Free Republic

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Former U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan told Congress on Thursday he is "shocked" at the breakdown in U.S. credit markets and said he was "partially" wrong to resist regulation of some securities. Despite concerns he had in 2005 that risks were being underestimated by investors, "this crisis, however, has turned out to be much broader than anything I could have imagined," Greenspan said in remarks prepared for delivery to the House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. "Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholder's equity (myself...

NASA announced on Tuesday, August 19, 2008 that it has worked out a solution to the excessive-vibration problem in its yet-to-be developed Ares 1 launch vehicle. The Ares 1 rocket will take astronauts into space inside their Orion crew capsule as part of the new Project Constellation for the United States. The first manned flight is due around 2015. However, early in the design phase of the Ares 1, NASA engineers found that combustion in the solid-fuel motor would spread excessive vibration throughout the multi-stage Ares 1 rocket and the Orion crew capsule. Although the larger-than-desired vibrations would only appear...

A car exploded Sunday evening while parked outside a block of flats in the Århus suburb of Åbyhøj, reports DR public broadcaster. The force of the explosion shattered six windows and one of the car doors was flung 15 metres from the car itself. Police are at a loss as to the motive of the bombing but have issued a warrant for a 25-35-year-old man seen leaving the scene of the crime. Two other cars were set on fire in the city of Århus, but police believe the episodes are unrelated. (LYT)

Officials at a U.K. high school were aghast after a stripper visited a student during class and whipped him in front of other students and a horrified teacher, Sky News reported Thursday. A booking error is to blame after a mother arranged to send a "gorilla gram" to her son on his 16th birthday, an arrangement she cleared with Nottingham's Arnold Hill School and Technology College. Instead, the agency sent a stripper clad in a policewoman costume, Sky reported. After whipping the teen, the stripper placed a collar around his neck and led him around the classroom with a leash,...

Contoocook, N.H - Former President Bill Clinton said he was "shocked" by revelations that a top fundraiser for his wife is a fugitive from justice and claimed he didn't even know what "HillRaiser" Norman Hsu did for a living. "You could have knocked me over with a straw, especially when I heard the L.A. people had been allegedly looking for him for 15 years when he was in Plainview," he told Newsday while touring a county fair in rural New Hampshire Sunday.

HOUSTON - Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling were known as visionaries, hands-on executives, corporate titans directing the high-flying ship at Wall Street darling Enron Corp. Add another title: convicted felons. "Certainly we're surprised," a shaken Lay said Thursday after a jury capped a four-month-long fraud and conspiracy trial and in its sixth day of deliberations returned guilty verdicts against him and Skilling. "I think it's more appropriate to say we're shocked. This is not the outcome we expected." Besides all six counts in the main trial, Lay, Enron's founder, also was convicted of four charges of bank fraud and making...

John McCain is running for President 2008. As a republican candidate, John McCain could win the republican nomination. Many feel if John McCain runs against Hillary Clinton, he would win the presidential election in 2008. John McCain graduated from the Naval Academy in 1958. After graduation, John McCain became a Naval Avaitor. For over 5 years, John McCain was a Vietnam captive. John McCain became a US Senator for Arizona in 1986. Senator John McCain is now Chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, and is known for his successful passing of Campaign Finance Reform. Express your...

Fellow Americans, there comes a time every mans life when we must give up ourselves before we are worthy to recieve. There comes a time in this war on terror when in order to protect liberty, we have to give it up in the mean time for safty. That's right folks. Today, Americans have forsaken the creator for the creation and have decided that they would value our "civil liberties" than protecting western civilization and rich white people from the tender mercies of radical Islamic terrorists. Selfish liberals insist and whine that Bush has no right to spy on Americans...

In this war freedom should come first not after! In New Hampshire the Motto is Live free or Die! I don't need Bush spying on law abiding americans and taking our freedoms. Anyone who surrenders a square inch of freedom to the government in the name of saftey is a traitor and should be treated like one! Let the Bush Fashists all drop dead! Filthy Commys! LET FREEDOM RING!

PARIS - World leaders, uneasy at the prospect of a Hamas-led Palestinian government, immediately exerted pressure on the Islamic militants Thursday to recognize Israel and renounce violence as a precondition for support. That a group listed as a terrorist organization by the European Union and the United States won seemingly fair-and-square at the ballot box compounded the dilemma for foreign governments. While they welcomed the smooth running of the Palestinian legislative elections, the militants' stunning showing also unsettled many and threw Middle East peacemaking into turmoil. "Hamas won," said Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel. "Hamas is surely not a...

