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During each program, “A Muslim Journey to Hope” presents the true stories of people who have had a life-changing experience. Each story is true, and each story is different. Yet they are as different as the lives of each person: Women and men. Young and old. Rich and poor. From many countries in the world. But each story tells how each of these people has found hope. Link is to Testimony #47 at muslimjourneytohope dot com by a man simply identified as “Afshin”. body of comment An Authentic Encounter with Jesus

...He was born in New York City, and raised in a Jewish home. He graduated from the City University of New York with a degree in Psychology. He then earned his master’s degree and his Doctorate in Clinical Psychology at Wayne State University. After a year’s internship in the department of psychiatry at Wayne State University Medical Center, in Detroit, Michigan, he followed that with a year of Post-Doctoral study in the department of child psychiatry at Upstate Medical Center, in Syracuse, New York, where he was later on the Clinical Faculty of the Department of Psychiatry, as well as...

Assemblyman Paul Cook won an unexpected victory in the Assembly Public Safety Committee when his bill to relax restrictions on witness testimony during death penalty trials passed. Assembly Bill 2228 aims to change a current state law that prohibits conditional testimony from use during death penalty trials. Conditional testimony is often used when a witness’ life is in jeopardy or they are unable to attend due to health reasons. Under these circumstances, witnesses provide the court with videotaped testimony. Cook believes that using conditional testimony for capital punishment cases will afford victims, victim’s families, and eyewitnesses, an opportunity to testify...

WASHINGTON, April 9, 2008 – U.S. Rep. Howard L. Berman has a gavel, and he’s not afraid to use it. At the fourth appearance in front of a congressional audience by the United States’ top military commander and envoy to Iraq, Berman, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, cut to the chase. Already, Army Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker had both seen more than 12 hours of combined testimony before the start of their final appearance on Capitol Hill this afternoon. Berman asked for only a summary of their previous testimony so the committee members...

Our inimical lich of a House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was at it again last week, subtly sabotaging our military’s efforts in Iraq, potentially demoralizing and compromising our troops in a transparent election year political ploy. On April 4, Pelosi admonished General David Petraeus not to “put a shine” on developments in Iraq when he and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker testify before Congress this week. Petraeus and Crocker's report will ostensibly illustrate Iraq's political and military progress since their last report to Congress in September. “We have to know the real ground truths of what is happening there, not...

February 16, 2004 - Reported in Spirit Daily.com online newspaper. "In 1992 my life changed dramatically," says Father Donald Calloway. "I had a profound conversion experience after reaching rock bottom."Rock bottom indeed! Now a 31-year-old priest who serves as assistant rector at the National Shrine of the Divine Mercy in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, Father Calloway had been a runaway youngster who was immersed in everything from drug abuse to theft."I had gone through all a boy could do up to the age of twenty," he says. "My mother had been married three times and we had no religion. The family...

As best as I can determine, my same-sex attraction began in reaction to my father, who was a violent alcoholic. He often drank, came home to throw things around the house and abuse my mother in addition to threatening me and my brother. I thought he hated us. Consequently, I didn’t want to be anything like him. In my sorrow, I started looking for the love of my father in thearms of other men. At age 17, a predator took advantage of me under the teacher/pupil dynamic and I became completely mixed up about human sexuality. Over the years, one...

In the midst of inflation, funding difficulties and halted expansion projects, a budget error on the part of the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) may have exacerbated their challenges. "TxDOT does some mysterious accounting," said Rep. Chuck Hopson (D-Jacksonville). "They had close to $1 billion counted in their budget twice." "That was a serious error on our part and we have made changes to try to prevent that type of error from occurring again," said TxDOT Spokesman Chris Lippincott, adding that the amount added twice in their financial statement was unrelated to the $1.2 billion in federal rescissions, which are...

