Free Republic

NEW ORLEANS, La. – The Revolutionary Communist Party USA has announced a "Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America," and members say they are planning for a "revolution" against capitalism, with violence if necessary. The "present capitalist-imperialist system" should be replaced with a "radically new economic system," they say. Carl Dix, a founding member and spokesman, believes that the federal government bailouts, under both George W. Bush and Barack Obama, are just one instance where they propped up what he calls the "capitalist class." His party is "building a revolution" and under the proposed constitution all "natural resources...

As reported in the UK Independent (10/14/10), president of the Islamic Sharia Council in Britain, Sheikh Maulana Abu Sayeed, has reiterated alarming comments made during a March, 2010 interview, sanctioning marital rape. Sheikh Sayeed was in fact responding to an inchoate effort at modernizing the contracts which govern Muslim marriages in Britain. The good Sheikh, representing Britain’s main Islamic Sharia court, the Islamic Sharia Council, promptly published a rebuttal of the contract, which included a statement on sexual abuse (page 6 here). He opined in the March interview:Clearly there cannot be any “rape” within the marriage. Maybe “aggression”, maybe “indecent...

The HOLY NORTH AMERICAN MARTYRS(†1642-1649)The Holy North American Martyrs are eight in number; five died in what is now Canada, three in what is now the United States. All are Jesuits, all are French in origin. They came in the 1640's to New France, to add their strength to that of the Franciscan Recollets, who had preceded them by a few years. There was not yet any bishop to assist them; the first bishop of Quebec, Blessed Monsignor Francis Montmorency de Laval, arrived only in 1658.Words strive in vain to convey to a comfortable world the virtue of the first...

NOTE The following text is a quote: News Release July 8 2010 OPP lay charges for hate crimes TORONTO, July 8 /CNW/ - Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) have charged a Mississauga man under a seldom-used section of the Criminal Code of Canada governing hate crimes. At a news conference in Toronto, Commissioner Julian FANTINO and members of the Provincial Operations Intelligence Bureau's Hate Crimes Extremism Unit outlined details of the charges against 25-year-old Salman An-Noor HOSSAIN. A five-month investigation revealed that a website and blog operated by Mr. HOSSAIN contained information that, among other things, wilfully promoted hatred and advocated...

Note: Video included at link. SNIPPET: "Now, law enforcement officials appear increasingly concerned Al-Shabaab members are trying to come back to America. But these members aren't disenchanted young men like Hassan, seeking to escape the terrorists' hold. Rather, the concern is that they are returning either to recruit more members or perhaps to plot attacks here." SNIPPET: "Al-Shabaab represents a "threat to the whole nation, all of the world," Ahmed told the IPT. "Everywhere they could recruit somebody they will try – Europe, North America, Australia, Africa…And they want to disrupt world peace." Ahmed warned that Al-Shabaab's main focus in...

Songbirds in the US are getting smaller, and climate change is suspected as the cause. A study of almost half a million birds, belonging to over 100 species, shows that many are gradually becoming lighter and growing shorter wings. This shrinkage has occurred within just half a century, with the birds thought to be evolving into a smaller size in response to warmer temperatures. However, there is little evidence that the change is harmful to the birds. Details of the discovery are published in the journal Oikos. In biology, there is a general rule of thumb that animals tend to...

WASHINGTON: Some Muslim-American groups are supporting a fatwa issued by a body of Islamic scholars forbidding Muslims from going through full body scanners at airports, a media report said. The Fiqh Council of North America issued the religious ruling this week that says going through the airport scanners would violate Islamic rules on modesty, Free Press reported. "It is a violation of clear Islamic teachings that men or women be seen naked by other men and women," reads the fatwa issued Tuesday. "Islam highly emphasises haya (modesty) and considers it part of faith. The Quran has commanded the believers, both...

WASHINGTON: Some Muslim-American groups are supporting a fatwa issued by a body of Islamic scholars forbidding Muslims from going through full body scanners at airports, a media report said. The Fiqh Council of North America issued the religious ruling this week that says going through the airport scanners would violate Islamic rules on modesty, Free Press reported. "It is a violation of clear Islamic teachings that men or women be seen naked by other men and women," reads the fatwa issued Tuesday. "Islam highly emphasises haya (modesty) and considers it part of faith. The Quran has commanded the believers, both...

