Free Republic

BAGHDAD (AFP) - Moqtada al-Sadr's militiamen Tuesday battled troops in four Iraqi cities on Tuesday, including the capital, as the hardline Shiite cleric threatened a countrywide campaign of civil revolt. Heavy clashes broke out between Sadr's Mahdi Army fighters in the southern oil city of Basra, killing at least seven people and wounding 48, and in Kut and Hilla, both south of Baghdad, officials said. As evening fell, Mahdi Army fighters fought with Iraqi and US forces in their Sadr City bastion in eastern Baghdad for the first time since last October, a security official and witnesses told AFP. Troops...

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr's Mehdi Army militia ordered shops to close in some Baghdad neighborhoods on Monday in what they said was the start of a "civil disobedience campaign." The show of force by the feared militia, which the U.S. military once called the greatest threat to peace in Iraq, alarmed residents, but leaders of Sadr's political bloc in parliament stressed that it was a peaceful protest. The militia has kept a low profile since Sadr called a ceasefire last August and extended it last month, a move U.S. commanders say has helped to sharply reduce...

When Georgia’s Department of Agriculture held its hearing a couple weeks ago on a proposal to require that all raw milk be dyed charcoal, raw-goat-milk producer Bob Hayles was the first to stand up and speak out against the regulation. Dozens of others followed him, and the agriculture agency decided shortly after the session not to implement the regulation. While many farmers and consumers feel they scored a major victory, Bob doesn’t agree. “Everyone thinks we won something important. But all we won was a battle, and it was a small battle.” The event convinced him that a much more...

An American Legion commander in California says he and other veterans will defy a newly imposed ban on flag-folding recitations that include references to God. During thousands of military burials, Veterans Administration employees and volunteers have folded the American flag 13 times and recited the significance of every fold to survivors. The fourth fold, for example, refers to God's "divine guidance." The 11th fold glorifies "the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob." And the 12th fold glorifies "God the Father, the Son and Holy Ghost." Now the National Cemetery Association has made a decision to ban flag-folding recitations by VA...

Makah tribesman "feeling kind of proud" he shot whale  01:20 PM PDT on Monday, September 10, 2007  KING5.com Staff and Associated Press Makah tribe members shoot, harpoon gray whale NEAH BAY, Wash. - The Coast Guard and National Marine Fisheries Service says the California gray whale killed by rogue whalers off Neah Bay could refloat as it decays. If it is found, the carcass would likely be evidence in a case against Makah tribal members. Coast Guard spokesman Shawn Eggert says buoys were cut from the whale when it sank Saturday, but it still carries a harpoon. National Marine...

Many fear effort to legalize new hunt may be derailed NEAH BAY -- One day after a group of frustrated Makah tribal members asserted treaty and historic rights by harpooning and killing a protected gray whale, tribal leaders condemned the hunt and vowed to prosecute the men. "Their action was a blatant violation of our law, and they will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law," said Debbie Wachendorf, the Makah Tribal Council vice chairwoman. "The Makah Tribal Council denounces the actions of those who took it on themselves to hunt a whale without the authority of the...

Today: September 09, 2007 at 5:5:7 PDT Calif. Gray Whale Shot With Machine Gun NEAH BAY, Wash. (AP) - An injured California gray whale was swimming out to sea Saturday after being shot with a machine gun off the western tip of Washington state, officials said. Coast Guard Petty Officer Kelly Parker said five people believed to be members of the Makah Tribe shot and harpooned the whale Saturday morning. The extent of the whale's injuries were not immediately known. Tribe members were being held by the Coast Guard but had not been charged, said Mark Oswell, a spokesman for...

A gray whale died Saturday night, several hours after Makah tribal members harpooned and shot the animal. The men shot the whale without federal permission. Coast Guard Petty Officer Kelly Parker confirmed the harpooning by five tribal members. The whale was one mile east of Neah Bay, in the Strait of Juan de Fuca, about a half-mile off shore The Coast Guard detained the five tribal members and questioned them, said Mark Oswell, a National Marine Fisheries Service spokesman. They later were released to the tribe, who placed them into custody at the tribal jail, according to the mother of...

But think about it. There are two components to Jesus' words. We are to "render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's," but we are also to "render unto God the things that are God's." Well, everything ultimately belongs to God. But, most of all, this injunction by Jesus instructs us that government laws cannot trump God's laws – ever. If government commands you to do evil, as a Christian you must resist. There is no alternative. Citing the "render unto Caesar" line is an apologetic for accountability to God – nothing more, nothing less.

