Free Republic

California state Sen. Jack Scott says he didn't intend to "be a party pooper." It's just that helium-filled foil balloons -- like those found at hospital gift shops and office parties -- are dangerous. They float into electric lines and cause power outages, more than 800 in California last year, utilities say. He drafted a bill to ban foil balloons; it sailed through the state Senate and now awaits a vote in the Assembly. ***** The pro-balloon people are hoping that even if the bill does pass, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will veto it. At a recent news conference, the governor...

Observe that the Lutherans cite government as “an important catalyst in God’s work.” In fact, their agenda implies that government is virtually God’s only instrument. The Lutherans want government to abolish poverty, prohibit war, cleanse the environment, engineer egalitarian justice globally, and seemingly usher in The Millennium through additional regulation and taxation. If government can achieve so much, who needs God, much less the church?

Officials of the declining 4.9 million Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) have revealed what God’s priorities are in the U.S. presidential campaign. And remarkably, the divine priorities was very akin to the Democratic Party’s priorities, if not further to the left. Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson, with three other ELCA officials generously wrote both presidential candidates a public letter with the divine guidance. Although famed Protestant Reformer Martin Luther championed the Bible as God’s exclusive revelation, modern ELCA activists have located more useful counsel in the secular welfare state and environmental agenda. “The Scriptures are clear about God's concern for...

To understand anything, we have to know its history. To understand who stole our culture, we need to take a look at the history of "political correctness." Early Marxist theory Before World War I, Marxist theory said that if Europe ever erupted in war, the working classes in every European country would rise in revolt, overthrow their governments and create a new Communist Europe. But when war broke out in the summer of 1914, that didn't happen. Instead, the workers in every European country lined up by the millions to fight their country's enemies. Finally, in 1917, a Communist revolution...

Grilled cheese, World War II and fiduciary have one thing in common: if you “Google” them, each prompts a Wikipedia entry as the No. 1 result. Wikipedia is all too convenient, but of what value is it? What good is a stockpile of information if it’s unreliable and often incorrect, as many have said Wikipedia is? Since its launch in 2001, the “The Free Encyclopedia” has grown exponentially, offering a definition (or more) for almost every topic. Last spring the resource reached the 10 million article mark over a spectrum of 20 different languages in its attempt to “summarize all...

July 08, 2008, 6:00 a.m. WikipropagandaSpinning green. By Lawrence Solomon Ever wonder how Al Gore, the United Nations, and company continue to get away with their claim of a “scientific consensus� confirming their doomsday view of global warming? Look no farther than Wikipedia for a stunning example of how the global-warming propaganda machine works. As you (or your kids) probably know, Wikipedia is now the most widely used and influential reference source on the Internet and therefore in the world, with more than 50 million unique visitors a month. In theory Wikipedia is a “people’s encyclopedia� written and edited...

Imagine what life would be like floating around the world on a giant island capable of holding 50,000 people and completely sustaining itself. Well, welcome to "Lilypad City." Designed like a lily pad, the innovation by award-winning Belgian architect Vincent Callebaut could be used as a permanent refuge for those whose homes have been covered by water in the future. "I think trying to accommodate the millions of people left homeless by environmental changes will prove to be one of the great challenges of the 21st century," he told the Daily Mail. "Some countries spend billions of pounds working on...

Michael Munger of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about Munger's recent trip to Chile and the changes Chile has made to Santiago's bus system. What was once a private decentralized system with differing levels of quality and price has been transformed into a system of uniform quality designed from the top down. How has the new system fared? Not particularly well according to Munger. Commuting times are up and the President of Chile has apologized to the Chilean people for the failures of the new system. Munger talks about why such changes take place and why they...

All new vehicles on sale in California will soon have to display their green credentials. This is a new scheme implemented by the California Air Resources Board (CARB). From January 1, 2009, stickers like the one seen here will carry information about the environmental performance of every vehicle they’re pasted into. There will be a ‘Global Warming Score’ (based on greenhouse gas emissions from driving and fuel production) and a ‘Smog Score’ (pretty much self-explanatory), both rated on a one-to-ten scale, with ten being the cleanest. And, similar to warnings on cigarette packets, they will say: ‘Protect the environment, choose...

Summary: AMAZING ANIMATION, Shame they wasted it on rank socialist agitprop

While millions of American families struggle with falling house prices, soaring gasoline costs and tightening credit, some environmentalists, urban planners and urban real estate speculators are welcoming the bad news as signaling what they have long dreamed of -- the demise of suburbia. In a March Atlantic article, Christopher B. Leinberger, a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution and a professor of urban planning, contended that yesterday's new suburbs will become "the slums" of tomorrow because high gas prices and the housing meltdown will force Americans back to the urban core. Leinberger is not alone. Other pundits, among them author...