Date: January 8, 2010 ISCC affiliated Imams Issue Important Fatwa Attack on Canada and the United States is Attack on Muslims Over 10 million Muslims Live in North America Calgary) Twenty Imams affiliated with the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada have issued a Fatwa today declaring the attacks on Canada and the United States by any extremist will be the attack on 10 million Muslims living in North America. This is the first Fatwa by the Muslim clergy declaring attacks on Canada and the United States as attack on Muslims. Following is the text of the Fatwa. FATWA (religious edict)...

Brebeuf's Instructions to the Missionaries In 1637, Father Jean de Brebeuf drew up a list of instructions for Jesuit missionaries destined to work among the Huron. These reflect his own experience and a genuine sensitivity toward our people. You must love these Hurons, ransomed by the blood of the Son of God, as brothers. You must never keep the Indians waiting at the time of embarking. Carry a tinder-box or a piece of burning-glass, or both, to make fire for them during the day for smoking, and in the evening when it is necessary to camp; these little services...

I have repeatedly written articles about the complete disregard for the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts's as well as the disregard for the United States Constitution by elected officials in this State. Today, however, Massachusetts goes above and beyond into what can only be viewed as a true case of Big Brother knocking down the doors of American citizens. Today, by a vote of 113-36, the Massachusetts's House voted to grant the State's Governor the ability to force residents into mandatory vaccination in the event the Governor feels so inclined. It also grants him the right to declare martial...

MIDWAY, Utah -- LDS filmmaker Kieth Merrill says he picked the background for "The Testaments" by default, and if he had it to do over, he would have sought locations in North America rather than Central and South America. Speaking Friday at the Book of Mormon Prophecies Conference at the Zermatt resort, Merrill said he believes evidence supports a North American backdrop in the "promised land" for the Book of Mormon stories, wars and visits from Jesus Christ. "I know that the Book of Mormon is true. I can't say I know where it all took place," Merrill said as...

As we approach the Summit of the Americas, our hemisphere is faced with a clear choice. We can overcome our shared challenges with a sense of common purpose, or we can stay mired in the old debates of the past. For the sake of all our people, we must choose the future. Too often, the United States has not pursued and sustained engagement with our neighbors. We have been too easily distracted by other priorities, and have failed to see that our own progress is tied directly to progress throughout the Americas. My Administration is committed to the promise of...

Japan's ...exports tumbled 49.4 percent... Demand plunged in all regions of the world, particularly North America, Europe and Russia. The dismal figures highlight the grim outlook for Japan's export-oriented economy, the world's second-largest. Japan, which had relied foreign sales of its cars and gadgets to drive economic growth, now finds itself mired in its deepest recession since the end of World War II.

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Meat-eating dinosaurs the size of a small chicken roamed areas of North America 75 million years ago, according to research by Canadian paleontologists. The mini-dinosaur, similar in appearance to the Velociraptor, is named Hesperonychus elizabethae and is the smallest carnivorous dinosaur known to have lived in North America. "Hesperonychus is currently the smallest dinosaur known from North America," said University of Calgary paleontologist Nick Longrich. "Its discovery just emphasizes how little we actually know, and it raises the possibility that there are even smaller ones out there." Longrich, together with University of Alberta paleontologist Philip Currie, are...

Arizona State University has created a new trilateral research center to advance the continuing globalist agenda to integrate the United States, Mexico and Canada into a North American configuration. The North American Center for Transborder Studies, or NACTS, makes clear that while North American integration advocates may have backed off promoting the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America as their vehicle to create a North American Union, the globalist effort to integrate North America economically and politically continues under different names. NACTS Director Rick Van Schoik held a press conference Feb. 10 at the National Press Club in Washington,...

