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HOW do you tell a wealthy heiress from a family farmer? It sounds like the setup for a joke. But in fact it is the fundamental problem underlying sensible reform of the federal estate tax. Members of Congress are hoping to revise the current law on the estate tax by the end of this year; if they don’t, the estate tax will disappear for a year. Lawmakers should use the opportunity to solve the farmer/heiress riddle once and for all and move our tax system closer to the values on which the country was founded — that hard work should...

The University of East Anglia mail server was hacked earlier in the week and a string of private correspondences between esteemed climate scientists were published. In addition to some juicy internecine gossip becoming embarrassingly public, a few of the messages seem to reveal doubts about the evidence for global warming and at least one refers to a statistical “trick” being used to hide lower-than-predicted surface temperatures in recent years. James Delingpole dubs this “Climategate” and pronounces it “the final nail in the coffin of ‘Anthropogenic Global Warming.’” Andrew Bolt calls it evidence of a scandal involving most of the most...

The man sadly reports reality!

Brace yourself, an ounce of common sense has been found in a Democrat! Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.) penned a letter to Holder and Defense Secretary Robert Gates suggesting military trials would be a more appropriate venue for the accused terrorists. “As a former prosecutor, I am not yet convinced that the right decision was made in these cases, nor that the presumption in favor of federal criminal trials over military tribunals for these detainees should continue,” Skelton wrote. … “The decision to terminate the prosecution of these self-confessed terrorists in military commissions, transfer them to the United States, and bring...

Here are some of the goodies I found in a quick scan of the GloBULL Warming "scientists" emails: 1) And the issue of with-holding data is still a hot potato, one that affects both you and Keith (and Mann)…. The trouble here is that with-holding data looks like hiding something, and hiding means (in some eyes) that it is bogus science that is being hidden. 2) There is an ECMWF ERA-40 Report coming out soon, which shows that Kalnay and Cai are wrong. It isn’t that strongly worded as the first authoris a personal friend of Eugenia. The result is...

Gov. Charlie Crist’s office is “looking into” the possibility of removing embattled attorney Scott Rothstein from the state’s Judicial Nominating Committee. Rothstein has offered to surrender his license to practice law. But, he may remain a member of JNC unless, or until, he’s charged with a felony crime. Gov. Charlie Crist named Rothstein to the JNC in August 2008. “Typically, the governor would only step in when felony charges are filed against a public official,” said Sterling Ivey, Crist’s spokesman. “Whether we will act before that point in this case is not clear yet. Our legal office is looking into...

Electronic files that were stolen from a prominent climate research center and made public last week provide a rare glimpse into the behind-the-scenes battle to shape the public perception of global warming. While few U.S. politicians bother to question whether humans are changing the world's climate -- nearly three years ago the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded the evidence was unequivocal -- public debate over the debate persists. And the newly disclosed private exchanges among climate scientists at Britain's Climate Research Unit of the University of East Anglia reveal an intellectual circle that appears to feel very much...

          BE KIND TO STRANGERS Do not forget or neglect or refuse to extend hospitality to strangers [in the brotherhood — being friendly, cordial, and gracious, sharing the comforts of your home and doing your part generously], for through it some have entertained angels without knowing it. — Hebrews 13:2 A clique is an exclusive group, one to which not everyone is welcome. Being "in" makes us feel important, but being "out" can be very painful. I find that even the church is full of cliques. As believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, you and...

Big Crowds Already for Sarah Palin’s Saturday Night Visit Last Update: 11:01 am Henrietta, N.Y. -- Hundreds of Sarah Palin fans are already lined up outside the Borders bookstore in Henrietta, getting ready for Sarah Palin's visit on Saturday. The Rochester stop is the only scheduled destination in New York state on her “Going Rogue” book signing tour. She is scheduled to be in Henrietta from 6 to 9 p.m. Fans started lining up since around 7 p.m. Friday, and the line for wristbands to gain entry to the book signing was stretching all the way down the shopping plaza...

Folks, this is cool. Mark Stein, singer/keyboardist for 60s supergroup "Vanilla Fudge" has a song that isn't all that flattering to the Messiah. Check it out. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5LLKs7oW_Q

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa today announced his selection of Douglas Guthrie to become the new general manager of the city’s Housing Department. Guthrie, a former top official at the Chicago Housing Authority, most recently worked with private ventures focused on affordable urban development and the redevelopment of old public housing into mixed-use city centers. Guthrie served for six years as president of Kimball Hill Urban Centers in Chicago, which built mixed-income affordable housing in many depressed city centers that most traditional developers would avoid, including a project with former U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry Cisneros, one of...

