Free Republic

<p>A man in Granite Falls, Wash., who slept with a pistol beneath his pillow woke up one morning last week to find the gun had gone off and shot him.</p> <p>The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported Saturday that the man, who was not identified, went to bed Thursday night with a loaded .22-caliber revolved tucked under his pistol. Sometime during the night, the gun discharged and shot him in the chest, but he apparently didn't realize he was wounded until he awoke early Friday.</p>

<p>SHREVEPORT, La. (AP) -- A handgun went off at a courthouse checkpoint but it wasn't the owner's fault, the Caddo Parish Sheriff's Office said.</p> <p>The 75-year-old owner, whose name was not released, had turned the gun over to security guards and warned them to be careful because it was loaded, said Cindy Chadwick, a sheriff's office spokeswoman.</p>

<p>WEST POINT, Ky.--A casualty list from the Knob Creek Gun Range, which hosted one of the country's largest machine-gun shoots this past weekend, would look something like this: Two dozen old appliances. A dozen junked cars. Tens of thousands of rounds of spent ammunition. Zero people.</p>

<p>The Iraqi Governing Council (search) -- the national authority created to represent and empower Iraqis until new constitutional arrangements and free elections can be effected -- recently caused a stir in Arab and Western circles.</p> <p>In one of its first official actions, it announced a temporary ban on the Al Jazeera (search) and Al Arabiya satellite television channels in Iraq.</p>

On the bulletin board at my frantic Gymboree in Los Angeles there are flyers, business cards, and tear-off slips for services targeted at every brand of overbooked, underappreciated post-feminist new mother. There are lactation support groups, baby yoga classes, eco-friendly housecleaners, Reiki-trained doulas, and a service that takes the notion of mother's helper to a whole new level: "Nanny and Me: For your caregiver and child—courses in Spanish that lovingly teach your Latina nanny the customs and daily practices of Jewish culture." This would be ripe fodder for Arlie Russell Hochschild, a sociologist and the author of The Second Shift...

A holiday in Italy can make you wish you lived there - but the reality, says Sebastian Cresswell-Turner, is that it's a land of almost unbridled anarchy "How lucky you are to be living in Italy." "That must be heaven." "I do envy you." If you live in Rome, as I do, you get used to comments like these. But you soon realise that the idyllic vision of Italy suffers from just one drawback: it is almost complete rubbish. Rome: unbridled anarchy For the first few months after you move here, all is indeed perfect. The sun is warm, the...

When it was launched five years ago, Viagra was hailed as a wonder drug that would revolutionise the sex lives of millions of men and women. The diamond-shaped pills became a bestselling brand and a designer accessory favoured by everyone from Robbie Williams to the former US presidential candidate Bob Dole. But a new book by a leading American doctor reveals the anti-impotence drug is failing to rise to the occasion. Dr Abraham Morgentaler, a urologist at Harvard Medical School who helped with the implementation of Viagra, says it is causing more problems for some couples than it solves. His...

Ann Coulter's critics prefer to quote each other rather than deal with the arguments contained in Treason. Talk about inferiority complexes! You know, it really tosses some “elites” into paroxysms of envy that Ann Coulter has the moxie to write her convictions in plain English while their cowardice condemns them to a life of paycheck prostitution. As the elite intelligentsia pathetically shuffle through life staring at the insignificance of their politically correct Hush Puppies, Coulter ventures to the leading edge of thought. She makes a tough case and then documents her positions. Unlike the liberal idol Hillary, who employs numerous...

In the Vietnam War, when I first felt the pride of placing a green beret on my head, we in Special Forces had a dual mission: we were fighting an unconventional war in Vietnam and simultaneously training to be guerrillas. Our primary unit mission was to carry out a resistance movement behind enemy lines. We trained in sabotage, ambush and guerrilla warfare -- tactics of the weak -- for we were not strong enough to engage the enemy in positional warfare. These tactics are roughly similar to those employed by what Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld calls "dead enders" who...

The French have never liked Disneyland Paris, blaming it for a host of cultural ills. But, as they relish its current financial woes, Philip Delves Broughton, who spent a day there with his family, says it's worth every euro Europe's "cultural Chernobyl", as one French critic called Disneyland Paris, is in meltdown again. Falling attendance, overspending on a new movie-themed park and those cursed terrorists are to blame. This month, it announced it would have trouble repaying its banks and the doomsayers are predicting bankruptcy. Small world: Disneyland Paris aims to bring the famous formula to Europe For those who...

I drive a couple of hundred miles each week so my border collies can embrace their destiny—or is it their ancestry?—by herding sheep at a farm. When I'm there, I'm always amazed at the scores of people who show up with all sorts of dogs, from avid herding breeds to bewildered mutts. Their owners are all eager to expose them to the ancient art. "I do agility, obedience, and therapy dog training," the owner of a Lab/shepherd mix told me, "and I'd love to add herding. We have Thursdays and Fridays open." America has enriched its children to the bone...

