Free Republic

The House yesterday passed a new "reform" measure aimed at curtailing the practice of trading on securities with inside information amongst members of Congress and their staff. Suprise! Some members of Congress were arriving in Congress and becoming rich on the experience. Ever wonder how people go to Congress and become millionaires? The publication last year of a new academic report cleared up for us at least one way the millionaires' club known as Congress benefits.A report from four scholars, Alan J Ziobrowski; James W Boyd, Ping Cheng; and Brigitte J. Ziobrowski, titled Abnormal Returns From the Common Stock Investments...

The hypocrisy of opponents of school choice schemes has never been a big secret. But rarely has that quality been so brazenly exhibited as by Vincent Giordano, the head of the New Jersey Education Association, in a recent interview on New Jersey public television. When asked why he opposes giving poor parents the same opportunity to take their kids out of failing public schools and into successful private or religious institutions the wealthy have, the teachers union boss, who makes more than half a million in salary and other compensation, replied: "Life's not always fair." Giordano, who has been a major antagonist of New...

linked to verbotten source:Buffett’s Railroad Among Winners From Keystone Denial

GREENBELT, Md. – A former U.S. Army soldier has been charged with attempting to provide material support to terror group al Shabaab, the Department of Justice announced Monday. Craig Benedict Baxam was arrested Friday upon return to his home state of Maryland after he was captured in Africa during an alleged attempt to reach Somalia, where the terror group is based. Baxam, 24, joined the Army in 2007 and served in Baghdad and Korea. During his enlistment, he completed eight months of advanced intelligence and cryptology training, the Justice Department said in a press release. According to court papers, Baxam...

JONESBORO, Ga. (CBS Atlanta) – Police charge two caregivers at a Jonesboro facility with waterboarding an 89-year-old woman. Clayton County police said Jermeller Steed and Cicely Reed held down Anna Foley after an argument that started over ice cream. They’re said to have allegedly held down Foley in a locked shower room, flooding her face with the hand-hold shower nozzle in 2008. According to WGCL-TV, Foley was undergoing treatment at the facility for dementia. A co-worker witnessed the event and blew the whistle. The technique slowly drowns subjects by blocking the air passages with flowing water while the subject is...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: They cleaned out Zuccotti Park. Well, they tried to clean out Zuccotti Park. The cops went in there and they told everybody to get out, they're gonna clean the place. "You can come back after we clean it up but when you come back you can't bring any tents or anything to stay overnight." And they went out and found a judge, "Oh, no, you can't do that, Mr. Mayor. If those people want to go back, they can go back. You can't establish rules on these people after they're there. You have to have these rules...

Dariano v. Morgan Hill Unified School District (N.D. Cal.), decided the day before yesterday, upholds a California high school’s decision to forbid students from wearing American flag T-shirts on Cinco de Mayo. (See here and here for more on this case.) On Cinco de Mayo in 2009, a verbal exchange and altercation arose between a group of predominantly white and a group of Mexican students. This altercation involved an exchange of profanities and threats were made. A makeshift American flag was put on one of the trees on campus. A group of Caucasian students began clapping and chanting “USA” as...

I don't care what these slimebag women say because they are all liars. Gloria Allred is now a political operative. She's scum,too. I'm praying every day that Herman Cain survives these attacks and goes on to become THE REAL 1st Black President of these United States. Don't be fooled by these media attacks. Those country club republicans and the dirty dems are terrified of Herman Cain. Do everything you can to raise hell with you local media & start complaining, start calling your Congress & Senate critters. Herman is the real deal . If you let him down you have...

Heard it on Rush.Somebody duct tape my head, please.

AGUA PRIETA, Mexico — "My wife, my son — I have to get back to them," Daniel kept telling himself, from the moment he was arrested in Seattle for driving with an expired license, all the way through the deportation proceeding that delivered him to Mexico in June. Nothing would deter him from crossing the border again. He had left his hometown at 24, he said. Twelve years later, he spoke nearly fluent English and had an American son, a wife and three brothers in the United States. "I’ll keep trying," he said, "until I’ll get there." This is increasingly...

Joe McGinnis's new book "The Rogue: Searching for the Real Sarah Palin," hasn't won him any new friends in the Palin camp, and has likely created more than a few enemies among her supporters. The book takes a hard look at Palin and her husband Todd, digging into her upbringing, what he considers her "deep streak" of racism, alleged drug use, rumours of affairs and general all-around bad parenting.