(Excerpt) WHEAT RIDGE, Colo. - Call it Freedom of Speech. A billboard recently erected in Wheat Ridge compares President Barack Obama to a terrorist and questions his U.S. citizenship. The billboard, located at 4855 Miller Road, shows two cartoonish images of Obama wearing a Muslim turban and reads "PRESIDENT or JIHAD?" It also says "BIRTH CERTIFICATE - PROVE IT!" alluding to the conspiracy theory which claims Barack Obama was born in Kenya rather than Hawaii, which would disqualify him for the office of President. The words "WAKE UP AMERICA! REMEMBER FT. HOOD!" appear on the bottom of the billboard. (more...

An Illinois woman is charged with a hate crime for berating a Muslim woman about the Fort Hood shooting and then pulling at her headscarf. The charge could lead to three years in prison: justice or prosecutorial overkill? In the days after the Ft. Hood shooting, mosques around the country bolstered their security in anticipation of a backlash from Americans angry about a Muslim man alleged to have killed American soldiers on their own turf. Since then, only one alleged hate crime against Muslims has been directly tied to the Fort Hood rampage. Two days after the rampage by an...

The picture that emerges of prominent climate-change scientists from the more than 3,000 documents and emails accessed by hackers and put on the Internet this week is one of professional backbiting and questionable scientific practices. It could undermine the idea that the science of man-made global warming is entirely settled just weeks before a crucial climate-change summit. Researchers at the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, England, were victims of a cyberattack by hackers sometime Thursday. A collection of emails dating back to the mid-1990s as well as scientific documents were splashed across the Internet. University officials...

Dems snare 60 votes to move ahead on health careBy ERICA WERNER, Associated Press Writer – 4 mins ago WASHINGTON – Democratic leaders secured the last two votes to move ahead on historic health care legislation, clearing the way for a Saturday night showdown on President Barack Obama's top domestic initiative. In long-awaited speeches, centrist Sens. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana said they would stand with their party and vote "yes" on the crucial test vote despite deep reservations with elements of the 2,074-page bill to remake the nation's health care system. "The truth is this...

Rangel Plans to Renew Expiring Tax BreaksBy Michael Cohn November 20, 2009 House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., intends to introduce legislation next month that would keep a variety of tax breaks from expiring before the end of the year. Instead of sending the bill through his committee, Rangel plans to dispatch the bill directly to the floor of the House, according to Bloomberg.com. There are about 73 tax provisions scheduled to expire by Dec. 31, including the credit for research and experimentation expenses, deductions for tuition and state and local taxes, film and TV production expensing...

Dems’ health plan would limit immigrant aidLatinos shaken by Senate gambit to win conservative and moderate votes By LYNSI BURTON HOUSTON CHRONICLE Nov. 21, 2009, 9:16AM WASHINGTON — The latest loser in the political pandemonium over health care reform may be immigrants living in America, an estimated 24 million people likely to be bartered in order to win support in Congress from fence-sitting Democratic moderates and conservatives. Just as House Democratic leaders sacrificed the wishes of abortion-rights activists in a successful gambit to win the votes of anti-abortion Democrats last week, the Senate leadership has included provisions in its health...

China , Japan, Vietnam, Indonesia, Afghanistan, Pakistan... US president Barack Obama ran through the gamut of nations as he articulated another elegant Asia policy speech in Tokyo this week. Conspicuous by its absence was India. Was India not on his radar? Or was it such a close ally that he skipped naming it at a public function? It left New Delhi wondering. Just two days later, bam! He did something even more astonishing by acquiescing in a Chinese demand to let Beijing assume the role of a monitor in South Asia, an area where China is seen by India as...

Bill Moyers to Leave Weekly TelevisionBy ELIZABETH JENSEN; Compiled by DAVE ITZKOFF Published: November 20, 2009 The PBS mainstay Bill Moyers, left, said he was retiring from weekly television and would end his Friday night public affairs show, “Bill Moyers Journal,” on April 30, 2010. That date will also be the last for “Now on PBS,” which has been canceled. Mr. Moyers said he had been planning for some time to retire the program on Dec. 25 but was asked by PBS to raise the funds to continue through April, which he did. “I am 75 years old,” he said...

Hundreds of private e-mail messages and documents hacked from a computer server at a British university are causing a stir among global warming skeptics, who say they show that climate scientists conspired to overstate the case for a human influence on climate change. The e-mail messages, attributed to prominent American and British climate researchers, include discussions of scientific data and whether it should be released, exchanges about how best to combat the arguments of skeptics,... --snip-- In several e-mail exchanges, Kevin Trenberth, a climatologist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, and other scientists discuss gaps in understanding of recent...

