Free Republic

Gun-control advocates across the country reacted with shock and outrage at the Supreme Court’s decision to strike down the District of Columbia’s ban on handguns today, saying the ruling would threaten gun-control measures in other states. If there was any doubt that other bans would be in peril, the National Rifle Association quickly put those questions to rest when it announced shortly after the ruling that it would file a flurry of lawsuits challenging restrictions in San Francisco, Chicago and several Chicago suburbs. The law in Washington, which spelled out rules for the storage of weapons and made it extremely...

There is a lot of talk these days about the “street.” What’s the word on the street? What does the average person think? How do upper-level policies actually translate down to day-to-day reality? The antique media use the “street” term mostly in relation to the so-called Arab street. Will U.S. actions in Iraq and elsewhere anger the Arab street or win it over? Will we get credit from the street for liberating Iraq from Saddam Hussein and helping Iraq establish a democracy, or will the Arab street rise up against us every time the U.S. commits some real or imagined...

T here's been a lot of excitement about blogs since they broke into public consciousness during the 2004 election. They are now growing at an astronomical rate. The blog search engine Technorati now tracks almost 20 million of them, and various estimates of the number of blog users range from 32 million to 50 million Americans. Blogophiles see blogs as a new way for citizens to express themselves and, especially among the political bloggers, a new way for citizens to talk back to the "MSM" -- the mainstream media. According to Mike Godwin, legal director of a First Amendment advocacy...

Kenneth Tomlinson's crusade to purify public broadcasting is Nixon Redux. It's also Reagan Redux and Gingrich Redux. Snip All this reads like chapters from the Nixon attack plan against public TV and radio snip. If it weren't so damaging, the hard right's obsession with public broadcasting would be merely pathetic snip Yet instead of just sucking up their annoyance with something few people see or hear, conservatives pump their pulse rates into triple digits and bleat about being the poor victims of liberal media bias.

Campaigns Rally Against Wrong T-Shirts Wearing Opponent's Gear Can Mean Arrests, Ejections Nov. 1, 2004 - Behind the scenes of one of the most contentious presidential races in recent memory, both Democrats and Republicans have organized what can only be called the T-shirt defense squads. It is an all-out effort to spot T-shirts supporting the other candidate and block them from view, or in some cases to actually have the T-shirt-wearing offenders ejected or arrested. ABC News conducted a bipartisan experiment in which producers and volunteers went to rallies for each candidate wearing the other party's T-shirt, and found that...

The right wing operates its own code -- a kind of moral Talibanism where the punishment for sin is death (as in the death penalty) or if the crime is noncriminal, ridicule, ouster or impeachment. The right applies the code to politicians, ordinary citizens and celebrities with equal dispassion. And no one gets away unjudged -- except, of course, for the right-wingers themselves. The loophole in the code applies when conservatives -- or more accurately, Republicans (I'm not sure ''conservative'' means anything anymore) -- break one of the moral laws. Then, of course, the rules are amended to create what...

<p>Wherever Administration Moderator went, he was greeted by huge, enthusiastic crowds of cheering people – people as far as the eye could see - reaching out to Administration Moderator and he reaching back at every opportunity. Administration Moderator has got the right stuff, he loved being with the FReepers and the FReepers loved being with Administration Moderator. There is a genuine connection between the Moderator and his message and the FReepers. Administration Moderator could capture the presidency in 2004!</p>

Through the federal government, President Bush has been able to declare WAR in a "foreign" country. Unlike Viet Nam, Bush jump started the war with Iraq. With all of this diversion going on, WHY doesn't the media report on the real truth? That being that the de facto unlawful government state of Hawaii isn't a "STATE" at all and never has been. The fraud, lie and coverup has been all along that Hawaii has been militarily occupied for the past 110 years. There lives today 274 men/women that are of the true nationality of being Hawaiian. They never signed the...

