Free Republic

When historians study 2019, they will surely take note that this was the Year of the Florida Man. First, in March, came the 'Florida Man Challenge,' a social media fad involving Googling your birthday and the term 'Florida Man' to see what bizarre news item popped up. A month later came the Florida Man backlash, in which commentators debated whether it was ethical to laugh about Florida Man headlines because so many involve people who are homeless or mentally ill. . . .

A cross-denominational faith group on Friday (October 5) announced their plans to construct what they're describing as a West Coast Statue of Liberty on a San Ysidro hilltop overlooking Tijuana. Modeled after the Virgin Mary the sculpture is expected to stand 40 feet tall and will be constructed at the Our Lady of Mount Carmel Catholic parish, located just a mile north of the border. "Immigrants contribute to the diversity of this great nation, as well as to our local economy," said parishioner David Gonzalez at an event announcing the beginning of a funding drive for the project. " I'm...

I am seeking information from Houston Freepers about real estate there. My daughter moved to Houston 2 years ago from San Diego when her company asked her to temporarily run their Houston office. She now has the opportunity to make the move permanent, and she wants to stay in Texas. Mr. RightField and I are here in Houston for the month of October (visiting in our motorhome). While we are here, we're hoping that local Freepers might point us to a good realtor and a mortgage broker. This will be her first home purchase, and she is looking in the...

Her daddy's been away for years, serving two combat tours in Iraq and two in Afghanistan. He's getting ready to go Afghanistan again soon, but 10-year-old Belle Worbington got to spend Friday at work with him at Camp Pendleton. "It's sad when he's gone, but I know he's doing something good," said Belle, a fourth-grader at Escondido's Reidy Creek Elementary School. Several dozen Marine spouses and children spent much of Friday taking part in exercises that their military parents routinely perform, including calisthenics, shooting and working with amphibious assault vehicles. Read more: http://www.nctimes.com/news/local/military/military-marine-kids-get-a-glimpse-of-what-their-parents/article_8c6152d0-17b1-581a-8bf2-1cd2dbc3fb83.html#ixzz1oiuMIC5T

The teenage girl standing with her father in line behind me at Kroger was clearly annoyed with her teacher. "I just gave her some b.s.," she said. They were discussing the school day, and a writing assignment. Her father asked her what the topic had been and between loading my items onto the conveyor belt I gathered that the assignment had involved a journal entry regarding feelings about family and living arrangements. "Well," her father replied, "you could have answered that with fewer than twenty words: 'My parents went through a ten-year custody battle and now I live with my...

OCEANSIDE ---- While they're out of school for summer, students in Oceanside can pick up a free lunch at various school and community sites throughout the city. Through the federal Seamless Summer Feeding Program, Oceanside Unified School District employees are giving out about 1,000 meals a day at 10 different sites to anybody under the age of 18, district officials said. The program was designed to ensure that students, especially those from poor families, get nutritious meals while they're out of school. "During the whole school year, they get good nutritious meal, but in the summer, some of them are...

OCEANSIDE ---- A federal judge on Friday ordered the state Transportation Department to let a controversial group of anti-illegal immigration activists pick up litter near a Border Patrol checkpoint. In a 34-page order, Judge William Q. Hayes granted the San Diego Minutemen's request for a preliminary injunction that gives Caltrans 30 days to reinstate the group's Adopt-A-Highway permit for a 2-mile stretch of Interstate 5 near San Clemente. The state also must restore the courtesy sign bearing the Minutemen's name, the judge ruled. The judge's decision enables the North County group to once again pick up trash alongside the busy...

AGUA DEL ESPINO, Mexico - The two women worked in silence. Laura Teresa Gomez Santos patted a ball of masa and slapped it onto a tortilla press. Her husband's mother, Ignacia Zavaleta Rios, stirred a pot of simmering black beans. They tried to hush the barking dogs and quiet the roosters, afraid they might miss the sound of the phone. Laura's husband, Celestino Garcia Zavaleta, 20, had been caught by Border Patrol while trying to cross into the United States. Two days before, one of his brothers, who lives in the United States, had called to say Celestino had been...

