Free Republic

BELGRADE - They sit like open sores at the heart of this turbulent eastern European nation. Long before international fugitive Miladin Kovacevic revived tensions between the U.S. and Serbia, NATO bombs reduced a row of once formidable government buildings here to hulking shells. The ravaged red-brick and concrete buildings are still standing nearly 10 years after the American-led aerial assault. They represent a wound that, many Serbians say, still runs deep. "Our people look at America like it's an enemy," said Niko Percovic, 30, a reporter based in the northern city of Novi Sad. That is one of the reasons,...

Presumptive Republican nominee's birth location revives debate over the constitutional requirement that limits the presidency to 'natural born' citizens. By Eunice MoscosoWASHINGTON BUREAU Saturday, July 05, 2008 WASHINGTON — Is Sen. John McCain a natural born citizen? Or is he ineligible to be president? The presumptive Republican presidential nominee was born Aug. 29, 1936 — not within the 50 United States, but in the Panama Canal Zone, where his father, a Navy officer, was stationed. His birth location has revived a long-standing debate over the constitutional requirement that limits the presidency to "natural born" citizens. The problem is that the...

Bush may have done a service to us all. The eight years gave us lay offs and unemployment not seen since the great depresion, wars and attrocities commited in the name of advancing american multi corporate agenda and white Christianity, we saw the rich get richer and the poor become even more poor, we heard slogans such as jobless recovery, strategery, modern economy, trickledown effect Ad nauseum. The values of Bush are the values of the capitalist system, another word for fascism. the eight years of Bush proves capitalism is a failed system. We see more debt, unemployment and 100...

This was just too good to pass up. A word of caution, the following might make those with weak stomachs and those who are easily offended uncomfortable. It doesn’t contain any profanity or obscenity but may put images in your head that you would rather not be there. You have been warned. The group Re-create 68, protesters who plan to disrupt the Democratic Convention, are fearful of a new crowd control weapon that they have heard the Denver Police are planning to use on them in August. I will try to be delicate here. The device is called "Brown Note."...

A few days ago I was talking to a prominent conservative commentator who told me how much he'd come to admire the campaign Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., had waged against Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill. No fan of Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the commentator said to me that if Clinton promised to not raise income taxes and she gave the conservatives the next Supreme Court pick, he'd vote for her. That won't happen, of course -- but it's a remarkable phenomenon, and now it's showing up in conservative publications. Rich Lowry, writing in the National Review: "Was just talking to a...

A remote mountain tomb and relics from 1st century Jerusalem have been discovered in southwest France. Among them are a simple pottery drinking cup and a small ointment vase that were said to have been used at the wedding of Jesus and Mary Magdalene over 2000 years ago. According to the priest who hid them away a century ago, they are sacred relics -- the true Holy Grail -- which symbolized this secret wedding. They have been analyzed by both the British Museum and Dr Gabriel Barkay of Bar Ilan University, Jerusalem, who said: "It is possible that artifacts excavated...

Immigrants and their advocates today found an unlikely ally: the top law enforcement officer in New Jersey. "Being in this country without proper documentation is not a crime," Christie told more than 60 residents and town officials. "The whole phrase of 'illegal immigrant' connotes that the person, by just being here, is committing a crime." Being undocumented may be a civil wrong, but it's not a criminal act, Christie said. "Don't let people make you believe that that's a crime that the U.S. Attorney's Office should be doing something about," he added of entering the country illegally. "It is not."...

My name is Jessie from the United States; I am 30-years-old,i`m a career woman. I work in an insurance company, learning Chinese almost a year. China's Tibet after the incident, I have read many Chinese sites, though not all understand, but a year of learning is not wasted. I found that our own media reports in China and Tibet there are many things inconsistent, in some cases are completely reversed the facts, when I heard C-N-N's Jack Cafferty with the insulting remarks at a shame, I do not know Whether they live in a stress on democracy and freedom, speaking...

