Free Republic

<p>Limiting protesters to a "free speech zone" means First Amendment rights will be under assault at the Democratic National Convention, civil rights lawyer David Lane said during a training class for lawyers today.</p>

The Twin Cities will become a battleground between security and civil liberties when the Republican National Convention begins in less than seven weeks. 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS has learned activists will press for more protections for protesters Wednesday. "There is cause to worry. That's why we're focused on making sure that the laws are in place to protect people as they plan to exercise their rights," Jude Ortiz said. Ortiz is part of the Coldsnap Legal Collective, a group of volunteers who run a hotline to help people in police custody. He explained the group wants certain protections in Minneapolis to...

More anti-war figures are voicing their opinions about contradictory and confusing statements regarding Iraq made Thursday by presumptive Democrat presidential nominee Barack Obama, and the news is clearly not good for his campaign. One such concerned party is Tom Hayden, the famed ex-husband of Jane Fonda who, along with Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin, was part of the Chicago Seven that incited riots at the 1968 Democratic National Convention.

Members of the terrorist-supporting group Code Pink repeatedly heckled President Bush's speech at a naturalization ceremony for new American citizens this morning at Monticello, the home of Declaration of Independence author, Thomas Jefferson.Code Pinko Desiree Farooz, infamous for getting in the face of Sec. of State Condoleezza Rice at a House hearing last fall in a stunning breakdown of security, rushed the stage where President Bush was speaking. Taking advantage of distractive actions being taken by other Code Pinkos, Farooz was able to get past the front row and turn toward the stage before she was intercepted by security. It...

"Hundreds" of FBI agents will be in Denver during the Democratic National Convention, according to James Davis, the FBI special agent in charge of the Denver field division that oversees Colorado and Wyoming. The FBI is "responsible for gathering intelligence on, primarily terrorist activity, any possible terrorist activity with regard to the convention, and make sure we get that intelligence to our partner agencies so they can be prepared," according to a "Colorado Matters" interview that aired today on Colorado Public Radio. The audio is available here. Davis also said that, "We don't have any information right now about any...

The fence around the public demonstration zone outside the Democratic National Convention will be chicken wire or chain link, authorities revealed in U.S. District Court today. That may allow protestors to be seen and heard by delegates going in and out of the Pepsi Center during the convention. But the American Civil Liberties Union and several advocacy groups have filed an amended complaint to their lawsuit against the U.S. Secret Service and the city and county of Denver that says protestors and demonstrators may have their First Amendment rights violated by security restrictions

Jack Black, master thespianwhat's goin on with this ensemble? short pantsuit = little Hillary?Richie HavensJulianne Mooreand this year's President of the Jury, that's right, your friend and mine, Jeff Spicoli.

Horror novelist Stephen King talking to High School students had this to say about literacy: "The fact is if you can read, you can walk into a job later on. If you don't, then you've got, the Army, Iraq, I don't know, something like that. It's not as bright." Now literacy is critically important and I applaud efforts to get people to read. But it’s the example he uses that is offensive. He assumes that people who go into the military do so because they have no other choices and because they are illiterate. This is clearly not true. If...

Her shirt reads: '"The most dangerous weapon is an educated Chicana. Be all you can be in the Raza"(La Raza is "the race" - basically a Latina/Chicana supremacist statement.)'""There was music, so a mosh pit formed."Below is the person holding the Nixon sign...Lenin, Stalin and Mao on guy's shirt.

Word has it that radical peace (?) groups are planning to create monumental tumult during the August Democrat National Convention in Denver. The goal is a media-frenzied series of public disturbances similar to the disorder which occurred in the 1968 Chicago Democrat Convention. However, the current plan is more extreme. They plan to throw bags of urine and blood on cops at the DNC protests. Pretty disgusting, eh? Under the name ReCreate 68 and led by Ward Churchill supporter, Glenn Spagnuolo, the group wants to choreograph the actions of various anti-American, anti-capitalist and socialist throngs such as Code Pink, Food...

Protesters will not be confined to "cages" during the 2008 Democratic National Convention and the city wants to get away from the long lines of shoulder-to-shoulder, riot-gear-clad police that typified security at the national conventions in Boston and New York, Denver city councilman Charlie Brown said today. "We don't want to provoke violence," Brown said. "We don't want to provoke violence." Brown said he talked with Mayor John Hickenlooper Wednesday and the two discussed "trying to get away from having lines of police officers." Brown later asserted: "We aren't going to cage protesters." The councilman made his comments before a...

