Free Republic

As I understand it ..

Movie critics are, by definition, folks with strong opinions about movies. But opinions are personal and subjective, so usually critical response to any movie is split between the positive and the negative. Still, there are a few extraordinary films every year that unite reviewers. When they all uniformly praise a movie, it's probably close to a masterpiece. When they all hate a flick, it probably stinks worse than week-old Limburger. RottenTomatoes.com, which aggregates the opinions of over 100 professional movie critics and distills them down to a single numeric "freshness" rating, has compiled the "Worst of the Worst," a list...

authorities called back an aircraft from the runway on Sunday to arrest a suspected jihadi who had a lookout notice issued against him by the Intelligence Bureau. The Kerala Police is still in the dark about Kabir, a resident of Rippon in Wayanad district, but unconfirmed reports say the IB suspects him of being involved in terror attacks, including the Bangalore blasts in 2008. He is also believed to be close to absconding Indian Mujahideen commander Tadiyantavide Nasir, who is also wanted for the Bangalore serial blasts. Kabir was held at the end of some dramatic moments, which saw a...

Bad, Barney, bad Posted on Sat, Jan. 24, 2009 10:15 PM Troubled OneUnited Bank in Boston didn’t look much like a candidate for aid from the Treasury Department’s bank bailout fund last fall. The Treasury had said it would give money only to healthy banks. But OneUnited had seen most of its capital evaporate and was under attack for allegations of poor lending practices and executive-pay abuses, including owning a Porsche for its executives’ use. Nonetheless, OneUnited got a $12 million injection from the Treasury’s Troubled Asset Relief Program in December. The reason: the intercession of Democratic Rep. Barney Frank,...

Berlin - German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck on Sunday ruled out the creation of a 'bad bank' to take toxic assets from the nation's major financial institutions. Such a bank would need to be funded by at least 150-200 billion euros (198-260 billion dollars) of taxpayers' money, the minister told the newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. 'How could I take such a proposal to the federal parliament,' he asked. 'The nation would think we've gone crazy.'

A retired NYPD officer raped a woman after drugging her at a Bronx bar and hauling her to a motel in Westchester, police said. Greenburgh detectives charged ex-cop Jose Arroyo, 46, with the November rape and kidnapping of the 31-year-old woman. Arroyo, who left the force in 2005, slipped a drug in the woman's drink while they chatted at Doyle's Pub in Throggs Neck, police said. ">Snip<"

The Dimmest Bulb of 2008: Vice-President-elect - Joe Biden There are a lot of reasons why congressional reporters long ago nicknamed the Delaware Democrat as "Senator Gaffe." His performance as Barack Obama's vice presidential nominee demonstrated yet again that Biden is a truly gifted goof. Here's Biden's top five goofs, as rated by About.com's Daniel Kurtzma: 5. "Look, Jon's last-minute economic plan does nothing to tackle the No.1 job facing the middle-class, and it happens to be, as Barak says, a three letter word: jobs, J-O-B-S, jobs." 4. "A man I'm proud to call my friend. A man who will...

It's kind of hard to be surprised by bad economic and budget news in California these days. After all, there's virtual unanimty that we're in deep you-know-what. And yet, today's full analysis by the Legislature's nonpartisan budget watchers is still shocking... probably for its opinion that the problems stretch across almost every single aspect of state revenues and expenditures. The annual fiscal outlook, the first under newly minted Legislative Analyst Mac Taylor, adds some details to the gloomy projections the LAO released just nine days ago. That projection focused on a $28 billion gap by July 2010. Ready for some...

Well, the election is over, and 65 million Americans chose Barack Obama to be their President despite his lack of experience, troubling associations and socialist ideals. Yes. Apparently, most Americans were willing to put these pesky details aside in order to usher in an Era of Good Feeling. Of course, I can’t help but fear that we’ve actually begun the Era of Bad Thinking. That remains to be seen, however, so in the meantime, let’s take a closer look at the Good, the Bad and the Ugly of the 2008 Presidential Election. The Good Believe it or not, there is...

