Free Republic

President Barack Obama’s first paid TV ad of the 2012 campaign had one basic purpose, Democrats say: to ensure that Solyndra doesn’t become the Bain of the president’s existence. Typically, the kickoff ad in a presidential reelection campaign has a gauzy, upbeat, “Morning in America” vibe. Not this one — it was a pointed response to a $6 million ad campaign, paid for by the Koch brothers-linked nonprofit group Americans for Prosperity, which hits Obama on the semi-scandal surrounding the now-defunct, government-subsidized maker of solar power components. It’s clear Obama’s campaign staff in Chicago sees the Solyndra attacks as a...

A judge tossed out California's newly adopted lethal injection procedure on Friday, throwing the state's already stalled capital punishment system into further doubt. Marin County Superior Court Judge Faye D'Opal, finalizing a tentative ruling she issued a day earlier, said prison officials failed to properly explain why they rejected a one-drug process using only a barbiturate when one of their experts recommended it as being superior to the three-drug mixture that was adopted to execute inmates. *** Prison officials will now either have to appeal or again revise their lethal injection procedures and submit them to public comment, a process...

No serious constitutional argument can be made against the death penalty. The endless campaigns to ban it cost taxpayers millions to defend. By David B. Rivkin Jr. and Andrew Grossman On the September night that the state of Georgia put Troy Davis to death, a crowd of several hundred gathered at the Supreme Court in Washington to protest America's continued practice of capital punishment. But they were in the wrong place. The protesters should have assembled 600 miles southeast, in Atlanta.

Secretary of State Clinton, in a sharp departure from her stance when she was a senator, is warning that any American action, even symbolically, toward recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel must be avoided for the reason that it would jeopardize the peace process. Wrong hand giving the salute, Ms. Clinton. Her warnings were issued in a brief she has just filed with the Supreme Court — in which she is arguing that a law she voted for when she was Senator is unconstitutional because it could require the U.S. government to give to an American citizen born at...

Would the Steiger amendment benefit chiefly the rich, as the President says? Not really. Undeniably, a cut in the capital gains tax below the present top rate of 49% would help mainly people in (or above) the 50% tax bracket, who are more likely to own stock and other assets. To be in that lofty bracket, one needs taxable income of about $40,000 or more. But a lot of "average" taxpayers leap into the higher brackets a few times in their lives—when they sell a house, a farm, or the stock that Aunt Tillie left them; or when they collect...

The rotting bodies of 30 men, almost all black and many handcuffed, slaughtered as they lay on stretchers and even in an ambulance in central Tripoli, are an ominous foretaste of what might be Libya's future. The incoming regime makes pious statements about taking no revenge on pro-Gaddafi forces, but this stops short of protecting those who can be labelled mercenaries. Any Libyan with a black skin accused of fighting for the old regime may have a poor chance of survival. The atmosphere in the Libyan capital is frighteningly uncertain a week after the sudden collapse of Gaddafi's forces. Nobody...

There may have been no rioting in the Highlands, but no one has been watching the arson and looting of Britain’s cities more closely than the Queen. With fewer than six months to her Diamond Jubilee, when celebrations are planned for the length and breadth of the kingdom, the disorder has alarmed aides planning the extravaganza. Central to their concern is not just the damage to the country’s image overseas, but also how quickly the feelgood factor engendered by April’s Royal Wedding has been lost. From her summer home in Balmoral, the Queen has kept in touch with developments and...

Rolling coverage of the third night of violent disturbances in London, with arson and looting reported at several locations across the capital.

In June, President Obama celebrated a rare sliver of good economic news: Foreign investment was up 49% last year over 2009. The president says that this boost in capital shipped to the U.S. by international companies or foreign investors leads to more businesses and higher-paying jobs here at home. He's right. But this isn't the economic success story that the White House is spinning. The real truth of the recession and limping recovery is that for the first time in decades America is, on net, losing, not attracting, growth capital. That may be the single most important explanation for persistently...

