Free Republic

With the deluge of threads being posted, and slated to increase greatly as the election heats up, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE .. especially if it's a news/breaking thread ... add the appropriate keywords to your posting form. So, if someone's looking for the latest string of "Obama" or "Sarah Palin" articles, let's say, they just click on that particular keyword at the top of the page, and those articles containing the keyword will come up chronologically. Thank you! Popular keyword options at the top of the main page: ~~~~ *110th *2008 *2008polls *ayers *bailout *barackobama *biden *bo *democrat *democrats *demron *economy...

It's been at least 30 seconds since the last vanity and I was starting to go through VANITY withdrawal symptoms so I decided to take matters into my own hands... I mostly experience twitching and the shakes but now its diarrhea too. Please keep these senseless vanities coming... /s

I see it so often that someone logs onto a thread and proclaims it to be a waste of time that it begs the question: Why log onto the thread at all? Isn't it by definition a waste of time? We saw that a lot on Duncan Hunter threads, now on the certifigate threads. I'm sure there are some religion threads that would qualify. So I offer this thread where Freepers can log on and let other freepers which ones they consider to be a waste of time. Maybe at some point in time we'll have the capability to filter...

Is prayer to saints / Mary Biblical?" The issue of Catholics praying to saints is one that is full of confusion. It is the official position of the Roman Catholic Church that Catholics do not pray TO saints or Mary, but rather that Catholics can ask saints or Mary to pray FOR them. The official position of the Roman Catholic Church is that asking saints for their prayers is no different than asking someone here on earth to pray for you. However, the practice of many Catholics diverges from official Roman Catholic teaching. Many Catholics do in fact pray directly...

SEXY new all-female professional football teams are threatening to steal the spotlight from their NFL counterparts. The hugely popular half-time Lingerie Bowl – which aired during the Superbowl – has created its own women’s league with the stunners taking to the field in saucy underwear as well as pads and helmets. Launching in 2009, the Lingerie Football League (LFL) will comprise 10 franchise teams from Los Angeles, Dallas, Phoenix, Seattle, San Diego, Chicago, Miami, Tampa, Atlanta and New England. And we're sure you won't mind seeing a few of these lovely ladies touch down.

The Obama campaign announced that from now on all media questions must be submitted in writing, in advance. “Too many trick questions are being asked,” said Harvey Sain, deputy media specialist for the Obama campaign. “The Senator’s message is getting lost in the media’s demand for answers to trivial matters. Iraq, Iran, drilling, taxes…these petty concerns should not be allowed to distract voters from our promise of hope and change.” Sain also questioned the motives of reporters asking such questions. “Are they shills for McCain?” Sain asked. “Or are they closet racists? Either way, we’re putting a stop to it....

Republican Sen. John McCain, engaged in increasingly sharp attacks on rival Barack Obama, pledged that if elected president, he would work closely with Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, praising her as an effective leader and an "inspiration to millions of Americans." "I respect Speaker Pelosi. I think she's one of the great American success stories," McCain said during an interview with The Chronicle prior to a fundraiser at the Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco. "We talk about (New York Sen.) Hillary Clinton and her inspiration to millions of Americans. Speaker Pelosi has been an inspiration as well" in a role...

California Democratic Representative Anna Eshoo has introduced legislation to regulate the loudness of TV commercials. The bill, which I promise you is real, is called the Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act, or CALM. Read more about it here. This is the kind of thing where you expect Ashton Kutcher to run onto the house floor in his mesh trucker hat, jumping around and wildly hugging all of the representatives who have been sitting there with their mouths agape since Eshoo introduced this bill and declaring into the CSPAN cameras that we have all been Punk’d.

Presidential contender Senator Barack Obama (D-Ill.), who has faced widespread criticism of his characterization of rural Americans as bitter and racist, says the intensity of the reaction “proves the validity of what I said. The animosity shown toward the first credible Black man to run for president is evidence enough that racism is still the mainstream of rural America.” “I don’t totally blame them for being bitter,” Obama went on. “I’m articulate, clean and charismatic—everything that they’re not. And I’m a millionaire, to boot. It’s got to be hard on these rednecks to see a Black man outshine them by...

