Free Republic

The Indianapolis Colts, already reeling with injury and performing below expectations, received even more terrible injury news on Tuesday: quarterback Andrew Luck suffered abdominal injury in the team's victory over Denver. Luck is expected to miss two to six weeks. Colts head coach Chuck Pagano announced the injury on Tuesday afternoon, saying Luck suffered a lacerated kidney and a partially torn abdominal muscle on a fourth-quarter scramble. This is in addition to the report from earlier this season that Luck had been playing with multiple fractured ribs. The Colts are in a bye week this week, then face the Falcons,...

Three Texans, limited government constitutional conservative Republicans; Senator Ted Cruz, Representative Louie Gohmert and Governor Greg Abbott are demonstrating how governing according to conservative principle is not only good policy, but good politics.    As our friend Rick Manning observed in an excellent article for NetRight Daily, in just one day last week, Ted Cruz took on Operation Choke Point through an Obama nominee for Justice who should be rejected, Chinese human rights abuses, sanctuary cities that release violent illegal alien offenders, and led a hearing giving voice to U.S. victims of Palestinian and Iranian terrorism.  Cruz followed this one-day blitz of policy entrepreneurship with a bill to designate the...

In what undoubtedly will be seen as a controversial move, Texans owner Bob McNair donated $10,000 this week to a group advocating against LGBTQ rights. The donation comes at a time when the NFL has been publicly promoting acceptance of gay players and Michael Sam, the league's first openly gay player, was drafted last year.

The U.S. Military will bring over a thousand troops as well as aircraft and heavy vehicles to Texas and six other southwestern states for Operation Jade Helm--an unprecedented special operations training exercise. A civilian group has organized to monitor the training, including companies in Texas that plan to post up at each drill site in the Lone Star State.

ACTION NEEDED TO CONTINUE FINANCING BOOTS ON THE GROUND ON TEXAS BORDER This week it is critical that Texans take actions to ensure that Texas House Representatives honor the desires for a secure border indicated by recent elections. Activists can only do so much to thwart the monied interests in this state and need back-up at this time. If you want to see our border secured from illegal crossings and all the consequent crime and violence that go with it, we must seek a continued budget in the upcoming supplemental bill. That means pressure by Texas Voters on the deciders...

TEXANS WILL RESPOND TO THREATS AGAINST LIBERTY! Please save the date January 29 to lobby for ALAC at OUR capitol in Austin! Another unfortunate aspect of unbridled and unassimilated immigration is culture clash. Stop the Magnet has decided to assist in the effort to forward legislation which will protect our freedoms and Constitutional values. Many of you have expressed your concern and knowledge of creeping Sharia in our state by participating in the protests in response to the "Stand with the Prophet” conferences in Garland and Houston, http://www.soundvision.com/events/houston/. Many of the characters on this panel forum were involved with CAIR...

Very long interview with O'Brien that Texans fans will certainly want to read - especially w/ regard to the draft. Hard to read him, but I get the feeling that if they draft Johnny Football, it will be an upper management decision, not a Bill O'Brien decision. I obviously liked a few of his remarks about Penn State as well.

Mess with Texas. You most likely associate the phrase “Don’t mess with Texas” with cheesy t-shirts and that unmistakable brand of Texas swagger.What you don’t know is that the slogan is the product of a 1980s anti-littering campaign and a federally registered trademark of the Texas Department of Transportation. The initiative is credited with cutting highway trash by 70% from 1986-1990.So maybe the best way to piss off a Texan is to mess with our state — cruise down a Hill Country two-lane during wildflower season and throw your pickle juice and mustard-stained Whataburger wrapper out the window. Local law...

ESPN Chris Mortensen: Houston Texans hire Bill O'Brien as Headcoach Bill O'Brien and Texans agreement...see you on SportsCenter tomorrow am. Happy New Year— Chris Mortensen (@mortreport) January 1, 2014

Team owner Bob McNair announced Friday that the Texans have fired their longtime coach after dropping a franchise-record 11th consecutive game Thursday night -- a 27-20 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars -- to tumble to 2-11 on the season. "We had a great run here and we will never forget our back-to-back AFC South championships," Kubiak said in a statement. "Coming back home was a dream come true for all of us. This will always be our home. Thank you.” TheMMQB.com's Peter King first noted Friday that he expected the team to fire Kubiak, who exits after seven-plus seasons and...

