinner Friday night. The president said, "...as a citizen, and as president, I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as anyone else in this country. That includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances." After a torrent of criticism, the president on Saturday tried clarifying what he meant. "I was not commenting and...

Anti-Semite: "a person who discriminates against or is prejudiced or hostile toward Jews." Some prejudices are tolerated by elites in this country. Examples: One can regularly smear political conservatives as know-nothings, Evangelical Christians as believers in a fantasy, Roman Catholics for their church's stand against abortion and birth control and Republicans as greedy people who care only about profit and power. Bill Maher regularly serves up a menu of these prejudices on his HBO program. Comedy Central is working on a cartoon series mocking Jesus Christ but altered a sketch featuring the Prophet Muhammad for fear of a Muslim backlash....

Three modern myths have been sold to the American people: the promise of a transparent administration (President Obama); the promise of a more ethical Congress (Speaker Pelosi); and the myth of “global warming,” or climate change. The first two are daily proving suspect and now the third is sinking with greater force than melting icebergs, if they were melting, which many believe they are not.

President Obama has returned to a theme he used effectively during the 2008 campaign: politics is too divisive; name-calling isn't helpful; labeling people doesn't solve problems. In his commencement address to University of Michigan graduates last Saturday, the president said, "We've got politicians calling each other all sorts of unflattering names. Pundits and talking heads shout at each other. The media tends to play up every hint of conflict, because it makes for a sexier story -- which means anyone interested in getting coverage feels compelled to make the most outrageous comments." All true. In our 2008 book, "Common Ground:...

President Obama's appointment of Rashad Hussain, his deputy associate counsel, as special envoy to the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), the second largest inter-governmental organization after the United Nations, charged with safeguarding and protecting "the interests of the Muslim world," should be of serious concern to Congress and the American public. Especially since Hussain, a devout Muslim, has a history of participating in events connected with the Muslim Brotherhood, according to the Chicago Tribune, "the world's most influential Islamic fundamentalist group" whose goal is to create Muslim states throughout the world. In 1991, a memo written by Mohamed Akram...

That a double standard exists for Republicans, for religion, for even whites and blacks and what they say on race and other subjects is a given. The media treat such comments differently depending on the policies of those who utter them. In fact, Democratic Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia can utter the phrase "white nigger" and it barely raises an eyebrow in liberal circles. Rarely is Byrd's background as a former leader in the Ku Klux Klan mentioned in polite liberal company. As long as the speech offender is a liberal who favors the social and political policies of...

That a double standard exists for Republicans, for religion, for even whites and blacks and what they say on race and other subjects is a given. The media treat such comments differently depending on the policies of those who utter them. In fact, Democratic Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia can utter the phrase "white nigger" and it barely raises an eyebrow in liberal circles. Rarely is Byrd's background as a former leader in the Ku Klux Klan mentioned in polite liberal company. As long as the speech offender is a liberal who favors the social and political policies of...

Cal Thomas, America's most widely syndicated political opinion columnist, is joining The Washington Examiner's growing stable of top-notch commentary writers. More than 500 daily newspapers currently publish the veteran conservative commentator's twice-weekly columns, which are syndicated by Tribune Media. "In a very short time, The Washington Examiner has gotten the attention of an increasing number of Washingtonians." Thomas said. "From its news coverage, to its opinion, editorial and sports pages, The Examiner has become a newspaper that must be paid attention to. I am delighted to now have my column running there twice a week." The Thomas column will begin...

Apparently not content with his congressional majority that wishes to force Americans on a long march to healthcare disaster, President Obama has invoked the name of Jesus to broadcast his gospel of spreading the wealth around. Speaking Monday afternoon to a group of children from the Washington, D.C., Boys and Girls Club, the president delivered a mini sermon on “why we celebrate Christmas.” He asked the children if they knew. One piped up and said, “The birth of baby Jesus.” One can imagine the reaction of the media and other elites had a Republican president asked such a question. That...

It's a night and day difference between the media's scrutiny of former President George W. Bush and the current command-in-chief, President Barack Obama. And the coverage of three Navy SEALs now facing a court martial that captured one of the most wanted terrorists in Iraq, who allegedly was the mastermind of the murder of four Blackwater contractors in Fallujah in 2004, is proof. John Scott, host of "Fox News Watch" noted this story on the show's Nov. 28 episode and asked why there hasn't been more coverage about this. "Pretty outrageous story came out, in my view, this week," Scott...