The unnecessary refrigeration of America has become a chronic disease. It seems to have gotten worse over the past few years, with thermostats routinely set at 68deg.F, and sometimes even 65 deg., in the (far too many) hotel rooms I've suffered on the campaign trail. "Americans seem to keep their houses cooler in summer than they do in the winter," muses Edward Parson, an environmental expert at the University of Michigan Law School. But it's hard to know for sure, since there are no comprehensive studies that measure air-conditioning trend lines...

For three days, members of the U.S. Conference of Mayors meeting in Miami this weekend shared their problems and successes, heard experts discuss challenges facing them and compiled a list of issues their representatives will take to Washington, D.C., and to state capitols. It so happens that the top representative for the coming year is Miami Mayor Manny Diaz, newly installed as the group's president. As such, he'll be pushing the mayors' agenda in Congress, at the White House and in the federal agencies that interact with city governments. Greener cities It is an ambitious agenda. The Mayors Conference, for...

Children learn many useful things from television shows and cartoon characters. They learn letters and numbers from the characters on Sesame Street; Dora the Explorer helps them hone their reasoning and problem-solving skills. Now, a cartoon character is telling them when they should die. He’s a dog in a lab coat named “Professor Schpinkee.” He is a creation of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Planet Slayer website. Kids who visit the website are invited to pay a “game” called “Professor Schpinkee’s Greenhouse Calculator.” But instead of learning letters or numbers—or even how to take a bite out of crime—they learn “how...

I thought about GanGreen because we are going to be cutting off arms and legs to pay.

Gordon Brown's futuristic eco-towns to fine residents for driving out of city limits Jill Sherman, Whitehall Editor Motorists living in Gordon Brown's futuristic green communities face fines for driving their cars out of town, under radical proposals being drawn up by ministers, The Times has learnt. Residents of the largely pedestrianised eco-towns may also be expected to park their cars at the outskirts and walk or cycle to their homes, up to ten minutes away. These are among possible ways being discussed with ministers to meet a government target to cut car use in eco-towns by half. Detailed planning proposals...

ITHACA — Legislation further restricting smoking in the City of Ithaca should reduce exposure to secondhand smoke while not creating unintended consequences, according to members of the Smoke-free Zone Legislation Subcommittee. The smoking ban legislation Common Council is exploring includes ... a huge variety of outdoor, public spaces, including parks, natural areas, outdoor concerts and festivals, trails and walkways, parking garages and lots, transit shelters, Newman Golf Course, and city cemeteries. This would include outdoor dining areas at all times, and entire parks or the entire Commons during festivals like Ithaca Festival or the Chili Cook-Off.... It could also include...

VILLANOVA, Pennsylvania: As the 60th anniversary of the Berlin Airlift approaches, recycled myths about its accomplishments drop from the sky like candy into the waiting arms of Americans hungry for a foreign policy alternative to endless war and secret torture. But politicians and pundits looking for a humanitarian policy to win the world's hearts and minds should look back to the airlift with caution. Sixty years after British and American planes began to fly supplies to West Berliners facing a Soviet blockade, even the faux news program "Colbert Report" has reprised the Cold War refrain that the airlift saved the...

With the important exception of racial discrimination -- which was already dying a natural death when I was young -- it is difficult to come up with an important area in which America is significantly better than when I was a boy. But I can think of many in which its quality of life has deteriorated. When I was a boy, America was a freer society than it is today. If Americans had been told the extent and number of laws that would govern their speech and behavior within one generation, they would have been certain that they were being...

In Charles Krauthammer's May 30 must-read column, "Carbon Chastity," he rightly lambastes environmentalists as resurrected communists/socialists who have latched on to the environment and climate change as a means to advance their anti-people social agenda. The specific occasion for his justifiable outrage is a recent proposal by a British parliamentary committee to institute a personal carbon ration card for every citizen. The plan would place limits on food and energy consumption in the form of credits not to be exceeded — except through the potential for heavy-carbon users, often the wealthy, to purchase credits from lower-carbon users, often the less...

The Provincial High Court of Madrid has decided to judge four high rank officers of the [Spanish] Police, among them, the general inspector of the Scientific Police Miguel Ángel Santano, for the so-called "boric acid case" on the presumed manipulation of a forensic report that linked ETA to the brutal attacks of 3/11. The court, presided by Judge Alberto Jorge Barreiro, thus misestimates to apply "the Botín doctrine" as it was asked in the previous phase by the Office of the Public Prosecutor, the State attorney and the defence of the indicted ones. […] According to the popular accusation, the...

