Free Republic

Democrats decided 16 months before the 2018 election how they would start winning races again. Gathered in a small Virginia town on a sweltering July day, Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi and their lieutenants laid out a “Better Deal" agenda focused on middle-class jobs and higher wages — a vow, they said, that their party would never again waver from a laser-like focus on the economy. Donald Trump makes some promises difficult to keep. Just days later, the president declared on Twitter that transgender men and women were banned from the military. His action drew a swift rebuke from Democrats, who...

Another reminder, as if we needed one, that it's not going to stop with Confederate generals. Or, for that matter, Virginians or slaveowners. Look at the history of the left around the world. And look at where they drew the line and stopped. The answer is nowhere. And so we have this insult, unthinkable in the pre-Obama era where the Dems at least feigned respect for America. An historic Episcopal parish where George Washington frequently worshiped has decided to remove a memorial plaque honoring the nation’s first president, saying the decision was out of a desire to provide a “welcoming”...

PITTSBURGH — The Pittsburgh Art Commission voted Wednesday to recommend the Stephen Foster statue in Oakland be removed. The recommendation is that the statue is removed from the public and placed in a place in private and "properly contextualized." The Pittsburgh Art Commission will recommend removal of the statue within six months. Foster, a Pittsburgh native who died in 1864, is famous for classic songs including “Oh! Susanna” and “Camptown Races.” Many of his songs were used in minstrel shows in which actors performed in blackface. The statue depicts Foster sitting above shoeless, banjo-playing “Uncle Ned,” a slave character from...

Two prominent stars say what many Hollywood dwellers have been hinting at since Nov. 8, 2016. For a while one message rang out from Team Hollywood in the Age of Trump. The industry didnÂ’t want you as a customer if you wear a red MAGA hat. Oh, celebrities didnÂ’t actually mouth those words. Instead, they embedded their disgust for both President Donald Trump and his admirers in nearly everything they did. - Movies. - TV shows - Late night monologues. - PSAs - Press interviews - Social media We got the message, even if they didnÂ’t actually say it. Denver...

A three-judge court panel ruled Wednesday that a World War I memorial in the shape of a cross in Bladensburg, Maryland, is unconstitutional, a decision that a legal scholar says could imperil other similar memorials. In a 2-1 decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit said the 40-foot cross erected 92 years ago violates the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause. “The monument here has the primary effect of endorsing religion and excessively entangles the government in religion,” Judge Stephanie Thacker wrote for the majority. “The Latin cross is the core symbol of Christianity. And here, it is 40...

Established in 1910, the Boy Scouts have long stood on tradition, but in recent years, the organization has yielded to a changing culture by revising its admission policy to permit openly gay Scouts and adult volunteers, as well as transgender children who identify as boys to join. Mark Hancock, chief executive officer of Trail Life USA, said the admittance of girls into the Boy Scouts of America is part of a growing “war on boys” that views the sexes as interchangeable and masculinity as something undesirable. He said the decision Wednesday is just latest step in the Boy Scouts’ progressive...

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A housing benefit that saves clergy $800 million a year in taxes has been deemed unconstitutional by a federal judge. Under the law, housing allowances paid as part of clergy salary can be subtracted from their taxable income. Religious freedom advocates fear the ruling could force many churches in poor areas to close.MADISON, Wisconsin - A federal judge in Wisconsin has struck down as unconstitutional a law that gives clergy tax-free housing allowances, in a ruling that could have far-reaching ramifications for religious leaders, who could be facing new taxes which will threaten their ministry. Under the federal law passed...

The radicalization of the Democratic Party is transforming everything that happens in America into another battle in our unending culture war. Is there anything left in American public life that isn’t an occasion for political rancor and division? NFL games are now nothing more than crude pieces of political theater. On Sunday even Vice President Mike Pence got in on the act, showing up to a Colts-49ers game then leaving after a few players knelt during the national anthem. Next day was Columbus Day, which the cities of Los Angeles and Austin decided this year to replace with “Indigenous Peoples’...

Even as Democrats publicly and loudly decry corporatist political “dark money,” billionaire Democrats and other donors funnel hundreds of millions to radical and violent causes.   Barely a week had passed after Donald Trump’s historic upset in the November 8 presidential election, but some of the world’s richest individuals were already launching a counteroffensive. George Soros and his fellow deep-pocket funders of the Democratic Party and left-wing causes gathered with a lineup of party activists and luminaries from Hollywood, K Street, and Wall Street for a three-day “investment conference” (November 15-17) at the luxurious Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Washington, D.C....

After Kanye West purged his timeline of Donald Trump tweets, a rapper named King Myers claimed West produced an anti-Trump song called "Propaganda" in his Twitter bio, and was believed to be signed to G.O.O.D. Music. A source close to the situation tells Billboard that West did not produce the song, nor is King Myers signed to the label. [Snip] The song "Propaganda" contains lines like, "I ask Allah how the hell Trump still livin'/ I say and do what I want 'cause I'm a real n---a," and calls for the POTUS' impeachment in light of his recent immigration ban.

