Free Republic

MIAMI (CBS4) ; A local Republican running for office in November is already involved in controversy. Corey Poitier, who is running for a congressional seat, is taking heat for comments he made that have been interpreted as racist against President Barack Obama. "They are portraying me in the media as I should have a white hood on," said Poitier, to CBS4's Jorge Estevez at a coffee shop in Miami-Dade. Poitier is accused of racism for comments made surrounding President Obama's new health care plan. "Since it started in the Senate, to me, it is unconstitutional," said Poitier, referring to the...

PROVO, Utah -- Stories printed in early 19th century newspapers did little to allay fears about the new Mormon church and the efforts of its members to lead peaceful, productive lives. In fact, judging by the headlines and story direction, Mormons were thought to be lawbreaking fanatics who could only bring trouble. So said one of the presenters at the Twelfth Annual Religious Education Student Symposium at BYU Feb. 19. Sara D. Smith outlined her findings in a paper entitled "More Sinned Against Than Sinning." Smith researched newspaper stories about the Mormons in the special collections library in the Harold...

Oral Roberts: MANY OF America’s televangelists have had more than their fair share of scandals involving sex, fraud and extremist politics. But Oral Roberts, who has died aged 91 of complications from pneumonia, always devoted himself to money – and, occasionally, God. He even justified his love of wealth with a biblical source. At the age of 29, he was a struggling part-time preacher with church pastorates in Oklahoma, and his college studies had not brought him a degree. He told the story of how he picked up his Bible and it fell open at the Third Epistle of John....

As cynical as I have become about the news media, even I never thought I would see the day where "60 Minutes" provided far more comedy than "Saturday Night Live," but Sunday’s edition of the formerly respected news magazine gave the educated viewer infinitely more laughs than SNL delivered (although Charles Barkley’s pathetic performance may have still somehow been even worse than that of Anderson Cooper). Specifically I am referring to the segment that was allegedly devoted to the new book “Game Change” about the 2008 Presidential election. Quite simply, (partly because it dealt with subjects about which I have...

Of all the falsehoods and distortions in the political discourse this year, one stood out from the rest. "Death panels." The claim set political debate afire when it was made in August, raising issues from the role of government in health care to the bounds of acceptable political discussion. In a nod to the way technology has transformed politics, the statement wasn't made in an interview or a television ad. Sarah Palin posted it on her Facebook page. Her assertion — that the government would set up boards to determine whether seniors and the disabled were worthy of care —...

Sarah Palin may or may not run for president in 2012, but she is already the overwhelming favorite in the Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck primaries. In a new Washington Post poll, Palin beats other GOP leaders on two questions: who best represents the party's core values, and who Republicans would vote for if the presidential nomination battle were held today. But she has particular appeal to the loyal followers of Limbaugh and Beck, two of the most popular conservative talk show hosts in the country.

(HITPIECE ALERT) http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE59F5GX20091017SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Wal-Mart Stores Inc is taking its ferocious price cutting into new markets as the economy shows hints of recovery.

In another blow to the false narrative advanced by Tea Party operatives and Fox News that the movement is a “grassroots” uprising of ordinary Americans. A co-founder of the national anti-tax Tea Party Patriots movement, failed to disclose during her numerous media interviews and TV appearances that she and her husband filed for bankruptcy and owed the IRS half a million dollars.

With admirable calm, President Obama has sought to deflect the supercharged politics of race by expressing his optimism about American attitudes and ignoring the most extreme statements by his critics. For his own sake, as well as the nation’s, he is wise to give a pass to the likes of Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh. That is not, however, what they deserve. The behavior of those media provocateurs over the past few months is almost beyond parody. They call the president a racist, even though there is no evidence of prejudice on his part and much evidence to the contrary....

On Sept. 12, a large crowd gathered in Washington to protest ... what? The goals of Congress and the Obama Administration, mainly — the cost, the scale, the perceived leftist intent. The crowd's agenda was wide-ranging, so it's hard to be more specific. "End the Fed," a sign read. A schoolboy's placard denounced "Obama's Nazi Youth Militia." Another poster declared, "We the People for Capitalism Not Socialism." If you get your information from liberal sources, the crowd numbered about 70,000, many of them greedy racists. If you get your information from conservative sources, the crowd was hundreds of thousands strong,...

