Free Republic

ADDISON, Ill. - You could hardly design a more intriguing contrast: man versus woman; a veteran legislator versus a political neophyte; anti-abortion candidate versus abortion rights proponent. If you live in Chicago’s western suburbs in the Sixth Congressional District you’ll get a chance to choose the winner of this face off. Your choice could decide whether Democrats gain control of the House. This is a district where President Bush won 53 percent of the vote in 2004. Now it’s up to veteran state legislator Peter Roskam to keep it a Republican seat in House. Since 1974, Republican Henry Hyde, best...

U.S. Lawmaker Blasts Yasukuni Visits MAY 15, 2006 03:10 by Young-A Soh (sya@donga.com) U.S. political leaders voiced strong concerns over the Japanese prime ministerfs paying respects at the Yasukuni Shrine. Thus, it is expected that the controversies over the Yasukuni Shrine will heat up in Japan with its election of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) president slated for this September. Stop Paying Visits to the Shrine If to Give an Address at the U.S. Congress – The Asahi Shimbun reported on May 13 that the U.S. House International Relations Committee Chairman Henry Hyde (Republican, picture) demanded that Japanese Prime...

CHICAGO, Feb. 18 The smiling candidate in rimless eyeglasses and a long woolen skirt maneuvers carefully among tables and chairs as she works a crowded Starbucks. She is taking small steps, and the reason for the slight awkwardness in her gait is not instantly clear. Reaching to shake hands with a voter, she says: "You may have heard of me. I'm the Iraq war vet who's running. I was injured over there." Talking with another, she says: "I actually lost both my legs. I can walk because I got really good health care." Tammy Duckworth, Democratic candidate for Congress, cannot...

WASHINGTON - In an effort to defend Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice against allegations of heavy-handedness in brokering an Israeli-Palestinian border-crossing deal, the heads of America's two largest synagogue movements are calling on members of the House of Representatives to sign a letter commending her efforts. Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Union for Reform Judaism, and Rabbi Jerome Epstein, executive vice president of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, sent a letter to all House members, urging them to sign a letter congratulating Rice. The letter is making the rounds on Capitol Hill. Seymour Reich, president of the Israel...

OSCAR winner Kim Basinger has recently sent a curt email to her ex-husband Alec Baldwin. It did not contain even the most perfunctory of festive greetings -- she refuses to write or speak his name. The subject of this terse missive was their daughter, Ireland, 10, who is spending New Year with her father in New York. The handover must be planned with almost military precision so that her warring parents do not have to talk to each other or meet. The child-share deal was thrashed out almost two weeks ago at the Los Angeles County Superior Court. In an...

ELK GROVE VILLAGE, Ill. Henry John Hyde, Junior -- son of Illinois Republican U-S Representative Henry Hyde -- has died at the age of 55. A spokesman for Congressman Hyde says Hyde Junior died yesterday following a lengthy illness. Henry Hyde Junior was the first-born son of Congressman Hyde. Following his first year in college at Loyola University of New Orleans in 1970, Hyde played baseball in the minor leagues. In 1973, Hyde Junior was signed by the Atlanta Braves as a free agent and sent to pitch in the South Atlantic League, where he spent parts of two seasons...

Human Events is expected to name their 2005 Man of the Year some time next week and I thought we would take a look at some of the possible contenders who helped shape the past year.2005 was very much a nascent turning point for the conservative movement and with 2008 seemingly getting closer everyday we must finsih what was started in 2005.Almost all of the candidates for Man Of the Year were part of the beginning stages of a revitalized conservative movement that was begun in 05 but will have to be finished in later years. Henry Hyde After thirty...

Durbin takes rare stand to endorse candidate ----------------------------- WASHINGTON - Wounded Iraq war veteran Tammy Duckworth on Sunday will announce her plans to run in the Democratic primary for retiring Rep. Henry Hyde's seat in the northwest suburbs of Chicago. Duckworth was a helicopter pilot with a Peoria-based Illinois Army National Guard unit when her aircraft was shot down on Nov. 12, 2004. She lost both legs and suffered serious injury to her right arm and has spent much of the time since in surgeries and rehabilitation. She served with the 1st Battalion, 106th Aviation Regiment. "You can't meet this...

CARACAS -- A congressional delegation led by Rep. Henry Hyde arrived on Monday in Venezuela, but was not permitted to leave the plane at the country's main airport and left abruptly, a spokesman for the U.S. embassy said. The president of the airport, however, denied the accusation, saying the U.S. ambassador met the plane at the airport, entered it briefly, and then the craft departed. The delegation on the plane had been slated to meet with Venezuelan Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel and other government officials, and waited for roughly one hour before departing, Brian Penn, the embassy spokesman, told...

In reviewing the career of French diplomat Jean-Bernard Mérimée, two key moments stand out. In June 1995, Mr. Mérimée, then France's ambassador to the U.N., announced he was largely satisfied with the progress Iraq had made on disarmament and wanted sanctions lifted sooner rather than later. And this week, a French investigative magistrate brought Mr. Mérimée in for questioning on an allegation that he took a bribe from Saddam in the form of 11 million barrels of oil. So now we know what French officialdom means by the word "multilateralism": One part involves speechifying about the need for international "consensus"...