WASHINGTON (CNN) – As President-elect Obama visits the White House, a new national poll suggests that the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is the most unpopular president in the six decades since presidential approval ratings were first measured. Seventy-six percent of those questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Monday disapprove of how George W. Bush is handling his job as President. That's an all-time high in CNN polling, or in Gallup polling dating back to World War II. "No other president's disapproval rating has gone higher than 70 percent. Bush has managed to do that three times...

WASHINGTON -- Bush administration officials today unveiled a dramatic partial nationalization of the U.S. financial system, a series of "unprecedented and aggressive steps" to pour at least $250 billion into the banking system and expand federal insurance protection in the largest government intervention since the 1930s. "Today, we are taking decisive actions to protect the U.S. economy. We regret having to take these actions," said Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. "Today's actions are not what we ever wanted to do, but today's actions are what we must do to restore confidence in our financial system." President Bush announced the...

In a move that could help increase home ownership rates among minorities and low-income consumers, the Fannie Mae Corporation is easing the credit requirements on loans that it will purchase from banks and other lenders. The action, which will begin as a pilot program involving 24 banks in 15 markets -- including the New York metropolitan region -- will encourage those banks to extend home mortgages to individuals whose credit is generally not good enough to qualify for conventional loans. Fannie Mae officials say they hope to make it a nationwide program by next spring. Fannie Mae, the nation's biggest...

As I have followed recent events, particularly of the past three weeks, I am compelled to share some thoughts about what is going on in banking: Merrill Lynch. Lehman Brothers. Fannie Mae. Freddie Mac. It's a who's who of Wall Street giants - all in trouble. If these giants can't survive the country's economic woes, what chance can the smaller community banks have? The answer is most community banks did not participate in the subprime mess responsible for the upheaval across the country. We are going about business as usual, working hard for our communities and doing fine.

For the money being paid, this has to be one of the worst commercials made. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiVMPgCf6YY

I would like to reinforce the disaster [Romney] was for our state, said Walsh. There were 40,000 fewer people working in Massachusetts when he left than when he arrived. That is because we actually had a loss in population for two consecutive years under his stewardship. That is why Mitt Romney was so unpopular when he left. Forty-one percent of Massachusetts voters would be less likely to vote for John McCain if Mitt Romney were on the ticket. // For more information go to www.TheNextCheney.com

During the primaries, McCain considered Romney an opportunist who would say or do anything to get elected. Of Romney he said, "Never get into a wrestling match with a pig. You both get dirty, and the pig likes it." Will McCain flip for a flip-flopper? Romney is a fabled flip-flopper, changing from mild-mannered moderate to indignant conservative. McCain sarcastically told Romney, "You are the candidate of change." If McCain picked Romney he'd seem like a flip-flopper himself. And Romney, as the loyal running mate, would have to flip back to positions he had flopped from before. His rhetorical contortions would...

Bad guys really do get the most girls 18 June 2008 NewScientist.com news service Mason Inman NICE guys knew it, now two studies have confirmed it: bad boys get the most girls. The finding may help explain why a nasty suite of antisocial personality traits known as the "dark triad" persists in the human population, despite their potentially grave cultural costs. The traits are the self-obsession of narcissism; the impulsive, thrill-seeking and callous behaviour of psychopaths; and the deceitful and exploitative nature of Machiavellianism. At their extreme, these traits would be highly detrimental for life in traditional human societies. People...

Lynching lawyers, as Shakespeare once suggested, has never appealed much to the legal profession itself – literally or figuratively. But an exception apparently will be made for a group of attorneys who advised President Bush and his national security staff in the aftermath of 9/11. They've been subject to an increasingly determined campaign of public obloquy by law professors, activist lawyers and pundits. Their legal competence and ethics have been questioned. Suggestions have even been made that they can and should be held criminally responsible for "war crimes," because their legal advice supposedly led to detainee abuses at Abu Ghraib...

WASHINGTON, March 27, 2008 – Army officials announced today that the service has suspended its contract with a company that delivered ammunition from China for use by Afghan army and police forces in a way that violated the contract terms. Officials from the Army Legal Services Agency notified Edraim Diveroli, president of the Miami Beach-based AEY Inc., that his company is suspended from future contracting with any U.S. government agency. That letter, dated March 25, follows an Army investigation launched in November regarding AEY’s violation of its contract. The Army contracted with AEY in January 2007 to supply various types...