Glenn Beck, the hottest right-wing voice on the air, worried aloud to his listeners the other day that powerful, sinister forces trying to destroy America might soon "shoot me in the head." But there's fear among his critics, including calmer conservatives, that the victim more likely will be one of Beck's many broadcast targets. After a summer of mob anger at town hall meetings on health care - some of which featured gun-toting protesters - and a burst of Beck-fanned hysteria over President Obama's back-to-school speech last week, the former top 40 deejay has emerged as a goofy dark...

An online backlash is building against Whole Foods Market Inc. chief executive John Mackey, thanks to his op-ed column in The Wall Street Journal knocking President Barack Obama's proposed health care bill.

Anchorage NBC affiliate KTUU is trying to get one last ratings boost out of Governor Palin, running a "retrospective" series this week. The first entry was yesterday...of course it consists of pretty much nothing but criticism, but there are some interesting tidbits in there about the NBC policy toward Palin: "She knew when she came back that she came back to a different environment," Stapleton said. "I think it was -- and I hate to say it -- but I think the Thanksgiving pictures coming out of Channel 2 with a turkey getting slaughtered over her shoulder was her first...

In his novel "The Plot Against America," Philip Roth imagined that Charles Lindbergh, an isolationist and an anti-Semite (but a hell of a flier), ran for president in 1940 and beat Franklin Roosevelt. In his novel "Fatherland," Robert Harris imagined a Britain that had succumbed to the Nazis. These works are categorized as "alternate history." Here is my contribution to the genre: Sarah Palin becomes president of the United States. Far-fetched? Not really. After all, Palin really was on the Republican ticket, and the Democratic candidate was both untested nationally and the first African-American to claim the nomination. A significant...

Everyone seems to have a Sarah Palin story of ignored calls, mishandled invitations or unanswered e-mail. Disorganized is how one might charitably describe the Palin operation. "Basically, it's just rude," says one political operative who is a Palin fan. "They've been running the great snub machine. That's the reason the boys in the Republican Party are unhappy with her." That unhappiness has been building gradually in the past seven months, and it was on full display this week as the party faithful gathered for a fundraising dinner at which Palin originally was invited to speak. She was later uninvited, and...

Pope Benedict's repeated gaffes and the Vatican's inability to manage his message in the internet era are threatening to undermine his papacy, Vatican insiders have said. The Holy See is struggling to contain international anger over the Pope's claim on his first official visit to Africa that Aids "cannot be overcome through the distribution of condoms, which even aggravates the problems". The Pope's remarks about condoms, and a recent furore over his lifting of the 20-year excommunication of a British bishop who has questioned the Holocaust, has left him looking isolated and out of touch, prompting calls for a radical...

And Jindal's résumé, intellectual confidence and command of policy make him the anti-Palin. Fairly or unfairly, media and intellectual elites (including some conservative elites) regard Gov. Sarah Palin as an inhabitant of another cultural planet. Jindal, while also religious and conservative, speaks the language of the knowledge class and will not be easily caricatured or dismissed. To journalists, policy experts and Rhodes scholars, Jindal is also "one of us."

MONROE -- When Gov. Bobby Jindal talks to the nation Tuesday, he will be feted by the national Republican Party as the GOP's own man of hope -- an antidote to President Barack Obama. Louisiana's 37-year-old governor will deliver the GOP's response to Obama's national address, and it'll be a breakthrough moment. He'll be the talk of political junkies, and the conservative punditry will likely gush over him and his inspirational story, the Rhodes Scholar son of Indian immigrants. But there's a twist: Back home in Louisiana, a state that turns more Republican with every election cycle, Jindal is not...

MILWAUKEE — For a few deeply unpleasant days, the Rev. David Cooper found himself in the crosshairs of the Roman Catholic hierarchy. It was 2003, and the priest had opined to a reporter that women should be ordained. Faraway bishops rumbled about censure. Then he picked up the telephone and heard the baritone of Milwaukee’s archbishop, Timothy Michael Dolan. Father Cooper immediately offered to resign. No, no, the archbishop replied, we just need to repair the damage. “He was very pastoral and caring,” Father Cooper recalled. And how was it resolved? “Oh, I agreed to recant,” he said. “He effectively...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) - Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's first two years in office have been called a time of milk and honey, when the resource-rich state was flush with wealth from record oil prices. The second half of her term isn't looking so rosy as Palin faces her first major financial challenge as governor. The rapid decline of oil prices has left the state in a looming budget crisis and a late-entrant in the national recession. And that could have political repercussions for the former Republican vice presidential hopeful, who has signaled an interest in a 2012 presidential run but...