Free Republic

“According to reports” – in other words Nick had a few spare minutes over breakfast, trawled Google News then regurgitated stuff he picked up from a publisher’s PR blurb and a hit piece from the New York Daily News. Lurid allegations by a serious author….please Mr Allen…I think you might have been snorting something white and powdery yourself.

The Daily Telegraph, based on information acquired by the Wikileaks organization, as follows: Al-Qaeda is on the verge of producing radioactive weapons after sourcing nuclear material and recruiting rogue scientists to build "dirty" bombs, according to leaked diplomatic documents.

Although Rush Limbaugh doesn't actually work from a bunker, he does have a bunker mentality. His studio is on the third floor of a (purposefully) anonymous building 100 yards off the white sands of Palm Beach, Florida, and about a mile from his gated mansion (the one next to Chuck Norris's). Along with the Gulfstream jet (cost: $54 million), fleet of sports cars and eight-year contract, worth $400 million, this mansion is his reward for being the most listened-to talk-radio host in America, a title he has held for 20 years. But it is also his compensation. Professional Right-wing controversialists...

World dispatch -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- US thinktanks give lessons in foreign policy Brian Whitaker reports on the network of research institutes whose views and TV appearances are supplanting all other experts on Middle Eastern issues Monday August 19, 2002 A little-known fact about Richard Perle, the leading advocate of hardline policies at the Pentagon, is that he once wrote a political thriller. The book, appropriately called Hard Line, is set in the days of the cold war with the Soviet Union. Its hero is a male senior official at the Pentagon, working late into the night and battling almost single-handedly to rescue...

I should seriously write a book called, The Idiots Guide To Not Thinking Seriously About Islam. It’s hard to find a subject where mushy thinking is more in vogue – where political correctness conquers reality more thoroughly. People actually are afraid to think seriously on the subject, because the logical conclusions are too frightening for many to contemplate. And so, there’s no place where comfortable clichés are more readily deployed. Probably the most glaring illustration of inanity here were recent comments by his Holiness, the Dalai Lama. On leaving a meeting with Pope Benedict XVI, the leader of Tibetan Buddhists...

I was wondering why the antics of world leaders at the United Nations General Assembly seemed so familiar last week. Then I realised. It was just like a university faculty meeting. Extravagant, long-winded denunciations of the president are what professors do, not politicians. Sure enough, the Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez could not resist brandishing a book by Noam Chomsky – the America-hating darling of all campus Lefties.

May 2003 was an uncomfortable time in Iraq. The President of the United States had just announced that combat operations were complete and force levels were beginning to be reduced, following the defeat of the Iraqi army in the field. But the vacuum that had been created by the toppling of the Ba'athist regime of Saddam Hussein had not been filled - and clearly the people needed some form of leadership after 35 years of one-party rule. That vacuum was made more severe by the removal of the Iraqi army and police, resulting in an outbreak of lawlessness that was...

In the end, it was the sheer preppie courtesy of election night that hit home. When John Kerry defied the logic of the first results and declined to concede the election early yesterday morning, the engines of George W Bush's motorcade were revving and ready to whisk the re-elected President to a public stage to claim victory. But aides told him it would look bad, and might seem "divisive", and perhaps not the sort of thing one Yale man does to another. So Mr Bush held back, and gave his opponent more time to ponder the irrefutable arithmetic of the...

Since so few readers of The Telegraph have a vote in Tuesday's presidential election, it might seem impertinent or redundant for this newspaper to express a preference in the knife-edge contest between George W Bush and John Kerry. But the economic, military and diplomatic power of the United States is so great - and its links with this country so intimate - that it is important to ask which of the candidates would govern America in a way which better served the British national interest. Last year, Britain's exports to the US were worth more than £29 billion; American firms...

It is ironic that the German publisher whose interest in The Daily Telegraph prompted Richard Desmond's outburst was once shut down by the Nazis and later became dedicated to reconciliation between his nation and the Jews. Before he became one of the most influential newspaper publishers in Germany, the late Axel Springer learned his trade at the Altonaer Nachrichten, a small paper near Hamburg. In 1941, it was shut down for failing to comply with Nazi standards. The details of Mr Springer's life were not directly attacked by Mr Desmond this week when the owner of the Daily Express began...

