Free Republic

THE campaign-finance-re form lobby is launching a new attack on one of our most basic rights. For more than 200 years, Americans have had the right to operate printing presses without having to get a license from the government. The First Amendment was written to protect against just such depredations of freedom of speech, hallmarks of monarchical tyranny. Modern technology has made access to that right even more democratic. With PCs and the Web, virtually anyone can become a publisher. Any citizen — kook, crank or committed grassroots activist — can reach as many readers as William Randolph Hearst ever...

WASHINGTON (AP) - The United States has obtained a letter from one terrorist leader to another that discusses plans to force a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, create an Islamic state there and then spread their fight into neighboring countries, Pentagon officials said. Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman would only broadly characterize the intercepted letter, which he said was written by Osama bin Laden deputy Ayman al-Zawahri to the leader of al-Quaida in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Whitman would not say where, when or how it was obtained, or who intercepted it, but he said the Pentagon is confident it is authentic.

Al-Qaeda has shrewdly seen to it that, along with the sword, they also employ the pen in their Holy War. In order to vindicate their actions and rally support, they have orchestrated a series of carefully constructed messages. These messages fall into two distinct genres, each revealing a different goal. The West is familiar with one of these genres: those many al-Jazeera communiqués and internet statements. Strategically directed towards the West, the gist of these messages is always the same: all the injustices inflicted upon the Muslim world by the West, every conceivable grievance Muslims have experienced at the hands...

SITTING snugly at the corner of prosperity and lunacy, Brooklyn's Vox Pop cafe serves up piping-hot conspiracy theories about the 9/11 terror attacks, along with the coffee and scones. The strikes on the World Trade Center? They were an "inside job" — either carried out by the United States government or allowed to occur so we might plunge into war. Or, it was the mother of all insurance scams. Take your pick. Oh, and the evil CIA murdered JFK, too. Last week, the Fire Department's incoming chaplain, Imam Intikab Habib, was forced to resign, after he told an interviewer that...

Bill Bennett's recent abortion comments exposed the divide in America between thinkers and feelers. Bennett said "If you wanted to reduce crime, you could -- if that were your sole purpose -- you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down." But Bennett then immediately added that doing so would be "an impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do." No thinking person listening to Bennett would believe that he ever advocated aborting black babies. But Bennett's abortion remarks did conjure a horrible image of the mass killing of unborn black children. Feelers,...

So, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has a new blog called "Give 'Em Hell, Harry." You can leave comments here. I'd suggest asking Sen. Reid about this story in one of his hometown newspapers, the Las Vegas Review Journal: The money that led to the indictment this week of two Las Vegas pastors and the wife of one of them came from federal grants arranged by Sen. Harry Reid in September 2001, a Reid spokeswoman said Wednesday. Moving to distance Reid from a possible scandal, aide Tessa Hafen said the senator sought the money on behalf of a nonprofit...

To The Washington Post they were simply “gunmen.” The New York Times non-judgmentally called them “armed men.” The elite media fastidiously avoid such harsh words as "terrorist" – even to describe those who, last week, rounded up five Iraqi teachers from outside their school, dragged them into a classroom, lined them up against a wall and shot them to death. The Post was quick to inform readers that “no children were hurt in the attack.” Are we to regard that as restraint on the part of these “gunmen”? The Times noted that “the killings appeared to have been motivated more...

PETA isn't a bother most of the time. The animal rights group's efforts are often annoying, sometimes laughable, but rarely craven and vile. Until recently. Advertisement My first inclination was to ignore the latest outrageous stunt by the Virginia-based People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals rather than give it any ink. I held my tongue several years ago when it implored The Sun to stop covering fishing. I didn't comment when PETA asked the Boy Scouts to stop giving out fishing merit badges. And like you, I did not rush out last year at this time to take part...

Here's hoping that our run of major hurricanes is over -- and here's an opportunity to examine which people, institutions and concepts won or lost credibility this month. One big loser is New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, who jumped to erroneous conclusions and cast blame like confetti. But he wasn't alone among local demagogues, who did Huey Long proud. Aaron Broussard, president of Jefferson Parish, embellished a widely publicized story of a nursing home mother who purportedly begged her son for four days to rescue her from rising waters. Reports of official pilfering of emergency aid bring to life FBI...

MEN are dogs. No, really. Men are dogs, according to a new book causing a stir in Britain called "Everything I Know About Men I Learnt From My Dog," which says there's a reason canines are man's best friend. They eat from the same bowls. "There is really no difference at all between men and dogs when it comes to natural instincts and behavior," writes British socialite Clare Stapes, a former model who has been linked to mutts like musician Robbie Williams and actor Dougray Scott. The picture-driven, mini coffee-table read divulges techniques on how to improve ill-fated relationships with...

