Free Republic

Liberal blogger David R. Mark recently wrote, “Those that call themselves ‘compassionate conservatives’ would never think to touch their fat-cat supporters. It’s much easier to spin the ‘economic benefits’ of helping huge corporations fatten their bottom lines.” Liberal academic Thomas Frank, in his book What’s The Matter With Kansas?, claims that the corporate world “wields the Republican Party as its personal political sidearm.” Both Mark and Frank express a common view that corporations are major funders of the political right, and that when corporations make contributions to nonprofit advocacy groups they give to groups on the right because those groups...

LAKELAND -- A person died on State Road 33 north of I-4 early today when the vehicle he or she was in was hit by a stolen pickup truck, according to police reports. After receiving reports that a woman stole a pickup from a man in Lakeland, officers spotted the truck and chased it. Police cruisers ended up driving into stop sticks that had been placed on the road to stop the pickup. The incident resulted in the closing of State Road 33 this morning from I-4 to Tomkow Road.

Police refused to chase a thief who had stolen a moped because the youth was not wearing a helmet, the victim said yesterday. Max Foster, 18, said officers told him they feared being sued if the thief fell off the moped and injured himself. The thief escaped on the £1,200 moped, which was only insured third party. Mr Foster, of Coleford, Somerset, uses his Gilera 180cc to commute to work in Bath. He was staying at a friend's house in Bath on Tuesday night when he was woken at 1.45am by the sound of his machine being ridden outside. He...

BAGHDAD — U.S. and Iraqi forces zeroed in on Abu Musab al-Zarqawi over two weeks, tracking his spiritual adviser to the terrorist leader's doorstep and unleashing the airstrike that included a bomb equipped in Tucson that killed them, U.S. and Iraqi officials said Thursday. The first bomb used in the airstrike was a laser-guided Paveway GBU-12, Lt. Gen. Gary North, the top U.S. air commander in the region, told Reuters. Raytheon makes the bomb's guidance systems in Tucson

This year, 2006, is the 50th Anniversary of Walt Disney Picture's classic "The Great Locomotive Chase" starring Fess Parker and Jeffrey Hunter. This movie was made during the golden age of Hollywood when films were still made for the entire family. When it comes to locomotives many of us are children at heart. Don't you love a good story about the bygone era of passenger trains that once were America's fastest way to travel? America's most famous locomotive "The General" is now home at the Kennesaw, Georgia Civil War Museum. Kennesaw, Georgia is is just 45 miles from Atlanta. Located...

China Construction Bank may not know that a security vulnerability on its server has been exploited Criminals appear to have hacked a Chinese bank's server and are using it to host phishing sites to steal personal data from customers of eBay Inc. and a major U.S. bank., according to Internet services company Netcraft Ltd. It may be the first scheme that uses one bank's infrastructure to exploit another bank, said Paul Mutton, an Internet services developer for Netcraft, based in Bath, England. A user of Netcraft's free phishing toolbar reported receiving a suspicious e-mail, Mutton said. The e-mail led to...

WASHINGTON - Heartland communities with jobs to offer are becoming magnets for Hispanics, who now account for half the nation's population growth. Hispanics in the U.S. — both recent immigrants and people born here — are moving beyond traditional ports of entry in large numbers, boosting the populations of states such as North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia and Indiana, a study by the Brookings Institution shows. And they are heading not only to big cities; many are moving to historically white, non-Hispanic suburbs, said William Frey, a demographer at Brookings and the author of the study, which is being released Tuesday....

Barry Wetcher/HBOEdie Falco as Carmela, the wife of Tony Soprano, who is played by James Gandolfini. HIGH on the wall of the otherwise-nondescript conference room inside the production offices of "The Sopranos" hangs a small, framed photograph of a man with his face half shadowed by a fedora. Ambling by in his lumbering gait, slowed by a slight limp from a recent leg injury, James Gandolfini stopped to take a look at the photo. "Who's that?" he asked. "Fellini," said David Chase. Federico Fellini might seem an odd choice to oversee the room where an American television series is...

TIKRIT, Iraq (Army News Service, Jan. 4, 2005) – U.S. Soldiers responding to an indirect fire attack against a coalition base near Balad killed one suspected terrorist and captured another Jan. 2. A coalition aircraft operating near Logistics Support Area Anaconda spotted two people running away from the site where the fire originated and helped guide a nearby patrol to the area. The 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division Soldiers quickly captured one suspect, but the other fled on foot. The man led the Soldiers on a two-hour long chase that finally ended when the Soldiers cornered him in...

