Free Republic

Gulf Coast residents could receive federal money for uninsured homes Gulf Coast residents who did not purchase flood insurance because they lived outside areas considered at high risk of flooding — but whose homes were nevertheless ravaged by Hurricane Katrina — would be in line for an unprecedented government bailout under a budget package approved Monday by the House of Representatives. If the $29 billion earmarked for Katrina relief in a defense appropriations bill that the House passed Monday morning wins final congressional approval, up to $11.5 billion will go toward those uninsured flood victims in Mississippi and Louisiana. Story...

Three federal appeals court judges today indicated a lower court judge got key facts wrong in declaring unconstitutional an evolution disclaimer sticker put in Cobb County science books. During oral arguments, all members of the federal appeals court panel noted that U.S. District Court Judge Clarence Cooper made incorrect findings as the basis for his decision that the stickers violated the First Amendment by endorsing a religious viewpoint. Judge Ed Carnes dominated much of the 40-minute arguments by tearing apart sections of Cooper's January ruling that ordered the stickers, which declared evolution "a theory, not a fact," removed from almost...

The overwhelming assessment by Asian officials, diplomats and analysts is that the U.S. military simply cannot defeat China. It has been an assessment relayed to U.S. government officials over the past few months by countries such as Australia, Japan and South Korea. This comes as President Bush wraps up a visit to Asia, in which he sought to strengthen U.S. ties with key allies in the region. Most Asian officials have expressed their views privately. Tokyo Governor Shintaro Ishihara has gone public, warning that the United States would lose any war with China. "In any case, if tension between the...

Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room Release Date: April 22, 2005 Starring: Kenneth Lay, Jeff Skilling, Andy Fastow Directed by: Alex Gibney PREMIERE.COM'S REVIEW (posted 4/21/05) 4stars For the half century immediately following World War II, Nazis dominated the screen as Hollywood 's all-purpose go-to goons. From Casablanca to Raiders of the Lost Ark, the old goose-stepping standbys conveniently embodied all that was evil in the world. And then a very curious thing happened. Slowly but surely, a new group entered the picture, edging out the Nazis as the true supervillains of the 20th century: They were the greedy...

NEW YORK, Dec. 23, 2004 — A California woman reveals to ABC News that she unknowingly married a Muslim extremist who helped set up what authorities say was one of the first al Qaeda sleeper cells out of their Orange County apartment complex. Saraah Olson says she watched as her then-husband, Hisham Diab, and his group transformed local teen Adam Gadahn into an America-hating fanatic who she says is the masked man who promised in an al Qaeda video message released in Pakistan late October that the "streets of America will run red with blood." Olson said she repeatedly tried...

TALLAHASSEE - For the second time in two weeks, a Tallahassee judge stripped Reform Party candidate Ralph Nader from Florida's presidential ballot today, sending a biting reprimand to Secretary of State Glenda Hood and eliciting an immediate appeal from her office.

From Electoral-Vote.com: I have it on good authority that overseas voters are registering in huge numbers this time, maybe double or triple 2000. I was told that the number of people who showed up at the Democratic party caucus in England earlier this year was 10 times what it was in 2000, ditto in other countries. Americans overseas vote in the state they last lived in, even if that was decades ago. There are about 7 million overseas Americans and probably about 5 million are over 18. In Florida, it was the overseas absentee ballots that swung the election. I...