Free Republic

In a movie that's being described as "the feel-good al-Qaida date flick of 2005," Bush-hating actor Sean Penn will star as a suicidal hijacker who tries to crash a commercial airliner into Bush's official residence, the White House. The Penn presidential assassination movie is fiction, of course, as clearly indicated by the title: "The Assassination of President Nixon." Still, Penn's decision to make a film that parallels the only part of the 9/11 attacks that wasn't successfully executed (thanks to the brave passengers aboard United Flight 93) has even Bush-hating Hollywood nervous. "It was very hard to find distribution for...

DATE POSTED: DECEMBER 8, 2004 Women donate quilts to injured special operations Soldiers at Walter Reed By Sgt. Joe Healy U.S. Army Special Operations Command WASHINGTON (USASOC News Service, Dec. 8, 2004) — In Walter Reed Army Medical Center’s Ward 57 here, Soldiers receive medical attention from doctors and occupational specialists for injuries suffered during Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. Now, because of a pair of volunteers' efforts, some of those Soldiers are also getting attention of a different kind. “Can I offer you a hand-made quilt and a hug?” Gloria Kelly asked Dec. 2 to a number...

My conservative friends continue to tell me that the liberals (who just lost the election) “just don’t get it.” That is, liberals “don’t get” the destructiveness of the American Civil Liberties Union’s relentless efforts to ban any allusion to Christianity and any mention of God in a country that is 96 percent Christian. They “don’t get” that the vote recounts in Ohio and elsewhere – which are costing taxpayers millions of dollars – are not, as they claim, to insure the sanctity of the voting process, but rather a colossal example of sour grapes at its worst.

Liberalism on Fumes Jonah Goldberg has drummed Kevin Drum's arguments on the War on Terror into the ground and stomped on them pretty successfully, but as one who defined himself as a liberal or a leftist for most of my life, let me throw myself into the breach on this, at least briefly. Jonah was writing in response to a much talked about Peter Beinart piece urging liberals to take a harder line on Islamofascism in the manner many did on Communism back in the forties and fifties. Drum seems to have been peeved by Beinart's suggestion, making the risible...

Every German schoolroom should display a stuffed Dutchman as a horrible example to youth, wrote the poet Heinrich Heine in 1831. For Americans, the horrible example to youth at the taxidermist shop is Western Europe. Last month the US re-elected a president despised by enormous European majorities. Europeans hate and fear the United States, but Americans barely can summon the energy to ignore Europe, which they have written off as a decadent and soon-to-disappear civilization. In the major newspapers of the US east coast, to be sure, Europeans continue to read about their sad little concerns. What "red state" Americans...

SEC. RUMSFELD: Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. My goodness. What a group this is. Impressive gathering. General Steve Whitcomb, thank you so much for your kind words. Sergeant Major Kellman, it’s good to see you again. I appreciate your able leadership as well. First, I want to say thank you to each of you, to your families for your superb service to our country. You are doing noble work, it’s vitally important work and your country is deeply grateful. Today’s December 8th. Sixty three years ago today our nation declared war on an enemy that had launched...

Even if Republican Dino Rossi wins the hand recount of the state’s extraordinary governor’s race, a never-before-used provision in the state constitution could allow the Democrat-controlled Legislature to hand the election to Democrat Christine Gregoire. Experts are unsure how to interpret the provision. But the state Democratic Party says it gives Democrats the ability to contest the results of the election before the Legislature. The Legislature would hold a trial of sorts, like an impeachment hearing, with lawmakers voting on the final outcome, according to a Democratic Party lawyer. That scenario would seem to favor Gregoire, because Democrats will hold...

The University of Illinois' student newspaper, the Daily Illini, is in hot water with the chancellor over what he says is a series of items offensive to Jews in the last two years. Urbana-Champaign Chancellor Richard Herman is demanding staff journalists undergo better training and do more to fight error. If they don't, he threatens to start a newspaper to compete with the campus paper, which is financially independent from the university. "Seeing a newspaper intentionally or otherwise continue to spew out what is broadly seen as anti-Semitic comments is just not appropriate,'' Herman said this week. Quote published twice...

School District Critics Plan Nativity Scene, 'Silent Night' Performances MUSTANG, Okla. -- Lakehoma Elementary School's annual Christmas performance was to include a rendition of "Silent Night" on Thursday evening after Mustang school officials reached a compromised in a dispute over Christian religious elements in the program. The decision came after a number of Mustang residents complained and others announced plans to stage a silent protest Thursday night during the evening performance. Superintendent Karl Springer had originally banned a staged nativity scene and the singing of "Silent Night" because of First Amendment concerns. However, during an early performance of the program...

The Implausibility of a New Liberalism By William Voegeli Peter Beinart, the editor of The New Republic, has written an unusually long, provocative, and important essay for that magazine. Its title, "An Argument For a New Liberalism," is at odds with its thesis, since what Beinart really wants is to revive an old liberalism. But then, its thesis is at odds with the reality of that old liberalism. Beinart wants, specifically, a revival of the liberalism of 1947, the year the Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) was founded. More specifically still, he wants liberalism to stand resolutely against Islamist...

