Free Republic

Hey, Horace, looks like you might have been wrong. Dead wrong. That is, making good, respectful citizens isn’t best left to government schools. Way back before the Civil War, Horace Mann promoted the “common school” not merely to increase literacy and certainly not to prepare a majority of students for college. The movement that gave birth to the modern public school system in America was designed to inculcate good citizenship. The idea? Put all kids through a “shared experience.” The idea was to promote “American” ideas of democracy and republicanism into the minds of children who, Mann feared, were too...

The newly elected CEO and co-founder of Mozilla - the maker of the Firefox web browser - was forced into resignation today after activists pressured the company over his donation to a political campaign that opposed same-sex marriage. Brendan Eich was forced into resigning from the company he co-founded just one month into his new role as CEO. In 2008 Eich donated $1000 to the campaign for California Proposition 8 and was widely chastised by the left press and social media. After his recent appointment as CEO his vilification was reawakened and he came under pressure from employees, press, social...

Remember Julie Boonstra? She’s the single mother fighting leukemia who appeared in an anti-Obamacare television ad running in Michigan: (see video at link) Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid assailed Ms. Boonstra, and others like her, in a breathtakingly mean-spirited floor speech — going so far as to say that “all” of their negative experiences were “untrue” and “lies.” Reid now claims he doesn’t remember saying any such thing, but there’s video tape: (see Reid video at link) In his effort to discredit Boonstra, Reid relied on a Washington Post “fact check,” which effectively ruled her story half true. In fact,...

Guinness pulls out of St. Patty’s parade over LGBT ban Guinness beer has pulled its sponsorship from New York’s famed St. Patrick’s day parade over a controversial policy that prohibits gays and lesbians from marching openly, according to reports. “Guinness has a strong history of supporting diversity and being an advocate for equality for all,” the company said in a statement on the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation website. “We were hopeful that the policy of exclusion would be reversed for this year’s parade. As this has not come to pass, Guinness has withdrawn its participation. We will continue...

In response to a number of lawsuits in which such providers of wedding-related services as bakers and photographers have been threatened with conscription into participating in same-sex ceremonies to which they object on religious grounds, Arizona’s state legislature has adopted a law under which businesses that decline to provide such services will enjoy protection. It is perhaps unfortunate that it has come to this, but organized homosexuality, a phenomenon that is more about progressive pieties than gay rights per se, remains on the permanent offensive in the culture wars. Live-and-let-live is a creed that the gay lobby specifically rejects: The...

SAN FRANCISCO (KPIX 5) – A Bay Area woman said she was attacked for wearing the Google Glass wearable computer at a bar in San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury. Tech writer Sarah Slocum wrote on her Facebook page that she was at Molotov’s on Haight Street Friday night. Slocum said she was showing someone at the bar how the high-tech glasses work, when two women confronted her. Then, a man ripped the Google Glass off of her face. “OMG so you’ll never believe this but… I got verbally and physically assaulted and robbed last night in the city, had things thrown at...

Admittedly I don’t listen to Christian rap or rap of any kind for that matter, but after watching this news report I had to hear Bizzle’s new song which is a well thought out response from a Christian perspective to Macklemore’s song “Same Love.”- (the song the played at the Grammys for the big gay wedding.) And let me say Bizzle’s new song doesn’t pull any punches at all. It treads in love but it doesn’t tread lightly. It’s quite powerful actually. But first, watch this news report by KHOU on how Bizzle’s life is being threatened because of his...

"If one oversteps the bounds of moderation, the greatest pleasures cease to please." -- Epictetus "The world is full of people who will help you manufacture tornados in order to blow out a match." -- Shaun Hick There are few things on the planet more necessary than water. In fact, roughly 60% of the human body is water. Yet, water isn't ALWAYS a good thing as Noah could tell you. Virtues can be like this as well. In moderation, they're good for you, but taken to extremes, they become destructive. 1) Tolerance: A little tolerance is a good thing,...

The other day, as the rest of the U.S. was experiencing record lows brought on by the Polar Vortex that Al Gore’s beclouded crystal ball didn’t see coming, I was soaking up the eighty-three degree rays in Miami at my gated-community’s swank pool. Boo-yah. That’s why we endure hurricanes folks, for the glorious winter weather. Fortunately for me, no one was at the cement pond when I rocked up so I got the best chaise in the best place. So far … so good. After I got my old, crippled ass into a perfect position for a maximum tan...

