Free Republic

Moviegoers in Baghdad were on the edge of their seats while watching “American Sniper” — as the controversial war drama thrilled audiences in Iraq, where much of the film is set. “When the sniper was hesitating to shoot [the child holding the RPG in the film’s first scene], everyone was yelling, ‘Just shoot him!’” Gaith Mohammed told the Global Post, adding that his theater was packed. “Some people watching were just concentrating, but others were screaming, ‘F-ck, shoot him! He has an IED, don’t wait for permission!!’” Since the movie’s release, many people have objected to the film’s portrayal of...

Media Progressives are nothing if not predictable. A case in point is one Matt Taibbi, writing what purports to be a movie review of American Sniper in a January 21, 2015 edition of Rolling Stone, which rag hasn’t had a good run of journalistic integrity of late. One can expect the self-appointed cultural elite to be insultingly dismissive of and terminally snarky about anything the denizens of flyover country–you know, Americans?–like, but his article “American Sniper’ Is Almost Too Dumb To Criticize. Almost,” is a study in predictability and lazy disdain.Regular readers know that I’ve been covering Chris Kyle for...

For a country that's been engaged in two major theaters of war for around the last 13 years, much of the service and sacrifice has been made by the true 1%'ers. A 2013 Pew Research article reports that only a 5th of the Congress at the time had any military experience, themselves. Not all that long ago, military service was practically a requirement for serving in Congress. The high point in recent decades was the 95th Congress (1977-78) when, following an influx of Vietnam-era veterans, a combined 77% of the House and Senate had served in the armed forces. But...

We saw "American Sniper" last night. My wife and I went with a group of about a dozen other military parents (Navy, Marine Corps, Army). This is not a typical "war movie" in that it explores one man's journey from civilian life into the military community into war (four tours in Iraq) and then explores his difficult re-entry into civilian life. So, in a way, the movie is about the family and community of the as much as it is about Chris Kyle. There are aspects of the movie that some will dismiss as trite or jingoistic: Kyle's father instructing...

The release of the film American Sniper has led to an increase in threats against Muslims in the US, according to an Arab-American civil rights group. The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) has written to director Clint Eastwood and star Bradley Cooper. Their film is based on US soldier Chris Kyle's service in Iraq from 2003-09. The ADC said a "majority of the violent threats we have seen over the past few days are result of how Arab and Muslims are depicted in American Sniper". The organisation, which describes itself as the largest Arab civil rights organisation in the US, said...

In a Weekly Standard piece titled, “The ‘American Sniper’ Freakout: Why the Left Can’t Tolerate This Movie,” Mark Hemingway does a fine job of breaking down exactly why the Left either hates “American Sniper” or is dishonestly claiming it is a left-wing movie. It’s a thorough, must-read that perfectly lays out the case. Outside the context of the film itself, there is an additional reason the Left can’t tolerate Eastwood’s masterpiece: every act of apostasy, even one, must be punished. The Left cannot tolerate dissent. If just one thing sneaks through the institutions the Left is desperate to hold a...

Valor: When Hollywood icon Clint Eastwood talked to an empty chair at the 2012 GOP convention, many thought he'd lost it. Now more Americans are watching his story of hero Chris Kyle than saw the State of the Union. There was a sense of irony in President Obama praising himself for a "persistent, steady resolve" in fighting an Islamic terrorism he refuses to call by name. He delivered his State of the Union speech just as the U.S. military was moving the assault ships Iwo Jima and Fort McHenry into the Red Sea to evacuate American personnel, if necessary, from...

I haven’t yet seen the movie American Sniper, but I have read Chris Kyle’s autobiography, on which it is based. I therefore believe that I am qualified to write on the topic.Although, come to think of it, I’m not really going to write about American Sniper at all. Instead, I’m going to write about some of the reactions to American Sniper, which function as a Rorschach test of American (and, dare I say, un-American?) values.I have to begin with the fundamental premise, one that drives the Left nuts, which is that Clint Eastwood, with help from a superb Bradley Cooper,...

Medal of Honor recipient Dakota Meyer criticized Michael Moore for Twitter comments he made Sunday. SNIP Meyer responded to the tweet in a post on Scout: "I'm sure that his grandfather, who died serving this country, is rolling over in his grave knowing that his grandson is using him to justify him calling U.S. servicemen cowards. I'd be willing to bet that at some point during his grandfather's service, he was watched over by U.S. snipers, and probably had his life saved more than once by U.S. snipers during the war. "I served as a Marine sniper for three years,...

This weekend and into Monday morning, the usual cast of characters and character assassins have been spouting nonsense about America and Islam and war and soldiers, all in the wake of the record-smashing opening for the movie American Sniper. Michael Moore weighed in, as did Seth Rogen, to name two of many. Among the words thrown around were "Nazi", "mass murderer", "coward" and even that most damning of epithets, Republican. That's what they have to say about a soldier. (Remember, as we go on through this story, that liberals love the troops. You'll have to keep reminding yourself because it...

