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A long-awaited government study on a mysterious skin condition known as Morgellons disease concludes that it isn’t infectious or caused by something in the environment. It also is very rare, affecting fewer than 4 in 100,000 people surveyed. (The study appears in PLoS ONE.) However, it isn’t possible to say from the data whether the mysterious skin condition — “unexplained dermopathy,” as the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention calls it — is a new ailment or part of an existing condition like delusional infestation, according to the researchers from the CDC, Kaiser Permanente Northern California and several academic institutions....

<p>The president of the United States came to Osawatomie, Kan., last week to deliver a speech of such fascinating awfulness archeologists of the future sifting through the rubble of our civilization will surely doubt whether it could really have been delivered by the chief executive of the global superpower in the year 2011.</p>

In May Barack Obama urged Israel to hand over half of Jerusalem, the Wailing Wall, The Temple Mount, Old Jerusalem, and the tomb of Jesus Christ to the Hamas-Fatah terrorist alliance. Obama thought this would bring peace. Hamas and Fatah leaders met again this week to discuss the reconciliation process between the two radical groups. But, since when did facts matter to Barack Obama? Last night Barack Obama told Jewish donors in New York that he has done more for Israel than all of his predecessors combined. The Jerusalem Post reported, via Israel Matsav: US President Barack Obama defended his...

Nearly every professional woman has had the experience of saying something in a meeting, receiving no response, and then listening as a male colleague offers the same thought or suggestion minutes later to great acclaim. The first time it happens, she feels slightly foolish and is a little unsettled. Did I say that out loud or just in my head? Maybe he made the point better than I did. The second time it happens, she gets frustrated. The third time, she gets angry. Look at the senior women meeting with Obama in this White House photo at a dinner they...

(CNSNews.com) -- While a federal appeals court ruled today that the mandate in Obamacare requiring individuals to purchase health insurance was unconstitutional, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, dismissed a question in 2009 about Congress' constitutional authority to impose such a mandate. At the U.S. Capitol on Oct. 22, 2009, CNSNews.com asked Leahy, “Where, in your opinion, does the Constitution give specific authority for Congress to give an individual mandate for health insurance?” Leahy said, "We have plenty of authority. Are you saying there is no authority? … Why would you say there is no authority?...

Obama says U.S. is still a AAA country Photo 2:12pm EDT WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama on Monday blamed a downgrade in the United States' credit rating on political gridlock in Washington and said he would offer some recommendations on how to reduce federal deficits. Obama said in a White House appearance that he hopes the Standard and Poor's downgrade of U.S. debt to AA-plus from AAA will give lawmakers a new sense of urgency to tackle deficit spending and said he did not believe the reductions could be carried out with spending cuts alone.

"Washington, We Have a Problem," proclaims Vanity Fair magazine. In an eerie echo of the verdicts passed during the presidency of Jimmy Carter, namely that the presidency was "too big for one man," Vanity Fair now declares, "The evidence that Washington cannot function — that it's 'broken,' as Vice President Joe Biden has said — is all around." The Vanity Fair piece is a long apologia for President Obama's perceived ineffectiveness, and reflects — no surprise here — the Obama interpretation of events.

Political analysts are predicting a huge win for Republicans in November's congressional elections, but some Democrats believe they have a secret plan to stave off a crushing Republican landslide. That’s the analysis from Newsweek magazine’s Andrew Romano, who writes that “the Democrats in charge are actually rather confident about getting their fellow Dems elected this year. The reason? They have a plan — a plan that they believe will produce much better results on Election Day than anyone expects.” The first element of that plan is the return of Obama’s former campaign manager David Plouffe, who left politics after Obama’s...

What an amazing night for progressives! In Pennsylvania, progressive challenger Joe Sestak defeated Republican-turned-Democrat Arlen Specter in the primary! In Arkansas, progressive challenger Bill Halter is neck-and-neck with corporate Democrat Blanche Lincoln and firmly advances to a run-off election in 3 weeks. Lincoln only has 43% in a Democratic primary (unbelievable!) -- voters want change, and Halter promised tonight to "finish the job" in the run-off. Can you chip in an emergency $3 to help Halter "finish the job" in the upcoming run-off? Click here! Thousands of PCCC members contributed time and money to Halter's campaign. PCCC members chipped in...