Not all revolutions begin in the streets with tanks and guns. Some advance slowly, almost imperceptibly, until a nation is transformed and the public realizes too late that their freedoms are gone. Such is the revolution now taking place in America. The '60s crowd has emerged from the ideological grave and is about to impose on this country a declaration of dependence in the form of government-run health insurance and treatment. It matters not what facts are known about this "coup," because to those from the '60s -- whether they lived in that decade or were born later and adopted...

There's little doubt that at hand is an ongoing effort by the Obama White House to marginalize the Fox News Channel - especially after the administration attempted to leave Fox out of the White House pool last week. That is something conservative columnist Cal Thomas said is eerily comparable to Cold War tactics of the old Soviet Union. On the Fox News Channel's Oct. 24 "Fox News Watch," Thomas alluded to an Oct. 21 column he wrote, which he compared what the Soviets did with radio signals that penetrated the Iron Curtain to deliver a message of freedom from Western...

I am sympathetic to the story told by Joseph Rocha, who claims in a Washington Post opinion column that he was discharged from the Navy because he is gay, though he says he never told anyone. Rocha says his male colleagues concluded he was gay when he wouldn't laugh at their dirty jokes about women or visit prostitutes with them. Gay service members have a point when they claim a double standard exists for heterosexuals and homosexuals regarding sexual behavior. Rocha also alleges cover-ups by higher-ups about male sexual assaults on lesbians and the pressure he says lesbians feel to...

If you are an enemy of America seeking her destruction, you would add to your pursuit of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons the undermining of this nation from within. You would do this largely through deception, putting on a peaceful face while subtly plotting ways to bring America down. That tactic was on display last Friday in Washington as a crowd estimated at 3,000 Muslims gathered to pray. The organizer of the rally, Imam Abdul Malik of Brooklyn, N.Y., told Americans what we like to hear: "What we've done today, you couldn't do in any Muslim country. If you prayed...

Who wrote the following: "We must learn to welcome and not to fear the voices of dissent. We must dare to think about 'unthinkable things' because when things become unthinkable, thinking stops and action becomes mindless." A "right-wing extremist" didn't write these words, nor did a cable TV or radio talk show host. Sen. J. William Fulbright, the late Arkansas liberal Democratic senator and Bill Clinton mentor, wrote them in his 1966 book, "Arrogance of Power." The arrogance of power and disdain for average Americans is what fueled much of the dissent expressed in town hall meetings. Growing numbers of...

HBO showed the film "Schindler's List" last week. The 1993 Steven Spielberg movie never ceases to arouse my deepest emotions. The perennial question put forth in the film remains: How could people wantonly kill so many others as a matter of state policy? This is more than history, however. There are those who would gladly "finish the job" the Nazis started. The Obama administration -- like previous administrations -- is pressuring Israel in ways that, if the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu succumbs, will effectively give Israel's modern enemies the opportunity to destroy its people. Next time it is...

Despite their control of all three branches of government, this has not been a good summer for liberal Democrats. Their healthcare “reform” bill, which has yet to be fully written, much less fully funded, has been exposed at town hall meetings as a power grab over life and death with the strong possibility that “do no harm” will be replaced by a utilitarian approach to treatment. The cap-and-trade measure (dubbed “cap and tax” by The Wall Street Journal) appears in trouble. Closer scrutiny has revealed it as one more reach into our pockets by politicians who never have enough of...

OPINION: A columnist from the right side of the political spectrum will miss his longtime friend and ideological rival from the left | Cal Thomas http://www.worldmag.com/webextra/15808

After pledging during last year's presidential campaign, and as recently as the spring, not to re-visit the past, the Obama administration, in the person of Attorney General Eric Holder, has named a special prosecutor to go after CIA interrogators who pried information from terrorist suspects, preventing more deadly assaults on the country. Before the hard Left assumed power, anyone engaged in protecting America by interrupting terrorist plans might have expected to receive a commendation. Now they could face jail time. And somewhere in a cave in Pakistan, Osama bin Laden rejoices. By any objective standard, releasing terrorists from prison and...