FALLBROOK ---- The American Civil Liberties Union on Thursday called for administrators at Fallbrook High School to apologize to a student who said she was told to stop displaying an American flag on campus two weeks ago. Fifteen-year-old Malia Fontana said the district violated her right to free speech when it asked her to remove a handkerchief-sized flag that she wore in her back pocket when she went to school on March 31. Tom Anthony, superintendent of the Fallbrook Union High School District, said he will meet with school officials when they return from spring break Monday morning to discuss...

SAN DIEGO -- Courts and San Diego city and county government offices will be closed Friday for Cesar Chavez Day. Refuse and recyclables will be collected one day later in the city of San Diego, according to the city's Mona Favorite-Hill. Garbage collection will return to its normal schedule on Monday. Tickets won't be issued for expired parking meters or parking in areas scheduled for street sweeping, Favorite-Hill said. All other parking restrictions will be in effect and enforced. All city and county branch libraries will be closed, as will the city of San Diego's community service centers, police storefronts,...

VISTA ---- The Vista Unified School District is canceling all classes Friday, citing concerns for student safety after a week of walkouts and student demonstrations that have centered on proposed changes to immigration law, district officials said Thursday. Interim Superintendent Darrel Taylor said the decision to close the schools came around 1 p.m., after the sheriff's department raised the specter of large protests on the birthday of Cesar Chavez, a Latino labor leader and activist. "We were presented with some fairly significant information that really told us there could be some trouble tomorrow with the demonstrators in this area," Taylor...

VISTA ---- Hundreds of demonstrators on both sides of the illegal immigration debate faced off at a popular gathering spot for day laborers two weeks ago in central Vista, exposing a deep political rift in this diverse North County community. Throngs of job-seekers ---- predominantly Latino men who congregate most mornings in search of under-the-table work ---- are not a new sight along busy Escondido Avenue. But recently, they have become the focal point of this sticky local conflict. Advocates say the laborers are simply trying to work, often to support families. But opponents contend the majority are in the...

VISTA ---- Videoconferencing began as a technological tool for the white-collar set. Now, a new North County company is putting it to use for the bluest-collar segment of all: migrant workers ---- specifically, homesick migrant workers from the Mexican state of Oaxaca. That is the concept behind Videoenlaces Familiares, roughly translated as "Family Videolink." The Spanish words are the name of a new company in Vista that lets migrant workers talk to those back home through a full-screen videoconferencing system. For $40, migrant workers will be able to see, hear and talk to relatives and friends in the state of...

What psychological characteristics do "leftists" like Josef Stalin, Fidel Castro and Ted Kennedy have in common: an enthusiasm for "change"? A commitment to coercive methods of conflict resolution? Narcissism? A propensity for murder? You aren't likely to see a study published in the American Psychological Association's Bulletin that purports to address the above questions, but a few weeks ago a "meta-study" (a study of other studies) by four university professors provided a psychological profile of "conservatives" – among whom they included Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Ronald Reagan, and George W. Bush. The traits given particular attention were the following: fear,...

Don’t Make Fun of Feminists by Gail Jarvis Government bodies are often wasteful and have a tendency to intrude upon our rights, those we have left. On the other hand, they occasionally provide us with comic relief and the present buffoonery at the South Carolina House of Representatives is a perfect example. But before I describe these incidents let me assure you that I am not making this up. The current sideshow has the Women’s Caucus pitted against the young female House pages or, more particularly, the pages’ choice of clothing. The Women’s Caucus considers the pages’ outfits to be ...

Just another manic Monday Robert Nanninga North County Times Overpopulation shows itself in many ways. In the Philippines people are living in landfills, eating the refuse of others. In sub-Saharan Africa 18 million people are being sustained on emergency food assistance provided by international relief agencies. In Rio De Janeiro gangs of feral children roam the streets. China's Three Gorges Dam is about providing power for a billions of consumers, and the war in the Balkans is really about too many people fighting for too little space. It is a small world after all. Here in America we are only ...