Free Republic

George Orwell's classic dystopian novel 1984 opens with a surveillance helicopter chopping its blades menacingly through London, peeking inside apartment buildings. The protagonist, a conscience-stricken state worker with no way to blow the whistle, goes home to a "telescreen" watching and reporting his every word, move and even mood. The totalitarian state apparatus of Orwell's bleak vision was patterned after the world's Communist parties. But many of today's 21st-century Democrat and Republican politicians see no problem with the kind of permanent police dragnet envisioned in the novel. While Orwell's homeland of the United Kingdom is still the most-surveilled on Earth,...

MONTGOMERY - Keg parties at fraternities and many other places would be outlawed under a bill passed 30-0 Tuesday by the state Senate. If the bill becomes law, people could drink draft beer only at a bar, restaurant, private club or other retail establishment licensed for beer sales by the state Alcoholic Beverage Control Board, said Sen. Bobby Singleton, D-Greensboro, the bill's sponsor. People could not buy a keg and take it elsewhere to drink. Singleton said he proposed the bill in an effort to stop teenagers from drinking beer. Donna Alexander, a lobbyist for the Alabama Wholesale Beer Association,...