The House Judiciary Committee has filed a lawsuit to compel Josh Bolten and Harriet Miers to testify in the US Attorney firings scandal, now mostly forgotten. The lawsuit sets the stage for a resolution to the executive privilege claim by the Bush administration. It may also provide more closure on executive privilege than either branch of government will want: The House Judiciary Committee filed a lawsuit on Monday seeking to force the White House chief of staff and the former White House counsel to cooperate with the committee’s investigation into the firing of a group of federal prosecutors.The lawsuit, filed...

Texas spirit was alive and well at the Navasota DEIS public hearing on Feb. 28. Opposition groups, such as the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, came from as far as Washington, D.C. to give recorded testimony, and get a first hand look at TxDOT process procedures. Assistant Director of Communications, Leigh Strope, who attended the meeting on behalf of the 34,000 Texas Teamsters Union members, says, “Teamsters want to stop the dangerous trend of selling our roads and bridges to foreign investors so they can slap tolls on the driving public. We are also concerned because the Trans-Texas Corridor would form...

NACOGDOCHES — The rows of extra chairs brought into the The Fredonia's biggest meeting room Thursday night were not enough to accommodate more than 750 people who attended an open house and public hearing on the proposed TTC-69 highway. Texas Department of Transportation officials heard hours of public testimony that continued late into the night overwhelmingly opposed to the construction of new roadways through East Texas. Applause throughout the hours-long meeting never swelled as loudly as it did when the first speaker of the night, state Rep. Wayne Christian, told TxDOT representatives emphatically that "our answer is 'no' on the...

From the author's description: About This Video The audio for this was made by Abraham Juliot. ... (more) Added: December 23, 2007 The audio for this was made by Abraham Juliot. He has other compilations which can be found at the following: Mp3's are here: music.theopenlife.com Abe's personal site: abe.theopenlife.com I found this audio from a link at Slice of Laodicea last night and decided to put this video together. Many of the Paul Washer videos I put up have been uploaded by the webmaster of upp.mypodcast.com, Matt Haney . You should visit his site. There are some great messages...

Reminiscent of the days when soldiers and sailors were spat upon by large segments of anti-war activists in the '60s and early '70s, congressional expectorating was launched in the direction of one Gen. David Petraeus before, during and after his testimony in both the House and Senate.

U.S. Army Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. military commander in Iraq, and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan C. Crocker are briefing Congress this week on their assessment of the security situation in Iraq. Report to Congress on the Situation in Iraq | Slides "The military objectives of the surge are, in large measure, being met. In recent months, in the face of tough enemies and the brutal summer heat of Iraq, Coalition and Iraqi Security Forces have achieved progress in the security arena." Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, Sept. 10, 2007

MIAMI - The defense rested its case Tuesday in the trial of Jose Padilla and two other men charged with supporting terrorism, with Padilla's lawyers calling no witnesses or putting on any evidence. After the defense rested, prosecutors called only one additional witness and then ended their case, earlier than had been anticipated. The actions, coming on day 53 of the trial, clear the way for closing arguments, likely next week. Jurors could begin deliberations next week as well. Padilla, 36, is accused along with Adham Amin Hassoun and Kifah Wael Jayyousi, both 45, of participating in a support network...

Few political families are as affected by their history as Gaullism. Because of the experience of war and the solidarity born of the Resistance, this is understandable. In fact, however, recent generations of Gaullist leaders did not live through these events, and yet nothing has really changed. Nostalgia for the past, the love of epic stories, and the presence in the party of mythical and charismatic speakers are all part of the Gaullist legacy. I remain, sometimes despite myself, deeply affected by this history. I have my favorite memories and it's hard to stop me from bringing them up. One...

Why I Belong, and Why I Believe Clayton M. Christensen Professor, Harvard Business School As I have progressed through my life, my commitment to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has deepened for two reasons. The first is my reason for belonging to the church as an organized institution: because of the way the church is organized, it puts opportunities to help others in my path every day. It facilitates my efforts – and in some instances almost compels me – to practice Christianity, not just believe in it. The second is my reason for believing that the...