Governor Palin posted the following on her Facebook wall:God bless our troops, especially our snipers. Hollywood leftists: while caressing shiny plastic trophies you exchange among one another while spitting on the graves of freedom fighters who allow you to do what you do, just realize the rest of America knows you're not fit to shine Chris Kyle's combat boots. May the epic "American Sniper" bring nothing but blessings to Taya and the children of this true American hero. Thank you Bradley Cooper and Clint Eastwood for respecting the United States Military. - Sarah Palin PS - Rep. Paul Gosar’s office...

Chris Kyle was incredible. He was simply an incredible, real-life action hero. Before his death, he was already known as the deadliest sniper in American history and as a best-selling author. Since his death, a few reporters have heard trickles of other stories. Around Midlothian, one story in particular has been raising eyebrows. It goes something like this: when he was first back from Iraq, in 2009, Chris Kyle killed two armed men who were attempting to carjack him at a gas station. I first heard this story more than a year ago. It hasn’t made the news much. There...

While Kyle was risking his life over four tours of duty to protect his country and innocent Iraqi civilians from evil, savage terrorists, the American Left, and most especially the Hollywood Left, were using every weapon at their disposal to ensure untold millions of innocent Iraqis were fed into a terrorist/death squad meat grinder. The Left made no secret of this. At the height of the Iraq War, Democrats, the mainstream media, and Hollywood fought tooth and nail for America to pull prematurely out of Iraq. The very same people lying about Chris Kyle today are the very same people...

RUSH: The primary criticism of American Sniper ran in the New Republic, and it's what's feeding all the other criticism. The criticism in the New Republic is written by a guy named... What's his name? Dennis Jett. He admits he's not even seen it. He hasn't even seen it. The criticism of American Sniper is that Clint Eastwood has written and directed a movie that's celebrating a murderer -- a racist, bigoted murderer -- Chris Kyle who murders innocent Iraqi brown people. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99k3u9ay1gs We in America, by going to see this movie, are celebrating barbarism. We are celebrating murder. We...

Even as “American Sniper” breaks January box-office records and revels in six Oscar nominations, criticism over the subject of the film, sharpshooter Chris Kyle, is rising and reaching into the Academy of Motion Picture of Arts and Sciences, which votes on the Academy Awards. Over the weekend, multiple Academy members told TheWrap that they had been passing around a recent article by Dennis Jett in The New Republic that attacks the film for making a hero out of Kyle, who said: “The enemy are savages and despicably evil,” and his “only regret is that I didn’t kill more.” Kyle made...

A sniper has told how he was given the nickname 'The Reaper' by his comrades in the military - after killing 33 men in less than four months. Former Army Ranger Nick ‘Irv’ Irving using his trusty SR-25 rifle he nicknamed ‘Dirty Diana’ to blast insurgents to death during the Iraq War. He was so possessive over ‘his girl’ as he called the gun, that he hated it when other men touched her and would spend four hours a night painting her. Before every battle he would get pumped up to the sounds of men zipping their gear up with...

and i don't say that lightly. Patton, Gettysburgh, Das Boot, Run Silent Run Deep, Fury, and on and on. But Sniper is absolutely riveting in its portrayal of combat and the people in combat, i can't say more, except that when the movie ended in a packed theatre, a few people, me included, were drying eyes, but the theatre was absolutely silent and stayed that way. no one moved for a while then the whole theatre silently filed out.

Considering that the movie American Sniper written about Chris Kyle, and directed by Clint Eastwood has been out since the last week of December, I may be late to the game expressing an opinion. I'll say it anyway, this is one of the best movies I've ever experienced. Notice I say, 'experienced, vs just 'seen', because the film becomes exactly that, something anticipated, tolerated, endured and later celebrated. Certain portions of the film resemble riding along with the police during their night shifts, or at least what most people expect these shifts to be like. I know very little about...

Chris Kyle was Derek's teammate through 10 years of training and battle. They both suffer/suffered from PTSD to some extent and took great care of each other because of it. 2006 in Ramadi was horrible for young men that never had any more aggressive physical contact with another human than on a Texas football field. They lost many friends. Chris became the armed services number #1 sniper of all time. Not something he was happy about, other than the fact that in so doing, he saved a lot of American lives. Three years ago, his wife Taya asked him to...

DARPA's Extreme Accuracy Tasked Ordnance (EXACTO) program conducted the first successful live-fire tests demonstrating in-flight guidance of .50-caliber bullets in the spring of 2014. This video shows EXACTO rounds maneuvering in flight to hit targets that are offset from where the sniper rifle is initially aimed. EXACTO's specially designed ammunition and real-time optical guidance system help track and direct projectiles to their targets by compensating for weather, wind, target movement and other factors that could impede successful aim. The EXACTO program is developing new approaches and advanced capabilities to improve the range and accuracy of sniper systems beyond the current...