A Facebook post by nephew Billy got me thinking today. He wrote, "If it's legal to get an abortion, it should be legal to abort a child molester. Just sayin'." It occurred to me that, since Governor Pat Quinn signed the legislation abolishing the death penalty on March 9, 2011, he established curious moral inconsistency, given his radical, enthusiastic support for another death penalty: Abortion. In the State of Illinois, an unborn human being who has never committed a crime can be executed, but due to the repeal of the death penalty here, Cecil S. Sutherland, who abducted, raped and...

The $29 Trillion Recovery by: Calafia Beach Pundit April 05, 2011 Since the low of early March 2009, the capitalization of global equity markets has more than doubled, rising by $29 trillion. Valuations now are only $7 trillion shy of their late 2007 high. It would be an understatement to say that "fortunes" have been won, lost, and won again in the past several years; the magnitude of the collapse and the rebound have been more than anyone could have imagined. It is a testament to the resilience of markets, risk-takers, and workers that the global market economy has not...

Yes, in New York, there's a "capital tax" -- a tax on money you have in the bank. New York, apparently, wants to encourage companies to take as much risk of bankruptcy as possible, by raising or retaining as little cash as possible, so it taxes them on cash they have in the bank. And we raised a whopping $3 million last summer, and we still have it in the bank. So that means we have to pay New York $10,000 of "capital tax" as punishment. Never mind that we've created 45 new jobs in New York and that most...

Anti-government protests raged Monday for the first time in the Libyan capital, Tripoli, with unconfirmed media reports of pro-regime snipers firing into crowds, bloody clashes on the city's main square, and fires blazing in key government buildings. Al Jazeera reported that a fire was burning inside the People's Hall, a symbol of longtime strongman Moammar Kadafi's repressive regime. TV images ......posted using frpa

Shirley Lynette Ledford was a pretty, 16-year-old teenage girl just coming into her own in 1979, the year she was kidnapped and murdered. She would have turned 48 this year. I got to thinking about her Wednesday after reading another story about how we can't seem to come up with a humane way to thin out the waiting list on San Quentin's death row without causing murderers too much pain and suffering. It's a hard argument to swallow when you know the pain and suffering Ledford went through at the end of her short life. I can still hear her...

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COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) -- Ohio says it's switching its lethal injection drug to an anesthetic commonly used to euthanize pets as a shortage of the drug normally used for executions has worsened.

Russia will abolish taxes on capital gains from long-term direct investments starting next year, seeking to lure funds to reduce the economy’s energy dependence and subdue speculative capital, President Dmitry Medvedev said. “Such investments are critically important for modernizing the national economy and we are ready to create institutions to facilitate such investments,” Medvedev said at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum today. His government will create an investment fund within a year to help draw “strategic investors” by raising 3 rubles of private capital for each 1 ruble of state money, the president said. The world’s largest energy exporter...

The Tennessee State Supreme Court acted Monday to stop the executions of four inmates, including one set for Tuesday, to consider whether prison officials have found a way to carry out lethal injections humanely. The court gave Davidson County Chancellor Claudia Bonnyman 90 days to rule on the constitutionality of the state’s new lethal injection procedure. The ruling came hours after lawyers for condemned double-killer Stephen Michael West asked the court to stop his execution Tuesday (read article here). They argued prison officials have failed to ensure he won’t suffer horrific pain as he suffocates on the gurney in the...

The King of kings is about to call ! Unilateral agreements are now coming into play , The Bride of Christ coming together all in one day , So break out the confetti and raise your voice and sing , For the King of Glory and his banquet are about to ring \o/ , The sound of unity across his Body and Bride , For The Kingdom of God is moving in leaps and strides , No longer will hindering spirits be allowed to stand , For The Lord himself is coming with an army to take back all his...

Ironically, a major focus of the speeches at the "One Nation" hate rally was the need for "Green Jobs" along with plenty of rhetoric accusing conservatives of not caring about our environment.