Free Republic

It's time to ban the burka in the US now. Which one of the new congress people will stand up and sponsor a bill. Will all good men be quiet now?

Russia has presented a startling proposal to overcome the tensions with the EU: The EU should renounce the free trade agreement with the United States TTIP and enter into a partnership with the newly established Eurasian Economic Union instead. A free trade zone with the neighbors would make more sense than a deal with the US.

Never one to shy away from the social media spotlight, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei recently took to Twitter to bash the United States for alleged racial injustices, using popular hashtags like #Ferguson and #BlackLivesMatter to draw parallels to Jesus and the unrest in Gaza.“#Jesus endured sufferings to oppose tyrants who had put humans in hell in this world& the hereafter while he backed the oppressed. #Ferguson,” Iran’s chief political and religious authority tweeted to his 92,000 followers on Sunday, CNN reported.Mr. Khamenei went on to compare Jesus’ struggle to that of black people in the United States.“It’s expected...

n the fall of 2008, a 30-year-old computer expert named Zarrar Shah roamed from outposts in the northern mountains of Pakistan to safe houses near the Arabian Sea, plotting mayhem in Mumbai, India’s commercial gem. Mr. Shah, the technology chief of Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Pakistani terror group, and fellow conspirators used Google Earth to show militants the routes to their targets in the city. He set up an Internet phone system to disguise his location by routing his calls through New Jersey. Shortly before an assault that would kill 166 people, including six Americans, Mr. Shah searched online for a Jewish...

Russian strategic bombers conducted a third circumnavigation of the U.S. Pacific island of Guam last week as other bombers flew close to Alaska and Europe, defense officials said. Two Tu-95 Bear H bombers made the flight around Guam, a key U.S. military hub in the western Pacific, on Dec. 13. No U.S. interceptor jets were dispatched to shadow the bombers. Separately, two Canadian F-18s intercepted two Bear bombers that intruded into the Alaska air defense identification zone on Dec. 8 that a military spokesman called “unwanted, provocative, and potentially destabilizing.” Around the same time in Europe, NATO jets intercepted Russian...

Mr. Robert Spencer at Restoration Weekend 2014, at the David Horowitz Freedom Center.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, President Obama and politicians in both countries have been trading barbs for months as the countries' relations have plunged ever southward. But what about the countries' citizens? Are they as at odds as their leaders' rhetoric suggests? WorldViews delved into recent opinion polls conducted by the Pew Research Center and Gallup. Together, the data provide interesting insights into what Russians and Americans think about each other and themselves, how they differ in certain ways, and how they are similar when it comes to other aspects. Ways Americans and Russians think differently Less than half of all...

For the first time in decades, the U.S. is no longer the largest economy in the world, and China has become number one, the International Monetary Fund says. The IMF recently released the latest numbers for the world economy, stating that China will produce $17.6 trillion in terms of goods and services-- compared with $17.4 trillion for the U.S. Just 14 years ago, the U.S. produced nearly three times as much as the Chinese, Dow Jones’ MarketWatch reported. But each country reports its data in its own currency, according to the IMF website. In order to compare data, each country's...

WASHINGTON—The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to review the first-ever national environmental standards requiring power plants to reduce emissions of mercury and other toxic air pollutants, saying it would decide whether the government should have considered how much the rules would cost utilities. The court’s action extends a saga that dates back more than two decades. Congress first required the Environmental Protection Agency to issue regulations in 1990, but the agency’s efforts had been stalled for years because of several factors, including lengthy court battles. The EPA rules, adopted in 2012, require coal and oil-fired power plants to cut...

The apology follows the dated term found in updated Army regulations policy as an acceptable classification for 'a person having origins in any of the black racial groups of Africa.' The newly revised policy now limits the acceptable terms to 'Black or African American.' The U.S. Army has backtracked with an apology after approving the term "Negro" as an acceptable reference for black service members. The decision comes two days after the dated term was found listed as an acceptable classification for "a person having origins in any of the black racial groups of Africa" in section 6-2 of the...

ORLANDO, Fla. — It's a multimillion-dollar problem, putting pressure on the United States immigration system. Now federal officials admit more than 52,000 unaccompanied children who illegally crossed the nation’s southwest border this year could be anywhere. Eyewitness News found out more than 4,000 of the children made their way to Florida, and Channel 9's Stephanie Bertini found one teenaged boy living in central Florida. He agreed to speak with her as long as his identity was not revealed. The boy’s footprints mark the pathway of an illegal journey fueled by dreams. “We had to walk a lot… and we only...

