Free Republic

Abu Dharr al-Ghifari, a Companion of Prophet Muhammad, is credited by many as a principal antecedent of Islamic socialism.[1][2][3][4][5] He protested against the accumulation of wealth by the ruling class during 'Uthman's caliphate and urged the equitable redistribution of wealth. The first Muslim Caliph Abu Bakr introduced a guaranteed minimum standard of income, granting each man, woman, and child ten dirhams annually; this was later increased to twenty dirhams.[6] The first experimental Islamic commune was established during the Russian Revolution of 1917 as part of the Waisi movement, an early supporter of the Soviet government. The Muslim Socialist Committee of...

Dallas, TX Mayor Mike Rawlings spoke Saturday on MSNBC, saying that ISIS wants the United States to "demonize" the Syrian refugees, the reason being that ISIS does not represent Islam. "ISIS wants us to demonize these Syrian refugees, want us to alienate these children," Rawlings said. "We have got to build a coalition of Middle Eastern states and we need to reach out, they're Muslims and we have got to use the words carefully to show them that we care about them. ISIS is no more Islamic than the Nazi senior staff was Christian. so we have got to differentiate...

It's always the things you don't expect that get you. After banking scandals, currency issues, and a Greek/Portugese/Spanish debt crisis just about every six months, the economic and political partnership that is the European Union seems much more likely to fall apart for an entirely different reason after all. That reason is ISIS. This is a political nightmare for the statist bureaucrats who have been working for decades to reduce true representative democracy all for the goal of a unified and monolithic economic entity without worrying about being hindered by annoying little things like the will of the people. Before...

We hear so often about Muslims as victims of abuse in the West and combatants in the Arab Spring's fight against tyranny. But, in fact, a wholly different kind of war is underway--an unrecognized battle costing thousands of lives. Christians are being killed in the Islamic world because of their religion. It is a rising genocide that ought to provoke global alarm.The portrayal of Muslims as victims or heroes is at best partially accurate. In recent years the violent oppression of Christian minorities has become the norm in Muslim-majority nations stretching from West Africa and the Middle East to South...

In a comment elsewhere, someone wondered about differences between Catholics and Lutherans.  HEREI cannot go into deep detail about these differences.  Books can be written about each point, and have been.Here are my lunch break reflections while the US Bishops are having lunch during their annual meeting.Keep in mind that I am a former Lutheran convert to the Catholic Church.  I was validly baptized as a Lutheran.  I rejected the Lutheran catechism and instruction when I was 7 years old because I couldn’t square their message about corruption with the beauty of the music of Mozart.  After a vaguely Christian time and a...

GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump says the United States has "absolutely no choice" but to close down mosques where "some bad things are happening." "Nobody wants to say this and nobody wants to shut down religious institutions or anything, but you know, you understand it," Trump said on Fox News's "Hannity" on Tuesday. "A lot of people understand it. We're going to have no choice." Trump said on Monday he would "strongly consider" closing mosques if elected in response to the terrorist attacks in France last Friday that killed at least 129 people and injured hundreds more. Pressed to explain...

CNSNews.com) – As a college student in the 1970s, John Brennan, President Obama’s nominee for CIA director, traveled in Indonesia where – he recalled in a speech in New York in 2010 – “despite my long hair, my earring and my obvious American appearance, I was welcomed throughout that country, in a way that is a reflection of the tremendous warmth of Islamic cultures and societies.” Brennan’s Feb. 13, 2010 address to a meeting at the Islamic Center at New York University, facilitated by the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), provided an insight into his views on Islam, a...

Invitation List Looms as Test for Syria Talks By SOMINI SENGUPTA NOV. 9, 2015 When world powers gather in Vienna this weekend to discuss a possible postwar political deal for Syria, one of the main points of contention will be to determine whom to include among opposition groups in future negotiations — and the West may back groups that are less than “moderate,” Britain’s top diplomat said on Monday. From Our Advertisers “In my judgment, people we should be talking to will include people who have a vision for the future of Syria that is different from ours, a vision...

Donald Trump suggested Monday that U.S. counterterrorism officials should shut down certain mosques in response to the horrific terrorist attacks in Paris last week. “I would hate to do it but it’s something you’re going to have to strongly consider,” the 2016 Republican frontrunner said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” when asked if he would recommend taking the measure. “Some of the absolute hatred is coming from those areas,” he said.

BEAUMONT, Texas - For John Courts, the terrorist attacks in Paris that killed 129 provided yet more evidence of something he has long suspected: Syrian refugees are not to be trusted. "I think they're wolves in sheep's clothing," said Courts, 36, a police officer in this industrial town in southeast Texas who attended a political rally for Donald Trump Saturday. "Bringing those refugees here is very dangerous. Yeah, they need help, but it's going to bring terrorism right into our front door." Courts was relieved a few weeks ago when Trump first promised to kick all Syrian refugees out of...

