Free Republic

Hillary Clinton scrubbed her Benghazi emails. That is the logical conclusion drawn by investigative reporter Sharyl Attkisson who, while at CBS, fought to break stories exposing the Obama administration’s lies on “phony” scandals from Fast and Furious to Benghazi and for her efforts had her computer hacked and monitored, likely by administration operatives concerned by her revelations and curious about her sources. Attkisson said on NewsmaxTV’s “The Steve Malzberg Show” recently that she thought it was a common sense conclusion that Hillary Clinton erased the contents of her personal email server, created and used in violation of the National Records...

SANLIURFA, Turkey — When Abu Hamza, a former Syrian rebel, agreed to join the Islamic State, he did so assuming he would become a part of the group’s promised Islamist utopia, which has lured foreign jihadists from around the globe. Instead, he found himself being supervised by an Iraqi emir and receiving orders from shadowy Iraqis... All of the men, however, were former Iraqi officers who had served under Saddam Hussein... His account, and those of others who have lived with or fought against the Islamic State over the past two years, underscore the pervasive role played by members of...

The Republican field is crowded, which implies that primary voters have little information about where some of the candidates stand. That is particularly the case this season, with a few relatively unknown contenders who lack legislative experience or a long history of campaign contributions that would allow researchers to precisely identify where they stand on the liberal-to-conservative political dimension.However, one characteristic all candidates share is that they have active and popular Twitter accounts. And as I showed in an article published earlier this year in the journal Political Analysis — now freely available online as an Editors’ Choice article —...

Peter denied Jesus three times but Hillary Clinton appears to have a much more difficult task; she is going to have to deny herself at least 45 times. Last Friday, Hillary Clinton's spokesperson, Karen Finney, appeared on CNN's The Lead and exasperated Jake Tapper by continuing to avoid avoid answering the important question as to whether her boss still supports or opposes the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade bill in Congress. Not a smart move in the long run because yesterday Tapper struck back by listing in detail, with her own quotes, 45 times that Hillary pushed the trade bill over the years....

NEWTOWN, Conn. --- According to media reports coming out of the first day of the Paris Air Show, the Chengdu/Pakistan Aeronautical Complex JF-17 Thunder jet fighter has secured its first confirmed export deal with an unnamed Asian country. The lead sales and marketing official for the JF-17, Pakistan's Air Commodore Khalid Mahmood, declined to specify the customer and number of aircraft ordered due to client request, divulging only that deliveries will begin in 2017. This prompts the natural question: Who is the buyer? To begin with only a handful of countries in the Asia-Pacific Rim region procure military hardware from...

MOSCOW, June 16 (UPI) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin announced Tuesday Russia's nuclear arsenal would be would increase by 40 intercontinental ballistic missiles in 2015. Speaking at Army-2015 Expo, an international military trade show near Moscow, Putin said the new missiles could "overcome even the most technically advanced anti-missile defense systems," adding a new long-range early-warning radar "to monitor in the western direction" was also being prepared. It was a reference to plans by NATO to permanently place troops and heavy armaments in Poland, a Russian neighbor and former Warsaw Pact country. In reference to apparent plans to reinforce NATO's...

Secretary of State John Kerry said Tuesday that a full accounting of Iran’s possible past atomic weapons research is not necessarily critical to reaching a nuclear deal with Tehran. His comments came amid concerns the Obama administration is backing down on demands that Iran resolve concerns about previous work as part of an agreement that would curb its nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief. Kerry said the U.S. and its negotiating partners are “not fixated” on the issue of so-called “possible military dimensions” because they already have a complete picture of Iran’s past activities. He said they are more...

In the two years since the Edward Snowden saga went public, a handful of people who actually understand the Western signals intelligence system have tried to explain the many ways that the Snowden Operation has smeared NSA and its partners with salacious charges of criminality and abuse. I’ve been one of the public faces of what may be called the Snowden Truth movement, and finally there are signs that reality may be intruding on this debate. No American ally was rocked harder by Snowden’s allegations than Germany, which has endured a bout of hysteria over charges that NSA was listening...

While UK government officials are said to have been briefing the Sunday Times that the Russians and the Chinese have managed to “crack” the encryption on the Snowden files, cyber-security experts have been casting doubt on the credibility of the story. The Sunday Times reported this weekend that the top-secret cache of files stolen by Edward Snowden from his former employer the NSA had been decrypted by Russia and China, forcing MI6 to pull agents out of live operations in hostile countries. The story was built around anonymous briefings by officials from Downing Street, the Home Office and the security...

