Free Republic

Alaska Airlines, America's seventh-largest carrier in terms of passenger traffic, said on Wednesday that it would end a decades-old tradition of handing out prayer cards with its in-flight meals. The prayer cards, which the Seattle-based airline began offering in the 1970s after an executive spotted them on another airline, were intended to serve as a marketing strategy and to put passengers at ease, a spokeswoman said. The airline sent an e-mail to its frequent flyers on Wednesday explaining the change, which takes effect February 1.

Waiting on Perry to take podium any moment! He will endorse Newt!

The United States was still a young nation when three major earthquakes rocked the central Mississippi River valley in the winter of 1811-1812. Chimneys fell, the earth heaved and church bells rang hundreds of miles away, set off by the powerful vibrations from what is now called the New Madrid Seismic Zone. As farmland rolled and shuddered, the shock waves spread as far as New York and the Carolinas. Now on the 200th anniversary of those devastating quakes, some seismologists are warning that the region should be on guard because of the risk that another "Big One" could strike the...

Mid-East Prophecy Update - December 11th 2011 Pastor JD's latest. Part 2 of 2. Topic: The rise of Islam, and the role of Islam, as it relates to the future of Islam which suggests, at best, that Islam plays a most prominent role, and at worst, Islam plays a dominant role in the Anti-Christ's one world religion.

After the news of Herman Cain, it appears to me that conservatives are lost. How can you abandoned a man on allegations yet flock over to support someone who has a history of doing worse. It reminds me of when Jesus was being betrayed by his own people instead they wanted the guy that use to rape their women an steal from them to go free.. America, you deserve what you get in 2012. You are constantly being played like sheep to a slaughter. We can now proceed with the plans for the New World Order for the next century...

(podcast ... a must listen) Was the collapse of MF Global an accident or the calculated move of a political insider? Ann passionately lays the whole scheme bare, explaining the massive implications this has for our legal and financial systems, not to mention how investors should prepare in the face of massive corruption.

FXstreet.com (Barcelona) - S&P rating agency has just downgraded 37 global banks. Goldman, BofA, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley, BNY Mellon are amongst the cuts based on a new methodology. Japanese and UK banks cut or outlook lowered as well.

THE first thing I would do if I was the benevolent dictator of planet Earth would be to fire all politicians — who are basically university lecturers in positions of power. They might be able to quote the existential philosophers but that doesn't mean they know how to run businesses. Countries are businesses — they have imports and exports and you want your exports to be higher than your imports so you can have a profit. You want to make sure that whatever money you give out to your population is money that you can afford to send out. Countries...

UPDATE - Nov. 9: The Associated Press is reporting that Joe Paterno has decided to retire at the end of the season. As the amount of alleged victims in the Jerry Sandusky case climbs rapidly, reports are emerging that Penn State head coach Joe Paterno's coaching career will soon come to an end. Official support for Paterno is reportedly "eroding," even as Nittany Lion fans rally in support of the longtime coach. The New York Times reported Tuesday that Paterno's 46 years as Nittany Lion head coach "will soon be over, perhaps within days or weeks." According to two sources...

The Best Places To Stay After The Zombie Apocalypse Andrew Shen Oct. 20, 2011, 9:00 PM Image: Wikimedia Commons The 2011 Zombie Safe House Competition has begun. When the zombie apocalypse happens, where will you live? See some of this year's new ideas for how to survive. Humans can go to the water, underground, above ground, or just fight back. We've gathered some of our favorite proposals here. Voting for the best safe house ends today.(Click to the site to see the choices)

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Someday, cultural historians will look back on the early 21st century and speculate about what killed the credibility of America’s so-called liberal-media elite. They will ask, Were the wounds self-inflicted or the product of a methodical plot? Make no mistake about it. We did this to ourselves. As a card-carrying member of the leftist media near-elite — alas, I’m not nearly rich or famous enough to be regarded as a 100% elitist — it pains me to see my brethren sinking like the sun in the west. But we have nobody to blame but ourselves. We’ve...

Breitbart: I Have E-Mails Showing Organized Plan For #OccupyWallStreet Protests To Destabilize Government On Fox Business, Andrew Breitbart breaks the news that Big Government has obtained and will release e-mails that prove the organized plan behind the "Occupy Wall Street" protests.

WASHINGTON – Maj. Walter Reed's sword was symbolically handed over to the Navy at a ceremony Wednesday marking the closure of the Army hospital bearing his name, where hundreds of thousands of the nation's war wounded have been treated for more than a century. The tone was somber at times, but mostly celebratory, as more than a thousand former and current staff members and patients — some of them wounded troops from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars in wheelchairs who have lost limbs —gathered under a white tent to say goodbye to the Army's flagship hospital. The Army band played,...

The new NBC/Wall Street Journal poll on the debt ceiling crisis reinforces points made in the new issue of National Affairs in two important articles, the first by AEI Vice President Henry Olsen, and the second by Weekly Standard writer Jay Cost. What the poll reveals, as NBC’s Deputy Political Director Mark Murray writes, is that “Strong majorities of Democrats and independents prefer that Democratic congressional leaders make compromises in this budget debate, while almost 70 percent of independents want Republican leaders to do the same.” For me the key phrase in Murray’s comment refers to the desire of independents....

Glenn Beck later this year will end his Fox News Channel talk show, which has sunk in the ratings and has suffered from an advertiser boycott.

Large crowds gathered at Porky's in St. Paul Friday, a few days before the decades-old restaurant closes its doors. Nora Truelson and her late husband opened Porky's in 1953, establishing it as the St. Paul gathering place on Saturday nights. Truelson declined to speak on camera, but her son told 5 EYEWITNESS News light rail construction along University Avenue was a factor in the decision to close. The Truelsons say they are selling their property to their next door neighbor, Episcopal Homes. The restaurant is scheduled to close Sunday; everything at Porky's will be auctioned off Monday. The Preservation Alliance...

Reporting from Las Vegas and Los Angeles — The Sahara hotel-casino, a Rat Pack-era jewel of the Las Vegas Strip that age and a prolonged recession had tarnished, will close in May, owner SBE Entertainment announced Friday morning. Chief Executive Sam Nazarian, the Los Angeles nightclub impresario who purchased the Moroccan-themed casino in 2007 and vowed to restore its hipness, said in a statement that running the property was "no longer economically viable."

The Libyan leader has lost all three pillars of his rule - tribal, military and diplomatic. Judging from his desperate speech last night, he seems to be losing his mind and perhaps his nerves. That's why it's only a question of time for his regime to breakdown. For the last four decades, Gaddafi has based the stability of his rule on a careful balancing act among more than 100 tribes and clans, especially the 30 influential among them, that pride themselves on playing an important role in freeing Libya from colonialism. Gaddafi has used bribes when possible, blackmail and scare...

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Kennedys have held congressional seats, the presidency and the public's imagination for more than 60 years. That era ends when Patrick Kennedy of Rhode Island vacates his U.S. House seat next month, leaving a City Council post in California as Camelot's sole remaining political holding.

Departing Republican-turned-Democratic Sen. Arlen Specter on Tuesday said conservative Republicans who backed Tea Party challengers against establishment candidates in the recent elections engaged in political cannibalism. In his final floor speech, Specter complained there's scant room for centrists like himself in a polarized Senate where civility is in short supply. "In some quarters, compromise has become a dirty word," said Pennsylvania's longest-serving senator, who lost his re-election bid after three decades in the Senate. Specter complained that some GOP senators had helped Tea Party challengers beat incumbent Republicans like Utah Sen. Bob Bennett and Rep. Mike Castle in his Delaware...