Free Republic

Poor Sean Hannity Sean Hannity, a radio talk-show host and Fox News whiner, has a one-rut mind. Every criticism or dissent, no matter what the subject, the topic or the source, is a left-wing attack against his hero, George W. Bush. Well, what can you expect from an immature groupie? Every time he tries to think, his face reflects the pain of the effort. But he really showed his emptiness recently when he said that criticism of the United States failing to guard the Iraqi National Museum was — you guessed it — just left-wing soreheads who are mad that...

Choose The Right Gun If you saw the recent video of "Old Mr. Grump" shooting the "Lucky Lawyer" in Los Angeles, you can learn a valuable lesson about which firearm to choose for self-defense. The press rarely reports what kinds of guns are used in crimes, and usually gets it wrong when it tries. Nevertheless, I have concluded Mr. Grump used a .22-caliber pistol. Otherwise, the Lucky Lawyer would not have remained on his feet for so long. Now, a .22, a .25 and a .32 will kill you, provided the bullet strikes a vital organ. Sometimes the person will...

George Soros George Soros, the billionaire currency speculator, has set aside $15 million just to help defeat George W. Bush's re-election efforts. Soros, originally from Hungary, believes the Bush administration is dangerous and is leading us into perpetual war. He's spreading the money to various organizations committed to working against Bush's re-election. I don't know if he will get what he wants, but I tend to agree with him that the Bush administration seems committed to perpetual war. Bush has so loosely defined both terrorism and his war on terrorism that there is absolutely no way anyone will be able...

Dr. Dean And Dixie Dr. Howard Dean was born in New York City and has spent his life there and in Vermont. I guess he's about as Yankee a Yankee as you can get. Yet he reached out to Dixie and got burned by his fellow Democrats. The thing to note is that Dr. Dean first made his remark about wanting the votes of guys with Confederate decals on their pickup trucks at a meeting of national Democrats about three months ago. His remarks drew thunderous applause. It was only after he became a front-runner that his tag-along rivals decided...

Ricky Nelson Wasn't The Only "Poor Little Fool" By Chuck Baldwin Food For Thought From The Chuck Wagon November 7, 2003 The late Ricky Nelson had a smash hit with a song called, "Poor Little Fool." Well, it seems to me that Ricky spoke for a lot of us poor little fools! Take our illustrious conservative movement for example. The only people who are paid any attention are the "big" people. Unless your wallet is fat enough, or your church is large enough, or you happen to stumble upon fame and fortune by some quirk of fate, there isn't a...

Loans And Grants It's too bad Southern California isn't part of Iraq. If it were, then the federal aid it will get would be in the form of grants instead of loans. If Southern California were Israel, it could get $4 billion a year in grants without fires. Even so, it's better to be temporarily scorched Southern California than part of Iraq. Iraq doesn't have forest fires, but that's because there are no forests. Iraq has sandstorms instead. Israel is afflicted with perpetual war. It's sad to see so many lose their homes, but it's just nature. Southern California has...

Crime And Trivia I haven't written about the Laci Peterson murder case or the rape case involving Kobe Bryant for two reasons. One, the only things that should be legitimately reported about any criminal trial are the testimony of the witnesses under oath and the remarks of the judge and the attorneys inside the courtroom during the trial. Everything else is hearsay and gossip. Two, an ordinary crime and subsequent criminal trial do not affect anyone except the victim, the perpetrator and their families. Therefore, it should be of no interest to anyone else. Unless you are family or friend,...

A Lucky Year I am of the same generation as Sen. Bob Graham and Saddam Hussein. All of us in that generation were born at the tail end of the Great Depression, were children during World War II and came of age in the 1950s. The only good thing to say about Saddam is that he is pretty darn spry as a fugitive. I'm not sure that I could elude 146,000 Americans soldiers and who knows how many angry Iraqis for five months. Maybe swimming the Tigris River every year has kept him in better shape than he ever looked...

A Good-Tempered Man Several times I've heard television journalists complain that Howard Dean has to learn to control his temper. Actually, it is his temper that I find attractive. An honest man with sincere convictions will get angry when he hears lies. Some of our greatest presidents had ferocious tempers. George Washington, Andy Jackson and Harry Truman are three examples. You don't see other candidates getting angry because they are all phonies. Their so-called convictions are just campaign positions manufactured by their staffs. They don't really believe in anything except getting elected, so they really don't care what is said....

King Features Syndicate Inc.Charley Reese 10/06/2003 A Giant Among MidgetsLast week, television news shows took note of the deaths of Donald O'Connor, an actor-dancer; of George Plimpton, a high-toned journalist; and of some rock 'n' roll singer I'd never heard of. Completely missing from the shows I scanned was any mention at all of the death of a giant in this era of mental and moral midgets. I refer to Edward Said, a professor of literature at Columbia University; a Palestinian and a fearless champion of human rights; a musician and a music critic; and a writer of great note....