Obama: Jimmy Carter under consideration for my Secretary of State (Chicago, Ill) 4/19/08 – In a statement released late Friday, the campaign of Senator Barack Obama (D-Ill) had this to say regarding potential candidates for the Office of Secretary of State: “In beginning the review process for potential administration appointments, one name stands out among the rest for the critical position of Secretary of State. That name is Jimmy Carter. At 83 years old, he has the knowledge, experience, charisma, character and fortitude required to represent the United States to the world, inclusive of our allies and our enemies. His...

Asian women, fancy coffee, farmers markets, dinner parties and gay friends — these are just a sampling of life's pleasures — if you're white. Excuse me? That's according to Christian Lander, the (white) wit behind the Web sensation Stuff White People Like blog, an irreverent daily missive on the passions of posh urbanites of the Caucasian persuasion. It's the latest in a string of racially charged blogs (first came theassimilatednegro.com, then angryasian.com) that act as a virtual shrink's sofa for those tackling the tricky topics of race and class. Lander is not the only one who uses the Web site...

Dialogue effort is largest of its kind By Sandi Dolbee UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER December 16, 2007 SAN DIEGO – In what is being described as the first such effort of its kind, two major Jewish and Muslim groups will launch “serious education programs” in the United States and Canada aimed at bridging a divide formed from centuries of animosity over land, politics and religion. “When we are killing each other in the name of God, sensible religious people have an obligation to do something about it,” Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Union for Reform Judaism, said yesterday to about...

(Kyodo)—Japanese Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura indicated Tuesday that a meeting of chief delegates to six-nation talks on denuclearizing North Korea, which Japan, China, South Korea and others had initially hoped would begin on Thursday, will now likely be delayed. "At first we wanted to have it from Dec. 6-8 and we discussed it at the trilateral (foreign ministerial) meeting between Japan, China and South Korea in Singapore recently," Komura told reporters. "But right now, a difficult situation has developed and I have been told coordination is still under way." He did not elaborate on what the difficulties were. Under an...

Redone short funny video, with a different twist. We all need a little laughter, now and then. Revski o7jimmy

By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer LONDON - President Bush is sending his national security adviser to the Middle East next week to keep up pressure on Israel and the Palestinians to reach agreement on launching formal peace talks, a senior U.S. official said on Thursday. The announcement came as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said she was encouraged by what she had heard from the two sides during four days of intense talks with Israeli and Palestinian officials and civic and business leaders in Jerusalem and Ramallah in the West Bank. But Rice also acknowledged tensions between the two...

...The slump in Las Vegas could last until 2010, even if gamblers and vacationers continue to fuel the city economy, said Patrick Newport, chief U.S. economist at Global Insight, based in Lexington, Massachusetts. Prices have already dropped 5 percent from their peak last year and may fall another 15 percent in the next three years, he said...

Republican Presidential Candidate Debate #7 – Baltimore, Maryland 09/27/07 - Official Discussion Thread All-American Presidential Forum on PBS Morgan State University, Baltimore, Maryland September 27, 2007, 9:00 pm-10:30 pm ET (check your local PBS listings) Moderated by Tavis Smiley. Candidates participating: Sam Brownback Mike Huckabee Duncan Hunter Alan Keyes Ron Paul Tom Tancredo Journalists involved... Ray Suarez is a Washington-based Senior Correspondent who joined The NewsHour in October 1999. Suarez has thirty years of varied experience in the news business. Cynthia Tucker is the editorial page editor of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist whose work appears in...

