Free Republic

Thanks to timely assists from Wikileaks, Trump has successfully framed Hillary Clinton as a crooked politician. Meanwhile, Clinton has successfully framed Trump as a dangerous monster. If the mainstream polls are accurate, voters prefer the crook to the monster. That makes sense because a crook might steal your wallet but the monster could kill you. As of today, Clinton has the superior persuasion strategy. Crook beats monster. Reality isn’t a factor in this election, as per usual. If the truth mattered, voters might care that the Democratic primaries were rigged against Sanders. They might care that the Clinton Foundation looks...

Hillary Clinton's declining personal image, ongoing battle to break free of the challenge from Sen. Bernie Sanders and struggle to adapt to an anti-establishment mood among voters this year have become caution signs for her campaign and the focus of new efforts to fortify her position as she prepares for a bruising general election. More than a dozen Clinton ­allies identified weaknesses in her candidacy that may erode her prospects of defeating Donald Trump, including poor showings with young women, untrustworthiness, unlikability and a lackluster style on the stump. Supporters also worry that she is a conventional candidate in an...

At first, Mexico's government did its best to ignore Donald Trump. Then it likened him to Adolf Hitler. Now it has appointed a new ambassador to come up with a better plan. Fed up with the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination labeling Mexico as a cradle of drug-runners, job poachers and rapists, the government is sending in respected diplomat Carlos Sada to lead a fightback. Mexico's new ambassador in Washington, Sada acknowledges his country has neglected its image across the border and aims to fix that with PR and media campaigns, and by lobbying prominent U.S. companies, lawmakers and...

ESTES PARK, Colo. — A man visiting the hotel that inspired the Stephen King novel “The Shining” captured a haunting image during a recent stay at the Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, Colorado. Henry Yau was taking a panoramic photo of the hotel’s grand stairwell and lobby, according to KPRC. He did not notice anyone walking down the stairs when he took the image, however when he looked at his picture the next day he saw the ghostly figure, according to KUSA.

SNIP Of her dad’s feud with Fox News’ Megyn Kelly, Ivanka called the war of words “sensationalized” and “very much for TV.” Shrugging it off further, she said in what sounded a bit like channeling the Donald, “Truthfully, it didn’t interest me that much.”

<p>The news that Hillary Clinton is expected to appear on "Saturday Night Live" represents a clear recognition by her campaign that she has an image problem with the American public that needs fixing — and fast.</p> <p>In order to appear, Mrs. Clinton turned down the chance to give the keynote address to the influential Human Rights Campaign, the country’s most powerful lesbian and gay rights group, which will allow her to make the debut SNL appearance of her 2016 campaign, said several people with knowledge of her schedule who could not discuss private planning for attribution.</p>

There will be no more flip jokes about her private email server. There will be no rope lines to wall off crowds, which added to an impression of aloofness. And there will be new efforts to bring spontaneity to a candidacy that sometimes seems wooden and overly cautious. [Snip] They want to show her humor. The self-effacing kind (“The hair is real, the color isn’t,” she said of her blond bob recently, taking note of Mr. Trump) has played better than her sarcastic retorts, such as when she asked if wiping a computer server was done “with a cloth.” [Snip]...

Earlier this week, President Barack Obama banned the sale of certain military-style equipment to police departments. Brian Kilmeade reported tonight on "The Kelly File" that Obama also thinks that police officers should have "softer looking" uniforms. Kilmeade explained that Obama thinks that police officers are "making things worse" when they show up to inner city communities wearing military-style equipment and riot gear. "They're concerned about the helmet. They're concerned about the shield. It's sending the wrong message," Kilmeade stated. "I used to think from the civilian point of view that that would be a reason not to riot, because the...

I started a thread on this years ago, been too busy and forgot about it.TERRAGEN generates landscapes. Depending on your effort they can be amazing.

When women first started coming forward to accuse Bill Cosby of rape last month, the public was surprised due to his flawless reputation as 'America's dad'. It has now been revealed that a team of lawyers and publicists worked tirelessly to keep his image pristine for decades, by silencing alleged victims and keeping the media from reporting their claims, the New York Times reports. That apparently all-male team includes $850-an-hour Hollywood lawyer Martin Singer (whose clients include Charlie Sheen and Arnold Schwarzenegger), former William Morris agent Norman Brokaw, his publicist son David, and New York lawyer John P Schmitt.