Hon. James David Manning says Barack Hussein Obama was a CIA operative who used Columbia University as a cover up to go to Pakistan in 1981 when the United States and the Taliban worked together against Russia. "I am James David Manning, Senior Pastor of the Atlah World Missionary Church in Harlem, New York. I am also the originator of the Columbia Obama trial scheduled for the 14th of May, year 2010. Due to the growing threatening circumstances surrounding this trial, I must now release the full transcript we wish to present, document and prove at the Columbia Obama trial...

I usually don't go anywhere near my leftist hubby's reading material. While he subscribes to Mother Jones and Newsweek, I buy National Review. His emails are from moveon.org; mine from Newt Gingrich. However, after being home for three days with a bad cold, I was desperate to read something new. So I reluctantly picked up one of his Harpers. I was pleasantly surprised that the magazine carried an article, The Mendacity of Hope, critiquing Obama's first year. The author, Roger D. Hodge, even confronts Obama on the hypocrisy of eliminating water boarding yet supporting torture in the form of overseas...

Whether President Obama is suffering from some form of a delusional break down from reality or is just in a state of denial is something a qualified psychologist will have to determine. The question some Americans are beginning to ask: Does President Obama have the mental stability or is he competent enough to remain as Commander In Chief during a time of war?

There's no point in the White House saying this, so it won't. But an official predicted to me the other day that Obama's numbers would hit 60 after the health care bill passes, and Chuck Schumer seems to think roughly the same thing: that the public polling on the Democratic reform bill will turn around "soon." When people see what is in this bill and when people see what it does, they will come around," Schumer said. "The reason people are negative is not the substance of the bill, but the fears that the opponents have laid out. When those...

The nation's hospitals agreed last night to contribute $155 billion over 10 years toward the cost of insuring the 47 million Americans without health coverage, according to two industry sources. The agreement that three hospital associations reached with White House officials and leaders of the Senate Finance Committee is the latest in a series of side deals that aim to reduce the cost of revamping the nation's health-care system and to neutralize influential industries that have historically opposed such reforms... Most of the savings -- about $100 billion -- would come through lower-than-expected Medicare and Medicaid payments to hospitals, said...

In 2007, the federal budget deficit was $162 billion (1.2% of gross domestic product). For 2009, the budget deficit is projected to be 11 times larger: $1.752 trillion. This World War II-like deficit (12.3% of GDP) is not all on President Obama. Much of it is due to policies put in place by President Bush, Hank Paulson and last year's Congress. President Obama's "stimulus" bill will certainly raise the deficit, but, to be fair, it is not the predominant digger of this year's large fiscal hole. Nonetheless, contrary to the spin of big-government types, these deficits are not just temporary....

Well folks Britney Spears, the queen of comebacks has done it again. After the previous years' meltdown which lead to her being hospitalized twice at UCLA as well as her being placed under emergency guardianship, Britney Spears is back again like a boomerang. Already there is talks of a movie deal and perhaps another sleazy album. But the road back up has been long and hard and although she is now seeking treatment for "Bipolar" disorder, psychiatrists in charge of her care may be doing more to undermine her mental health than promote it. Britney Spears was incarcerated in UCLA's...

CAVUTO: Let me ask you. This comes at a time when there are all sorts of rumors in Washington that you and the president, though you started hitting it off — he had this dinner for you, I think, the night before inauguration, and then he was talking about how crucial your support was on the troop drawdown in Iraq — and then it seemed like the wheels kind of came off the goodwill wagon. What has happened here? MCCAIN: Neil, I am the loyal opposition.I work with the president, as I did on the Iraq issue. I will work...