AUSTIN, TX, November 11, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – State Senator Wendy Davis' statement that she is “pro-life,” made just before she officially entered the governor's race this weekend, was designed to “muddy the waters” about her position on abortion and appeal to voters who are far more conservative on the issue than she is, according to some pro-life leaders in the state and around the country. Last Tuesday, the Forth Worth Democrat told an audience at the University of Texas in Brownsville, “I am pro-life.”

Strange things are afoot in the South Texas oil patch and in the sky above...cellphone video, taken by worker Xavier Garza, shows a reddish-orange orb in the northern sky. Witnesses say the camera didn't pick up a dozen more lights that appeared and reappeared several times, typically hovering in formation. It happened two nights in a row. And last week, a photo surfaced on the website of the Mutual UFO (Unidentified Flying Object) Network, a volunteer group that investigates UFO claims, purportedly taken at a well site in the same stretch of the Eagle Ford. Allegedly taken from a security...

Charles Hauboldt, a Texas funeral home owner, wants nothing more than to see his Houston Texans bury the Baltimore Ravens’ Super Bowl drive at this Sunday’s big game at M&T Bank Stadium. He’ll get his chance as the winning bidder for a playoff ticket auctioned by a Texas Catholic priest and rabid Ravens’ fan. Hauboldt’s high bid of $2,115 won him the ticket, a flight to Baltimore, lodging and ground transportation – not to mention the chance to sit next to Trinitarian Father Stan DeBoe, the man who put the ticket up for grabs. The money will be used to...

Call it Niall Ferguson's Pauline Kael moment . . . During the roundtable segment this morning on ABC's This Week, Ferguson, an academic with appointments at Harvard, Stanford and Oxford, said that "all the Texans I know" can't stand Rick Perry. Ferguson was reacting to host Christiane Amanpour's question about Perry's highly-animated New Hampshire address. Ferguson professed to like the "swaggering Texan" side of Perry he apparently saw in the speech. George Will had a caustic comeback. View the video here.

Christopher Hitchens said that his 'time' is coming as he made his first public appearance in months...The controversial writer and fervent atheist, who is suffering from oesophagus cancer, attended the Atheist Alliance of America conference in Texas where he was presented an award by Richard Dawkins. The 62-year-old said that he had been determined to attend the conference because of the state's Bible Belt devotion. Receiving the Richard Dawkins Freethinker of the Year Award, Hitchens looked gaunt and his voice was soft. ... During his speech Hitchens said that he appreciated the fact that Texas governor Rick Perry had been...

More Texans disapprove of Rick Perry’s performance as governor than approve of his work for them, a new poll finds. Forty-five percent of Texas voters have a positive view of Perry’s job performance while 48 percent disapprove, according to the latest poll of Texas voters released by Public Policy Polling today: . The good news for Perry: The Republican presidential contender has finally moved ahead of President Obama in the Lone Star State, 51 percent to 44 percent, after trailing the Democratic incumbent a month ago.

Do you live in Texas, but hate governor Rick Perry? Do you love coyotes and hate concealed weapons and lower taxes? Well the Obama campaign is anxious to hear from you. "Your feedback will help hold him (Perry) accountable on the campaign trail, inspire fellow Texans to get involved, and introduce his record -- his actual record -- to voters across the country," Hector Nieto, the campaign's Texas director, told Texas supporters in an email blast today. "Your words will remind him that even as he runs, he won't be able to hide --

Texas Gov. Rick Perry sounds more like a presidential candidate by the day. This weekend he gave a rousing speech at the Republican Leadership Conference in which he blasted the Obama administration as a bunch of smarty-pants busy-bodies. “They clearly think they know best,” said Governor Perry. “And let me tell you, I vehemently disagree. They don’t know best.” As he kept speaking he was interrupted by audience members chanting “Run Rick, Run!” But here’s a question: Is it too late for Gov. Perry to throw his drawl into the ring? It gets late early when it comes to running...

Badass ole Stevie, I miss him...

Authorities are still searching for a Rio Grande City woman after busting a Starr County-based gun ring. A federal grand jury indicted Jeniffer Lopez and nine others on federal firearms charges last week. U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, & Explosives (ATF) agents arrested two ringleaders and seven suspects but 28-year-old Lopez remains at large. The group is accused of “straw purchasing” about 60 high-powered handguns and assault rifles between December 2008 and April 2009. Straw purchasing is buying a gun for a criminal or someone else. The federal crime is punishable up to five years in prison. Court records...