Perfumed PrinceI don't know Gen. Wesley Clark, but I have a good friend who does. My friend is, like Clark, a career Army officer who has retired.Essentially, my friend says that Clark is "the last guy in the world you want to see in the White House." He describes him as a "perfumed prince" who is so conceited he never admits he's wrong and treats subordinates like dirt. My friend, I should make clear, was never a subordinate of the general, so this is not a case of sour grapes.I'm sure you can find others who know Clark and...

Dangers Of War Here is a quotation from Reich Marshal Hermann Goering. It's a statement he made during the Nuremberg trials: "The people can always be brought to the bidding of leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country." Eric Margolis, an excellent journalist, quoted this in a recent column. While I can't verify the quote, I have no reason to doubt it. After all, it is one of those truths...

King Features Syndicate, Inc.Charley Reese 09/15/2003 A Good Economy The problem with many in Washington and the media is that their only definition of a "good economy" is statistical. The gross domestic product, however, does not tell us if we have a good economy. We can increase the GDP by going into ruinous debt or by crashing our cars or by buying a truckload of whiskey. Nor does the Dow Jones industrial average or any of the other stock-market indexes tell us if we have a good economy. The stock markets are akin to gambling casinos, where paper is bought...

Truth Is Scarce Some years ago, I gave up interviewing politicians. They will not tell the truth. Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., in his official campaign-opening speech recently, is a perfect illustration of the politician's aversion to truth. "I voted to allow the president to threaten the use of force," Kerry said, adding that it was the right decision. That's a lie. Kerry did not vote to allow the president to threaten force. He voted to authorize the president to use force. Why couldn't he just say that and add, "In retrospect, that was a mistake." No, Kerry is not going...

King Features Syndicate Inc.Charley Reese 09/10/2003 Let's Revive An Old Trait You might have noticed that, other than one column pointing out that Arnold Schwarzenegger, a successful businessman, is qualified to be a governor, I haven't written anything about the California recall election. That's because I don't live in California. And for all of us who don't live in California, it's none of our business. Minding our own business and not sticking our noses into other people's business is an old American trait now out of style. We need to bring it back. It's a very good rule that can...

Great New Book If you want to know what is really going on in President Bush's War on Terror, read "Terrorism and Tyranny: Trampling Freedom, Justice, and Peace to Rid the World of Evil," by James Bovard. What is so valuable about Bovard's work is that it is just plain, fact-based, footnoted reporting. He is not a polemicist, and you will find no shrill arguments, no straw men, no rants, no name-calling such as you find in most of the quickie political books that people grind out these days. Instead, you get a sober recitation of the facts set within...

See Through The Dust To help you see through the cloud of heifer dust that the Bush administration emits, I want to point out that in Iraq there are two separate and unrelated security problems. One is security for the Iraqi people against common criminals. As the occupying power, it's our obligation to provide it. We have failed miserably so far — though the situation seems to be getting somewhat better, thanks primarily to Iraqis who are taking matters into their own hands. The other problem is security for the occupation forces and their allies. We have failed miserably in...

King Features Syndicate, Inc.Charley Reese Missed The Point09/01/2003 The people on both sides of the flap over a monument to the Ten Commandments in the Alabama Supreme Court building have missed the point entirely. It's not about state religion or about acknowledging God. It's about jurisdiction. There is nothing in the U.S. Constitution that gives a federal judge the authority to say how the state of Alabama should decorate the lobby of its courthouse. If you will read the First Amendment, you will note that it states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the...

Keep The Lights On Two things all of us should learn from the big blackout: (1) We are addicted to electricity and cannot function without it. (2) Politicians have neglected America's infrastructure, which — like everything else — ages, wears out or gets outgrown. When Thomas Alva Edison invented the electric light bulb, the primary use of electricity was to provide illumination. My mother remembered the first time she ever saw an electric light bulb. She looked at it with awe and wonder. If illumination were still the only use we made of electricity, then power losses would be a...

Ashcroft's Lack Of Credibility Attorney General John Ashcroft has launched a publicity campaign to save the USA Patriot Act, a misnamed piece of legislation if ever there was. It should be called the Anti-Bill of Rights Act. Ashcroft is out on the hustings because opposition to the Patriot Act, passed hurriedly in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attack, is itself coming under attack. More than 134 local governments have passed resolutions denouncing it. The American Civil Liberties Union is challenging a portion of it in federal court. Ashcroft is denying that the federal government has or will abuse the...