Federal prosecutors last summer rejected claims that ISNA was unfairly named an unindicted co-conspirators in the Holy Land Foundation Hamas terror funding case. ISNA has admitted ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas. The Muslim Brotherhood is waging, in its own words, "a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and ‘sabotaging’ its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and Allah’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.” And the head of ISNA is going to offer a

At past inaugurations, ceremonial prayers uttered on behalf of the incoming president drew about as much attention as the flags on the podium. Not this year. Barack Obama's choice of clergy is under scrutiny like no other president-elect before him, alternately outraging Americans on the left and the right as he navigates the minefield of U.S. religion. "I can't recall any prayers drawing so much attention," said Charles Haynes, senior scholar at the First Amendment Center who specializes in religion in public life. Gay advocates assailed Obama, while many conservative Christians were heartened, when he invited the Rev. Rick Warren,...

Jeffrey Imm writes in with an AP report about the January 21 Inaugural prayer service to take place at the National Cathedral in Washington. Among those officiating will be Ingrid Mattson, president of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA). This is an outrage and should be stopped. What's ISNA? As I have written (here, for instance), the US government has identified ISNA as a Muslim Brotherhood front organization. Actually, the Muslim Brotherhood itself has identified ISNA as a Muslim Brotherhood front organization. And the Muslim Brotherhood is all about extending Islamic law globally--even in America. According to its 1991...

We tend to focus on creeping sharia in the U.S. but Canada is not exempt from the grand jihad as this article from earlier this year indicates. With porous borders and chatter of a North American Union we should hope Canada is taking the threat seriously. David Harris. The enemy within If terrorism suspect Momin Khawaja, now on trial in Ottawa, is as guilty as Crown prosecutors say, it’ll be time to settle an important question: Was Mr. Khawaja a “Naji man”? Amid trial allegations, court details and defence objections, significant questions arise about Mr. Khawaja’s status as a consultant...

Exploding asteroid theory strengthened by new evidence located in Ohio, Indiana Space & Earth science / Earth Sciences Ken Tankersley seen working in the field in a cave in this publicity photo from the National Geographic Channel. Geological evidence found in Ohio and Indiana in recent weeks is strengthening the case to attribute what happened 12,900 years ago in North America -- when the end of the last Ice Age unexpectedly turned into a phase of extinction for animals and humans -- to a cataclysmic comet or asteroid explosion over top of Canada. A comet/asteroid theory advanced by Arizona-based geophysicist...

How Will North America's Largest Aquifer, The Ogallala Aquifer, Fare?The Ogallala aquifer underlies parts of eight states. (Credit: Photo courtesy U.S. Geological Survey) ScienceDaily (Apr. 10, 2008) — Are the tens of thousands of playa lakes that dot the Southern High Plains key to keeping the Ogallala Aquifer's dwindling waters clean? That's the question Agricultural Research Service (ARS) plant physiologist Dennis Gitz is asking about North America's largest aquifer. Playas are ephemeral lakes that form when rainwater fills natural clay depressions in the landscape. Gitz found that this water flows continually downward, if slowly, into the Ogallala, contributing to its...

The U.S. has built nine navigation systems for Mexico and Canada under the controversial Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America in an apparent first step toward establishing the satellite infrastructure needed to create a North American air traffic control system. The defining vision for North American air traffic control was articulated by then-Secretary of Transportation Norman Y. Mineta in a Sept. 27, 2004, statement announcing, "We must make flying throughout North America as seamless as possible if we are to truly reap the rewards of the expanding global economy."

Pollution Visible From East Asia To North America In New Satellite ImageIn a new NASA study, researchers taking advantage of improvements in satellite sensor capabilities offer the first measurement-based estimate of the amount of pollution from East Asian forest fires, urban exhaust, and industrial production that makes its way to western North America. (Credit: Image courtesy of NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center) ScienceDaily (Mar. 18, 2008) — In a new NASA study, researchers taking advantage of improvements in satellite sensor capabilities offer the first measurement-based estimate of the amount of pollution from East Asian forest fires, urban exhaust, and industrial production...

ROBSTOWN, Tex. — Leon Little’s farm here near Corpus Christi would not be seized for Texas’s proposed $184-billion-plus superhighway project for 5 or 10 years, if ever. But Mr. Little was alarmed enough to show up Wednesday night with hundreds of his South Texas coastal neighbors to do what the Texas Department of Transportation has been urging: “Go ahead, don’t hold back.� Don’t worry. Texans have gotten the message, swamping hearings and town meetings across the state to grill and often excoriate agency officials about a colossal traffic makeover known as the Trans-Texas Corridor, a public-private partnership unrivaled in the...

