Free Republic

When Rupert Dickinson, the chief executive of one of Britain's biggest property firms, left his BlackBerry behind in London while on a business trip to Ireland, he simply ordered one of his staff to get on a plane and deliver the device to him. For Dickinson's then head of sustainability, Tim Nicholson, the errand was much more than an executive indulgence: it embodied the contempt with which his boss treated his deep philosophical beliefs about climate change. In a significant decision today , a judge found Nicholson's views on the environment were so deeply held that they were entitled to...

It looked like a stunning reversal: the same church that helped defeat gay marriage in California standing with gay-rights activists on an anti-discrimination law in its own backyard. On Tuesday night, after a series of clandestine meetings between local gay-rights backers and Mormons in Salt Lake City, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced it would support proposed city laws that would prohibit discrimination against gays in housing and employment. The ordinances passed and history was made: It marked the first time the Salt Lake City-based church had supported gay-rights legislation.

Okay, we are all disgusted, dispirited, angry, and not sure of what to do next. Evidently, the Tyrants in the democrat party do not care if we have Tea Party's, they mock us. They don't care if they lose some elections, they mock us. They persecute our leaders and they mock us. How can we hit back? Tea Party's are good, but they have been relatively inaffective. We are ignored or mocked. Let's consider hitting these bastards where it will really count, let's call for a national strike by the people! Not a union strike, this is an American people...

NEW YORK (CNN) -- Immigrant rights activists are calling on U.S. retailers to stop selling two controversial "Illegal Alien" costumes that have surfaced for Halloween, saying the outfits are a broadside attack on illegal immigrants. The "Illegal Alien Adult Costume," manufactured by Forum novelties, includes an orange jumpsuit, similar to prison garb, with "Illegal Alien" stamped in black across the chest; a space alien mask; and a fake Green Card. The "Illegal Alien Mask with Hat" also includes a space alien mask, this time with a dark handlebar mustache and a baseball cap

Activists yell during a protest in Washington, DC. Thousands of gay rights activists marched on Washington to call for homosexual rights, a day after President Barack Obama vowed to repeal a ban on gays serving openly in the US military. Doug Armstrong, 35, of Washington, left, blows bubbles at Arundhati Baden-Mayer Eidinger, 5, as she walks with her mother Alexis Baden-Mayer Eidinger, of Washington, center, during the National Equality March with thousands of gay rights advocates in Washington, Sunday, Oct. 11, 2009. Actress Cynthia Nixon speaks at the National Equality March in Washington, on Sunday, Oct. 11, 2009

You may work with a Nessman. You may have Nessmans in your family. Your neighbors might be Nessmans. You may even be married to a Nessman. I’m talking about Les Nessman, a character in the best sitcom ever, “WKRP in Cincinnati.” Nessman was the “news director” for the down and out radio station, directing a staff of one, himself. WKRP wasn’t much into news. That didn’t prevent Les Nessman from poking his nose into everyone’s business, though his nose for news didn’t reach much past his WKRP office. Actually, Les didn’t have an office, but he placed a piece of...

BERN, Switzerland – Drug maker Novartis AG said Tuesday that animal rights activists have stolen the ashes of its CEO's mother and set fire to his Austrian hunting lodge. Swiss authorities, however, said they didn't know who was behind the attacks. In the latest incident, CEO Daniel Vasella's Tyrollean lodge in Bach, Austria, was badly burned early Monday morning. "It was arson with a professional fire accelerator," Novartis spokeswoman Isabel Guerra said in Basel.

About 100 Iranian activists and political moderates went on trial Saturday to face charges related to massive protests following the controversial presidential election. The semi-official Fars news agency published images of defendants sitting in a packed Tehran courtroom, some handcuffed in pairs. The IRNA news agency says the detainees are accused of conspiring against the ruling system, among other charges. Reports say some leading political figures on trial have retracted their claims that the June vote was rigged - the main rallying point of opposition demonstrators.

