Free Republic

The difficulty of creating new and better medicines has been the subject of extensive – at times excessive – soul searching, a process that’s intensified as high-profile patents expire, along with their associated revenue streams, traditionally relied upon to support future R&D. As a result, both biopharma companies and patients awaiting new treatments find themselves struggling for viable solutions. Predictably, industry (where I obviously reside) attributes excessive regulation, regulators say “don’t blame us,” and considered reporters and observers typically try to split the different – maybe everyone is a little bit at fault. The problem with this resolution is that...

Representative John Mizuno (D-Oahu) is sponsoring a bill that would require all web sites to keep records of who visits their sites. “The government has a right to know who is reading/viewing what,” Mizuno insisted. “A lot of the stuff on the Internet is not supportive of the government’s efforts to provide a safer and better life for the people. This could inspire mentally unbalanced persons to take dangerous actions that could interfere with these goals. We need to be able to spot this in advance if we are to avert an unwelcome turn of events.” The bill is opposed...

A Saudi woman who defied a driving ban in the kingdom was injured and her companion killed when their car overturned in the northern Hael province, a police spokesman said on Monday. "One woman was immediately killed and her companion who was driving the car was hospitalised after she suffered several injuries" when their four-wheel-drive vehicle overturned late on Saturday, said police spokesman Abdulaziz al-Zunaidi. Ultra-conservative Saudi Arabia is the only country in the world where women are not allowed to drive.

CSW is urgently calling for action on behalf of Pastor Yousef Nadarkhani who faces execution anytime from Thursday onwards after refusing to renounce his faith. Pastor Nadarkhani is currently on trial in Rasht. He has appeared in court three times this week and each time has refused to renounce his faith when asked to do so by the court.

Mesbah-Yazdi, the theoretician of violence, gave a new speech at the end of Ramadan (end of August) in which he criticized the opinion of those people who claim Islam is based on generosity and respect for Human Rights. In this speech he said: “Democracy, Human Rights and the rights of citizenship have no place in Islam.” He continued that there is no room for freedom of speech and thought in Islam, and that Islam is based on strictness and violence. Muslims and those who convert to the religion of Islam must only adhere to the opinions of the leader of...

Former Vice-President Al Gore says he takes encouragement from the so-called “Arab Spring” protests against tyranny that have sprung up in the Muslim countries of the Middle East. “If young people can stand up against a government that shoots them down in the street, then I think there’s hope that the young people of America can rally against the oppressive and incompetent Obama Regime here,” Gore surmised. “I don’t believe that President Obama would dare call on troops to fire on American protestors. But even if he did the American people might finally get the message that they made a...

Egypt sit-in despite concessions‎ BBC News - 12 Jul 2011 Protesters complain that nothing has changed, and believe the military rulers ... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-14128073 Daily Life in Egypt after the Revolution Remains the Same; but One ... 12 Jul 2011 - In terms of the everyday life of the people, nothing has changed in Egypt after the revolution... http://hetq.am/eng/news/2870/ Humbling of the pharoah | Anne Penketh | Independent The ... blogs.independent.co.uk [3 August, 2011] The received opinion in the West in recent days has been that nothing has changed in Egypt since the downfall of Mubarak... http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2011/08/03/the-humbling-of-the-pharoah/

From The Declaration of Independence The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world. (Excerpt) He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them....

FIRST IT’S DRIVING: THEN WHAT? Authorities detained a Saudi woman this weekend after she committed an unspeakable act of defiance in the not-so-magical kingdom: she drove a car - then posted a video of herself behind the wheel to encourage other women to follow suit. Manal al-Sherif’s YouTube video has attracted more that 500,000 views since it was posted several days ago. There is no written law that specifically bans women from driving, but Saudis must obtain locally-issued licences in order to drive legally – and such licenses are not issued to women – which makes it effectively illegal for...

What started out as a hobby for their son and turned into a family side-business grossing $4600 (with a net profit of $200 after expenses) last year has landed John Dollarhite of Missouri in a heap of trouble. For the “crime” of selling more than $500 worth of rabbits in a single year, Dollarhite has been hit with a $90,643 fine and been warned that the penalty could go as high as $3.9 million. US Department of Agriculture spokesman Robert Crook explained that “if you sell more than $500 worth of rabbits in any given year you have to have...