Televised report shocks business owner By Lisa Scheller, News Editor Wednesday, December 8, 2004 Last Wednesday night, Bill McGraw stayed up past his bedtime to watch the 10 o'clock news on KCTV Channel 5. What the 80-year-old Tonganoxie farmer thought he'd see was an interesting feature that mentioned his longstanding fertilizer business. Instead, he saw a broadcast that wrongly depicted McGraw's business as an irresponsible company that would sell ammonium nitrate -- in huge quantities -- to anyone who came along. Ammonium nitrate was one of the ingredients used in the April 19, 1995, bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah...

Capitol Hill (CNSNews.com) - Following an Election Day prediction that Democratic candidate John Kerry would win more than 300 electoral votes and the presidency, one of America's most well known polling firms continued the job Wednesday of explaining its flawed projection. Shawnta Watson Walcott, communications director for Zogby International, joined a group of liberal Democrats at a faux congressional hearing focused on whether fraud influenced the Nov. 2 outcome. "... it has become increasingly clear that this election has produced unprecedented levels of suspicion regarding its outcome, and we join this panel discussion in an attempt to find a...

REPORTING FOR DUTY Sen. John Kerry and his Massachusetts minions insist he has not decided on whether he will run for president again. But actions speak louder than words, and when one does things like set up leadership PACs, and take time away from holiday celebrations to hang out with campaign volunteers and state fundraisers, one's intentions ring loud and clear. Last weekend saw Kerry in New Hampshire thanking his statewide campaign staff and meeting with Democrat officials. This coming weekend finds the Man from Mope in Des Moines, Iowa, for yet another party with his supporters. Kerry advisers and...

Arson Fires Deemed Worst In Maryland History Investigators Comb Burned Homes For Evidence   POSTED: 6:45 am EST December 7, 2004 UPDATED: 1:56 pm EST December 7, 2004  INDIAN HEAD, Md. -- Fire investigators are searching for evidence in the rubble of dozens of torched houses in what's being called the worst arson fire in Maryland State history. According to Faron Taylor, a deputy state fire marshal, more than 20 federal, local and state investigators searched for forensic evidence. Some $10 million in damage was done at 41 homes at the Hunters Brooke subdivision, near Indian Head in Charles...

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) _ State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, whose investigations have shaken the nation's financial institutions, said Tuesday he will run for governor of New York in 2006. ``The state is at a point of crisis,'' Spitzer told The Associated Press. ``The state is in dire need of leadership that will address budget issues, tax issues. We are bleeding jobs. We need reform in the process of government.'' Long known to be interested in the job, it marked the first time the high-profile attorney general has said he will definitely run for the state's highest office. The two-term attorney...

Just caught the end from E.D. Hill: Five bombs have exploded in "Spain", phone call from ETA? said they were going to blow up...areas cleared before they went off.. More later, FOX just left the story hanging...

Last Wednesday, Norm Coleman, a Republican from Minnesota and co-chairman of the U.S. Senate subcommittee investigating the United Nations oil-for-food program in Iraq, called on UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to resign in a commentary published in The Wall Street Journal. While Britain, Germany, France, Russia and China quickly rallied to Mr. Annan's defence, there can be no doubt that the senator is correct: Mr. Annan has to go. As Mr. Coleman argues, "the most extensive fraud in the history of the United Nations occurred on [Mr. Annan's] watch." Over the decade-long run of the oil-for-food program, the UN and several...

The box office flop of “Alexander” is cause for celebration. That Stone’s pretentious film debuted at a weak sixth place—well behind the animated “The Incredibles” and “The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie”—is even better.Not because of its debatable portrayal of “Alexander the Great” as bisexual.But because “Alexander’s” director, Oliver Stone, and star, Angelina Jolie, are Soft On Terrorism.  Extremely soft.  Especially Palestinian terrorism.OLIVER STONE’S TERRORIST BUDDIESRemember the 2002 Passover Massacre, when a Palestinian suicide bomber blew up 29 innocent, elderly Israelis celebrating the important Jewish holiday?Right after that, Oliver Stone paid homage to Yasser Arafat, visiting the now-deceased Palestinian terrorist-in-chief at his...

The Colegio Hebraica, the private Jewish school in Caracas was raided by Venezuelan police on Monday, November 29. The raid took place at 6:30 AM, just as students were arriving for the start of the school day. The state media had been trumpeting that the Mossad had played a role in the recent assassination of State Prosecutor Danilo Anderson. Anderson, who was initially charged with prosecuting environmental crimes, was handling all of the high profile political prosecutions - including that of the accused anti-Chavez coup plotters. Arrests related to this investigation have targeted prominent citizens and resulted in several shootouts....

"To hold a pen is to be at war." -- Voltaire If Abraham Lincoln were president today, CBS and the New York Times might be boarded up, with Michael Moore, Ted Kennedy, Al Gore, and even John Kerry rotting in jail. I'm not saying that would be a good thing. The point is simply that the line between treason and free speech in America has moved a considerable distance in the last 142 years. In 1862, Lincoln suspended habeas corpus on his own authority as a way of dealing with the Peace Democrats, better known as copperheads. The copperheads were...