Less than two and a half years after it came to power, the Bush administration, elected by fewer than half of the voters, has an impressive but depressing record. It has, in self-defense, declared one war—the war on terrorism —that has no end in sight. It has started, and won, two other wars. It has drastically changed the strategic doctrine and the diplomatic position of the United States, arguing that the nation's previous positions were obsolete and that the US has enough power to do pretty much as it pleases. At home, as part of the war on terrorism, it...

In the annals of infotainment, few moments match the sight of George Bush leaping from the cockpit of a fighter jet and striding across the deck of a carrier at sea. Top Gun: The Pseudo Event enchanted the public, horrified liberals, and galvanized the press. Suddenly media mavens noticed that Bush's handlers have elevated the photo-op to pure cinema. So what else is new? Actually there was something novel about this occasion, but it passed utterly below the radar. Discretion prevented anyone from mentioning that Bush's outfit gave him a very vivid basket. This was the first a time a...

There is unrest in the forest, There is trouble with the trees, For the maples want more sunlight And the oaks ignore their pleas. The trouble with the maples, (And they're quite convinced the're right) They say the oaks are just too lofty And they grab up all the light. But the oaks can't help their feelings If they like the way they're made. And they wonder why the maples Can't be happy in their shade. So the maples formed a union And demanded equal rights. "These oaks are just too greedy; We will make them give us light." Now...

Communism is a better form of economic organization, compared to capitalism. I will use these following examples equality, employment, health care and society, to show why Communism is a better form of economic organization. First of all in a communist regime, people are all equal to each other no matter how educated that person is, in the eyes of the government. For example a Surgeon how is very well educated is equal in status with a peasant farmer because in communism their is no such thing as lower class, middle class and upper class. Eliminating economic boundaries which separate people,...

The nature of conservative politics is very much of the status quo, the standards set by society for itself and which is harshly regulated by the establishment and by the right. Anything outside of the "normal" is to be destroyed, looked down upon, or forgotten. Only one culture is acceptable to the conservative and to the right, the culture, of course, of the that group. All others are unimportant and wrong. Look at the obviously pro-capitalist stance taken by most, if not all, conservatives. It is the viewpoint that only what is good for me and my own is good...

<p>Ha-ha-ha oh man did we ever get smacked on that one. Conned big time. Punk'd like dogs. Just gotta shake your head, laugh it off. They reamed us but good, baby! Damn.</p> <p>Turns out it really was all a big joke after all. The war, that is. All a big fat nasty murderous oil-licking lie, a sneaky little power-mad game with you as the sucker and the world as the pawn and BushCo as the slithery war thug, the dungeon master, the prison daddy. You really have to laugh. Because it's just so wonderfully ridiculous. In a rather disgusting, soul-draining sort of way.</p>

Hail to the great hyprocrite Paul F. Macri, Auburn, Maine President Bush is a great American, a great American hypocrite, that is. My stomach turned last Thursday night as Bush’s jet landed on the USS Abraham Lincoln and America saw him in a flight suit for the first time since he went AWOL from the Texas National Guard more than 30 years ago. Don’t those cheering sailors — who truly are brave and did serve their country — know that Dubya conveniently sat out the Vietnam War, not as a protester or Rhodes Scholar, but with a rich boy’s “in”...

The GAGG Session Yesterday’s nearly 8-hour debate in the Senate on the Conceal & Carry legislation is the last piece to our acronym for this legislative session, which is G-A-G-G. It stands for Gays, Abortion, Gambling and Guns. These are the issues that have played feature roles this legislative session and all emanated from the state House. The renegotiation of the state employee contract to remove the provision for domestic partnership benefits began the moniker. This followed by the 24-hour Waiting Period for Abortion and rapidly on its heels the Racino bill for slot machines at Canterbury Park. Finally, the...

I know I am not welcome hear among King George's sycophants, but some things need to be told. George always wanted war. Now George has the war he always wanted. Enjoy these last special moments because the world will be never be the same again. There will now be a clash of culture, a clash of civilization, with so many innocent lives lost. Who would have thought a know-nothing, incompetent, with no achievements except what his family name garnered would have gotten the chance to plunge the world such danger, into darkness? Now, he gets the chance to lead the...