One of the proprietors-designate of the Daily Telegraph said yesterday that the newspaper could shift its political allegiance and no longer be the house organ of the Conservative party. David Barclay, one of the Barclay twins who have concluded a dramatic purchase of the controlling shares in the paper, said yesterday that the venerable rightwing publication would no longer automatically support Michael Howard and his team.

George Galloway yesterday launched an appeal to fund his high court libel battle against two newspapers that claimed he received money from Saddam Hussein's regime. The beleaguered Labour MP urged supporters and sympathisers to back his court action against the Daily Telegraph and the Christian Science Monitor over their allegations, which were based on documents purportedly written by the Iraqi security service. Mr Galloway, MP for Glasgow Kelvin, vehemently denies the claims. He said he "didn't have any choice" but to sue if he was to clear his name, but he was unable personally to finance a defamation case that...

Lawyers for The Daily Telegraph are to ask the American government to grant them access to Tariq Aziz to try to secure vital evidence in their forthcoming libel battle with George Galloway MP. Mr Aziz, the former Iraqi deputy prime minister and foreign minister who gave himself up to US forces yesterday, is named in Iraqi documents that the newspaper claims it obtained from the the country's Foreign Ministry last week. The newspaper alleges that Mr Galloway had struck a deal with Mr Aziz for the receipt of three million barrels of oil every six months, of which the MP's...

The Daily Star talks of our "brave heroes" - the SAS. The paper claims that members of the elite group of troops are already on the streets of Baghdad. Oh and there is a picture of a girl in a bikini.The Sun shows a British tank poised to attck Baghdad with the Allied army set to do battle with Saddam Hussein's elite Republican Guard. It uses the headline: "Saddam's Last Stand."The Daily Express is also looking at the main push towards Baghdad. It uses a picture of allied troops ready to go over the top.US and British warplanes, guided by...

The Daily Star claims Iraq executed a number of American prisoners of war in "cold blood". It also advertises its "Oscars Special" with a picture of Carmen Elektra."God Help Them" is the headline on the front of the Daily Express. It refers to the American prisoners of war that Iraq paraded on TV. It also claims a number of prisoners who were killed were shot in the head.The Sun also looks at the plight of the US prisoners of war being held in Iraq. It says they are being "Held At The Mercy Of Savages".The Daily Mirror continues with its...

Dramatic pictures have been coming out of Iraq since the bombing campaign began. The Sun carries perhaps the most dramatic yet - capturing the moment the "shock and awe" campaign began.The anti-war Mirror puts it another way. It describes last night's attack, which was beamed across the world as it happened, as "America's night of shame".The cruise missile blitz is captured in the two detailed pictures by the Daily Mail, which shows smoke pouring out of one large building.The Daily Express opts to carry a picture of Iraqi troops surrendering in southern Iraq, although the paper's picture desk has ignored...

The Sun reports on what it calls the "Battle For Basra". It says 10,000 British troops stormed into action to seize the key city in southern Iraq.The Mirror carries a full-page picture of smoke rising from a missile strike in Baghdad with the headline "Mass Destruction".The Star also leads with a picture of a burning Baghdad and says allies have blitzed Saddam's palaces and troops have warned: "You ain't seen nothing yet".The Express says 10,000 British troops have spearheaded a full-blown invasion of Iraq and says they have come under fire from "the missiles Saddam the liar said he never...

The Sun leads with the words of an army commander who told British troops to "Show Them No Pity... They Have Stains On Their Souls".The Mirror carries a nightime picture of a RAF Harrier over Iraqi oilfields.The Star claims that British SAS troops have already exchanged fire with Iraqi troops in what were the first shots of the "war against evil tyrant Sadddam Hussein".The Mail quotes from speech from a British commander to his troops - it says the impassioned speech brought tough infantrymen to tears and prepared them for the horror and the tragedy of war.The Express reports that...

The Sun is in no doubt that Tony Blair's passionate Commons performance carried the day against the "war wobblers". It says the Prime Minister delivered the speech of his life in a "brilliant, blistering offensive".The Mirror focuses on Cabinet minister Clare Short and claims she is now a political pariah after ditching her pledge to quit over war with Iraq.Under the headline "We're Gonna Get You Saddam", the Star says the most powerful invasion force in history is preparing to rid the world of Saddam Hussein.The Mail hails Tony Blair's "thunderous call to arms" and says his most powerful commons...