Activists seek unity, new definition of Black PowerBy Ashahed M. Muhammad Assistant Editor Updated Jun 1, 2009 - 11:29:08 PM MARIETTA, Ga. - At a May 22-24 gathering, the South became the nexus of Black liberation and political thought at the 2009 National Black Power Conference, which was headquartered at the Roberts Crowne Plaza, a Black-owned hotel just outside Atlanta's city limits. Organizational representatives from across the United States and those concerned with the future of the Black nation participated in the meeting. The conference was co-convened by longtime scholar Dr. Leonard Jeffries and Atty. Malik Zulu Shabazz, of the...

Marine Confesses He Witnessed Torture My fellow veterans please forgive me. But I must purge my soul. I only ask that you reserve judgment until you read all of if. I only want peace for all and a world free of torture. What I saw in the military was much worse than water boarding. The prisoners were taken to a 12 foot deep pool. Feet weighted they were forced into the pool. Those who hesitated, were moved onto a plank high above the pool and forced off. They were to stay in this deep water for over an hour feet...

TORONTO, April 9, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A two month-old child at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children, described in the media as "dying," has defied doctor's predictions and continued to live after the removal of a respirator. The respirator was removed in the expectation that the child would stop breathing, and that her heart could then be harvested for transplant. Her parents have expressed their disappointment that another child who is being cared for at the hospital will now not receive their daughter's heart. ~Snip~ Kaylee Wallace was born with a condition called Joubert Syndrome, which causes a malformation of the...

This past Wednesday evening, March 11, renowned conservative author and columnist Don Feder came to the University of Massachusetts Amherst, sponsored by the UMass Republican Club, to give a speech on "Hate Crimes -- Fighting Bias With Fascism" - the myth of hate crimes and the liberals who propagate the laws targeting them. It promised to be an illuminating event. But the college homosexual activists decided that he shouldn't be allowed to speak. They boldly announced that they intended to disrupt the event, and campus police responded requiring the UMass Republican Club to pay $600.00 to hire 5 policemen to...

"The warmists set off on their march just as it began snowing again. Unfortunately, from that point on I could not record any interviews about the imminent inferno of global warming because my pen froze."

These little Che Guevaras and Obamas finally ran everyone's patience at NYU to an end. highlights are: spouting the usual mob-rule collectivist nonsense about "democratic process," threatening the administration, shouts of "police brutality," and, my personal favorite, trying to tell the security and police staffs what they can and cannot do..It's classic collectivist nonsense. If I came away with anything from this video, it's that I do not want my kids to go to NYU. What a bunch of snotty little Ches.

In the past two years, community organizations across the United States mobilized like never before to help Latinos become citizens, register to vote and go to the polls. Now, many of these organizations plan to use that structure to advance the interests of Latinos on issues such as the economy, education and immigration. “The work has just begun,” said David Valladolid, who headed regional efforts to establish Viva Obama clubs and form a coalition with San Diego County's African-American population. The National Association of Latino Elected Officials worked with Spanish-language media and community groups in a get-out-the-vote effort, and it...

There is a funny piece in the L.A. Times today discussing Obama’s possible picks for the Supreme Court. It is not ha-ha funny, it is funny because it shows how far-left liberals distinguish themselves from one another; sort of like a zebra saying another zebra has a slightly wider stripe.

WASHINGTON — A powerful new lobbying force is coming to town: Barack Obama's triumphant army of 3.1 million Internet-linked donors and volunteers. In a mass e-mail thanking them, written moments before his Grant Park victory speech, Obama put them on notice. "We have a lot to do to get our country back on track, and I'll be in touch soon about what comes next," he wrote. Many are eager. "I'm going to be sitting at the phone, asking, 'What do you want me to do next? I'm ready,' " said volunteer Courtney Hood, 37, a mother of three from Owings,...

If Barack Obama loses this election to John McCain – something which, for the first time, I regard as a real possibility – history will point to August 29 as the pivotal moment. That was when Mr McCain announced that Sarah Palin would be his running-mate, and when livid Democrats and their friends in the media voiced their feelings about her and much of the electorate, and gravely harmed their candidate’s prospects. For Mr McCain to win the election against the odds that faced him pre-Palin – with the economy in the tank and the incumbent Republican president setting records...