TEN YEARS AGO, I WAS ARRESTED AT MY HOME IN BEVERLY HILLS for pandering, which the dictionary defines as acting as "a go-between in sexual intrigue." In other words, I was a madam. After a jury convicted me of three counts of pandering, the verdicts were thrown out, but the government didn't give up. It made me the Al Capone of prostitution. I spent three years in a federal penitentiary in Dublin, Calif., for conspiracy, tax evasion, and money laundering. But it was the sex that got me in trouble. When I was a Hollywood madam, I had between 20...

CORBIN, KY -- A clever canine in Kentucky sought out his own medical care by limping to a local veterinarian's office after getting hit by a car, according to a Local 6 News report. Injured Dog Takes Self To Vet The 6-year-old dog, Scooby, ran away from his owners when his collar ring snapped during a recent thunderstorm. As he was running across a road a vehicle hit him, injuring his leg and tail....

Three Arapahoe County sheriff's deputies were injured at the firing range Wednesday when a gun accidentally discharged during a training exercise, Sheriff Grayson Robinson said. The deputies were not hit by any bullets but were bruised by shrapnel and blown concrete, Robinson said. The deputies were identified as David Kleinheksl, Charleen Briggs and Douglas Sauerbreit. The trio were part of a group of 16 deputies who were undergoing mandatory training at Highlands Ranch Law Enforcement Training Facility, at 9008 North Highway 85. Before they can use the firing range, and before they can get their bullets, deputies have to have...

(AP) Bridgestone-Firestone and Ford Motor Co. settled a lawsuit Monday with two people injured in a wreck that killed a civil rights leader. The companies did not settle with Earl Shinhoster's widow, Ruby, and the trial of her wrongful death claims continues Tuesday with jury selection. Attorneys and others involved would not discuss the settlement because Macon County Circuit Judge Howard Bryan placed them under a gag order until after the trial. The settlement was confirmed by several sources close to the case who spoke on condition of anonymity. Shinhoster, a former NAACP acting executive director in Atlanta, was a...

DoD's Tail Is Wagging the Dog by William J. Toti &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &quot;Why does a dog wag its tail? Because the dog is smarter than the tail. If the tail were smarter than the dog, the tail would wag the dog.&quot; This tease line from the movie Wag the Dog comes to mind nearly every day now. Over the past decade, I have been transferred from the operating forces to the Pentagon three times to work weapon development and acquisition issues. In that time, I have learned one important lesson: whenever a conflict emerges between career Pentagon bureaucrats and ...

DoD's Tail Is Wagging the Dog by William J. Toti &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &quot;Why does a dog wag its tail? Because the dog is smarter than the tail. If the tail were smarter than the dog, the tail would wag the dog.&quot; This tease line from the movie Wag the Dog comes to mind nearly every day now. Over the past decade, I have been transferred from the operating forces to the Pentagon three times to work weapon development and acquisition issues. In that time, I have learned one important lesson: whenever a conflict emerges between career Pentagon bureaucrats and ...

DoD's Tail Is Wagging the Dog by William J. Toti &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &quot;Why does a dog wag its tail? Because the dog is smarter than the tail. If the tail were smarter than the dog, the tail would wag the dog.&quot; This tease line from the movie Wag the Dog comes to mind nearly every day now. Over the past decade, I have been transferred from the operating forces to the Pentagon three times to work weapon development and acquisition issues. In that time, I have learned one important lesson: whenever a conflict emerges between career Pentagon bureaucrats and ...

State's No. 2 leader injured in training exercise in Muskego By CORISSA JANSEN of the Journal Sentinel staff Last Updated: June 11, 2001 The Wisconsin FBI's second-in-command shot himself in the leg during a training exercise at a Muskego shooting range, police said Monday, but FBI representatives refused to release any information on the accident. It was the first such incident at the practice facility, which is used by the FBI and Milwaukee and Muskego police. The agent, Jeffrey J. Berkin, 44, shot himself in the left thigh after apparently neglecting to check for bullets in the chamber of his ...

Six Children Dead in Japan School Stabbing By Keiko KanaiIKEDA, Japan (Reuters) - Six Japanese children were killed on Friday and more than 20 others injured, several critically, by a man who burst into their elementary school classroom and began stabbing at random.The attack, unprecedented in traditionally safe Japan, took place in the middle of morning classes at the elementary school in Ikeda, a suburb of the western city of Osaka.``Six dead and more than twenty others are injured,'' an official at the Ikeda fire department said. Japanese media reported that most of the injured children were in the first ...