Free Republic

August 12, 2013 (LifeIssues) - Let’s be honest. To truly be successful advocates for life, we can’t just spend our time “preaching to the choir.� We must step outside our comfort zone to reach those who are on the other side. This is no easy task when you’re faced with individuals who hurl obscenities, act combative or are willfully defiant. But if we’re to change hearts and minds, we must first try to understand the motives of those who are for abortion. Not all pro-abortion advocates are the same, but I believe there are five general traits that exist...

>Plutarch, the first-century Greek moralist who outlined four stages of a civilization, said that a society that has become libertine is in its next-to-last stage before its final descent into tyranny. When tyranny is mentioned, most people, if they are old enough to remember, think of Mussolini and his secret police or Hitler and his jack-booted thugs. After all, dictators are essentially cowards who not only operate in ambiguity but invariably get underlings to do their bidding. Under the current Obama administration, government bodies such as the National Security Agency, the Internal Revenue Service, and the Environmental Protection Agency,...

And why not? If we go on defining human life down, we’ll end up determining that anyone can be killed at any time in the name of the greater good.That’s where this road of warped ethics inevitably leads. The article, published in the Journal of Medical Ethics, says newborn babies are not “actual persons” and do not have a “moral right to life”. The academics also argue that parents should be able to have their baby killed if it turns out to be disabled when it is born. You know, if you’re going to call for murdering babies, maybe you...

Does it seem plausible that the true spark of the American Revolution was the religion of peace—Christianity? In fact, how could it be any other way in a country expressly founded to establish Christian religious liberty? Colonial America was one of the most intensely evangelized and churched societies in history. For example, according to Harry Stout in The New England Soul: Preaching and Religious Culture in Colonial New England, the typical colonists probably listened to 7,000 hours of sermons in their lifetime. For many colonists, their instruction in religion, science, history, politics and most other subjects were delivered only by...

Sheilah O’Donnel tells herself that her new home, a townhouse in a development in Chevy Chase, Md., just a stone’s throw from a Safeway, isn’t really all that bad. Sure, it’s near a gas station. And the front window, with its cheerily upholstered cushions, overlooks a dreary parking lot. And yes, it’s kind of small — “an apartment,” O’Donnel, who is 44, sometimes says bitterly, when she’s reminded of her former life with her ex-husband in their custom-built, six-bedroom home. But then again, it’s perfectly maintained and impeccably furnished, and most important, it’s rented with her own money, from the...

President Obama took his case for ending the sequester to hundreds of disabled veterans Saturday, saying he protected their benefits from the “reckless” cuts to the federal budget but suggesting next year might be different. “It’s hurting our military. I made it clear that your veteran’s benefits are exempt from this year’s sequester,” the president said to the applause of hundreds at the Disabled American Veterans' convention in Orlando, Fla. “But I want to tell you going forward the best way to protect the VA care you have earned is to get rid of this sequester altogether.” The president...

Putin talks NSA, Syria, Iran, and Drones in Exclusive Video

A Fine Gael minister has backed the idea of a referendum next year on extending marriage rights to same-sex couples. Brian Hayes, minister of state at the Department of Finance, says he has “no problem” with a poll on the constitutional change, despite some in the Fine Gael top brass being wary of the issue. Mr. Hayes is the most senior Fine Gael minister to come out, specifically, in support of a referendum in 2014. And he joins Justice Minister Alan Shatter and Transport Minister Leo Varadkar in saying he would vote yes in a gay marriage poll. …

Fresh clashes erupted Saturday between groups of Hindus and Muslims in the Indian portion of Kashmir, wounding three people, police said. The rival groups also burned some homes in Paddar, a village about 50 kilometers (40 miles) north of the town of Kishtwar, where clashes between Muslims and Hindus during Muslim holiday celebrations Friday killed at least two people and injured 24. Police rushed to Paddar on Saturday to control the situation, a police officer said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to reporters. …

The left has been waging a decades-long smear campaign against conservatives, painting them as bigots who have been on the wrong side of history on every issue, including America’s greatest sin – slavery. Vice President Joe Biden even went as far as to suggest during the 2012 election that a Republican victory would re-enslave African-Americans. Leftist academics and historians have gone to great lengths to bury and distort the names and legacies of the men who defended the ugliest of American institutions; men whose philosophy on government, rights, and liberty, as it turns out, is uncomfortably close to their own....