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz supports NASA's human space exploration program as a national priority that deserves congressional support. USA Today reports if NASA's program goes as planned, astronauts could travel to Mars by the 2030s. Cruz, a Tea Party Republican, said developing a rocket and capsule that could cost tens of billions of dollars is "critical" to ensuring American's leadership in space. "It is imperative that America has the capability to get to the space station without the assistance of the Russians," Cruz said Tuesday while chairing a hearing before the Commerce, Science and Transportation Subcommittee on Science, Space and Competitiveness. "The Commercial...

RIGA, Latvia — In a significant move to deter possible Russian aggression in Europe, the Pentagon is poised to store battle tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and other heavy weapons for as many as 5,000 American troops in several Baltic and Eastern European countries, American and allied officials say. The proposal, if approved, would represent the first time since the end of the Cold War that the United States has stationed heavy military equipment in the newer NATO member nations in Eastern Europe that had once been part of the Soviet sphere of influence. Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the war...

A plan by Washington to station tanks and heavy weapons in NATO states on Russia's border would be the most aggressive U.S. act since the Cold War, and Moscow would retaliate by beefing up its own forces, a Russian defense official said on Monday. The United States is offering to store military equipment on allies' territory in eastern Europe, a proposal aimed at reassuring governments worried that after the conflict in Ukraine, they could be the Kremlin's next target.

What kind of person would read evidence-free accusations of this sort from anonymous government officials – designed to smear a whistleblower they hate – and believe them? That’s a particularly compelling question given that Vice’s Jason Leopold just last week obtained and published previously secret documents revealing a coordinated smear campaign in Washington to malign Snowden. Describing those documents, he reported: “A bipartisan group of Washington lawmakers solicited details from Pentagon officials that they could use to ‘damage’ former NSA contractor Edward Snowden’s ‘credibility in the press and the court of public opinion.'” Manifestly then, the “journalism” in this Sunday...

Russian women’s reproductive rights are under threat with a new bill before parliament calling for radical changes to access to abortion.

MI6 has pulled its spies out of 'hostile countries' and America's intelligence agencies are on high alert after Russia and China cracked encrypted files leaked by fugitive whistleblower Edward Snowden. The top-secret documents contain information that could lead to the identification of British and American spies, according to senior officials in Downing Street, the Home Office and the security services. A senior Home Office official accused Snowden - the former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor responsible for the biggest confidential information leak in US history - of having 'blood on his hands' after they gained access to over one million...

Konstantin Goldenzweig resigned from the Kremlin-backed NTV channel Renowned Russian journalist Konstantin Goldenzweig has resigned from state-funded TV channel 'NTV' after becoming disenchanted with the Kremlin's misinformation campaign. He announced the move through Facebook on June 9, TJ reports. "I want to thank all my colleagues who helped me, taught me, encouraged me and were my friends. And continue to be my friends. And sorry for taking part in this propaganda madness. There is only one banal conclusion: the deals with your own conscience are only as good as those you can cancel" - Goldenzweig wrote.

On April 7, Blue Origin President Rob Meyerson said that the space company founded by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos would be conducting its first unmanned test flights “later this year.” As it turns out, “later this year” meant “three weeks.” The company has announced that it had conducted the first flight of its New Shepard space vehicle yesterday. The propulsion module, powered by Blue Origin’s BE-3 rocket engine, took the New Shepard space capsule up to a speed of over Mach 3. The capsule then separated from the propulsion module and flew to an altitude of 307,000 feet before beginning...

In a significant move to deter possible Russian aggression in Europe, the Pentagon is poised to store battle tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and other heavy weapons for as many as 5,000 American troops in several Baltic and Eastern European countries, allied officials say. The proposal, if approved, would represent the first time since the end of the Cold War that the United States has stationed heavy military equipment in the newer NATO member nations in Eastern Europe that had once been part of the Soviet sphere of influence. Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the war in eastern Ukraine have caused...

When I heard Spokane NAACP head Rachel Dolezal was transracial, I was inspired to reveal my own secret. Please spread the word...there are more like me. TOUR DATES: http://www.ericschwartzlive.com/tourd...

The first thing to notice is how rapidly Elon Musk's SpaceX is altering the market for government-sponsored rocket launches. Witness how frequently the words "to compete with SpaceX" appear in industry statements and press coverage. To compete with SpaceX, say multiple reports, the United Launch Alliance, the Pentagon's traditional supplier, is developing a new Vulcan rocket powered by a reusable engine designed by Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin. Because of SpaceX, says Aviation Week magazine, Japan's government has instructed Mitsubishi to cut in half the cost of the Japanese workhorse rocket, and China is planning a new family of kerosene-fueled Long...