Humans somehow made their way into the Americas from distant lands, but knowing precisely when and from where they made the journey are matters of heated scientific debate. New genetic evidence, however, backs up a chilly northwestern arrival to North America from Siberia about 12,000 years ago, via a temporary land bridge spanning the Bering Strait. The findings further challenge an alternative idea that humans sprinkled in to both North and South America on open sea voyages 30,000 years in the past. Excerpt only...... whole story at link

Official Mexican government reports reveal Mexico has entered discussions with the state of Texas and top officials in the Bush administration to extend the Trans-Texas Corridor into Mexico, with a plan to connect through Monterrey to the deep-water Mexican ports on the Pacific, including Manzanillo and Lazaro Cardenas. The official website of the Mexican northeastern state of Nuevo León contain multiple reports that José Natividad Gonzáles Parás, governor of the Mexican state of Nuevo León, has actively discussed with numerous U.S. government officials, including Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the...

It's now leaking out that there was more going on than met the eye at the Security and Prosperity Partnership Summit in Montebello, Canada, in August. The three amigos - President George W. Bush, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Mexican President Felipe Calderon - finalized and released the "North American Plan for Avian & Pandemic Influenza." The "Plan" - that's what they call it, with a capital P - is to use the excuse of a major flu epidemic to shift powers from U.S. legislatures to unelected, unaccountable "North American" bureaucrats. This idea was launched on Sept. 14, 2005,...

One of the unindicted co-conspirators of the FIRST WTC bombing, Siraj Wahhaj, will be a speaker at a local Islamic Conference to be held THIS SUNDAY in Hartford, Connecticut. All Freepers and Lurkers in good standing are requested to drop everything to be in Hartford for this event. This meeting is being held by known HAMAS supporters, also.

Lawmakers in Canada appear to be paving the way for "deep integration" with the U.S. and Mexico with a proposed measure that advances the controversial Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America promoted by the Bush administration, notes WND columnist Jerome Corsi. It's an issue Corsi has fully investigated for his newest book, "The Late Great USA." The conservative minority government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper is pressing for "The Trade, Investment and Labour Mobility Agreement", which would enable a Canadian company to challenge laws in provinces that block the North American Free Trade Agreement. Murray Dobbin, a Vancouver author...

The White House has confirmed that U.S. President George W. Bush will travel to Canada this summer to meet Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Mexican president in Quebec. The announcement says Bush will be in Montebello, Quebec, on August 20 and 21 to meet Harper and Mexican President Felipe Calderon. The White House says the three leaders will discuss global and hemispheric issues at the North American summit. News of the meeting first came out last month when it was reported that the summit would be held at a luxury rural hotel resort in Montebello. Officials have said the...

Judicial Watch, a public-interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, has obtained more documents pertaining to the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) of North America -- an initiative that has created uneasiness among some conservative groups. According to its own government website, the SPP is defined as a "trilateral effort to increase security and enhance prosperity among the United States, Canada, and Mexico through greater cooperation and information sharing." The effort includes what the website calls "ambitious security and prosperity programs" designed to keep the nations' borders "closed to terrorism yet open to trade." Tom Fitton, president of Judicial...

NAFTA SUPERHIGHWAY | An urban myth or reality? Super suspicious foes The government denies any such plans, but campaign against it continues. By MATT STEARNS McClatchy Newspapers WASHINGTON | If the government really has a secret plan for a 12-lane road-and-rail NAFTA Superhighway that will split the heartland from Mexico to Canada, it is playing with a great poker face. “There is absolutely no U.S. government plan for a NAFTA Superhighway of any sort,” said David Bohigian, an assistant secretary of commerce. Sen. Kit Bond, a Missouri Republican and a powerful member of committees that would authorize and pay for...

