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The Boys On The Tracks Book Excerpt: A new look at the 1987 deaths of two Sal County Teens. Arkansas Writers' Project, Inc. By Mara Leveritt November 29, 1999SourceMara Leveritt StatementWhat Readers Can Do By all accounts, the engineer did a masterful job of bringing his train to a stop. It had taken a screaming, screeching half mile. By the time the engine shuddered to a standstill, Conductor Jerry Tomlin was on the radio notifying an approaching train on a parallel track to stop because some boys had been run over. He also called the dispatcher. "Have you got injuries?"...

The original mega-thread: CIA Fires Officer For Leaking Classified Information to Media I think this is as big as rathergate.   Dana Priest's Pulitzer has just turned to dust. Not only that,  the Pulitzer's are finally dust themselves...it is up to us and others to find out, because  the Drive-By Media will ignore the story. Let's Play Connect the Dots Let’s connect some dots in the Mary McCarthy CIA leak tale, shall we? (Hat tip: WordWarp).Mary McCarthy leaks the secret CIA prisons story to Dana Priest, in what may have been a sting operation.Mary McCarthy and Joe Wilson served at the...

1 Best Free Web Browser Internet Explorer is a good browser but it has become such a target for malicious exploits that it is now a major security risk. Quite separately, the browser itself is now looking dated with most alternative products offering tabbed browsing and other productivity enhancements. There are several excellent alternatives but Mozilla Firefox is the stand-out pick. It's safer than Internet Explorer, so safe in fact that many users have reported no spyware infections since they started using the product. It's also browses faster than Internet Explorer and since the release of version 1.0, it's stable...

The debate over homosexual "marriage" often becomes focused on whether homosexuality is a learned behavior or a genetic trait. Many homosexual activists insist that "science" has shown that homosexuality is inborn, cannot be changed, and that therefore they should have the "right to marry" each other. Beginning in the early 1990s, activists began arguing that scientific research has proven that homosexuality has a genetic or hormonal cause. A handful of studies, none of them replicated and all exposed as methodologically unsound or misrepresented, have linked sexual orientation to everything from differences in portions of the brain,1,2 to genes,3 finger length,4...

Most people reading this have strong stomachs, so let me lay it out as baldly as I can: Much of what we loosely call the western world will survive this century, and much of it will effectively disappear within our lifetimes, including many if not most western European countries. There’ll probably still be a geographical area on the map marked as Italy or the Netherlands— probably—just as in Istanbul there’s still a building called St. Sophia’s Cathedral. But it’s not a cathedral; it’s merely a designation for a piece of real estate. Likewise, Italy and the Netherlands will merely be...

Bipartisan congressional negotiators squelch independent counsel's findings Though it has had scant attention from the mainstream media, a bipartisan effort to squelch an independent counsel's final report on Clinton-era abuse of the Internal Revenue Service and Justice Department has gotten the attention of Web activists and commentators, causing a growing call for the release of the document that is said to including damning evidence against the 42nd president and his administration. Over 10 years ago, independent counsel David Barrett was charged with investigating former Clinton Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Henry Cisneros in relation to his lying to the...

The foreign policy of the Democratic Party verges on deliberate defeatism: afraid of American "dominance" in the world, many Democrats would prefer that America tie wars than win them. Because they would like to see America put in its place -- this isn't an overstatement; just listen to the Democrats' constant complaints about America's lone "superpower" status -- their contribution to the war effort is defined by deep ambivalence. They don't necessarily want their country to lose, but they are not so sure if they want it to win either. They often define this ambivalence as "patriotism": we're henpecking and...

Wilsongate: Motive, Means, and Opportunity The Buried Story Behind PlamegateBy Fedora Introduction Since Robert Novak mentioned Valerie Plame’s CIA background in July 2003, the media has focused on trying to trace the leak of Plame’s name to the White House, but has devoted less follow-up to another newsworthy angle in Novak’s original story. Novak wrote: The CIA's decision to send retired diplomat Joseph C. Wilson to Africa in February 2002 to investigate possible Iraqi purchases of uranium was made routinely at a low level without Director George Tenet's knowledge. . . Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife,...

CHENEY FIGHTS BACK Wed Nov 16 2005 18:56:46 ET Excerpts As Prepared For Delivery Tonight by Vice President Cheney THE VICE PRESIDENT: "As most of you know, I have spent a lot of years in public service, and first came to work in Washington, D.C. back in the late 1960s. I know what it’s like to operate in a highly charged political environment, in which the players on all sides of an issue feel passionately and speak forcefully. In such an environment people sometimes lose their cool, and yet in Washington you can ordinarily rely on some basic measure of...

Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Bill Tierney, a former military intelligence officer and Arabic speaker who worked at Guantanamo Bay in 2002 and as a counter-infiltration operator in Baghdad in 2004. He was also an inspector (1996-1998) for the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) for overseeing the elimination of weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles in Iraq. He worked on the most intrusive inspections during this period and either participated in or planned inspections that led to four of the seventeen resolutions against Iraq. FP: Mr. Tierney, welcome to Frontpage Interview. Tierney: Thanks for the opportunity. FP: With the...

