Free Republic

Publisher Peter Osnos, who admits to personally working with former Bush White House press secretary Scott McClellan on his new book, What Happened, began his career as an assistant to I.F. Stone, the pro-communist "journalist" named as a Soviet agent of influence who was the uncle of Weather Underground communist terrorist Kathy Boudin. But the connections don't end there. Boudin's son Chesa was raised by Barack Obama associates Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, who were Boudin's comrades in the communist terrorist group, after Kathy Boudin went to prison for her involvement in an armed robbery and assault that took the...

Wake up and smell the Contras! Fair-trade coffee’s not just for lefties. Now the Contras are in on the action, says Mike Power Nicaraguan coffee has been a staple of any good liberal's shopping basket since the 1980s. But now misty-eyed Reaganites can get their hands on the fair-trade action as well, with Contra Coffee. Gourmet coffee grown by former Contras – the US-supported militia who tried to topple Nicaragua's socialist Sandinista government in the 1980s – is now available and offering customers a chance to "Wake up with freedom fighters!" according to company founders Tom Kilroy and Ryan Myers,...

WASHINGTON - A former defense secretary for Ronald Reagan says he implored the president to put Marines serving in Beirut in a safer position before terrorists attacked them in 1983, killing 241 servicemen. "I was not persuasive enough to persuade the president that the Marines were there on an impossible mission," Caspar Weinberger says in an oral history project capturing the views of former Reagan administration officials. He said one of his greatest regrets was in failing to overcome the arguments that "'Marines don't cut and run,' and 'We can't leave because we're there'" before the devastating suicide attack on...

J. James Estrada editorializes in The American Daily:""Working in the U.S. Attorney’s office in the Southern District of New York, James Comey investigated and declined to indict Hillary Clinton in Pardongate, a case involving pardons for votes in the New York town of New Square. In his final days in office, President Clinton pardoned four rabbis from the town and Hillary went on to win the votes of the village: 1200 to just 14 for Rick Lazio, her New York Senate opponent." "Comey went on to prosecute Martha Stewart and from there then went on to become Deputy Attorney General...

In assessing the current phase of events in the Middle East, it is essential to link events in Syria with events in Iran. These, in turn, must be linked to the state of the war in Iraq and conditions in the Arabian Peninsula. The region is of one fabric, to say the least, and it is impossible to understand unfolding events -- the pressure against Syria involving the murder of a former Lebanese prime minister; feints and thrusts with Iran and talk of direct political engagement with the United States; the emergence of a new government in Baghdad, or obstacles...

SIMI VALLEY, Calif. -- Sometimes, the only thing a president can do is hang onto history -- the promise of that day when he has his library and all his critics have transformed into admirers who gloss over his many stumbles only to stand in awe of his accomplishments, when the naysayers and nitpickers cannot be heard, as the ears before him hear only an uplifting soundtrack of Aaron Copland. President Bush clearly was dreaming of that day as he stood at the grand opening of the Reagan Library Air Force One Pavilion, with wife Laura and Nancy Reagan by...

The day after the House voted to halt all aid to rebels fighting to overthrow the Sandinista government of Nicaragua, U.S. Ambassador to Honduras John D. Negroponte urged the president's national security adviser and the CIA director to hang tough. The thrust of the envoy's "back channel" July 1983 message to the men running the contra war against Nicaragua was contained in a single cryptic sentence: "Hondurans believe special project is as important as ever." "Special project" was code for the secret arming of contra rebels from bases in Honduras -- a cause championed by Negroponte, then a rising diplomatic...

LEAGUE CITY — In what further may be a sign that the once dominant blue of the Democratic Party is starting to take on a stronger shade of Republican red in Galveston County, Oliver North is set to rally the conservative faithful this spring. North, the retired U.S. Marine officer best known for his involvement in the Iran-Contra investigations during the Ronald Reagan administration, has agreed to be the keynote speaker for the annual Lincoln Day Dinner in March. The Lincoln Day Dinner, named for President Abraham Lincoln, is a yearly event sponsored by local conservative groups. The Fox News...

