Free Republic

Last Thursday’s GOP presidential debate was a doozy. Some of the commercials weren’t bad, either. My favorite was the ad from the National Popular Vote movement, promoting legislation in the 50 states to guarantee that the people, not the electoral college, choose our president. Mind you, I’ve always found it kind of fallacious to worry that our current system elevates popular-vote losers to the presidency: that’s because popular votes cast in a state-by-state contest for 270 electoral votes do not reflect the national will. Rather, they reflect the results of a competition in which candidates tailor their messages and deploy...

WhiteHat Security said Wednesday that it had found an issue in how Safari's AutoFill feature handles personal information, which could open up the personal information of a web surfer simply by visiting a malicious website.Using a few lines of code, the hacker would be able to obtain the information without the user even knowing it occurred. The "Using info from my Address Book card" option would need to be checked in AutoFill preferences in order for the hack to work.There is one positive: AutoFill does not work with fields starting with numbers, meaning street addresses and phone numbers would not...

Defenders of Innocent Infants: Click on the "Hialeah Homicide" petition link above. View the petition and please leave your comments how we should defend this from happening again. In Hialeah, Florida, July 20, 2006 at 2:30 pm, an 18 year old girl walked into A Gyn Diagnostics Center, 3671 W. 16th Ave, with the intention of aborting her baby. The 18 year old mother then delivered a baby girl who was alive and breathing. Clinic worker, Belkis Gonzalez cut the umbilical cord of the baby, stuffed her into a bio-hazard bag, and removed every moment of love or life the...

If there's one thing Donovan Riley apparently learned during his time in Chicago, it was "Vote early and often." Riley, 69, the former CEO of the University of Illinois Medical Center and a former law professor at Loyola University, is running for a state senate seat in Milwaukee. On Nov. 7, 2000, the day of the big election between Vice President Al Gore and Texas Gov. George W. Bush, Riley appeared at the polling place in Oconomowac, Wis., where he had registered to vote just the day before, voting records show. His ex-wife owned a home there. "Then he drove...

SARASOTA -- A circuit judge on Tuesday lowered the bail for a man accused of swerving his car toward U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris as she campaigned on a sidewalk a few days before her re-election in November. Circuit Judge Andrew Owens lowered the bail for 46-year-old Sarasota resident Barry Seltzer from $500,000 to $25,000. Seltzer's father had paid the bail with a $500,000 cashier's check, allowing Seltzer to stay out of jail while awaiting trial. His father will get his money back, minus the $25,000, attorneys said Tuesday. Seltzer, a Democrat, is accused of swerving his Cadillac at Harris, a...

Anti-American attitudes are a daily fact of life in Great White NorthBy NORA JACOBSON I moved to Canada after the 2000 election. Although I did it mainly for career reasons — I got a job whose description read as though it had been written precisely for my rather quirky background and interests — at the time I found it gratifying to joke that I was leaving the United States because of George W. Bush. It felt fine to think of myself as someone who was actually going to make good on the standard election-year threat to leave the country. Also,...

Crawford mayor is Kerry supporter BY GROMER JEFFERS JR. The Dallas Morning News (KRT) - Crawford may be the heart of Bush country, but the town's mayor says John Kerry is the best choice for president. "I don't see where I'm better off than I was four years ago," Robert Campbell said Tuesday. "I don't see where the city is any better off." The Kerry campaign recently listed Campbell as one of 100 black mayors around the country - seven of them Texans - who support the Massachusetts senator over President Bush. But the campaign has not focused particular attention...

In 1997’s “Batman And Robin,” a maniacal Mr. Freeze (Arnold Schwarzenegger) runs around with an ice-emitting blaster gun turning Gotham into the North Pole, while he grunts: “Stop Global Warming! Start Global Freezing!”   There may actually be more science in the last installment of the Caped Crusader saga than in “The Day After Tomorrow,” which premiered on May 28th.   The $200-million Summer blockbuster features super-tornadoes smashing LA, hail stones the size of Toyotas falling in Tokyo, waves that wash an oil tanker up Fifth Avenue in New York, and a blizzard that turns Manhattan into Mt. Everest.  ...

