Free Republic

As we counsel young men concerning military service, we must clarify for them our nation's role in Vietnam and challenge them with the alternative of conscientious objection. I am pleased to say that this is a path now chosen by more than seventy students at my own alma mater, Morehouse College, and I recommend it to all who find the American course in Vietnam a dishonorable and unjust one. Moreover, I would encourage all ministers of draft age to give up their ministerial exemptions and seek status as conscientious objectors. These are the times for real choices and not false...

New York - The Empire State Building was lit in red, white and blue on Thursday night for women's suffrage as more than 100 people protested a refusal by the iconic skyscraper's owner to mark Mother Teresa's 100th birthday. Yet the colors that the Catholic League had requested in her honor were the most luminous against the darkened skyline: The building's 203-foot pinnacle blazed a brilliant blue, while the stories just below glowed a frosty white. A fading red was just visible underneath. (Snip) But the building's owner, Anthony Malkin, declined the Catholic League's request to honor the ethnic Albanian

The West Is Facing A Debt Crisis And It's Now Or Never For The American Empire Gregory White May. 16, 2010, 12:28 PM Historian Niall Ferguson spoke with the Big Think about where the world's future is heading, with the end of the American Empire very much in the cards. Ferguson feels there is still a chance for Western dominance of the next age, if the U.S. can serious trim its budget deficit because it has a political advantage over China due to its pluralistic democracy. Ferguson also spoke with the BBC late last week on how the same issues...

Controversial South African president Jacob Zuma caused diplomatic embarrassment today by branding the British as 'old fashioned imperialists' - just hours before meeting the Queen. The visiting polygamist premier, 67, accused the UK of harbouring a feeling of cultural superiority he attributed to the country's colonial past. He spoke out over press reports in Britain which highlighted details of his colourful private life ahead of his state visit to London, which starts today.

I fear that this is the fall of the American empire. The way this echoes the fall of the Roman Empire is far too eerie. Decadence abounds. Everybody remembers that the fall of the Roman Empire entailed mass decadence and moral decay. The power of Rome dissipated through a lack of discipline, and an abandonment of the values that put Rome at the paragon of civilization. It was often said that during the decline of the Roman Empire, Romans refused to believe in their gods. The parallels with American society in 2010 are undeniable. America is obviously undergoing a similar...

When conservatives used to bash Bill Clinton their arguments usually centered on one thing — Monica Lewinsky. He lied to the American people! Clinton disgraced the office of the presidency! “Slick Willie!” Much like the popular culture they often claim to abhor, conservatives tend to focus on the personalities in politics rather than policy. I never cared much about Clinton’s relationship with Lewinsky. My greatest problem with our 42nd president was that he wasn’t much different from the 41st or 43rd. Under Clinton, the size of government grew, our worsening illegal immigration problem was ignored, the U.S. needlessly punished the...

Meticulous ancient notetakers have given archaeologists a glimpse of what life was like 3,000 years ago in the Assyrian Empire, which controlled much of the region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Persian Gulf. Clay tablets inscribed with cuneiform, an ancient script once common in the Middle East, were unearthed in summer 2009 in an ancient palace in present-day southeastern Turkey... A team led by University of Akron archaeologist Timothy Matney has been excavating the massive mud brick palace, once inhabited by the governor of the empire's Tushhan Province, for more than a decade. The palace is located in Ziyaret...

Russian President... Medvedev has invited his Iranian counterpart to participate in an upcoming Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit....Iran...has been seeking to join the 9-year-old international organization since 2008....the SCO aims to act as a counterweight to NATO's influence in Eurasia and to oppose US interference in Central Asia by developing regional security cooperation between its member states -

Jack Cafferty is a CNN commentator who has always held the most radical liberal views on CNN. I suppose the fan base he has is there to combat MSNBC's radical bias that draws in the liberal crowd. Today, he was on CNN, quoting various articles that all seem to agree on one thing: America is a super power that is soon to lose its super power status. They also agree that America is an empire that may soon need to withdraw its troops from around the world.

ALBANY - Caroline Kennedy's interest in the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Hillary Clinton could reignite tensions between two political powerhouse families: the Kennedys and Cuomos, political insiders say. Kennedy's cousin is the ex-wife of Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, who is considered a front-runner for Gov. Paterson's appointment to replace Clinton. The sudden interest by Caroline Kennedy, daughter of the late President John F. Kennedy and niece to the late Robert F. Kennedy, who once held the seat, throws a titillating wrench into the works, insiders say. "It's awkward," said one well-known Democrat. "If she's serious, there could be...