Polar bears in the southern Beaufort Sea are starving as they struggle to adapt to a warming Arctic climate, according to the latest research by a Canadian polar bear expert. Changing spring sea ice is making it more difficult for the bears to hunt their primary prey, the ringed seal, said Ian Stirling of the Canadian Wildlife Service. Residents and RCMP in Deline, N.W.T., described the three polar bears that wandered into their community April 2 as being thin and hungry. (Photo courtesy Les Baton) In an article published in the March issue of Arctic, the journal of the Arctic...

WHERE TO BUY YOUR USA-GAS, THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT TO KNOW. READ ON-- Every time you fill up the car, you can avoid putting more money into the coffers of Saudi Arabia Just buy from gas companies that don't import their oil from the Saudis. These companies import Middle Eastern oil: Shell...........................205,742,000 barrels Chevron/Texaco.........144,332,000 barrels Exxon /Mobil...............130,082,000 barrels Marathon/Speedway...117,740,000 barrels Amoco..........................62,231,000 barrelsCitgo Gas comes from South America, from a Dictator who hates Americans.Do the math at $30/barrel, these imports amount to over $18 BILLION! (Oil is now $100-$110 a barrel)Here are some large companies that DO NOT import Middle Eastern...

What's the take around here about the story of McCain being the pilot who started the Forrestal explosions/fire by wet-starting his jet on deck, and touching off the rocket of the A-4 behind him? Did he really get an immediate transfer off the ship even before it was under control? (Like they were afraid the surviving crew was going to basically kill him for this?) Is this something that is an urban legend or did it really occur and he has some or all of the blame for this happening?

Today marks the 5th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. The Bush Administration, its neoconservative allies, its congressional supporters, and the acquiescent mainstream media need to take this week as an opportunity for critical self-examination. It is time for them to face the fact that they have a problem, an addiction to this war. Here are just a few of the signs and examples: Defensiveness, temper tantrums, resentful behavior – i.e. the labeling of those who oppose the war as defeatists, unpatriotic, “blame America first” types, or saying that they don’t “support the troops” Unexplained moodiness or irritability – i.e....

NYT: MCCAIN'S BIRTHPLACE IN CANAL ZONE RAISES ELIGIBILITY QUESTIONS...

Chatter bounces off the bare walls and checkered linoleum floor as Josh Pedaline and other Barack Obama supporters burn through their call sheets. A map of Delaware County splays across a tabletop. Another is laden with cookies, pretzels and other snacks. Volunteers seated elbow-to-elbow peck at cell phones and pitch the Democratic Illinois senator in advance of Ohio's March 4 primary. The scene is a typical campaign boiler room, except that four of the 13 dialing away are lifelong Republicans, including Pedaline, who reveres former President Reagan and twice voted for President Bush. "I am so sick and tired of...

Thomas Paine and the Age of Reason Thomas Paine is sometimes grouped with the Founding Fathers. Your daily newspaper might reinforce this view with editorials like this: Franklin, Washington, Jefferson, Paine and most of our other patriarchs were at best deists, believing in the unmoved mover of Aristotle, but not the God of the Old and New Testaments.[1] It would be difficult to name a single one of the Founding Fathers who approved of Paine's Age of Reason, his famous tract attacking religion in general and evangelical Christianity in particular. Even less-than-evangelicals like Benjamin Franklin and the "Unitarians" all denounced...

LOS ANGELES - President Bush cannot exempt the Navy from environmental laws banning sonar training that opponents argue harms whales, a federal judge ruled Monday. Navy officials did not immediately respond to the ruling by U.S. District Judge Florence-Marie Cooper. Mark Matsunaga, spokesman for the Navy's Pacific Fleet, headquartered in Hawaii, said officials needed time to review it before commenting. The president signed a waiver Jan. 15 exempting the Navy and its anti-submarine warfare exercises from a preliminary injunction creating a 12 nautical-mile no-sonar zone off Southern California. The Navy's attorneys argued in court last week that he was within...