How heavy is information? Most of us know that computers represent all types of information—e-mails, documents, video clips, Web pages, everything—as streams of binary digits, 1s and 0s. These digits are mathematical entities, but they are also tangible ones: They are embodied and manipulated as voltages in electronic circuits. Therefore, every bit of data must have some mass, albeit minuscule. This prompted DISCOVER to ask the question: How much would all the data sent through the Internet on an average day weigh? In searching for an answer, we scanned technical databases, tore through reference books, Googled like crazy, and checked...

Two days ago, in blogging about the abortion records of the serious GOP Presidential prospects (McCain, Giuliani, Romney), I provoked a great deal of anger by writing off the other current contenders (Huckabee, Brownback, Tancredo, Ron Paul, Gilmore, Thompson, Duncan Hunter) as "lesser" candidates who stand no realistic chance of winning primaries or grabbing the nomination. No matter how much you may admire these people, their candidacies are irrelevant – more a bid for attention, or a preparation for future races, than a realistic bid for power... When, in the last 60 years of Presidential politics, did any obscure underdog...

Address at the National Review Institute You can watch the video  here  The following is the handout given at the speech: As we look to the way forward as conservatives, one fact is paramount:  American conservatism is about vastly more than the presidency.  The history of the modern American conservative movement was written in states and communities and in citizen activism.  Some of the highlights: Howard Jarvis’s Proposition 13 anti-tax revolt in 1978 began in California but incited a nationwide revolt against big government and high taxes. As a candidate for Governor in 1966 Ronald Reagan advocated welfare reform –...

Did anyone else see Hardball today when Chris Matthews got so worked up over the war that he said we aren't going to get into a contest with Iran over who the biggest S*** in the Middle East is and both his guests sort of went white and Matthews just sat there for a few seconds and pretended nothing happened and then tried to blame the Scooter Libby trial for his loss of control?

Cincinnati (FR) - The completely unknown and cordially disliked Free Republic poster "You Dirty Rats" announced today from his PC that he is not a candidate for the Republican nomination for President for 2008. "After carefully consideration of the chances of victory, I have decided against a run for 2008," he said. YDR noted that his negatives were much less than over half of the Representatives and Senators who have either announced a run, considered running or have issued statements that they aren't running. "Lots of people have seen Jimmy Cagney movies, and they might vote for me on that...

JEANNETTE, Pa. (AP) - Meow. A district judge has been asked to decide whether that word is a harmless taunt or grounds for misdemeanor harassment. Jeannette police charged a 14-year-old boy for "meowing" whenever he sees his neighbor, 78-year-old Alexandria Carasia. The boy's family and Carasia do not get along. The boy's mother said the family got rid of their cat after Carasia complained to police that it used her flower garden as a litter box. The boy testified Tuesday that he only meowed at the woman twice. Carasia testified, "Every time he sees me, he meows." The boy's defense...

http://www.google.com 1- Go to www.Google.com 2- Type in the word Failure 3- Look at it the first listing 4- Tell other people before the people at Google Fix it

Investors around the world continue to clamor for shares in online gambling companies – shaking off the news of an indictment against the former chief executive officer of BetOnSports.com, and the passage of a bill in the U.S. House of Representatives that would essentially ban Internet gaming in the U.S. According to Gregory Harris, an analyst for Canaccord Adams, a London-based investment bank, investors are viewing the recent actions in the U.S. by the government as nothing more than election year grandstanding.

Further Property Description: IFB / Sale No.: 1PR-06-05 Property Address: 111 West Huron Ave Buffalo, NY 14202 Type of the Property: COMMERCIAL Property Address: 1 mile WSW of Kent Point, offshore,Chesapeake Bay Kent Point, MD Type of the Property: OTHER Type of the Structure: Offshore lighthouse, structure only Potential Usage: recreational, museum

UNITED NATIONS - The United States and France reached agreement Saturday on a U.N. Security Council resolution aimed at ending the fighting between Israel and Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas, U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said. Bolton refused to comment on the text, but an official with knowledge of the document said the draft calls for a “full cessation of violence” between Israel and Hezbollah, but would allow Israel the right to launch strikes if Hezbollah attacks it.

