Free Republic

Instead of pressing charges with the children, the concerned mother calling 911 should have got slapped with a false 911 call. (Technically she should have called the police line for non emergencies.) What is the world coming to.... that kids can no longer be seen playing with plastic guns? I grew up doing that with my cousins since I was 4. It would be nice of the local governments steps in and seriously scolds the education administration. - Vae Victis

Five days after WND first broke the news that the strategy by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Secretary of State John F. Kerry to cast members of the Free Syria Army as “moderates” among the Syrian rebel forces was the brain-child of a Wall Street Journal researcher, the analyst has been fired from a Washington think-tank for lying about her qualifications. As WND reported, Elizabeth O’Bagy, 26, had claimed she was pursuing a Ph.D. in Arab studies and political science at Georgetown University and working on a dissertation on woman’s militancy. In his Sept. 3 testimony before the Senate Foreign...

The student loan bubble is starting to burst. The largest bank in the United States will stop making student loans in a few weeks. JPMorgan Chase has sent a memorandum to colleges notifying them that the bank will stop making new student loans in October. “We just don’t see this as a market that we can significantly grow,” Thasunda Duckett tells Reuters. Duckett is the chief executive for auto and student loans at Chase, which means she’s basically delivering the news that a large part of her business is getting closed down. And if you read Zero Hedge or AgainstCronyCapitalism,...

ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. — 9 Investigates discovered the U.S. Department of Education was warned about an increase in student loan fraud two years ago but failed to put all of the recommended procedures in place to prevent it. Anchor Vanessa Welch started asking questions, and now a local congressman is getting involved. Frank Lilos relies on student loans to help pay tuition at UCF. He was surprised to learn about a huge student loan scam that costs taxpayers more than $187 million. "I think that's ridiculous to be getting that much money and not going to school," Lilos said. The...

On February 8th, Clemmons posted the following on his Tumblr page: hello. my name is irenigg and i plan on shooting up georgia southern. pass this around to see the affect it has. to see if i get arrested. As it turns out, Clemmons got exactly what he was looking for: Officials, who were reportedly tipped off by an anonymous person, arrested Clemmons a few hours after he posted his comments. Initially, the case received minimal media attention until a Gawker post brought it to the forefront on Sunday. Clemmons has remained imprisoned at Bulloch County Jail since his family...

RALEIGH — A tenant in a student apartment complex in West Raleigh shot and killed an armed intruder early Saturday, police said. Vincent Reed Bellamy, 23, told police the intruder broke into his apartment and held a handgun to his face. Bellamy was able to retrieve his own handgun and shot the man, who was identified as Trevor Anders Herne, 35.

high school intern with the conservative Daily Caller Web site got into a testy exchange with White House Press Secretary Jay Carney Wednesday after asking if the White House would intervene to protect George Zimmerman from death threats in the wake of his acquittal on murder and manslaughter charges. Gabe Finger @GabeemtheFinger Just angered Obama's press secretary. Word. 11:21 AM - 17 Jul 2013

NEW YORK (MainStreet)—Congressional inaction resulted in an increase, as of July 1, in the interest rates of new subsidized Stafford Loans. The rate went from 3.4% to 6.8%. This resulted in a hue and cry from the Beltway. The Obama administration is intent...

... Debt loads for recent graduates average just under $27,000 ... The institute’s study found that the average payoff time is 21 years, ranging from 17 years for those who attended college but did not get a degree to 23 years for those with graduate degrees

The case of the rural West Virginia eighth-grader who was suspended and arrested in late April after he refused to remove a t-shirt supporting the National Rifle Association just keeps getting weirder. According to local CBS affiliate WOWK-TV, the student, 14-year-old Jared Marcum, was back at the Logan County Courthouse on Monday for a hearing because prosecutors Christopher White and Sabrina Deskins were seeking an emergency gag order. Earlier this month, Marcum had been formally charged with obstructing an officer. He was also suspended from school for one day. His crime was refusing a teacher’s request to take off the...

According to the Congressional Budget Office, $8.7 billion of the money collected in student loan interest payments actually goes to pay for ObamaCare. The CBO estimates that the interest rate on these loans could be reduced from 6.8 percent to only 5.3 percent were the funds not used to subsidize the healthcare reform law and other federal programs. The profits from student loans are divided as follows: $8.7 billion goes to pay for ObamaCare; $10.3 billion goes to pay down the federal debt; and $36 billion goes to Pell Scholarship grants. The 16 million American students who now have student...