THE US will commit $US2 billion ($2.27 billion) over the next three years for a new international fund to promote clean energy technologies and fight climate change, President George W. Bush will tell Congress today in his annual State of the Union speech.

Apple has lowered its projected shipments of iPhones from two million units to around 1-1.2 million units for the second fiscal quarter, which will end March 2008, the Chinese-language Economic Daily News (EDN) quoted sources at Apple's handset component suppliers in Taiwan as indicating. Sales of iPhones in Europe have been lower than expected, pushing Apple to slash its shipment projection for the second quarter, the EDN quoted the sources as saying. Apple shipped more than 2.3 million iPhones in the first fiscal quarter, bringing total shipments of iPhones to close to four million units since its launch, the paper...

The United States, with its claims of exceptionalism, is usually thought of as free of historical analogies. But comparisons with the fate of earlier empires are becoming more common. I have recently been struck by an analogy from German history: the disaster of German leadership during the first world war, epitomised by Kaiser Wilhelm II. In 1888, at just 29, Wilhelm became the leader of a country on the cusp of European mastery. Wilhelm flaunted his absolute power, believing it to be divinely ordained, was contemptuous of parliament, revelled in the trappings of power, and delighted in uniforms. He was...

Republican Ron Paul is out with a new TV ad, set to run in New Hampshire through Tuesday's primary, stressing his military credentials. Patriotic music booms. Soldiers salute. The announcer begins: "A proud military veteran who served our nation. Ron Paul salutes and supports our troops who protect and defend our freedom." A flag waves. The announcer continues, "But who do the troops support? Ron Paul. The record shows they're standing up for him." The ad concludes: "Ron Paul is their choice for commander-in-chief." His campaign spokesman Jesse Benton said Paul "has long been a praised as staunch advocate for...

RALEIGH - No, you're not imagining things. That really is a Ron Paul for President blimp flying over the City of Raleigh today. Organizers for the blimp took off this morning at 8am at the Airship Management Hangar in Elizabeth City, North Carolina and they are on their way to Chester, South Carolina where they will make their first stop. This afternoon, the blimp will be flying over north Raleigh and will most likely be visible from Interstate 540 at some point, said Bryce Henderson, a media coordinator for the effort. Organizers say the current schedule has it passing over...

The story is as enduring as it is dubious: A millennium or so ago in Rome, the pope was riding in a procession when suddenly she–that's right, she–went into labor and had a baby. Nonsense? Europeans in the Middle Ages didn't think so. The story of a pope named Joan, writes historian J.N.D. Kelly in his Oxford Dictionary of Popes, "was accepted without question in Catholic circles for centuries." Only after the Reformation, when Protestants used the story to poke fun at Roman Catholics, did the Vatican begin to deny that one of its Holy Fathers had become an unholy...

ESPN is reporting that Les Miles will be Michigan's next football coach.

Nonintervention and global neutrality should be the national security creed of the United States. Every soldier deployed abroad — whether in South Korea, Japan, Afghanistan, Iraq or elsewhere — should be returned to deter and defend the United States at home. Non-intervention and neutrality everywhere coupled with a threat to annihilate any United States attacker would make the country safer, freer and more prosperous. The United States should recognize the obvious. Its contemporary leaders lack the high-mindedness and wisdom necessary to extend democracy and liberty abroad. Their motives are invariably cynical, and their adventurisms create more enemies than they destroy....

Federal immigration authorities have laid down new guidelines that will reduce the number of suspected illegal immigrants handed over from cities like Irving for possible deportation. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials in Dallas e-mailed a set of guidelines to the Irving Jail asking officials not to refer suspected illegal immigrants to them if they were arrested for a Class C misdemeanor. Because of that change, the number of suspects Irving turns over to ICE could drop by 60 percent, city officials said. "We are surprised by this action," Irving Mayor Herbert Gears said. "In fact, we cannot imagine how the...