In the wake of strong news for former Governor Jerry Brown’s campaign for state attorney general in the Field Poll and in fundraising figures, the campaign of his trailing Republican challenger, Fresno state Senator Chuck Poochigian, sent out a volcanic missive. Poochigian chief strategist Ken Khachigian, a former Reagan speechwriter, attacked the Field Poll as pro-Democrat and promised a campaign to expose Brown’s “exceptionally erratic conduct of public affairs” and “bizarre political views.” In a Poochigian campaign statement entitled, “Poll's Snapshot Blurs Brown's Fringe Extremism,” Khachigian claimed “evidence that the Field Poll today is once again skewed in favor of...

Haven't geologists proved from scientific dating methods that the Earth is 4.5 billion years old? Doesn't astronomy prove that the universe must, at least, be billions of years old since it would have required billions of years for light from the nearest stars to reach the Earth? Don't all qualified scientists, including geologists, believe in Darwinian evolution and a billions of years old Earth and universe? The simple answer is "no". Both evolutionists and creationists have certain built-in assumptions in interpreting and using scientific data when it comes to the Earth's age. The issue many times comes down to which...

KEY UN Security Council members agreed informally today on a resolution demanding Iran suspend nuclear enrichment and reprocessing work and threatening to consider sanctions if it refuses. The draft text must first be approved by governments of the five Security Council members with veto power - the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China - as well as Germany, a European negotiator on the Iran controversy. Western countries, which have been haggling with Russia and China on a text over the past two weeks, were optimistic of a deal a week ago only to see the talks drag on. But...

Pence-Hutchison “Compromise” Induces Illegal Aliens to Leave By Letting Them All Stay Plan Compromises the Security of the Middle Class by Putting Business in Charge of Immigration Policy Washington, DC—In a desperate effort to “get something done” on immigration before the end of the congressional session, two normally sober members of Congress have hatched a plan that is vague on details when it comes to securing America’s borders and protecting American workers, while containing specific promises to millions of illegal aliens. The plan offered by Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Tex.) would require that the...

OK, I've got a question for all of you, this is an interesting one. If you weren't your religion, which religion would you be(and Judaism and Christianity are out of the question, I would expect a few to pick Judaism since it is so close to Christianity)? Why? What doctrine is the most important, and what do you think is the most important? I would maybe be a Zen Buddhist, afterall being one means a combination of romanticizing and the military thirst. That is, Jack Kerouac a Republican, supporter of Vietnam, and wrote On The Road as a rather nationalist...

Most of my friends hate Superman. He's too powerful, they say. Too indestructible. Too fast and too strong for his own good. Superman is just too damn super. The problem a lot of people have with Superman is the same problem we have with the modern definition of heroes. Nowadays we overuse the term. This past May, News Statesman magazine ranked Bill Gates as number eight in an article detailing 50 "Heroes of our time," right above the Dalai Lama. I hate to break this to everyone, but Bill Gates is not a hero. In 2000 a man worth nearly...

The mayor of a small Bergen County, New Jersey town is calling for a McDonald's boycott if the fast-food chain does not take down a Spanish-language billboard.... Bogota Mayor Steve Lonegan said the advertisement is "offensive" and "divisive"......"The true things that bind us together as neighbors and community is our belief in the American flag and our common language," Lonegan said. "And when McDonald's sends a different message, that we're going to be different now, that causes resentment." Representatives for McDonald's and CBS Outdoor in New York, the company that owns the billboard on River Road in Bogota, defended the...

Just wanted to you to know FOX National News just annouced a National Breaking Fox News Alert that there was a severe Thunderstorm warning in DC. With all the breaking graphics and sound effects. Ohh, The Nation is now informed and I feel safer. Oh and penny size hell. DOesnt the National Weather Service break in to these local Broadcast anyway -make loud buzzing noises and run alerts and scroll all this stuff on the bottom of the screen anyway.