N. Korean defectors testify before British opposition party leader By Sohn Suk-joo SEOUL, June 20 (Yonhap) -- Two North Korean defectors Tuesday testified before the British parliament about the life in North Korean gulags, Christian group officials said Wednesday. Having spoken at a meeting of the All-Party British-North Korea Parliamentary Group in the Moses Room of the Houses of Parliament in London, Ahn Myeong-Cheol and Shin Dong-Hyok, both now settled in South Korea, also met with David Cameron, leader of Britain's opposition Conservative Party, they said. The meeting came after Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), the organizer of the event, issued...

You won’t see it on CNN or MSNBC and you probably won’t see it in any major newspaper but she lied and we have it on record.

I grew up attending church at the Lee's Summit First Church of the Nazarene. When I was around 6 or 7 years of age, I went forward during an altar call at a revival service being held, and prayed a prayer, and then got baptised a couple of weeks later. Despite my profession of faith, my life as I grew older did not demonstrate any sort of true repentence unto salvation. All through middle school and high school, I did pretty much the same thing all the other kids did: I lied, I gossiped, I made fun of other kids,...

Karl Rove fathered Anna Nicole Smith’s baby. In an unforgettable night fueled by alcohol, lust, a lion tamer outfit, a failed attempt to freebase "Sweettarts", an Al Franken blow-up doll and some crimes against nature with a very confused puffer fish, Karl fathered her child. I think we should all be ashamed of Mr. Rove (how much is she worth again?). Now, admittedly, there is no crime in having sex with Anna Nicole Smith. If that were illegal most of the Western Hemisphere’s male population would be perp walked into a future of Federal incarceration that includes forced labor, strained...

In 2004, John Kerry said that he wouldn't let his faith affect his decision making. Does it affect yours? Yes, it does. I do believe in the separation of church and state. But I don't think separation of church and state means you have to be free from your faith. My faith informs everything I think and do. It's part of my value system. And to suggest that I can somehow separate and divorce that from the rest of me is not possible. I would not, under any circumstances, try to impose my personal faith and belief on the rest...

WASHINGTON - Democrats are moving to compel some of the eight U.S. attorneys who have been ousted to tell their stories publicly, under oath, after a federal prosecutor claimed he was fired for political reasons. A House subcommittee is slated to vote Thursday on subpoenas for four of the eight dismissed U.S. attorneys. The Senate Judiciary Committee, meanwhile, will send letters to those fired before voting next week on compelling their testimony, according to officials with both panels. The prosecutors have privately told both committees that they would not testify voluntarily but would honor a congressional subpoena, according to Sen....

Chairman Biden, Ranking Member Lugar, and members of the committee: Thank you for allowing me to testify. This is an extraordinarily important series of hearings on a topic of enormous national importance. The United States finds itself in a global struggle with the forces of Islamic fascism and their dictatorial allies. From a fanatic American near Chicago who attempted to buy hand grenades to launch a personal Jihad in a Christmas mall, to 18 Canadians arrested for terrorist plots, to the Scotland Yard disruption of a plot in Britain to destroy ten civilian airliners in one day that if successful...

Two San Francisco Chronicle reporters will avoid jail time after a criminal defense lawyer pleaded guilty Wednesday to leaking them secret grand jury documents from the BALCO steroids investigation. Troy Ellerman admitted allowing reporters Lance Williams and Mark Fainaru-Wada to view transcripts of the grand jury testimony of baseball stars Barry Bonds, Jason Giambi, Gary Sheffield and sprinter Tim Montgomery, according to court documents. The Chronicle published stories in 2004 that reported Giambi and Montgomery admitted taking steroids while Bonds and Sheffield testified that they didn't knowingly take performance enhancing drugs. A federal judge ordered the reporters jailed after they...

