Free Republic

Turkey has lifted a ban on the Islamic-style headscarf in schools, allowing girls from the fifth grade and up to cover their hair in a further easing of generations-old restrictions on the public expression of faith. The government, whose roots are in political Islam, has already lifted a ban on religious garb for university students and female civil servants, scrapping curbs stemming from the founding of Turkey's secular republic in 1923 on the ashes of Islamic Ottoman Empire. "Our female students have yearned" for the end of the ban, Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said late on Monday after a...

President Barack Obama's push to raise the minimum wage, which has largely found success in liberal-leaning coastal states to date, could make headway in the conservative heartland in the November elections. Voters in the Republican-controlled states of Alaska, Arkansas, Nebraska and South Dakota will consider ballot initiatives in November that would raise the minimum wage above the national rate of $7.25 per hour. Activists on both sides of the issue say the proposals stand a good chance of passing.

(Reuters) - Israel has arrested six Jewish suspects in the abduction and killing of a Palestinian teenager whose death sparked violent protests in Jerusalem and Israeli Arab towns, a security source said on Sunday. With tensions high along the Gaza border, Israel said its aircraft attacked 10 sites in the Palestinian enclave in response to persistent rocket strikes on southern Israeli towns. But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signalled that broader Israeli action was not imminent. The security source gave no details about the suspects arrested in the investigation into the abduction and killing of 16-year-old Mohammed Abu Khudair, other than...

WASHINGTON/KABUL (Reuters) - The frantic search for Bowe Bergdahl began the moment his comrades discovered he was no longer inside the fragile outpost in a rock-strewn valley in one of the most hostile corners of Afghanistan. Exactly why Bergdahl left is subject to intense scrutiny. But accounts by two Taliban sources as well as several U.S. officials and fellow soldiers raise doubt over media reports that he had sought to join the Taliban, and over suggestions that the deaths later that year of six soldiers in his battalion were related to the search for him. His dramatic release on May...

JERUSALEM (AP) — Pope Francis delivered a powerful boost of support to the Palestinians during a Holy Land pilgrimage Sunday, repeatedly backing their statehood aspirations, praying solemnly at Israel's controversial separation barrier and calling the stalemate in peace efforts "unacceptable." -snip- Palestinian officials hailed Francis' decision to refer to the "state of Palestine." In its official program, the Vatican referred to President Mahmoud Abbas as the president of the "state of Palestine," and his Bethlehem office as the "presidential palace." He pointedly called Abbas a "man of peace." -snip-

The European Commission has approved new rules aimed at limiting the spread of a virus that has killed millions of piglets in the United States, highlighting the risk of animal feed products as a potential transmission agent. Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea virus (PEDv) has wiped out more than 10% of the US pig population since it appeared a year ago, and has also struck in Canada, Mexico and Japan. The European Union has not been affected by this strain. In the United States, the world’s biggest pork exporter, losses from PEDv could cut pork production as much as 7% in 2014,...

Among the roughly 300 killed during intense fighting in Aleppo was Molhem Barakat, a Reuters photographer. Barakat's death last Friday, in the indiscriminate barrage on Aleppo that the White House criticized Monday, has raised serious questions about Reuters' hiring practice. Hannah Lucinda Smith, a British freelance photojournalist and acquaintance of Barakat, writes that Barakat tried to join Al Qaeda. According to Smith, Barakat wanted to join the terrorist organization for the 11,000 Syrian lira monthly salary. "It is a pitiful wage for a potential suicide bomber, but enough to tempt an eighteen-year-old stuck in a war zone with no job."...

For the second year in a row, the Human Rights Campaign has awarded us the top rating of 100% on its Corporate Equality Index 2014. This score is based on the HRC’s evaluation of fair and inclusive workplace policies across large U.S. employers. Businesses that achieve this score are recognized as “Best Places to Work for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Equality.” Thomson Reuters is one of 303 companies (out of 934 evaluated) to earn this distinction. “We’re honored to be recognized again by the HRC for our continued efforts,” said Jane Moran, Chief Information Officer for Technology and executive...

Egypt to look beyond U.S. for arms: foreign minister Reuters By Samia Nakhoul and Michael Georgy CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's Foreign Minister Nabil Fahmy said on Saturday that Egypt would look beyond the United States to meet its security needs and warned Washington that it could no longer ignore popular demands in a changed Arab world. Speaking ahead of a visit by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, Fahmy said the United States must take a long-term view of its relations with Egypt and understand that in the wake of the Arab Spring, "it would have to deal now with...

Reuters is carrying an editorial today on how the DC "government has failed us – again." Knowing Reuters's record on articles like this, you might wonder why I stopped to read it. It was the title of the article, "The Sanity Caucus," that caught my eye. Surprised by the title, I scanned down, wondering if the article would make the point that the Tea Party folks, despite their methods, had the right ideas: Stop the expansion of the US government by any means possible, at least long enough to make a serious point about a serious issue. This wasn't...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Eager to exploit divisions among Republicans, Democrats have hammered the message that the U.S. government shutdown is the work of a small segment of House of Representatives Republicans on the far right. In fact, support for the tactic that led to the shutdown - now in its fourth day - has proven to be far more solid and widespread among House Republicans than the Democratic portrayal. That is because the far right, after the 2010 and 2012 congressional elections, is not a small segment at all - it represents probably 69 percent of the House Republican caucus....