Throughout Africa, millions of people live in circumstances scarcely imaginable. It is too simple to lay the conditions of grinding poverty, failing institutions, rampant corruption, recurring conflict, starving children, and flagging economies all at the feet of some notoriously wretched leaders, although the continent has its share. Africa has also been the victim of good intentions. Decades of promises from Western donors have littered the landscape with half-finished projects that now stand as rusted monuments to the African miracle that hasn't happened.We should all applaud Tony Blair for making Africa the centrepiece of the July G8 summit at Gleneagles Hotel,...

When US Representative Henry Hyde spoke about the bill that would penalize the United Nations half the dues it extorts from the US annually for not embracing reform he included as shocking a statement that has ever been uttered on Capitol Hill. He alluded to the fact that those who represent us in Washington DC need to be “good stewards of the people’s money.” Of course, for this statement of common sense to have any meaning those in Washington would first have to understand that the money they “appropriate” isn’t theirs, it’s ours, and that they work for us. I...

A House committee yesterday voted to slash U.S. dues payments to the United Nations by half if the world body fails to enact sweeping reforms to its budget, human rights arm and peacekeeping missions. By a one-vote margin, the House International Relations Committee rejected a softer Democratic alternative that would have given Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice the power to decide whether to withhold dues. Committee Chairman Henry J. Hyde, Illinois Republican and a co-sponsor of the bill, said anything short of a mandatory cutoff of U.S. funds was an "empty gesture" in the face of such scandals as the...

UNITED NATIONS (AP) - The United Nations on Friday warned that a proposed congressional bill linking U.N. reform with tens of millions of dollars in U.S. dues would be "counterproductive." U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan is pushing his own reform package, which would include some of the most sweeping changes in the 60-year history of the United Nations. Officials here worry that the congressional action would interfere with his efforts. "The secretary-general's position on the use of withholding as a tool for reform is pretty clear," U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said. "He feels it's counterproductive, particularly at a time when reform...

The US Congress is on a collision course with the United Nations by threatening to cut its annual budget by tens of millions of pounds, which would disrupt its work on the ground. Henry Hyde, the Republican chairman of the house international relations committee, is circulating an 80-page draft bill suggesting cuts to UN programmes congressmen regard as inefficient or worthless. Republican senators have waged a long campaign against the UN, much of whose work they oppose on ideological grounds. Their case has been aided by recent scandals, ranging from sex abuse by UN peacekeepers in Africa to the mishandling...

UNITED NATIONS (AP) - A U.S. congressional committee has drafted a bill that threatens to withhold tens of millions of dollars in dues from the United Nations unless the world body conducts wide-ranging reforms, possibly setting the stage for a funding battle like the one that plunged the U.N. into financial crisis a decade ago. The "United Nations Reform Act of 2005" targets a panoply of issues that have troubled critics of the United Nations, particularly Republicans, for years. Among other things, it would seek to cut funding for programs seen as useless and bar human rights violators from serving...

THE SPOTLIGHT -- This morning, just four blocks from the Glen Ellyn neighborhood in which he grew up, Republican State Senator Peter Roskam will formally announce his candidacy for the 6th Congressional District seat being vacated by retiring U.S. Rep. Henry Hyde. The race to replace Hyde is likely to receive national attention. U.S. Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Chicago) sees the open seat as one of the Democrats' top targets. Roskam is one of several Republican candidates whose names were floated as potential successors to Hyde when rumors began to swirl about the 81-year-old's possible retirement earlier this year. Roskam's early...

IN THE SPOTLIGHT -- On Monday, Republican State Senator Peter Roskam was joined by supporters as he formally announced his candidacy for the 6th Congressional District seat being vacated by retiring U.S. Rep. Henry Hyde. The race to replace Hyde is likely to receive national attention. U.S. Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Chicago) has suggested that Democrats will target the west suburban race as a one of their top in the nation. Roskam is one of several Republican candidates whose names were floated as potential successors to Hyde when rumors began to swirl about the 81-year-old's possible retirement earlier this year. Yesterday...

State senator announces bid to replace Hyde in Congress GLEN ELLYN, Ill. State Senator Peter Roskam says he will run for the congressional seat being vacated by Henry Hyde. Roskam was first elected to the state Legislature in 1993. He is among its most articulate voices for conservative positions on gun control, abortion and more. He has also been a frequent critic of Democratic Governor Rod Blagojevich (bluh-GOY'-uh-vich). The 44-year-old Wheaton resident could face some tough competition. Moderate state Senator Carole Pankau (PAYNK'-ow) might challenge him for the Republican nomination. And the 2004 Democratic nominee is likely to run again....

State Sen. Peter Roskam, R-Wheaton, will make official what he's been hinting at for weeks: He will run for Congress to succeed retiring U.S. Rep. Henry Hyde. Roskam, the Illinois Senate Republican whip and floor leader, scheduled his announcement for 10 a.m. Monday at the Main Street Recreation Center in Glen Ellyn. Although Republican leaders have called Roskam the front-runner, he will have company on the ballot. Republicans J.P. "Rick" Carney of Wheaton, former DuPage County recorder; state Sen. Carole Pankau of Roselle; and former state Rep. Tom Johnson of West Chicago have declared or are exploring their candidacy for...