Free Republic

...Buried within the federal register are thousands of new rules which will require American employers to spend more time complying with federal regulations and less time running their business and providing for their families. The Federal Register 2.0 project exposes the alarming growth of the regulatory regime by allowing taxpayers a closer look at the bureaucratic process. One of the most innovative parts of the Register 2.0 project is its ability to give taxpayers a real-time view of the regulatory regime. Just yesterday, 12 new rules have been implemented, 11 have been proposed, and 108 notices have been sent, totaling...

Never-ending pasta bowls and Cheddar Bay biscuits are on their way to the Middle East. Orlando-based Darden Restaurants on Tuesday revealed plans to open Red Lobsters, Olive Gardens and LongHorn Steakhouses in seven Middle Eastern countries. It will be Darden's first foray into international territory other than in Canada, where Darden operates some restaurants, and Japan, where a separate company runs 25 Red Lobsters. Darden has an agreement with Americana Group, which will develop at least 60 restaurants in Bahrain, Egypt, Kuwait, Lebanon, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates during the next five years. The first should open...

The sight of a severed snake's head under his broccoli made Jack Pendleton lose interest in dessert. Pendleton said he found the head, the size of the end of his thumb, while eating Sunday at the T.G.I. Friday's in Clifton Park. The chain restaurant said it regrets the appetite-killing error. Pendleton said he has no plans to sue. Pendleton said he ordered vegetables instead of fries with his chicken sandwich. When he started to eat his broccoli, he saw something gray on the plate he at first thought was a mushroom. "I start to turn it over. I see this...

Here are a few more details about Obama's plan, which had Joseph Farah scratching his head. First is Obama's quote. "We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded." Now, since I've never heard anyone inside or out of government use the phrase "civilian national security force" before, I was more than a little curious about what he has in mind. . . . What does it mean? If we're going to...

A big red-headed guy in a pickup pulling a fishing boat stopped in front of Barack Obama headquarters here — loaded for bear, as they say. Land Tawney, a fifth-generation Montanan with a gap-toothed smile, was wearing a plaid shirt and a camouflage cap atop his head. He belongs to Sportsmen for Obama, which sounds like Facebook Users for McCain, or Linguists for Bush. I asked him whether fellow members of the hook-and-bullet community are concerned about Obama’s race, or the depictions of him as un-American. Montana, after all, has a black population of less than one-half of one percent....

Rome, 14 Feb.(AKI) - Association of Moroccan Women in Italy president, Souad Sbai, claims that some Muslim women in the north of Italy are being kept chained up in their homes. "In northern Italy, there are women that live chained at home, from the kitchen to the bathroom, without being able to open the door," said the leader of the women's group. "In the North,[of Italy] there are 4 and 5 year old girls that wear the [Islamic] veil in the summer, and in the winter. This is the culture of male chauvinists, of fundamentalists - and nobody is shocked,"...

Late payments on U.S. home equity lines of credit rose to a 5-1/2 year high in the second quarter of 2007 but delinquencies on many other types of consumer loans fell, the American Bankers Association said Wednesday. In its quarterly report on consumer borrowing, the bankers group said delinquencies in repaying home equity lines of credit rose to 0.77 percent in the April-June period. That compared to a rate of 0.60 percent in the first quarter and represented the highest rate since the fourth quarter of 2001 when the rate was 0.81 percent. However, the rate of closed-end home equity...

Talking about harming the president will land you in jail. But on Oct. 27, for the price of a movie ticket, you can see what would happen if someone killed President Bush in “Death of a President.” The movie will open locally at Kendall Square Cinema in Cambridge and Embassy Cinema in Waltham, both owned by Landmark Theatres. It’s also set to screen at Cinema 95 in Salisbury and Entertainment Cinemas in South Dennis and Springfield. Most of the nation’s largest cinema companies, however, won’t touch the controversial film. Boston film critics got their first glimpse of the fictional “documentary”...