Asked during the 2008 presidential campaign about his relationship with the left-wing radical Bill Ayers, Barack Obama replied that Ayers was just "a guy who lives in my neighborhood." He implied that to even bring that questionable relationship out of the shadows was a mean-spirited, guilt-by-association political tactic. Ayers, Obama went on, had done something deplorable "forty years ago when I was six or seven years old." Otherwise, Obama insisted, Ayers was a paragon of virtue: a respectable fixture in mainstream Chicago, a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, on a foundation board focused on education that included...

An Austrian man has been accused of locking up his two mentally disabled daughters and using them as sex slaves for 41 years. Police said that the 85-year-old, who has not been named, repeatedly raped the women between 1970 and May 2011. The alleged victims are now 53 and 45 years old. The women escaped when the father was unable to get up after the older daughter pushed him over when he last tried to rape her, according to Austrian media. The sisters allegedly fled as their father lay unable to seek help for two days until he was found...

(This is the total article but apparently needs to be excerpted. Also needs account to be accessed. That's how the lamestream media forces you to read their version of the news.) A Freeport man has been slapped with criminal charges after he tried to upgrade his flight at Kennedy Airport by claiming to be in the U.S. Army, prosecutors said Monday. Rock Diaz, 22, of Frankel Avenue was released on his own recognizance after his arraignment Saturday in Queens Criminal Court, the Queens district attorney's office said. The criminal complaint against Diaz said he was wearing a U.S. Army uniform,...

ROCKFORD -- The second of three men accused of killing a Rockford ice cream vendor will be sentenced next month after a jury found him guilty. After deliberating less than two hours Friday, the jury declared Justin Dismuke, 22, guilty of first-degree murder in the death of Isidro Duran, the Rockford Register Star reports. Police say that on July 15, 2007, Dismuke and two others approached Duran, 47, who was selling fruit bars out of a push cart. One of the men shot Duran several times in the back and leg. Police said it was an attempted robbery.

Tea party lawmakers are being targeted for elimination by their own party, as old-guard Republicans use the Census-mandated redistricting process to erase seats won by last year’s upstarts, the National Journal reports. House freshmen from several GOP-majority states are in danger of losing out in a political realignment that rewards more connected veteran representatives. It may be cold comfort to tea partyers that the hostile redistricting process proves their point: They really don’t belong to the political establishment.

(Viewer Discretion Advised) Socialist Counter Protest to Tax Day TEA Party DATELINE Portland Oregon - 15 April 2011 Socialists were out in full force to counter the peaceful patriotic Tax Day Protest in Pioneer Courthouse Square. Very strong language...but just pass it along so everyone can see what these people are really about. http://youtu.be/V7l-pEBYeLI

In a Facebook note, Sarah Palin compared Bill Maher to "an annoying little mosquito found zipped up in your tent" and encouraged conservatives to not get distracted by the petty, vulgar attacks of liberals like Maher. The problem with mosquitos, however, is that many carry diseases like encephalitis, dengue fever, and malaria. In Maher's case, the diseases are ignorance, hate, and radical liberalism. On Friday, the foul-mouthed little man demonstrated the height of his intellectual capacity yet again by referring to Michelle Bachmann and Sarah Palin as bimbos, and attacked John Boehner by saying: "John Boehner wears bronzer and goes...

National City, Calif.—A San Diego-area boxing gym that serves at-risk kids is showing what it takes to fight for what is right and to win.  A trial is scheduled to begin on Monday, March 14, 2011, to decide whether National City, Calif., may declare nearly 700 properties—including the gym—“blighted,” thus freeing the city to bulldoze these properties and make way for luxury condos among other private developments.  The trial will be held before the Honorable Steven R. Denton, Superior Court of California, Hall of Justice, 330 W. Broadway in San Diego, Calif. The Community Youth Athletic Center (CYAC) has had...

Right now, 30,000 people are gathered outside of the Capitol building in Madison, Wisconsin speaking out against Republican Governor Scott Walker's attempt to take away collective bargaining rights from public employees. Our SEIU brothers and sisters stand to lose their rights as well and are speaking out in force. Use this form to send a message to SEIU members - and everyone - who have been fighting for their rights all week outside (and inside) the Capitol. We'll make sure they receive your thoughts this weekend.

A California mother is outraged after thieves "robbed from the grave" when they stole the American flags from a memorial for her son who died fighting in Afghanistan. Marsha Gonsalves, of Turlock, Calif., said she put up 34 new ones outside her home when vandals snatched the four American flags decorating the memorial last week. "How could somebody be so cruel? It's almost like robbing from the grave," Gonsalves told FoxNews.com. "This is not something a decent American person would do. That person disrespected our property, our flags, and our son and his comrades."