McFarland campaign fueled by major Clinton backers YONKERS – A review of Kathleen McFarland's campaign reports filed with the Federal Election Commission reveal a very troubling fact for Republicans seeking to defeat Senator Clinton. A clear pattern has emerged whereby donors to Ms. McFarland are also big supporters of Senator Clinton, the DNC and other related leftwing entities. For example, the following McFarland donors also gave money to Sen. Clinton and the DNC: Lionel Pincus donated $4,200 to Ms. McFarland while giving Sen. Clinton $6,000 since 1999. Between 1997-2000, Pincus donated $300,000 to the DNC! Constance Spahn donated $500 to...

FBI Finds the Remains of More Than One Hoffa DETROIT, Michigan — The FBI has revealed that the recent search for the remains of Jimmy Hoffa, long-dead Teamster strongman, was at least a partial success. "We really can’t say if we've found the remains of Mr. Hoffa," reported Steve Barry, FBI spokesman. "We have already recovered the partial remains of over two-hundred and seventy-five individuals," continued Frank Bochte, spokesman for the FBI. "From just a small portion of the site," qualified Frank Scafidi, another FBI spokesman. "We expect that Hoffa's remains …" said Jim Margolin, FBI spokesman, "… may well...

<p>Wednesday, June 07, 2006 WASHINGTON — A constitutional amendment to define marriage as a union between one man and one woman stalled Wednesday in a 49-48 vote, but conservative backers say they are pleased to have had the vote nonetheless.</p>

ALBANY - State GOP Chairman Stephen Minarik, who just knocked William Weld out of the race for governor, will now try to do the same with Republican Senate hopeful Katherine "KT" McFarland, The Post has learned. Minarik, backed by other GOP leaders, will publicly urge McFarland, a Reagan-era Pentagon official, to drop out of the Senate race today "in the interest of party unity," a source familiar with Minarik's thinking said. Minarik will urge GOP voters to rally around former Yonkers Mayor John Spencer, who defeated McFarland, 63 percent to 36 percent, at last week's party nominating convention, as the...

-snip- Robinson explains that before they left the area his team convinced Alaska state authorities to set up nine locations that were not cleaned up, so they could monitor whatever long-term improvements were observed. “For a period of years,” John says, “those locations [that were left alone] were in much better shape than the locations that had been aggressively cleaned up. “The very aggressive way we went about it - I have to fault myself on this, because I’m the one that directed it, turned out to be a much more serious problem than the oil was. We were killing...

An exhaustive two-week search of a Michigan horse farm for the body of influential union boss Jimmy Hoffa has ended without result, the FBI says. Agents tore down a barn and dug up several sites on Hidden Dreams Farm 32km (20 miles) from the restaurant where he was last seen in 1975. They had acted on a tip-off from a convict who lived there at the time. The former leader of the powerful Teamsters union apparently disappeared after meeting a mafia boss. Rumours have persisted that Hoffa was murdered by the mafia to prevent him regaining control of the union....

YONKERS -- In November, New York Republicans need a maximum turnout to defeat Senator Clinton and win down ballot races. That's why a loose cannon like K. T. McFarland at the top of the ticket spells wipe out. K. T. McFarland is running on her resume. But her resume has a Jason Blair quality. It's phony. Her legalistic hair splitting makes Bill Clinton sound like a straight shooter. Read how Human Events found K. T. McFarland inflated her resume to claim she was the highest ranking woman in the Pentagon: "Her campaign evidently has been bragging about her being the...

YONKERS -- The New York Post calls K.T. McFarland ‘kooky.’ How kooky? Well, maybe instead of running for Senator, she’s really auditioning for a Get Smart remake. In March, K.T. accused Senator Clinton of spying on her. The New York Post reported “Republican Senate candidate Kathleen “KT” McFarland (left) is bizarrely claiming that Sen. Hillary Clinton (right) has been spying in her bedroom window and flying helicopters over her house in the Hamptons.” (3/25/06) Then the facts came out; K.T. had hired private detectives – from the same firm the Clinton’s hired to spy on conservatives and Republicans -- to...

