Free Republic

Surgeons fought for hours to save Castro's life By Phil Hart in Havana (Filed: 06/08/2006) Doctors at the exclusive Cimeq hospital in western Havana are accustomed to handling the delicate health problems of Cuba's communist elite. It was here last weekend, The Sunday Telegraph has learnt, that they battled for several hours to save the life of the regime's most important patient, Fidel Castro. Unable to stem intestinal bleeding with drugs, the country's top surgeons performed an emergency operation on the veteran leader. To all but a handful of trusted doctors and his closest lieutenants, President Castro's medical condition has...

The 2006 Senate Races, with state, Senator, party, 2005 ACU rating (American Conservative Union), current outlook. 4 Republicans likely to be defeated, Burns MT, DeWine OH, Santorum PA, and Chaffee RI. 1 NJ, Menendez, D, 0, leans D 2 MO, TALENT, R, 84, leans R 3 CT, Lieberman, D 8 primary, leans D 4 MD, Sarbanes. D, 0, retiring, leans D 5 MN, Dayton, D, 16, retiring, leans D 6 VT, Jeffords, I, 8, retiring, leans I (D) 7 TN, FRIST, R, 92, retiring, leans R 8 CA, Feinstein, D, 12, safe D 9 DE, Carper, D, 8, safe D...

Lt. Steve Smith, in charge of the detective bureau for the Malibu/Lost Hills station of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, confirmed to me just now that "the contents seem to be similar" between the official reports and the four pages posted by TMZ.com on the Internet alleging Mel Gibson made anti-Semitic slurs -- "fucking Jews" and "The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world" and asking the arresting deputy "Are you a Jew?" -- during his DUI arrest early Friday morning. Smith denied TMZ.com's charge that the sheriff's department was involved in a "cover-up" of Gibson's...

Mel Gibson LOS ANGELES - A blitzed Mel Gibson launched into an obscenity-laced tirade when he was busted on suspicion of drunken driving early yesterday, threatening an officer and making anti-Semitic and sexually abusive remarks, according to a police report. The "Passion of the Christ" director repeatedly said, "My life is f----d," according to the report by Los Angeles County Deputy James Mee, which was obtained by TMZ.com. The celebrity news Web site posted excerpts of the handwritten report. Gibson, 50, was pulled over for speeding at 3:10 a.m. on the Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu, Calif., cops said. The...

A Jewish activist was physically assaulted and his life was threatened during a planned "peaceful" rally held by the Muslim American Society in Boston, he told WorldNetDaily today. "I have never been physically attacked before. I've had slurs thrown at me, got into heated debates, but what was amazing was that I was actually physically attacked," Seva Brodsky said. "Since they were the majority, and felt invincible, they threatened to kill me!" Brodsky, who recently returned from nearly six months in Israel, captured some of the confrontation on video, available at the weblog Solomonia.com. The event Friday at Boston's City...

Tehran, 19 July (AKI) - The Farsi-language leftist website Peyknet has claimed in an unconfirmed report that US aircrafts flew over Tehran at dawn on Tuesday, citing anonymous Western sources. Edited by former members of the Iranian Communist party, the online paper alleged that the Iranian government kept the news a secret so as not to alarm the population. The website also quoted the same unnamed sources as claiming that some European embassies were studying plans to evacuate their citizens from Tehran in case of a US attack.

We're going on day four of the latest fidel castro is dead rumors. Here are a couple more uncorroborated reports and speculations: - Hugo Chavez supposedly took an "urgent flight" to Cuba yesterday afternoon along with other high ranking Cuban officials. Details or news accounts of same unavailable. - Granma once again published articles profiling Raul Castro, heir apparent to the dictator throne. - WHPC reports that there is much action in Cuba at the moment, with reports from Granma stating that workers are "waging a fierce battle" in attempts to have construction and other related project complete for a...

Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. Now, count this as a rumor so far, but it seems that Jean Claude Van Damme thinks he's signed on to play the villain in RUSH HOUR 3... Here's the scoop: Here is a big scoop for you, Harry! Jean Claude Van Damme has signed on to play the main villain in "Rush Hour 3"(set to film in August). It involves Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker getting mixed up with Triads in Paris. Van Damme spoke on a recent British TV Show about it and was looking forward to working with Jackie Chan. Also rumored to...

Penn, Sarandon Unite for Hunger Strike July 5, 2006 SEAN PENN, SUSAN SARANDON and WILLIE NELSON are just some of the big names who will be lending their support to anti-war activist CINDY SHEEHAN's hunger strike. Sheehan, whose son Casey was killed while serving in Iraq, began her "Troops Home Fast" protest outside the White House on Independence Day. Her plan is to abstain from eating and consume only water and juices throughout the summer. Penn, Sarandon and Nelson, meanwhile, will participate in a "rolling fast" along with actor DANNY GLOVER, author ALICE WALKER and nearly 3,000 activists nationwide. The...