For the past 25 years when Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, why did Saddam Hussein not use those weapons of mass destruction against the US or Israel, or hand them over to the Al-Qaeda terrorists or the terrorists in the west bank, even though during the past 25 years, on and off, the following were done which angered and humiliated Saddam Hussein (1) Israel destroyed Saddam Hussein's nuclear reactors in the 80s (2) Through the Iran-Contra scandal, the US supplied arms to Iran in the Iran-Iraq war in the 80s (3) In the 90s, the US ousted Saddam...

John Kerry's Fellow TravellersA 5-part series exposing John Kerry's Communist connections.Part 4: Subversion in the Senate: Kerry's Communist ConstituencyBy Fedora *NOTE: The term "fellow traveller" as used in this article series refers to someone who is not a member of the Communist Party (CP) but regularly engages in actions which advance the Party's program. Some apparent fellow travellers may actually be "concealed party members": members of the CP who conceal their membership. Which of these classifications is applicable to the Kerrys is a question this series leaves unresolved. This series does not argue for any direct evidence of Richard or...

John Hull denounces [Kerry, John F. Investigation of Contra Links with Narcotics (1986-1989); Democratic Party (United States)] for permitting [Communists; Journalists] to distort truth of Nicaragua in correspondence with Richard G. Lugar

Misael Vacca Ramirez, the Bishop of Yopal BOGOTA, Colombia - Colombian President Alvaro Uribe ordered his troops to launch a rescue operation if they locate a Roman Catholic bishop being held by Marxist rebels in jungle-covered mountains. Hundreds of counterinsurgency forces searched the northwestern Casanare region Monday for signs of Misael Vacca Ramirez, the Bishop of Yopal. He was seized Sunday by members of the National Liberation Army, or ELN, the smaller of Colombia's two main rebel groups. "Kidnapping is indefensible," Uribe told reporters. "He must be rescued, and I hope that he quickly regains his freedom." Speaking Tuesday from...

I'm sick of the ignorance by a media that never understood the implications of the Cold War...and even the events and misrepresentations of Iran/Contra. Before one can understand what liberals like to call Reagan's great betrayal, one must have a partial understanding of foreign policy and precedent even before Reagan became president.  Since the days of Harry Truman, every president usually had the full support of Congress when dealing with communist/Soviet aggression. The disgrace of Iran/Contra wasn't what Reagan did...but what an obstructionist (mostly democrat) congress did. From the very day Reagan set foot in office, the far left wing...

Most of us old enough to have been reading newspapers and watching television in the mid-1980s remember when the Soviet-backed Marxist-Leninist junta “Sandinistas” were battling the anti-communist guerrilla army of “Contras” in Nicaragua. And who could forget the overblown Iran-Contra affair, the attempt to arm the Contras through a deal to swap arms for hostages with the mullahs in Iran. What might be hazy in the memory after 20 years, however, is the Keystone Kops, I-want-to-play-president role of the freshman senator from Massachusetts, John Forbes Kerry. Still humming his “Give peace a chance” mantra from Vietnam days, Kerry jumped into...

HAVE YOU FORGOTTEN!--THE KERRY COMMITTEE? By Humbetro Fontova Say what you want about Senator John Kerry, nobody ever called him lazy. He landed in Congress and immedeatly rolled up his sleeves and spat on his hands. The Nicaraguan people MUST end up like the Cuban and Vietnamese! Toward this end the man was tireless. The vision inspired him to such a staggering work load, energized him to such a frantic pace, propelled him to such legislative feats, that his colleagues--even the pinkest-- gaped in envy and awe. Back then Nicaragua was the true believers' latest City On a Hill, Daniel...

Rep. Barbara Lee's Republican challenger this year is an online CEO, an energetic campaigner -- and also the daughter of the Nicaraguan Contras' late military commander, a heritage that has some East Bay liberals and human rights activists howling. Claudia Bermudez, 50, of Oakland, said she'll confront Lee on issues from homeland security to education. "I'm a businesswoman, I live here in the district -- I don't come as a Contra leader to come and overtake Berkeley." But she touts her father's legacy on her campaign Web site, saying she's "proud to carry on a tradition of political activism that...