Kathy Griffin behaved during her New Year's Eve broadcast, and kept from being yanked off the air as she warned would happen if she relapsed into bad language. The comic set a resolution for 2011 -- taking on a new Palin in the new year. "I've already gone for Sarah, Todd and Bristol obviously," Griffin tells The Hollywood Reporter. "But I think it's Willow's year to go down." "In 2011 I want to offend a new Palin," she vows. While the daughter of former Alaska governor Sarah Palin is 16, Griffin feels she's fair game, pointing to Palin's widely reported...

Though the Eagles didn’t have a chance to make news on the field tonight, they made some more news off the field. Peter King of NBC reported during Football Night in America that President Barack Obama recently called Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie to congratulate the team for giving quarterback Mike Vick a second chance. President Obama explained that a level playing field rarely exists for prisoners who have completed their sentences. Vick’s success gives all of them hope. In our view, Obama’s gesture also provides Vick with the kind of positive reinforcement that will help keep him out of any...

Gay activist and Iraq war veteran Lt. Dan Choi has been hospitalized following a breakdown, ABC News is reporting. "Dan sends his unconditional love," said Choi's Twitter account, after linking to the ABC article.Choi, a Tustin High graduate, was discharged from the New York Army National Guard in July under the Don't Ask Don't Tell policy he's been working to change. He was admitted to the psychiatric ward at the Veteran's Administration Hospital in Brockton, Mass., ABC News stated.

There is growing support for Sinn Fein after the party forced Fianna Fail into fourth place in a national opinion poll, Gerry Adams has said. The Sinn Fein president said momentum is gathering for change ahead of the Government's austerity measures. Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams P<> Fianna Fail suffered a bruising after an opinion poll put its support at just 13%. The party is now behind Sinn Fein, at 16%, according to the Red C survey for the Irish Sun. Support for Fine Gael has fallen by 1% to 32% on a similar Red C poll carried out on...

Name: Julian Assange Date of Birth: July 3, 1971 Nationality: Australian Current Whereabouts: Unknown TAMPA, FLORIDA (SCHNITTSHOW.COM) NATIONALLY SYNDICATED TALK SHOW HOST, TODD SCHNITT ANNOUNCES $50,000 REWARD FOR CREDIBLE INFORMATION LEADING TO THE APPREHENSION AND ARREST OF JULIAN ASSANGE, FOUNDER OF WIKILEAKS. FOLLOWING THE ARREST WARRANT FOR ASSANGE SWORN BY SWEDEN ON ALLEGED RAPE CHARGES, THE THIRD MASSIVE PUBLICATION OF HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF DOCUMENTS STOLEN FROM THE U.S. GOVERNMENT, AND THE ADDITION OF ASSANGE TO INTERPOL’S MOST WANTED LIST, SCHNITT IS PUTTING HIS MONEY WHERE HIS MOUTH IS. “ASSANGE IS A TERRORIST, AN ENEMY COMBATANT, AND NEEDS TO BE...

JACKSONVILLE, Florida -- A north Florida mother has pleaded guilty to shaking her baby to death after the boy's crying interrupted her game on Facebook. Alexandra V. Tobias pleaded guilty to second-degree murder on Wednesday and remains jailed. The Florida Times-Union reports that she told investigators she was angered because the boy was crying while she was playing the game FarmVille.

CAIR shut down Juan Williams this week. Juan was the lib we could tolerate. I tried calling a multitude of CAIR offices asking their opinion on homosexuality :) Surprise the leaders were out of the country (most likely on a terrorist recruiting mission IMO). You can say CAIR is some fringe organization but look what CAIR has done in the past 2 years. 1) Fire Juan Willaims from NPR 2) Ban Michael Savage from the UK 3) Boycott Fox News 4) Team up with the gay facist group media matters

Senate Finance Chairman Steve Ogden, R-Bryan, said he knows that just mentioning a possible statewide property tax will stir up emotions.

Afghan private security forces with ties to the Taliban, criminal networks and Iranian intelligence have been hired to guard American military bases in Afghanistan, exposing United States soldiers to surprise attack and confounding the fight against insurgents, according to a Senate investigation.

MEXICO CITY -- As if Mexicans needed more evidence that criminal groups are trying to hijack the political life of the nation, it came with a ferocious triple-whammy punch in the past 24 hours. Assailants shot and seriously wounded the mayor-elect of a town in the border state of Chihuahua on Friday afternoon, less than a day after commandos in Nuevo Leon state executed a sitting mayor, making him the 10th municipal chief slain so far this year. In Mexico City, a fugitive legislator with drug charges pending against him sneaked into Congress and took his seat, automatically obtaining immunity...