Britons freed from chains in mullah's 'drug cure' prison By Isambard Wilkinson in Haripur (Filed: 06/10/2006) A Pakistani cleric has been arrested for running a private jail to which he lured dozens of drug addicts from Britain by offering a spiritual cure in return for money. Treatment: Maulana Ilyas Qadri In a raid this week, police found 113 people, aged between 12 and 50, bound in chains and shackled together at a madrassa, or religious school, in a remote village in northern Pakistan. At least seven were British nationals of Pakistani origin. Many prisoners, whose relatives consigned them to the...

CAMP PENDLETON ---- The Marine Corps on Thursday defended the treatment of seven Marines and a Navy corpsman being held in the base brig as investigators probe the alleged killing of an Iraqi civilian on April 26. The men from the Camp Pendleton's 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment's Kilo Company are being investigated by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service for the alleged kidnapping and slaying of 52-year-old Hashim Ibrahim Awad al-Zobaie. Family members of the servicemen have told the media that they are being held in solitary confinement. A base spokesman disputed that characterization Thursday, saying none of the eight...

A GROUP of animal liberation activists have chained themselves to an Ipswich abattoir in protest against the slaughter of cattle. Eleven activists from Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne snuck into the Churchill Abattoir in Ipswich, west of Brisbane, at about 4am (AEST) today and chained themselves up to prevent this morning's slaughter. Animal liberation campaigner Noah Hannibal said from inside the abattoir four of the activists had chained themselves up on the killing room floor and seven more were chained to equipment in the loading shoot where the animals were stung. The workers arrived at the abattoir to begin slaughtering the...

Mullah sought after boys flee school in chains By Massoud Ansari in Karachi (Filed: 05/02/2006) Pakistani police have issued an arrest warrant for a mullah at one of the country's Islamic schools after two young pupils claimed to have been beaten up and kept in chains for failing to memorise Koranic scripture. Mohammad Ammar, eight, and Ahsan Mawia, 10, were found crawling through the streets in shackles in the dead of night after fleeing in terror from a strict school in Karachi. The pair were in a "hysterical state" and showed "visible sign of torture", according to police who examined...

Taking a cue from King Louis XIV of France, three Britons are proposing a ban on sharp, pointed kitchen knives. In a British Medical Journal article, the three hospital workers suggest banning pointed kitchen knives. They note that in 1669, to reduce violent crimes committed with knives, Louis passed a law demanding that the tips of all table and street knives be ground smooth. In the United Kingdom, where citizens do not have the right to own, much less carry, firearms, violent crime is increasing. For example, figures from London show a 17.9 percent increase in violent crime from 2003...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Supreme Court, brushing aside warnings by two justices that it was jeopardizing courthouse safety, ruled Monday it is unconstitutional to force capital murder defendants to appear before juries in chains and shackles. Justices threw out the sentence of Carman Deck, who was shackled in leg irons and handcuffed to a chain around his belly when he faced a Missouri jury that put him on death row. Carman Deck as he appeared at his double murder trial in Jefferson County in 1996.

Las Vegas law prohibiting strippers from fondling customers during lap dances is unconstitutionally vague, a judge ruled....Friday's ruling affects only dancers within city limits. The Clark County Commission in 2002 limited touching between strippers and patrons during private lap dances, specifically barring strippers from touching or sitting on the customer's genital area. But the municipal code was not as specific, saying only that strippers and their patrons should not "fondle" or "caress" each other.

<p>At first glance, the switch seems counterintuitive. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, is vowing to close down some California public prisons after allowing as many as 33,000 nonviolent parole violators to enter treatment programs rather than go to jail. His predecessor, Gray Davis, took $2.6 million in campaign contributions from the prison guards union and was usually against granting parole.</p>

<p>Iowa State University student leaders voted 21-9 Wednesday to grant funds to a student organization that teaches about bondage and other sexual fetishes.</p> <p>The Government of the Student Body gave $94 to the group, called Cuffs. Leaders of Cuffs said they requested the money to promote the group and try to increase attendance at its meetings.</p>