Free Republic

McALLEN — Asked Wednesday about the Second Amendment, longtime U.S. Rep. Rubén Hinojosa fumbled for an answer. “There are so many people in Washington who come and talk to us about the Constitution and the rights that they want kept sacred and that not do anything about them. (sic) That we not change them. That we not amend them,” said Hinojosa. “And I can tell you that — I’m drawing a blank on the Second Amendment, but I think it’s the weapons, isn’t it? The NRA?” Hinojosa recovered after a brief pause, recalling how the 1999 Columbine High School massacre...

McALLEN — Asked Wednesday about the Second Amendment, longtime U.S. Rep. Rubén Hinojosa fumbled for an answer. “There are so many people in Washington who come and talk to us about the Constitution and the rights that they want kept sacred and that not do anything about them. (sic) That we not change them. That we not amend them,” said Hinojosa. “And I can tell you that — I’m drawing a blank on the Second Amendment, but I think it’s the weapons, isn’t it? The NRA?” Hinojosa recovered after a brief pause, recalling how the 1999 Columbine High School massacre...

(CNN) -- A toxic cloud that formed after 300 gallons of hydrochloric acid leaked at a southeast Texas storage facility sent nine people to hospitals and forced thousands of residents indoors, an emergency management official said Thursday. Four firefighters were among those who were hospitalized for exposure after a tank ruptured at a storage facility near the Port of Texas City, Bruce Clawson of the local emergency management office said. More than 45,000 residents of Texas City were ordered by emergency management officials to remain indoors, turn off air conditioning units and make sure all windows and doors were closed...

International election monitors took a dim view on Wednesday of Texas' threat to prosecute them if they observe voting in the state a bit too closely on November 6.

Texas Warns UN Affiliates Monitoring U.S. Election of Prosecution Risk Written by Alex Newman Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott sent a strongly worded letter warning United Nations-affiliated “elections monitors” that if they fail to obey state law by going in or even near a polling place, the UN-linked observers risk criminal prosecution and serious penalties. The international observers, he added, have absolutely no jurisdiction to interfere with voting in the Lone Star State. The UN partner known as the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) came under fierce criticism across the country in recent days after it announced...

One man was killed and another was at large Wednesday after a woman put her father’s lesson in firearms to use during a burglary in southeast Oak Cliff. “I just hate that she didn’t get both of them,” said Charles Brown, the homeowner. Dallas police say Brown’s daughter was upstairs about 11:30 a.m. when the two men kicked down the front door of the family’s home on Concordia Lane, southwest of Camp Wisdom and Houston School roads. The woman, alerted by a home alarm, fired several shots at the men, striking at least one of them as they charged up...

My wife and I just returned from early voting in the Northwest Dallas (Farmer's Branch / Coppell) area. Lines were out the door ... more than one hour wait to vote. The election judge said that about 1,200 people had cast ballots there each day during the first two days of early voting. Today's total was expected to exceed 1,500. The judge also said that only about 500 people (total ... not per day) voted early there in 2008. About 300 in 2010. The precinct is in the 24th Texas congressional district. It is strongly conservative with Kenny Marchant...

SNIPPET: "Actually, two have been convicted by a jury for using their nightclubs to launder the proceeds of drug and weapons deals, one was acquitted of money laundering but has pled guilty to a drug trafficking charge, and one of those convicted of money laundering has now been charged with tax evasion. And that's not to mention the failure to pay state liquor taxes and fees, the unsolved murder of a one-time business partner, and various immigration-related issues. Money was transferred in to a relative and known Hizballah operative in Lebanon, and there are strong ties to the Lebanese expat...

San Antonio and Corpus Christi don’t sit in the Eagle Ford Shale play, but you wouldn’t know it based on the jobs numbers. The two cities are in line to see some of the biggest jobs gains due to increasing oil and gas production in South Texas. The shale play supported 4,290 jobs in Bexar County in last year, and that number should grow to 11,627 jobs by 2021, according to a report released Tuesday by the University of Texas at San Antonio. Nueces County is poised to end up with the greatest number of jobs from the Eagle Ford,...

The loaded .45-caliber Glock handgun left in a crowded Denver International Airport bathroom belonged to a Drug Enforcement Administration agent based in Houston, according to records obtained on Tuesday. The gun, with one round in the chamber and 10 in the magazine, was found by a traveler last week on the back of a toilet seat beyond Transportation Security Administration checkpoints, according to a Denver police report. It was later returned to the agent, who was traveling on Southwest Airlines from Denver to Houston. The DEA has stayed mum on the gun, declining to confirm the agency's ties to the...