The identity of a priest, who appeared at an accident scene, is a mystery. Illinois rescue crews spent the first 45 minutes after the accident trying to get a 19-year-year old girl out of a car. They were running out of options when a priest came out of nowhere, even though the road was blocked for miles, WEWS-TV reported. "I went back and talked to the priest and told him we were worried she would think we'd given up hope. He said 'I just want to anoint her' and so we just let him come up to the scene," New...

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What is the most intellectually dishonest profession around? My nomination: the admissions officers at highly selective colleges and universities. Evidence in support of this comes from, of all places, a recent article in the New York Times. The writer is Ruth Starkman, and the subject is her experience as a reader of applications to the highly selective University of California, Berkeley. “Admissions officers were careful not to mention gender, ethnicity and race during our training sessions,” she notes. But when she asked one privately, “What are we doing about race?” she was told it was illegal to consider it, but...

David Cameron yesterday confessed he found it a “little difficult” to follow Christ’s example and give all his possessions to the poor. Questioned about his religious beliefs, however, the Prime Minister described biblical teachings as “not a bad handbook” for life. …

In a remarkable admission that is likely to rock the Internal Revenue Service again, testimony released Thursday by House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp reveals that an agent involved in reviewing tax exempt applications from conservative groups told a committee investigator that the agency is still targeting Tea Party groups, three months after the IRS scandal erupted..

Last year NewsBusters repeatedly made the case that members of the press – in particular ABC’s George Stephanopoulos – aided and abetted President Obama’s claim that the Republicans were engaging in a so-called War on Women. In a radio interview with Geraldo Rivera Wednesday, Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.) said this might have been the case (video follows with transcript and commentary): GERALDO RIVERA: Reince Priebus, the RNC chair was on the Republican, top politician on the Republican side, just saying that if CNN and NBC don’t cancel their planned films about Hillary Clinton, that he’s not going to allow any...

Merriam-Webster is going to have to update the next edition of its dictionary, at least if marriage redefiners have their way. Do you know what the words “monogamish,” “throuple,” and “wedlease” mean? If not, you soon will. After all, the power to redefine words is the power to redefine reality. Let’s start with “monogamish,” a play on “monogamous.” A 2011 New York Times profile of gay activist Dan Savage, headlined “Married, with Infidelities,” introduced Americans to “monogamish” relationships — in which partners would allow sexual infidelity provided there were honest admissions of it. The “monogamish” perspective is one of the...

No matter how you feel about Hal Lindsey, he did a good job in the first 15 minutes of video on the threat of political correctness vs. the Christian Church. How government can use it against the Church and how damaging political correctness can be when it is allowed in the Church.

Canadians can take pride in a number of national achievements, not all of which occur on ice rinks. But protecting the fundamental freedoms of expression and religion isn’t chief among them. Enter same-sex marriage. Introduced by the Canadian courts a decade ago, same-sex marriage has become, for many, a cherished symbol of tolerance, inclusion, and acceptance. So much so that many have a difficult time seeing any reason to tolerate continued dissent. According to this line of thinking, the wellbeing of gays and lesbians can only be secured in a milieu that now forbids even raising the question of whether...

(CNSNews.com) – As part of his ongoing campaign to transform New York City into what he calls “Fit City,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg is promoting “active design” for low-income housing developments being built there, including plans to prompt residents to use the stairs and rooftop gardens for growing “healthy” foods. In 2010, the Bloomberg Administration and other public and private sector groups issued the “Active Design Guidelines,” which promotes car-free neighborhoods, encourages “physical movement” inside buildings and “improves access to nutritious food.”The Center for Action Design was launched next as a resource for architects and developers who sign on to the...

In the wake of a rising tide of pro-life sentiments and sensibilities in America, the utter bankruptcy of the pro-abortion position is being revealed, especially in its more militant forms. The pro-abortion side is now faced with: • The beautiful reality of 3D and 4D ultrasounds, making clear that the fetus in the womb is really a carefully formed, developing baby. It is now impossible to deny that the little one seen with such clarity on the screen is a human life that is about to be snuffed out. • The brutal reality of the houses of horrors run by...

“The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they are ignorant, but that they know so much that isn’t so.” — Ronald Reagan “There are no solutions; there are only trade-offs.” -- Thomas Sowell "In the matter of reforming things, as distinct from deforming them, there is one plain and simple principle: There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, ‘I don’t see the use of...