<p>As Congress wrangles over immigration, the debate is moot in major cities across the country.</p> <p>The reason: "Sanctuary" cities from Los Angeles to New York will never check a person's immigration status regardless of what Washington passes.</p> <p>Consider Houston. Its police department's Web site is crystal clear -- in Spanish and English.</p>

I'M SIPPING A Blue Moon ale in a Philadelphia bar, Janis Joplin is wailing about Bobby McGee and I'm thinking a smoke would go great about now. I take out one of Baby Cakes' Parliament Lights and fire it up.I'm smoking in a bar in Philadelphia and nobody says, "Boo!"There are 20 other people, smokers and nonsmokers, hanging out, enjoying themselves, not doing any harm to anyone (except maybe themselves). The bar is spacious, the NCAA is on the TV screens, beer pennants hang from the ceiling, and through the large windows I see rain falling.The owner is sitting at...

The left-wing candidate in Mexico's disputed election, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, and his backers are occupying the capital's main square and avenues. Mr Lopez Obrador on Sunday called on his adherents to paralyse Mexico City until every vote was recounted. Official results from the 2 July vote gave victory to the conservative Felipe Calderon by half a percentage point. Mr Lopez Obrador alleges vote counts were rigged - but EU monitors have said they found no irregularities. The country's electoral court has until the end of August to rule on a recount.

You know, after the last month or so of watching our Administration Senate and House of Representitives muck up offshore drilling, the war, immigration and spending, many are suggesting to not vote for the RINOs or, at best, call your US Rep.I doubt that will do any good. They haven't listened so farSo we have gays, illegals and who knows who taking to the streets to protest for THEIR rights.Is it time for us, Americans and Conservatives to hit the bricks?I feel out of ammo on any other way to get GWB and the Congress' attention. I only have about...

<p>Thanks to John McCain, Free Republic will shut down tomorrow at high noon for 30 days. No non government approved electioneering messages may be transmitted over the internet for the 30 days immediately preceding a primary election.</p> <p>That is all.</p>

Former Playboy Playmate Anna Nicole Smith took her 11-year-old family feud to the Supreme Court yesterday. But another case about sex and deception that the Court decided yesterday will surely matter more to most Americans. We're talking about the 8-0 decision (new Justice Samuel Alito didn't participate) barring the use of federal extortion and racketeering laws, or RICO statutes, to prevent public antiabortion protests. The case of Scheidler v. NOW goes back nearly 20 years, to a suit by the National Organization for Women to harass abortion opponents who demonstrate in front of abortion clinics. RICO was designed to go...

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — French Quarter bar owners say the Big Easy's soul can never be restored if a midnight-to-6 a.m. curfew continues to be enforced, so they plan to challenge it the only way New Orleans knows how: with a party. Jim Monaghan said his Molly's at the Market bar will return Friday to its normal operating hours of 10 a.m. to 6 a.m. regardless of a curfew police have enforced more aggressively over the past week or so. His goal, he said, is to demonstrate that New Orleans is on the mend and it's open for business. "We'll...

Maori have every right to enjoy smoking, gambling and eating fatty foods if they want to - and Maori health workers who say otherwise are just brainwashed "house niggers". That's according to the authors of a controversial new book on Maori health published by one of South Auckland's largest Maori health providers. The Kotahitanga Community Trust, a taxpayer-funded charitable organisation in Counties Manukau, provides health care for more than 5000 patients - 4000 of whom are Maori. The book, Maori Health, was co-authored by trust chairman Peter Caccioppoli and Rhys Cullen, a GP at the trust's Papakura practice and published...

Have you heard of Lisa Fithian? A veteran of the Seattle WTO riots and scores of other protests, she’s been with Sheehan from the start. A notice on Cindy Sheehan's website, meetwithcindy.org, asks for donors who might be able to offer a camper, or an RV, or just money, for Sheehan's upcoming cross-country tour, scheduled to begin Wednesday in Crawford, Texas, and end in Washington at the big antiwar demonstration scheduled for September 24. At the end of the note, readers with something to offer are asked to "please call organizer Lisa Fithian." To anyone familiar with the world of...

Judge George Greer ruled that the State of Florida has no right to take custody of Terri Schiavo, which ruling came hours after an appeal by Terri's parents to re-insert the feeding tube was refused by the U.S. Supreme Court. Meanwhile, another hearing was scheduled tonight before US District Judge James D. Whittemore .. the same judge who previously heard and denied the request subsequent to the 'de novo' intention of the law past last weekend by the Congress and signed by President Bush, in an effort to confirm that no stone was left unturned before Terri would endure legally...