American truckers plan to circle the White House and state capitals in a "rolling blockade" to protest a federal government plan to allow Mexican long-haul rigs to operate throughout the U.S. Drivers who participate in "Truck-Out" also are being asked to run their rigs at the minimum speed permitted by law. The protest is scheduled for April 23-25 to coordinate with the "Hold Their Feet to the Fire" rally and radio talk show marathon in Washington planned by the Federation for American Immigration Reform. "American truckers are going to have their jobs undercut or vanish into the hands of Mexican...

Mr Bush will speak about social justice and equality President George W Bush is in Guatemala for a one-day visit, after a stop in Colombia where he pledged his personal support to its fight against drugs. He will discuss security, trade and immigration with Guatemala's president. This is the fourth stop in Mr Bush's tour of Latin America, which has seen protests at every stage. Venezuela's president, Hugo Chavez, has used a parallel tour of the region to speak out against what he calls the interference of the "American empire". Mr Chavez started his tour last week in Argentina,...

Thousands of protesters greeted Mr Bush's arrival US President George Bush has met his Uruguayan counterpart, Tabare Vazquez, as part of his five-nation Latin American tour to promote trade.Mr Bush arrived in Montevideo from Brazil - where he signed a deal to develop alternative fuel sources. Uruguay is keen to sign free trade deals with the US, even if it means leaving the Mercosur trade bloc. The tour attracted protests in Brazil and about 5,000 protesters gathered in Uruguay for Mr Bush's visit. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is conducting his own tour of the region and addressed 40,000 anti-Bush...

!-- S IIMA --> Chavez attacked Bush in front of the Buenos Aires crowd It was the kind of situation that the Venezuelan leader, Hugo Chavez, loves - 40,000 flag-waving supporters joining him in hurling insults at the US President, George W Bush.He was at a football stadium in the Argentine capital, Buenos Aires, leading what he called an anti-imperialist rally to coincide with Mr Bush's arrival in neighbouring Uruguay. Most of the crowd were members of trade unions, left-wing and human rights organisations, those who already supported Mr Chavez and what he calls his brand of socialism for...

Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center Washington, D.C. Thank you all. (Applause.) Please be seated -- si ntese. Buenas tardes. Gracias por la bienevenida. For those of you not from Texas, that means, good afternoon. (Laughter.) And thank you for the welcome. I'm honored to be back again with the men and women of the Hispanic Chamber. I appreciate your hospitality. I'm pleased to report the economy of the United States is strong, and one of the reasons why is because the entrepreneurial spirit of America is strong. And the entrepreneurial spirit of America is represented in this room....

Some charge that such a union would eventually override our Constitutional government, our economic system, and even our currency. Can it be possible? On March 23, 2005 President Bush met with Mexican President Fox and Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin in what was officially described as a "Summit." The initiative is called the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP). Yet there has been no Congressional oversight or authorization. No funds appropriated. The major debate in the U.S. today is over border security. Our nation is being flooded with hordes of illegal aliens. They are over-burdening our schools, hospitals and social services....

North American CEO group recommends Canada import temporary workers Canada and Mexico should accelerate efforts to import temporary Mexican energy workers to alleviate the skills shortage in Alberta and other provinces as oil sands development ramps up, top North American CEOs will recommend today. They will also call for Canada, the United States and Mexico to start work on harmonizing regulations and standards in three sectors: financial services, transportation, and food and agriculture, The Globe and Mail has learned. The 30 chief executive officers make up the North American Competitiveness Council, formed last year to advise political leaders on strengthening...

OTTAWA (AP) -- Senior officials from the United States, Canada and Mexico opened talks Friday to hash out ways to thwart cross-border security threats, cope with a potential bird flu outbreak and boost North American trade. With growing Mexican and Canadian concerns about U.S. border restrictions imposed since the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez were meeting their counterparts from the two countries to consider cooperation on the issues. Hosted by Canadian Foreign Minister Peter MacKay, the gathering of the two-year-old Security and Prosperity...

The Clovis people, known for their distinctive spear points, likely were not the first humans in the Americas, according to research placing their presence as more recent than previously believed. Using advanced radiocarbon dating techniques, researchers writing in the journal Science on Thursday said the Clovis people, hunters of large Ice Age animals like mammoths and mastodons, dated from about 13,100 to 12,900 years ago. That would make the Clovis culture, known from artifacts discovered at various sites including the town of Clovis, New Mexico, both younger and shorter-lived than previously thought. Previous estimates had dated the culture to about...

