Free Republic

You cannot have it both ways! Every year in America, this “both ways” mentality gets worse and worse. Somewhere along the line Americans started thinking that we could have all of our rights and freedoms and have expedient justice and results at the same time. Well, I have to tell you: YOU CANNOT. There is a blend of the two that must be championed if we are going to continue being a successful country. The mortgage crisis of late is one of the great disasters caused by this “have it both ways” mentality. The government was constantly pressured by citizens...

A multi-faith cemetery will have all its graves aligned with Mecca, despite Christian burials traditionally facing east. CHRIS BIRKLE finds out how Christians and Muslims feel about the controversial council decision In today's secular society you could be forgiven for not knowing which direction Christian graves face. Ancient tradition shows they should look east in anticipation of the second coming of Jesus Christ. But all headstones at the new £2.5m High Wood Cemetery in Bulwell will be plotted to face north-east, in line with Islamic faith. Muslims believe the dead look over their shoulder towards Mecca, towards the south-east

In Dubai, everyone refers to their ruler, Emir Mohammed Bin Rashid al-Maktoum, as "MBR." Just to give you an idea of how he is into tourism not terrorism, here's a quick story. He has closed circuit television in his private office. And what are the cameras trained on? Immigration/passport control lines at the airport. If MBR sees the lines are getting too long, he picks up the phone and orders more personnel to reduce the lines. Again, his focus is tourism not terrorism. The US Navy docks its ships at Dubai more often than at any other non-US port in...

SUSAN Kennedy, with her people skills and grasp of policy, can be a terrific chief of staff for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Or, with her strategic guile and experience, Kennedy can be a brilliant strategist for the governor's re-election campaign. But she can't do both jobs at the same time. Her current hybrid status -- drawing $131,000 as a full-time state employee as the governor's chief of staff, along with a reported $75,000 supplement to perform campaign work -- is ethically shaky on its face. This double-dipping arrangement is inviting a scandal when observers start connecting the dots, fairly or not,...

Published January 22, 2006 [ From the Lansing State Journal ] Mexican painting has both Christian, Aztec influencesUnearthed mural shows melding of cultures(Photo by Associated Press) Flying into view: This image of a bird is part of the 16-yard-long mural at an excavation in Mexico City. By Mark Stevenson Associated Press Salvador Guilliem dangles on a narrow beam over the sunken remains of a mural painted by Indians shortly after the Spanish conquest. Guilliem, an archaeologist, points out the newly excavated red, green and ochre flourishes in one of the earliest paintings to show the mixing of the two cultures....

Note: This article may seem pedantic, but it is aimed at those who are not “insiders” on the history of the Middle East.I keep hearing the phrase, “It’s their land,” regarding Palestinian claims to Israel. Terrorist groups like Hamas and Islamic Jihad publicly assert that their aims are to reclaim every inch of Israel as part of a proposed Palestinian homeland. Unfortunately, these ownership claims are echoed by “activist” groups like the International Solidarity Movement and the Palestine Solidarity Movement, both with throngs of naïve followers on U.S. and European college campuses. The followers are too eager to take these...

Publisher says Bible textbook respects both facts and faith NEW VOLUME IS AIMED AT PUBLIC SCHOOLS By Richard N. Ostling Associated Press Posted on Fri, Sep. 23, 2005 An interfaith group released a new textbook Thursday aimed at teaching public high school students about the Bible while avoiding legal and religious disputes. The non-profit Bible Literacy Project of Fairfax, Va., spent five years and $2 million developing ``The Bible and Its Influence.'' The textbook, introduced at a Washington news conference, won initial endorsements from experts in literature, religion and church-state law. American Jewish Congress attorney Marc Stern, an adviser on...

(AP) Having one type of diabetes is bad enough, but two? Doctors are seeing a new phenomenon dubbed double diabetes that makes it harder to diagnose and treat patients — especially children. The mix can strike at any age, and comes in various forms: Children who depend on insulin injections because of Type 1 diabetes gain weight and then get the Type 2 form in which their bodies become insulin resistant, for example. Or someone with classic Type 2 symptoms isn't responding to therapy, and tests reveal they also are developing the insulin-dependent form of the disease. Or they may...