When William Bolthouse, a California philanthropist, donated $100,000 in March to support a proposition to ban gay marriage in California, calls and emails poured in -- not to Mr. Bolthouse, but to the corporate offices of a company that bears his name -- even though he sold it three years earlier. "It wasn't us, it's not our fault," says Jeffrey Dunn, now the chief executive of Bolthouse Farms, whose juice bottles are sold at upscale markets such as Whole Foods. Bolthouse Farms is the latest target in what has become an increasingly bitter political fight in California. As gay-rights activists...

At the University of Chicago no man looms larger than Milton Friedman, the Nobel laureate who led the “Chicago school” of economics and who died in 2006. When the university announced plans for a $200m economics institute in May, it seemed fitting that the centre should be named after him. But a small war broke out. On June 6th more than 100 faculty members wrote to the university’s president to protest against the institute. Armed with academia’s common weapons, indignation and verbosity, they said they were all “disturbed by the ideological and disciplinary preference implied by the university’s massive support...

You might have thought the demented Americans with Disabilities Act — a bonanza for lawyers that requires any public facility to be designed with handicappers in mind or be sued out of existence — would be the last word in otherly-abled totalitarianism. Not so. Visitability is a concept that makes the ADA downright libertarian by comparison. The initial objective of Visitability proponents is to impose on every home a zero-step entrance, interior doors at least 32" wide, and at least one wheelchair-accessible bathroom on the ground floor. Once they've managed to have this mandated, we'll see where they go from...

WASHINGTON — Barack Obama's plan to build up U.S. forces in Afghanistan while keeping perhaps 50,000 troops in Iraq has triggered a deep rift among antiwar activists, a reminder of the difficult tasking facing the presumptive Democratic nominee as he tries to broaden his appeal. The Illinois senator wrapped up three days of tours and talks in the war-ravaged nations Tuesday, stressing in a news conference that the "situation in Afghanistan is perilous and urgent" and that "we should not wait any longer" to provide additional troops. In Iraq , Obama won a tacit Iraqi endorsement of a plan to...

Peace activists want equal access to Los Angeles high schools to counter military recruiters they describe as "car salesmen" bent on meeting quotas. The Coalition Against Militarism in Our Schools says it's vital for students to have unvarnished information about military service. The coalition promotes nonviolent alternatives to military service. Group coordinator Arele Inouye says recruiters "have a quota and it's their job to get students to sign up. So just like a car salesman, they're going to say everything they can to get students to sign up." The group's access proposal could be considered by the school board next...

Defenders of Marriage as a lifelong union between one man and one woman faced another challenge in the growing activist led effort to compel Legal recognition of equivalent status for homosexual partnerships and married couples. On Wednesday, May 28th, California’s Chief of Vital Statistics issued guidelines to the 58 County Clerks’, effective June 17, 2008, requiring that they issue marriage licenses to homosexual partners. In addition, she issued new language which removes any reference to the applicants being a man or a woman, assigning instead the new identification of “Party A’ and “Party B” to the applicants. ...There is a...

The California Supreme Court today trashed society's traditional institution of marriage, opening it up for same-sex duos because retaining the historic definition "cannot properly be viewed as a compelling state interest." In a 4-3 decision replete with concurring and dissenting opinions filed by individual members of the court, the majority opinion determined state laws specifying marriage as being between a man and a woman were unconstitutional.... "It is certainly disappointing that the court, in declaring a right to same-sex marriage in the California Constitution, has shown an outrageous lack of respect for a majority of California voters and ignored a...

CAIRO, Egypt - The Egyptian state prosecutor on Wednesday ordered 147 detained members of the Muslim Brotherhood to be investigated on rioting accusations, a judicial official said, in the latest crackdown on the country's largest opposition group. The detainees, who have not been formally charged, are also accused of holding unauthorized demonstrations after a flurry of protests in northern cities, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. Thousands of Muslim Brotherhood members demonstrated across the Nile Delta on Tuesday, accusing the government of preventing them from participating in...