University campuses receive a great deal of attention due to the political and cultural indoctrination and activism that some academics try to pass off as education.[1] However, government education bureaucrats are eager to ensure that their prescribed views are etched on the slate of the human mind at a much earlier age. For this reason, the most shameless political and cultural activism is often directed, under the guise of environmental and social education, at young children attending government primary schools.In Australia, governments have adopted environmental education programs that teach children that human intrusion into nature is to be condemned and...

Dear Google comrades Sergei and Larry! The Party looks kindly at your attempts to correct and improve history by unobtrusively modifying the Google logo on notable calendar dates. For years you have zealously informed the masses about progressive and useful events like Earth Day or Earth Hour, while purposefully ignoring Memorial Day (no logo change on this reactionary American holiday). Most recently, you enlightened the unwashed about the Spanish artist Velázquez on June 6 without mentioning the Allied Invasion of Normandy on D-Day, a celebration of which would indeed be offensive to National Socialists. ~ The time is ripe for...

ROME - Better insulation at home, less use of the car and even giving up an electric toothbrush can help people in rich nations halve emissions of greenhouse gases, a UN report said on Thursday. "Adopting a climate-friendly lifestyle needn't require drastic changes or major sacrifices," according to the 202-page UN Environment Programme (UNEP) book entitled "Kick the CO2 Habit: the UN Guide to Climate Neutrality". Issued to mark the UN's annual World Environment Day on June 5, it outlines ways for people to combat global warming with measures such as packing lighter suitcases when flying or going jogging in...

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Could "green" become a new watchword in TV programming? While the media companies have long been touting everything they're doing behind the scenes to become more environment-friendly, the message increasingly is seeping into their programming. On Wednesday, Discovery Communications launches the first 24/7 eco-friendly network, Planet Green, which will take over the space occupied by Discovery Home Channel. That follows NBC Universal's second companywide "Green Week" in April -- featuring 100 hours of green-themed content airing across 42 NBC Universal brands and 28 Web sites -- with two more already planned for November and April....

With the final primary concluded barely hours before, top Democratic Party leaders in Washington early this morning ratcheted up the pressure to force all remaining uncommitted superdelegates to make their choice of candidate known by Friday -- and thus end the now hopeless, onetime front-running campaign of New York Sen. Hillary Clinton. The joint statement was obviously pre-planned and timed for issue shortly after Clinton refused to concede the presidential nomination victory to Barack Obama, who's gained sufficient delegates to clinch the party's nomination. Howard Dean, right, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader...

There are RINOs (Republicans In Name Only) and then there are RINOs who call themselves Republicans for Environmental Protection. Founded in 1995, REP seeks to save the planet through decidedly un-Republican, big-government socialism. It also annually hands out its "Greenest Republican in Congress" award. This year's co-winner is Rep. Christopher Shays, RINO-4th District, who by sheer coincidence is on REP's "Honorary Board of Distinguished Republicans," along with co-winner Sen. Susan Collins, RINO-Maine. On REP's 0-100 scorecard, Rep. Shays scored 103 for promoting policies that are responsible for today's record energy prices and much more. Out of the other side of...

WASHINGTON - The Senate began what is expected to be a weeklong, contentious debate Monday over legislation to combat global warming by mandatory reductions in carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. Senators voted 74-14 to proceed to the bill, but immediately it became clear Republican opponents were not going to make it easy. A request by Democrats to begin considering substantive changes in the bill was blocked by GOP opponents until Wednesday at the earliest. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada promised a thorough debate that will probably last through the week, if not longer. He said it's clear...

If there indeed is a second Great Depression to come, this will be the government measure that guarantees it arrives with a devastating gut punch. The U.S. Senate returns to session this week and will take up something deceptively labeled "America's Climate Security Act of 2008." It's a bill designed to combat man-made global warming. But anybody with a brain should be able to understand that the only thing this bill would "secure" would be our national demise. Not only is it one of those sadly classic bureaucratic "solutions" in search of a problem, it is a sad exercise...

Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of illegal immigrants are expected to join supporters in a four-mile march through downtown Seattle at the height of rush hour today, proclaiming they're not illegal or undocumented — but workers. And at the same time, many more are expected to stay away, fearful of drawing the attention of immigration authorities or frustrated by the failure of Congress to fix the immigration system even as raids and deportations continue. "Two years ago, there was legislation in Congress and a tangible reason to turn out," said Louis DeSipio, an expert on Latino politics and associate professor of political...

