Free Republic

[Top 21 of the] Top 50 Most Popular Text Terms: 1. 2moro - Tomorrow 2. 2nite - Tonight 3. BRB - Be Right Back 4. BTW - By The Way -or- Bring The Wheelchair 5. B4N - Bye For Now 6. BCNU - Be Seeing You 7. BFF - Best Friends Forever -or- Best Friend's Funeral 8. CYA - Cover Your Ass -or- See Ya 9. DBEYR - Don't Believe Everything You Read 10. DILLIGAS - Do I Look Like I Give A Sh** 11. FUD - Fear, Uncertainty, and Disinformation 12. FWIW - For What It's Worth -or- Forgot...

Here are some phrases President Barack Obama uttered in a speech at the White House last week: “gun violence,” “gun rights,” “gun possession,” “gun safety,” “gun laws.” Here is a term he did not use: “gun control.” This isn’t surprising. Advocates for tougher gun laws have for years edged away from “gun control” as a way of referring to gun regulations. The word “control” suggests government overreach, the opposite of what they want to evoke. “How you label things has consequences,” said Robert Spitzer, the chair of the political-science department at SUNY Cortland, and the author of five books about...

In interviews and on the stump, Sen. Ted Cruz likes to attack President Obama, Hillary Clinton and "some of the more aggressive Washington neocons" for their support of regime change in the Middle East. Every time we topple a dictator, Cruz argues, we end up helping terrorists or extremists. He has a point. But what interests me is his use of the word "neocon." What does he really mean? Some see dark intentions. "He knows that the term in the usual far-left and far-right parlance means warmonger, if not warmongering Jewish advisers, so it is not something he should've done,"...

GraphicaArtis/Corbis ¡Feliz Navidad! Joyeux Noël! Frohe Weihnachten! God Jul! Sretan Božić! Crăciun fericit! Priecīgus Ziemassvētkus!How do you keep the Christ in Christmas if your language doesn't have a Christ in it to begin with?The languages of the world have quite a variety of names for Christmas. That's not surprising, what with different languages having different words for things, but it turns out that our Christmas name stocking is stuffed with words that mean quite a few unrelated things. And many of them have nothing to do with Christ.Christmas lands right at the same time as winter solstice festivals that...

In a long campaign thats far from over, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trumps comment in Grand Rapids, Mich., that Hillary Clinton, former first lady, former U.S. senator, former secretary of state, woman — got schlonged in her 2008 primary run might be considered just another insult. Trump, after all, has been down in the dirt slinging mud before, calling Rosie O’Donnell a fat pig and a slob and making comments that certainly seemed critical of Megyn Kelly’s menstrual cycle. But there was something different about schlonged. Sure, it was sexist — especially given Trumps general disapproval of Clintons bathroom use...

Our own Katie Pavlich over at Town Hall came across a poll of college students taken back in September which is either a hopeful sign for the future or some “too good to be true” sampling errors run wild. A survey conducted by Inc./Woman Trend of one thousand college students age 18-24 sought to capture their feelings about Social Justice Warrior issues currently driving protests on campuses around the nation. The results, as I already implied, are shocking to say the least. A new scientific poll sanctioned by Young America’s Foundation and conducted by Inc./Woman Trend shows the majority of...

Well, well, look at this. First, it was inappropriate and offensive to refer to them as illegal aliens. It had to be illegal immigrants. Then that was offensive. So it became "undocumented immigrants." But now, if the University of Maryland's new poster campaign is on the leading edge of the left's movement, even that term is too offensive. The new preferred terminology is "undocumented citizens," implying that these are simply U.S. citizens who don't have their paperwork in order. Nothing more than that. The way these liberals phrase it, they try to take the politics out of it. To them,...

Words. Without them we'd just grunt at each other. Given how some people use them, that might be an improvement. But no matter how you use or misuse them, they've always had meanings. At least until now. Words always have evolved, naturally and over time. Some simply have fallen out of favor and no longer are used. "Swell" mostly has been retired, as has "groovy." That's not what we're talking about here. Now, statements given in plain language are followed by "clarifications," and flat-out lies are treated as truth. It's getting to the point we might as well grunt at...

I shudder ever damned time this co-conspirator arm of the moeslem Brotherhood is pronounced as "care" as if they really "care" about the infidel. We should pronounce it as "kah-ear", Ca = Kah, ir = Ear. It is an organisation that is alient o our western enlightened culture and as such we should pronounce it as such, an alien word. I am thinking that the Muslim brotherhood picked the acronym CAIR to have a double meaning as it could be pronounced as "care" and simular to the islamic name "khar" Short meaning of Khair: Noble, Admirable and Praiseworthy Alternate spelling:...

Well, that didn't take long. Within hours of the Colorado shootings, abortion-choice advocates were placing blame squarely on the shoulders of pro-lifers. Apparently, we're guilty of "violent" rhetoric; that is, claiming that abortion intentionally kills an innocent human being and that rhetoric is fueling acts of terror against abortion providers. "Do we really think that there are no consequences to claiming that abortion is murder," writes Jessica Valentiin The Guardian. "Can we stop pretending that pro-life lies don't have an effect. We know why this [attack] happened. Clinic workers who put their lives on the line every day know why...

While my memories might verge on the edge of fuzzy nostalgia from time to time, I remember quite clearly what the women and men of the 1970s did, said, and believed in small-town American neighborhoods. In those years, I absolutely loved reading (and researching and writing), but I also loved running, biking, and exploring. I could be… rather… well. ..hyper. When I got too hyper and misbehaved, neighbors (usually women, as the men were at work) corrected me. I do not remember ever being spanked by a neighbor, but I certainly remember receiving stern “talking to’s.” The worst thing to...

A major battle in a war over the future of Western civilization has been lost as millions of migrants from the Middle East who largely oppose Judeo-Christian values and have no intention of assimilating flood the United States, Britain, France, Germany and other nations, talk-radio host Michael Savage told his listeners Tuesday. Savage said he received an email from someone he described as "far smarter than I am" and "farseeing." "He said to me, 'It's over.'" Paraphrasing the email, Savage said that what German Chancellor Angela Merkel is "doing to Germany, what the weakling is doing to England, what the...

Is there anything inherently “doggy” about the word “dog”? Obviously not—to the French, a dog is a chien, to Russians a sobaka, to Mandarin Chinese-speakers a gǒu. These words have nothing in common, and none seem any more connected to the canine essence than any other. One runs up against that wall with pretty much any word.Except some. The word for “mother” seems often either to be mama or have a nasal sound similar to m, like nana. The word for “father” seems often either to be papa or have a sound similar to p, like b, in it—such that...

<p>A new report shows that languages spoken in Muslim countries are surging into U.S. households, thanks in large part to immigration from Muslim nations.</p> <p>2014 data from the American Community Survey reveals that Arabic and Urdu – Pakistan’s national language – are the fastest-growing foreign languages spoken at home, according to a new report by the Center for Immigration Studies.</p>