Free Republic

Channel 9 has obtained video from a Seminole County courtroom where an emotional domestic violence victim was sentenced to three days in jail for failing to show up for her abuser's trial. During her contempt of court hearing in July, the woman told the judge she had been having anxiety for months after she was attacked by the father of her child. She said she told the state's victim's advocate that she wanted to drop the charges and move on with her life rather than testify, but she was still called in to court. After she failed to show, she...

Taking on a new case that tests Congress’s power over the courts, but also gets into a sensitive question of U.S.-Iran dealings, the Supreme Court agreed on Thursday to review a legislative mandate on legal rights at issue in a case filed by victims of terrorism. The case filed by Iran’s central bank, Bank Markazi v. Peterson, was one of thirteen new cases that the Justices accepted for review in the new Term that formally opens next Monday. It is likely that the Court will hear oral arguments in the new cases in January and February.

In the wee hours of the morning on Sunday, the mighty state of Texas was asleep. The honky-tonks in Austin were shuttered, the air-conditioned office towers of Houston were powered down, and the wind whistled through the dogwood trees and live oaks on the gracious lawns of Preston Hollow. Out in the desolate flats of West Texas, the same wind was turning hundreds of wind turbines, producing tons of electricity at a time when comparatively little supply was needed. And then a very strange thing happened: The so-called spot price of electricity in Texas fell toward zero, hit zero, and...

In her essay For The New Intellectual, Ayn Rand warned that our society was fast approaching the precipice of moral, intellectual, and philosophical bankruptcy with only two paths left for Americans to follow: “they can evade the reality of their situation and act on a fanatic, blind, range-of-the-moment expediency — not daring to look ahead, wishing no one would name the truth, yet desperately hoping that something will save them somehow — or they can identify the situation, check their premises, discover their hidden assets and start rebuilding.” America, at present, is following the first course as our intellectual leadership...

Nearly 43 years after construction began on the Watts Bar Nuclear Plant, the Unit 2 reactor at the Spring City, Tenn., plant is nearly ready to begin power production. The Tennessee Valley Authority, which has spent more than $6 billion on the 1,150-megawatt reactor during a series of starts and stops in construction since 1973, said Tuesday the unit is 99 percent complete and key operating systems have been tested and proven to be in good working order.

A cutaway view of the proposed ARC reactor. Thanks to powerful new magnet technology, the much smaller, less-expensive ARC reactor would deliver the same power output as a much larger reactor. Credit: the MIT ARC team ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It's an old joke that many fusion scientists have grown tired of hearing: Practical nuclear fusion power plants are just 30 years away—and always will be. But now, finally, the joke may no longer be true: Advances in magnet technology have enabled researchers at MIT to propose a new design for a practical compact tokamak fusion reactor—and it's one that might be realized...

Joe Biden, who is considering a run for president, posed today in front of reporters with Samantha Power, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Should Biden decide to run for president, he'd face Hillary Clinton, whom Power called a "monster" in the 2008 campaign.

Hope you like increasing prices, everyone! #ForTheMiddleClass https://twitter.com/WSJPolitics/status/627796768328183808 … It’s not like Americans weren’t warned. All in the name of fighting “climate change,” of course. Has that ever really been a barrier for this administration?

NEW YORK (AP) — President Barack Obama will impose even steeper cuts on greenhouse gas emissions from U.S. power plants than previously expected, senior administration officials said Sunday, in what the president called the most significant step the U.S. has ever taken to fight global warming..... Obama, in a video posted to Facebook, said the limits were backed up by decades of data and facts showing that without tough action, the world will face more extreme weather and escalating health problems like asthma."Climate change is not a problem for another generation," Obama said. "Not anymore."In his initial proposal, Obama had...

Republicans are investigating what they call "improper influence" from a national green group on the Obama administration's signature Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) climate change regulation. The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, as well as Republicans on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, are demanding the EPA and the environmental group Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) hand over documents on the organization's involvement in drafting the proposed carbon pollution rules. The investigation is based on a New York Times ' report that said the NRDC provided the blueprint used for the rules, and "heavily influenced the president's proposal." While...