Sarah Palin will be elected President in 2012, no matter what happens two weeks from now. She will, most likely, rise up when John McCain declines to run for re-election or, failing that, on her own as a direct candidate. PALIN 2012, YOU HEARD IT HERE FIRST .... As endorsed by the Dodger!

PSYCHIATRISTS have detected the first case of "climate change delusion" - and they haven't even yet got to Kevin Rudd and his global warming guru. Writing in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, Joshua Wolf and Robert Salo of our Royal Children's Hospital say this delusion was a "previously unreported phenomenon". "A 17-year-old man was referred to the inpatient psychiatric unit at Royal Children's Hospital Melbourne with an eight-month history of depressed mood . . . He also . . . had visions of apocalyptic events."

CHICAGO (AP) -- Perhaps no one took greater comfort in the Republican Party's third straight loss of a long-held House seat this week than Barack Obama, who says the results point to clear limits in the effectiveness of attack ads he expects this fall. The Democratic presidential candidate played a prominent role in all three special elections to fill vacant GOP seats, and he landed on the winning side each time. In recent contests in Louisiana and Mississippi, Republicans or their allies ran TV ads linking the Democratic House nominees to Obama, warning that a vote for them was a...

The new year is only a couple of weeks old. This is 2008 an election year, yet the MSM is already calling it over for several candidates. Among them Fred Thompson. Why are they calling for him to drop out? It's because of his message. The only candidate that does not seem to have special interest backers or a huge war chest. One that speaks more common sense then the others and is smarter than the others. Fred did not spend 2007 stomping the nation drumming up delegates. This is the reason the MSM and many so-called right/conservative pundits are...

Why the smart money is on Duncan Hunter OK, so you’ve got a thousand dollars burning a hole in your pocket and you want to make a statement with it at the same time as getting 40X return on your “investment”, you want $40,000 for that $1000 bet, like Hillary did in her Pig Belly futures or whatever it was. You’re going to decide between putting it down on Hunter or Thompson over at Intrade because these are the 2 most conservative candidates in the race. https://www.intrade.com/ Which one do you choose? Let’s start with the guy who has 3...

Senator John Kerry (D-Mass.) whose bid for the presidency in 2004 was damaged by attacks on his vaunted Vietnam War record by a group called “Swift Boat Veterans for Truth,” says he is now ready to refute their allegations. “We have put together a powerful and irrefutable rebuttal to the scurrilous charges made against me by these right wing fanatics,” Kerry asserted. Kerry declined to disclose any of his reputedly irrefutable proof at this time saying that “the American people have not yet shown a sufficient measure of regret and contrition for voting against me. They disrespected me—a decorated veteran—and...

In a new outburst of antiwestern sabre-rattling, President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela has threatened Britain with “revenge” for the Falklands war of 1982. The belligerent Latin American leftist warned last week that his recent build-up of sophisticated Russian and Iranian weapons would be used to destroy the British fleet if it attempted to return to the South Atlantic. Speaking on his weekly television show Alo Presidente (Hello, Mr President), Chavez denounced what he described as Britain’s “illegal occupation” of the Falklands and repeated his call for a regional military alliance against Britain and the United States. “If we had been...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 1 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean issued the following statement after Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid signed a bill that implements the recommendations of the 9-11 Commission and makes our country safer and more secure: "Democrats have again kept their promise to the American people and showed why Americans trust them to keep the country safe," Dean said. "Even with Republicans blocking them every step of the way, Democrats implemented the recommendations of the bipartisan 9-11 Commission. President Bush and his Republican allies wasted years playing politics with our security. Republicans ignored these recommendations,...

Among athletes who obsess about their weight, we cyclists are second to none. Training rides are filled with conversations about weight lost or gained and the latest diet regimens and food fads. Resolutions are made and broken. We all know the formula: 10 pounds of extra weight on a 5 percent grade slows your ascent by half a mile an hour. It has a ring of Newtonian finality to it. F = MA. The Force needed to turn the pedals equals Acceleration times that Mass on the saddle. But most of the guys I ride with are like me: in...

