Free Republic

Texas Republican Rep. Steve Stockman threatened Monday afternoon that he would file articles of impeachment against President Barack Obama if he institutes gun control measures with an executive order. Stockman warned that such executive orders would be “unconstitutional” and “infringe on our constitutionally-protected right to keep and bear arms.” “I will seek to thwart this action by any means necessary, including but not limited to eliminating funding for implementation, defunding the White House, and even filing articles of impeachment,” Stockman said in a statement. At his press conference Monday, Obama floated the possibility of using executive action to enact policies...

This morning, political commentators are paying a great deal of attention to one of the Los Angeles Times’ stories about Barack Obama’s plans for a Republican takeover of Congress. Unfortunately, they are focusing on the wrong one. Most commentators spent the morning quoting the president’s remarks on a black radio program that a GOP-dominated Congress will result in “hand-to-hand combat.” The reality is most of the action will take place behind their backs and over their heads. All indications are, if Obama cannot get his legislative agenda enacted by Congress, he will impose it by decree. The evidence comes...

Scientists have used NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and ESA's XMM-Newton to detect a vast reservoir of gas lying along a wall-shaped structure of galaxies about 400 million light years from Earth. In this artist's impression, a close-up view of the so-called Sculptor Wall is depicted. Spiral and elliptical galaxies are shown in the wall along with the newly detected intergalactic gas, part of the so-called Warm Hot Intergalactic Medium (WHIM), shown in blue. This discovery is the strongest evidence yet that the "missing matter" in the nearby Universe is located in an enormous web of hot, diffuse gas. The X-ray...

<p>Now that Saturday's 5 p.m. deadline has passed, Californians should revisit the isle of sanity.</p> <p>While only about a fourth of the 500 people who had picked up filing papers actually turned them in, this ballot will still have more than a hundred candidates. Democrats ended up with only one prominent name on the ballot, improving their chances of holding the office against the four well-known Republicans.</p>

Edmund Burke was borne in Dublin on January 12--some 273 years ago. He is often called the father of conservatism, reflecting the central passion throughout his writings and speeches--opposition to arbitrary power, especially in the hands of the government, with its "officious, universal interference" in people's lives. He was also an intellectual ally of America's revolution, condemning the imposition of taxes without representation as "perfect uncompensated slavery," and warning that if required to choose between British sovereignty and freedom, American colonists "will cast your sovereignty in your face. Nobody will be argued into slavery." Given that Burke continues to inspire...