Today, I cover (briefly) some advice to guys about Valentines, and such.

HONOLULU: The top U.S. military commander in the Pacific said Thursday he is "perplexed and concerned" by China's last-minute decision to deny a U.S. aircraft carrier entry to Hong Kong for a previously scheduled port visit. The USS Kitty Hawk and its escort ships were due to dock in Hong Kong for a four-day visit Wednesday until they were refused access. Hundreds of family members who had flown to Hong Kong to spend Thanksgiving with their sailors were stranded by the move. "It's hard to put any kind of positive spin on this," Adm. Timothy Keating told The Associated Press...

Source: Association for Psychological Science Date: August 28, 2007 We Remember Bad Times Better Than Good Science Daily — Do you remember exactly where you were when you learned of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks? Your answer is probably yes, and researchers are beginning to understand why we remember events that carry negative emotional weight. In the August issue of Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, Boston College psychologist, Elizabeth Kensinger and colleagues, explain when emotion is likely to reduce our memory inconsistencies. Her research shows that whether an event is pleasurable or...

PARACHINAR: Tension gripped Kurram Agency on Wednesday as the Pakistan Army sent reinforcements to the Pak-Afghan border following reports that the Afghan National Army had deployed in significant numbers on the Durand Line along with extra artillery and mortar guns. The situation became even more serious in the evening when the political administration decided to make announcements from mosques and through vehicles fitted with loudspeakers about the possibility of outbreak of firing on the Pak-Afghan border. It advised the people not to become scared due to intense firing because this would be due to the situation on the border and...

Astronomer Sir Patrick Moore thinks TV is worse than it used to be - because the BBC is run by women. The presenter of The Sky At Night also belittled female newsreaders in an interview with the Radio Times, describing them as "these jokey women". Sir Patrick, 84, criticised the BBC for showing interesting programmes late at night, especially the 650th edition of The Sky At Night, which went out at 2am Astronomer Sir Patrick Moore

New details emerged about a massive bombing that was averted two months ago when the explosive device failed to go off, YnetNews reported. 25-year-old Omar Ahmed Abu al-Rob traveled from Jenin to Tel Aviv via Jerusalem, exploiting gaps in the separation barrier. The whole time, he carried the explosive device in his backpack, with the batteries not yet connected. When he arrived in Tel Aviv, he connected the batteries to the explosive device, apparently incorrectly.

WOMEN are more prone to ogling than men despite the widespread belief they are less focused on the physical, a study suggests. Scientists used eye-tracking technology to pinpoint what people looked at when shown a series of sexy photos. They expected women to be more interested in faces, and men in genitals. To their surprise, they found almost the reverse was true. Men were more likely than women to linger on the face before diverting their attention to other parts of the body. But women spent longer poring over images of couples performing sexual acts. Desire ... women ogle more...

That's right. John Piper is Bad. See the video here.

Apparently, Kevin Federline wasn't the only warm-blooded being Britney Spears ousted from her home this year. Once the proud owner of pampered pooches Bit-Bit, Lacy and Lucky, Spears ended the year dog-less, a feat that earned her the title of World's Worst Celebrity Dog Owner in an online poll of readers of Hollywood Dog and New York Dog magazines. "Britney was the overwhelming choice," editor Hilary O'Hagan said in a statement. "She once had three Chihuahuas and never left home without at least one of them on her arm. As soon as she met K-Fed and had kids, they disappeared."...

Via Tim Chapman, political analyst Larry Sabato is now predicting that the Democrats will take control of the House this November. In the end, he says, they will claim 221 to 225 total seats (with 218 needed to for the majority).

YUSUFIYAH – The sounds of car horns honking and chickens squawking were a soundtrack for prosperity at a market just south of Baghdad on July 13, where vendors displayed everything from clothing to ice and vegetables in this once insurgent-infested town. American, British and Iraqi forces fought pitched battles here in the fall of 2004, during a sweep of insurgents still loyal to Saddam's regime. Today, the market is full of faces looking forward to peaceful and uneventful days. “Before the American Army came to this area, it was full of insurgents and thieves and killers,” said Ali, who declined...

