Free Republic

My calculation is that President George Bush will not delay the operation to replace Iraq's Saddam Hussein until next year but will launch it in November, or even late October. It will be a swift and terrible onslaught, coming from Kuwait, Jordan, Turkey, the Persian Gulf and from the new complex of bases built up by the U.S. in Afghanistan and Central Asia. Britain will make the biggest contribution of forces (unofficial figure: 30,000), but there will be special troops from many countries, including Russia. It should all be over in weeks, possibly even days, perhaps in time for...

Sunny Clinton forecast leaves cloud over Bush August 8, 2002BY ROBERT NOVAK SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST The Commerce Department's painful report last week that the national economy is worse than anticipated obscured the document's startling revelation. Hidden in the morass of statistics, there is proof that the Clinton administration grossly overestimated the strength of the economy leading up to the 2000 election. Did the federal government join Enron and WorldCom in cooking the books? Through all of President Bill Clinton's last two years in office, the announced level of before-tax profits was at least 10 percent too high--a discrepancy rising close to...

Intelligence Expert: U.S. Still Lags in Fighting TerrorismWes Vernon, NewsMax.comTuesday, Aug. 6, 2002 WASHINGTON – America is "doing business the same old way” nearly a year after the Sept. 11 attacks, says a veteran intelligence expert. Furthermore, he believes left-wing senators obstructing the president’s judicial nominations are toying with national security. Also, the intelligence community has yet to rise to the serious threat. The U.S. has made a few changes, but overall, lack of preparedness "is really a disaster,” said Herb Romerstein, former head of the U.S. Information Agency's Office to Counter Soviet Disinformation and Active Measures. "We may...

The Worm TurnsBy Bruce S. Thornton FrontPageMagazine.com | August 5, 2002 Back in the sixties' the paradigm of cultural types was pretty simple. Conservatives were uptight, repressed authoritarians eager to regiment people according to set rules about what made the best society. Liberals, on the other hand, were champions of spontaneous individualism, quirky self-expression, joie-de-vivre, and the ideal of personal freedom as the highest good.The one cultural artifact that perhaps best embodies this idea is Ken Kesey's "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest." The mental hospital is an obvious metaphor for the modern, bureaucratic oppressive "establishment" that seeks to...

An Unfortunate Clinton Truthby Linda A. Prussen-Razzano, Dallas Bureau Chief August 1, 2002 "Candidly Yours" Those who hailed the triumphant end of the Cold War with Russia were celebrating prematurely. After having vanquished our political foe, we should have ensured our own national security by keeping readiness high. Had we maintained the same high level of readiness, no doubt we could still be enjoying our "preeminence" party. If our leaders were still cautious and concerned about national security, perhaps we could still sleep peacefully in our beds. It didn’t happen. With massive declassification document dumps, ridiculously lax licenses and technology...

<p>WASHINGTON — The White House complained Wednesday that the Senate's $355.4 billion defense bill provides less than President Bush wants, but said it wants lawmakers to approve the measure anyway.</p> <p>Senators began debating the legislation two days before their scheduled August recess, following repeated calls by Bush that it be made their top spending priority. With elections for congressional control looming in three months, the Senate's Democratic leaders want to leave no room for Republicans to question their devotion to the war on terror.</p>

By Andrew Clark WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Senate on Wednesday cleared $28.9 billion in emergency funds for the Pentagon ( news - web sites), U.S. homeland security efforts and New York's recovery from the Sept. 11 attacks -- sending the much-delayed package to President Bush ( news - web sites), who is expected to sign it into law. Reuters Photo The Senate voted 92-7 to approve the 2002 supplemental spending bill, which was earlier passed by the House of Representatives on Tuesday. Lawmakers last week cut billions of dollars in spending from the bill to satisfy White House complaints that...

<p>SOMERSET, Pa.  — Rescue workers have contacted some of the nine miners who have been trapped underground for three days via a telephone dropped through a pipe, according to rescue officials.</p> <p>News of contact comes just after the drill broke into the chamber at around 10:16 p.m.</p>

What Leftists Hate MostBy Chris WeinkopfFrontPageMagazine.com | July 18, 2002 POLITICS IS, by its very nature, a reactionary enterprise. It's outrage ? outrage about the existing order of things or outrage about whatever threatens the existing order of things ? that provokes politically interested people to pay attention. At the heart of every political struggle is a sacred cow, whether it's the Second Amendment, the welfare state, marriage, or Roe v. Wade. On opposing sides are those who want to lead the cow to slaughter and those standing guard with shotguns at the barn door.Because what outrages politicians, activists, and...

Supporters of the Hamas and Hezbollah terrorist movements announced a lawsuit today that names President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Colin Powell among the defendants. The suit, aimed at Israeli leaders whom it alleges committed "war crimes," is led by New York-based lawyer Stanley Cohen, an attorney for members of the terrorist group Hamas and other radical causes. Militant activist Abdurahman Alamoudi, a founder and longtime leader of the American Muslim Council (AMC) who describes himself as a supporter of Hamas and Hezbollah, joined Cohen at the news conference announcing the suit and made a statement in Arabic...