Minnesota Vikings running back Adrian Peterson argues that professional athletes are “modern day slaves.” “People might laugh at me for saying this, but I feel like a slave,” Peterson contended. “Sure, there’s six or seven-figure annual salaries, but what about the working conditions? We have to play outdoors most of the time—in the heat, cold, rain or even snow. Meanwhile, most of our fans are sitting at home with their feet up, snacks and drinks at hand. They’re benefiting from our suffering.” “And how many other jobs are there where 200+ lb. guys get to beat on you and it’s...

Last week on his show Piers Morgan Tonight, the smitten host gushed that his impromptu guest Charlie Sheen (before his complete meltdown) was "the Che Guevara of television" and "one of life’s great characters." What a wild and crazy guy, that Che Guevara! CNN was the first U.S. network Fidel Castro bestowed with a Havana Bureau, so Morgan’s epic stupidity might be superseded by other factors here. And Sheen’s meltdown has greatly accelerated since then. But Piers Morgan’s stupidity still presents an irresistible lure. So let's get started. . The puritan Stalinist Piers Morgan equates with Charlie Sheen initiated Cuba's...

BEIJING - One week after foreign journalists were physically harassed by security officers - and one videographer beaten so badly that he had to be hospitalized - China's foreign minister, Yang Jiechi, denied that the police took part in beating any reporters and said the government follows "the rule of law."

For days now, the mainstream and leftstream media have been telling us that the Muslim Brotherhood is not dangerous, not radically Islamist—but that even if they are Islamist that they are popular amongst the people. Western leftists view the Brothers as engaged in a Hamas-like form of soup kitchen social work/theocratic totalitarianism, but who nevertheless have earned the right to be democratically voted into power by the people. They have been invited to join the negotiations with Mubarak's regime. Short-sightedly, they claim that if we are serious about standing for democracy and the vote, that we have no choice but...

Muslims, by belief and practice, are the most blatant violators of human rights. We hardly need to detail here Muslims' systemic cruel treatment of the unbelievers, women of all persuasions, and any and all minorities across the board. To Muslims, human rights have a different meaning, and its protective provisions are reserved strictly for Muslims -- primarily for Muslim men. Just a couple of examples should suffice for now. Oppression of women, for one, is so systemic in Islam that to this day women are, at best, second-class citizens under Islamic law. Saudi Arabia, the custodian of Islamdom, denies women...

Communists Ban Christmas Mass in Vietnam Editor: too bad our Bishops don't make our Communists this angry and fearful. Vietnam...[kreuz/AsiaNews] Bishop Michel Hoang Ðúc Oahn (72) from Kontum in the central highlands of Vietnam may not celebrate Christmas Mass. This was reported by the Old Liberal news agency 'AsiaNews'. The ban came from the district's Communist authority. That mountain people from the Diocese wanted to participate at that Mass, alerted the comrades to the celebration. Initially, there was no opposition: the ban came first on Christmas day when 'AsiaNews" mentioned that Msgr Hoang Ðúc Oanh is famous for many conversions....

Often I hearken back to Winston Churchill’s speech: 4 June 1940 "I have, myself, full confidence that if all do their duty, if nothing is neglected, and if the best arrangements are made, as they are being made, we shall prove ourselves once again able to defend our Island home, to ride out the storm of war, and to outlive the menace of tyranny, if necessary for years, if necessary alone. At any rate, that is what we are going to try to do. That is the resolve of His Majesty's Government-every man of them. That is the will...

The American Revolution was over. The United States of America was finished. The Continental Army was all but finished in December 1776 as the British and their Hessian (German) mercenary allies settled in for a long winter rest. In those days, it was customary that armies rest and refit in the winter months in preparation for the campaign seasons of spring and summer. And the British were all about custom and tradition. No matter, thought the British. They saw little need to move directly against Washington's army and risk further casualties. The Continental Army was disintegrating. Unpaid, ill-equipped, cold, and...

Some months ago I related to you how I stood in the parking lot of one of the Big Box stores and counted 22 cameras observing everything going on around me. Those were just the cameras I could see from my vantage point. There were more. Please note: That was OUTSIDE the store. Upon entering the store there were uncountable cameras peering at shoppers -- some obvious and others strategically located and camouflaged, I expect. Some years ago, in a nearby city, my wife and I had been shopping in a large grocery store in route home from attending church....

Making the rounds on YouTube these days is a film of a group of manly looking women preparing for and conducting a "flash dance" in a Philadelphia food store. The crew of ladies, dressed in tight black clothes and sequined accessories, arrives at The Fresh Grocer supermarket, breaks into a preplanned chant ordering shoppers not to buy Sabra and Tribe hummus and telling them to oppose Israeli "apartheid" and support "Palestine." From their attire and attitude, it is fairly clear that the participants in the video would congratulate themselves on their commitment to the downtrodden, the wretched of the earth...