New Orleans Levee Failure Analysis - Part V Contents Introduction and Basic Levee Construction, Section and Elevation Details Section 1. Pre-Landfall Flooding in Kenner and Western Metairie of East Jefferson Parish Section 2. Analysis of the 17th Street and London Canal Breaches and Post Katrina Flood Sequence in Downtown New Orleans Section 3. Surge Sequence for the Industrial Canal Basin, Analysis of the Five Major Breaches and east Orleans Parish Flooding Section 4. Flood Sequence for St. Bernard Parish and the Lower Ninth Ward, MRGO Reach Failure Analysis Section 5. Contributory Causality, Political and Funding Issues Leading to Levee Failures...

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1050959/posts What they're saying about "Onward Muslim Soldiers" - An expose of militant Islam.JihadWatch ^ The FREEPERS Guide To Islamic Terror Websites - CYBERTERRORISM (And It's Sponsors)     http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1052371/posts Palestinian Children Say the Deadliest Things FrontPageMagazine.com ^ | 1/06/04 | Itamar Marcus and Barbara Crook, Jerusalem Post     http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1051593/posts The Myth of Mecca (oldie but goodie)pol usa ^ | 9/27/2001 | By Jack Wheeler     http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1051529/posts ISLAM IN AMERICA, PART 1 WorldNet Daily.com ^ | 1-3-04 | Sherrie Gossett     http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1049887/posts Palestinian Authority Sermons 2000-2003(Barf Alert; CODE RED)Memri ^ | December 26, 2003 No.24 | By:...

What Wilson Didn’t Say About AfricaJoseph Wilson's Silent PartnersBy Fedora with help from a few FReeper friends Former ambassador Joseph Wilson has been a leading spokesman for critics who accuse President Bush of basing his case for war against Iraq on forged documents purporting that Iraq attempted to buy uranium from Niger. Wilson’s charge has been discredited by a Senate investigation,1 but what remains unanswered are questions arising from what is now known about French intelligence’s role in pushing the forged documents on British and US intelligence. The role of France and Wilson in undermining Bush’s case for war looks...

The chain of events that gave rise to a grand jury investigation FOR TWO YEARS, THE political class in Washington has followed with intense interest the story of Joseph Wilson and the events that led to the compromising of his wife's identity and undercover status as a CIA operative. The rest of the country seems to have responded with a collective yawn. That will soon change if special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald issues indictments of senior White House aides in his investigation of the alleged leaking of Mrs. Wilson's name.The narrative constructed to date by the mainstream media is uncomplicated: The...

This is part four of a five part series examining the Hurricane Katrina levee failures. Part 1 is a timeline sequence of who reported what flood events, to whom, and when it was reported. It can be found here: Part I: Hurricane Katrina Flood Report Sequence Part 2 is a discussion of the levee system's viability, or lack thereof, prior to Hurricane Katrina. It can be found here: Part II: Pre-Katrina Levee Assessment Part 3 is a discussion of the overall storm surge sequence, levee failure modes, and causal limitations relating to the 17th Street Canal and London Canal seawall...

The near total evacuation of the major American port city of New Orleans, Louisiana was accomplished between Tuesday afternoon, August 30 and Friday afternoon, September 2, 2005. This evacuation occurred while other search, rescue, relief and evacuation operations were simultaneously being conducted throughout the Gulf Coast between approximately Lafayette, Louisiana, on the west and the Florida panhandle on the east -– an area of about 90,000 sq. miles, or the size of the entire nation of Great Britain. I'd say this amazing achievement is the opposite of slow. I'd say that it's a stunning accomplishment and one that demonstrates superb...

1) Why Didn't Louisiana Follow it's Emergency Plan? Why isn't anyone talking about this? 2) Why hasn't anyone mentioned that a Pre-Requisite for a Federal Response BY LAW is that State Law is Executed and the Emergency Plan is Executed FIRST? 3) Why did the Governor abandon the City of New Orleans for the Safety of Baton Rouge, before the Plan was Executed? 4) Why, when the federal Government was acting in accordance with the Stafford Act, did the State of Louisiana, by its Governors acts, delay making requests when being told this storm was going to hit? 5) Why...

Okay fellow FReeper Researchers! I love doing research here on FreeRepublic. But I am always in search of new Research sites. So… Here are some of the sites I use when I am researching. What are your favorite research sites? Black Book Online: Bankruptcies, reverse look-ups, phone directories, real estate, businesses, death records, criminal records, sex offenders, state records, federal records, non-profits, aviation, vessels. Global Environmental Policy Research Tools: General information on using the internet for environmental research (including other collections of web resources), International governmental collaboration (treaties, international organizations, ...), Nongovernmental organizations, Information on National Governments (sorted by region), ...

  Get Off His BackBy Ben Stein Published 9/2/2005 11:59:59 PM A few truths, for those who have ears and eyes and care to know the truth: 1.) The hurricane that hit New Orleans and Mississippi and Alabama was an astonishing tragedy. The suffering and loss of life and peace of mind of the residents of those areas is acutely horrifying. 2.) George Bush did not cause the hurricane. Hurricanes have been happening for eons. George Bush did not create them or unleash this one. 3.) George Bush did not make this one worse than others. There have been far...

Countering the commonly held notion that Americans who don’t have health insurance can’t afford it, the Census Bureau reports that nearly one-third of those without insurance live in households with an annual income of $50,000 or more. About 16 million Americans in $50,000-plus households – more than 13 percent of the total – lack insurance, as do 8 million earning more than $75,000 a year. The number of uninsured people in $75,000-plus households actually went up by 114 percent over a recent 9-year period, while those in households with incomes under $25,000 fell by 17 percent. The new Census Bureau...