Free Republic

I must be naive. I really thought the administration would welcome the return of bank bailout money. Some $340 million in TARP cash flowed back this week from four small banks in Louisiana, New York, Indiana and California. This isn't much when we routinely talk in trillions, but clearly that money has not been wasted or otherwise sunk down Wall Street's black hole. So why no cheering as the cash comes back? My answer: The government wants to control the banks, just as it now controls GM and Chrysler, and will surely control the health industry in the not-too-distant future....

WASHINGTON — The Environmental Protection Agency is expected to act for the first time to regulate carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that scientists blame for the warming of the planet, according to top Obama administration officials. The decision, which most likely would play out in stages over a period of months, would have a profound impact on transportation, manufacturing costs and how utilities generate power. It could accelerate the progress of energy and climate change legislation in Congress and form a basis for the United States’ negotiating position at United Nations climate talks set for December in Copenhagen. The...

TEHRAN, Iran (CNN) -- Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal on Sunday praised Iran for helping Hamas achieve "victory" over Israel in Gaza, according to Iranian media reports. "The victory of the people of Gaza was a miracle of God and the Islamic Republic definitely has a share in this victory," Meshaal said after meeting with Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, according to Iran's semi-official Fars News Agency. Meshaal arrived in Tehran for his first visit to the country since Israel's recent military offensive on Gaza, Iranian media reported. He also met with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Foreign Minister Manouchehr...

CAMARILLO, Calif. - A national survey shows gas prices continue to decline, tumbling nearly 53 cents a gallon in the last two weeks. The average price of a gallon of regular gasoline at self-serve stations was $2.78 Friday. Mid-grade was at $2.93 and premium was at $3.05. That's according to the Lundberg Survey of 5,000 gas stations nationwide, released Sunday.

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez threatened on Saturday to imprison his main political rival, intensifying a campaign against a man he calls a crime boss just a month before he faces tough regional elections. Opposition leader Manuel Rosales, who lost to Chavez in the 2006 presidential vote, is governor of the oil producing state of Zulia and is running for mayor of its capital Maracaibo. "I am determined to put Manuel Rosales behind bars. A swine like that has to be in prison," Chavez said. Chavez railed against Rosales at a gathering of businessmen in Zulia, urging the...

CLEVELAND - Volunteers supporting Barack Obama picked up hundreds of people at homeless shelters, soup kitchens and drug-rehab centers and drove them to a polling place yesterday on the last day that Ohioans could register and vote on the same day, almost no questions asked. The huge effort by a pro-Obama group, Vote Today Ohio, takes advantage of a quirk in the state's elections laws that allows people to register and cast ballots at the same time without having to prove residency. Republicans have argued that the window could lead to widespread voter fraud because officials wouldn't have an opportunity...

The sputtering economy has caused an increase in prices of many staples including gasoline, rice, ice cream, even beer. Now some lawmakers in New Jersey are considering taking food taxes a step further and install a proverbial "sin" tax on fast food. Yes, the idea of marking up your favorite fast food burger or pack of fries is actually being tossed around, and it's not settling well with many residents. "They're taxing everything. Now you're gonna tax fast food? That's crazy," said Newark resident Miriam Robertson. Added Livingston resident Tina Abrahamian: "No one wants to be taxed. I mean, it's...

Emily Derke looked surprised when she was asked why she was attending church on Earth Day. In her mind, the question was not "why" but "why not?" "I see Earth Day as a spiritual thing," said Derke, who drove from her home in Coon Rapids to St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral in downtown Minneapolis for an interfaith celebration. "God made the Earth, and now it's up to us to protect it. Everybody here [at the service] is here for the same purpose. It's all about the Earth." Indeed, the faith community has become one of the major players in environmental issues....

In an effort to help Idaho Sen. Larry Craig, the American Civil Liberties Union is arguing that people who have sex in public bathrooms have an expectation of privacy. Craig is asking the Minnesota Court of Appeals to let him withdraw his guilty plea from a bathroom sex sting at the Minneapolis airport. The ACLU on Tuesday filed a brief supporting the Idaho Republican. The ACLU wrote that a Minnesota Supreme Court ruling 38 years ago found that people who have sex in closed stalls in public restrooms "have a reasonable expectation of privacy."