Mexico's frustration with U.S. immigration policy builds Government, advocates are calling for measures to influence U.S. public opinion. By Jeremy Schwartz MEXICO CITY BUREAU Saturday, November 17, 2007 MEXICO CITY — Anger in Mexico is growing in the wake of a number of new state laws in the United States considered by critics to be anti-Mexican, a shift probably reflected in President Felipe Calderón's verbal lashing this week of U.S. presidential candidates. In tougher rhetoric toward U.S. immigration policies, Calderón scolded presidential candidates for using migrants as thematic hostages and announced a media campaign aimed at influencing American public opinion....

(AP) Rudy Giuliani assured a conservative legal group Friday that if elected president he would appoint federal judges who adhere to their principles. He also praised a judge who declared the capital city's gun ban unconstitutional and ridiculed efforts to eliminate the words "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance. In a speech marking the 25th anniversary of the Federalist Society, Giuliani spelled out a conservative legal agenda in which he cited Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito and Chief Justice John Roberts as models for the judges he would appoint to the federal bench.

VALENCIA, Spain (AP) -- Working until dawn, negotiators on Friday concluded a policy guide for governments on global warming that declares climate change is here and is getting worse, one of its authors said. Provisional agreement on the text -- which is about 20 pages and summarizes thousands of pages of data and projections -- required compromises among the more than 140 delegations, but resulted in a "good and balanced document," said Bert Metz, a Dutch scientist who helped draft the report. The brief Summary for Policymakers is expected to get final approval later Friday after a longer version of...

I don't think President Bush is going to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities, not before the presidential election next November 4, and not between then and the day he leaves office the following January 20, either. As reckless as he is, I don't think he's that reckless. He wouldn't make a move that could set off WMD missile wars, invasions, coups, Islamic revolutions and whatnot all over the Middle East, then just fly back to the ranch and let somebody else clean up the mess. If Bush was at the beginning of his term, he might do it, but not with...

The government has a duty to look after the health of everyone and sometimes that means guiding or restricting our choices Lord John Krebs, of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics Government ministers should shrug off media accusations that they are running a nanny state and introduce tougher public health measures, experts say. The Nuffield Council on Bioethics said the time had come to consider a whole host of interventions in the UK after the introduction of a smoking ban. Its proposes raising alcohol prices, restricting pub opening hours and better food labelling to fight obesity. The government said it was...

Californians are more likely than the rest of the nation to see global warming as a threat, but also are more optimistic that greenhouse gases can be cut while creating jobs and expanding the economy, according to a Field Poll released Friday. State residents are more likely than other Americans to back efforts to address climate change, with large majorities favoring government regulations, tax incentives and other efforts by industry and individuals to curb their emissions, the poll showed. "They think California can take the lead in being an innovator and in making the state more energy efficient and reducing...

Paul: My policy benefits Israel Republican presidential hopeful Ron Paul says his foreign policy would benefit Israel. Mainstream Jewish groups have shunned Paul, a U.S. congressman from Texas upsetting his party's presidential field. His lonely anti-war candidacy, once thought of as a long shot, is now competitive with front-runners in fund raising.Paul has long opposed defense and other assistance to Israel, a policy consistent with his opposition to all foreign aid. He also has said the pro-Israel lobby is too influential in Washington, another statement that is consistent with his disdain for foreign policy lobbying. In a statement released Wednesday...

Citing campus shootings in other states, the university says gunshots could frighten people. Boise State University has turned down a request from veterans for a 21-gun salute on campus Monday to mark Veterans Day, saying it might scare bystanders still spooked by school shootings in other states. R.K. Williams, a Vietnam War veteran and longtime Boise State employee who runs the campus veterans services office, said he asked university officials for permission to hold the salute at noon, but they turned him down — twice. The salute would consist of seven shooters firing blanks in three volleys as part of...