This week, groups planning to protest during the Democratic National Convention in Denver are getting some training. A group known as "Recreate 68" is planning several demonstrations while the convention is in Denver in August.National experts are in town teaching protestors how to assert their rights and how to act during police encounters.The training will focus on first amendment rights, police questioning and police searches.More Information: DNC People's Law Project

The usual media suspects greeted us on Tuesday morning with the happiest possible Liberal spin on the federal byelections in Toronto, Vancouver and Saskatchewan. "Liberals win three out of four seats!" No one actually put "Whee!" in the headline, but it would have been consistent with the feigned spirit of jollity at work. The reality for the Liberal party is much darker, however. The expected byelection result for an opposition party running in seats where they had strong pluralities last time out is pretty clear: it's got to be four-for-four. The Liberals went three-for-four, squeaking by with a paltry 151-vote...

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. - Jay Jay French wants to rock. He also wants Barack. So the Twisted Sister guitarist has rerecorded the heavy metal band's anthem, "I Wanna Rock," which has become "I Want Barack." French, a lifelong liberal Democrat whose mother campaigned for John F. Kennedy, said Barack Obama, who is seeking the Democratic presidential nomination, has energized a new generation of voters who previously felt left out of politics. "He has excited so many people," said French, who founded Twisted Sister in 1973, in a telephone interview Tuesday. "He has given sincere hope to people who have been...

He's been fasting for nearly three weeks, gaining little notice even from the target of his protest. But Jerry Peace Activist Rubin is willing to refrain from eating for at least another three weeks and then another three weeks after that and then. ... Well, you get the idea. His goal: Persuade Ralph Nader to drop his quadrennial bid for the presidency - or at least explain to Rubin why he's running again in 2008. Rubin, who has launched more than 30 fasts over the past 25 years, is worried that Nader will play a spoiler role, as he believes...

ST. PAUL (AP) _ A coalition that wants to hold an anti-war march at the Republican National Convention says it's still waiting for details on where its people can march. The group wants to hold a march September 1 from the state Capitol to the Xcel Energy Center, where the convention is being held. Meredith Aby is with the Coalition to March on the RNC and Stop the War. She says the group has a permit, but might not get details on a route until the end of May. Aby says she's concerned the final route won't let protesters within...

The top military commander in Iraq gave some insight today into what he will consider as he prepares to report to the president and Congress in April on the way ahead. Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of Multinational Force Iraq, spoke with reporters accompanying Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who is visiting the country. The security trend lines all are favorable, the general said. “Attacks have continued to go down. We’ve had a five-month period consistently of a level of attacks we’ve not seen since spring of 2005,” he said. “This past week...

5 Questions On Israel For The Next Debate (Mother Jones Blog barf) As I've said before, there's been a vacuum surrounding Israel and Palestine this campaign season. Moderators have broached the issue only twice in the last 13 debates. And the most recent question, posed by Wendell Goler last week at the Fox News debate in South Carolina, was pretty weak. As Goler wound up—"Mayor Giuliani, President Bush is in the Middle East ... laying the groundwork for a Palestinian state"—there was, briefly, a glimmer of hope. Then he tossed this doozy of a softball: "I wonder, sir, how you...

Howard Zinn invites you to: A House Party Fundraiser for Iraq Veterans Against The War Winter Soldier Hearings Home of Sev and Louise Bruyn 48 Glenwood Ave. Newton Center 617–332–1764 Sunday, January 27 at 3 PM “These are the times that try men's souls: The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country” — Thomas Paine This quote inspired the name for the Winter Soldier Investigation (WSI) in 1971 of war crimes in Vietnam, for it is the Winter Soldier who is the true patriot. Vietnam Veterans Against The War (VVAW)...

MIAMI (AP) - Protesters demanding the arrest of Luis Posada Carriles called off a planned demonstration Little Havana after they were confronted by supporters of the anti-Castro Cuban militant. Women from an anti-war group known as Codepink had planned to discuss with reporters their campaign against Posada -- who is wanted by the Cuban and Venezuelan government on charges that he plotted the deadly 1976 bombing of a Cuban jetliner while in Caracas. About 15 Codepink activists were met in front of a Little Havana restaurant yesterday by some 200 supporters of Posada. Several of the Posada supporters charged at...

As someone who actually talks to teens, I hated, hated, hated this movie. In the liner notes to "Juno: Music from the Motion Picture," the soundtrack album released on Tuesday, director Jason Reitman writes about how the movie's star helped choose its music, which was key in setting the pervasive sarcastic-hipster tone. "Two months before we started shooting 'Juno,' Ellen Page was hanging out at my office when I asked her 'What kind of music do you think Juno listens to?' " Reitman recalls. "Without pause, she blurted out 'the Moldy Peaches.' " Within seconds, the actress was downloading songs...

