Free Republic

Health-care reform might have become just another political ploy to earn votes come Election Day up on Capitol Hill -- but it's causing some parents to resort to Middle Ages-style medicine that even Theodoric of York wouldn't prescribe. We don't know if the lack of adequate dental care in the country forced these two parents to pull their child's loose tooth out the "Radio Shack way" -- tying one end of a string around the tooth and another to the end of a remote-controlled car and sending it barreling toward a makeshift ramp at Mach 2 -- but we're pretty...

Junk your SUV and buy an electric scooter. Recent claims by various OPEC leaders that the world has plenty of oil left are bunk, alleges Sadad Al-Husseini, a former top executive at Saudi Aramco, Saudi Arabia’s state-owned oil company. Oil-producing countries are inflating the size of their oil reserves by as much as 300 billion barrels by padding supposedly proven reserves with “probable” reserves and tar and oil sands, according to Husseini. Such hypothetical reserves are “not delineated, not accessible and not available for production,” Husseini said at a recent energy conference in London. Oil production has now reached its...

An MV-22 Osprey, belonging to Marine Medium Tilt Rotor Squadron 263, sits on the deck waiting for members of the 27th Infantry Brigade, 7th Iraqi Infantry Division and Marines with Military in Transition team 0720 to load up after a heli-borne operation. Photo by 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing (Fwd) Public Affairs. AL-ANBAR PROVINCE — As Coalition forces continue to operate throughout the Iraqi countryside, training the Iraqi security forces (ISF) to stand on their own two feet becomes an increasingly familiar scene. Third Marine Aircraft Wing (Forward) does its own part in the transition process by participating in training operations...

Scientists have paved the way for the first permanently manned base on the Moon by developing a way to 'squeeze' oxygen out of lunar soil. Nasa experts say the technique will allow astronauts of the future to create their own supplies of the gas instead of transporting it all from Earth. The space agency plans to take its extraction system to the Moon in 2011 as part of its Robotic Lunar Exploration Program, which will test a range of equipment designed to support human life. If the technique is successful, it could lead to a permanent station like Moon-base Alpha...

By Gray Beverley Telegraph Staff Writer LIZELLA - About three days before Pfc. Jessica Lynch returned home to her family in West Virginia, one of her rescuers was visiting his parents in Lizella. Lt. Col. Jean Malone - who got back from the war about a month ago - said he was surprised by the attention given to the rescue operation, which he helped coordinate as deputy operations chief for the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Brigade. "It's kind of surprising for me," Malone said Tuesday from his Camp Lejeune, N.C., home. "We didn't realize it was that big of a deal."...

Command Releases Details of Lynch Rescue 6 minutes ago By NICOLE WINFIELD, Associated Press WriterCAMP AS SAYLIYAH, Qatar - Frightened and seriously wounded, a 19-year-old supply clerk who was held by Iraq (news - web sites) for more than a week at first hid under a sheet when a team of U.S. military commandos stormed into her hospital room.   "Jessica Lynch," called out an American soldier, approaching her bed. "We are United States soldiers and we're here to protect you and take you home." Peering from behind the sheet as he removed his helmet, she looked up and said,...

NEW MISSION FOR THE SNATCH SQUAD WHICH SAVED PRIVATE JESSICA LYNCH by Gordon Thomas The snatch squad which rescued US army private Jessica Lynch is poised to carry out an even more sensational rescue – snatching Top Gun pilot Michael Scott Speicher from his TWELVE YEAR incarceration as Saddam’s prisoner. Incredibly, the CIA and other US intelligence agents in Iraq, believe the pilot is still alive – and incarcerated in one of Saddam’s torture dungeons in the north-east suburbs of Baghdad. A week before the war started, Captain Speicher was “spotted alive” being driven out of one of Saddam’s palaces...

'It worked perfectly' WASHINGTON - As U.S. special forces hurtled out of a Black Hawk helicopter to rescue Private Jessica Lynch from an Iraqi hospital in a night-time raid, Gen. Tommy Franks watched the entire operation unfold via a live video feed. The U.S. commander watched as special forces shot their way into the hospital in Nasiriya, found the wounded 19-year-old and shot their way back out again. "It was a classic joint operation done by some of our nation's finest warriors ... loyal to the creed they know that they'll never leave a fallen comrade behind and never embarrass...