Has anyone found any "recent" news on the Noah's Ark Expedition that was supposed to start in Turkey up Mt. Ararat on July 17th? I searched Google and found a lot of sites discussing it back in April and May, but nothing about the expedition status. Anyone else have any news?

The Associated Press reports that New York junior Senator, Hillary Clinton, narrowly escaped injury when the aircraft that she was piloting was forced to make an emergency landing in southern New Jersey because of bad weather. National Transportation Safety Board officials have issued a preliminary determination that pilot error contributed to the accident, and that the Senator was flying the aircraft alone in IFR (instrument flight rating) conditions while only having obtained a VFR (visual flight rating) rating. The absence of a post-crash fire was likely due to insufficient fuel on board. No one on the ground was injured. The...

In Mar 2006 I read Japanese book "ƒXƒNƒŠƒ…�[‰¹‚ª��‚¦‚½ “ŒŽÅŽ–Œ�‚Æ•Ä�î•ñ�H�ì‚Ì�^‘Š" (in English, "The truth of Toshiba COCOM affair and American information manipulation : The noize of Soviet's submarine was gone.") (1993) by Japanese journalist Mikio Haruna �t–¼Š²’j or Washington DC Cheif ƒ�ƒVƒ“ƒgƒ“Žs‹Ç’·, Kyodo News ‹¤“¯’Ê�MŽ� and, soon, I suspect Toshiba Corp killed US Commerce secretary Malcolm Baldrige as Mind-control Terrorism. Nextly, I read 2 other Japanese books, 2ndly, "ƒhƒLƒ…ƒ�ƒ“ƒg“ŒŽÅ‚Ì�ߌ€ ŽŸ‚É‘_‚í‚ê‚é‚Ì‚�‚Ç‚±‚©" (in English, "The tragedy of Toshiba Corp as a documentary : Who is next target of America ?") (Dec 10, 1987) by Japanese Eiji Oshita ‘剺‰pŽ¡ and 3rdly, "“ŒŽÅŽ–Œ�‚Ì�^‘Š" (in English,...

ALBANY, May 10 — There are the children he fathered with a subordinate while he was still married to someone else. Add to that some charges of nepotism. And for good measure, throw in a top aide who pleaded guilty to sodomizing a 15-year-old boy. It is not a soap opera. It is opposition research, the dark political art known to practitioners simply as "oppo." Its subject is John Spencer, the former mayor of Yonkers, who is seeking the Republican nomination to challenge Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton. The research is being rolled out by the campaign of a fellow Republican,...

Indecency bill on faster track- Frist pressing for House version By Brooks Boliek Reuters/The Hollywood Reporter May 3, 2006 WASHINGTON -- Responding to pressure from fundamentalist organizations, Sen. Bill Frist, R-Tenn., is attempting to jump-start legislation that would impose a tenfold increase on fines for indecent broadcasts, congressional and industry sources said. Frist is running a "hotline" on the version of the bill that won approval in the House last year. Hotlining is a procedure that allows the Senate to pass bills that are not expected to be controversial. Once a bill is hotlined, any senator with an objection to...

Hollywood’s 9/11 Propaganda Docudrama Opens A New Box of Demons "United 93" is an odd film by any standard. Filmmaker Paul Greengrass (notable for his terrific 2002 docudrama "Bloody Sunday" about the 1972 British Army massacre of 27 civilians in Northern Ireland) wrote and directed what is a disturbingly prosaic piece of dramatic conjecture about one of the most puzzling events of 9/11. As a fictionalized docudrama, "United 93" punctures all suspension-of-disbelief because of the intrinsic absurdness that the mightiest military power on earth couldn’t scramble a dozen squads of F-16 fighter planes to perform aerial escorts for the "11...