Left-wing groups have gone to international organizations in the run up to this election, seeking to apply global governance to the United States. The results of this is that the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE, not the UN as is often reported) has announced it will send election observers, with the implication that Voter ID laws are a problem.Now, the reason they’re only investigating Republican-run areas is that Republicans would never run to the OSCE or anyone else to interfere with American elections. But that said, we must not let the OSCE observers think they are above...

LOS EBANOS — Five men from Mexico face federal drug charges after U.S. Border Patrol agents were fired upon from the Mexican side of the Rio Grande. The shooting took place Friday evening along the river near Los Ebanos after agents saw a dark Ford Expedition that approached the river and then was loaded with bundles of marijuana by several men who had used rafts to move the bundles from Mexico to the U.S. side, court records show. The agents requested backup and moved in to intercept the vehicle as it was leaving the river, heading northbound. Upon spotting the...

Will Gov. Mitt Romney reverse the decision of President Barack Hussein Obama and issue the Purple Heart to the victims of the jihad attack on Fort Hood in 2009? The day before the general election, Nov 5, is the third anniversary of the jihad attack by Maj. Nidal Hasan at Fort Hood, Texas. Thirteen of our service members, as well as one unborn baby, died under Hasan’s gunfire. None of our service personnel was armed, making them easy targets as Hasan screamed “Allah Akbar!” and began shooting. President Barack Hussein Obama refuses to designate Hasan’s assault on Fort Hood as...

Three years after Major Nidal Hassan opened fire in a personnel center on Fort Hood, Texas, the Obama regime has yet to declare the incident is what it obviously is: an act of terrorism. Rather, according, to Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta: “the department is dealing with the threat of violent Islamist extremism in the context of a broader threat of workplace violence.” Unfortunately, this is not trivial. Because the incident is not considered an act of terrorism, the victims do not get combat-related special compensation that provides disability pay for medically retired servicemembers. Manning, who was shot six times,...

Victims of the Nov. 2009 Ft. Hood shooting are being denied benefits commensurate with combat injuries because the Obama administration refuses to label the attack an act of terrorism. Instead, the shooting Maj. Nidal Hasan carried out after screaming "Allahu Akbar" it is still being labeled "workplace violence." The difference between labeling the incident "workplace violence" and "terrorism" is not only the rightful recognition 13 of our troops deserve for being killed in service to their country on Nov. 5, 2009, but also ongoing benefits that would help survivors pay for the physical therapy, and other medical and psychological treatments...

The Chronicle's backing of Barack Obama in 2008 broke a 44-year string of endorsing Republican candidates for president. Like so many others, we were captivated by the Illinois senator's soaring rhetoric and energized by his promise to move American politics beyond partisan gridlock and into an era of hope and change. It hasn't happened. Four years later, President Obama's deeds have failed to match his words, much less his specific vows to cut the national debt by half and bring the nation's unemployment rate to 6 percent. As Texans, it is a particular vexation that this president's attitude toward the...

The cheering midst of a rally featuring President Barack Obama and a largely college-age crowd of 15,000 on the Oval at Ohio State University would not seem a likely place to encounter those not in the presidentÂ’s corner. Yet, the first five students approached at random by a Dispatch reporter on Oct. 9 turned out to support Republican Mitt Romney and his aspirations of replacing Obama in the White House. The must-vote adoration and enthusiasm for Obama isnÂ’t what it once was among 18- to 29-year-old Millennials in central Ohio, a must-win area in a must-win state for presidential hopefuls....

Henry and Mary Alice Cisneros want the 45 mostly immigrant families served by American Sunrise, the nonprofit they founded, to take a pledge — a 10-point promise to become American. They'll pledge to learn English, and to know American customs. They'll vow to become “learning” households that meet their financial needs and make college graduation a family tradition. Most importantly, they'll agree to “carry our home country in our heart but commit to our obligations in the United States.”

WESLACO - Illegal entry into the United States is the only option for many who seek to escape poverty and violence, experts said. Immigrants put their money, trust and ultimately their lives in the hands of human smugglers. Some of those smugglers are not old enough to hold a driver's license. One of those smugglers is accused of crashing a van loaded with 17 illegal immigrants near Palmview. Life ended for nine of those immigrants. "These smugglers are ruthless people," Border Patrol Spokesman Henry Mendiola said. Mendiola is familiar with the carnage left behind by some of the human smugglers....

Robbie Middleton was doused in gasoline and set on fire on his eighth birthday in 1998He died 13 years later from cancer caused by the burns covering his bodyIn a video recorded on his deathbed he accused his alleged attacker Don Collins of raping him two weeks before he was set on fireDon Collins, now 27, is to be charged with felony murder