A summary of testimony from witnesses in the obstruction and perjury trial of former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby: PROSECUTION: MARC GROSSMAN: A former undersecretary of state, Grossman said he told Libby on June 11 or 12, 2003, that Valerie Plame, the wife of a prominent war critic, worked at the CIA. Under cross-examination, Grossman acknowledged some inconsistencies in his statements, such as whether the conversations were face-to-face or over the phone. ROBERT GRENIER: The former No. 3 official at the CIA testified that he told Libby about Plame on June 11, 2003. He originally told investigators he...

WASHINGTON - NBC newsman Tim Russert testified Wednesday he never discussed a CIA operative with vice presidential aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, contradicting Libby's version to a grand jury in the CIA leak investigation. The testimony came as prosecutors prepared to rest their perjury case against Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff. Russert, the host of "Meet the Press," testified about a July 2003 phone call in which Libby complained about a colleague's coverage. Libby has said that, at the end of the call, Russert brought up war critic Joseph Wilson and mentioned that Wilson's wife worked for...

Testimony links firm to Jefferson probe In papers filed with the FBI, Suleiman YahYah, a Nigerian businessman listed as a target in the ongoing probe of Rep. William Jefferson, D-New Orleans, said that one of the 2004 meetings he attended with Jefferson and iGate Inc. CEO Vernon Jackson, occurred in the Washington offices of Worldspace Inc., an international satellite radio provider. YahYah's statement is the first to provide any kind of link between iGate and Worldspace, whose CEO, Noah Samara, said in a June filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that he turned over documents and gave testimony to...

Already under siege by American environmental regulators and financial-market investigators, BP PLC faces a new inquisitor today: Congress. In the first of as many as two Capitol Hill appearances in coming days, U.S. operations chief Bob Malone and other BP officials face a public grilling from politicians just ahead of U.S. midterm elections. The House Energy and Commerce Committee will hear testimony from experts and BP officials on corrosion problems at BP's Alaska oil field. The London company partially shuttered the field last month after discovering corroded pipes. The hearing comes amid a series of embarrassing regulatory, criminal and civil...

LOS ANGELES Attorneys who failed to get kingpins of the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang acquitted on charges of murder, conspiracy and racketeering are trying a novel approach to save their clients from possible death sentences. The defense for Barry "The Baron" Mills and Tyler "The Hulk" Bingham have filed motions with a federal judge arguing that the government must present live witnesses during their clients' sentencing phase or nothing at all. The argument is based on the 2004 U.S. Supreme Court decision Crawford v. Washington, in which the high court found that defendants have the right to confront witnesses whose...

As much as 17 percent of the grand jury testimony that led to the criminal indictment of Mayor Ron Gonzales, his top aide and Norcal Waste Systems should remain under seal because it could prejudice potential jurors or be inadmissible at trial, lawyers for the defendants say. Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge James Emerson was set to hear the lawyers' request to keep portions of the testimony secret Thursday. While lawyers for Gonzales and his aide, Joe Guerra, submitted an identical list of transcript sections they want sealed that amounts to about seven full pages, Norcal's attorneys asked that...

BUFFALO, Aug. 1 — ....“This has been the most significant F.B.I. criminal investigation in western New York in the past 20 years,” said Laurie Bennett, special agent in charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s office here. “I say that because of the widespread violence and the significant and devastating economic loss to the community.” ...Witnesses in the first days of the trial described threats against themselves and their relatives, slashed tires, vandalism at construction sites ... ...On Thursday, Goran Stevanovich, who was a nonunion worker at an asbestos-removal project in the spring of 1997, described how Local 91 pickets...

Testimony, not Biographyhttp://scoutoath.tripod.com/id17.html By Hans Zeiger I once went to a car race where most of the cars were marked with the names and logos of their sponsors and drivers. Only one car stood out. This one was a sprint car, and it carried a simple message on the side: “Jesus is Lord.” As I watched the racers zoom around the track, I reflected on the difference between that car and all the rest. The race is now but a flash of memory – the dust settled, the fans went home, perhaps the prize money was spent – but that...