It’s fall, the temperature is falling, the leaves are turning and with November here, we have some repeats to watch on the cable networks. The History Channel will show one of their favorites, ABC’s documentary “Beyond Conspiracy” featuring Peter Jennings and a computer animation which shows a bullet that hit President Kennedy’s back four inches below his collar but then the bullet allegedly exited his neck after nicking the upper part of the knot of his tie, and then it goes down at approximately a 25 degree down angle to hit Governor Connally in his back. It’s amazing what computers...

Widely prescribed anti-psychotic drugs do not help most Alzheimer's patients with delusions and aggression and are not worth the risk of sudden death and other side effects, the first major study on sufferers outside nursing homes concludes. The finding could increase the burden on families struggling to care for relatives with the mind-robbing disease at home. "These medications are not the answer," said Dr. Thomas Insel, director of the National Institute of Mental Health, which paid for the study. He said better medications are at least several years away. Three-fourths of the 4.5 million Americans with Alzheimer's disease develop aggression,...

"We have great admiration for you and leadership," US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas at a press conference on Wednesday following their meeting in Ramallah. Rice added that the US was "very concerned" about the plight of the Palestinians and pledged to improve living conditions in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. She said that the US would "redouble efforts" to help the Palestinians. The secretary of state went on to say that the US was aware of the hard work that needed to be done in order to achieve a two state solution...

Gov. Schwarzenegger’s opponent Democrat Phil Angelides won’t back down on his pledge to return California National Guard troops stationed in Iraq. Angelides spoke at an anti-war rally attended by about 200 people at Sacramento City College Thursday. Public opinion polls this week indicate Angelides trails Schwarzenegger by double digits. Angelides expanded on his call for the return of California Guard troops, calling the Iraq war a fool’s errand and condemning Gov. Schwarzenegger for supporting the re-election of President Bush. Despite a free lunch, fewer than 200 students attended the rally. In a statement released by the Schwarzenegger campaign, Devore characterized...

Iran unveiled its first locally manufactured fighter plane Wednesday during large-scale military exercises, state-run television reported. The report said the bomber Saegheh is similar to the American F-18 fighter plane, but "more powerful." It also said the plane was "designed, optimized and improved by Iranian experts." State TV said the Iranian air force had commissioned the Saegheh plane after many test flights in the past year. Television footage showed the airplane taking off and launching two rockets. The plane had a small cockpit and only one pilot. "Saegheh is capable of launching both rockets and bombs," the report said. General...

President Bush is pursuing a globalist agenda to create a North American Union, effectively erasing our borders with both Mexico and Canada. This was the hidden agenda behind the Bush administration's true open borders policy. Secretly, the Bush administration is pursuing a policy to expand NAFTA to include Canada, setting the stage for North American Union designed to encompass the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. What the Bush administration truly wants is the free, unimpeded movement of people across open borders with Mexico and Canada. President Bush intends to abrogate U.S. sovereignty to the North American Union, a new economic and...

The Times-Standard SAN FRANCISCO -- Actor and comedian Tommy Chong entertained more than 500 National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws conference-goers Friday. ”If more people were stoned there would be less violence in the world,” Chong said. Chong was introduced by NORML Executive Director Allen St. Pierre. ”It was Tom Chong the man that was wrongly sentenced to nine months in jail when everyone else paid a fine,” St. Pierre said. “I'm so proud and happy that Tommy is joining us today.” Chong took the stage to a standing ovation. ”I would like to thank what's his name,”...

It's a shame that Joseph Heller, author of "Catch-22," is no longer alive and laughing at human folly because he'd love "Saddam's Delusions," an amazing article in the May/June issue of Foreign Affairs. Heller's masterpiece is a darkly comic story of absurdity, brutality and insane military bureaucracy. So is "Saddam's Delusions." "Catch-22" is fiction, of course, but "Saddam's Delusions" is all too true. It's a 25-page distillation of a 230-page Pentagon study of the last days of Saddam Hussein's regime, based on thousands of secret Iraqi government documents and interviews with dozens of captured Iraqi officials. Written by military analysts...