PHOENIX -- An Arizona man is betting that a chance at $1 million will bring more people to the polls. Dr. Mark Osterloh is a Tucson, Ariz., ophthalmologist and political activist who headed and bankrolled the campaign to get a proposal on the state's November ballot that would give one lucky voter $1 million. Under the proposal, anyone who actually casts a ballot would be eligible. Osterloh and other supporters submitted petitions Monday bearing what they said were more than 185,000 signatures of registered voters. That's well over the 122,000 required to put a proposed state law on the 2006...

Quotes from early reviews of "The DaVinci Code" at Cannes:"CANNES, France - "The Da Vinci Code" drew lukewarm praise, shrugs of indifference, some jeering laughter and a few derisive jabs Tuesday from arguably the world's toughest movie crowd: critics at the Cannes Film Festival.""One especially melodramatic line uttered by Hanks drew prolonged laughter and some catcalls, and the audience continued to titter for much of the film's remainder. Some people walked out during the movie's closing minutes, though there were fewer departures than many Cannes movies provoke among harsh critics. When the credits rolled, there were a few whistles and...

ROCHDALE, England, May 2 — "I snapped it out myself," said William Kelly, 43, describing his most recent dental procedure, the autoextraction of one of his upper teeth. Now it is a jagged black stump, and the pain gnawing at Mr. Kelly's mouth has transferred itself to a different tooth, mottled and rickety, on the other side of his mouth. "I'm in the middle of pulling that one out, too," he said. It is easy to be mean about British teeth. Mike Myers's mouth is a joke in itself in the "Austin Powers" movies. In a "Simpsons" episode, dentalphobic children...

General Lee's Daughter Annie : What Became of Her During the Civil War? by D. R. Schwerin.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Dennis Hastert wrote to President Bush on Tuesday asking for a moratorium on an Arab company's takeover of operations at six major U.S. seaports.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Groovy is over, hip is square, far out is long gone. Don't worry, though - it's cool. "Cool" remains the gold standard of slang in the 21st century, as reliable as a blue-chip stock, surviving like few expressions ever in our constantly evolving language. It has kept its cool through the centuries - even as its meaning changed drastically. How cool is that? Way cool, say experts who interpret slang for their messages about society. "Cool is certainly a charter member for the slang hall of fame," says Robert Thompson, a Syracuse University professor of popular...

LOL Election Day Tire Slashing Trial on Court TV. 5 men charged with felony vandalism at Republican headquarters. The 5 Defendants were dressed in dark, "Mission Impossible" type clothing. What a hoot. FYI and not funny but a good laugh for those who have access to a tv.

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) - State transportation officials are considering a "bad driver surcharge" that would fine drivers who cause accidents that lead to traffic jams. The Indianapolis Star reports that the fee is meant to reduce the number of traffic-snarling crashes on Indiana's most congested highways and roads. The fine would require General Assembly approval. It is listed as a "recommended funding option" in Republican Governor Mitch Daniels' Major Moves road plan.

Disasters: Searching for Lessons From a Bad Year John Bohannon No doubt about it, the 12 months since the last Breakthrough of the Year issue have been an annus horribilis. Three major natural disasters--the 2004 "Christmas tsunami" in the Indian Ocean, Hurricane Katrina on the U.S. Gulf Coast, and the Pakistan earthquake--left nearly 300,000 dead and millions homeless. In Pakistan, the disaster is still unfolding as winter engulfs the devastated communities. Insurance companies classify such events as "acts of God": misfortunes for which no one is at fault. But in their aftermath, many scientists are pointing out that natural disasters...

Hurricane season finally ending, but next year could be bad, too By JOHN PAIN Associated Press Writer November 29. 2005 4:27PM The busiest and costliest Atlantic hurricane season on record officially - and mercifully - draws to a close Wednesday, with hundreds of thousands of Americans still dealing with the devastation wrought by Katrina, Rita and Wilma. Despite the end of the June 1-to-Nov. 30 season, hurricanes could still form over the next few months. In fact, a tropical storm took shape in the Atlantic on Tuesday. But no hurricane has been known to hit the United States between December...

