Free Republic

KUALA LUMPUR: Police have arrested Wan Min Wan Mat, a key leader of Kumpulan Militant Malaysia (KMM) during an operation in Kota Baru Friday morning. Inspector-general of police Tan Sri Norian Mai said the 42-year-old former Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) lecturer was arrested at about 9.30am. Police are looking for eight suspects who are key KMM members and are offering a RM50,000 reward for information on each leader.

roanoke,va - WASHINGTON (AP) - Now it can be told: The mysterious petty theft that President Barack Obama’s new computer chief committed at age 21 was shoplifting four dress shirts worth $134 from J.C. Penney. A 1996 Montgomery County, Md., police report obtained by The Associated Press on Wednesday under a public records law shows Vivek Kundra was observed by a security guard putting the men’s shirts into a shopping bag and leaving the store without paying. Sgt. Tom Stanton wrote that Kundra was arrested after a brief foot chase and the property was recovered

Irrational Exuberance? We Are Now Below It . . . By Barry Ritholtz - March 2nd, 2009, 8:00PM On December 5, 1996, Alan Greenspan gave his famous Irrational Exuberance speech. At the time, the S&P500 was at 744.38. It blew through that number today, closing at 700. We’re still 350 points above the Dow’s closing price of 6,437.10; The Nasdaq is a stone’s throw (22 points) from its closing price of 1,300.12. In other words, the SPX is now lower than when Greenie gave his infamous speech 3 years ago, and the other indices are just above their levels when...

The Dark Ages : Were They Darker Than We Imagined? By Greg Bryant Published in the September 1999 issue of Universe As we approach the end of the Second Millennium, a review of ancient history is not what you would normally expect to read in the pages of Universe. Indeed, except for reflecting on the AD 837 apparition of Halley's Comet (when it should have been as bright as Venus and would have moved through 60 degrees of sky in one day as it passed just 0.03 AU from Earth - three times closer than Hyakutake in 1996), you may...

Democrats Are Fined $243,000 for Fund-Raising Violations WASHINGTON, Sept. 20 — The Democratic National Committee has agreed to pay civil fines and turn over to the Treasury a total of $243,000 to settle accusations that it took more than $1 million in illegal foreign contributions in 1995 and 1996, according to Federal Election Commission records released today. The documents also state that the election commission's general counsel found in 1999 that there was "reason to believe" that the People's Republic of China "knowingly and willfully" violated federal election law. But the heavily redacted documents also state that the commission voted...

No one in America has catalogued Barack Obama's connections to far left radicals like Stanley Kurtz of the National Review. Today, Kurtz looks at an article written by Obama sycophant Ben Smith of Politico who incredibly, has taken the word of former New Party co-founder Joel Rogers that the radical, Maoist "fusion" party "didn't have any members:" As for Obama's membership? [in the New Party] "We didn’t really have members," said Rogers. They also didn't have a ballot line in Chicago. So he said the line in the party newsletter appeared to refer to the fact that the party had...

I have previously posted about Barack Obama's involvement in the socialist led Illinois New Party here, here and here. Below are scans from New Party News Spring 1996. They prove that Barack Obama was a member of the Illinois New Party and was endorsed by them in his 1996 Illinois State Senate race. Front page-scanned from a photocopy Front page close up-scanned from a photocopy Front page ultra close up-scanned from a photocopy Note that the text refers to Barack Obama as a New Party member, while Willie Delgado is only "NP endorsed" The New Party clearly drew a distinction....

My fellow Americans, my fellow Republicans. I am honored to be with you this evening. I am especially honored to be here with the distinguished Americans that you have just heard from. With President Gerald Ford, a man who at a time of national despair brought dignity and respect back to the presidency. And with President George Bush, who took us through the end of the Cold War and the defeat of communism. George Bush the statesman, George Bush the statesman and my boss who led us to a great victory in the Persian Gulf War. With Mrs. Nancy Reagan,...

In 1985, Barack Obama traveled halfway across the country to take a job that he didn't fully understand. But, while he knew little about his new vocation--community organizer--it still had a romantic ring, at least to his 24-year-old ears. With his old classmates from Columbia, he had talked frequently about political change. Now, he was moving to Chicago to put that talk into action. His 1995 memoir, Dreams from My Father, recounts his idealistic effusions: "Change won't come from the top, I would say. Change will come from a mobilized grass roots. That's what I'll do. I'll organize black folks....

If you want to start worrying about the presidential election this year, you can look at the comparison between 1996 and 2008. John McCain is a similar candidate to Bob Dole--a war hero, running on his experience, but also somewhat past his political prime. The Democrats had the advantage of incumbency in 1996, but of course Bill Clinton had been rebuked by voters in 1994. In July 1996, Democrats only enjoyed a 5.1 percent advantage in generic congressional polls. Yet in late July, Clinton was ahead of Dole in one Harris poll by 22 percent and in a Gallup poll...

