Free Republic

Question: Was it immoral to drop atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki? Yesterday, August 6th, the world commemorated the 75th anniversary of America dropping an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, thus commencing the “atomic age.” Seventy-five years later, the debate still rages on whether it was immoral for President Truman to authorize the use of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and then a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki three days later. I believe that President Truman made the right decision, the moral decision and one that stands moral scrutiny and the test of history. To properly evaluate the decision to...

Michael Moore Replaces Christmas Angel With Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg 3:50 PM 12/23/2018 | US Virginia Kruta | Associate Editor Documentary filmmaker Michael Moore responded to news that Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg had been ailing by giving her the place of honor on his Christmas tree. News broke late last week that Ginsburg, who had only recently recovered from three broken ribs, was recuperating after surgery to remove cancerous nodules on her lungs. (RELATED: Justice Ginsburg Told Audience Her Health Was ‘Fine’ Days Before Cancer Operation) Moore shared photos of his tree with a Ginsburg doll...

It was on this date in 1945 that, for good or ill, the "nuclear age" began, with the explosion of the first experimental atomic bomb, code-named Trinity, in the western desert near Alamogordo, New Mexico. Trinity, with a yield equivalent to 20 kilotons of TNT, was the first spherical implosion bomb, developed at Los Alamos under the auspices of the Manhattan Project during World War II. The weapon designers were so confident of the success of the simpler gun-barrel configuration that the device of that type dropped on Hiroshima only three weeks later had never been tested. The subsequent Nagasaki...

On the morning of Aug. 6, 1945, shortly after 8:00 a.m. local time, a lone American B-29 was conducting what seemed to be a reconnaissance flight at high altitude over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. At about 16 minutes after 8:00, the aircraft released an object over the centre of town. Attached to parachutes, the object floated down slowly enough to give the four-engine Boeing Superfortress time to turn and lumber out of the airspace. The atom bomb exploded at about 1,900 feet above the centre of Hiroshima. The devastation was cataclysmic. Immediate casualties, dead and injured, numbered approximately 115,000....

Republicans aren’t talking about Chris Christie. The New Jersey governor’s name has been conspicuously omitted during speeches given by key GOP figures during a Republican National Committee meeting in San Diego this week, a GOP official confirmed to The Daily Caller on Thursday. “None of the speeches so far have mentioned Christie,” the source said, noting Christie was kept out of RNC Chairman Reince Priebus’ opening remarks. “In Governor Mary Fallin’s speech last night,” the source went on, “she rattled off a bunch of governors running for president but left Christie out.”

In his new film Birdman, Michael Keaton plays an aging actor living in the shadow of a past superhero role. It would be easy to see this as Keaton’s swan song to Batman, a character he re-invented for the big screen in Tim Burton’s Batman and Batman Returns. But Keaton says that’s not the case. In fact, he’d be willing to play Batman again – under one condition. “If it was Tim Burton directing? In a heartbeat,” Keaton tells Entertainment Weekly in a new cover story.

Today marks one of the United States’ most important – but least celebrated – anniversaries. It is remarkable not only for what happened on this date in 1945 but for what did not happen subsequently. What did happen was that the “Enola Gay,” an American B-29 bomber from the intentionally obscure 509th Composite Group (a U.S. Army Air Force unit tasked with deploying nuclear weapons), dropped “Little Boy,” a uranium-based atomic bomb, on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. That dramatic act hastened the end of World War II, which concluded within a week after the August 9 detonation of “Fat...

VIDEO

Volusia County deputies arrested a 450-pound man after they said they found marijuana hidden under his "stomach fat," according to The Smoking Gun. Christopher Mitchell, 42, was arrested Friday after a drug-sniffing dog alerted deputies during a traffic stop. A search turned up 23 grams of marijuana he had hidden on himself, authorities said, along with cocaine, a handgun and $7,000 in cash.

When a male contact sent me a 14-slide New York Post slideshow of paparazzi beach photos Leonardo DiCaprio under the headline “The Great Fatsby?” I felt a pang of empathy unprecedented in my relations with A-list actors. Poor Leo, of all people: carelessly frolicking in the Bora Bora surf, his hair in a man-bun and a 22-year-old in his arms, without the faintest idea that his body would soon be served up for our evaluation. He was oblivious to his appearance, yes, but even so, his body hardly seemed to qualify as fat. No question mark! “I look like that,”...