An all-too-familiar scene was enacted on the campus of Swarthmore College during a meeting on May 4 to discuss demands by student activists for the college to divest itself of its investments in companies that deal in fossil fuels. As a speaker was beginning a presentation to show how many millions of dollars such a disinvestment would cost the college, student activists invaded the meeting, seized the microphone, and shouted down a student who rose in the audience to object. Although there were professors and administrators in the room — including the college president — apparently nobody had the guts...

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York announced that households continued to improve their finances during the first three months of 2013 (for the most part). Outstanding household debt declined approximately $110 billion from the previous quarter, due in large part to a reduction in housing-related debt and credit card balances. Meanwhile, delinquency rates for each form of household debt declined, with about 8.1% of outstanding debt in some stage of delinquency, compared with 8.6% the previous quarter. Here is the report: DistrictReport_Q12013 Mortgages, the largest component of household debt, fell in the first quarter of 2013. Mortgage balances shown...

What began as an outburst in class is now making the rounds online. Video of a student reprimanding his teacher for her allegedly poor teaching methods has gone viral. Several versions of the cell-phone video, which each have garnered hundreds of comments and thousands of likes since being uploaded to YouTube Wednesday, identify the school as Duncanville High School in Duncanville, Texas. In an impassioned speech, the student criticizes his teacher for "handing them a frickin' packet" instead of providing "face-to-face" lessons.

A local high school English teacher was suspended after the father of a student accused the teacher of engaging in an inappropriate relationship with the student. The father of the 15-year-old girl gave a statement to the Putnam County Sheriff's Office accusing Palatka High School English teacher Austin Johns of having unseemly text message conversations and engaging in illicit trysts with the student. ... Johns, 27, has been put on suspension. His name is one of eight names listed as being up for resignation, suspension or termination at Tuesday's school board meeting. ... "We investigated it, and we found it...

A Claremont McKenna University professor of made “unprofessional” statements but did not violate the school’s harassment policy when he called a student a “cockroach” during a March demonstration, according to a report released Friday. The results of the investigation led by Claremont McKenna Dean of Students Mary Spellman found that CMC professor Yaron Raviv did make an inappropriate comment to a Pitzer College student outside of Collins Dining Hall, but did not impede the free speech rights of the students. CMC President Pamela B. Gann said in a statement accepting the findings of the report that Raviv’s statements “were unprofessional...

A 15-year old student at Appleton North Highschool in Appleton, Wisconsin, is claiming that he was bullied by faculty members for being a conservative. Now, the school district has launched an investigation into Benji Backer’s accusations and are taking the claims “seriously.” Backer told Fox News that he has had to endure name-calling and harassment as well as watch other students be indoctrinated. According to Backer, the tensions began to mount when he was 12, during Governor Scott Walker’s battle with the unions and liberals’ unsuccessful re-call bid. Since then, Backer claims that teachers denigrated Walker and labeled Republicans as...

The Dutch doctoral student who was seen in a controversial video trying to reeducate Dutch-Turkish youths has been forced into hiding after receiving death threats. The Dutch daily NRC writes that Mehmet Sahin has gone into hiding with his family on the advice of the mayor of Arnhem, Pauline Krikke. Last week a video surfaced of Sahin interviewing several Muslim youths in Holland. During the interview the youths spewed vitriol at Jews and praised Hitler, with one of the boys saying, “As far as I’m concerned Hitler should have killed all Jews.” The youths also displayed an alarming lack of...

EASTON, Pa. — Talk about grade inflation. Graduate student Megan Thode wasn't happy about the C-plus she received for one class, saying the mediocre grade kept her from getting her desired degree and becoming a licensed therapist — and, as a result, cost her $1.3 million in lost earnings. Now Thode is suing her professor and Lehigh University in Bethlehem, claiming monetary damages and seeking a grade change. A judge is hearing testimony in the case this week in Northampton County Court. Lehigh and the professor contend her lawsuit is without merit. Northampton County Judge Emil Giordano declined to dismiss...

According to The Federal Reserve today, consumer credit rose by $16.2 billion in January, higher than the expected increase of $14.7 billion. So, it appears that lenders are easy their credit standards, right? Not so fast. Depository institutions suffered a DECLINE of 168.7 BILLION in January. But the Federal government saw an INCR EASE in consumer credit of $310.8 billion (mostly student loans). Revolving credit (aka, credit cards) saw a decline in the flow of $233.4 billion. Nonrevolving credit ( automobile loans and all other loans not included in revolving credit, such as loans for mobile homes, education, boats, trailers,...