Free Republic

Del. Bob Marshall, R-Manassas, has introduced a bill that would give farmers and landowners’ property rights remedies against local zoning laws. The bill is inspired by the Martha Boneta debacle last year. But unlike last year’s “Boneta Bill,” HB1219 extends beyond farmers to anyone who owns property. The bill also tackles other issues such as the constitutional rights of farmers. HB1219 says that local governments that violate constitutional rights through zoning must pay their victims the amount of the fines they sought to impose and the actual damages, including attorney fees. The bill also allows the Virginia Attorney General to...

TRIPOLI, Libya – NATO airstrikes targeted the center of Moammar Gadhafi's seat of power early Monday, destroying a multi-story library and office and badly damaging a reception hall for visiting dignitaries. Gadhafi's whereabouts at the time of the attack on his sprawling Bab al-Azizya compound were unclear. A security official at the scene said four people were lightly hurt. Monday's strike came after Gadhafi's forces unleashed a barrage of shells and rockets at the besieged rebel city of Misrata, in an especially bloody weekend that left at least 32 dead and dozens wounded.

I read, and I write for, the Highlands Newspaper, a weekly paper with a modest circulation. The Editor, also my editor, is Kim Lewicki. She ran an article in last week’s issue that was excellently written and edited, and worthy of sharing with my national audience. The week before, Erika Olvera, a former Police Officer in this town, filed an EEOC Complaint against the Town of Highlands. Our experience with Officer Olvera was limited, but we found her to be diligent and capable. She worked for the Town for two years. She is a naturalized American from Mexico, who has...

In fatal cases of 2009 H1N1 influenza, the virus can damage cells throughout the respiratory airway, much like the viruses that caused the 1918 and 1957 influenza pandemics, report researchers from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the New York City Office of Chief Medical Examiner. The scientists reviewed autopsy reports, hospital records and other clinical data from 34 people who died of 2009 H1N1 influenza infection between May 15 and July 9, 2009. All but two of the deaths occurred in New York City. A microscopic examination of tissues throughout the airways revealed that the virus caused damage...

In his Sept. 9 address before Congress, President Obama noted that litigation "may be contributing" to increasing health-care costs and promised to fund "demonstration projects" in the states to improve the liability system and to test "ideas about how to put patient safety first." Alas, as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's health-care bill emerged last week, it became clear that Congress' leaders are less interested in funding demonstration projects that work than in keeping cash flowing from trial lawyers to the Democratic Party. Section 2351 of the Pelosi bill outlines incentive grants to the states to fund "medical liability alternative" demonstrations...

Rick Paul, owner of Rick's White Light Diner, was found in contempt of court Monday and must pay $1,000 to a charity of his choice, for again infringing on the Derby-Pie trademark. Before U.S. District Judge Joseph Hood in a Lexington courtroom, Paul was found in contempt of court for violating a 1997 permanent injunction signed by Hood, ordering Paul not to infringe on Kern's Kitchen Inc.'s trademark Derby-Pie. Paul also must pay Kern's Kitchen's attorney fees and costs. "I am disappointed with the judge's ruling and I accept it," Paul said today. "Our proof was considerably different than Derby...

LUBBOCK, Texas — One Central Texas farmer said Monday he was "dumbfounded" by Gov. Rick Perry's veto of an eminent domain bill designed to protect landowners when the state wants to take their property. Robert Fleming is not alone in an area worried about the massive Trans Texas Corridor proposal. The planned route cuts through Fleming's Bell County farms. He's bewildered by Perry's veto. "We were so close to getting something done," Fleming said. "We've worked hard trying to get private property rights." Perry vetoed the bill, and 48 others, Friday. In 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Kelo...

Ceuta, Spain, Jul 25 (EFE).- A Spaniard held for two years without charge by the United States at its prison camp in Guantanamo denounced terrorism here Tuesday, while saying he was unjustly jailed, that mistreatment harmed his eyesight and that he intends to sue President George W. Bush for millions of dollars. Hamed Abderraman Ahmed, who was absolved by the Spanish judicial system in June of allegedly having links to Al Qaeda, discussed his capture in Afghanistan and his confinement at the U.S. military prison in far eastern Cuba. Ahmed was captured in Afghanistan and transferred to U.S. Army custody...

LONDON (AP) - The son of U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan has accepted a settlement from a British newspaper that claimed he was involved in selling Iraqi oil during Saddam Hussein's rule, his lawyer said Friday. Businessman Kojo Annan had brought High Court libel proceedings over a January story in The Sunday Times. His lawyer, Simon Smith, said the newspaper claimed Kojo Annan admitted to a friend that he had been involved in negotiations to sell 2 million barrels of Iraqi oil to a Moroccan company in 2001 as part of the corruption-riddled U.N. oil-for-food program. Sunday Times lawyer Alastair Brett,...