Wednesday was the 101st anniversary of Milton Friedman’s birth, and it will be widely celebrated among the vast number of Americans who march in Tea Parties and wear tricorner hats in public. He will be hailed by the vast number of “libertarian populists” now burgeoning within the Republican ranks. But the new “libertarian populism” is increasingly at odds with the possibility of a shared future. Libertarian populists love markets. One of their favorite proposals is privatization: If there is a problem, they look to markets to solve it. Milton Friedman wrote, “The most important single central fact about a free...

The twentieth anniversary of the death of Eric Hoffer, in May 1983, passed with very little notice of one of the most incisive thinkers of his time -- a man whose writings continue to have great relevance to our times. How many people today even know of this remarkable man with no formal schooling, who spent his life in manual labor -- most of it as a longshoreman -- and who wrote some of the most insightful commentary on our society and trends in the world? You need only read one of his classics like The True Believer: Thoughts on...

Cassidy et al. / Environmental Research Letters Shifting crops grown for animal feed and biofuel to food for direct human consumption can feed an additional 4 billion people with existing cropland, a study says. The lab-grown burger taste-tested Monday in London is billed as one way to avert a looming food crisis by freeing up the agricultural resources used to feed billions of cattle each year. Another way to avert the crisis is to stop eating animal products altogether, according to a recent study.In fact, "we find that doing a complete radical shift away from grain-fed animals, and stop...

Mark Levin said that he got a nice note from Glenn Beck the other day and called it an “absolute class act”. He went on to say: “I think it’s long over due that Glenn Beck and I do what we can in our own roles to help save the country and restore the Republic.”

Rush Limbaugh says Obama's “Nudge Squad” is designed to promote certain behavior. I'm sure he just misspoke. The Nudgers themselves admit they are attempting to do much more than just promote. Government can and already does produce commercials that merely promote an agenda. No, the “Nudge Squad” is not a promotional group. These “behavioral scientists” are charged with steering us into making the “correct” decisions.And who gets to determine what’s the correct decision? Why, the administration. They are the arbiters of right and wrong, good and bad behavior.Do you recall the statement by Bill Clinton, circa 1999? Thanks to the...

Friends, I have hesitated about publishing this article because its tone is so dire and so few in the church are ready to receive it. However, just a few days after I wrote it Alan Chambers shut down Exodus International and publicly announced his embrace of the same “gay” theology I warn about in the article. I have taken that as a sign I should release this now. In a few days the Supreme Court will announce it’s ruling on at least one of the homosexual cases now before it. I’m predicting that we’ll lose at least one of them,...

Rejection -- even repeated rejection -- doesn't have to mean defeat. That, it turns out, is the lasting lesson of the Chuck Ross story. You may recognize the name; two Sundays ago, I wrote about J.K. Rowling, the spectacularly successful author of the Harry Potter books, and about how she has published a detective novel under the name Robert Galbraith. In the column, I recalled what a young and frustrated writer -- Chuck Ross -- did in the 1970s. To briefly recap: Ross had written a mystery novel that had been turned down everywhere he sent it. So, as an...

The Voluntary Human Extinction Movement (VHEMT[A]) is an environmental movement that calls for all people to abstain from reproduction to cause the gradual voluntary extinction of humankind. VHEMT supports human extinction primarily because, in the group's view, it would prevent environmental degradation. The group states that a decrease in the human population would prevent a significant amount of man-made human suffering. The extinctions of non-human species and the scarcity of resources required by humans are frequently cited by the group as evidence of the harm caused by human overpopulation.

This wasn't the revolution the Tea Party had in mind. Four years ago, the movement and its potent mix of anger and populism persuaded thousands of costumed and sign-waving conservatives to protest the ballooning deficit and President Obama's health care law. It swept a crop of no-compromise lawmakers into Congress and governor's offices and transformed political up-and-comers, including Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, into household names. But as many Tea Party stars seek re-election next year and Rubio considers a 2016 presidential run, conservative activists are finding themselves at a crossroads. Many of their standard-bearers have embraced more moderate positions on...