(IsraelNN.com) Empire Kosher Poultry announced on Sunday that it will increase its output of kosher chicken more than 100,000 birds or 50%, as of November 24, according to Yeshiva World News. The announcement follows recent reports of a widespread shortage of kosher poultry. It's the second increase in production for Empire this year, the previous, smaller one also addressing concerns about reduced supply conditions in the marketplace. Empire also announced that starting November 24, it will reduce the price of fresh chicken cutlets (skinless and boneless chicken breast) by at least 10%.

The wicked thing that I believe is now happening in Africa. Out of desperation, much of the continent is selling itself into a new era of corruption and virtual slavery as China seeks to buy up all the metals, minerals and oil she can lay her hands on: copper for electric and telephone cables, cobalt for mobile phones and jet engines - the basic raw materials of modern life. It is crude rapacity, but to Africans and many of their leaders it is better than the alternative, which is slow starvation. China offers both rulers and the ruled in Africa...

PETER HITCHENS: How China has created a new slave empire in AfricaBy PETER HITCHENS Last updated at 12:00 PM on 28th September 2008 I think I am probably going to die any minute now. An inflamed, deceived mob of about 50 desperate men are crowding round the car, some trying to turn it over, others beating at it with large rocks, all yelling insults and curses. They have just started to smash the windows. Next, they will pull us out and, well, let's not think about that ... I am trying not to meet their eyes, but they are staring...

Russia’s Restless Muslim Republics By Uwe Klussmann Although Russia is celebrating the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, it still has its own problems in the region as its Muslim republics are drifting toward a partisan war. Last Monday, an eerie funeral procession passed through the center of Nazran in the Russian republic of Ingushetia. Hundreds of people silently crowded around the coffin of Magomed Yevloyev. The 37-year-old lawyer and founder of a Web site ( www.ingushetiya.ru) that was critical of the government was killed in police custody. The authorities said that he was shot in a police car “inadvertently”...

Perhaps it is time they went back to this again, more accurate.

Barack Obama is EMBARRASSED of America because..

America has become an empire. Everyone says so. This is a surprise to most Americans, since few imagined that they were building such a thing. But, as historians such as Walter Nugent and Robert Kagan have recently taught us, Americans have been at this imperialist expansionism for quite some time — really since the beginning of the republic. How else to explain that the United States has gone from a handful of agrarian colonies to a world-spanning colossus in the space of only a few centuries? As you read this, American military might is deployed across the planet. The U.S....

America’s longing for an empire has a long history NEARLY 50 years ago, when William Appleman Williams, one of the 20th century’s most important historians of diplomacy, drew attention to America’s persistent search for an empire, he was denounced for being pro-communist. To challenge deeply held beliefs about American innocence was shocking enough. To contradict cold-war propaganda was worse. Recently, however, such ideological conformism has been disappearing. It has become acceptable to speak of empire, both among those who defend American foreign policy and those who condemn it. “If people want to say we’re an imperial power—fine,” says William Kristol,...

MOSCOW -- The Byzantine Empire fell in 1453. But you wouldn't know it in Russia, where Vladimir V. Putin has been behaving as though the 15th century never ended, as though he is the direct descendant of the Byzantine kings and Moscow remains the "Third Rome" it declared itself to be in 1472. Just like the leaders of Byzantium centuries ago, Putin and his supporters talk about Russia today as if it were a divinely ordained power, destined to withstand the decay and destruction of the West. The "double eagle" emblem, originally adopted in Russia about the time of the...

Following are excerpts from an interview with Lebanese Sunni cleric Sheik Muhammad Abu Al-Qat', which aired on Al-Manar TV on May 10, 2008: Sheik Muhammad Abu Al-Qat': Today, on May 10, 2008, at 22:50 – through Al-Manar TV – let me bring good tidings to the Muslims: Allah willing, the American empire will very soon collapse. They object to any talk about the destruction of the state of Israel. Interviewer: And they are celebrating its 60th anniversary... Sheik Muhammad Abu Al-Qat': That's not the issue. We say that Allah willing, within 10 to 12 years, America will collapse. This won't...