STARVATION: DAY 8 Jeb Bush not likely to ride to rescue Florida governor indicates he won't defy court order Posted: March 25, 2005 1:00 a.m. Eastern © 2005 WorldNetDaily.com Those hoping Florida Gov. Jeb Bush will step forward to save Terri Schiavo from imminent, court-ordered starvation death are likely to be disappointed, based on his comments to a group of reporters following county court Judge George Greer's ruling against the state's effort to take custody of the brain-injured woman at the center of a worldwide euthanasia controversy. While Bush reiterated his motivation to save Schiavo, based on new evidence that...

Pinellas Park police Lt. Kevin Riley, standing upper right, prepares to arrest members of the Keys family as they were attempting to bring Terri Schiavo water Wednesday morning, March 23, 2005 outside the Woodside Hospice in Pinellas Park, Fla. The Keys family, of Burnet, Tex., kneeling, from left, Josie, 14, Gabriel, 10, Chris, the children's father, and Cameron 12, were all taken into custody. Galen Keys, upper left, the children's mother looks on, but was not arrested.The mother insists it was the children's idea: "I am proud of them," said the boys' mother Geilen Keys from Texas, who was not...

WHAT BETTER WAY TO SPEND EASTER WEEK??? Everyone GO and try to give Terri water in person. They've already arrested one Catholic worker. Four other Saturday or Sunday. Are there only five trying? Imagine if by tonight tens and hundreds of THOUSANDS are showing up being arrested as they try to give this innocent woman water. And tomorrow. And the next day.

It is time to stop taking and to fight back, Washington State Freepers!!

The topic sentence of this AP article would lead one to believe the radicals have a relatively mild-mannered protest planned for President Bush’s second inaugural parade. They are going to wear plain clothes and then turn their backs on the president. Oh, he’ll just be devastated! But a couple of paragraphs down, reporter Donna Cassata contradicts herself, drastically: Among planned events are an anti-war rally and three-mile march to the White House, a massive bike ride similar to those that disrupted traffic in New York City before the Republican National Convention, and a "die-in" to remind the nation of more...

College student says he was trying to expose security weaknesses ... A North Carolina college student who hid box cutters on airplanes to expose weaknesses in airline security was sentenced Thursday to two years of supervised probation and fined $500. Nathaniel Heatwole of Damascus, Md., a student at Guilford College in Greensboro, N.C., also must serve 100 hours of community service and reimburse his parents for up to $500 in legal expenses under the sentence imposed by U.S. District Judge Paul Grimm.

Barbara Herrera (left) and Sarah Hubbard, a San Diego County deputy sheriff, were married last month in San Francisco. The county doesn't recognize the marriage. Barbara Herrera (left) and Sarah Hubbard, a San Diego County deputy sheriff, were married last month in San Francisco. The county doesn't recognize the marriage. ENCINITAS – Sarah Hubbard, 39, and Barbara Herrera, 42, have built a good life in the 18 years they have been together. They've raised four kids, bought a house and built a business. They see themselves as a happy ordinary American family with an annual pass to Disneyland. But...

80-Year-Old Charged with Assault Maydell Purvis Unmasked Screaming Aggressor at March 6 Rally Maydell Purvis charged with pulling mask off protester at March 6 rally. Wearing masks at a public event is illegal in many jurisdictions, Tucson Police Go After Brave American When angry protesters screamed in her face, Maydell Purvis, an eighty-year-old resident of Tucson, had enough. She reached up and pulled the down the mask of the aggressor. Now she has been charged with assault by the Tucson Police Department (see complaint). She must appear in court on March 17. Glenn Spencer, president of American Border Patrol said...

NEW YORK - The mayor of the nation's largest city says same-sex couples deserve the same rights in civil unions that straight couples enjoy in marriage, but he will continue to enforce New York state's ban on gay marriage. Mayor Michael Bloomberg's statement, reversing his previous refusal to discuss his position on gay marriage, came the same week that dozens of same-sex couples seeking marriage licenses were turned away by the City Clerk, and that state Attorney General Eliot Spitzer held that gay and lesbian marriages are prohibited by state law. Bloomberg said in an interview that he goes "back-and-forth"...