Talk about your tangled webs!  When you start looking at the online terrorist community you can get lost in a never ending circle.  Here's the journey I took today - starting where else?  YouTube, the terrorists dream come true.  Let's take a trip, shall we? Isn't that sweet?  An old man strapped with a suicide belt.   This video is apparently so good it has 2 sequels:   In part 3 there we see the suicide terrorist waving goodbye from a car that's driving away, and then later in part 3 - BOOM!  He blows himself to hell. In case...

The Yemeni-American imam who's been under renewed scrutiny after the deadly shootings at Fort Hood, Texas, preaches against alcohol, birthday parties, black magic and extramarital sex. He also supports armed struggle — jihad — against the U.S. military in Afghanistan and Iraq, and has encouraged extremist insurgents in Pakistan and Somalia. None of that sets Anwar al Awlaki, 38, apart from other militant Sunni Muslim clerics — and even many mainstream ones — in the Middle East. Awlaki uses digital means to spread his views, however, through a blog, lectures on YouTube and Facebook pages with more than 1,000 fans....

Tennessee's new law allowing people with handgun permits to be armed in bars and restaurants that serve alcohol is unconstitutionally vague, a judge ruled on Friday. Chancellor Claudia Bonnyman said the law, enacted earlier this year over the veto of Gov. Phil Bredesen, is "fraught with ambiguity." She ruled after an hour of arguments in a lawsuit brought by a group of plaintiffs, many of them restaurant owners. More than 257,000 people have handgun carry permits in Tennessee. Tennessee previously banned handguns in all locations where alcohol was served. The new law made an exception for establishments that serve at...

It was supposed to be all about the end of politics as usual. But while President Barack Obama has been happy to bring about change while abroad by doing all he can to diminish the superpower status of the United States, at home it's been the same old, writes Toby Harnden. Take the case of Greg Craig, the first big figure to depart the Obama White House and the victim of the Washington equivalent of a back-alley stabbing. A respected lawyer who defended President Bill Clinton during impeachment, the former State Department official was one of the first big guns...

Where is your stimulus money going? In Baker City, Ore., the Bureau of Land Management is putting $256,000 of it toward "rattlesnake stewardship." It's the latest addition to our Stimulus Jobs Map.Clear Pacific, Inc. reports creating 8 jobs on this "snake contract." But like more than a thousand of the 30,000 stimulus contractors, they reported the jobs despite not having started the work, and not having received any of the money. Because these firms are not supposed to provide projections -- and especially because the Obama administration has used the jobs reports to extrapolate into future years of stimulus job...

Gordon Brown was told last night that he must seek the immediate return of the Lockerbie bomber to Britain. A senior senator in the United States has written to the Prime Minister to protest that Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi's early release on compassionate grounds on August 20 was granted on the assumption he had only three months to live. Charles Schumer said that period had now elapsed and there was speculation that the severity of the Libyan's condition had been exaggerated. There is growing pressure for all of Megrahi's medical papers to be published, as well as monthly updates...

The Democratic-controlled House voted Thursday to add more than $200 billion to the deficit to prevent steep Medicare payment cuts to doctors, a move Republicans denounced as a political payoff. The measure, approved on a near party-line vote of 243 to 183, is a top priority for the American Medical Association. The GOP contended that Democrats supported the bill to thank the doctors group for backing President Barack Obama's health care overhaul. "This is nothing more than a repayment to the American Medical Association for endorsing the larger health care bill that was on the floor several weeks ago," said...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - Opponents of the so-called guns in bars and restaurant law won their battle in court Friday. Nine local restaurant owners filed a petition in August asking for a hearing on an injunction to challenge the law. In court on Friday, a judge found the new state law to be unconstitutional due to vagueness. The law, which allows gun carry permit holders to take their weapons into bars and restaurants where alcohol is served, went into effect in July. The law will be put on hold until lawmakers return to session in January. Some lawmakers said they would...

MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. -- No charges will be filed against a man who stabbed a teenager to death earlier this month in Minneapolis. The Hennepin County Attorney says the man acted in reasonable self defense. Timothy Jackson, 17, died in the early morning hours of November 7. Investigators say Jackson and another teenager tried to rob the man on the Midtown Greenway. The man stabbed Jackson Robbery charges were filed last week against the teenager who was with Jackson.