The day after New Year's 1996, operatives for Barack Obama filed into a barren hearing room of the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners. There they began the tedious process of challenging hundreds of signatures on the nominating petitions of state Sen. Alice Palmer, the longtime progressive activist from the city's South Side. And they kept challenging petitions until every one of Obama's four Democratic primary rivals was forced off the ballot. Fresh from his work as a civil rights lawyer and head of a voter registration project that expanded access to the ballot box, Obama launched his first campaign for...

It seems that Senator Obama's Old party was called the New Party. The party was a Marxist Political coalition. This was not a guilt by association thing. Senator Obama sought out their nomination. He was successful in obtaining that endorsement, and he used a number of New Party volunteers as campaign workers. Read more on the Marxist endorsement that Barack Obama sought out: Co-founded in 1992 by Daniel Cantor (a former staffer for Jesse Jackson's 1988 presidential campaign) and Joel Rogers (a sociology and law professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison), the New Party was a Marxist political coalition whose...

Clinton's records vanished after warning May 12, 2008 By Jerry Seper - Hillary Rodham Clinton's Rose Law Firm billing records, found in the White House residence in January 1996 two years after they had been subpoenaed by government regulators, disappeared shortly after the first lady was warned that the firm's billing problems were "very serious" and the then-ongoing Whitewater investigation could result in criminal charges, newly obtained records show. More than 1,100 pages of grand jury testimony, investigative reports, memos, charging documents, chronologies, narratives and draft indictments, previously undisclosed but now being "processed" at the Library of Congress, say Mrs....

Bill Clinton Retells Hillary's 1996 Bosnia Story April 10, 2008 7:10 PM ABC News' Sarah Amos and Eloise Harper Report: After a trip to Puerto Rico and two days entirely off the campaign trail, former President Bill Clinton eagerly discussed myriad topics with the crowd that awaited him in Boonville, Ind., and what he said of a trip his wife made to Bosnia in 1996 seemed a bit misleading. "I am so glad to be here. And I'm glad that Indiana is gonna have a say in who the nominee of the Democratic Party is and the next president of...

WASHINGTON - A great old war hero - arms man gled by battle and known as an acerbic straight shooter - is picked by Republicans to be their nominee to make darned certain that a Clinton doesn't get back into the White House. John McCain? No, Bob Dole in 1996. And it didn't work out very well for Republicans. Dole lost after a campaign vexed by senior moments such as when the nominee fell off a stage, or when he referred to the Los Angeles Dodgers as the Brooklyn Dodgers. All along, President Bill Clinton showed extreme deference to Dole,...

April 3, 1996 Ronald H. Brown, the U.S. secretary of commerce, is killed along with 32 other Americans when their U.S. Air Force plane crashes into a mountain near Dubrovnik, Croatia. Brown was leading a delegation of business executives to the former Yugoslavia to explore business opportunities that might help rebuild the war-torn region.

Accused Saddam Agent Says He Met With Hillary at White House By IRA STOLL, STAFF REPORTER OF THE SUN | March 27, 2008 A Michigan man facing federal criminal charges of illegally working for Saddam Hussein's Iraqi Intelligence Service says he met with Hillary Clinton at the White House in May 1996. In a 1997 interview with this reporter, Muthanna Hanooti said that at the meeting, Mrs. Clinton was "very receptive" to his request for an easing of the American sanctions on Iraq that were in place at the time. He said Mrs. Clinton "passed a message to the State...

Sen. Hillary Clinton has used a story of arriving in Bosnia under sniper fire to bolster her foreign policy bona fides, but the Washington Post retrieved a photo showing that upon landing, she actually was greeted in a customary tarmac ceremony, complete with a kiss for a native child. Hillary Clinton arriving in Bosnia in 1996 Clinton has declared on the campaign trail that a welcoming ceremony for the March 25, 1996, arrival in Tuzla was canceled, and she had to run from the airplane into an airport building for safety. The then-first lady's traveling party included 15-year-old daughter Chelsea,...

My NARN colleague Michael Brodkorb discovered this nugget of Al Franken’s comedy genius last week, and today the Minnesota GOP has demanded an apology from the Senate hopeful for his sexist and racist routine. Franken reads a chapter from his book Rush Limbaugh Is A Big, Fat Idiot, And Other Observations called “Chickenhawk” and supposedly recounts a sexual fantasy of Newt Gingrich. It goes without saying that this is Not Safe For Work.(Warning: Video Contains Strong Language) The GOP sent out its review of the comedy stylings of Al Franken in a press release today: “The outrageous and offensive ‘comedy’...

The two Independent candidates on this year's ballot for U.S. House of Representatives each expect to draw more votes than Independents traditionally have gleaned in South Dakota, and that could make a difference in how the Democratic and Republican candidates fare. Independent Stacey Nelson said Friday he expects to draw between 15 and 55 percent of the popular vote. Independent Kurt Evans said that he estimated his support at 5 to 8 percent of the vote as of Oct. 24... Democrat Rick Weiland and Republican John Thune are expecting to share most of the votes. Weiland's campaign press secretary Clay...