The First Casualty of Culture War is Free Speech Standing for the anthem is the new counterculture. September 29, 2017 Daniel Greenfield Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical left and Islamic terrorism. Don’t like millionaire black nationalists in the NFL refusing to stand for the anthem? Too bad! It’s freedom of speech. The same left that decided James Damore didn’t have freedom of speech at Google now insists that football players have it at the NFL. Never mind that the Google engineer was unknown until his...

A new company is tackling the stock photography industry’s overwhelming whiteness, one photo at a time. TONL, created by photographer and Street Ettiquette founder Joshua Kissi and entrepreneur Karen Okonkwo, launched on August 23 with a goal to provide stock photos that feature a more diverse array of subjects and scenarios. Kissi, a 28-year-old creative director of the company, told HuffPost that the inspiration behind the idea came from the personal experiences he and Okonkwo (who he met through his girlfriend) experienced in the media industry.

But there’s something genuinely harrowing about the sight of Peter Rabbit – gentle, Edwardian Peter Rabbit – thoughtlessly injuring some birds, or grabbing a pile of lettuce leaves and making it rain like a banker in a stripclub, or literally twerking. No joke, all of these things happen in the trailer. There’s even a moment where a badger hurls a hedgehog at a dartboard, and it’s so much like the dwarf-throwing scene from The Wolf of Wall Street that you’re left with the incontrovertible feeling that this entire venture was put together by people who genuinely hate Peter Rabbit. Just...

Back in October 2011 Congressman Louis Gohmert (R-TX) questioned Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano about Mohamed Elibiary, a member of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) with a high level security clearance who allegedly accessed, illegally from his home computer, a Texas State and Local Intelligence Community database. Napolitano denied knowing anything about it, and told Gohmert she would personally do the investigation. See the video below. Gohmert charged that Elibiary shopped information marked For Official Use Only, [classified] about Texas Governor Rick Perry and other Texas officials, to a left-leaning media outlet. See my original article from January 2012 for...

Senior cadet Steven Fox from the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs is accused of assaulting a date he brought to an AFA dance back in 2015, KKTV reported. Court papers accuse Fox of penetrating the man with a finger without his consent and rubbing himself against the man’s leg for sexual gratification, The Gazette reported. Fox’s defense lawyers say the acts were consensual and the two men were dating at the time.

A group serving as a central hub of information for congressional town halls was founded by a former Hillary Clinton campaign staffer and its parent company is located at the same address as an organization funded by liberal billionaire George Soros. Democrats have insisted that recent town hall outbursts against Republican politicians occurred organically, likening them to the Tea Party, while President Donald Trump yesterday tweeted that the "so-called angry crowds in home districts of some Republicans are actually, in numerous occasions, planned out by liberal activists. Sad!" The Town Hall Project, a group that serves as a one-stop shop...

NEW YORK - After 12 years advocating for abortion rights, Joe Solmonese might have opted for a less divisive field of work. Instead, he is taking over leadership of the largest national gay-rights group at a time when the same-sex marriage debate rivals abortion for volatility and virulence. "My challenge is to talk about why the equality we seek is not just important to our community, but should be important to everyone," Solmonese said. "I have to believe in the optimism and fair-mindedness of the American people." Solmonese was named last week as the new president of the Washington-based Human...

Note: The following text is a quote: http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-the-President-at-Human-Rights-Campaign-Dinner/ THE BRIEFING ROOM THE WHITE HOUSE Office of the Press Secretary __________________________________________________________________ For Immediate Release October 10, 2009 REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT AT HUMAN RIGHTS CAMPAIGN DINNER Walter E. Convention Center Washington, D.C. 8:10 P.M. EDT THE PRESIDENT: Thank you, everybody. Please, you're making me blush. (Laughter.) AUDIENCE MEMBER: We love you, Barack! THE PRESIDENT: I love you back. (Applause.) To Joe Solmonese, who's doing an outstanding job on behalf of HRC. (Applause.) To my great friend and supporter, Terry Bean, co-founder of HRC. (Applause.) Representative Patrick Kennedy. (Applause.) David Huebner, the...

Terry Bean, a Portland power player in national Democratic politics and the gay rights movement, was arrested today on charges of sex abuse in a case involving a 15-year-old boy. Law enforcement sources familiar with the case say Bean will be charged with two counts of sodomy in the third degree, a felony, and sex abuse in the third degree, a misdemeanor. The arrest comes after a six-month investigation that began with allegations Bean secretly made video recordings of men having sex in his bedroom. As WW reported in June, Bean accused a former lover, Kiah Lawson, of attempting to...