PHILADELPHIA (CBS 3) ― Police are searching for two suspects wanted in connection with an assault on a Geno's Steaks employee just two days after Christmas. Surveillance video shows the suspects at the world-famous cheesesteak shop in South Philadelphia in the early morning hours of December 27. Police said the unidentified males reportedly were verbally harassing a female employee at about 6:30 a.m. A 32-year-old male employee, who was outside power-washing, tried to intervene when the suspects turned their attention to him. Following a brief argument, one of the males allegedly picked up the employee up and flipped him onto...

Sunday, December 23 Congress' approval of $70 billion for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan last week as part of a $555 billion federal budget bill effectively marks the quiet end of the Democratic majority's effort to bring an end to the war in Iraq. The great promise of a year ago following the 2006 elections in which the Democrats tossed the Republicans out of the congressional leadership gradually drained away, in part because of procedural realities but also because of a disappointing lack of fire among Democrats in Washington. Congress will revisit the issue in spring, but major policy...

Washington, Dec 8: One of the two US human rights activists deported from Pakistan has been arrested soon after arrival here. Tighe Barry was detained for protesting at the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on US assistance to Pakistan. Barry has been asked to return for a court hearing on December 27. On Friday, Barry and Medea Benjamin, who went to Pakistan to support the pro-democracy movement, protested outside the State Department, urging the Bush Administration to discontinue its support to the Musharraf regime. The two flew directly from Pakistan to Washington to attend this hearing. They had asked...

Public participation, accountability and transparency are keys to honest and efficient government. There are only five levels of executive and legislative levels of government in the American political system - municipal, township, county, state and federal. The principles of accountability and transparency should apply across the board. This means that at every level of government elected officials ought to be held accountable. It is easier said than done. People who are elected to do a job must step forward and do what they promised to do during their campaigns. The public has a major role to play in the process....

One issue voters. Confused, emotional one issue voters. And they come from all stripes of politics. Let's have a look. The Neo nazi groups/conspiracy theorists - Ron says he will end aid to Israel. They've latched on to that one. Most of them don't want the government to function, good or bad because it keeps them in check. Not quite anarchists, but close. The Leftie Anti war crowd, not really pacifists, but bohemian cowards promoting anarchy. Paul says he'll end the war and be nice to everyone no matter how they've tried to kill us. The Conservative who really would...

As the Oct. 27 peace rally concluded at the Federal Plaza, my husband and I headed back to our car on an almost empty, darkened street and heard voices behind us commenting on the sign I still carried high. I turned around. A young man and his mother both smiled broadly. "I just got back from Iraq," he said. "Thanks for marching." I was filled with joy. Until that moment, a small part of me felt that marching in the street has little impact. I've become used to my opinion being disregarded where I reside in Wheaton, a Republican stronghold...

Thousands of voices echoed through the streets here on Saturday as they called for an end to the war in Iraq. Some 4,000 protesters from Oregon, Idaho and Montana wove through Seattle, shouting anti-war slogans like "Bush, Cheney, what do you say? How many kids have you killed today?" and "Peace throughout the world. We're going to let it shine." The crowds set out to challenge the status quo, calling for the U.S. to redirect its course in Iraq. "As a starting point, it's something. Obviously we need to do a lot more of this," said Lori Jones. Crowds gathered...

Philosopher: Potter is a lefty26/10/2007 16:21  - (SA)    Paris - Harry Potter is a left-winger and the seven books by JK Rowling are a diatribe against Thatcherite Britain, a French philosopher said on Friday on the day of the last novel's publication in French. "It must be said from the start that Harry Potter is deeply political and that the books speak of today's England," Jean-Claude Milner told the left-wing newspaper Liberation. "Reading it, one can see that JK Rowling - like many cultured English people - believes there was a real Thatcherite revolution, that it was a disaster, and that...

Poor little Bruce Springsteen is upset because patriotic Americans object to his anti-victory music. (Drudge Report 20 September 2007). In this twerp’s political world patriotism is wishing defeat for your country. Now where did this ignoramus get his anti-American views? He got them from Brandeis-educated Jon Landau, a vicious America-hating leftist. A man who supported the communist conquest of South Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. The same loathsome creature who is working to subvert the war against al Qaeda. No wonder Springsteen supports the Soros-Heinz funded anti-American groups MoveOn.org and Americans Coming Together. He also supports the vicious Christic Institute, the...