David Cameron’s decision to hire Lynton Crosby last November as the Conservative Party’s chief political strategist was a brilliant move that has helped revive the Tories’ fortunes ahead of the 2015 general election. Crosby, who helped John Howard win four Australian general elections, has emphasised the importance of focusing on traditional issues that conservative voters actually care about, including immigration, welfare reform, Europe and combating the power of the trade unions. He has shifted the core messaging away from issues that are a turn-off for many Conservative voters, including gay marriage, climate change and foreign aid, all of which are...

JONATHAN CHAIT of New York asks if conservatives can be economic populists, too, and concludes that they can't because Republicans hate helping poor people with taxpayer money, and Democrats don't. "[T]he right-wing populist analysis is...a magic trick," he writes, "a way of transmuting the party that taxes the rich to provide health insurance to the sick and poor into the party of the rich and powerful." There's definitely something to the idea that conservative populism is hampered by the conservative antipathy to progressive redistribution. However, there is a further idea, threaded throughout Mr Chait's column, that there is simply no...

As President Obama and America move forward with full implementation of the Affordable Care Act, this nation continues to be embroiled in the fundamental struggle for human dignity that Dr. King addressed at the Lincoln Memorial 50 years ago. Although the President did not stress this historic perspective during his seminal remarks on economic renewal at Knox College last week, he made it clear that the movement to assure affordable health care for every American is a moral, as well as economic, imperative. The President believes, as do I, that the harsh reality of too many Americans’ dying before their...

After several days of intense intraparty fighting over whether to threaten government shutdown over Obamacare funding, Ted Cruz backed away from some inflammatory rhetoric on Laura Ingraham’s radio show Wednesday afternoon, saying he had never used the term “surrender caucus” and had not “said an ill word about” his fellow legislators. Ingraham questioned Cruz’s pugnacious strategy of calling out his members, worrying it would lead to a GOP “civil war.” “If it ends up looking like these cowboys are coming in threatening to shut [the government] down, and they’re calling out people like Tom Coburn, committed legislators,” Ingraham said, “then...

In one fell swoop, Howard Dean has managed to expose his ignorance of libertarianism while making a stale and insulting joke about New Jerseyites. Discussing on today's Morning Joe the dust-up between Rand Paul and Chris Christie and the broader issue of the philosophical rifts within the GOP, Dean declared that "Rand Paul is not a libertarian" because he is pro-life. Dean is apparently unaware of the lively debate over abortion within libertarian circles, with a reported 30% of libertarians being pro-life. Dean also warned Paul: "do not take on a guy from Jersey. Obviously this guy does not watch...

Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke’s term as chairman of the Fed expires at the end of the year and President Obama has quite ungraciously indicated his intent to replace him, remarking that he had, “already stayed a lot longer than he wanted or he was supposed to.” Despite what Mort Zukerman has argued in his column titled “Mistreating Ben Bernanke, the Man Who Saved the Economy,” policy under Bernanke has not been good, to say the least. Policy before the crisis expanded created credit, kept rates too low for too long, generating a second, but this time catastrophic, boom-bust cycle. Since...

Egalitarian rhetoric, once largely confined to revolutionary movements, such as French Jacobins & Marxist Communists, now appears accepted by many in the political & social mainstream. Thus, there is scarcely a ripple among affluent viewers when major "Liberal" broadcast media air programs discussing the "need" & methods to "narrow a gap between the rich & poor," despite the unspoken, yet obvious, implications. Thus a former American President, who claimed to be a "Compassionate Conservative," voiced a similar objective, with scarce notice in a generally hostile media, which had no problem in mislabeling him & the like-minded, as "right wing." The...

Members of the ex-gay community will be on Capitol Hill Wednesday to lobby their congressional representatives for recognition of former homosexuals and federal protection from discrimination. Christopher Doyle, the president and co-founder of Voice of the Voiceless (VoV), the only anti-defamation league for former homosexuals and people who have unwanted same-sex attraction, told The Christian Post on Tuesday that the organization is demanding that every state recognize former homosexuals as a protected class. Doyle and VoV will also hold a rally and press conference at the Supreme Court Wednesday afternoon. "We want federal protection just as gays are given," Doyle...

Tuesday, 30 July 2013 14:32 Texas City Stands up to Atheists Over Prayers at Government Meetings Written by Dave Bohon Texas City Stands up to Atheists Over Prayers at Government Meetings The Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) appears to be losing its intimidating touch as it goes about its business of trying to stop people from praying and expressing their faith in public. The atheist group's latest attack has come against the city council of League City, Texas, which has included prayer by local clergy in its regular government meetings since the early 1960s. In a July 15 letter to...