The California Highway Patrol is weaning itself off its fleet of now-discontinued Chevrolet Camaro pursuit cars, switching to new Porsche 987 Boxsters. As a spokesman for the CHP bizarrely put it, “The Camaros were at the end of their useful life, and were never able to be used fully given that CHP officers are prohibited from wearing mullets while on duty.” (Apparently, droll humor isn’t unlearned during baton-fighting exersizes.) An initial order for 200 Porsche Boxsters will be fulfilled by the end of 2005(6), with the majority of units being placed in service in high-enforcement areas, like Irwindale. (PS: Check...

ROME, AP - Al-Qaeda leaders sold out Abu Musab al-Zarqawi to the United States in exchange for a promise to let up in the search for Osama bin Laden, the slain militant's wife claimed in an interview with an Italian newspaper. The woman, identified by La Repubblica as al-Zarqawi's first wife, said al-Qaeda's top leadership reached a deal with U.S. intelligence because al-Zarqawi had become too powerful. She claimed Sunni tribes and Jordanian secret services mediated the deal. Al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, died June 7 in a U.S. airstrike outside Baqouba, northeast of Baghdad. "My husband has...

BEIJI, Iraq - Five U.S. Army soldiers are being investigated for allegedly raping a young woman, then killing her and three members of her family in Iraq, a U.S. military official said Friday. The soldiers also allegedly burned the body of the woman they are accused of assaulting in the March incident, the official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case. The U.S. command issued a sparse statement, saying Maj. Gen. James D. Thurman, commander of coalition troops in Baghdad, had ordered a criminal investigation into the alleged killing of a family...

The American army in Iraq suffered a fresh blow to its image today as it emerged that five soldiers were being investigated for allegedly raping a woman and then murdering her and three members of her family. The soldiers are accused of burning their alleged victim's body, according to sources quoted by the AP news agency. Major General James Thurman, commander of coalition troops in Baghdad, has ordered a criminal investigation into the alleged killing of the family of four in Mahmoudiya, south of Baghdad, in March. "The entire investigation will encompass everything that could have happened that evening. We’re...

Anyone else hear that if there is going to be a SCOTUS retirment it will happen tomorrow. That makes sense giving that the last cases will be announced tomorrow, Hamdan v. Rumsfeld and I think a few others. Also, if anyone else is up for random speculation on who will retire and who will replace. I'll go with Stevens retires, Karen Williams replaces. Mods, sorry if this is a useless vanity.

Rick Roberts has been on topic about the fact that the Mexican flag is flying along with the American flag at the San Diego County Fair, at the Durante entrance.

I don't have a link, but I read on another message board that Canadian News reported the downing of an American aircraft over North Korea. Apparently, we have denied the report, but this does illustrate the high tensions.

Malfunctioning distillery turns lake into vodka. According to specialist analysis, the Bracholinskie lake in Wielkopolska is filled with alcohol. The concentration of alcohol in the water amounts to 30% in some places. The phenomenon is a result of a technical problem in the nearby vodka production plant. "Our alcohol measuring equipment is not wrong. It recorded a level of 30%. There is vodka in this lake," stated chemist Robert Wilczynski. The news about the free vodka in the lake spread fast and attracted a number of farmers from nearby villages who arrived at the lake to take as much vodka...

WOULDN'T IT BE GREAT TO TURN ON THE TV AND HEAR ANY U.S. PRESIDENT, DEMOCRAT OR REPUBLICAN GIVE THE FOLLOWING SPEECH? My Fellow Americans: As you all know, the defeat of Iraq regime has been completed. Since congress does not want to spend any more money on this war, our mission in Iraq is complete. This morning I gave the order for a complete removal of all American forces from Iraq. This action will be complete within 30 days. It is now to begin the reckoning. Before me, I have two lists. One list contains the names of countries which...

Franklin Roosevelt, a Democrat, introduced the Social Security (FICA) Program. He promised: 1.) That participation in the Program would be completely voluntary, 2.) That the participants would only have to pay 1% of the first $1,400 of their annual incomes into the Program, 3.) That the money the participants elected to put into the Program would be deductible from their income for tax purposes each year, 4.) That the money the participants put into the independent "Trust Fund" rather than into the General operating fund, and therefore, would only be used to fund the Social Security Retirement Program, and no...

Zarghawi's Last Words "Prepare My Virgins" IRAN TOLD HAMAS, HAMAS TOLD THE JORDANIANS, THE JORDANIANS TOLD THE AMERICANS (Washington D.C.) - and the Americans invited the Iraqis to join in to bolster the new government's ministerial positions. Nobody really knows exactly why "anything" but speculation can be reasonably accurate. Might the cash-strapped Hamas have been angling for the $25 million bounty on which to operate? Or was this a gift from Hamas to the West aimed to potentially reinstate Jordan as the land of the Palestinians as was originally intended long ago and now so feared a possibility -...