Post-Katrina trip brings 8 jobs after 'bad seeds' act up Thursday, October 27, 2005 By SUSAN DAKER Staff Reporter The bus trip that took more than 50 people from Mobile to New Orleans to seek jobs resulted in about eight deciding to work there, according to state Sen. Vivian Davis Figures. Figures, D-Mobile, said this week that she would not be helping send anyone else to New Orleans since most jobs are being reserved for people from Louisiana. Also, some of the people on the Oct. 11 Mobile bus trip were responsible for a disturbance that caused the Mobile contingent...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 7 /U.S. Newswire/ -- City leaders today vowed to press on in their fight against H.R. 3893, the Gasoline for America's Security Act of 2005, as it moves to the Senate following today's close vote in the House. Officials from the National League of Cities (NLC) see the bill as a serious preemption of the historic rights of cities and towns to determine where facilities such as refineries can be located. "There is no evidence that the location of new refineries has been held up by any actions of local government," said Donald J. Borut, NLC executive director....

President Bush's push to give the military a bigger role in responding to major disasters like Hurricane Katrina could lead to a loosening of legal limits on the use of federal troops on U.S. soil. Pentagon officials are reviewing that possibility, and some in Congress agree it needs to be considered. Bush did not define the wider role he envisions for the military. But in his speech to the nation from New Orleans on Thursday, he alluded to the unmatched ability of federal troops to provide supplies, equipment, communications, transportation and other assets the military lumps under the label of...

Michael Savage is angry that Department of Defence lawyers knew the whereabouts of four 9/11 terrorists in 1999, but kept intelligence departments from sharing the information. He says that these lawyers are responsible for 9/11 and should go to jail; as though they knew what the terrorists were planning. The information he found in the New York Post is nothing new. Its just more of the same story: we knew who the terrorists were, where they were, and could have gotten them. Just like the many opportunities Bill Clinton had to capture or kill Osama Bin Laden before 9/11, but...

Legislators and the governor celebrated the passage of the 2005-06 state budget that some call a victory for taxpayers - no new taxes, no new borrowing, and the largest single annual increase for the education budget. It is also argued by some that this budget is moving the state's finances towards structural balance. Such wishful thinking! This budget not only ignores the structural deficit, but it unfortunately paves the way for future tax increases that will become necessary to finance future spending. Let's begin with the budget's proposed spending plan. As shown in the accompanying chart the enacted budget contains...

CHICAGO - Here's some medical news you can trust: A new study confirms that what doctors once said was good for you often turns out to be bad — or at least not as great as initially thought. The report is a review of major studies published in three influential medical journals between 1990 and 2003, including 45 highly publicized studies that initially claimed a drug or other treatment worked. Subsequent research contradicted results of seven studies — 16 percent — and reported weaker results for seven others, an additional 16 percent. That means nearly one-third of the original results...

PROVO - There is a new coffee shop in town, but it's no Starbucks. The entry is framed with little white Christmas lights, there are half-a-dozen couches to go along with a few tables, and the walls are yellow, red, green and purple. Opposite a faux-brick wall there is a wall dedicated to nonsense. "Girls are like ladders," one customer wrote. Another scribbled: "I love yellow people." It's all the same to owner Christin Johnson. She's just happy the people who jotted down the messages wanted to stick around in her Vermillion Skies De-cafe and Lounge long enough to pen...

NEW YORK (Reuters) -- Saddam Hussein, washes his hands compulsively and thinks fondly of the late U.S. President Ronald Reagan, according to American soldiers who guarded him and tell their story in the July issue of GQ magazine. The jailed former Iraqi leader described how Reagan, who was president during the time of Iraq's 1980-88 war with Iran, sold him planes and helicopters. "Reagan and me, good,'" Saddam said, according to the article by Lisa DePaulo in the July issue that goes on sale June 28. "He said, 'I wish things were like when Ronald Reagan was still president,'" said...

Madison school district is holding a referendum to permanently exceed spending caps on Tuesday. But it was discovered late on Friday that the ballots were “misprinted”. They claim that they will have the ballots in the polling places corrected before the election, but there are 2200absentee ballots out there that are wrong and people may inadvertently vote the wrong way, and since those ballots have already been sent, there is no time to correct them. This election is expected to be very close, so these 2200 ballots may very well make a difference! This is liable to end up in...