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BALTIMORE - Just when we thought we couldn't get any fatter, a new study that followed Americans for three decades suggests that over the long haul, 9 out of 10 men and 7 out of 10 women will become overweight. Even if you are one of the lucky few who made it to middle age without getting fat, don't congratulate yourself — keep watching that waistline. Half of the men and women in the study who had made it well into adulthood without a weight problem ultimately became overweight. A third of those women and a quarter of the men...

WASHINGTON - Getting President Bush from here to there consumes an enormous amount of fuel, whether he's aboard Air Force One, riding in a helicopter or on the ground in a heavily armored limousine. The bill gets steeper every day as the White House is rocked by the same energy prices as regular drivers. Taxpayers still foot the bill. Almost every vehicle Bush uses is custom-made to add security and communications capabilities, and the heavier weight of these guzzlers further drives up gas and jet fuel costs. The White House declines to discuss travel costs related to the presidential entourage,...

On June 8, 2005, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan visited President Bush in the White House. Among the topics the two discussed were freedom, democracy, and the rule of law. Speaking from the Oval Office, Bush declared Turkey's democracy to be "an important example for the people of the broader Middle East."Turkey remains an important ally of the United States despite recent bilateral tensions over the Iraq war and its aftermath. Both Republican and Democratic administrations have valued Turkey not only as a strategic military partner in the Cold War but also, in recent decades, as a democratic outpost...

WASHINGTON -- Border Patrol agents arrested nearly 100,000 non-Mexicans illegally crossing into the United States through Mexico over the past eight months and let the vast majority of them go free on bail or their own recognizance, immigration officials told a U.S. Senate panel Tuesday. About 70 percent of so-called non-Mexican illegal immigrants captured along the southern border of the United States are released on their own recognizance to appear at a future deportation hearing, Border Patrol Chief David Aguilar told the Senate Judiciary Committee. Few ever show up. The rise in non-Mexican illegal immigrants captured while crossing the Mexican...

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon told American Jewish leaders that Maaleh Adumim, Gush Etzion and Ariel will stay in the hands of Israel forever but the rest of Yesha is negotiable. After guards evicted hecklers who interrupted his speech to 1,500 fund-raisers, Sharon said that the status of other areas of Judea and Samaria are subject to the "final phase of the permanent agreement negotiations and talks." Most media reports on his speech ignored Sharon's implication that leaves in doubt the future of communities of about 1,000 families, such as Beit El, Ginot Shomron, and Kedumim. Sharon added that disarming terrorists...

With the revelation that a copy of the Quran may have been desecrated by U.S. military personnel at Guantanamo Bay, Muslims and their governments--including that of Saudi Arabia--reacted angrily. This anger would have been understandable if the U.S. government's adopted policy was to desecrate our Quran. But even before the Newsweek report was discredited, that was never part of the allegations. As a Muslim, I am able to purchase...

Illegal aliens: Democrats stumped By Froma Harrop PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Hillary gets it. Hillary Clinton says she's against illegal immigration. And she would fine employers who hire illegal aliens. Pundits say the Democratic senator from New York is using this hot-button issue to position herself for the 2008 presidential election. It's a way to hit Republicans from the right. Polls show huge majorities of both Republicans and Democrats oppose illegal immigration - and are frustrated that President Bush won't do a thing to stop it. But this issue does not belong to the right. Or it shouldn't. Illegal immigration hurts...

Residents of Hawaii, Wyoming and Connecticut shoulder the heaviest state tax burdens in the nation. The least state taxes per person are paid by those living in Texas, South Dakota or Colorado, U.S. Census figures for 2004 show. The tax burden is important because it helps determine a state's business climate, carves a hole into taxpayers' wallets and influences individual decisions on where to live. The tax burden weighs so heavily in some states that people have called the moving van to escape to a lower-tax state.

When murder suspect Gordon Weaver skipped out on $300,000 bail while awaiting trial in the 1999 death of his wife, Jean, the fugitive White Bear Lake businessman reportedly turned to "the only two people from my past I can trust." In a new twist in the case, White Bear Lake police detail, in a series of reports, how they believe Weaver sought help from his parents, and how Lawrence and Delores Weaver helped their fugitive son, who used the alias David Carson, avoid capture for four years.

CRYSTAL RIVER - Too weary to walk, the father and grandparents of a missing 9-year-old girl drove the 50 yards from their home to a bank of microphones and TV cameras. "I really ... I really need as much help as I can right now," Mark Lunsford said between sobs. "I need my daughter home." Jessica Marie Lunsford was reported missing Thursday morning. She was still missing when Lunsford, 41, and his parents addressed the media for the first time at 9 a.m. Friday. And she was still missing long after darkness fell and well-wishers held candles and prayed. For...

