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Editorial cartoonist Ted Rall recently made the news for penning yet another crass cartoon, this one denigrating Pat Tillman, the football star turned soldier recently killed in Afghanistan. Rall painted Tillman as a racist, bloodthirsty idiot who was just another cog in the "El Busho" war machine. MSNBC.com decided to pull the cartoon because it "did not meet MSNBC.com standards of fairness and taste." Blogger Andrew Sullivan called for a protest campaign against Rall and yesterday offered this enlightening Rall quote: "The word 'hero' has been bandied about a lot to refer to anyone killed in Afghanistan or Iraq....

A team of military intelligence and police drug enforcement units rounded up some 50 Muslim residents of the Al-Salam Mosque Compound in Barangay Culiat, Quezon City as part of intensified operations against illegal drugs and firearms in the metropolis. Senior Superintendent Procopio Lipana, chief of the Central Police District-Criminal Investigation Unit (CPD-CIU), said 12 suspects remained under their custody while the rest were released. Lipana identified the 12 as Dawabe Ben Albi Maulana, businessman from Basilan; Musa Sabaddin Abdurahman, 27; Awop Wadja Ignus, 26; Radjail Karawan Tirih, 34; Raquel Francisco Mabajo, 26; Pamaran Alain Awali, 48; Abubakar Cuevas Zunco, 34;...

Mel Gibson's put his money where his mouth is. By now everyone in the world knows he's spent $25 million to make "The Passion of the Christ" and promised nearly $25M more to market it. But what you may not know is that Gibson has also put up $5.1 million so far to run his own personal church near Malibu. Last year Christopher Noxon wrote in The New York Times that Gibson had donated $2.3 million to make Holy Family Catholic Church in Agoura Hills, California a reality. Holy Family rejects the universally accepted teachings of the Second Vatican Conference...

HERO’S BURIAL: Gen. John MacDonald, official representative of the US army, hands over the American flag to Helen Therriem, mother of Fil-American US army specialist Solomon Bangayan (inset) who was killed in action in Iraq earlier this month. Bangayan was given the Bronze Star, Purple Heart and the Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary Medal as he was buried in his hometown of Sudipen in La Union yesterday.

French born NOW activist Marie-Jose Ragab has penned a vicious editorial against President Bush in which she performs a "Monica" on Saddam Hussein, admonishing the US that the world is poised to side with Hussein, leaving us isolated. Read on if you dare: ********************************************************************************* Last December14 th was an entertaining moment in America. Here, splashed on every TV screen, was the former president of Iraq, Saddam Hussein, clearly having a bad hair day. Ever the ham, L. Paul Bremer (the 'L' stands for 'Lying'), decked in his boring blue blazer and cowboys boots, the two pieces of clothing he seems...

WASHINGTON (Talon News) -- The leader of a conservative political group says he thinks Democrat presidential front-runner Howard Dean is too "mentally unstable" to become president and that it is "sad" Republicans want him to be the Democrat nominee. Religious Freedom Coalition Chairman William J. Murray sent an e-mail to supporters on Wednesday voicing his reservations about the former Vermont governor becoming the Democrat nominee for president that he says are echoed behind closed doors across the country. "It says something about our nation that a great political party consisting of millions of Americans could possibly pick someone as...

WASHINGTON - Three years after Muslim Americans overwhelmingly voted for George W Bush, democratic presidential candidates are courting these disenchanted voters in hopes of winning millions of backers in key states. "I want to earn the support of Muslims and Muslim leaders across the United States," Senator John Kerry, a Democrat from Massachusetts, told a major Muslim conference outside Los Angeles last weekend. "I very much hope for your support," Democratic front-runner and former Vermont governor, Howard Dean, told the same meeting, the Muslim Public Affairs Council annual convention. Dean, Kerry and Ohio Representative Dennis Kucinich all called in from...

PETA urges India to 'give leather the boot' - The Hindi version features a well-known voice artiste An animal welfare group is urging Indians to steer clear of wearing leather with an advertising campaign featuring singing cows. "Do I make myself clear? Keep your hands off my rear!" croons a cow in the 30-second TV advert. The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) hopes the lip-synched bovines will persuade Indians to boycott leather products. The Hindi-language version of the advert is dubbed by Chetan Shashital, a well-known voice artiste who has worked with such celebrities as cricket stars...

WASHINGTON — The presidential election of 2000 was one of the low points of modern U.S. politics. But the upcoming 2004 nomination contests have the potential to be exciting. Either or both conventions could be electrifying affairs. Democrats may have the first multi-ballot convention since 1952, which could be a disaster or an unexpected opportunity. Republicans, who set their convention in New York City so President Bush could return to the scene of his apparent post-9/11 political triumph, might find Manhattan circa 2004 a much less friendly international stage. There may be more FBI agents and uniformed military people in...

CommonConservative.com 11/16/03 --> "WE CALLED THEM TRAITORS"...and everyone laughed... by Tom Adkins. For years, conservatives claimed liberals were bent on destroying the United States. We suspected they were willing to ruin lives, even actively ruin America to gain political power and turn America into a socialist state. We called them traitors. And everyone laughed. We said liberals were anti-American. We said they were traitors. And we watched the evidence mount. The Rosenbergs. Whitaker Chambers. The Church Commission. The counter culture. So-called “peace protesters.” Jane Fonda. Jimmy Carter’s arrogant socialist smile. The pro-Sandinista Congress. We called them traitors. And everyone laughed....