SAN DIEGO - Narcotics syndicates operating along the southern border are a threat to the security of the United States, and not enough is being done to close the nation's borders to would-be terrorists, government witnesses told U.S. congressional leaders Wednesday. The House Subcommittee on International Terrorism and Non-proliferation held the first of several field hearings on border security and terrorism at the Imperial Beach Border Patrol Station in San Diego. During testimony, law enforcement agents, researchers and federal officials said they lack the funding, manpower and technology to fully secure the nation's northern and southern borders. "Drug cartels, smuggling...

...I was formerly known as Iraqi Fedayeen Major General, Ali Ibrahim Al-Tikriti. I was one of Saddam's chief Generals dealing with his secret nuclear, chemical, and biological programs... After the Gulf War our weapons programs were driven deep underground to avoid international inspections. We composed an idea of using salvaged parts from Tamuz in the early 90's as well as research we still had filed to begin construction of a simulation reactor. One of the most critical components was the gas centrifuges. After numerous attempts to acquire specially designed high strength aluminum tubes for these centrifuges we were finally successfully...

HOUSTON - After exchanging some parting shots with his prosecutor, Kenneth Lay finished six days of testimony at his federal fraud and conspiracy trial Tuesday by professing love for Enron Corp., the company he founded, and the people who worked there. "I loved Enron very much," Lay said in a brief response to the final question from his lawyer, George Secrest. "And I loved Enron's employees very much. I spent half my professional life running Enron. I think we built a great company. We changed energy markets around the world. "I think the most painful thing in my life was...

Moussaoui Judge Warns Againt Prejudicial Testimony Monday, April 10, 2006 ALEXANDRIA, Va. — The grandfather of the youngest victim of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, testifying at Zacarias Moussaoui's sentencing trial Monday, described watching on television as the plane carrying his son and granddaughter hit the World Trade Center. C. Lee Hanson said that his son, Peter, was calling from the phone. "As we were talking he said, very softly, 'Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God!' " The 73-year-old Hanson was describing the moment before he watched the plane become the second to hit the Twin Towers...

The disciplinary arm of the N.C. State Bar dropped charges of felonious misconduct against two former Union County prosecutors Friday because of a 1999 clerical error at the state Supreme Court. The State Bar had charged Kenneth Honeycutt and Scott Brewer with lying, cheating and withholding evidence in a 1996 death penalty case. The ruling Friday marks the second time that Honeycutt and Brewer won on procedural grounds before the bar's Disciplinary Hearing Commission, which sits as judge and jury in disciplinary cases. . . . Prosecutors around the state are concerned that the case is damaging their reputation and...

In the grand scheme of things, Gov. Kathleen Blanco’s confusion and mendacity in her testimony to the U.S. House’s committee investigating the Hurricane Katrina disaster will serve the state poorly in its quest for federal help to rebuild. In some parts of her testimony, Blanco seemed confused. Before she made a statement about how she “would not be here today if the levees had not failed,” she said, “What happened to us this year can only be described as a catastrophe of Biblical proportions.” But those kinds of calamities to which she refers were visited upon certain persons and peoples...

Her testimony will be live on the Internet at www.katrina.house.gov according to Shreveport Times.

Bob Woodward 'fesses up to a grand juryabout Valerie Plame... (click here to see it reeeeeeeally large)

Jack Abramoff was frogmarched into Railroad City, nationally humiliated in front of his daughter, and has been the target of a left-wing media vendetta, for one and one reason only: to use him to try and get Tom DeLay. The Democrats and the their media buddies could care less about Abramoff. That he was close to DeLay is all that matters. So they harped on and ramped up scandals about him – over a dozen front page stories in the WaPo alone – until they had the fascist egos of prosecutors sufficiently lathered up. [. . .] There is not...