What would you say if we told you that it's possible to copy, translate, edit and even erase the text inside any image you find on the internet? Well, you can, and it's a lot easier than you might think. All it requires is a new browser extension, called Project Naptha, made by developer Kevin Kwok. It uses a number of optical character recognition (OCR) algorithms, including libraries developed by Microsoft and Google, which quickly build a model of text regions, words and letters from nearly any image. Once installed, you simply hover your cursor over available image text and...

The first lady almost suffered a major wardrobe malfunction just like Kate Middleton, but luckily the President was there to hold down her dress! ...Crisis averted! Michelle Obama had trouble on the way as the wind started to pick up. There was a huge opportunity for a tragic wardrobe malfunction to occur, but not on Barack’s watch. Luckily President Obama was standing close by to wife Michelle, assisting her with any battle between her skirt and the wind.

All Miles Scott wanted to do was to put on his Batman costume and fight crime on the grimy streets of Gotham City. Miles, a 5-year-old leukemia patient, got his wish on Friday, and his heroism earned him a pat on the back from President Obama. “Way to go, Miles. Way to save Gotham,” the president said in one of his first posts on Vine,a social media site that loops six-second videos uploaded by its users.

A new poll for the Hill newspaper finds that “more voters trust the Democratic Party than the Republican Party on budgetary issues . . . even though a strong majority actually prefer Republican fiscal policies.” The poll of 1,000 likely voters was taken last week by Pulse Opinion Research. It asked respondents to choose between two different budget approaches without their being identified with a particular party. A total of 55 percent picked a plan similar to the one offered by House budget chairman Paul Ryan: Trimming federal spending by $5 trillion, not raising taxes, and reaching a balanced budget...

I contend that much of the problem with current right-of-center electoral efforts involves conservatism as currently practiced. This has nothing to do with conservative principles, or any public preference for moderation in politics. It has to do with how conservatism is expressed, and can be summed up as conservatism's failure to sell itself.**snip** Several common stereotypes of conservatism exist and are utilized to define and destroy conservative candidates and movements.**snip** What all these have in common is that they are clown images -- laughable, easily caricatured, and, like all clowns, sinister and menacing at base..virtually any GOP or conservative spokesman...

The last four years have witnessed a decline in the image of the United States around the world, and President Obama’s approval rating has also taken a hit in some regions abroad, according to a series of polls this year. The survey results call into question the assertion, touted by administration officials and echoed in much media reporting, that Obama’s foreign policy has been an unqualified success and that his “engagement” with the international community, especially through the United Nations, has boosted America’s image significantly. Particularly striking in some of the polls is the negative trend in key Islamic countries,...

A new satellite image suggests that additional suspicious activity may be occurring at the Parchin site in Iran, according to a Friday report by the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS). The new GeoEye image dated August 15, 2012 shows that additional suspicious activity may be occurring at a building suspected of housing high explosive experiments related to the development of nuclear weapons and at an adjacent, northern building that may have also hosted suspect activities. ISIS noted that the new image shows what appears to be pink tent-like material over the two buildings, citing an article which concurrently...

How come every image search i do on google has muBarack oFUBARak in it? Like an image search "it's gonna come to that" or it's coming around. Why does he get to be on my facebook page when I never invited him?

My son heads to Quantico on 27 May for USMC OCS as a senior candidate. I was using google maps and google earth as aerial recon, and for the life of me I cannot definitively locate the Quigley course. I am failing my photo interpretation class ;-). Can you vets who have been there/ done that tell me WHERE the Quigley course is? I believe it may be south of the bridge, in the woods/water west of Timmerman, north of Flemming.

Gail Harville supports GOP presidential hopeful Michele Bachmann because she wants a candidate who can debate President Obama “and beat him.” Republican presidential candidate Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., talks during the book-signing event for her book "Core of Conviction" Saturday in Aiken, S.C. Advertisement No, that’s not enough, said her husband, Bill, adding, “someone who will shred him!” The North Augusta couple were among about four dozen fans, activists and skeptics who turned out for the Minnesota congresswoman’s book signing at Books-A-Million in Aiken on Saturday morning. A handful hoped to see a ticket that combines Bachmann and former House...