From San Francisco to Berkeley to Washington, D.C., peace activists plan demonstrations across the nation today to mark the fifth anniversary of the start of the Iraq war. More than 600 events are scheduled. Anti-war activists say their goal is to use the occasion to renew interest in the conflict when many Americans are focused on the troubled economy and the presidential election. "We want to make sure that this war is put back into the American consciousness as an issue," said Bill Hackwell, spokesman for the Act Now to Stop War and End Racism coalition, or A.N.S.W.E.R. "This has...

Plots by Communists to infiltrate America. The disintegration of borders and rural areas. Citizens mobilizing and rising up against government agencies and big business. It all sounds like the plot for a summer blockbuster, but it's something that could be happening in your own backyard. These were just a few of the topics addressed in the "How to fight the TTC" workshop, held Monday at the Pitser Garrison Civic Center in Lufkin. The conference served as an informational meeting aimed at informing citizens and local government officials how they can unite in trying to stop the proposed Trans-Texas Corridor project....

So, according to the AP’s guidelines, it would fall under the heading of fair use when I point out the following Reuters photograph, and mention that it’s yet another example of the mainstream wire services’ utter corruption and moral blindness, labeling Hamas terrorists in suicide bomber outfits as “activists.” They’ve slowly debased the language to the point where this kind of sick, evil description is routine business as usual. Palestinian Hamas activists take part in an anti-Israel rally organized by the Hamas movement in Gaza March 7, 2008. (Reuters)

A 20-year-old legal fight over protests outside abortion clinics ended Tuesday with the Supreme Court ruling that federal extortion and racketeering laws cannot be used against demonstrators. The 8-0 decision was a setback for abortion clinics that were buoyed when the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals kept their case alive two years ago despite the high court’s 2003 ruling that had cleared the way for lifting a nationwide injunction on anti-abortion leader Joseph Scheidler and others. Anti-abortion groups appealed to the justices after the lower court sought to determine whether the injunction could be supported by findings that protesters...

At least three Hamas members were killed and two others injured in an Israeli missile strike in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, Palestinian medical workers said. According to Reuters, locals said the group of fighters had been firing mortars at Israel at the time of the strike. The incident took place around the town of Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip. An Israeli army spokeswoman confirmed the army carried out an air strike on activists who were about to fire mortars into Israel. Israel said that on Tuesday alone, Palestinians fired 21 rockets and mortars against Israeli targets, bringing...

November 23, 2007 — Adbusters, the Canadian culture jamming magazine largely responsible for propagating Buy Nothing Day, has once again been rejected in its attempt to buy advertising on MTV in promotion of the anti-consumerist holiday. MTV's Advertising Standards representative, Elisa J. Billis, didn't deny that the rejection was based soley on the message of the ad, simply saying that "the spot goes further than we are willing to accept on our channels." The ad features a burping animated pig and seeks to illustrate the divide in the amount of waste produced by the richest and poorest countries in the...

FORT HUACHUCA — It was a meeting of polar opposites. On one side of a conference room on this Southern Arizona post were three people who wanted to know why the Army teaches torture techniques. On the other side were four soldiers — three officers and one chief warrant officer — who said the Army does not teach torture and does not condone such practices. For some, the meeting, which was approved at the highest level of the Intelligence Center and Fort Huachuca, may seem strange, since two of the three civilians have protested outside the fort in the past,...

While most of us spend our time working to pay our energy bills and put food on the table, Friends of the Earth (FOE) spend theirs doing everything in their capacity to insure that the nation and the world will not have sufficient energy to meet the needs of the human family. They may be friends of the earth, but they are no friends of those of us who live on it. This Mother of All Green Groups has devoted itself to finding every way possible to make our lives miserable, all in the name of protecting the environment. They...