Ideologies: Once in a while the truth accidentally tumbles out on global warming activists' real agenda. That's exactly what happened at the U.N., when Bolivia's leader called for ending capitalism to save the planet. Delivering the keynote address at the United Nations forum on Indigenous People on Monday, Bolivia's President Evo Morales told the adoring crowd that "if we want to save our planet earth, to save life, to save mankind, we have a duty to put an end to the capitalist system."Morales elaborated on that by calling for an end to "unbridled industrial development, extraction of natural resources, excessive...

The more important issue than Senator Obama’s choice of words, is the world view underneath them. By using voter’s adverse economic circumstances to rationalize his cultural beliefs, Barack Obama has reintroduced what has been a defining question in American politics for more than generation: Why do so many working-class voters cast their ballots on social and values-based issues like gun ownership, abortion and same-sex marriage rather than on economic policy prescriptions?These voters — known as “the silent majority” in the 1970s, “Reagan Democrats” in the ’80s, and as “values voters” during the last two election cycles — have long been...

There is revolution going on in waste management, which Big Brother would be proud of. Tucked away under the rim of wheelie bins found in two Sydney councils are small radio frequency tracking devices collecting information on a household's waste habits. Randwick Mayor Bruce Notley-Smith told The World Today they are the way of the future. "We will be able to find out the weights of the various bins and collect the data, the entire amount, as opposed to the quantity that is recyclable," he said. The garbage truck reads the data on the bin, weighs the bin, and the...

Cultural MarxismBy Linda Kimball There are two misconceptions held by many Americans.  The first is that communism ceased to be a threat when the Soviet Union imploded.  The second is that the New Left of the Sixties collapsed and disappeared as well.  "The Sixties are dead," wrote columnist George Will ("Slamming the Doors," Newsweek, Mar. 25, 1991) Because the New Left lacked cohesion it fell apart as a political movement.  However, its revolutionaries reorganized themselves into a multitude of single issue groups.  Thus we now have for example, radical feminists, black extremists, anti-war ‘peace' activists, animal rights groups, radical environmentalists,...

A Gannett New Jersey study finds the number of government employees with two or more public jobs that paid more than $100,000 together swelled by 20 percent last year. Those multiple job holders had a collective salary of $107.8 million. My colleague James W. Prado Roberts reports there were 6,271 multiple job holders including one woman who had 12 jobs. Sen. Stephen Sweeney asks "Is it really right for part-time workers to be in the pension system?" Does the question really have to be asked? To take a look at the double-dippers click here.... http://php.app.com/NJpublicemployees/results2.php

The City of Long Beach is advertising for planning consultants to carry out their plans. Will they be hired if there is some danger that the consultant will say "We have studied the situation carefully and we believe the city should not impose zoning restrictions on property owners and their uses of the land. Nor do we believe that eminent domain is justified." Would such a consultant be considered or hired?...

DAKAR (Reuters) - African nations should follow Venezuela's lead and nationalize their energy and mining sectors to secure the resources to fight poverty, Venezuela's deputy foreign minister for Africa said on Friday. Reinaldo Bolivar, on a visit to Senegal, said his oil-rich South American nation would host a summit of African and South American nations in November to discuss cooperation ranging from energy to banking between the two regions. African nations, which produce 15 percent of the world's oil, could learn from aspects of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's nine-year-old leftist revolution, Bolivar said. "Africa's oil is plundered by multinationals: they...

Have evangelicals abandoned the Religious Right for a more moderate center? Some say yes. ... Mr. McLaren says global poverty, destruction of the environment and increasing violence in the world must be addressed and calls for the church to "change its framing story" and to start trying to change public opinion in these areas. He launched a tour called "Everything Must Change" and is currently traveling throughout the country rallying support. ... Well-known liberal evangelical Jim Wallis called evangelicals the swing voters in '08. Not everybody agrees with his statement, but political analysts do a note a shift. Some religious...

Taking the advice of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's top planning appointee, a Valley Village woman has sued the city over a new rule that allows developers to build taller, bulkier buildings if they include affordable units. Last month, city Planning Commission President Jane Ellison Usher sent an e-mail to community groups, criticizing the recently adopted density bonus ordinance and laying out a legal strategy to challenge it. On Thursday, homeowner Sandy Hubbard filed the first lawsuit using Usher's suggestions. A group of home and business owners is also considering a lawsuit. Usher and community groups have complained that the density bonus...

South Africa’s deputy security minister has told police how to tackle rampant crime in their cities: “kill the bastards”, and do not worry about regulations. “You must kill the bastards if they threaten you or the community,” Susan Shabangu, told a local police forum in Pretoria. “I want to assure the police station commissioners and policemen and women that they have permission to kill these criminals. “You must not worry about the regulations. That is my responsibility. Your responsibility is to serve and protect,” she added. “I won’t tolerate any pathetic excuses for you not being able to deal with...