WASHINGTON - Both political parties are to blame for the impasse on confirming President Bush (news - web sites)'s judicial nominees, says Arlen Specter, Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee (news - web sites). "No one wants to back down and no one wants to lose face," Specter said Thursday in his first interview with Washington reporters since disclosing he has Hodgkin's disease. Specter will initiate this year's confirmation battles between Bush and the Democrats by holding hearings on the nominations of former Interior Department Solicitor William Myers on Tuesday, a nominee who was blocked last year, and U.S....

"We now know that he (Al Gore) would have won Florida," proclaimed Ronald Prescott Reagan, son of the late President Ronald Wilson Reagan. Ron made this incredible declaration during MSNBC"s Chris Matthews' show, as they reported about former Vice President Al Gore's speech at the Democratic National Convention. When asked by Matthews how does he know this, Ron remarked that there was a "consortium" of newspapers who counted the votes in Florida and determined that Gore would have won. Matthews incredibly confirmed this by saying Gore would have won the election if he requested a statewide vote recount in Florida....

Editor's note: Readers may also be interested in Iran: The Invisible Revolution. During the U.S. presidential campaign, debate over Iran policy received unprecedented attention. The reasons are multifold. With Iran on the verge of developing both nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missile capability, Washington policymakers can no longer ignore the Iranian threat, especially when confidants of Supreme Leader Ali Khomenei lead televised chants of "American will be annihilated," as Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati did last June. American concern over a nuclear Iran is multifold. The danger is not necessarily that Iran would conduct a nuclear first strike, although former president Ali Akbar...

The purpose of FreeRepublic.com's multiple message boards is to limit the topics for each board to particular topics. Posting the same message on all the boards defeats the purpose of multiple-boards for special topics. It is very annoying to see the same message on every bulletin board. PLEASE! DO THE READERS A FAVOR. STOP CROSS-POSTING YOUR MESSAGES!

Gal Luft is executive director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security in Washington, D.C. He is a specialist on strategic issues and energy policy with a PhD in strategic studies from Johns Hopkins University. A former lieutenant colonel in the Israel Defense Forces, his writings have appeared in Commentary, Foreign Affairs, the Los Angeles Times, Middle East Review of International Affairs, the Washington Post and Wall Street Journal. Mr. Luft addressed the Middle East Forum in Philadelphia on October 27, 2004. Introduction In both World War Two and the Cold War, the side best deploying scientific...

Critics: Dean-backed tax-cut program is like Bush's By David Gram The Associated Press MONTPELIER -- Democratic presidential contender Howard Dean criticizes President Bush for giving unneeded tax breaks, but as Vermont governor, he supported a program critics say did much the same for corporations. The Vermont Economic Progress Council, which Dean signed into law in 1998 to provide tax credits to businesses promising to expand, has approved more than $80 million in such credits, according to a report by the state auditor. Companies had claimed about $25 million of those credits by the end of the 2001 tax year. Both...

'You go in there with both barrels. You let them know they are taking on the US army and you crush them' By Oliver Poole with the Third Brigade Combat Troop, Kuwait (Filed: 18/03/2003) The battle flags were unfurled yesterday as the troops who will spearhead an invasion of Iraq gathered in formation at dawn to be told by their commanding officer to prepare for an advance to the border. US tanks from the 3rd Brigade Combat team fire at a practice range in northern Kuwait Divided into their three companies, each with unit banners held aloft in the early...

Mitochondria can be inherited from both parents 17:01 23 August 02 NewScientist.com news serviceMitochondria may not be inherited solely through the maternal line, according to new research that promises to overturn accepted biological wisdom. If confirmed by other researchers, the findings could have huge implications for evolutionary biology and biochemistry. Robert Sanders Williams, from Duke University Medical Center in North Carolina, says the findings are "remarkable and unanticipated. This is more than a mere curiosity. It asserts the principle that it can occur in humans. It could have significant implications for the study of human evolution and the migrations of...