Most of them didn't endorse Arnold Schwarzenegger for governor, and they clash with him occasionally on issues ranging from smog to logging. But environmental groups said Monday they are surprisingly pleased with the number of environmental bills Schwarzenegger signed ... Of the Sierra Club's list of 25 priority bills, Schwarzenegger signed 18 - or 72 percent - the highest ... since he took office. "It is important that he is signing more environmental bills and across a variety of subjects," said Bill Allayaud, the Sierra Club's state legislative director. "The environment did well this year." Working until nearly midnight Sunday,...

MOSCOW (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told Russian human rights activists on Saturday she wanted to help them build institutions to protect people from the 'arbitrary power of the state'. "I think that there is too much concentration of power in the Kremlin," she later told reporters. Her remarks and the meeting with eight human rights leaders could irk the Kremlin, which is sensitive to Western accusations it is rolling back democratic freedoms and suspects foreign governments of trying to influence next year's presidential election. Rice told the rights activists she wanted to hear about their efforts...

Call it ActRed. There’s something of a competition brewing between three new Republican groups angling to cut into the online fundraising advantage enjoyed by Democrats and their Internet money machine, ActBlue. Rightroots, Big Red Tent and Slatecard.com are the latest in a series of as yet unsuccessful efforts by GOP operatives to close their party’s Web-cash gap with Democrats. All three will allow visitors to their websites to contribute to Republican candidates running for federal offices, plus in Rightroots’ case a few who aren’t – namely might-be presidential candidates Fred Thompson, Newt Gingrich and Chuck Hagel. The committees will forward...

Environmental activists get a shock in Vt.By Kristi Ceccarossi, Globe Correspondent July 28, 2007 BRATTLEBORO, Vt. -- Activists opposed to development planted flowers and herbs in a gentle protest that stretched through the night. In the morning, when they refused to leave a vacant lot where a truck stop has been proposed, things got ugly. The protesters were Tasered by police. "It was torture," said Janisse Ray, one of the protesters, who witnessed Jonathan "Slug" Crowell and Samantha Kilmurray being shocked. Police acknowledged that they used the devices Tuesday, but said they had to use them to get the protesters...

Historians and Orthodox activists of Moscow call to rename the metro station Voikovskaya named after Peter Voikov, a Soviet commissar who was directly relevant to the death of the Russian Royal Family.

THE Pasha Bulker isn't Australia's only large, red, shiftless, inert mass. Australia's lefty activists were once active; they wanted change, movement, action. Today's activists want anything but. These modern so-called activists are mooching in on our conservative "let's do nothing" scam! Consider recent inactivist actions: On Iraq: Activists (who invariably claim they always wanted to bring down Saddam Hussein's oppressive regime) first opposed sanctions against Iraq and then opposed a military removal of the nation's brutal dictator. Left to lefty activists, Iraq would still be ruled by Saddam – who paid thousands to the families of Israel-bound suicide bombers –...

How many "human-rights activists" does it take to betray civilization? After the Fatah al-Islam terrorists holed up in a Palestinian camp carried out a wave of bombings, bank robberies and assassinations, Lebanon's struggling democratic government ordered its army to stop them. The Palestinian refugees themselves applauded the army's efforts, stating that few of the terrorists were local and most were fanatics from other Muslim states. The terrorists ruled with the gun and sought to enforce Sharia law. Their victims want them gone. The response from Human Rights Watch? Ignore the crimes of the terrorists and criticize the Lebanese army for...

Did the New York City Police Department spy on peaceful groups and citizens trying to exercise their constitutional right to protest the renomination of President Bush at the Republican National Convention in the summer of 2004? This is what civil liberties groups allege, and what the NYPD denies. Who is right? The issue is at the heart of several interrelated suits being adjudicated in federal district courts in New York, many of them filed on behalf of the 1,800 protesters who were arrested during the largest protest at a political convention in American history. In its complaints, the New York...