<p>BOSTON — Federal agents late Thursday night raided a Quincy, Mass., company that provides critical software to major U.S. agencies and is suspected of having ties to Usama bin Laden and Al Qaeda terrorists.</p> <p>Ptech Inc.'s clients include the FBI, Internal Revenue Service, Energy Department, Federal Aviation Administration, U.S. Naval air systems, the U.S. Air Force, NATO, the U.S. House of Representatives, the Department of Energy and the agency that handles nuclear weapons security, according to its Web site.</p>

<p>A central figure in the Iran-Contra affair of the 1980s has passed allegations to the Bush administration that $150 million in enriched uranium was smuggled from Iraq into Iran five years ago and some may remain hidden in Iraq.</p> <p>The information was relayed to the administration through a conservative author, Michael Ledeen. And Ledeen is now accusing the CIA of failing to aggressively check the allegation because of a long-held distrust of Manucher Ghorbanifar, a middleman in the Reagan administration's Iran-Contra swap of arms for hostages.</p>

Our dangerous Iran policy continues. Even for August, the media's handling of the latest round of leaks from the usual unnamed sources in State and CIA on the subject of Iran is unusually feckless. The gist of the "story" fed to the press is that some Pentagon officials (and maybe I, as well) met and actually spoke with some Iranians a year or more ago, and then again a month or two ago. These talks were "unauthorized," which apparently means that Colin Powell and George Tenet weren't asked for permission beforehand, and, according to Newsday and the Washington Post, they...

<p>Pentagon officials met over a three-day period in late 2001 with a long-discredited Iranian who was a middleman in the Iran-Contra scandal, Defense Department officials said Friday.</p> <p>Manucher Ghorbanifar sat in on a series of meetings in Europe between two defense officials and two other Iranians who the Bush administration had been told had information useful to the United States in its then-fledgling global war on terrorism, a senior defense official said on condition of anonymity. The meetings occurred not long after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, he said.</p>

The announcement that Admiral John Poindexter's latest brainwave - to encourage betting on the likelihood of a terrorist attack - had been terminated was characteristically bland. It began: "The Director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) announced today that DARPA's participation in the Futures Markets Applied to Prediction (FutureMAP) program has been withdrawn" The language does not betray the repugnant nature of the project, but then Poindexter is expert at disguising repugnant projects in bland language. He came to prominence in the Reagan administration, where the word "freedom" was used to justify renewed support for Latin American military...

Fellow freepers...could use some help here. My liberal friends keep bringing up the Iran-Contra affair as if their was a illegal cover-up by the Reagon administration. I need to know what really happened. Could you guys give me a hand with this. Thanks.

The treatment of a Jew Jonathan Pollard about 18 years ago held a sensitive position in the United States intelligence community which gave him access to some classified information. Being a Jew, besides being a United States citizen, gave him an extra awareness about the dangers his Jewish people in Israel were facing, Israel being at the time classified as a United States friendly nation - certainly not an enemy state. Besides, there was a commitment during those days by the United States that they would pass on the intelligence information that would be vital for Israel's security to know....

Flipping through channels at lunch and ran accross Leon Harris interviewing McCain. Harris proposed that if Bush has lied to get us to attack Iraq it would be worse than either Iran-Contra or Watergate in his opinion. Funny, he neglected to mention Viet Nam where that was actually the case.

So in light of the two wars we've fought against Iraq now, I was wondering if there had been any serious analysis of the effect of our playing both sides in the Iran-Iraq war to keep either from winning. I remember, vaguely, at the time Demos whining that we were going to regret having helped the Iranis, when in fact is has probably saved American lives now...in addition to helping free Nicaragua, of course. So does anyone have any good, and serious, articles on the issue they can point me too?

Jimmy Carter offers to mediate peace talks between Israel and Palestinians... developing...

I have a lefty classmate who has the following thesis : Oliver North brokered back-channel deals with unsavory principals as the representative of the US Government. Israel was willing to go along because this had the government's implicit backing. The White House was acting in specific and intentional contravention of laws passed explicitly with the purpose of preventing the White House from doing exactly what it was doing. This makes North a criminal and by implication -- Ronald Reagan and all the staff that supported this operation. The Reagan White House helped the Irananians perpetuate their belief that hostage-taking could...