Free Republic

<p>While other members of Congress are hosting gun-control advocates for Tuesday's State of the Union address, Rep. Steve Stockman has given one of his visitor's gallery tickets to Ted Nugent, the conservative gun-rights supporter.</p> <p>"I am excited to have a patriot like Ted Nugent joining me in the House Chamber to hear from President Obama," Mr. Stockman said in a statement announcing the choice. "After the address I'm sure Ted will have plenty to say."</p>

Could there be a better illustration of the cultural divide over firearms than the White House photograph of our skeet-shooting president? Clay pigeons are launched into the air, but the president's smoking shotgun is level with the ground. This is not a man who is comfortable around guns. And that goes a long way toward explaining his gun-control agenda. Lack of informed presidential leadership aside, there is a gulf between those Americans who view guns as invaluable tools for self-defense, both against private wrongdoers and a potentially tyrannical government, and those who regard that concept as hopelessly archaic and even...

Israeli settlers living in the Palestinian territories often deceptively give their products a “Made in Israel” label. The European Union wants to move soon to end the practice and appears to be set on a collision course with the country. … The international community has never recognized Israeli sovereignty over these areas, and the Geneva Convention outlaws the establishment of settlements within occupied territories. Nevertheless, successive Israeli governments have allowed colonies to be built up within them and, today, some 650,000 Israeli settlers live in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. …

Brennan...has had the president's ear for four years. He is also the sponsor of a foreign policy where Islamism is the central, yet invisible, nexus of near and distant national security threats. "Invisible" because Mr. Brennan has made his mark as an articulate apologist for, and co- architect of, a policy of stealth appeasement. The pillars of the Brennan doctrine are threefold: high visibility engagement with Islam, low visibility isolation of Israel, and clandestine kinetic containment of "radicals"... Withal, any solo holy warrior, or Muslim organization, that kills in the name of Allah or jihad, or sympathizes with terror tactics,...

Manassas, VA --(Ammoland.com)- Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA) has published some of the details of her new “assault weapons” ban, and it’s even uglier than anticipated. It is expected was introduced on January 22 2013, the first day the Senate accepts bills for the new session. Meanwhile, on the first day of the new session in the House of Representatives, several legislators introduced - or reintroduced - a variety of anti-rights bills. Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY) has 4 bills: H.R.137 requiring background checks on all firearm transfers, H.R.138 banning possession and transfer of magazines with a capacity over 10 rounds, H.R.141 regulating...

(CNSNews.com) – The White House isn’t saying where President Barack Obama was, what he did or whom he spoke to between 5:30 p.m. Sept. 11, 2012—when he finished a meeting with Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Gen. Martin Dempsey, which took place while the Benghazi terrorist attacks were unfolding—and 11:26 p.m. that night, which is approximately the time former Navy SEALs Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty were killed in the attacks.

Former congresswoman and shooting survivor Gabrielle Giffords urged members of congress to "be bold, be courageous" at the first gun violence hearing since the Newtown massacre.

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A new virus from the same family as SARS that sparked a global alert last September has been found in a further patient in Britain, health officials said on Monday. This latest case of infection with the new virus known as a coronavirus brings the total number of confirmed cases globally to 10, of which five have died. The British patient, who had recently travelled to the Middle East and Pakistan, is receiving intensive care treatment in hospital in Manchester, northern England.

Top box.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced today he would extend certain benefits to the same-sex partners of U.S military service members. Panetta's statement reads as follows: “Seventeen months ago, the United States military ended the policy of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” We have implemented the repeal of that policy and made clear that discrimination based on sexual orientation has no place in the Department of Defense. “At the time of repeal, I committed to reviewing benefits that had not previously been available to same-sex partners based on existing law and policy. It is a matter of fundamental equity that we...

President Obama on Monday is in Minnesota pushing his proposals to curb US gun violence. He’ll visit the Minneapolis Police Department’s Special Operations Center and make remarks promoting a renewed ban on assault weapons and expanded background checks on gun buyers. [snip] The longer answer is that Minnesota is simply the first stop as the administration mounts a public-diplomacy campaign on an issue fraught with emotions on both sides.

Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know. Jeremiah 33:3

Random thoughts on the passing scene: I can't get excited by the question of whether Senator Robert Menendez had sex with a prostitute in Central America. It is her word against his — and when it comes to a prostitute's word against a politician's word, that is too close to call. If an American citizen went off to join Hitler's army during World War II, would there have been any question that this alone would make it legal to kill him? Why then is there an uproar about killing an American citizen who has joined terrorist organizations that are at...

Biblical scholar Chris Rock breathed the spirit of a Pauline epistle last week, as he urged children to meekly submit to their parents: “The president and the first lady are kinda like the Mom and Dad of the country,” Rock said. “And when your Dad says something, you listen. And when you don’t, it will usually bite you in the ass later on.” Wait…he wasn’t urging submission to mom and dad, but to Caesar as if he were mom and dad. If you’ve managed to keep your last meal down, it gets worse. Because, when you reject the parental ministrations...

As dozens of riot police fired volleys of tear gas towards crowds of angry youths on Bourghiba Avenue this week, the scene was disturbingly reminiscent of what happened on this very avenue two years ago. Even the chanting was the same: "We want the downfall of the regime!" The target of the crowd's anger may be a different government, but many here feel their efforts in 2011, when they succeeded in removing Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali, may have been for nought. Many outsiders, myself included, always believed the Tunisian "Jasmine" uprising had the best chance of succeeding, of building a...

Citing advanced years and infirmity, but showing characteristic tough-mindedness and unpredictability, Pope Benedict XVI shocked Roman Catholics on Monday by saying that he would resign on Feb. 28, becoming the first pope to do so in six centuries. Speaking in Latin to a small gathering of cardinals at the Vatican on Monday morning, Benedict said that after examining his conscience “before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise” of leading the world’s one billion Roman Catholics. The statement, soon translated into seven languages, ricocheted...

One thing you won’t hear when President Obama delivers his State of the Union address Tuesday: An ambitious new plan to rein in the debt. In recent days, the White House has pressed the message that, if policymakers can agree on a strategy for replacing across-the-board spending cuts set to hit next month, the president will pretty much have achieved his debt-reduction goals. “Over the last few years, Democrats and Republicans have come together and cut our deficit [over the next decade] by more than $2.5 trillion through a balanced mix of spending cuts and higher tax rates for the...

PHOENIX - A federal judge has blocked illegal immigrants in the new "deferred action" program from arguing in court that they are being "irreparably harmed" by the refusal of Gov. Jan Brewer to let them have Arizona driver's licenses. Judge David Campbell agreed to a request by the attorneys for the five individual plaintiffs in the lawsuit that they should not be questioned about how they obtained work or are driving. He said that issue is irrelevant to their legal claims that they are being denied equal rights, or that the directive issued by the governor denying them licenses is...

The persistent drought is taking a toll on producers of ethanol, with corn becoming so scarce that nearly two dozen ethanol plants have been forced to halt production. The Renewable Fuels Association, an ethanol industry trade group, provided data to The Associated Press showing that 20 of the nation’s 211 ethanol plants have ceased production over the past year, including five in January. Most remain open, with workers spending time performing maintenance-type tasks. But ethanol production won’t likely resume until after 2013 corn is harvested in late August or September. Industry experts don’t expect a shortage — millions of barrels...