Free Republic

I see no reason whatsoever that President Bush could not use his Presidential Pardon power to pardon Terri Schiavo. Our founding fathers granted the presidnet this power to protect the individual against evil in the judiciary. No mention is made between civil or criminal cases, and the only recourse from those opposed is the ballot box or impeachment.President Bush could pardon Terri Shiavo, pick her up in the presidential helicopter, and keep her in the Lincoln bedroom to guarantee her safety during rehabilitation. Terri's mother could file for divorce on her behalf. With access to Terri, the news media and...

For those who subscribe to Judeo-Christian values, right and wrong, good and evil, are derived from God, not from reason alone, nor from the human heart, the state or through majority rule. Though most college-educated Westerners never hear the case for the need for God-based morality because of the secular outlook that pervades modern education and the media, the case is both clear and compelling: If there is no transcendent source of morality (morality is the word I use for the standard of good and evil), "good" and "evil" are subjective opinions, not objective realities. In other words, if there...

I once had the opportunity to ask Thomas Keneally, author of Schindler's List, what he thought was the difference between Oskar Schindler, rescuer of Jews and hero of his story, and Amon Goeth, the Nazi commandant of the Plaszow concentration camp. His answer was revealing. Not much, he said. Had there been no war, Mr. Schindler and Mr. Goeth might have been drinking buddies and business partners, morally obtuse, perhaps, but relatively harmless. What a difference a war makes, especially to the moral choices that lead to good and evil.Ever since 9/11, the discussion of good and evil has migrated...

From "Many Shades of Folly" by Roger Banks; published in NewsMax and The Legal Times. Advancement in age guarantees no corresponding advancement in wisdom, as Shakespeare's uncrowned Lear attests on the heath of his personal and political ruin, lamenting, "I am old . . . and foolish!" But, alas, one need not invoke Elizabethan tragedy to recognize this time-honored principle. As revealed in Sen. Zell Miller's magnificent new book, A National Party No More, the marriage of old age and folly is a daily matinee in Washington, especially among leaders of the author's own Democratic Party. In words that are...

Dutch politician's killer gets 18 years 15 April 2003 The assassin of Dutch populist politician Pim Fortuyn was jailed for 18 years today. Animal rights activist Volkert van der Graaf admitted shooting Mr Fortuyn at point-blank range nine days before the elections last May which swept the taboo-breaking politician's novice party into power. Mr Fortuyn, 54, a homosexual who courted controversy by calling for an immigration freeze and criticising Islam, was shot outside a radio station in Hilversum, near Amsterdam. Van der Graaf was arrested minutes later. "The accused went about his plan to kill the victim with calm consideration,"...

PACE, Fla. (AP) -- People in this Florida Panhandle town and surrounding communities paid final respects Monday to 18-year-old Chester Lee Miller, although many never knew the malnourished youth before his death. Chester died from a ruptured stomach Wednesday at a hospital in nearby Milton. Four days earlier, he had been taken in by strangers after he knocked on their door. He told them he had been starved and sent by bus from Pennsylvania to look for his father. His mother, Lydia Miller, 37, and stepfather, Paul Hoffman Sr., 38, of Hazelton, Pa., remained in a Pennsylvania jail Monday. They...

  Good and Evil FROM "The Prophet" By Kahlil Gibran AND one of the elders of the city said, Speak to us of Good and Evil.And he answered:Of the good in you I can speak, but not of the evil.For what is evil but good tortured by its own hunger and thirst?Verily when good is hungry it seeks food even in dark caves, and when it thirsts it drinks even of dead waters.You are good when you are one with yourself.Yet when you are not one with yourself you are not evil.For a divided house is not a den of...