Yaa, you repukes are not doing so well, huh? Imagine, you repukes control the presidency, both houses of Congress, and appointed 7 of the 9 Supreme Court justices. Yet the Supreme Court thre out sodomy laws in all 50 states and recognized the right of government to seize land for any reason. And you couldn't pass your Social Security changes could you? Sorry, that was your last shot. Come November, we're going to start seeing more Democratic faces in the House. It's the end for you guys. You guys are celebrating when Bush's numbers go *up* to 45%. Then Faux...

Bush’s giant Right Wing Noise Machine (RWNM) loves to preach about the Bush economic miracle. In fact, the RWNM’s current thinking is Bush doesn’t spend enough time talking about his economic triumphs. If only he did, then everyone would fall in line and believe in the great Bush economic miracle. There is one problem with this argument: it’s a lie. Any way you look at the Bush economy, it comes up short. Today, I want to compare Bush’s job creation record with other economic recoveries. As usual, Bush comes up way short. The national Bureau of Economic Research has identified...

Why does anybody support George w Bush as President? He is clearly the worst President I have ever seen -- a complete disaster. And before you say anything, I have been a registered Republican for 25 years.

UN 'shocked' by violence in Cairo Police surrounded the migrants, who included women and children The UN refugee agency has expressed "shock" after up to 20 Sudanese migrants died during an operation by Egyptian police to break up their camp. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres, said there was no justification for the violence. Thousands of police stormed the camp - which was set up near UN offices in September - wielding truncheons and firing water cannon at the protesters. Several children were reported to be among the dead. The migrants had been demanding that the UNHCR move...

After reading all of the crap that people have been saying regarding Adult Private Social Clubs, I felt that I had to post an article and give my opinion. I am sick and tired of all the religous groups that are saying that there are drugs, prostitution, minors, non-consenting people, and just immoral people at these clubs! First of all, who do these people think they are to decide what is morally right or wrong for me? I believe that I have a good set of morals. I am a law abiding, tax paying citizen, I work full time and...

Lies of omission about 9/11 -- stoking fears of terrorism THEY WANT YOU TO BE AFRAID The following post was censored by freerepublic.com shortly after it was posted on their "public" forum on 9/11/04. That forum is designed to appear as though it is a community forum open to all, but this post only received three responses before it and its replies were deleted, and a repeat posting at 4 am PST on 9/20/04 didn't stay online for 5 minutes! Someone is apparently watching closely over the content of the freerepublic.com forums and censoring them 24/7 (though they might have...

A naked man was accidentally shocked in the genitals by a Taser after he was found breaking windows and asking women to touch him in appropriately, police said. Jeremy J. Miljour, 26, of Bonita Springs, attempted to run when approached by Lee County sheriff's deputies Saturday. When he ignored requested to stop, Deputy Daniel Hollywood shot Miljour with a Taser. One of the Taser prongs accidentally hit Miljour's genitals and got stuck, said Cpl. Matt Chitwood. Officers are taught to aim for the torso, but it was difficult for officers to aim because Miljour was moving, Chitwood said. "The Taser...

A private attorney for the city of San Diego's pension fund was shocked when he found out about a plan to boost retirement benefits for a labor union president, and he said that alone could squelch the 2002 deal with the city to continue underfunding the pension system. An in-house lawyer for the retirement system recounted the San Francisco attorney's reaction to the special perk for the union official in an e-mail two years ago. "This, obviously, is huge," Sheila Leone, the in-house lawyer, wrote of the attorney's reaction on March 24, 2003. Leone said the attorney, Robert Blum, told...

Criminal charges are not warranted against Pacifica police officers who repeatedly applied stun-gun shocks to a combative, cocaine-intoxicated suspect who later died, the San Mateo County district attorney said Friday. Gregory Saulsbury Jr.'s family has filed a $30 million federal lawsuit claiming that police violated his civil rights. District Attorney Jim Fox said his independent review concluded that the three officers struggling to subdue Saulsbury, whom authorities characterized as violent and out of control, "performed at the highest standard of law enforcement in a very difficult and dangerous situation."

IRVING, Texas -- Tiger Woods saw his streak of 142 consecutive cuts made come to an end Friday as the top-ranked player in the world struggled to a 2-over 72 at Cottonwood Valley and will miss the weekend at the EDS Byron Nelson Championship