I have added my own commentary throughout this article. -- TaxesR2High Utopian fantasies have long transfixed the human race. Yet today a much rarer fantasy has become popular in the United States. Millions of Americans, the richest people in history, have a death wish. They are the new “Armageddonites,” fundamentalist evangelicals who have moved from forecasting Armageddon to actually trying to bring it about. Most journalists find it difficult to take seriously that tens of millions of Americans, filled with fantasies of revenge and empowerment, long to leave a world they despise. These Armageddonites believe that they alone will get...

THIS week executives from some of Arkansas's principal companies—Tyson Foods, the world's largest meat processor, Alltel, a wireless company, and Stephens, one of the biggest investment firms outside Wall Street—joined ministers, civic leaders and the local American Civil Liberties Union to form the Arkansas Friendship Coalition. The group, led by Steve Copley, a Methodist minister, stresses that states should abide by federal immigration laws rather than try to make their own. This sudden respect for the wisdom of Washington has been prompted by anti-immigration laws passed in Arkansas's neighbours, Oklahoma and Missouri... ...In answer to critics, the Arkansas Friendship Coalition...

Ron Paul’s inclusive message attracting African American votersMaple Brown, USA DailyPublished 10/25/2007 - 11:34 a.m. EDTRon Paul’s inclusive message of peace, freedom, and prosperity may be attracting African American voters. According to this poll, Ron Paul leads his GOP opponents among black voters in general election contests.In general election matches Paul loses among African American voters 60% to 33% against Hillary Clinton and loses 61% to 31% to Barack Obama.In 2004 CNN exit polls show Bush receiving 11% of the African American vote in the general election against Kerry.The averages of general election match up against either Hillary Clinton or...

The Skinny: Rival Drug Cartels Battle It Out With Smuggled American Weapons The U.S. isn't the only country struggling with the effects of what's coming illegally over the U.S.-Mexico border. The Washington Post reports that 100 percent of drug-related killings in Mexico are carried out with smuggled American weapons, according to Mexican police. About 2,000 enter Mexico each day, according to a Mexican government study. The guns are "crucial tools in an astoundingly barbaric war between rival cartels that has cost 4,000 lives in the past 18 months and sent law enforcement agencies in Washington and Mexico City into crisis...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6969100.stm

South Pasadena, California 10/20/2007 - A California “undercover investigator” identifying himself to this reporter as "Agent Egan" entered the Fremont Center Theatre at 8:00 PM curtain time tonight and halted the performance of Pulitzer Prize and National Medal of Arts author Ray Bradbury’s play Dandelion Wine. Bradbury was in attendance awaiting the start of the performance with a theatre full of celebrity guests including The Empire Strikes Back director Irvin Kershner.

WASHINGTON — Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, the congressman from the Houston area who opposes the Iraq war, has gotten more contributions than any other White House contender from donors identified as affiliated with the military. According to a Houston Chronicle analysis of campaign records from January through September, Paul received $63,440 in donations from current military employees and several retired military personnel. Democrat Barack Obama, another war critic, was second in military giving. The Illinois senator got $53,968 during the nine months. He was followed by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz, a decorated Navy pilot and former Vietnam prisoner of...

The spokeswoman for President Bush says illegal aliens from Mexico do not want to live permanently in the United States; they just want better jobs. Dana Perino was responding to a question from Les Kinsolving, WND's correspondent at the White House, who asked: "In Mexico President Calderon's state of the nation address, he said, 'Mexico does not end at its borders. Where there is a Mexican, there is Mexico.' And my question: What is the president's reaction to this statement, and what [does it mean] to New Mexico and other U.S. states?" "The president has tried to push forward a...

The colonel was furious. "Can you believe it? They actually drew their weapons on U.S. soldiers." He was describing a 2006 car accident, in which an SUV full of Blackwater operatives had crashed into a U.S. Army Humvee on a street in Baghdad's Green Zone. The colonel, who was involved in a follow-up investigation and spoke on the condition he not be named, said the Blackwater guards disarmed the U.S. Army soldiers and made them lie on the ground at gunpoint until they could disentangle the SUV. His account was confirmed by the head of another private security company. Asked...