Minutemen Go Inside Latino Immigration Meeting - Racism Espoused, Calls for Violence Against "Whites"by Linda Muller - Minuteman Project - ForTheCause.us There are many radical Latino groups calling for the violent overthrow of their "white" oppressors and the return of the American west to the mythical Aztlan from which they believe their land was stolen. Many Americans do not believe these fringe groups have any power and influence, so they dismiss them as harmless. Yet these groups continually draw U.S. Congressmen and staff members to their meetings. Corporate benefactors and foundations contribute funds and other means of support that enable...

Law and order is President Calderon's top priority Mexico's human rights record has been severely criticised in a new report by the rights group Amnesty International.The group says that arbitrary detention and torture are systematic and that it is Mexico's poor who suffer most. It also highlights the problem suffered by millions of indigenous peoples at the hands of the authorities. The government's use of soldiers to tackle drugs gangs is criticised but the Mexican government has said that it is working to clean up the abuses. 'Systematic abuses' Amnesty International cites case after case of people who it...

Winds Of Change: North America's Wind Patterns Have Shifted Significantly In The Past 30,000 Years Science Daily — Dartmouth researchers have learned that the prevailing winds in the mid latitudes of North America, which now blow from the west, once blew from the east. They reached this conclusion by analyzing 14,000- to 30,000-year-old wood samples from areas in the mid-latitudes of North America (40-50°N), which represents the region north of Denver and Philadelphia and south of Winnipeg and Vancouver. Researchers (left to right) Yong Shu, Eric Posmentier, Xiahong Feng, and Anthony Faiia. (Photo by Joseph Mehling) The researchers report their...

Just when you thought it might be safe to go on to topics other than regional integration and trade practices driven by the love of money and the lust for power, you get blindsided again. While ordinary Americans were reflecting on the fifth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, globalists of Canada, the U.S. and Mexico were making their way quietly, quietly, to Banff, Alberta for the North American Forum held at the Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel Sept. 12–14. The meeting was closed-doors. According to some reports buses with attendees were arriving at night. There was no print media coverage in...

Mashantuckets, Ballard To Explore Ancient Coastline They are questions that have intrigued scientists, archaeologists and historians for centuries: When did Native Americans first arrive on the North American continent, and where did they settle? Now, Robert Ballard, president of the Institute for Exploration at Mystic Aquarium, and Kevin McBride, research director of the Mashantucket Pequot Museum, and other researchers hope to answer that question. On Wednesday, Ballard, McBride and Dwight Coleman, the IFE's research director, outlined plans for a multiyear expedition to chart the location of ancient coastlines now underwater, identify sites of Native American settlements and find artifacts to...

When it comes to eminent domain usage by railroads, it doesn't seem to be a question of if they will get the property they need, but rather how much they will pay for it. Arizona state law delegates the right to take property through eminent domain to railroads, which have long been considered a public use, according to Tim Keller, executive director of the Institute for Justice, Arizona chapter. [snip to buried lede] Easterday said he was approached by a Union Pacific representative about selling an option to purchase 200 acres he owns at County 13th Street and Avenue 3E...

WASHINGTON – While several members of Congress have denied any knowledge of efforts to build "NAFTA superhighways" or move America closer to a union with Mexico and Canada, four members of the House have stepped up to sponsor a resolution opposing both initiatives. Rep. Virgil Goode Jr., R-Va., has introduced a resolution – H.R. 487 – designed to express "the sense of Congress that the United States should not engage in the construction of a North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) Superhighway System or enter into a North American Union (NAU) with Mexico and Canada." "Now that Congress is preparing...

Ancient civilisations in Mexico developed a writing system as early as 2,000 years ago, new evidence suggests. The discovery in the state of Veracruz of a block inscribed with symbolic shapes has astounded anthropologists. Researchers tell Science magazine that they consider it to be the oldest example of writing in the New World. The inscriptions are thought to have been made by the Olmecs, an ancient pre-Columbian people known for creating large statues of heads. The finding suggests that New World people developed writing some 400 years before their contemporaries in the Western hemisphere. ...... "I think it could...