Introduction: Campaigning and the Shapes of Time There is a natural inclination to look back with the benefit of hindsight to find fresh patterns in history. Thus, for example, the period 1870-1990 can be viewed as Europe's "Hundred- Year Civil War," a perception not necessarily obvious to those engaged in that "war" at any particular time; and the Japanese have seen the Second World War from their viewpoint as variously a part of a "Hundred Years War,"1 a "Seventy-Five Year War," a "Great Pacific War" and a "Great East Asian War." More recent operations against Islamic extremists have been seen...

Felipe Luciano becomes vice president of news for the progressive radio network Air America (WLIB, 1190 AM) with several premises. First, "All those years of talk about a 'liberal bias' in the media has pushed our national media to a right-wing slant. "What was once an independent voice has become afraid to take a stand. Everyone is afraid what happened to Dan Rather will happen to them. That's why we see almost no investigative journalism." To that timidity, says Luciano, Air America offers an essential alternative. Second, "You should never talk down to your audience, because they're much more interested...

Dr. Levin is the author of The Oslo Syndrome: Delusions of a People Under Siege. He earned an undergraduate degree in mathematics from the University of Pennsylvania, a B.A./M.A. in English language and literature from Oxford University, an M.D. degree from Penn and a Ph.D. in history from Princeton University. He is a clinical instructor in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and maintains a private practice in psychiatry. Dr. Levin has written extensively on Israel and the Arab-Israeli conflict. His articles have appeared in The New Republic, The Boston Globe, The Washington Times, and The Jerusalem Post. On the...

In Unruly Gaza, Clans Compete in Power Void By STEVEN ERLANGER GAZA CITY - Tawfiq Abu Khoussa is the spokesman for the Palestinian Interior Ministry in Gaza.... But when some of Gaza's many gunmen fired shots at his office, Mr. Khoussa did not seek protection from the Palestinian police or security services. He called gunmen from his own powerful hamulla -his clan or tribe - to protect him. .. ....the mess in Gaza is real, and it presents fundamental problems for Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian Authority he inherited from Yasir Arafat. After 38 years of occupation, Israel pulled its...

Come Monday, Sept. 19, fans of New York Times columnists Maureen Dowd, Paul Krugman, and David Brooks will have to break out their credit cards. Sept. 19 is the launch date of TimesSelect, a new subscription service designed to diversify the newspaper's revenue stream beyond traditional Web site advertising. The popular Op-Ed columnists are the main selling point behind the $49.95 a year subscription. (The service will be free for the paper's home delivery subscribers). The paper's news, features, editorials, and analysis will remain free, as will interactive graphics, multimedia, and video. TimesSelect subscribers will also have the ability to...

French Woman to Ordain Herself a Catholic Priest, Facing Automatic Excommunication The Associated Press LYON, France Jul 2, 2005 — A French woman defied a threat of excommunication by the Roman Catholic Church and held a ceremony proclaiming herself a priest on Saturday. In a small ceremony on a boat, Genevieve Beney was joined by other women from around the world who have taken similar dramatic action to draw attention to the church's policy against women priests. "This is not a rupture with the Roman Catholic Church," Beney said in a statement read aloud before she boarded the boat.. The...

For some historical background link to http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/1335495/posts Don't blow me off too fast. I am pretty up to speed on my radical (alleged) Indian groups and their activities.

After spending Christmas Day in a liberal home I can report that this was not a happy holiday for liberals. There was at least one thing to celebrate, though: the courage of San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom in standing up to the bigots and allowing people to do what comes naturally: fall in love and get married. Otherwise things did not look too good to my liberal neighbors. They saw hate everywhere they turned; one woman admitted to waking up most days and wanting to cry. How could Americans elect a president like George W. Bush? It just didn’t make...