SNIP In the statement, Murkowski said she would not run as a Libertarian candidate, which means that if she does run it will be as a write-in candidate. In explaining her decision, Murkowski had some harsh words for the Tea Party Express, which backed Miller. "...After meeting with the Libertarian candidate last week and considering that option, I cannot in good conscience seek the Libertarian nomination," she said. "As disappointed as I am in the outcome of the Primary and my belief that the Alaska Republican Party was hijacked by the Tea Party Express, an outside extremist group, I am...

The 39 year-old told journalists at the Frontline Club last night that US government insiders had informed him about discussions to charge him as a co-conspirator to espionage. The discussions were later dropped. Mr Assange says despite this he still fears he is at risk of being forcefully detained by the US government as a material witness in the prosecution of US intelligence analyst Bradley Manning. Mr Manning, 22, was arrested in Baghdad in May and charged earlier this month with multiple counts of mishandling and leaking classified data, after a computer hacker turned him in. In the United States...

Olbermann: Sherrod was 'Assassinated by Fox News and That Scum Breitbart' By Noel Sheppard Thu, 07/22/2010 - 01:19 ET Keith Olbermann interrupted his much-needed vacation Wednesday to surprise his few viewers with a "Special Comment" about the forced resignation of USDA official Shirley Sherrod.Quite predictably, his greater than twelve minute tirade largely focused on Fox News and Andrew Breitbart -- the latter repeatedly referred to as "scum" as well as a "pornographer of propaganda" -- who he claimed "assassinated" Sherrod.After starting his rant by pompously comparing the former USDA official to Alfred Dreyfus, the French artillery officer falsely accused of...

A former Orlando TSA security officer arrested for allegedly molesting a minor pleaded no contest to one charge today and was sentenced to 10 years' sex-offender probation. A victim told deputies Bennett asked her to be his sex slave and fondled her against her will. He pleaded no contest to the molestation charge, while prosecutors dropped the second count as part of the plea deal. Bennett, 58, could have received a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison for the felony. "Are you satisfied with your attorney?" Orange Circuit Judge Marc Lubet asked Bennett during the sentencing. "Yes," Bennett replied....

In mid-May, Portland police Officer James Crooker went to Southeast Portland on a patrol call. With a few minutes to spare, he decided to get a coffee. So, he popped into the Red & Black cafe on Southeast 12th Avenue near Oak Street, bought a coffee and was heading out when a customer approached him, saying she appreciates the hard job that police officers do every day in Portland. One of the co-owners of the cafe, John Langley, has another point of view. While the officer and customer were chatting, he walked up and asked Crooker to leave, saying he...

Illegal Alien Arrested After Striking Victims, Flinging 2 Of Them Off His Hood, Then Taking Off Good Samaritan Tracks Driver Down, Detains Him Until Police ArriveThey were clinging to the top of the hood, screaming for their lives, and police say they were treated like debris. Stunning revelations surfaced Thursday about the driver in the hit-and-run crash that seriously injured four high school students who were heading to the mall. "Thank God they're alive." That's the first thing Anthony Centamore said when he saw his daughter Stefanie in the hospital on Wednesday night, not yet aware of how she got...

Six months after losing a bruising battle for the 23rd Congressional District seat, Dierdre K. Scozzafava has decided to take a break from politics. The Gouverneur resident said Wednesday she will not seek a seventh term in the 122nd Assembly District. “If you go back to the run for Congress, I was really looking to do something different and go in a different direction and be challenged differently,” the Republican said Wednesday. “That hasn’t changed. As much as I’ve enjoyed my time in the state Assembly, I think it’s time for me to take a breather and go in a...

A "Scud Crisis" is threatening to ignite an all-out war between Israel and Hizbullah, the Kuwaiti al-Rai newspaper reported. The daily said that Syria has delivered to Hizbullah Scud missiles, sparking a behind-the-scenes crisis after Israel informed Washington that "it will take steps if the U.S. didn't find a solution to what the Jewish state considers a threat to its security." Following the Israeli warning, the U.S. State Department summoned Syrian ambassador Imad Mustafa and asked him "to inform his government about the level of danger if the missiles crossed the border," al-Rai said. Washington also reportedly told Mustafa that...

HADLEY, Mass. - Lawyers for three teenage girls accused of participating in the bullying of a 15-year-old girl who committed suicide entered not guilty pleas Thursday on their behalf to charges including civil rights violations and criminal harassment. Ashley Longe, Sharon Chanon Velazquez and Flannery Mullins, all 16, did not appear in Franklin-Hampshire Juvenile Court for their arraignments. A judge ordered them to have no contact with the family of Phoebe Prince, a South Hadley High School freshman who hanged herself in January after what prosecutors called an "unrelenting" three-month bullying campaign by six teenagers. Prosecutors say Prince was targeted...