Views on abortion are becoming more entrenched in certain regions of the country, with New England residents more convinced of the pro-choice position and the Midwest and parts of the South becoming more pro-life, according to a new Pew Forum study. While abortion views have remained relatively steady when looking at the nation as a whole, the Pew study shows greater variation in a few regions of the country. The study compares views on abortion in 1995 and 1996 to views on abortion in 2012 and 2013 for eight regional areas – New England, Pacific Coast, Mid-Atlantic, Mountain West, Great...

There are many liberals who lead thoroughly decent lives. And there are conservatives who do not. But that is not the whole issue. There is something about liberalism that is not nearly as true about conservatism. The further left one goes, the more one finds that the ideology provides moral cover for a life that is not moral. While many people left of center lead fine personal lives, many do not. And left-wing ideals enable a person to do that much more than conservative ideals do. There is an easy way to demonstrate this. If a married — or even...

Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh may be setting up shop at new radio stations in the near future. According to a report on Politico.com, Cumulus Media is planning on dropping both talk show hosts at the end of the year. If Cumulus goes through with their plans, that means the nation’s top two conservative radio personalities would be removed from more than 40 stations. The company declined comment to the political website. "Cumulus is not in a position to comment about negotiations with talent under contract, no matter what the rumor of the day might be," a rep said. Sources...

In a New York Times interview published Saturday, President Obama came out foursquare against the Keystone XL pipeline, claiming that it would not create jobs. “Republicans have said that this would be a big jobs generator,” Obama said. “There is no evidence that that’s true.” He then blamed Canada for not “doing more” to prevent carbon emissions from oil sands. Obama continued, “I meant what I said; I'm going to evaluate this based on whether or not this is going to significantly contribute to carbon in our atmosphere. And there is no doubt that Canada at the source in those...

A 'gigantic hole' in the sun's atmosphere, hovering over the solar north pole, has been photographed by a space telescope. The dark spot, which covers almost a quarter of the sun, is a large 'coronal hole' — a dark, low density region of the sun’s outermost atmosphere, the corona. It was spotted by the European Space Agency/NASA Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) spacecraft between 13 and 18 July, during which time it was spewing out material including solar wind into space. While the hole looks devoid of solar activity, it was in fact releasing violent blasts of solar wind and...

American Christian author Dr. Frank Turek notes that Cambridge-trained Ph.D. Stephen Meyer's New York Times best-seller, "Darwin's Doubt," is creating a major scientific controversy. Because Darwinists absolutely hate it, Meyer's well-reasoned argument that an intelligent designer is the best explanation for the evidence at hand elicits irrational accusations that Meyers is anti-scientific and guilty of endangering sexual freedom everywhere. (Darwin's Doubt, Turek, Townhall.com, July 09, 2013) Meyer writes, "Neo-Darwinism and the theory of intelligent design are not two different kinds of inquiry, as some critics have asserted. They are two different answers – formulated using a similar logic and method...

<p>The truth is usually a tough thing to accept, so I understand if this is flagged. It would be a cowardly thing to do, but I understand it. Some people just ignore unpleasant truths. However, if you think ignoring the problem, or trying to censor the truth, will help our black children improve, you're dreaming. This is important, so I'm happy to repost - indefinitely if necessary.</p>

A prominent Marxist educator, Shakti Butler, uses the following definition of "racist": Racist - A racist is one who is both privileged and socialized on the basis of race by a white supremacist (racist) system. The term applies to all white people (i.e., people of European descent) living in the United States, regardless of class, gender, religion, culture or sexuality. Butler then uses the following term to describe "reverse racism": Reverse racist - A non-term. The term was created by whites to deny responsibility for systemic racism, to maintain an aura of innocence in the face of racial oppression, and...

Friday, 26 July 2013 10:31 Chris Christie Finds Liberty a "Dangerous Idea" Written by Jack Kenny On the eve of a House vote Wednesday on his amendment to curb the National Security Agency's daily dragnet collection of Americans' phone records, Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.) tweeted, "Washington's elites fear liberty. They fear you." On Thursday, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (shown) demonstrated just how eager he is to join the Washington elite. Speaking at the Republican Governors Conference in Aspen, Colorado, Christie delivered what Aaron Blake at the Washington Post described as a "clear broadside" against Republicans of a libertarian bent,...