Gov. Pataki put the International Freedom Center out of its misery yesterday. Good for him. "There remains too much opposi tion, too much controversy over the programming of the IFC, and we must move forward with our first priority — the creation of an inspiring memorial," Pataki said. "The IFC cannot be located on the memorial quadrant." Again, good for the governor. And, if you don't mind, we'll indulge in a little back-patting, too — of ourselves. After all, from the moment Debra Burlingame — whose brother was a pilot of one of the hijacked 9/11 planes — blew the...

A marketing and public relations guru says she was shown the door at her high-powered real estate job after an ambitious assistant tattled to executives about her online diary. Kelly Kreth says the Web gripes were anonymous, and that she never identified any of her colleagues by name or the company, Dwelling Quest, in her rants. "It's been a nightmare," she said with a quivering voice. "They've promoted her to my position, and now they're threatening to sue me." The 35-year-old businesswoman says her assistant discovered her Web site at freeopendiary.com, where she's been a contributor for five years. She...

Whether or not you agreed with them, university presidents used to be dignified figures on the American scene. They often were distinguished scholars, capable of bringing their own brand of independent thinking to bear on the operation and reform of their institutions. Above all, they took seriously the university's mission to seek and transmit the Truth, and thereby to strengthen the free society that made such inquiry possible. But it has been a long time since Woodrow Wilson (at Princeton), Robert Hutchins (at Chicago) or James Bryant Conant (at Harvard) set the tone for American campuses. Over the past year,...

Amid the scandal over taking $875,000 from a Bronx Boys & Girls Club to fund its start-up, the Air America radio network is in such bad financial shape that its announcers are begging listeners for help paying the bills. In a rare move for commercial radio, the all-liberal network began asking listeners for donations and selling blocks of weekend airtime. The move comes after the network was pressured by city investigators to repay the $875,000 borrowed from the Gloria Wise Boys & Girls Club — with the money going into an escrow account until a city probe of the loan...

LAST weekend, 100,000 Americans protested in Washington, demanding that we bring our troops home now. It was a fascinating installment in our nation's self-therapy craze. Set aside the get-Bush-at-any-cost political hustlers, the earnest college students not yet seasoned by reality, the Jew-baiting free-Palestine detachments and the very few who have thought seriously about the war and found it lacking. You're left with the legions of Cindy Sheehan wannabes — meandering souls who, were they only capable of honesty, would be wearing t-shirts that read, "It's not about the war, it's about me!" Were we able to psychologically profile the demonstrators,...

MORE THAN 16 MILLION STUDENTS are now enrolled in colleges and universities in the United States, the largest number ever. In two years, the figure will exceed 17 million, and it will continue to grow, as the high school graduating class of 2008 will be the largest in history. Today nearly 70 percent of the 18-to-24 age cohort attends college in one form or another, and more than 80 percent of high school graduates do so. College attendance has become a near universal rite of passage for youngsters in our society, and a requirement for entry into the world of...

<p>Watch out, "rats" — a Web site claiming to expose snitches, informants and undercover cops is online and out to get you.</p> <p>The Who's A Rat site has law-enforcement officials steaming, because it allows anyone who can log onto the Internet to post pictures of alleged stool pigeons, alongside information about where they can be found and what they've done.</p>

Four schoolgirl members of a Brooklyn wolfpack were hauled off in handcuffs yesterday, a day after a racially charged attack on two parochial-school students on a city bus, police sources said. The four girls were taken into custody around 3 p.m. as they waited for the B9 bus at Avenue L and Nostrand Avenue, about a block from Andries Hudde IS 240 in Marine Park, where they are believed to be eighth-graders. They were cuffed by cops who had been driving along the bus route with the alleged victims — two white female Bishop Kearny HS students. The cops had...

On Thursday, at a town hall meeting sponsored by the Congressional Black Caucus, New York's Rep. Charles Rangel made a truly repugnant declaration. Railing against President Bush's handling of Hurricane Katrina, Rangel told a cheering crowd: "George Bush is our Bull Connor." Bull Connor, of course, was the Birmingham, Ala., police commissioner who in 1963 turned fire hoses and attack dogs on black civil-rights protestors, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. On that day, he came to personify Southern racism. Now, there's a significant temptation to dismiss Rangel's ravings as par for the course for the congressman. Earlier this year,...

Gun-control advocates will warn visitors to Florida that a new state self-defense law that starts Oct. 1 puts them in jeopardy. Gov. Jeb Bush's spokeswoman called the campaign `ridiculous.' TALLAHASSEE - Enter Florida at your own risk. That's the message supporters of gun control are sending in an ad campaign designed to warn visitors about Florida's new law allowing victims to shoot first in self-defense without fear of prosecution.