A Really Open Election By CLIVE THOMPSON Published: May 30, 2004 This fall, as many as 20 percent of American voters will be able to cast their ballots on A.T.M.-style electronic voting machines. But to put it mildly, these machines -- where you simply touch a screen and a computer registers your vote -- have not inspired much confidence lately. North Carolina officials recently learned that a software glitch destroyed 436 e-ballots in early voting for the 2002 general election. In a Florida state election this past January, 134 votes apparently weren't recorded -- and this was in a...

Today: April 22, 2004 at 19:16:15 PDT Shirts Sport French Insults to PresidentBy MELANTHIA MITCHELLASSOCIATED PRESS SEATTLE (AP) - Clothes can make a statement. Urban-bag designer Tom Bihn has discovered that labels can, too. Bihn's sales have doubled since a French-language presidential insult mysteriously made its way onto the bilingual washing instructions for hundreds of his laptop bags and backpacks. The labels read: "Nous sommes desoles que notre president soit un idiot. Nous n'avons pas vote pour lui." Translated into English: "We are sorry that our president is an idiot. We didn't vote for him." Bihn's self-titled company has drawn...

STAMFORD, Conn. (AP) -- A Stamford man says election day has left its mark on him and he is not happy about it. Robert Bonoff wants the city to pay for a new suede coat that he said has been ruined by a voting sticker. Bonoff says the "I voted today" sticker he was handed and asked to wear after voting in the March 2 presidential primary ruined his suede coat. Bonoff said he showed the coat to a dry cleaner who said the sticker's mark cannot be removed. He has filed a claim with the city seeking $106, the...

It's about the trees, foe of logging says Activist charged in firebombings denies FBI's 'terrorist' label By ANDREW KRAMER THE ASSOCIATED PRESS VICTORIA, B.C. -- For 19 months, Tre Arrow was one of the most wanted fugitives in North America -- he was accused of firebombing logging and cement trucks in Oregon and having links to a group of radical environmentalists viewed as terrorists by the FBI. Now he's in the Vancouver Island Regional Correctional Centre, facing charges of trying to shoplift bolt cutters. He has begun a hunger strike to protest what he calls injustices in the U.S. legal...

The real story of the 6-year-old and her lemonade stand is nothing like the tale that made national headlines. A neighborhood feud and savvy marketing made sure of that. By CHUCK MURPHY, Times Staff Writer© St. Petersburg Timespublished July 17, 2003 NAPLES - As portrayed nationwide, the story of the little lemonade girl, the nasty neighbor and big, ugly government goes something like this:A 6-year-old girl in sweltering Southwest Florida tries to make a little summer money by starting a lemonade stand. A crabby neighbor demands that the stand be licensed or shut down. Heavy-handed police officers force the...

Fla. Man Charged After Dialing 911 More Than 900 Times POSTED: 7:20 a.m. EDT July 2, 2003 UPDATED: 7:32 a.m. EDT July 2, 2003 WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- A 22-year-old man was charged with misusing the 911 system after dialing the emergency number more than 900 times since May, taxing dispatchers and police. Howard V. Hill Jr. was arrested Monday and released from the Palm Beach County Jail on his own recognizance. Unlawful use of the 911 system is a first-degree misdemeanor. During many of the calls, Hill claimed an officer had been shot, indicated he wanted to...

High school English instructor Erin Cougill has failed the mathematics part of the state's teacher certification test six times. If she does so again, she'll lose her job. The Central High School teacher, who also is secretary-treasurer of the Hernando Classroom Teachers Association, plans to take the test again May 13. If she doesn't pass, her job will become open June 1. Cougill, 36, acknowledges she has a "math block.'' Some of her students recently spoke out on her behalf, submitting a petition attesting to her abilities and criticizing a state law requiring teachers to pass a general knowledge test...