Partners in deception, partners in denial . . . Earlier today I noted that in her HuffPo column, ex-CBS producer Mary Mapes continues to cling to the delusion that the Memogate documents were authentic. In an inteview on "Morning Joe," Dan Rather has now made a similar reality-denying claim. Mika Brzezinski, who, as was repeatedly pointed out, used to work at CBS and has friends on both sides of the issue, conducted the interview. Bubbles didn't have the gumption to confront Rather with the crux of the issue: the forged documents at the heart of the story. Interestingly, Rather chose...

Russian Military Intelligence Analysts are reporting today that one of the United States most secretive spy satellites, the KH-13, targeting Iran was 'destroyed in its orbit' with its main power generator powered by the radioactive isotope Pu-238 surviving re-entry and crashing in a remote region of the South American Nation of Peru, and where hundreds are reported to be ill from radiation poisoning. Western media reports are stating that the US spy satellite debris hitting Peru was caused by a meteor, but which, according to these reports, would be 'impossible' as the size of 30-meter crater, if caused by a...

Karl Rove may have resigned as the President’s chief strategist, but the dirty and secretive tricks that have characterized the Republican Party in recent years are still here to stay. Leading California Republicans are promoting a dishonest initiative that steals electoral votes from California, a democratic state. Republicans attempting to steal votes in a major election? This smells all too familiar. The initiative, crafted by a lawyer for the California Republican Party and member of the group misleadingly called "Californians for Equal Representation,” proposes to divide California's electoral votes based on results in each congressional district, rather than award the...

On Thursday night President Bush and Republican presidential candidates Rudolph Giuliani and John McCain asked the American people to set aside their sense of history and common sense. The three Republicans asked the American people to buy into their spin of the facts surrounding the invasion and the current status of the occupation of Iraq. Americans were asked to forget the president's claim that Iraq was involved in the Sept. 11 attack on this country, that he said he had a plan for Iraq and that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. None of those assertions were true. Prior to...

* The media has recently caught on to the fact that US influence is in steep decline but still under the mainstream radar is the extent to which other players such as Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela are stepping into the vacuum. The US is still the military superpower but it's already sharing the global influence stage with emerging powers who can move global events as well or better. A dramatic global realignment appears to be in progress (and quickening) as the result of several factors: o The loss of US influence as a result of the Iraq war o A...

Last week 25-year-old Jessica Rowley became one of about a dozen women nationwide to make a highly unusual career move: she was ordained a Catholic priest. Rowley’s ordination—which took place at Eden Theological Seminary, a progressive institution in Webster Groves, Mo.—is approved by the Ecumenical Catholic Communion, a group of churches that decline to recognize the authority of the pope but see themselves nevertheless as Roman Catholic. This week Rowley—who is also married—begins working full-time as an associate pastor at Saints Clare & Francis, a breakaway parish in Webster Groves. The Roman Catholic Church, not surprisingly, does not recognize Rowley...

Military shifting donations to Democrats As the Iraq war drags on and US casualties mount, members of the military appear to be showing their discontent by donating more to Democrats, a campaign finance watchdog group said today. Service members have traditionally supported the Republican Party, but there has been a dramatic shift since the war started in 2003 away from financial backing for GOP candidates for president and Congress, the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics said. So far this year and in the 2004 election, about 40 percent of contributions from donors identifiable as military members has gone to Democrats,...

From The Times September 12, 2007 Taking the Pill cuts the risk of cancer Nigel Hawkes, Health Editor Pill plus HRT may bring cancer risk | Decade of Pill use doubles risk of cervical cancer Taking the Pill reduces the risks of a woman getting cancer later in life, according to one of the largest studies ever undertaken. The conclusion will reassure millions of women who took the Pill 30 or 40 years ago and are now of an age when the risks are growing. The study found that overall cancer risk was up to 12 per cent lower...