Posted tonight 11/30 >>WE ARE GOING TO WIN THIS, I GUARANTEE YOU.... Kerry will be in the White House as long as we keep up the pace we have been at the last few weeks. We need to keep the emails going, keep the protests going...as long as we do this more and more leaders will fall in line as they see the movement grow. I can't say this enough: 1) Protest, Protest, Protest If you have time to attend any protest in your area, DO IT. Get out there. Especially in Ohio and Florida. We did one in CO...

Throughout the 2004 campaign, Sen. John Kerry maintained his proposed health-care plan could not be labeled as "socialized health care." Arguably, his plan would have at least partially de-privatized the American health-care system. Only through massive insurance pools in which everyone had a vested interest would Kerry have been able to fulfill his bold promise to expand coverage to "96 percent of Americans and 99 percent of all children." But a majority of voters refused to buy into Kerry's health-care plan. This plan introduced us to the "collectivist" ideology that acts as the driving force behind so many socially liberal...

When Senator John Kerry finally came out of hiding on Friday, Nov. 19, and posted a new message on his Presidential campaign Web site, who was holding their breath? An army of barefoot, pajama-wearing bloggers—and their general, the host of MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Olbermann. "Regardless of the outcome of this election," intoned Mr. Kerry in a video clip linked to the site, "once all the votes are counted—and they will be counted—we will continue to challenge this administration." "It looks like an M.C. Escher drawing," Mr. Olbermann said in an interview the following Monday. "Is it past or future...

''No one would be more interested than me in finding out that we really won, but that ain't the case," said Jack Corrigan, a veteran Kerry adviser who led the Democrats' team of 3,600 attorneys who fanned out across the country on Election Day to address voting irregularities. ''I get why people are frustrated, but they did not steal this election," Corrigan said. ''There were a few problems here and there in the election. But unlike 2000, there is no doubt that they actually got more votes than we did, and they got them in the states that mattered." http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2004/11/10/internet_buzz_on_vote_fraud_is_dismissed/

JOHN KERRY'S IRAQ DELUSIONS~PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE 2 POURQUOI JOHN KERRY EST DANGEREUX POUR L'AMÉRIQUE   by Mia T, 10.09.04 IRAQ DELUSIONS (viewing movie requires Flash Player 7, available HERE) UNFIT #23: THUMBSUCKER SERIESJohn "One Position on Iraq" Kerry's 1971 Replay (viewing movie requires Flash Player 7, available HERE) NEW! compleatjohnkerry.blogspot.com NEW! unfitforcommand.blogspot.comjohnkerryisdangerousforamerica.blogspot.com KERRY DOESN'T HAVE THE JUDGMENT TO BE PRESIDENT Senator Kerry's contradictions on Iraq are the wrong signal to send to our troops on the ground, to our coalition partners, to the Iraqi people and to the terrorists seeking our destruction. On the eve of Prime Minister Allawi's visit...

Anyone who follows the developments in the Arab Islamic world will be struck by the complete absence of self-knowledge and introspection that characterizes these vexed cultures. Almost every problem is attributed to hostile external forces. The poverty and underdevelopment that plague most of the Arab world are the result of malicious machinations of Americans and Jews. This is no less true of the disaster in Darfur. Last week UPI reported that the Sudanese foreign minister Mustafa Osman Ismail had told journalists in Cairo that his government possessed "information that confirms media reports of Israeli support (for the rebels in Darfur)."...

When I think of spies in the Defense Department, I think of the pitiful debt-ridden Ron Pelton, who worked for 14 years at the National Security Agency, quit in 1979, and began selling secrets to the Soviets until he was arrested in 1986. I heard it was to complete construction on a home he had been building for years and years. Construction projects can be like that

The cigar seemed to be the same as any other. These was a rush of hot smoke, but it was followed by a familiar, yet disturbing sweetness. It was like setting fire to a packet of grape Kool-Aid and taking a deep breath. Not an experience most people would remember fondly. But candy-flavored cigars, like the grape one I bought at a neighborhood grocery store, have become the hippest thing to hit the streets since neck tattoos and color-coordinated cell phones. The experience, said a crowd of teenage boys and girls gathered on the corner near the store, is far...