Sarah Palin asks: 'Rationed care' already?By ANDY BARR | 11/20/09 8:44 AM EST Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin early Friday morning greeted news that renewed guidelines scale back screenings for cervical cancer by asking if bureaucratic panels were already rationing care. “The recommendation from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists comes on the heels of another recommendation to limit breast cancer screenings with mammograms. There are many questions unanswered for me, but one which immediately comes to mind is whether costs have anything to do with these recommendations,” Palin wrote in a post on her Facebook page. “The current...

EAST ST. LOUIS — A store clerk in East St. Louis killed robber Larando King, but it was holdup accomplice Michael T. Hunter Jr., who was charged Friday with first-degree murder, officials said. CRIME STATS bullet Get the breaking news from our St. Louis Crime Beat blog bullet See stats around St. Louis and the nation in our searchable database. A person committing a felony can be charged with murder under Illinois law for the death of anyone during the crime. St. Clair County State's Attorney Robert Haida, whose office filed the charge, said in a prepared statement: "I commend...

Oprah Winfrey is fleeing broadcast TV for cable. NBC, once arguably the biggest cultural tastemaker in the United States, is being shopped to Comcast, the country’s largest cable company. Have we reached a tipping point that suggests a remarkable decline in the fortunes of broadcast television in America? snip Analysts and executives agree that the economic model of broadcast — which relies more heavily on advertising than cable — is fractured. What they are wondering now is if it is irreparably broken. snip The business model of the big three networks — which became four when Fox began prime-time programming...

Forced health insurance on shaky legal groundPosted on Fri, Nov. 20, 2009 10:15 PM PHOENIX | In 2006, long before there was an Obama administration determined to impose a command-and-control federal health care system, a young orthopedic surgeon walked into the Goldwater Institute with an idea. The institute, America’s most potent advocate of limited government, embraced Eric Novack’s idea for protecting Arizonans from health care coercion. In 2008, Arizonans voted on Novack’s proposed amendment to the state’s Constitution: “No law shall be passed that restricts a person’s freedom of choice of private health care systems or private plans of any...

As a health reform bill endorsed by President Obama marches toward its first Senate floor vote on Saturday, his opponents stepped up efforts to define the legislation as big-government ambition run amok that will interfere with intimate medical decisions and threaten the pocketbooks of average taxpayers. A dozen Republican senators spent Friday in an orchestrated, hours-long session of floor speeches, assailing the health-care bill as a vehicle to higher taxes, Medicare cuts and premium increases. Meanwhile, the surprise recommendation this week by a quasi-government panel that women should have fewer mammograms injected a volatile issue into the health debate.

Fort Hood Texas Shootings Free Republic Archives PART IIORIGINAL Fort Hood Archives... If you create a new thread, feel free to post a link to it here as well. If you post a link, you don't have to ping it to me..just take my name out of the ping field. The last time it filled my ping box pretty fast. My thanks to ALL who helped create the previous thread. Our prayers Continue...... Fort Hood's Fallen HeroesBy Freeper La Enchiladita...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: The Gallup poll will announce -- they effectively have announced it -- the Gallup poll will announce that for the first time in their poll Barack Obama's approval rating has fallen below 50%. In fact, a little story about this. This from Ben Smith at The Politico: "His approval numbers have bounced down to the 50% mark several times, driven by weaker support from independents and Republicans, but hadn't crossed it. The slide is worrying for the White House, but it's probably not yet panic time. Ronald Reagan's approval numbers dropped well below 40% during the depths...

A billboard showing President Barack Obama wearing a turban has sparked a lot of attention at the suburban Denver used car dealership that put it up. The sign, completed Thursday by artist David Lee of Arvada, shows a grinning, cartoonish Obama and bears the words: “PRESIDENT or JIHAD?” Underneath the image is a yellow square with the phrase, “BIRTH CERTIFICATE, PROVE IT!” The words “WAKE UP AMERICA! REMEMBER FT. HOOD” appear at the bottom of the billboard at Wolf Interstate Leasing and Sales about seven miles west of Denver.

Robbery victim won't be charged. Prosecutors have decided not to file charges against the man accused of killing 18-year old Tim Jackson, saying he was acting in self-defense. Investigators say Jackson and another man tried to rob a man identified as P.W. as he walked in the Midtown Greenway near 28th Ave. and Hiawatha in Minneapolis. P.W. told police he stabbed Jackson in the stomach as Jackson tried to hit him in the head. "Minnesota law is pretty clear, folks are entitled to walk in the streets, if someone assualts you, you have a right to respond with reasonable force"...

A group of doctors in Italy is investigating a fascinating new treatment for multiple sclerosis, based on a theory that, if proven true, could radically alter the lives of patients.... Patients seen in the documentary relate how, after the simple procedure, their MS symptoms suddenly stopped and, in some cases, they were able to resume normal lives....