From time to time I read the news and articles of the PT (Worker’s Party), www.pt.org.br, official site. And it's not old news from old notebooks, it is this year’s declarations. It’s possible to see that old aspirations – suffering metamorphosis, or not – still live. Look at this affirmation of José Dirceu, head of Civil House: We are retaking the political agenda of 1964 because problems like cultural democratization, agrarian reform, national autonomy and citizenship are still ongoing since then. (http://200.155.6.3/site/noticias/noticias_int.asp?cod=16887) For the reader who doesn’t know what happened around 1964, I can explain in three words: Brazil's counter-revolution....

Apology to Muslims and censure of Boykin: Resolution H. Res. 419, introduced by Rep. John Conyers Please write your congressional representative about Resolution H. Res. 419, introduced by Representative John Conyers (D-MI). Click here for the Congress.org link. The language concerning “religiously intolerant remarks” amounts to censorship of Christian, as well as other beliefs. The resolution is a knee-jerk reaction to Lieutenant General William “Jerry” Boykin’s exercise of Free Speech and Freedom of Religion in his own church. Proposing such a bill is the worst kid of appeasement to a group that is aggressively intolerant to non-Muslims around the...

Shortly after the terrorist attacks of September 11th, a few of us Freepers became aware that Ramadan 2003 had special prophetic significance to certain Islamic sects. They are awaiting a spiritual avatar known as the Twelfth Mahdi, who will lead Muslims to great victories in war over the infidels. It's believed that this Mahdi will appear during a Ramadan with both a Solar and a Lunar Eclipse. This double Ramadan eclipse will occur this year, for the first time since 1786, and won't occur again until 2155. For those Muslims who place any credence in this prophecy, this year's Ramadan...

President Speaks to Muslim World Speaking to Al-Jazeera in particular and the Arab world in general, President Vladimir Putin on Friday criticized the United States' positions on Chechnya and Iraq and said Russia retains the right to use preemptive strikes if the UN continues to be sidelined in decisions on dealing with a security threat. "With preemptive strikes, we start from the assumption that international law is most important. Any use of force is appropriate only in the case of a decision by the UN Security Council," Putin said in remarks broadcast on the Qatar-based network and picked up by...

THE GREAT HERESIES by Hilaire Belloc Chapter Four The Great and Enduring Heresy of Mohammed It might have appeared to any man watching affairs in the earlier years of the seventh century_say from 600 to 630_that only one great main assault having been made against the Church, Arianism and its derivatives, that assault having been repelled and the Faith having won its victory, it was now secure for an indefinite time. Christendom would have to fight for its life, of course, against outward unchristian things, that is, against Paganism. The nature worshippers of the high Persian civilization to the...

President Vladimir Putin said Thursday Russia could switch its trade in oil from dollars to euros, a move that could have far-reaching repercussions for the global balance of power -- potentially hurting the U.S. dollar and economy and providing a massive boost to the euro zone. "We do not rule out that it is possible. That would be interesting for our European partners," Putin said at a joint news conference with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder in the Urals town of Yekaterinburg, where the two leaders conducted two-day talks. "But this does not depend solely on us. We do not want...

China developing `paralysis warfare'By Brian HsuSTAFF REPORTER Wednesday, Oct 08, 2003,Page 1 China's military is changing its strategy from deterrence to pre-emption, planning to use "paralysis warfare" against Taiwan in the future, the Ministry of National Defense said in a report delivered to the legislature's defense committee yesterday. "Paralysis warfare features Web-based information warfare, saturation ballistic missile attacks, joint precision strikes and seizure of the enemy's capital city by special operations units," the report says. "Such tactics will become a major option for the Chinese military in its choice of modes of attack against Taiwan in the future," it says....

US death row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal honorary citizen of Paris by the Mayor of Paris, above Death row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal made honorary citizen of Paris Sunday October 5, 1:49 AM The city of Paris made an honorary citizen of celebrated US death row inmate and black activist Mumia Abu-Jamal, sentenced to die for the 1981 murder of a white Philadelphia policeman.It is the first time Paris has bestowed the honor since Pablo Picasso was made honorary citizen in 1971, Socialist mayor of Paris Bertrand Delanoe told an audience of 200 people, taking the occasion to attack the "barbarity"...

MOSCOW - Russia’s main goal over the next 30-50 years is to build a liberal empire, Anatoly Chubais, head of RAO Unified Energy Systems of Russia, said at a news conference in St. Petersburg on Thursday. In his opinion, Russia should join neither the European Union nor NATO. However, it is necessary to take into account the contours of the new emerging world, which will unite the United States, the European Union, Japan and Russia. According to Mr. Chubais, the creation of a single economic space, linking together Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan, will be a direct step towards the...

Granada, Spain – A dispenser of iced lemonade sits invitingly by the door of the newly whitewashed building — hospitality for summer visitors coming to the first mosque built in Granada in over 500 years. But looming over the freshly planted garden, seeming to quiver in the furnacelike heat, is another image: the Alhambra, a 14th-century Muslim fortress of red-tinted stone that is everything this mosque is not: ancient, battle-scarred, monumental. It seems at once a reminder of lost glories and a spur for their restoration. It may also inspire darker sentiments. For it was from the Alhambra's watchtower that...