Poll: Most voters knew nothing of Clinton abortion speech ALBANY, N.Y. Most New York voters don't think it's possible to find common ground on the issue of abortion, despite Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's urging that they attempt to do. That's according to a new poll out today from the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. The survey of some 12-hundred registered voters in New York state asked about Clinton's recent speech in Albany to fellow abortion rights supporters in which she called for all sides in the debate to find "common ground" in an effort to reduce the number of abortions. The...

While the State Department's Patterns of Global Terrorism—2003 report [1] labeled Iran "the most active state sponsor of terrorism in 2003," the Bush administration has yet to agree on a national security presidential directive to define U.S. policy toward the Islamic Republic.[2] Meanwhile, Tehran continues to edge closer to nuclear capability.[3]The following are excerpts from the 9/11 Commission Report, an unclassified version of which was released to the public on July 22, 2004.[4] The commission interviewed more than 1,000 people in ten countries and conducted an unprecedented review of U.S. intelligence. Among its findings, excerpted below, was evidence of a...

MR. RUSSERT: Private accounts for Social Security--the president has made that a priority of his domestic agenda. Will you work with him in privatizing part of Social Security? SEN. REID: Tim, I can remember as a little boy my widowed grandmother with eight children. She lived alone, but she felt independent because she got every month her old age pension check. That's what this is all about. The most successful social program in the history of the world is being hijacked by Wall Street. Yes, Social Security is a good program. And if the president has some ideas about trying...

The purpose of FreeRepublic.com's multiple message boards is to limit the topics for each board to particular topics. Posting the same message on all the boards defeats the purpose of multiple-boards for special topics. It is very annoying to see the same message on every bulletin board. PLEASE! DO THE READERS A FAVOR. STOP CROSS-POSTING YOUR MESSAGES!

INDEPENDENCE, Mo., Nov. 23 - That legendary sign "The Buck Stops Here" gets prominent display at the Truman Presidential Museum and Library, along with a cautionary disclaimer that it is "unclear how long it sat" on Truman's Oval Office desk. But the sign, and its appearance here, provide a bracing contrast to the sensations inspired by the new William J. Clinton Presidential Center, 400 miles away in Little Rock, Ark. Some similarities might be expected. Both William Jefferson Clinton and Harry S. Truman were Democratic presidents sometimes facing hostile Republican-dominated Congresses; both were born without inheritance or distinguished lineage; both...

Do the media give aid and comfort to terrorists by giving their violence maximum exposure and impact at times while sanitizing the perpetrators and tainting their victims at others? It is standard procedure for many media outlets to describe the perpetrators of terrorist acts - the premeditated slaughter of civilians - with a range of euphemisms, "militants" being the most common. Thus, The New York Times can headline a report on the killing of a hostage as "Iraq Militants Said to Behead a Truck Driver From Bulgaria." Similarly, terrorists killed in a military strike can be described in another as...

Why isn't Kerry way ahead? Most liberals think those stupid heartland voters just don't get it By VIN SUPRYNOWICZ REVIEW-JOURNAL Sunday, October 24, 2004 I was reminded why I usually don't bother with the canned PBS "Washington Week" program when I accidentally tuned it in last Sunday. (OK, I found it shamefully riveting -- like slowing down to inspect the carnage of a traffic accident.) In an attempt to assemble an even-handed panel to discuss how George Bush and John Kerry did in the debates, host Gwen Ifill and her tax-funded PBS producers assembled four folks, one each from The...

Vaccines, lottery-style in New Jersey 10/19/2004 9:45 AM By: Capital News 9 web staff You won't win any money in this lottery, but you might be healthier this winter. Officials in Bloomfield, New Jersey, plan to register people for a lottery to determine who gets the town's 300 doses of flu vaccine. Flu shots in Bloomfield already were reserved only for senior citizens and other high-risk groups. Then, the community learned it would be receiving less than half the 1,000 doses it ordered. The health director said a lottery is the "most fair and equitable way" to distribute the available...

HOUSTON (Reuters) - A study of thousands of federal court cases has found that judges appointed by President Bush (news - web sites) are the most conservative on record in the areas of civil rights and civil liberties. The study's authors say the re-election of Bush would give U.S. courts a strong rightward tilt that could last for years. "If Bush wins re-election you're going to have a very conservative judiciary," University of Houston political scientist Robert Carp said on Thursday. "An average president puts in about a third of the federal judiciary in two terms, so this really is...

Most wanted list - who is still outstanding? December 14 2003 at 02:39PM London - Saddam Hussein was captured near his home town of Tikrit on Saturday in a major coup for the beleaguered United States occupation forces in Iraq. This brings the total number of 'most wanted' Iraqis known to have surrendered, been captured or killed to 41. (** indicates captured, surrendered or killed). **1. Saddam Hussein - president of Iraq, chairperson of the Revolutionary Command Council (RCC). **2.Qusay Hussein - Special Republican Guard Commander who controlled elite Republican Guards, intelligence services and a special force providing security for...