I am ashamed for America. Note carefully that I do not say I am ashamed of America. Despite all its inherent flaws and all its tragic mistakes, the United States stands, however incompletely and with whatever imperfections, for the highest standards of freedom and democracy that the world has yet known. I am ashamed for America because all the evil done in the nation's name in recent years is turning off the light on the mountaintop. 1. The president urges Congress in effect to accept the Turkish protest against the attribution of Armenian genocide because it might interfere with Turkish...

Labor leaders from around the world gathered in San Francisco today to call on workers to stand up and take organized action against war in Iraq, saying that politicians can't be counted on to halt the bloodshed. Several speakers cited the civil rights movement of the 1950s and the anti-Vietnam War movement of the 1960s as models to follow, saying that both achieved change that would not have occurred if matters had been left in the hands of those running the country. "Until people get off their asses and do something, there won't be a change," Clarence Thomas, past secretary-treasurer...

NOTE: I am glad she was not seriously hurt and glad she was not mugged. Because the whackjobs had to project on our side what they might do, this had to be written. She has joked before about assassination. MIDI - LONDON BRIDGE Careful when you walk your dog...danger's lurking Randi Rhodes is falling down, falling down, falling down Randi Rhodes is falling down...now she's toothless Lefties lie and blame the right, blame the right, blame the right Lefties lie and blame the right...we're so ruthless It's not surprising what they were surmising This stuff is not new...karma just got...

WASHINTGON, DC, October 10, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Famed Dear Abby columnist Jeanne Phillips, aka Abigail Van Buren, is being given an award by the homosexual activist group Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) for her endorsement of homosexual 'marriage'. "I believe if two people want to commit to each other, God bless 'em," the syndicated advice columnist told The Associated Press. "That is the highest form of commitment, for heaven's sake." Stephen Bennett, founder of TheParentsGroup.com, a worldwide support group for parents, family members and friends who have loved ones who are homosexual, responded swiftly to the flood...

A nationally syndicated columnist has recently urged that Americans forget about 9/11, become adults, and "get back our groove." Thomas Friedman is the senior columnist at the New York Times and hence de facto the most important columnist in the United States. That he disapproves of the 9/11 cult makes it official. As America's uber wise man, he has certified that the national obsession with the World Trade Center attack is a sign of weakness and fear. Yet in the marvelous Yiddish phrase, "Already, all right, enough!" The attack was a great evil, a terrible blow to the whole nation,...

Google ignored Memorial Day and Veterans Day, but today they have a special logo up to commemorate an event that must be near to their hearts—the 50th anniversary of the Soviet Union’s launch of the Sputnik satellite.

WASHINGTON -- Should the world's most-used search engine be more of a Yankee Google Dandy? Google Inc. occasionally features light-hearted doodles on its colorful home-page logo to commemorate special occasions. But now they are drawing criticism from conservatives for not being more patriotic. The Mountain View, Calif., company bathes its logo in stars and stripes every Independence Day, but last week's decision to honor the 50th anniversary of the Sputnik launch -- the second "g" in Google was replaced with a drawing of the Soviet satellite -- is being blasted by some conservatives. Not only did Google honor an achievement...

Rare are the times when a community, a nation, a world can say without hyperbole, "The future starts today." But that was the wondrous development 50 years ago last Thursday when the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first satellite to go beyond Earth's atmosphere and orbit the planet. Sputnik is the first world event I remember. In Miss Kempter's 2nd-grade class, I realized this was a big deal when she took time from our usual lessons to sketch a picture of Sputnik on the blackboard. A basketball-shaped object with spikes coming out its sides was what everyone was discussing on...

There's nothing unusual about a mayor being trailed by a bodyguard -- unless, that is, he needs to be protected from assassins working on behalf of the president of his own country. But then, Leopoldo Lopez of Caracas is not your usual mayor and Hugo Chavez of Venezuela is not your usual president. Lopez -- 36, educated at Harvard's Kennedy School of Public Policy, and mayor of Chacao, one of five municipalities within Caracas -- has emerged as one of the most visible challengers to the increasingly authoritarian Chavez regime. That's a dangerous undertaking. Lopez recounts three assassination attempts --...

We shouldn't once again wait too long to admit our mistake and leave In the scheme of small protests, I suppose what I did the other day qualifies. I was in one of those little catchall stores, the kind that sells candles and clothes and cheap jewelry. It was a necklace that caught my eye. A tiny peace symbol suspended from a plain pewter chain. Oh, please, you say. How very Vietnam. I know. I mean, I really know. In 1970, I was a student at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign when the National Guard descended on the campus....