I watched Gavin Newsom, outlaw-in-chief of San Francisco, on "Larry King Live" last week. With his slicked-back hair and silk tie, the 36-year-old mayor is the perfect model for the Radical Left's Extreme Makeover.Out: Drug-addled, draft card-burning, Molotov cocktail-tossing, campus protesters of the 1960s.In: Merlot-sipping, gay marriage license-peddling, cocktail party-throwing, pretty boys in elected office.Mayor Newsom looks a little like Ben Affleck and talks a lot like Bill Clinton. He's got a trophy wife with three names (former lingerie model Kimberly Guilfoyle Newsom) and a five-point government plan for everything from renewable energy ("Expedite implementation of San Francisco's solar energy...

Lawlessness and civil disobedience Posted: March 3, 20041:00 a.m. Eastern © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com The radical nature of the ongoing confrontation over homosexual marriage is obscured by the subject matter. Gay couples are common in large, urban areas, so their public affection hardly causes a ripple in many parts of America, but other parts of the country are scandalized. The debate over homosexuality in general, and gay marriage in particular, is also difficult to separate from the debate over religion in public life. There is such intense anger on both sides of the issue that debates flare suddenly into shouting matches. The issue...

NEW PALTZ, N.Y. (AP) -- The mayor of the town of New Paltz has been charged with 19 criminal counts for marrying same-sex couples. New Paltz Mayor Jason West said last Thursday it was his moral duty to marry homosexual couples. He issued marriage certificates to 25 gay couples. On Tuesday, Ulster County District Attorney Donald Williams lodged 19 counts of ``solemnizing a marriage without a license'' against West.

Four days after presiding over a slew of same sex marriages in his quaint Hudson Valley village, the mayor of New Paltz today was charged with 19 violations of New York's domestic relations law, injecting the debate over gay marriages in the state with increasing drama and urgency.

Ulster County District Attorney charged the Mayor of New Paltz New York with 19 counts of solemnizing a wedding without a license.

When San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom defied state law by allowing same-sex marriage licenses, a New York Times profile reported him sporting "a wide grin," "describing his motives as pure and principled," and cited his "business acumen, money, good looks and friends in the right places." But when Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore also defied the law -- by installing a Ten Commandments display in his public building -- a Times profile said that "civil liberties groups accused Justice Moore of turning a courthouse into a church," while allowing that he had also become "an Alabama folk hero." On the...

Operation Rescue to Law Enforcement: Read 'Em Their Rights and Take Them Away! 3/1/04 2:48:00 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- To: National Desk Contact: Troy Newman, 316-841-1700; or Cheryl Sullenger, 619-277-0725, both of Operation Rescue West Web: http://www.operationrescue.org WICHITA, Kansas, March 1 /U.S. Newswire/ -- The nation's leading abortion provider, Planned Parenthood, is intentionally violating the rule of law by failing to comply with the Department of Justice's lawful request for records, according to Operation Rescue West. Six Planned Parenthood organizations, including the Kansas and San Diego affiliates have refused to comply with Justice Department subpoenas requesting records related to late-term abortions....

Wedding Bells On Hold In New Paltz Gay Couples Rally For Licenses In New York City UPDATED: 9:32 AM EST March 1, 2004 NEW PALTZ, N.Y. -- More than 500 gay couples who have signed up for marriage licenses in New Paltz will have to wait until this weekend to tie the knot. Mayor Jason West said Monday he is overwhelmed by the number of people inquiring about getting married, but he won't be able to perform any more weddings until Saturday. State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer said he would not seek an emergency court injunction to stop West...

New Paltz, New York-AP) Feb. 28, 2004 - First San Francisco, now New Paltz. It didn't take long for the word to spread about the gay marriages that were being performed in the New York village that sits along the State Thruway about 75 miles north of New York City. More than 500 couples are now on a waiting list for Mayor Jason West to marry them. He officiated over 25 such marriages Friday and vows to continue them. West insists he broke no law. He says he obeyed the state constitution, and his oath of office. That issue, however,...

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - San Francisco, at the center of a heated national debate over the issue of same-sex marriage, would stop gay and lesbian weddings if a court ruled the city was breaking state law, the city mayor said on Saturday. "If and when a court makes a decision that we are breaking the law then I think at that point it's the right thing to do to stop," Mayor Gavin Newsom told Reuters. Newsom has been defiant since ordering the city to allow gays and lesbians to marry despite criticism by President Bush (news - web sites) and...

Local officials say they won’t — or can’t — follow San Francisco’s lead More than 3,200 couples have been married in San Francisco since Mayor Gavin Newsom instructed city clerks to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples two weeks ago. While local officials around the country, including Chicago’s Mayor Richard Daley, have expressed tentative support for the idea of issuing gay marriage licenses, officials in the Washington area say they have no plans to take Newsom’s approach. Tony Bullock, communications director to District Mayor Anthony Williams, said that his office will not follow San Francisco’s lead and begin issuing same-sex...