InitiumThe News Log of the Center for the Moral Defense of Capitalism [Monday, July 15, 2002] Individual Rights & the Supreme CourtNote: The following is CMDC Chairman Nicholas Provenzo's introduction to CMDC's "Year in Review" Report on the US Supreme Court A proper government defines and protects the individual rights of its citizens. Under such a government, the courts play a crucial role; it is through the courts that men are able to settle disputes peaceably according to predetermined legal rules. It is these legal rules that guide the judiciary—both substantively and procedurally—in achieving justice in the thousands of trial...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - American military planners are considering Jordan as a staging area for air and commando raids against Iraq in the event the United States decides to attack, the New York Times quoted senior defense officials as saying on Wednesday. But Jordan has not yet been consulted about the possible use of its bases, and Jordanian officials have criticized such a plan, according to the report. American planning in the event of an attack on the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein calls for air, land and naval forces to attack from three directions. Using Jordanian bases would...

Sunday, June 30, 2002 10:36 p.m. EDTPledge Ruling Certifies California as the Land of Fruits and Nuts NewsMax.com contributor Fr. Michael Reilly deconstructs the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling declaring the Pledge of Allegiance unconstitutional. The California federal court attacked the Pledge of Allegiance on the grounds that it established religion, a violation of the First Amendment, which is part of the Bill of Rights. Our Constitution is based on the concept of inalienable rights, rights which the government cannot take away. What makes those rights inalienable? According to the Declaration of Independence, man is endowed by...

Sunday June 30, 2002; 12:21 a.m. EDTReport: 'Lily Whites' Recruited to Carry Out OKC Bombing A congressional task force investigating the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing had information suggesting that Islamic plotters recruited two "lily whites" - non-Middle Easterners with no connection to prior terrorist activity - to carry out the attack ultimately perpetrated by Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, according to a report broadcast late Saturday. Terrorism expert Yoseff Bodansky discussed the previously secret evidence obtained by Congress during an interview with Fox News Channel's Rita Cosby. COSBY: I'm going to read some information that we obtained here at...

Real interest rates are one of the most important macro-market drivers yet they are often overlooked in analysis.  We examine the current real interest rate scene in the US.       As summer officially begins in the northern hemisphere, the financial markets are increasingly taking a back seat to the wonderful joys of summertime.  When compared to beach vacations, backyard barbecues, and exploring the great outdoors, the endless stream of information blasted worldwide by the markets seems much less alluring.   In the States and Europe, the markets often seem to slip into suspended animation during the prime summer...

The Open Source Russell Pavlicek Shred that paper AN OPINION IS a funny thing. Two intelligent individuals can look at a set of facts and develop two very different opinions about the matter. As someone who writes about his opinions, I hear from reasonable people with differing opinions every week. As the saying goes, it's all good. What annoys me, however, is a professionally written opinion that seems to ignore more facts than it acknowledges. Such is the case with a curious work titled "Opening the Open Source Debate," issued by a think tank called the Alexis de Tocqueville...

<p>Two years ago, IT vendors and other proponents of the controversial H1-B visa program were generating about as much sound and fury as a raging storm on the high seas. Lobbying groups such as TechNet insisted the chronic IT skills shortage would sink the industry unless the annual numbers of H1-B visas—allowing foreign workers to take positions temporarily in the United States—were substantially increased. They won, and the number of H1-B visas available to employers annually was increased to 195,000, triple the number available before 1998.</p>

With only 17 months on the job, it seems that the President is finally growing a pair - not just on one front, but two and both in the Middle East. The first front is where it pertains to the issue of Yasser Arafat. After banging his head repeatedly to the point of near-unconsciousness, the President has finally come to the conclusion that Arafat has got to go. He may not have used those exact words, but in making it clear that the Palestinian Authority must hold elections by the end of the year, it sent an unmistakable message that...

Portfolio StrategyBuy Stocks NowKenneth L. Fisher, 07.08.02, 12:00 AM ET Even if it's not the start of a real bull market, the rebound should last long enough to vaporize Wall Street's emerging consensus that there can't be a big up-move soon. It is finally time to get fully invested, although maybe only temporarily. Investors have dug down into pessimism too far for stocks not to pop upward nicely. My shift may surprise recent readers, who have seen me unremittingly bearish for 18 months. But bear markets last only so long. Why now? Among the most basic market rules is that...

Mr. President, PLEASE listen to this Democrat! http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com | The U.S. gives financial aid to friends AND enemies. That we taxpayers give money to our nation's friends is easy to understand. That we give it to those who hate us, despise us and who cheer when airliners crash into our buildings is not. New York Congressman Anthony Weiner, a Democrat from Brooklyn and Queens, is saying it again. The U.S. should cut off financial aid to Yasser Arafat's band of hoodlums. We should stop feeding the dog that bites us at every opportunity. As the Congressman points out, American...