Editor: This article appeared about two weeks ago, this situation is still ongoing, will check for more information and join these brave souls in their resistance to Communism. (Peking)All 100 Seminarians of the seminary in the Chinese province of Hebei are protesting against the Official of the State Commission for Ethnic and Religious Affairs in the Province. For 19 Days the Priests are in a hunger strike with which they are protesting the appointment of a Communist to the Vice Regency of the Seminary. The Seminarians fear that the Communist regime is going to interfere with the religious education and...

Let us remember who we are and where we come from. Let us remember that the whole point of America is to empower the individual by restraining the government. Big government is not “progressive.” It represents a regression to an earlier, less free time. A high tax rate is not “progressive.” What is slavery, if not a 100% tax rate? Our ancestors came here to escape the oppressive regimes of the Old World. That’s why they called it the New World. If we allow an oppressive regime to be established here, we will be insulting the memory of our ancestors....

As reported in the UK Independent (10/14/10), president of the Islamic Sharia Council in Britain, Sheikh Maulana Abu Sayeed, has reiterated alarming comments made during a March, 2010 interview, sanctioning marital rape. Sheikh Sayeed was in fact responding to an inchoate effort at modernizing the contracts which govern Muslim marriages in Britain. The good Sheikh, representing Britain’s main Islamic Sharia court, the Islamic Sharia Council, promptly published a rebuttal of the contract, which included a statement on sexual abuse (page 6 here). He opined in the March interview:Clearly there cannot be any “rape” within the marriage. Maybe “aggression”, maybe “indecent...

David Horowitz is one of those rare people who change lives. I know, because he changed mine. When I started snapping out of my Leftist trance three years ago, I had nowhere to turn. I didn't have the foggiest idea why thugs were surrounding Obama. Weren't the progressives the good guys? I turned to my local Borders bookstore for some answers. There I found the writings of David Horowitz, to which I could immediately relate. Like me, Horowitz was a Jew from New York who was hoodwinked by radicalism. But that's where the similarities stopped. My parents were JFK-type liberals...

The Vatican has recognized men who've been the Communist regime's Bishops for years. In public, the supposed warming of relations to fat cats was bought in Peking. The faithful will pay the bill. [kreuz.net, Hong Kong] The Emeritus Bishop of Hong Kong, Joseph Cardinal Zen, has openly criticized the communist-friendly China-politic of the Vatican's Congregation of Missions on 'AsiaNews'. The text is a copy of an article by a Father Jeroom Heyndrickx, the Cardinal with a question mark as the middleman between the Communists and the Congregation of Missions.

This source is banned. But if you do a search The Independ, UK on robert fisk's recent writing about Islam and read his articles about the oppression and crimes of Islam, you will find two important articles written by the commie.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will be offering about 800 jobs to people to carry out the Wall Street reform legislation. The head of the regulatory agency is planning on telling lawmakers. SEC Chairwoman Mary Schapiro will testify on Tuesday before a House Financial Services subcommittee.

Have the people of Arizona had enough? Grumblings in the state's capital seem to think so. After the fed had completely abandoned any serious efforts to secure the southwestern border, Arizona passed a law which largely enforced laws on the books. But the oppressive Obama Regime, who wants to legalize millions of illegals to secure votes, is now suing Arizona's new law. “The Justice Department is overstepping its bounds,” says a source in the Arizona government. “They have no right to overturn a law enacted by a State and overwhelmingly supported by its citizens. But we know this administration cares...

Iran: A year later, Green wave rippling no more Arrests, torture, raids, summary trials and executions have crushed Iran’s protest movement, a cause without a real leader. An Ahmadinejad aide prepares to run in the next presidential elections. Saturday, June 12, 2010 By Asia News Tehran – The contrast could not be any greater. A year ago, millions of Iranians had taken to the streets across the country, putting their lives at risk, to protest against rigged elections won by outgoing President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Tomorrow, a year after what was the greatest challenge to Iran’s 30-year-old theocratic regime, no one...

Why I Despise Progressives Ward Dorrity – June, 2010 The classical liberal contemporary of our Founding Fathers believed in individualism, in a society of free individuals organized as far as possible through mutual consent. The individualism that informed the Founder’s ideas regarded every man as an independent, spiritually sovereign entity who possesses an inalienable right to his own life. The right to live is derived from Man’s nature as a rational being. Individualism holds that a rational society, or any form of association, cooperation or peaceful coexistence among men, can be achieved only on the basis of the recognition...