Summary of Findings Hillary Clinton continues to lead Barack Obama by a wide margin in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination. But Obama has something Clinton doesn't have – the support of Oprah Winfrey. Winfrey endorsed Obama in May of this year and recently held a fundraiser for him at her Malibu, Calif. home. While political endorsements generally have little impact on voter preferences, there is no telling whether Winfrey can do for Obama what she has done for the countless books and products she's endorsed over the years. When compared with several other celebrities and public figures, Winfrey...

The memory of William "Curly" Hendershot is alive and well on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus. Hendershot was the Dow Chemical Co. recruiter whose 1967 visit here sparked one of the most important protests of the Vietnam War era. A sit-in against the company that made napalm used in Vietnam ended in a bloody clash with police that turned many students into radicals. On Thursday, students plan to carry signs reading "Curly, off campus!" as they protest a recruiting visit by a company they see as a villain in the war in Iraq: Halliburton Co. Protesters plan to disrupt the...

Last week was a strange one. The commander in chief, the president of the United States, took refuge behind a military field commander to achieve credibility with the American people. Through constant repetition of his name, almost an invocation, George Bush built up Gen. David Petraeus as the man who finally found a strategy that would work in Iraq. Because he said it would work, therefore, it had worked. Robert Draper's Dead Certain, a sympathetic portrait of the Bush presidency, reports that the president had insisted to his chief of staff Andrew Card up to the time of Card's resignation...

Middle East Times US anti-war protest numbers less than expected By Charles R. LarsonMiddle East Times Published September 16, 2007 What ought to have been the most massive protest ever in Washington, DC Saturday turned into a 1960s love fest, with leftover agendas and slogans from an earlier war. The long-planned march in Washington by the Act Now to Stop War and End Racism (ANSWER) antiwar coalition, petered out with a skimpy crowd of 25,000 protesters.  Organizers of the protest claim nearly 100,000 people marcheda from the White House to the Capitol to demand an immediate end to the...

On Thursday night President Bush and Republican presidential candidates Rudolph Giuliani and John McCain asked the American people to set aside their sense of history and common sense. The three Republicans asked the American people to buy into their spin of the facts surrounding the invasion and the current status of the occupation of Iraq. Americans were asked to forget the president's claim that Iraq was involved in the Sept. 11 attack on this country, that he said he had a plan for Iraq and that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. None of those assertions were true. Prior to...

I don't know if Pete Seeger believes in saints, but I believe he is one. He's the one in the front as they go marching in. "Pete Seeger: The Power of Song" is a tribute to the legendary singer and composer who thought music could be a force for good, and proved it by writing songs that have actually helped shape our times ("If I Had a Hammer" and "Turn, Turn, Turn") and popularizing "We Shall Overcome" and Woody Guthrie's unofficial national anthem, "This Land Is Your Land." Over his long career (he is 88), he has toured tirelessly with...

Protestors play drums as they demonstrate against what they feel is a possible U.S.-government involvement in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and a loss of personal freedoms as a result of counter-terrorism security measures, Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2007 at Seattle's Pike Place Market. About 300 protestors from a variety of anti-war and Sept. 11 conspiracy organizations spent most of Tuesday demonstrating around Seattle. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren) Stacy 'Banjo Man' Samuels, left, talks with Jon LeTowt, right, of Sonoma, Calif., during a CodePink 'general strike' outside the Federal building in Oakland, Calif., Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2007. The pair were protesting...

Regarding Fran Eaton's Aug. 26 column calling the South Suburbs an abortion-free zone: I remember a number of years back when doctors and clinics advertising that they were doing abortions in this area were threatened, set fire to and picketed, which is likely another reason there are not many openly-broadcast abortion clinics in the South Suburbs. That subject aside, I would like to address the many inconsistencies and illogical arguments in Eaton's column. Eaton name-calls liberals whom she says get "hot and bothered" about resistance to using tax dollars for fixing social ills. Interpretation: Rich people hate when they are...

No reason to be scared to fly on 6th anniversary of attacks On Sept. 10, 2001, I was at the Toronto Film Festival and I'd just seen my third movie of the day, when I realized there was no real need to wait until the next morning to fly home. Why not take a flight now and have a full day in Chicago the next morning? I didn't have any eerie premonition about the next day; I just canceled my scheduled Tuesday morning departure and took a plane out on Monday so I could wake up in my own bed....

After watching the news and the performance of President Bush over the past few weeks, I am reminded of a line in one of Richard Pryor's stand up acts. "Who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes?" It was a line Pryor used after his wife caught him in bed with another woman. Richard Pryor, at his peak was arguably the funniest stand up comedian that ever walked the earth. Pryor's line sums up George W. Bush's approach to his failed presidency. The odds are Bush will be known as one of the worst presidents in American...