The Justice Department intends to drop manslaughter and weapons charges against one of the Blackwater Worldwide security guards involved in a deadly 2007 Baghdad shooting, prosecutors said in court documents Friday. The shooting in busy Nisoor Square left 17 Iraqis dead and inflamed anti-American sentiment abroad. It touched off a string of investigations that ultimately led the State Department to cancel the company's lucrative contract to guard diplomats in Iraq. Iraqis have said they're watching closely to see how the U.S. judicial system handles the five men accused of unleashing an unprovoked attack on civilians with machine guns and grenades....

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WASHINGTON, DC, November 19, 2009 — The Mississippi Court of Appeals has granted a retrial for Covington & Burling LLP client Cory Maye, who was convicted and sentenced to death for the 2001 shooting of a police officer that occurred during a narcotics task force search of Mr. Maye’s home. In its opinion of November 17, the Court of Appeals found that Mr. Maye had been denied the right to be tried in the county where the offense occurred, and that the trial court had improperly rejected Mr. Maye’s attempt to withdraw a prior motion to transfer venue. The shooting...

While on the board of a Chicago-based charity, Barack Obama helped fund a carbon trading exchange that will likely play a critical role in the cap-and-trade carbon reduction program he is now trying to push through Congress as president. In 2000 and 2001, while Barack Obama served as a board member for a Chicago-based charitable foundation, he helped to fund a pioneering carbon trading exchange that is likely to fill a critical role in the controversial cap-and-trade carbon reduction scheme that President Obama is now trying to push rapidly through Congress. During those two years, the Joyce Foundation gave nearly...

Republican gubernatorial candidate Tom Campbell announced today he's passed the $1 million mark in fundraising, nearly doubling what he had raised by the end of June. The former congressman has largely been seen as an experienced but poorly funded challenger to his two GOP opponents, wealthy former Silicon Valley CEOs Meg Whitman and Steve Poizner, who are spending much of their own wealth on their candidacies. Whitman has already given $19 million to her own campaign.

SNIPPET: "ONTARIO, Calif. -- State lawmakers are holding a hearing today in Ontario to discuss the rise in the number of criminal gangs using networking sites like Twitter and Facebook. Officials say the hearing entitled "Gangs 2.0: The Emerging Threat of Cyberthugs" will explore the use of social networking tools in gang recruitment and gang-related crime. Assembly majority leader Alberto Torrico, and attorney general candidate, says gang members both in and out of prison are making more use of technology."

PRINCETON, NJ -- The latest Gallup Daily tracking results show 49% of Americans approving of the job Barack Obama is doing as president, putting him below the majority approval level for the first time in his presidency.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai is an "unworthy partner" who does not deserve a big boost either in U.S. troops or civilian aid, U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi said. Pelosi, a skeptic on sending more troops to Afghanistan, also said in an interview with National Public Radio aired on Friday that there was not strong support among her fellow Democrats in Congress for "any big ramp-up of troops" to oppose resurgent Taliban forces. She told NPR she had asked fellow Democrats to give President Barack Obama room to decide his Afghan strategy, which is expected to be announced in...

Why all the silence from the MSM on the US Senate healthcare bill? Other then for the alternate news media, who has been holding the torch in discussion of this major issue it has been nothing BUT SILENCE, PERIOD. This summer, I’ve spent my fair share of time reading complicated legislation that frequently does not make sense. There are thousands of pages with details about tax, regulation and service changes that will impact health care service, quality and cost. I challenge the media to tell us what’s in the bills.

US Legislators want new tax to pay for war in Afghanistan By Andrew Moran. Nov 20, 2009 Appropriations Committee Chairman Wisconsin Congressman Dave Obey, Defense Appropriations Subcommittee John Murtha of Pennsylvania and Connecticut Democratic Caucus Chairman John Larsen issued a statement on Thursday proposing a new tax, “Share The Sacrifice Act of 2010,” that would directly pay for the war in Afghanistan, according to AFP. The trio believes the new tax would pay for the wars without deficit spending. (snip) If this bill would be passed then it would affect anyone who makes an annual salary as little as $22,000...

The media is stirring up drama regarding tomorrow's vote - namely, they are speculating whether Landrieu and Lincoln will vote with Reid to start debate. Of course they will. Three big reasons: (a) "Keep the Ball Rolling". Tomorrow's vote - like all of the votes to date - is a process vote, meaning that Obama and the leadership can argue, "Vote yea to keep the process going. We can improve the bill later if you stick with us." Every vote they have won to date has, I think, been won based on this argument - and it should carry the...