Free Republic

The Hill set out to test Henry Kissinger’s maxim, "Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac," by investigating whether "Democrats, newly empowered, now have an edge on Republicans when it comes to dating prowess" and concludes that "Romantic opportunities have increased for Democrats": As one Democratic campaign strategist remarked, "Taking back the majority certainly has its perks. With the shift in power has come a shift in social standing for once-shunned Democratic operatives. It seems everyone from lowly interns to nerdy policy wonks have a full dance card so long as they have a ‘D’ behind their name."The strategist added that...

In the first-ever, nationwide survey of Muslim Americans, the Pew Research Center suggests that 26 percent of the 2.35 million Muslims in the U.S. believe there are circumstances in which suicide bombings are acceptable.Nearly half (47 percent) think of themselves as Muslim first, American second. Among those under the age of 30, 13 percent believe suicide bombings to defend their religion are sometimes justified; 11 percent say this tactic is rarely justified; two percent say it can often be justified.The Pew Research Center interviewed 1,050 randomly selected Muslim American adults aged 18 and older, from Jan. 24 through April 30,...

Hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants tramping through fragile ecosystems and wildlife refuges discarding hundreds of thousands of tons of trash have caused incalculable environmental damage in Arizona’s Sonoran desert and the Rio Grande Valley. Yet, for reasons ranging from fear of alienating lefty donors to concerns over cutting off animal migration routes, environmentalists are opposed to border control measures.The Associated Press reports that environmentalists who have acquired and preserved 90,000 riverfront acres of Texas scrub and forest in the Rio Grande Valley over the past 30 years object to Department of Homeland Security’s plans to erect 70 miles of...

Washington Post staff writers Peter Baker and John Solomon put their speed-reading skills to use and burned through two eagerly-anticipated biographies of Hillary Rodham Clinton that they got their hands on just yesterday: Carl Bernstein’s 640-page, "A Woman in Charge: The Life of Hillary Rodham Clinton," and the 416-page, "Her Way: The Hopes and Ambitions of Hillary Rodham Clinton," by New York Times investigative reporters Jeff Gerth and Don Van Natta Jr.Here’s the Baker and Solomon take on the two tomes: Two new books on Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York offer fresh and often critical portraits of the...

In an amusing article posted on Townhall.com, Amanda Carpenter details “liberal campaign follies you might have missed because you were watching [John Edwards’] “I Feel Pretty” YouTube [video] for the 100th time”:† Barack Obama, who “traveled to Detroit, Michigan to chastise auto industry officials for not producing as many hybrid vehicles as he’d like” drives his family around in a “V8 Hemi-powered Chrysler 300C that gets about 25 miles per gallon."† Hillary Clinton “supports burdensome campaign finance reform legislation” but she “forgot” to disclose her roles as treasurer and secretary her husband’s multi-million dollar charity, the Clinton Global Initiative on...

Three months after his felony conviction on perjury and obstruction of justice charges, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, 56, former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, has been sentenced to 2.5 years in prison and fined $250,000. Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald asked U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton to impose a sentence of 30 to 37 months, on the grounds that Libby had lied about his role in leaking the identity of former CIA staffer Valerie Plame and impeded a serious investigation, and has not expressed remorse. Libby's lawyers argued for leniency, considering that no one was ever charged...

Boston Herald columnist Margery Eagan was in NH Sunday covering the Dem debate, watching the action on two huge screens. When Hillary Clinton’s greatly magnified face appeared on the screen, it was obvious she had undergone a dramatic transformation: The instant Hillary appears, the woman behind me whispers, "Oh look at Hillary. She’s had work done!" I put the question to WBZ’s political guru Jon Keller: Notice anything about Hillary? "Botox," he replied, not missing a beat. …Hillary’s new glow was all the talk on "The View." This was when we needed Rosie O’Donnell to cut to the chase and...

The Stiletto worked her Hollywood sources, and learned the nature of the mysterious malady that got Paris Hilton sprung from jail after less than a week."Paris was born with anencephaly," explains a confidante of the Hilton family. "She wasn’t continually talking on her cell phone. She was listening to a pre-recorded message that prompted her to ‘Breathe in … breathe out. … Breathe in … breathe out.’" Since cell phones are banned in prison Paris kept forgetting to breathe, according to the knowledgeable source, and developed life-threatening hypoxia as a result.Editorial Note: If President Bush has no intention of pardoning...

International man of mystery and Hudson Institute fellow Richard Miniter visits the island of Akhtamar in Lake Van, Turkey, to see the newly restored Church of the Holy Cross - one of the holiest sites for Armenian Christians - for himself at the opening ceremonies: Our story starts with a small sandstone 10th-century Armenian church, on an uninhabited rock less than 500 yards wide, in a remote Turkish lake that changes colors like moods and sometimes bubbles like soda. If you had seen the ruins of it, as I did in 2000, you might cry. Its roof was gone. Its...

At a Town Hall meeting in Des Moines, IA, on June 1st, John McCain was asked about his views on torture, and he repeated just about word-for-word what he said in the second Republican debate (video link): Every retired and active duty military officer that I know says we shouldn't torture people. General Colin Powell, all of these others who have had the responsibility of leadership because they fear that if we torture people what happens to their soldiers when they are captured. We don't want that to happen to men and women serving in the military. The Stiletto has...

