Free Republic

Russia pounded Ukraine’s energy facilities Tuesday with its biggest barrage of missiles yet, striking targets across the country and causing widespread blackouts, and a U.S. official said missiles crossed into NATO member Poland, where two people were killed. A defiant Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelenskyy shook his fist and declared: “We will survive everything.” Polish government spokesman Piotr Mueller did not immediately confirm the information from a senior U.S. intelligence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the situation. But Mueller said top leaders were holding an emergency meeting due to a “crisis situation.” Polish...

The biggest question mark over Ron Paul has always been his affinity for unsavory wack jobs on the fringes of American politics, but these days he’s turning that question mark into an exclamation point. The Daily Beast reports that the ex-Texas Congressman is creating the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity, a think tank concerned with what Paul considers important foreign policy and civil liberty issues. It appears that the institute’s board contains some truly bizarre characters: Putin shills, Serb genocide apologists, 9/11 truthers, and pro-Confederate loons. Here’s a summary of one of the members, John Laughland: A prominent...

I would add 9/11 Truther, but there’s only so much room in the headline to list all his many virtues. Let’s start with the obvious one. Here is how Eric Margolis, a member of the Academic Board of Ron Paul’s new Institute for Peace and Prosperity, greeted the election of Barack Obama. Americans did not `liberate’ Iraq, but they certainly liberated their own nation last week by sweeping the Republican Party from power. One prays America’s long nightmare of foreign aggressions, fear, religious extremism, and flirting with neo-fascism is finally at an end…A forward-looking Democratic Party that represents America’s increasingly...