Free Republic

What's going to happen in the Arab world when Al-Jazeera or some other TV network broadcasts pictures of American soldiers killing Saddam Hussein's force of child soldiers? Among the nightmares confronting the American military as they develop their war strategy is Saddam's plan to protect Baghdad with thousands of human shields, including some 8000 child soldiers who have been trained to stage ambushes, act as snipers, and throw together roadblocks. Drilled in units with such monikers as Saddam's Lion Cubs, children 10 to 15 reportedly spend 14 hours a day absorbing political propaganda and weapons training. Upon graduation, they join...

   WHEN THE TWO KOREAN leaders embraced at the summit in Pyongyang in June 2000 the cover of that week's Economist said it all: "Greetings, Earthlings." It was the world's first glimpse in a long, long time of one of its most reclusive strongmen, Kim Jong Il, of whom virtually nothing is known. The firmest personal information to emerge about the North's Dear Leader was that he's 5'3", but his shoe lifts and pompadour cast even that in doubt. Over the years, however, the media was full of his exploits gleaned from various intelligence communities and North Korean defectors --...

<p>LOS ANGELES - A new front opened in the U.S. ``War on Terror'' on Wednesday as pundit Arianna Huffington and three Hollywood pals launched a TV ad campaign to stop Americans from driving sport utility vehicles because the gas-guzzling autos inadvertently aid the country's enemies.</p>

In their euphoria over the prospect of Republican delegates spending their cash in destitute New York, the Governor and the Mayor can hardly be blamed for suggesting that the state?s largely Democratic voters will look more kindly on the President in 2004. Certainly they should welcome George W. Bush, and happily house and feed his well-heeled supporters. But let?s hope that Mr. Bush won?t be too disappointed when he loses New York again anyway. If he and his adviser, Karl Rove, chose to locate their party convention here to win the state?s electoral votes, they probably should have picked New...

Weapon of the Week In war, one of the first things the Pentagon likes to do is turn out the lights. Along with liberal use of high explosives, it now does the job with a cluster bomb whose canisters spin out a payload that looks much like angel hair?the fine fibrous stuff you used to find in packets of itching powder as a child. This classified weapon has been called the "blackout" or "soft" bomb, the latter because it doesn't explode with a big bang or tear people to bits outright while going about its business. Whether it is actually...

On the two-year birthday of the high-end Titanium PowerBook, Apple Computer on Tuesday upped the ante by introducing a model with a massive 17-inch display. "We believe someday notebooks are even going to outsell desktops," Apple CEO Steve Jobs said during his keynote speech at the Macworld Expo in San Francisco. He predicted the sales ratio will climb to at least 50 percent in a few years. "We want to replace even more desktops with notebooks," he said. To achieve that goal, the company created a PowerBook that is 1-inch thick, slightly thinner than its predecessor. It weighs 6.8 pounds,...

Talk of a liberal media bias has been around for years. Now some are asking, is there a conservative bias in the media? From Rush Limbaugh to Bill O’Reilly, is America being bombarded with right-wing rhetoric? DONAHUE goes inside the question with comedian Al Franken, former New York Governor Mario Cuomo, radio talk show host Jeffrey Whitaker, and “Bias” author Bernard Goldberg.

<p>The hotly contested and prestigious honor goes to the person who during the past year best exemplifies the spirit and revolting behavior of the award's namesake.</p> <p>Finneran, you'll recall, was the passenger on an international flight in 1995 who, having been told he'd enjoyed enough liquor, responded by lowering his trousers and fecally sullying a nearby food cart.</p>

<p>Brazilian President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva waves as he rides in an open car on his way to the National Congress to be sworn in Wednesday. ------------------------------------------------------------------------    BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) -- Latin America's biggest nation marked a dramatic change in leadership Wednesday with the inauguration of a former shoeshine boy as Brazil's first elected leftist president.</p>

<p>ADVISE & CONSENT: President Bush introduces his choice for top economic adviser, Stephen Friedman, at a press conference on Thursday. - AP December 15, 2002 -- DESPITE determined attempts by the tax-cutting crowd to derail the nomination, it was clear even to the most ardent supply-siders Thursday that President Bush is extremely pleased with the choice of Stephen Friedman as his top economic adviser.</p>

December 11, 2002|11:02 PM by Joe Conason If there’s an uplifting aspect to Trent Lott’s nostalgic endorsement of Dixiecrat barbarism, it isn’t his strange apology, in which he pretended not to have said what he plainly did say. What gave cause for hope was the response of conservatives, whose fury obviously shook the Republican leader. After years of coddling the bigots in their midst; after years of tolerating and encouraging racially divisive campaign tactics; after years of subsidizing and publicizing phony racist "scholarship"—at long last, the better minds and hearts on the right decided that the time had come for their...