State Department functionary Michael Posner is either dumb or deluded. He's the fellow who earlier this month drew obnoxious moral parallels between US and Chinese human-rights records -- and he's still at it. "Part of a mature relationship is that you have an open discussion where you not only raise the other guy's problems, but you raise your own," he had said -- referencing, among other things, Arizona's new immigration law. Arizona wants federal immigration laws enforced, you see, and the Chinese violently oppress Tibetan and Muslim minorities and force North Korean refugees back home to face certain death. To...

Free Speech: President Obama, while addressing college graduates, condemns our access to new media as a subversion of democracy. Is the iPad a threat to democracy or exactly what Thomas Jefferson had in mind? At Hampton University in Virginia on Sunday, the president lamented that in an age of text messaging, the Internet and the iPad, information and its unfettered exchange had become a diversion that was putting a strain on democracy. We are not making this up. The "24/7 media environment," he told the students, "bombards us with all kinds of comments and exposes us to all kinds of...

Big Brother says elderly visitors to federally funded meals at a Georgia senior citizen's center aren't allowed to pray to that absurd, dangerous Christian God of theirs. Obama's Big Brother government contends that since it has paid for their meals the government has the right to slam its iron boot heel down on the necks of those seasoned citizens that dare to engage in such an apostasy toward the state. Seem absurd? Well it is but that is what happens when the feds roll into town and begin to hand out money. They feel the right to dictate what everyone...

In a renewed drive to regulate the Internet, the FCC has announced scaled-back ambitions for Net Neutrality, but only after an appeals court ruling that the FCC had "overstepped its authority." To evade the court ruling, the FCC aims to impose Net Neutrality - equal treatment for all web traffic, compelled through government regulation - by "regulating broadband lines under decades-old rules designed for traditional phone networks."

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- An all-but-overlooked provision of the health reform law is threatening to swamp U.S. businesses with a flood of new tax paperwork. Section 9006 of the health care bill -- just a few lines buried in the 2,409-page document -- mandates that beginning in 2012 all companies will have to issue 1099 tax forms not just to contract workers but to any individual or corporation from which they buy more than $600 in goods or services in a tax year.

LEADING APARTHEID AND OPPRESSOR OF THE WORLD SETS UP "HUMAN RIGHTS" DIV. [OIC], LOL This BITTER JOKE is in the news: Major Muslim group sets up human rights division 22 Apr 2010 ... The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) has announced it is setting up a special division that will deal with human rights.http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=173731 The regionalization of minority rights is most advanced within the West, in Europe and the Americas, By contrast, there is virtually no enthusiasm in Asia or the Arab/Muslim world to defelop regional norms on minortitiy rights. The whole issue remains essentially a taboo topic in...

The Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission (SHRC) has announced that it will be seeking leave to appeal the Bill Whatcott decision to the Supreme Court. In 2005, a Saskatchewan Human Rights Tribunal ruled that Whatcott had violated the Saskatchewan Human Rights code and ordered him to pay $17,500 to the four people who had filed complaints to compensate for "loss of their dignity, self-respect and hurt feelings." The four complainants, Guy Taylor and James Komar of Saskatoon, and Kathy Hamre and Brendan Wallace of Regina, filed their complaints after receiving anti-gay flyers in their mailboxes or slipped under the door of...

I posted a somewhat shorter version of this in a previous thread. I have been asked to expand it to a full post. Americans are now working their way through their tax forms and making valiant attempts to avoid using “colorful” language in reference to the tax people. For you this is a warning. If you have never had problems with the IRS you are very fortunate but rest assured you are in their crosshairs. The following is an experience I have had with the friendly, accessible government services that will be the template for the ever expanding O-care bureaucracy....

Venezuela’s government is filing charges against regime critic former Governor Oswaldo Alvarez Paz. The move comes after Alvarez said on a television program that “the country has become a haven for drug trafficking.” For these remarks Alvarez is being charged with “spreading false information and publicly inciting disrespect for duly elected authorities.” The fact that Venezuela has no law, per se, against criticizing the government is not expected to deter Chavez from going after Alvarez. “The law cannot anticipate all contingencies,” Chavez explained. “Sometimes we discover that a wrong has been committed before we have made a law against it....

It is unwise to give people the idea that they have nothing to lose. Lincoln said, “Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.” Our politicians are failing that test shamefully, and it is up to us to send them the report card. We hope they will get the message from the 2010 and 2012 elections, so that my dream will remain only a dream, and not become a real nightmare when the patient people lose their patience.