The Fahrenheit 9/11 director and political activist filed a complaint against his producer partner, Kathleen Glynn, on June 21. According US news site MLive, Michael, 59, and Kathleen, 55, no longer live together and court papers have say there is 'no reasonable likelihood that the marriage can be preserved'.

Revealed: How the U.S. planned to blow up the MOON with a nuclear bomb to win Cold War bragging rights over Soviet Union - Scientists were hoping for giant flash on the moon that would intimidate the Soviet Union - Aim of mission was to launch the nuke by 1959 - Plan was later scrapped due to possible danger to people on Earth It may sound like a plot straight out of a science fiction novel, but a U.S. mission to blow up the moon with a nuke was very real in the 1950s. At the height of the space...

when you're talking about Glenn Beck now he actually, the other day, called you a progressive on FOX Business channel. What do you say to that sort of claim?" Gingrich: "I don't know. It depends on what standard you're using, you know? The fact is I balanced the budget for four consecutive years. And we did so by cutting taxes and increasing employment so people went back to work, they left welfare, they left food stamps, they left unemployment, they left Medicaid. Who else has that record of achievement? I worked with Reagan in '79, '80. I worked with Reagan...

A 272kg man accused of stealing food and scamming restaurants has been unable to face his charges in court because he is too sick and fat. George Jolicoeur, 38, remained in a bed in his nursing home while his lawyer pleaded no contest to five petty theft charges in an Orlando court in the US state of Texas, the Palm Beach Post reports. The offences were all committed in 2007, when a more mobile Jolicoeur on five occasions walked into a restaurant or food store and claimed he had been sold substandard food. On each of the occasions, Jolicoeur demanded...

Crews have been trying since early Monday evening to rescue a 500-pound man who suffered a medical emergency on the St. Croix River near Grantsburg, Wis. The man was part of a group that went tubing from Danbury, Wis., said Dean Roland, Burnett County sheriff. One of the tubes went flat about 2.5 miles south of Fox Landing. Danbury is about 107 miles from Minneapolis. The man, believed to be 39 years old, reported chest pains when he called the Pine County, Minn., Sheriff's department at about 8:20 p.m. Pine County then called Burnett County for assistance, Roland said. Authorities...

November, 7th, 2006 5 Good Reasons to Vote Today 1. IT'S A NATIONAL REFERENDUM. Although candidates' names will be on the ballot today, this election is NOT about this candidate or that candidate. Make no mistake about it: This election is nothing less than a National Referendum on George W. Bush and his War. Don't waste your time trying to learn about who the schlump is that's running for office. You know they're all pretty much the same, a few are better than others, but... please. They is who they is. THIS election is not about them. It's a simple...

Those of us who enjoy military history usually just switch on the History Channel for our daily fix of guts, gore and armed conflict. But if you’re a serious war buff, and you want to relive one of the most horrifying moments in the deadliest war in human history, an Italian toy maker has just the thing. Brumm recently unveiled miniature models of “Little Boy” and “Fat Man.” Those names may conjure up images of cuddly cartoon characters, but they’re actually the codenames for two atomic bombs that the U.S. military dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the final days...

The fat man's walk across the United States has taken him from Oceanside to Ohio, and now on a detour to North Hollywood. The reason is simple: He isn't looking the part. Despite losing weight, Steve Vaught still has a prodigious gut. Vaught's walk has attracted worldwide media attention that promises to intensify as he approaches his destination of New York City. His book chronicling his quest to regain control of his life by crossing America on foot is scheduled to be published soon. Which he said means he needs to slim down – and fast. “Visual impact is everything,”...

When Steve Vaught began walking across the United States he had two simple, yet difficult goals. He wanted to lose a lot of weight and he wanted to come to grips with his life. Now slowly approaching Oklahoma City, the geographical halfway point of his journey, Vaught, 40, has lost about 55 pounds from his 6-foot-1-inch frame, down from 400. He also has figured out how to deal with the problems that led to his weight gain and depression and long history of job changes. "I found out who I was before I hit Barstow," he said. "Now I'm just...

In August 1945, two atomic bombs fell on Japan, killing tens of thousands of people instantly. Yet all 24 Australian POWs in Nagasaki - close to ground zero - survived. Patrick Carlyon reports. The August sun hangs like a red balloon. Smoke smudges the sky, as it has since the American planes began dropping bombs. The Japanese expansion had spread like an angry tumour across Asia and the Pacific. Now, after 14 years, the aggressors are losing. An Allied invasion appears certain. In the hills of Nakama, a small Japanese mining town, Australian prisoners-of-war dig pits to store potatoes. They...