Chris is challenging Gore to LET IT RIP right now!

Paul Allen's sports empire goes dot.bomb ------------------------------------------------------------------------ By Adrian Wojnarowski Special to ESPN.com The biggest, most important owners in sports are relentlessly ripped for wild, irresponsible spending and lording over bad teams and bad actors. But the richest disgrace of all stays strangely under the radar and out of harms way. For Paul Allen, owning a sports team is as risky an investment as owning tech stocks these days.Yet, there's no mistaking the truth: Billionaire Paul Allen has to be considered one of the worst sports owners ever. Who has ever spent so much money for so much embarrassment? His...

<p>BOSTON - They were brothers, born five years apart in a large Irish-Catholic family in working-class South Boston. But their lives took very different paths.</p> <p>Billy Bulger grew up to become one of the most powerful politicians in Massachusetts. James "Whitey" Bulger became a mob boss.</p>

War on terror: FBI ‘guilty of cover-up’ over anthrax suspect NICK PETERS IN WASHINGTON AMERICAN investigators know the identity of the killer who paralysed the US by sending anthrax in the post but will not arrest the culprit, according to leading US scientists. For several months the Federal Bureau of Investigation has claimed it has few leads and little evidence about the group or individual who targeted politicians and media organisations. Their failure to arrest a suspect has compounded other failures of the American security agencies to take action which could have prevented the September 11 attacks on the Twin...

Comment ------------------------------------------------------------------------ In the hands of the three witches There will be only one winner of an Iraqi war - Osama bin Laden George Galloway Wednesday November 27, 2002 The Guardian Picture if you will a bearded gentleman on a recruiting poster, finger pointing imploringly. "I need you," it would say. No, it's not the ubiquitous Lord Kitchener appeal, but "the emir", Osama bin Laden, and he needs you to invade Iraq. If there is one man who wants an Anglo-American invasion and occupation of an Arab country more than the chief of the US defence board, Richard Perle, it's...

                 MAHER: ... but I do mind being mischaracterized.        MATTHEWS: Right, the people who shot the cruise missiles were in the right. They were not cowardly or not cowardly. But you argue that those who use that as a weapon are cowardly.        MAHER: I don’t understand what you’re saying there.        MATTHEWS: Well you’re saying the United States civilian leadership, i.e., President Clinton at the time, was cowardly in using cruise missiles.        MAHER: I’m saying the entire country. This whole country never...

Nancy Pelosi’s refreshing embrace of the L-word has provoked cackles from progressive-bashing pundits. Pelosi’s Critics Won’t Laugh Long by Joe Conason Nobody knows whether Nancy Pelosi can prevail where Dick Gephardt failed. What can be said confidently right now is that her ideology will have little effect on her future success. Assuming that Ms. Pelosi wins the minority leadership in the House of Representatives when her colleagues vote on Nov. 14, her ascension will owe more to her personal dynamism, hard work, organizational skills and fund-raising abilities than her opinions about gay rights or medical marijuana. On the political spectrum...

Bill Clinton got more than he bargined for when he ate at Palm Beach's famed Bice restaurant with James Carville and 10 others last weekend. A pal asked Clinton to meet his female dining companions in the garden, and Clinton complied, shaking hands with one while the other put on her lipstick. When the lipstick-applier was finished, she "squealed loudly" and declared her willingness to give Clinton oral sex, according to New York magazine. Clinton "jusy stood there for like a minute. But then all these people at the other tables broke out in hysterics. Bill just went inside and...

Electoral watershed America's election results affect us all Leader Thursday November 7, 2002 The Guardian An opinion poll taken across America just before this week's mid-term elections found US voters split down the middle between Republicans and Democrats. The voters are almost as equally divided on whether their country is heading in the right direction or not. The poll confirms that there are two Americas today - Americas with different values and priorities - just as there were two Americas in the presidential vote in November 2000. In Tuesday's elections, however, there was only one winner - President George Bush's...