Editor’s note: Workers World is in its 50th year of publication. Throughout the year, we will share with our readers some of the paper’s content over the past half century. Below are reprints from two articles in 1968—the first one is on the police riot at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago and the second one is on the repression against students in Mexico, days before the Olympics where held there.

An invitation to a "diversity workshop" sent to Sandia Labs employees last week by labs management has drawn complaints because of its suggestion that white people are inherently racist. "Recent studies suggest whites' lack of awareness about other cultures has to do with whites' commitment to maintaining higher social status, or 'white privilege,' '' the invitation said. It also said whites "are likely to persist in racist behaviors unless persuaded to abolish the privileges they receive as members of the white race." Sandia staff received a dozen calls from employees upset about the wording, labs spokesman Michael Padilla said. He...

Hillary Clinton’s campaign says the candidate will stop telling the story of an uninsured pregnant woman who lost the baby and died after being denied medical care, following a hospital raising questions over its accuracy. Clinton has frequently told the emotional story of the woman from rural Ohio since late February. In the speech, Clinton said the woman made minimum wage working at a local pizza restaurant, without insurance, when she became pregnant. Clinton said the woman ran into trouble, went to a hospital in a nearby county but was denied treatment because she couldn’t afford a $100 payment. In...

Colleges' final frontier: mixed-gender housing Jason Carmignani hung out with his roommate, Yael Bassal, at Clark University. "We're both pretty mellow," he said. (Dominic Chavez/Globe Staff) Email|Print|Single Page| Text size – + By Peter Schworm Globe Staff / April 2, 2008 In the Woodstock era, the advent of coed dorms caused a stir, with Life magazine proclaiming the development "an intimate revolution on campus." Coed floors came along over the next two decades, giving college students immediate proximity to each other. The next step, coed suites and bathrooms, brought the sexes even closer together. Now, some colleges are crossing the...

<p>McDonald's has signed on to a nationwide effort to promote "gay" and "lesbian" business ventures.</p> <p>According to McDonald’s CEO Jim Skinner, McDonald’s will aggressively promote the homosexual agenda. In remarks on McDonald's Web site concerning the company becoming a member of the National Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce (NGLCC), Skinner wrote: "Being a socially responsible organization is a fundamental part of who we are. We have an obligation to use our size and resources to make a difference in the world … and we do."</p>

  Red, White & Black? by Paul R. Hollrah On March 23, 2007, a reception was held at the Tamiment Library at New York University. The occasion was the official opening of the archives of the Communist Party USA. The keynote speaker was Gerald Horne, noted Communist and contributing editor of the Communist Party journal, Political Affairs.  In his speech, Horne spoke glowingly of an African-American poet, Frank Marshall Davis, of Chicago, who moved to Honolulu at the height of the anti-communist fervor of the late 1940s. According to Horne, Davis was “certainly in the orbit of the Communist Party...

March 31, 2008 ALBANY - The scandal-scarred State Police is suspected of harboring a renegade unit that for years has secretly compiled personal information on top New York officials - possibly including Gov. Paterson, The Post has learned. The governor got a whiff of the existence of such an illegal, politically directed operation after being told by several lawmakers that the State Police targeted them for unjustified traffic stops and "interfered in their personal lives," a senior Paterson aide told The Post yesterday. The explosive information - supplied to Paterson by both Democrats and Republicans - suggests that the Dirty...

Freep. Here is where it stands now.

In checking my emails tonight, I had a message from my friend, the mole, with this package of photos taken of Code Pink's madams during their recent streetwalking activities in our nation's capital. I thought I'd share them with you, and invite your creative captions, insults, photoshopping, etc.Have fun! Gael Murphy, Desiree Farooz (Condi Rice's stalker), Tighe Barry Medea Benjamin in bed with the media. Chased off by the War Funkers, Medea and her girls look for a streetcorner to call their own. Fashion disaster, Tighe Barry, Code Pink set designer.

Bicyclists were twice as likely as drivers to be at fault in the nearly 2,000 collisions that killed or severely injured Bay Area bike riders in the past decade, an analysis by The Chronicle shows. Bicycle and safety advocates say the deaths two weeks ago of two cyclists hit by a Santa Clara sheriff's deputy's cruiser should serve as a call to improve relations between cars and bikes on the roadways.The advocates say large numbers of cyclists fail to follow the rules of the road, running stop signs and red lights, and drivers are becoming more aggressive. "There is a...