In Orlando, where he joined most of the Republican presidential field at a three-day "Sunshine Summit," Gov. Bobby Jindal (R-La.) got his biggest applause when he praised someone else's work. Jindal praised French President Francois Hollande for acting swiftly after Islamic terrorists massacred more than 100 people in Paris. "He's closed the borders," said Jindal. "It is time to close our borders and keep our people safe from these radical, evil terrorists." The audience's loud approval was a sort of vindication for Gov. Jindal. Earlier this year, after a trip to London, he had been criticized for saying that Muslims...

Two of the suicide bombers who caused carnage in the Paris massacre are thought to have sneaked into France by posing as refugees from Syria. The disclosure, which came amid claims of French intelligence failures, inevitably raised new security concerns about Europe’s borders. Police said the two men, who arrived in Greece last month, were among seven attackers, one as young as 15. One of the attackers was last night named by French media as Mostefai Ismaël Omar, 29, from Courcouronnes, in Essonne. Serbian media last night reported that one of the terrorists was named as Ahmed Almuhamed. The newspaper,...

When it opened 15 years ago, the Öresund Bridge was seen as a glistening symbol of the new Europe. Sweden and Denmark had been joined together by a motorway with no border controls, fusing together economies and even blurring national identities. Many Swedes in Malmö have come to relish the city’s growing reputation as a suburb of Copenhagen, just half an hour away by train. It seemed to embody many dreams about the future: a continent where national borders would come to mean nothing. That dream was shattered at noon today.

You will know them by their fruits." This ancient wisdom is from the author of the Gospel of Matthew. Sixteen centuries later, in his book "Will and Doom," the Rev. Gershom Bulkeley, paraphrased Matthew with, "Actions are more significant than words." In the 21 st century this timeless maxim continues to serve as we hear resident Obama say, "I intend to protect a free and open Internet. ... resident Obama treats the Internet as a political and diplomatic bargaining tool ... Write this on a rock … If Obama's plans for the Internet come to pass, his words, "I intend...

Ajit Pai, the sole Republican Commissioner on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), inferred in a Tweet that President Barack Obama’s secret, 332-page “Net Neutrality” document is a scheme for federal micro-managing of the Internet to extract billions in new taxes from consumers and again enforce progressives’ idea of honest, equitable, and balanced content fairness.

WASHINGTON, Feb. 4 (UPI) — The Federal Communications Commission will seek more influence on Internet regulation to ensure net neutrality, its chairman said Wednesday. In an editorial published on {link:the website of the magazine Wired: “http://www.wired.com/2015/02/fcc-chairman-wheeler-net-neutrality?mbid=social_twitter”,nw}, Tom Wheeler explained new rules, proposed this week, “to preserve the Internet as an open platform for innovation and free expression. This proposal is rooted in long-standing regulatory principles, marketplace experience, and public input.” The new rules will cast {link:high-speed Internet service as a public utility: “http://www.cnbc.com/id/102376526″,nw}, an unidentified person, who was consulted the FCC {link:on the proposal, told CNN: “http://money.cnn.com/2015/02/02/technology/net-neutrality-fcc/index.html”,nw}. The change would...

WASHINGTON—The Treasury Department is considering ways to inject capital directly into banks, possibly by taking equity stakes, as the financial crisis continues to worsen. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, in a marked shift in rhetoric, played up Treasury's newfound authority to "to inject capital into financial institutions" in remarks Wednesday. Mr. Paulson, who won approval from Congress to buy $700 billion worth of distressed assets, had previously focused on Treasury's plan to buy mortgage-related securities from financial institutions that are having trouble getting the assets off their books. As the financial crisis continues to escalate, Treasury has begun fleshing out ways...

For the past 20 years, there's been a discussion in political circles and the media about the "fault lines" in the Republican party over the hot-button social issues such as the death penalty, abortion, affirmative action and gay rights. The presumption has always been that these issues would ultimately cause a rift between conservatives and moderates that would split the Republican coalition. The pundits and the MSM have been expecting and predicting this split for as long as I've been watching politics and they've been puzzled by the fact that it has never occurred. I believe that the reason that...

MALAPPURAM’S peculiar demography provides perfect cover for groups that seek it. It is one of only two Muslim-majority districts in India, outside Jammu and Kashmir (the other being Murshidabad in West Bengal). Since the early 1990s, fundamentalists appear to have had a concerted plan to win over the community. Kerala Nadvathul Mujahedeen’s leader Ahmed Kutty paints a grim picture: ‘‘The method of the extremists to take control of a mosque is always the same. It begins with a small cell of adepts praying with the others and trying to rally them. If there is not much headway, relentless arguing and...

http://64.4.36.250/cgi-bin/linkrd?_lang=EN&lah=5f363ca8f1985ab244d5877e637c818f&lat=1095798538&hm___action=http%3a%2f%2fwww%2euselectionatlas%2eorg%2fenable%2ephp -This is an election atlas which runs a mock election. I'm sick of seeing it yellow and red.