 (click here to see it reeeeeeeally large)  here is a link to the news article thread, posted by FReeper Interesting Times: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1459552/posts  

Recent news reports and commentary have suggested that top White House adviser Karl Rove might be under investigation for perjury in the Plamegate affair. But sources familiar with the probe say the most frequently cited evidence for such speculation — an apparent inconsistency between Rove's and Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper's accounts of a July 11, 2003, telephone conversation — falls far short of being the basis for any prosecution, much less a perjury charge. Two days ago, in a front-page story headlined "Testimony By Rove And Libby Examined; Leak Prosecutor Seeks Discrepancies," the Washington Post reported that Plamegate special...

“Top Cheney Aide Among Sources in C.I.A. Story” is the headline the Associated Press chose for its article on now-famous journalist Matthew Cooper’s first-hand account of his testimony before the grand jury investing the leak of Valerie Plame’s identity. But the real story is that Karl Rove has been further vindicated. Though the ultimate arbiter of any legal issues will be special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald and the aforementioned grand jury, the political case against Bush’s right-hand man is quickly crumbling. Cooper’s story—on Time’s new cover—confirms that Rove was not “shopping” for an outlet to “out” Plame, but that he was...

WASHINGTON -- Accuracy in Media (AIM) editor Cliff Kincaid said today that journalists who sign an on-line petition in support of jailed New York Times reporter Judith Miller have compromised their objectivity on this story and should be disqualified from writing about the case. "The campaign in support of Miller represents a blatant conflict of interest by members of the press," said Kincaid. "The signers of the petition are not only taking a stand that undermines their status as news professionals but they are endorsing defiance of the law in the name of the First Amendment." The hundreds of signers...

Conservative radio talk show host Michael Reagan is a man with a mission. In his new book Twice Adopted, Reagan recounts his path through a painful and confused childhood to becoming a man of faith – a history he thinks can speak to many. Reagan was adopted into a life of privilege shortly after his birth. This good fortune imposed a high cost on the young Reagan, however, including years spent at boarding schools, the divorce of his parents (“where two adults take everything that matters to a child, smash it up, leave it in ruins on the floor, then...

James Robinson, President Free Republic, LLC PO Box 9771 Fresno, CA 93794 www.freerepublic.com June 3, 2005 Mr. Brad C. Deutsch Assistant General Counsel Federal Election Commission 999 E Street, N.W. Washington, DC 20463 Re:      Draft Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on Internet Communications Dear Mr. Deutsch: Please accept these comments on the proposed rules for FEC regulations of Internet Communications (11 CFR Parts 100, 110 and 114) pursuant to Notice 2005-10. Please note that we are requesting to give public testimony at the hearing scheduled June 28-29, 2005. FreeRepublic.com is an internet based electronic bulletin board owned by Free Republic, LLC, in Fresno, California....

A Los Alamos whistleblower scheduled to testify before congress later this month is now in the hospital, according to news reports. Auditor Tommy Hook was brutally beaten by three or four anonymous assailants who allegedly ordered him to keep quiet. On Saturday night, Hook went to a Santa Fe bar ostensibly to meet a person claiming to be a fellow Los Alamos whistleblower that called that night. When the person did not show, Hook left the bar after consuming two drinks. Whistleblowing auditor Tommy Hook before and after the beating. (CBS News photos) In the parking lot, he was yanked...

Top 10 Reasons Adoptees Should Openly Share Their Pro-life/Adoption Testimonies1. Adoptees are a beautiful living example of Life after Crisis pregnancy, not death. 2. It is honoring to God, to Birth Parents and to Adoptive Parents to hear an adoptee’s gratitude for Life/Adoption. ( One of the 10 Commandments exhorts us to honor our fathers and mothers. ) 3. A Positive Adoption story shared is a gracious approach to advocating for Life and adoption. This is a winsome alternative to opposing abortion. Carrying protest signs with photos of dead babies can be a turn off that often antagonizes and may...