The man killed by San Diego police after a moving gunbattle Thursday afternoon had a criminal past that included convictions for armed robbery and assault on a police officer, records show. Santino Juarez, 31, of Encanto was also wanted on two arrest warrants: for violating probation for a purse-snatch conviction in Chula Vista in 2003, and for a drunken-driving conviction July 28 in El Cajon. An undercover San Diego police detective was looking for Juarez in connection with the robbery warrant when he spotted him about 2 p.m. near the mobile-home park in Encanto where Juarez lived. The detective called...

Republicans increased their advantage in the state House of Representatives Oct. 13, when Democrat Rep. Cheryl Chase changed her party registration at a GOP-sponsored event in northwest Phoenix. “The once proud party I have always been a member of, including these last five years in the Legislature, has steadily become controlled by the liberal left and does not reflect the rural Arizona values that I hold dear and was elected to represent,” Ms. Chase said in a statement distributed to the media. The District 23 lawmaker cited Gov. Napolitano’s hard-line “end- justifies-the-means governance” as one of the main factors in...

WELCOME TO THE SECOND RACE IN THE CHASE FOR THE NEXTEL CUP.WE'RE IN DOVER AKA THE MONSTER MILE!! Here's the monster bridge with the best seats in the house which will rattle your brains out!! MBNA RacePoints 400 Nextel Cup TNT HDTV Sun. 12:30 p.m. Truck Race Las Vegas 350 SPEED Sat. 9 p.m. Busch Race Dover 200 TNT HDTV Sat. 1 p.m. MBNA RacePoints 400 Bud Pole Qualifying SPEED Fri. 3:10 p.m. All Times are ET

This thread is dedicated to everyone affected by the hurricane. God bless and keep them. Please help those who are suffering. And, as always please send your support for our troops who are protecting us. Race Schedule:Sony HD 500 NBC HDTV Sun. 7 p.m. Ameriquest 300 NBC HDTV Sat. 8:30 p.m. Sony HD 500 Bud Pole Qualifying - SPEED Sat. 5:20 p.m. Note: This is an impound race, practice is on Friday 6pm. All Times are ET

NEW YORK (Reuters) - JPMorgan Chase & Co. said on Monday it was investigating a credit card solicitation sent to a California man addressed as a "Palestinian Bomber." Kelly Presta, executive vice president at Chase Card Services, said in a statement the inappropriate address on the letter came from a mailing list Chase purchased from a vendor. Presta said the company's automatic screening procedures did not catch it. The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said Chase sent the solicitation to Sami Habbas, a Palestinian American who has lived in the United States for 51 years and served in the U.S....

Didn't a truck come up missing yesterday with thousands of pounds of fertilizer??

1.) Wilson Insisted That The Vice President’s Office Sent Him To Niger: Wilson Said He Traveled To Niger At CIA Request To Help Provide Response To Vice President’s Office. “In February 2002, I was informed by officials at the Central Intelligence Agency that Vice President Dick Cheney’s office had questions about a particular intelligence report. … The agency officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the story so they could provide a response to the vice president’s office.” (Joseph C. Wilson, Op-Ed, “What I Didn’t Find In Africa,” The New York Times, 7/6/03)

I-10 closed after pursuit that started in Ventura County ended in Alhambra

Just saw a police chase on Fox news. They cut from the video of the chase. Anyone have any updates. Wanted to watch the chase but Fox cut from it. ha.

A man suspected of abducting a 9-year-old girl led police on a chase Tuesday -- with the child in the car -- that ended when he crashed into an Arlington school bus on its way to Bailey Junior High School, police said. According to police, the girl was abducted Tuesday morning from east Arlington and was taken to a Grand Prairie apartment complex. A Grand Prairie police officer who was driving by noticed a disturbance between an adult and a child in a parked white Honda CRV. When the officer went to investigate, the driver of the car fled the...

HUMAN EVENTS has learned that a billboard blitz "thanking" Hollywood for the reelection of President Bush will be unveiled early next week. The advertisements feature the faces of liberal Hollywood icons Michael Moore, Whoopi Goldberg, Ben Affleck, Martin Sheen, Chevy Chase, Barbara Streisand, and Sean Penn, and offer thanks to Hollywood their help getting President Bush reelected. Two versions of the billboard were created, both "thanking" Hollywood -- the first for "4 more years" and the second for "W. Still President." Billboard creator Citizens United, a group that advocates a return to traditional American values, has purchased the use of...