The same Tuesday night that a senior official in US President Barack Obama's administration was quoted calling Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu "chickens**t," yet more officials indicated the US is warming up to cooperation with Iran - the Islamic regime seeking nuclear weapons that has repeatedly declared its desire to destroy Israel. Senior US and Arab officials were cited by the Wall Street Journal saying that in recent months, America and Iran have grown closer through cooperation against their "common enemy", the Islamic State (ISIS), as well as over a shared interest in "stability" in Iraq and Afghanistan. American officials revealed...

Fast forward to today when shortly after the close, and minutes after it announced the completion of another $11 million follow on offering, Lakeland surprised everyone, and especially those who are short the stock, when it released the following "Update on Business Activity Relating to Ebola Crisis" in which it announced that it has, by now, received a stunning 1 million Hazmat suit orders and rising exponentially.

There was something for everyone in the release last week by the Congressional Budget Office of its August update and outlook. The federal government’s revenues are expected to top $3 trillion this year for the first time in history, thanks to individual income taxes rising by six percent, payroll taxes by eight percent, and corporate income taxes by 15 percent. Those infatuated with big government are celebrating the event as a reflection of an improving economy resuscitated by government spending and stimulus programs. Small government advocates, on the other hand, are decrying the event by reminding those who will listen...

By Joel Leyden Israel News Agency(photo) The Pentagon wants to defend the US but has hands tied by the Obama White House. Jerusalem — October 26, 2014 … From Ebola to ISIS, it appears that almost every issue which is handled by President Barack Obama turns into total disaster. Obama’s policies with regard to the Middle East are either coming from a place of ignorance, negligence or just plain bias to the global Islamic agenda. For US Secretary of State John Kerry to draw a direct relationship between stability in the Middle East and the Israel Palestine peace process illustrates...

The Obama administration is considering imposing a forced quarantine on healthcare workers who return to the United States from the Ebola hot zone of West Africa, after a New York doctor who treated patients there tested positive for the virus on Thursday. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention spokesman Tom Skinner told Reuters on Friday that a mandatory quarantine is one possible plan under discussion by officials from across the administration. 'There are a number of options being discussed pertaining to the monitoring and mobility of healthcare workers who are returning to the United States from affected countries,' Skinner said.

American C-130 military transport aircraft made "multiple" airdrops of weapons, ammunition and medical supplies to Kurdish fighters fending off Islamic State (ISIS) terrorists in the strategic Syrian town of Kobane, despite Turkey labeling the Kurds "terrorists." According to US Central Command on Monday, the drops consisted of equipment from Kurdish authorities in Iraq, and were "intended to enable continued resistance against Isil's (ISIS - ed.) attempts to overtake Kobane," reports BBC. The US-led coalition against ISIS has already conducted over 135 airstrikes against ISIS over the past several weeks to defend Kobane, located strategically along the Syrian and Turkish border....

The Obama administration stopped shipping to Israel all defense items – and not just Hellfire missiles as previously reported – for a short time in the middle of the war against Hamas, reported Israel Defense’s Amir Rappaport, the well-informed and highly credibly editor of the website. Makor Rishon added to that report that the US actually cut off all communications with Israel’s Ministry of Defense purchasing offices in the US for days.

America needs an intelligent, aggressive, integrated policy of discovering what its southern neighbors want and accommodating them so that all sides gain. Or soon that heat wave coming up from the south will be fire from the mouth of the dragon Bucaramanga, Colombia—Step aside, EU! China is set to become Latin America’s second-largest trading partner in two years. And 13 years later it will be king of the hill according to the journal China Policy Review. Yes, having locked up Asia and Africa, the ever-hungry Chinese dragon is salivating over what the U.S. at least used to consider its “back...

China’s decades-long buildup of strategic and conventional military forces is shifting the balance of power in Asia in Beijing’s favor and increasing the risk of a conflict, according to a forthcoming report by a congressional China commission. China’s military has greatly expanded its air and naval forces and is sharply increasing its missile forces, even while adopting a more hostile posture against the United States and regional allies in Asia, states a late draft of the annual report of the bipartisan U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. As a result, “the potential for security miscalculation in the region is rising,”...