Pro-war veterans group and anti-war adversaries warily promise peaceful event Police say World Can't Wait will have exclusive right to plaza Jordan Green News editor In late January, protesters swarmed onto the steps of the US Capitol and spray-painted antiwar slogans during a rally to pressure President Bush and the Democratic Congress to wind down the war in Iraq. That was the tipping point for Charles Gant, a disabled Vietnam combat veteran from Greensboro who volunteers his time with others who have served in the US armed services. "The silent majority is tired of the extreme left-wing viewpoint," Gant said...

A gay rights activist group plans to hold a press conference at Patrick Henry College in Purcellville Thursday in an attempt to convince the college to change its policies toward gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. Patrick Henry College, a conservative Christian college, does not plan on welcoming the Soulforce Equality Riders onto campus. College spokesman David Halbrook said the school has requested the presence of town and county law enforcement to bar the activist group from campus. According to a press release from Equality Loudoun, a local group promoting Soulforce's visit, the group will arrive at Patrick Henry College...

NEW YORK - Undercover NYPD officers traveled around the U.S. and even to Europe to observe activists who planned to protest at the 2004 Republican National Convention — including hundreds who showed no sign of illegal intent, a newspaper reported. Posing as activists or sympathizers, the officers attended meetings of political groups in at least 15 states and filed reports with the police department's intelligence division, The New York Times reported on its Web site Saturday. The officers involved in the "RNC Intelligence Squad" then identified certain groups as potential threats, the Times reported, citing hundreds of still-secret reports it...

ALEXANDRIA, VA—The Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) announced today that California Congressman Duncan Hunter will address the nation’s oldest and largest gathering of conservatives on Saturday, March 3, 2007 at 8:30 a.m. in the Omni Shoreham Hotel’s Regency Ballroom in Washington D.C. “For more than a quarter of a century, Congressman Duncan Hunter has been a strong and reliable voice in the U.S. House for conservatives, fighting the good fight to keep our military up to speed, up to date, and up to the dangerous tasks our nation asks of them,” said J. William Lauderback, Executive Vice President of the...

Activists Blast Saudi Arabia Beheadings Friday February 23, 2007 1:01 AM By JAMES CALDERWOOD Associated Press Writer DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) - A human rights group said Thursday that Saudi Arabia violated international law when it ordered the beheadings earlier this week of four Sri Lankan robbers and then left their headless bodies on public display in the capital of Riyadh. Human Rights Watch said the four men had no lawyers during their trial and sentencing, and were denied other basic legal rights. The group called on Saudi Arabia to halt all pending executions and retry those remaining on...

Two missing Sea Shepherd activists have been found safe in the Antarctic, and hostilities have resumed against the Japanese whaling fleet. The whalers called a truce to help the hardline anti-whaling group in their search caused when the two aboard a Zodiac inflatable dinghy disappeared suddenly in fog in icy waters south-west of Australia. Sea Shepherd president Paul Watson told theage.com.au the inflatable's engine broke down, stranding Karl Nielsen, of Perth, Western Australia, and John Gravois of Los Angeles, USA. "We just kept going out from one point in a circular search until we found them," said Captain Watson, aboard...

Two anti-whaling activists, one an Australian, were feared missing in Antarctic waters after a clash with a Japanese whaling fleet. A search for the two men was under way after the anti-whaling group Sea Shepherd confronted Japanese whaling vessels in the Ross Sea. International director of Sea Shepherd, Jonny Vasic, said anti-whaling activists from two ships had used high speed inflatables to try to disrupt the operations of the whaling fleet. But a mayday message was issued after radio contact was lost with two activists in an inflatable. One of the men was an Australian from Perth and the other...

RICHMOND -- A Richmond community organizer alleged Friday that federal immigration agents are being deceitful by representing themselves as police officers in order to gain entry to homes and make arrests. Christina Espinosa of Contra Costa Interfaith Supporting Community Organization, also known as CCISCO, a group of 25 religious organizations, said the tactics of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents are jeopardizing efforts by Richmond police to gain the confidence of the city's immigrant community. Espinosa said her group and others have been working with Police Chief Chris Magnus on a community policing program aimed at giving immigrants trust...