Seven months after taking office amidst a religious-like faith that he was the one (or even The One) we had been waiting for, President Barack Obama is beginning to resemble a shooting star. A new USA Today-Gallup Poll finds that 57 percent of adults believe the president's $787 billion economic stimulus package is having "no impact on the economy or making it worse." The poll asked six questions and the answers reveal that Obama's short-term fixes are producing long-term anxiety. Fifty-four percent told pollsters they think the economy will still be in a recession one year from now. Forty-six percent...

Seven months after taking office amidst a religious-like faith that he was the one (or even The One) we had been waiting for, President Barack Obama is beginning to resemble a shooting star. A new USA Today-Gallup Poll finds that 57 percent of adults believe the president's $787 billion economic stimulus package is having "no impact on the economy or making it worse." The poll asked six questions and the answers reveal that Obama's short-term fixes are producing long-term anxiety. Fifty-four percent told pollsters they think the economy will still be in a recession one year from now. Forty-six percent...

PORTADOWN, NORTHERN IRELAND—For the past month I have watched British media report and comment on the American healthcare uproar. American cable networks are also available here. The back-and-forth reporting and commentary resembles a replay of the War of 1812, this time with verbal salvos. Conservative American politicians and commentators fire at the British National Health Service (NHS) system and the British fire back, sometimes on the same program, repeating the Democrats’ mantra of how 47 million Americans are “uninsured” and how medical treatment in the United States depends on how much patients, or their insurance companies, will pay. Here, they...

PORTADOWN, NORTHERN IRELAND -- For the past month I have watched British media report and comment on the American health care uproar. American cable networks are also available here. The back-and-forth reporting and commentary resembles a replay of the War of 1812, this time with verbal salvos. Conservative American politicians and commentators fire at the British NHS system and the British fire back, sometimes on the same program, repeating the Democrats' mantra of how 47 million Americans are "uninsured" and how medical treatment in the United States depends on how much patients, or their insurance companies, will pay. Here, they...

BELFAST, Northern Ireland -- While America debates whether the federal government should dictate which insurance policies and medical treatments it will allow us to have, here in the UK, the conversation has "advanced" to the approval of assisted suicide. Debbie Purdy, who suffers from multiple sclerosis, has won a landmark ruling in the House of Lords that many believe will move Britain one step closer to self-destruction. Purdy must be told under what circumstances her husband could be prosecuted should he accompany her to the Dignitas euthanasia clinic in Switzerland. The Director of Public Prosecutions will now be required to...

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius wrote an op-ed column for The Washington Post on Tuesday in defense of the Obama administration's efforts to "reform" health care. She wrote: "President Obama and I are working closely with Democrats and Republicans in the House and Senate and health care experts to make sure we get the details of health reform right. But we can't let the details distract us from the huge benefits that reform will bring." So, the objective is all that matters, not the process by which we get there? The most important words on a contract may...

BELFAST, NORTHERN IRELAND -- On my last visit to the UK three months ago, Members of Parliament were embroiled in a scandal involving outrageous expense claims for such things as moat cleaning, a baby crib and second homes that were sometimes occupied by friends and relatives, or not at all. For the first time since 1695, a speaker of the House of Commons was forced to resign and Prime Minister Gordon Brown (who also had questionable expenses) saw several of his ministers quit. Brown and Tory leader David Cameron, whose Conservatives were also caught up in the scandal, though to...

In the early '70s, comedian Flip Wilson created a character for his NBC television program called ``Reverend Leroy'' of ``The Church of What's Happenin' Now.'' Like some contemporary ``reverends,'' Rev. Leroy was a con artist who, among other things, once took up an offering to go to Las Vegas, explaining he had to study sin in order to effectively preach against it. Rev. Leroy would feel right at home in the modern Episcopal Church, which recently voted at its denominational meeting in Anaheim, Calif., to end the ban on the ordination of gay bishops and permit marriage ``blessings'' for same-sex...

In the early '70s, comedian Flip Wilson created a character for his NBC television program called "Reverend Leroy" of "The Church of What's Happenin' Now." Like some contemporary "reverends," Reverend Leroy was a con artist who, among other things, once took up an offering to go to Las Vegas, explaining he had to study sin in order to effectively preach against it. Reverend Leroy would feel right at home in the modern Episcopal Church, which recently voted at its denominational meeting in Anaheim, Calif., to end the ban on the ordination of gay bishops and permit marriage "blessings" for same-sex...

