Free Republic

Windows were filthy as a matter of course in Soviet Russia. In the five years I worked there, I never saw a clean one. Rats, on the other hand, were commonplace and played merrily among the rubbish bins of apartment blocks and in the entrances of railway termini. While most citizens struggled to survive in this suburb of Hell, however, a secret elite enjoyed great privileges: special living spaces, special hospitals, special schools, special lanes along which the Politburo's limousines roared at 90mph. Soviet power had taken on the responsibilities of God, but its commandments were very different. In fact,...

One of Washington's time honored rituals is that when a donor turns out to be a sleaze ball, or even an alleged sleaze ball, beneficiaries distance themselves -typically by donating the amount received by their campaign committees to charity. The disgorging has begun when it comes to R. Allen Stanford, the Houston-based banker who - according to the SEC - ran a fraudulent $8 billion investment scheme out of his office on the Caribbean island Antigua. Sen. John McCain of Arizona was the first major recipient to step forward. An aide said this morning that he will donate his receipts...

ZIMBABWE'S annual inflation soared to 231 million per cent in July, confirming growing hardship in the southern African country, a state newspaper reported today citing official statistics. The Herald newspaper said the annual rate of inflation gained 219.8 million per cent, up from the June rate of 11.2 million per cent, adding that it was "driven faster by food prices". "The month-on-month rate rose 1760.9 percentage points on the June rate of 839.3 per cent to 2600.2 per cent," the newspaper quoted a statement from the Central Statistical Office (CSO) as saying. Bread and cereals were the main drivers, the...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — State Sen. Ophelia Ford’s attorney has told the Senate speaker that she apparently won't be able to attend legislative sessions “for at least a few more weeks" and won’t attend Tuesday’s opening of the 2008 session. Citing “privacy concerns,” Memphis lawyer David Cocke’s letter did not disclose the nature of Ford’s illness. But her Memphis colleague, Senate Democratic Leader Jim Kyle, said today that she needs to allow her physician to explain her prolonged absence.

$1 Million Note On the Way As Cash Crisis Worsens Zimbabwe Independent (Harare) NEWS 16 November 2007 By Paul Nyakazeya CASH shortages worsened this week amid speculation that the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe was working on plans to introduce higher denominations of bearers' cheques. Business digest understands that the central bank is finalising the introduction of $500 000 and $1 million notes. The new bearer's cheque notes are likely to be introduced early next month. The denominations below $10 000 will be scrapped, sources said. "From the discussions and preparation we have had so far I would say the new...

QUITO, Ecuador (AP) -- Ecuador's president toughened his stance against Congress on Saturday, saying that a special assembly elected to write a new constitution for the politically turbulent country should dissolve the lawmaking body. ``I thought the constituent assembly wouldn't have to dissolve Congress ... but with this kind of Congress we're not going to be able to do anything,'' Rafael Correa said in his weekly radio address. The assembly ``will have to dissolve Congress,'' he said. Earlier this year, Correa's insistence that the 130-member assembly, which Ecuadoreans are scheduled to elect on Sept. 30, have the power to dissolve...

Economics: Europe has been the source of many of America's most beloved fairy tales. Not all are of ancient origin. Take the European Union's insistence five years ago that its economy would leapfrog ours by 2010. The so-called Lisbon Strategy was unveiled with much fanfare. Struck in the Portuguese capital, the deal essentially predicted the EU economy would pass up America's and leave it in the dust. At the time, it sounded reasonable. The EU was adding new members, and the common wisdom was that the U.S., though a big military power, was suffering from what geostrategists like to call...

Barbi Weiner, a third grade teacher currently on disability, is suing the Republican party for having taken an active role in returning George Bush to the White House, a circumstance that resulted in Ms. Weiner suffering a nervous collapse last Nov.8th as she crossed West 72nd Street. "I looked up and saw the WestSideWaffle! sign with its big red 'W’s,'" she says. "And I realized it was true – he won. Then I started thinking about my life and I realized that I couldn’t go on living in a country where a war-mongering baby-killer holds the highest office in the...