We have a royal class in America. They are those who trot around as if they were billionaires, with security, administrative staffs, special meals, wonderful trips -- and unspoken disdain for the rest of us. They are the growing number of elected officials, from the local level all the way up to the White House, who we first elected when they were "humble citizens" asking for our votes. Add to that many of the bureaucrats who fill local, state and federal governments. Trust me, this concept of a "political elite" is not only alive, it is in full bloom. Between...

Rob Stein is the founder of the Democracy Alliance, an umbrella a group that organizes the funding of left-wing causes by rich liberals and interest groups. In The Blueprint: How the Democrats Won Colorado by Adam Schrager and Rob Witwer, at page 7, Stein explains candidly what politics is all about for the Left: “The reason it is so important to control government is because government is the source of enormous power,” Stein continued. “One president in this country, when he or she takes office, appoints…5,000 people to run a bureaucracy, nonmilitary nonpostal service of 2 million people, who hire...

During a radio interview that had him declaring the United States as racist and using the N-word to emphasize his point, Barack Obama made some other remarks that have gone largely unnoticed by the Mainstream Media that offer further and troubling insight into a man seemingly obsessed with the belief he should remain the center of the known political universe… During that same already infamous interview, the president indicated his belief that he would be an even better presidential candidate if he was running again for a third term because, “I know what I’m doing and I’m fearless.” Self-declared as...

Senator Sen. Jeff Sessions declared TPA’s “entire purpose” is “for Congress to surrender its power to the executive branch” and said TPP was a “nascent European Union” in a speech on the Senate floor Monday. Sessions wondered, “Why do we have to create a transnational union, an institution that has the power, as I will explain, to impact the laws of the United States of America? It’s not necessary.” He added, “It [TPP] will be a living agreement, and that means that the entity itself, the commission, will then be entitled to make it say different things, eliminate provisions it...

Following through on a threat, House Republicans on Tuesday proposed cutting the State Department's budget to protest its slow response in producing documents related to the investigation of the terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya

Costco has a new PowerStroke pressure washer powered by a Subaru engine with 3100 PSI and 2.4 GPM. It will be on sale starting today for $269, $30 discount. I was thinking of buying it instead of paying someone to power wash the house, a 2 story home. Is such a machine suitable for power washing a house? Thanks for any feedback.

Why Did Paul Get Arrested at Philippi, and What Can a Sometimes Timid Church Learn From It? By: Msgr. Charles PopeThere is a story of St. Paul’s arrest, beating, and imprisonment at Philippi that serves as a kind of metaphor for the radical nature of true Christianity and why it so perturbs many in this world. The Christian faith, its message, and the transformation it can effect can be very unsettling to a world that figuratively and literally “banks on” sin. Let’s consider this lesser- known story of Paul and see what it ought to mean for us if we take the Christian...

Better for states not to comply with the EPA’s plans than to go along and absolve the feds of accountability for the mess. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) set off a firestorm recently when he advised states not to comply with the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Power Plan. Yet that advice isn’t as radical as his detractors make it sound. As a state public utilities commissioner who deals with the effects of federal regulations on a regular basis, I also recommend that states not comply. ... While the short-term effects may be painful, the long-term consequences of submitting...

Republicans’ latest attempt to slow the Obama administration’s climate change agenda calls for new regulations to be halted until all legal challenges are settled — an argument similar to the one President Obama has used when blocking the Keystone XL oil pipeline. The House Energy and Commerce Committee has begun work on legislation that would temporarily stop implementation of the administration’s Clean Power Plan, designed to force states to dramatically cut carbon pollution. The pollution reductions envisioned by the Environmental Protection Agency could only be achieved by addressing emissions from power plants, particularly coal-fired facilities. More than a dozen states,...

The proliferation of renewable energy will never please environmentalists. In fact, the more efficient and inexpensive energies like solar and wind become, the more environmentalists will fear and eventually hate them.Currently, arguments against renewable energy are based on the accurate claim they are too inefficient to become widespread. The technology behind solar and wind power are just not where they need to be to justify widespread use. In October 2014, data revealed the massive Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System in the Mojave Desert fell well short of its anticipated output. During an eight-month period in 2013, the solar plant...