President Obama's nomination of Dr. Francis S. Collins to head the National Institutes of Health is an excellent choice, but it troubles some secularists who believe science should proceed unrestrained by any higher principles than what can be achieved in a laboratory. The recent New York Times story announcing the president's selection of Dr. Collins ("who led the government's successful effort to sequence the human genome") reflects what would be considered bigotry or sexism if applied to someone because of his or her race or gender. Reporter Gardiner Harris writes that one of the objections to Dr. Collins (he names...

Help me out here. President Obama immediately "meddles" in the affairs of Honduras, denouncing a military coup, the intent of which is to preserve the country's constitution, but when it comes to Iran's fraudulent election and the violent repression of demonstrators who wanted their votes counted, the president initially vacillates and equivocates. Are we expected to accept this as a consistent foreign policy? Even Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was reluctant to call the removal of President Manuel Zelaya a coup, if for no other reason than it would stop U.S. aid flowing to the impoverished Central American nation. The...

"How fevered is the man who cannot look Upon his mortal days with temperate blood, Who vexes all the leaves of his life's book, And robs his fair name of its maidenhood..."; So wrote English poet John Keats in "On Fame." It's worth re-reading as we overindulge in the recent deaths of Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett. Ed McMahon's death the same week received somewhat less coverage because he was neither beautiful, nor weird, though he qualified as a celebrity. At least McMahon served in two wars as a Marine, which was a real accomplishment. What is it about celebrity...

The first thing that should be acknowledged about South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford's admission to an extramarital affair is that it could happen to any of us. That is not an excuse (and no, it has not happened to me, or to my wife). Every married person has heard the voice; the one that says you deserve something "better." Gov. Sanford should have been familiar with the voice because of the Bible studies he attended. The voice began seducing humanity a long time ago. It told our first parents that they needed more than the perfection of Eden. The voice...

There was a noticeable change in the climate during President Obama's Tuesday news conference that had nothing to do with the heat and humidity, the excuse given for moving the event indoors from the Rose Garden. Those Chicago boys (and girls) know all about cold winters, but if they think 80 degrees and partly cloudy is hot, wait until August when the three H's -- hot (95 degrees), humid (95 percent) and hazy -- take over. For the first time in a long time, the president was challenged about his positions on Iran, health care and his "occasional" smoking. This...

A criticism heard during the early years of the Bush administration was that the media were ''in the tank'' for Bush, fearing to question his foreign and domestic policies in the aftermath of 9/11 because of his then-high approval numbers and concern that they would be labeled unpatriotic. Such fears have evaporated with the advent of the Obama administration. The intensity of media worship and slavish devotion by more journalists to President Obama and his policies has risen to what one might expect from members of a cult. On MSNBC, Newsweek editor Evan Thomas said of the president: ''. ....

The Republican Party of late has been on a listening tour, asking people for recommendations about what the party should do to revive itself after the last two disastrous election cycles. Former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell has offered his opinions and in the process may have done more to further divide the party he claims to support. Appearing Sunday on CBS' "Face the Nation," Mr. Powell said if Republicans "don't reach out more, the party is going to be sitting on a very, very narrow base." Mr. Powell said his "model" for this outreach effort is the late...

The return of Sen. Arlen Specter to the Democratic Party (he flipped in 1965 from “Kennedy Democrat” to Republican) is something that should be celebrated by Republicans, at least those who are proud to call themselves conservatives. Specter is a career politician whose first priority is himself. Specter, whose predictable lament that the GOP is not the “big tent” he had been led to believe it was, now embraces a Democratic Party that is an even smaller tent. How many pro-life Democrats exercise any influence in that party? How many opponents to same-sex marriage are in the Democratic leadership? Smaller...

Rush Limbaugh and others talk about old friend Cal Thomas, holding the conservative line for a quarter century.

Another obituary was written about the "Religious Right," and as we Christians just passed Palm Sunday on the way to Good Friday and Resurrection Sunday, it is an excellent time to do some soul searching. Washington Post reporter Kathleen Parker queries in her article "Political Pullback for the Christian Right" whether the movement is dead, ineffective or has lost its way. "Is the Christian right finished as a political entity? Or, more to the point, are principled Christians finished with politics?" she asks. She then goes on to include criticisms of leaders like Dr. James Dobson as either having compromised...