This is a horrible idea, as Col. West points out. It undermines uniformity and conformity, which is fine for civilians but absolutely antithetical to to military philosophy. There are also more practical concerns. A Marine is going to regret his religious beard about ten seconds after hearing the words "gas, gas, gas!" Just try and get a seal on that mask with a religious beard or piercings. There is a very real need for uniformity in the ranks. This has been true since man began forming armies. As Col. West points out, this sort of policy change would be a...

Members of the University of Michigan Black Student Union said they would have to resort to “physical action” if a list of seven demands issued on Martin Luther King Day are not met within seven days, The Ann Arbor News reported. “If negotiations are not complete we will be forced to do more, beginning to increase valiantly our activism for social progress and take physical actions on the University of Michigan’s campus,” said senior Shayla Scales to a group of students gathered on campus, according to the Ann Arbor News. The seven demands, read aloud by an activist associated with...

SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS) — Members of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors have taken aim at anti-abortion banners placed on busy Market Street. Supervisor David Campos and six other supervisors are supporting a resolution opposing the banners and questioning their legality. The banners were put up by Walk for Life West Coast, a San Francisco based anti-abortion group that holds an annual rally in the city, scheduled for January 25th in Civic Center Plaza. --SNIP-- Eva Muntean of Walk for Life said her group obtained a permit and met all the criteria for their banners. --SNIP-- Muntean said the resolution...

Permit me a few thoughts on the issue of tolerance. This post is not intended as a systematic treatise on tolerance. Rather just some thoughts on a frequently misunderstood concept that some have called the only “virtue” left in our neo-pagan society.The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy defines Tolerance and toleration:  Toleration — from the Latin tolerare: to put up with, countenance or suffer — generally refers to the conditional acceptance of or non-interference with beliefs, actions or practices that one considers to be wrong but still “tolerable,” such that they should not be prohibited or constrained. [1] It goes on...

rom Campus Reform, "Colorado Democrat fires gay aide allegedly for visiting Republican office": Tyler Drum, a 21-year-old homosexual aide to Democrat state Senator Irene Aguilar (photo), was fired on the spot from his position in the Colorado Senate because he allegedly visited the office of a fellow college aide who happens to work for a Republican. Drum, a 2013 graduate of Colorado State University, told Campus Reform that Aguilar did not explain why he had been fired.  “I thought this would happen on the Republican side, now I’m a disenchanted Democrat.” Tweet This “She just said leadership was uncomfortable with...

This is a week old, but I hadn't seen this before. It's an interesting view from a gay man. GLAAD has way over stepped their bounds.

The left is all in favor of free speech — until someone offers a contrary opinion. Phil Robertson of TV’s wildly popular “Duck Dynasty” offended the homosexual lobby this week with remarks about his religious faith. The A&E network show is the most-popular reality program on all of cable television, following the Robertson family of Louisiana and their business of making calls and other paraphernalia for duck hunters. The show’s success makes the bearded Mr. Robertson, who has the appearance of ZZ Top in camouflage, an unlikely celebrity because he is a born-again Christian. A writer for GQ magazine asked...

In 1987, Andre Sarano took a photograph of Christ on the cross in a jar of urine. It won the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art’s “Awards in the Visual Arts” competition, which was sponsored in part by taxpayers. Outraged Christians were told they didn’t have to see it. They did not have to go to the museum. Their money, of course, had to fund the National Endowment for the Arts, but they themselves just needed to ignore it. Christians needed to show tolerance to for the diversity of others’ thoughts. Robert Maplethorpe spent many years touring the United States with...

...don't expect GLAAD to go after Islam, hammer and tongs, anytime soon. If anything, continue to anticipate more syrupy sycophancy.But hapless Phil Robertson, you bet. Phil's just a plump ol' duck lifting off the still, misty, dark waters in the rosy bayou morn. Pretty easy to aim a figurative shotgun at Phil to blow him outta the sky, huh? Pretty easy to bully the feller with the florid beard out of his show to set an example for likeminded Christians or the religious (Muslims exempted) who'd dare voice a belief that homosexuality (practiced) is a sin, and that society has...

Tracy Morgan is now your co-grand marshal of the Seminole Hard Rock Winterfest Boat Parade in Fort Lauderdale...

It happened Dec. 2, 2013, in Buenos Aires, Argentina. LifeSiteNews.com broke the story with the headline: “Violent mob of topless pro-abort feminists attacks praying men defending cathedral.” The raw footage is disturbing to the extreme (warning: viewer discretion advised for nudity, lesbian lewdness, and violence. A censored version is available in this WND story.) Both the video and the story have since gone viral. WND summarizes the attacks as follows: “Chanting, ‘Get your rosaries out of our ovaries,’ a mob of pro-abortion feminists – many of whom were topless with Nazi swastikas on their chests and foreheads – attacked and...