<p>February 27, 2004 -- ALBANY - Gay marriage comes to New York today as four couples are set to be wed in the upstate village of New Paltz.</p> <p>Jason West, the 26-year-old Green Party mayor of the Hudson Valley college town, said he had a "moral obligation" to preside over same-sex nuptials, which he'll conduct in a local bed-and-breakfast.</p>

For any man today who thinks and desires the capacity to unrestrictedly apply the conclusions of his mind, the scope of his current externally-imposed confinement is colossal and multifaceted. The government of this country has usurped almost every sphere of human activity, shackling creative entrepreneurial innovators through “antitrust” laws, which restrict the amount of market share a business may through its owners’ skill and the quality of its product acquire. It has erected barriers to the advancement of thoughtful freethinkers by the imposition of affirmative action initiatives that prevent many of them from acquiring education and jobs for faults not...

Conservative Talk Show host Joe Crummey is taking calls concerning the latest news about the grocery store lock-out and strike. Union officials were in Los Angeles yesterday to discuss current negotiations. Joe Crummey believes the grocery store strikers are being misled by their Union. He suggests that workers re-read their contract. Page 12 of their contract says that workers get $4.04 (company paid insurance benefit per hour) for every hour they work. Mentions also that civil disobedience has now been suggested by a sympathetic union supporter.

<p>ITHACA -- Four area youths are scheduled to be sentenced in the Town of Lansing Court Tuesday for participating in an antiwar demonstration held last year at a military recruiter's office.</p> <p>Marie De Mott Grady, 17, Oona Grady DeFlaun, 18, Anna Grady Flores, 17, and Anna Ritter, 17, were convicted by Lansing Town Court Justice William Burin on charges of third-degree criminal trespass, a class B misdemeanor. The charges were brought against them for trespassing Dec. 21, 2002, at the military recruiter's office at the Cayuga Mall in Lansing.</p>

<p>Three miles off the Florida coast in April 2002, two Greenpeace activists clambered from an inflatable rubber speedboat onto a cargo ship. They were detained before they could unfurl a banner, spent the weekend in custody and two months later were sentenced to time served for boarding the ship without permission.</p>

Those Ministers Who Say Judge Moore Acted Improperly Need To Tear Daniel Chapter Six Out Of Their Bibles! By Chuck Baldwin Food For Thought From The Chuck Wagon August 29, 2003 I have listened to minister after minister publicly rebuke Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore saying, as a Christian, he should have obeyed federal judge Myron Thompson's unlawful order to remove a Ten Commandments monument from the Alabama Judicial Building. Those ministers need to reread Daniel chapter six. Daniel was a government official in the court of King Darius. In fact, Daniel was the second-in-command answering only to...

Marc Emery, former London pot activist and bookstore owner, is coming home today to light up at a familiar place -- the steps of the London police station. Emery, now of Vancouver, grabbed headlines in the 1990s with unsuccessful stunts to get arrested for smoking pot and selling books on illegal drugs in front of the police station. Today, the ex-owner of City Lights bookstore plans to smoke up as part of his Summer of Legalization tour, says Cannabis Culture, a magazine he publishes. But with the law on pot possession now hazy, it's likely Emery won't be busted. "Simple...

As defenders of "10 Commandments judge" Roy Moore continue their vigil at the Alabama judicial building, a prominent evangelical leader is urging his 5 million radio listeners nationwide to head to Montgomery in a show of support. "It's not just an Alabama issue, and it's certainly not just (about) Justice Moore," said Dr. James Dobson, founder and chairman of Colorado-based Focus on the Family. Roy Moore speaking to supporters (Photo: Wsfa.com) "There's much more at stake here," Dobson told listeners yesterday. "This is part of a larger plan to remove every vestige of faith or reverence for God from the...

Civil Disobedience Is Consistent With Christian Conduct And With American History By Chuck Baldwin Food For Thought From The Chuck Wagon August 26, 2003 While Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore's refusal to remove a Ten Commandments display from the Alabama Judicial Building in Montgomery is not, in strict terms, civil disobedience, many people see it that way. Actually, the federal judge who ordered the monument's removal, Myron Thompson, and those who support him are guilty of breaking the law! The U.S. Constitution prohibits the federal government from interfering with the state's or the individual's right to express or...

Even the liberal media is now reporing that 100's of resistance believers are now camped out for the week with the numbers growing by the hour.