Free Republic

BLOOMER - He left for Iraq with a heart of courage, and came home to Arkansas on Thursday with a Purple Heart. Sgt. Wayne Ireland, 47, returned to Bloomer Thursday night after spending weeks recuperating in a Texas hospital from injuries sustained during a rocket-launched grenade attack on his unit at Camp Cook in Iraq several weeks ago. “It's probably one of the greatest things on Earth,” says Sgt. Irelan of being home with his family. As Irelan sat down in his recliner in his Bloomer home on Thursday, his young grandchildren scrambled up in his lap, glad to have...

My daughter has a question as she prepares for her finals tomorrow in her First Amendment class. It is relating to campaign finance law and government restrictions on expendutures and contributions in the 1976 case of Buckley vs. Valeo. She doesn't understand the difference between individual contributions to candidates and independant individual expenditures relative to a clearly identified candidate. It seems that the court allows a limit on contributions but doesn't allow a limit on expenditures. She doesn't know how to tell the difference between individual contributions and individual expenditures. Also, she is confused about the difference between soft and...

Get To Know Southern White Male Somebody with the Democrats needs to get a handle on the quintessential Southern white man, with whom I am well-acquainted by a lifelong coincidence of residence. Bill Clinton almost got it but was a bit too eastern in his education. His babe magnetism made him resented by this quintessential Southern white man, who does not like to share beauty pageant winners with elitists. Howard Dean wants to get it for electoral purposes, which is all he has been trying to say with these suddenly controversial declarations that he wants to be the Democrat who...

I discovered today that Victoria Magazine ceased publication last June. I always enjoyed it very much and never missed an issue. I have been looking for it at bookstores for quite some time but with my busy life just thought the stores here didn't carry it. It was the only magazine besides the Weekly Standard that I was interested in buying. Not political at all and definitely not a feminist magazine. I bet there are some freepers who may also miss it and might have more information about the reasons why it no longer is published.

In the second quarter the score is Rutgers 7, Army 0.

POTEAU — Authorities remain uncertain about the identity and significance of a man arrested in Sequoyah County who is of interest to several federal agencies. The man who identified himself as Juan Carlos Fals may have as many as 15 aliases, said Richard Gray, district attorney. Fals appears to have two social security numbers and has a record of arrests in Florida, but his booking photo in Sequoyah County does not match a photo taken by Florida authorities. “We don’t know who he is, but this thing has escalated and we may be sitting on a powder keg,” Gray said....

CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. - A little girl in Heidi braids sat on her father's knee in a hotel lobby, hesitating before answering his question. "How do you feel about what I do?" Stan Caldwell asked. "Um," replied Haley Caldwell, 9. "I'm glad I have a dad who will do this, but when this happens, I wish you didn't have this job." Somewhere in Kuwait is a big, steel trunk the Army shipped, filled with what Caldwell figured he'd need. But his Tupelo, Miss., family gave him more as they prepared to send him off to war today. A slumber party prayer....

Two men are being hunted by police today after a dramatic breakthrough in the search for the killers of jogger Margaret Muller. The men were spotted sprinting from Victoria Park in Hackney moments after the American artist was brutally stabbed to death. A witness, who was on his way to work, told detectives the men ran from the rose garden area of the park, where the 27-year-old artist was attacked at about 8am on Monday, towards Cawley Gate.

YORK, Pa. -- Army Capt. Andrew Clements was accustomed to living a nomad's life, moving with his family from Oklahoma to Germany to California. Having just earned a master's degree in business, Clements was looking forward to a new, more permanent position at an Army base in Virginia. He never made it.

We are trying to listen to Mark Levin's radio show on the internet. This is maddening! We can hear his idiot callers but we can't hear him! We just finished listening to Steve Malzberg's show so we know it isn't our internet connection or our computer. How can we let him know this? Is anyone else having this problem? Thanks!

STUTTGART, Germany — Robert Hanks, a longtime Patch High School science teacher, was found dead at the school Saturday around 6 p.m. The cause of death is under investigation, according to Department of Defense Dependents Schools spokesman Frank O’Gara. The school convened a crisis intervention team over the weekend. As school resumed Monday, the team members worked with faculty and students to deal with the death, O’Gara said. Hanks, 66, sold pretzels in the front lobby of the school each day to raise money to defray the costs of feeding the animals he kept that were part of his biology...

<p>EL DORADO, Ark. - Frontier justice and modern retailing collided when police arrested two men for riding horses through the food section of a Wal-Mart Supercenter.</p> <p>Store workers told police early Sunday the men rode horses through the store, then led officers to a large pile of horse manure just inside the entrance.</p>