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A seller of online marketing tools said on Wednesday it sued Google Inc., charging that the Web search giant has failed to protect users of its advertising program from "click fraud," costing them at least $5 million. Click Defense Inc. filed its lawsuit, which also seeks class action status, on June 24 in U.S. District Court in San Jose, California. Click fraud is not "fraud" as defined under the law. Rather, it is an industry term used to describe the deliberate clicking on Web search ads by users with no plans to do business with the...

McDonald’s pays $10m damages Silicon Valley (PTI): Fast food giant McDonald’s will pay $10 million to 24 groups, including the International American Gita Society, as part of a settlement of lawsuits. McDonald’s has been charged with misleading Hindus and vegetarian consumers by “wrongly describing” its French fries, containing beef additive for flavouring, as vegetarian. McDonald’s recently informed the Gita society that it is among the groups receiving the settlement money, the US-based non-profit organisation’s spokesperson, Ramananda Prasad, said. “We are such a small organisation, and nobody supports us, the temples are busy with their own activities,” Prasad, who founded the...

Calif. Mudslide Kills One, Damages Homes 1 hour, 6 minutes ago By LAURA WIDES, Associated Press Writer LOS ANGELES - A huge mudslide furiously crashed down on homes in a coastal hamlet Monday as a deadly Pacific storm hammered Southern California for a fourth straight day, boosting rainfall totals to astonishing levels. At least one person died and several were injured in the mudslide that pummeled a four-block area of homes in tiny La Conchita, damaging 15 to 20 homes, said Ventura County Fire Department spokesman Tom Kruschke. That brought the death toll in California from the storms to 10....

Friday, Sept. 10, 2004 3:30 p.m. EDT Kitty Kelley Bush-Bashing Book Publisher Seeks Damages From Newsweek NEW YORK – The publisher of Kitty Kelley's controversial new biography of the Bush family has accused Newsweek of allegedly violating a pre-publication agreement and said the magazine owed "substantial damages." "We demand public acknowledgment and additional remedies," Stephen Rubin, president and publisher of the Doubleday Broadway Publishing Group, said Thursday. Rubin declined to say how much money Doubleday was seeking and whether the publisher would sue. Story Continues Below Newsweek spokeswoman Rosanna Maietta said Thursday that the magazine had no comment. Kelley's "The...

Polish MPs call for war damages from Germany By Kate Connolly in Berlin (Filed: 11/09/2004) Poland's parliament voted overwhelmingly yesterday to instruct the government to demand compensation from Germany for its actions during the Second World War. The resolution, backed by 320 MPs with one abstention, also signalled a rejection of claims by millions of ethnic Germans for compensation in return for their deportation. The claims were dismissed as "illegal and unfounded". More than 130 MPs were absent for the vote, a signal of the power of the issue in the popular mind. The vote indicated how heated the reparations...

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Residents jammed narrow winding roads off a burning mountain on Tuesday as one of 10 wildfires raging across Southern California threatened to engulf two popular resort towns. As exhausted firefighters tried desperately to beat back the flames, authorities ordered more than 40,000 residents of Lake Arrowhead and Big Bear to flee their homes. The fire burned over a ridge through bone-dry and disease- infested timber that provided ideal fuel for an inferno that spewed a towering plume of smoke and ash. The fire has claimed at least 20 homes near Lake Arrowhead since late Monday,...

Acting Prime Minister John Anderson has branded a High Court decision to award damages for the birth of a healthy child repugnant, saying it devalued human life. Mr Anderson said the decision to award Brisbane couple Craig and Kerry Melchior $105,249 for the cost of raising their son Jordan, conceived after a failed sterilisation, was a further sign of a trend in society to view children as "consumer durables there for our pleasure - rather like an expensive fridge or new DVD player". "It is repugnant that the birth of a healthy child, like Jordan, should be the subject of...

<p>NEW ORLEANS — A federal appeals court rejected an attempt by survivors to collect damages from the government for the deadly 1993 confrontation in Waco, Texas, between government agents and members of the Branch Davidian cult.</p> <p>Without dissent, a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals (search) late Monday turned aside contentions that a lower-court judge who ruled against the survivors was biased.</p>

<p>The Michigan teenager simply invited a couple of friends over to play pool at his families million dollar Farmington hills home, then left them to join his parents for Memorial Day at a cottage near Fenton, Michigan.</p> <p>But by the time the firefighters had arrived the next morning, a wrecking crew of his fellow teens had fled, leaving behind a million dollar mess.</p>

Anyone remember that so called "Taxpayer Bill of Rights" act that was passed a couple years ago? That bill was rather bland, but did have a couple provisions that could be beneficial to a few people. Actually, I thought the IRS would just disregard it, as they do with most laws and court rulings they don't like. But, then I stumbled upon a new Internal Revenue Service "Notice of proposed rulemaking." The March 5 Federal register (Volume 67, Number 43; page 9929-9934) announces 26 CFR Part 301 [Reg-107366-00], which is a proposed rule to provide for a "Civil Cause of...