In a private meeting in the papal palace at the Vatican, Pope Benedict XVI told President Bush that he was concerned Christians in Iraq were being "mistreated by the Muslim majority."The New York Times reports that after the meeting, the president told reporters: "He did express deep concerns about the Christians inside Iraq, that he was concerned that the society that was evolving would not tolerate the Christian religion. And I assured him we’re working hard to make sure that people lived up to the Constitution, the modern Constitution voted on by the people that would honor people from different...

Imams and religious scholars interpret the Koran and the teachings of Muhammad to issue fatwas that guide the faithful on matters of Sharia law. The New York Times reports that in Egypt, there is growing concern that "too many fatwas are being issued, and that many of them rely on ideology more than learning. … government-appointed arbiters of Islamic standards say the fatwa free-for-all has led to the promotion of extremism and intolerance." Case in point: The breast-feeding fatwa.About a month ago, religious scholar Izat Atiyah issued a fatwa that unmarried men and women can be together at work only...

According to The Washington Post fatherhood means never having to say, "I don’t know."In what is surely an odd homage to fathers - published during the one week-end of the year children give them tokens of gratitude for not going out for a drive and never coming back, gambling away the grocery money, or making the entire family go without toilet paper – the WaPo follows Boston-based writer Doug Hardy and his son, Andrei, 12, as they traipse through the National Air and Space Museum.Andrei asks his father what the disks on a heat shield are made of; dear old...

James Taranto spotlights a piece about an EastWest Institute conference from the New York Sun in Friday’s edition of his "Best of the Web Today" column (curiously, he did not include this item in a new feature he calls "Wannabe Pundits" - but this is a whole ‘nother story that’s long and convoluted and has an expanding cast of characters, so The Stiletto must leave it for later). In a recent post, The Stiletto suggested that Taranto has been somewhat remiss in making disclosures ethical journalists typically make when they have a particular interest or stake in something they are...

Los Angeles Daily News columnist and Political Mavens Fellow Bridget Johnson saddened and shocked The Stiletto with her report that Arat Dink, son of Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, who was slain in cold blood by Turkish nationalists in January, is being charged with "insulting Turkishness" under Turkey’s notorious Article 301: [W]hen Dink prophesized in that last column that additional injustices would arise, he could have been speaking not only of his cold-blooded killing but of the trials that would follow.First, it was revealed that hearings for his alleged assailants will be closed to the press, and journalists won't even be...

It’s been eight months since President Bush authorized the CIA to resume using "enhanced interrogation techniques" on terrorism suspects, but the intelligence agency is loathe to use any of the methods it proposed to the administration until the White House signs off on them in an executive order, reports The Washington Post.Last summer, the Supreme Court ruled that all U.S. detainees are covered by the Geneva Conventions. Under Common Article 3 of the Military Commissions Act, Bush must certify that the CIA’s interrogation methods to not involve "outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment." Complicating matters, the...

Michael Moore's "Sicko," a polemical rant on universal healthcare falsely advertised as a documentary, is causing Dem presidential hopefuls nothing but headaches and heartburn, reports the Los Angeles Times: [U]nlike Al Gore's film on global warming, which helped rally support on an equally controversial problem, "Sicko" is creating an awkward situation for the leading Democratic presidential candidates.Rejecting Moore's prescription on healthcare could alienate liberal activists, who will play a big role in choosing the party's next standard-bearer. However, his proposal — wiping out private health insurance and replacing it with a massive federal program — could be political poison with...

An annual accounting of Prince Charles’s households - printed on recycled paper in vegetable-based ink – finds that he has cut his annual carbon emissions by nine percent, to 3,775 tons, between April 1, 2006 and March 31 of this year. He achieved this historical feat by cutting back on helicopter jaunts and converting his Jag and Landie to run on used cooking oil, reports The Associated Press. The prince offset the other 91 percent of emissions created by his households - the Highgrove estate in western England, Clarence House in London and Birkhall in Scotland - by investing $60,000,...

By now you’ve heard about – or read – The Boston Globe profile of Mitt Romney that highlighted his crisis management acumen by recounting a 1983 car trip from Boston to Ontario, during which the quick-thinking future presidential candidate pulled into a gas station to hose off his station wagon and the family dog (riding in a kennel fitted with a makeshift windscreen that was strapped to the roof of the vehicle) after the poor pooch had an attack of the runs.Of course, PETA howled in protest at Romney’s "animal cruelty." And some columnists had fun at Romney’s expense. In...

In a classic application of bottom-up management denizens of small towns let their elected representatives in Washington D.C. know exactly how they expected them to handle the compromised immigration compromise bill that neither secured our borders, nor was any more enforceable than previous legislation it was meant to "fix."Earlier waves of immigrants – legal and illegal – flocked to CA, , FL, IL, NJ, NY and TX ("gateway" states) but have been dispersing across a wider swath of the U.S. since 2000. The foreign-born, non-English speaking populations of DE, GA, IN, NE, NV and SC have exploded, say demographers, with...