Spychief Mike McConnell is drafting a plan to protect America’s cyberspace that will raise privacy issues and make the current debate over surveillance law look like “a walk in the park,” McConnell tells The New Yorker in the issue set to hit newsstands Monday. “This is going to be a goat rope on the Hill. My prediction is that we’re going to screw around with this until something horrendous happens.” At issue, McConnell acknowledges, is that in order to accomplish his plan, the government must have the ability to read all the information crossing the Internet in the United States...

WASHINGTON: The Federal Reserve moved Tuesday to impose tough new restrictions meant to curb unfair and deceptive home-lending practices and prevent a recurrence of the meltdown in subprime mortgages this year. By a 5-to-0 vote, the Fed approved a plan that would tighten provisions meant to protect borrowers and apply them to a far larger share of home loans - whether from banks, mortgage companies or other lenders - than under current regulations. The proposed rules underscore the more assertive role the Fed is now prepared to take in regulating lending, a big shift from the central bank's approach in...

MONTCLAIR, N.J. (CBS) ― College students at Montclair State University are all talking about a new requirement that will require students to have a cell phone. CBS 2 HD has learned more on this required feature that is forcing students to dig into their wallets. At Montclair State, there is no excuse for being out of touch. "'School Phone' I use for campus e-mail, different things like that," freshman Angela Vuocolo said. That's right.

DEMAREST, N.J. (CBS) ― Surveillance cameras rolling inside our local schools is nothing new, but what's taking place inside Demarest's public schools is truly cutting edge: a live feed from more than two dozen cameras with a direct connection to the police. It's an expensive, but effective tool that could be a sign of the times with an increase in school shootings over the years.

CHICAGO: If elected president, Senator Barack Obama would meet with Iran's leaders and offer economic inducements and a possible promise not to seek "regime change" if Iran stopped meddling in Iraq and cooperated on terrorism and nuclear issues. In an hour-long interview on Wednesday, Obama made clear that forging a new relationship with Iran would be a major element of a broad effort to stabilize Iraq. And he vowed to engage in "aggressive personal diplomacy" with Iran and other regional powers as he withdrew American combat forces in Iraq. Obama said that Iran had been "acting irresponsibly" by supporting Shiite...

With its Geo-4 report, the United Nations tells us that most aspects of the Earth's natural environment are in decline; and that the decline will affect us, the planet's human inhabitants, in some pretty important ways.

HELL is a place where sinners really do burn in an everlasting fire, and not just a religious symbol designed to galvanise the faithful, Pope Benedict XVI has said. Addressing a parish gathering in a northern suburb of Rome, the Pope said that in the modern world many people, including some believers, had forgotten that if they failed to "admit blame and promise to sin no more", they risked "eternal damnation - the inferno". Hell "really exists and is eternal, even if nobody talks about it much any more". The Pope, who as cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was head of Catholic...

AMHERST, Mass. --An Episcopal minister will stop performing all wedding ceremonies to protest the denomination's prohibition of same-sex unions. "We are called to join the fast that our homosexual brothers and sisters in Christ have had to observe all their lives," said the Rev. Robert Hirschfeld, rector of Grace Episcopal Church. Several members of the congregation say they support Hirschfeld's move, which he announced in his Sunday sermon. Others said they were concerned that that the move might add to the polarization of an issue that has already divided Episcopals. Erica Winter, of Northampton, said working for social justice often...

Czech Pres: Environmentalism is a religion WASHINGTON, March 9 (UPI) -- Environmentalism is a religion that is based more on political ambitions than science, the president of the Czech Republic warned Friday. Speaking at the Cato Institute, a public policy think-tank, President Vaclav Klaus said that environmentalists who clamor for policy change to combat global warming "only pretend" to be promoting environmental protection, and are actually being driven by a political agenda. "Environmentalism should belong in the social sciences," much like the idea of communism or other "-isms" such as feminism, Klaus said, adding that "environmentalism is a religion" that...

On the day that the latest report on global warming was released, I went out and bought a light bulb. OK, an environmentally friendly, compact fluorescent light bulb.