When human life is measured only by its cost, then you know there are wider and very concerning implications about what such people believe and will do. We are seeing the Obama Democrats come out these past few days revealing, more explicitly than ever before, their true nature of being political thugs. All stops are being pulled to ram their health care legislation through – no matter how much the American public opposes it, no matter how much they have to lie and trash the constitution and legislative traditions, and no matter how much they have to bribe or threaten...

So here we are in 2010 with all these damned “Rights”. The problem with Rights for Terrorists is just tying our hands together against the Dictators and Genocide Kings of this planet. Genocide Kings – Like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who is allowed to hang, rape, imprison, torture, mutilate, and kill anyone who protests his Dictatorship. Anyone who dares to want to have freedom, right to bare arms, freedom of speech or choose their own religion is a Bad Outcast and must be killed or shut down. Excuse me; Mr. President; this is too much. We as a Free Nation Must care...

While Iran's regime bloodies its dissidents, hangs homosexuals, presses women, the nuclear weapons-loving mullahs are seeking a treat for themselves at the United Nations. Iran is running for a seat on the U.N. Human Rights Council. And at the same time they are defending their own human rights record to the council. I am not sure what kind of rationale they can use (maybe Ahmadinejad can say he calls his mom every day), but in the end may not need it. The oppressive state got much support from some of its friends such as Nicaragua and Cuba. The events once...

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia - Saudi Arabia has launched a nationwide crackdown on stores selling items that are red or otherwise allude to the banned celebration of Valentine's Day. A Saudi official says the feared religious police are inspecting shops for red roses, heart-shaped products or gifts wrapped in red, and ordering storeowners to get rid of them. Red-colored or heart-shaped items are legal at other times of the year, but as Feb. 14 nears they become contraband in Saudi Arabia...

Haiti’s humanitarian disaster has rightfully elicited an outpouring of support from around the world. But the tragedy should also elicit outrage because the massive destruction, suffering and loss of life were largely avoidable. Natural disasters, such as hurricanes and floods that have regularly afflicted Haiti, have plagued mankind throughout history. As the world has become wealthier, the ability to cope with such calamities has grown; annual deaths due to such disasters have declined by 96 percent since the 1920s. Economic growth has made it possible for countries around the world, increasingly including developing nations, to mitigate damage done by “acts...

I know this is easier said than done, however, it must be done if you want to get yourself out from under the Oppression. If you want to reduce your exposure to being forced to pay for programs that you feel are un-american and un-fair you must begin (if you have not already) to do the following.

The Iranian Government’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Ramin Mahmanparast, blamed recent street violence in his country on “Western instigators.” “The modern media allow our nation’s young people to be constantly exposed to the most vile influences of infidel culture on a daily basis,” Mahmanparast complained. “We cannot control what they see and hear. Anyone can turn on the Internet and have their minds polluted.” “Women are particularly vulnerable,” Mahmanparast contended. “Their naturally weaker minds are dazzled by the West’s material abundance and the elevated status enjoyed by females in that depraved culture. Devotion to God and family, obedience to their fathers...

TEHRAN, Iran — Iran on Tuesday accused Western countries of fomenting deadly anti-government protests in the capital this week and said it was summoning Britain's ambassador to file a complaint. The comments by Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mahmanparast added to growing tensions between Iran and the West, which is threatening to impose tough new sanctions over Iran's suspect nuclear program and has criticized the violent crackdown on anti-government protesters in Tehran. Iran has said as many as eight people were killed in Sunday's clashes in Tehran. There was no serious violence reported Tuesday, but opposition Web sites said several activists...

Representative Alan Grayson (D-Fla) has filed a complaint with U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder demanding that a pesky critic of his be prosecuted. The critic is one Angie Langley—originator of a web site called “mycongressmanisnuts.com.” “It’s a sad day for America when a nobody like Ms. Langley can harass a member of congress with impunity,” Grayson complained. “People should be taught respect for those of us who govern them. We shouldn’t have to endure the kind of round-the-clock mockery being dished out by the people who live under us.” The basis for Grayson’s contention that Langley ought to go to...

DALLAS (Reuters) - U.S. allies Saudi Arabia and Egypt are among 10 mostly Muslim nations whose governments impose the most curbs on religion, according to a report on Wednesday by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. Afghanistan's government also ranked poorly, highlighting a potentially sensitive diplomatic flashpoint as President Barack Obama sends more U.S. troops to the Central Asian country to quell a growing insurgency. The Pew report says nearly 70 percent of the world's 6.8 billion people who live in countries that have severe restrictions on religion.