After a White House session attended by President Barack Obama and several of the country's top health insurers, Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius questioned the industry's "jaw-dropping" rate hikes. "The meeting was really focused on what is happening with the kind of jaw-dropping rate increases that people are seeing," Sebelius said, calling on insurers to file requests for rate increases online along with financial data. The day after Obama launched a last-ditch drive to pass a sweeping healthcare overhaul, he also met at the White House with groups of liberal and moderate Democrats from the House of Representatives to seek their...

Sen. Charles Schumer is denying a published report that he called the Securities and Exchange Commission for details about the probe into Bernie Madoff's $65 billion-dollar Ponzi scheme. In his a book set to be released next week, "No One Would Listen," Madoff whistleblower Harry Markopolos passes along an unsourced claim that New York's senior senator, a powerhouse fundraiser with close ties to Wall Street, called the financial industry watchdog for the inside scoop. He maintains Schumer did nothing wrong. "I was told, by a government agency, for example, that New York Senator Charles Schumer called the SEC at some...

Information has been received indicating that the Westboro Baptist Church WBC) is planning protest activity within the region. The group is described as an extremist hate group opposed to the military and homosexuals. The WBC has garnered media attention by protesting at the funerals of service members, famous people, people who have died from AIDS, as well as military installations and political events. The activity is planned to target schools, Jewish facilities, and military events in Henrico County, the City of Richmond, and the Tidewater area. The WBC is a highly organized group based out of Kansas. The WBC has...

WASHINGTON, Feb 22 (Reuters) - A modest job-creation bill advanced in the U.S. Senate on Monday as the chamber's newest Republican bucked his party and sided with Democrats on a $15 billion package of tax cuts and highway spending. Republican Scott Brown joined four other Republicans, 55 Democrats and two independents to overcome a procedural hurdle that sets up a final vote later this week. Brown was widely hailed as a conservative hero after his surprise victory in Massachusetts last month gave Republicans enough seats to block most Democratic legislation..............................

A reader writes: I was born, raised, and educated in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, an exemplary Whitopia. I grew up listening to Rush Limbaugh, watching Fox News and had a "Proud Member of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy" bumper sticker on my debate tub. I was lucky though. I did well enough in school to be eligible to attend one of those evil elite East Cost universities on scholarship. I defended Bush, idiotically, all the way until my senior year, when I studied abroad in both China and England. I was forced, over and over, by classmates and those I met...

House Passes Increase on Debt Limit by $1.9 trillion on a 217-212 Vote Developing...

It is legal for lawyers, like anyone else, to give campaign money to politicians. But questions arise when the politicians are local officials with influence over the selection of legal counsel for shareholder lawsuits filed by public pension funds, a role that can be lucrative. A Wall Street Journal analysis documented the extent of campaign giving by plaintiffs' law firms specializing in shareholder litigation. It found that 25 leading firms, their lawyers and family members contributed a total of more than $21 million in the past decade to state-level candidates and party funds, as well as to national-party groups that...

The Canadian doctor who performed a controversial medical procedure on Tiger Woods is under criminal investigation for drug violations on both sides of the border, bringing scrutiny to his colleagues, including one who worked closely with BALCO athletes and Yankee superstar Alex Rodriguez. Dr. Tony Galea was arrested in October and his Toronto clinic was raided by Canadian authorities after his assistant was detained at the U.S.-Canadian border and reportedly found to be in possession of illegal drugs, including human growth hormone (hGH) and Actovegin - a drug extracted from calf's blood that has been banned by the World Anti-Doping...

Porn star Holly Sampson said on an adult Internet talk show that she slept with Tiger Woods at his bachelor party five years ago. "Me and my girlfriends did a bachelor party for Tiger and it was amazing," she said on the show, in which she and other adult stars are interviewed topless. "He picked me to go into the room. I have to say he was really good." Now Jim McBride, the CEO of the celebrity adult Web site MrSkin.com tells Pop Tarts that Sampson has been running ads as a high-paying adult escort for at least seven years.

A disgraced Tiger Woods is terrified that the worst news is yet to come – that he fathered love children with his mistresses! And his many liaisons may have been caught on tape! That’s the bombshell charge that could wreck what’s left of his once squeaky-clean image, sink his badly tattered marriage and destroy his multimillion-dollar endorsement empire. The golf great had wild unprotected sex with a string of mistresses, sources tell The ENQUIRER- and now he fears claims that his out-of-control sexual proclivities may have produced children. “That would be the final straw for his wife – AND Tiger...