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WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama gave a steely defense of his handling of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden and his use of it to burnish his re-election credentials a year later, saying Monday that it is appropriate to mark an anniversary that Republicans charge is being turned into a campaign bumper sticker. He then jumped at the chance to portray presumed Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney as unprepared to make the kind of hard call required to send U.S. forces on that highly risky mission. Without mentioning Romney by name, Obama recommended looking at people's previous statements...

(CNSNews.com) – President Barack Obama on Monday issued a statement marking the start of Ramadan, the month devoted to prayer and fasting in the Muslim religion. “As Ramadan begins, Michelle and I would like to send our best wishes to Muslim communities in the United States and around the world,” the statement reads. “Ramadan is a festive time that is anticipated for months by Muslims everywhere.”

When you run into a mine field, there's something that's been known to happen: land mines go off. When scores of people charge at the border of a sovereign nation with Molotov cocktails and an assortment of other arms spotted in the crowd, another thing has been known to happen: the people on the other side of that border recognize a threat to their personal safety as well as their national sovereignty, and try to stop you. Of course, the headline circling the globe at this point is "Israel fires on protestors," plus a casualty estimate. As with the protests,...

A shopkeeper has cut litter in her village by 40 per cent by writing children's names on their sweet wrappers. Yvonne Froud, 52, marks each wrapper, crisp packet and drinks container with the name of the buyer using a black indelible marker pen. Litter louts who drop their rubbish are shown the evidence and temporarily banned from her shop or told to go on a litter-pick. The two-week scheme has been so successful Yvonne might extend it to adult shoppers at her post office and stores in Joys Green, Glos. She said yesterday: "I was so disgusted by the litter...

The purpose of FreeRepublic.com's multiple message boards is to limit the topics for each board to particular topics. Posting the same message on all the boards defeats the purpose of multiple-boards for special topics. It is very annoying to see the same message on every bulletin board. PLEASE! DO THE READERS A FAVOR. STOP CROSS-POSTING YOUR MESSAGES!

Is the Pope Catholic? The latest evidence of manipulation came Monday, the last day of the quarter. On that day, the majority of mutual funds beat the market. While that would seem to be a mathematical impossibility, researchers take it as evidence of a manipulative practice that is known in the mutual fund world as "marking the close." The SEC defines "marking the close," which is illegal, as "attempting to influence the closing price of a stock by executing purchase or sale orders at or near the close of the market." Right before the close, in other words, funds will...