The Reuters news agency is cutting some five percent of its editorial staff, a source close to the company said Wednesday, the latest layoffs in the troubled media industry. Parent company Thomson Reuters announced in a statement it would be making reductions, but offered no figures. -snip- A source familiar with the matter said the cuts would affect some five percent of the global staff of some 2,800.

Senator John McCain lashed out at fellow Republican Ted Cruz on Wednesday over a Nazi appeasement comparison he made during his all-night, anti-Obamacare marathon on the U.S. Senate floor. McCain, a Vietnam veteran and former prisoner of war, said the comparison was inappropriate. He said he had taken Cruz aside privately to tell him, and got a response he did not like: Cruz told him his appeaser reference applied not to distinguished members of the Senate but only media "pundits." "I resoundingly reject" Cruz's comments, said McCain, a senior Republican and former presidential candidate. "I think it's wrong and I...

China warned on Thursday that military intervention in Syria would hurt the world economy and push up oil prices, reinforcing Vladimir Putin's attempts to talk U.S. President Barack Obama out of air strikes. The rift over Syria could overshadow a summit of the Group of 20 (G20) developed and developing economies in St. Petersburg at which global leaders want to forge a united front on growth, trade, banking transparency and fighting tax evasion. The club that accounts for two thirds of the world's population and 90 percent of its output is divided over issues such as turmoil in emerging markets...

OTTAWA - U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, who says he recently discovered he is likely a Canadian, must win security clearance from Canada's spy agency, fill out a four-page form and then wait up to eight months to sever his ties to America's northern neighbor. Cruz, a Texas Republican who has fueled speculation that he may run for president in 2016, was born in Canada, which automatically makes him a citizen. On Monday he offered to renounce that citizenship. ... People giving up Canadian citizenship must prove they are or will become a citizen of another country, do not live in...

The online insurance exchange that Oregon established under President Barack Obama's healthcare law will not allow residents to sign up for coverage on their own when enrollment begins nationwide on Oct. 1, state officials say. The state is the first to say it won't be open for all comers by that date, raising concerns that other states running their own "Obamacare" exchanges might also be struggling. The decision by Oregon, an enthusiastic supporter of the Affordable Care Act, gives ammunition to opponents who have warned of an Obamacare "train wreck." Instead of enrolling in health insurance online themselves, at least...

Cue up the indignant reactions: President Barack Obama and his family are about to go on an eight-day vacation on the Massachusetts island of Martha's Vineyard, an elite playground for the East Coast wealthy set. Often the criticism of a president's vacation is partisan in nature, which is why White House spokesman Jay Carney dismissed a question about it when asked whether Obama's vacation was too extravagant. "I would just check what they said six years ago," he said, referring to a period when a Republican president, George W. Bush, was in office. Bush, who vacationed at his Texas ranch...

BEIRUT — The ouster on Wednesday of Egypt’s elected Muslim Brotherhood government barely a year after it took office represents a significant setback for the Islamist movements that have proved the biggest beneficiaries so far of the Arab Spring revolts. From Tunisia to war-torn Syria, anti-Islamist activists have begun expressing unhappiness with the religious parties empowered by freedoms the turmoil unleashed. That the backlash has crescendoed in Egypt — the Arab world’s political and cultural trendsetter and the birthplace of the Muslim Brotherhood 80 years ago — is likely to resonate far beyond, perhaps most forcefully in Syria. “What happens...

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, fighting to crush a two-year-old uprising against four decades of rule by him and his late father, said on Wednesday the upheaval in Egypt was a defeat for political Islam. "Whoever brings religion to use in politics or in favor of one group at the expense of another will fall anywhere in the world," Assad was quoted as telling the official Thawra newspaper, according to an official Facebook page.

CAIRO (Reuters) - Army concern about the way President Mohamed Mursi was governing Egypt reached tipping point when the head of state attended a rally packed with hardline fellow Islamists calling for holy war in Syria, military sources said. At the June 15 rally, Sunni Muslim clerics used the word "infidels" to denounce both the Shi'ites fighting to protect Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and the non-Islamists that oppose Mursi at home. Mursi himself called for foreign intervention in Syria against Assad, leading to a veiled rebuke from the army, which issued an apparently bland but sharp-edged statement the next day...

Reuters is reporting that the Egyptian Army ousted former President Mohammed Morsi in part over his calls for backing the Syrian rebels against dictator Bashar al-Assad.

A manager from a U.S. Internal Revenue Service office in Cincinnati where staff have been accused of unfairly subjecting conservative groups to extra scrutiny has said his agents were not influenced by any political agenda. John Shafer, who described himself as "a conservative Republican," told congressional investigators he sought advice from his boss on how to handle the first Tea Party application he and a lower-level agent came across in February 2010 because it was a new, high-profile issue. The furor since then has led to the ousting of the IRS chief by President Barack Obama, an FBI investigation and...

Priests and thousands of other Georgians broke through police barricades and forced gay rights activists to flee on Friday, cutting short their rally to mark the international day against homophobia. Holding banners saying "Stop Homosexual Propaganda in Georgia!" and "Not in our city!" the demonstrators swarmed into a square in central Tbilisi where about 50 Georgians were rallying in support of gay rights. Police escorted the gay rights supporters onto buses and drove them away to avoid violence. Several people, including some journalists, received minor injuries, Georgian media said. "We won't allow these sick people to hold gay parades in...

The United States was not given any warning before air strikes in Syria against what Western and Israeli officials say were weapons headed for Hezbollah militants, a U.S. intelligence official said on Sunday.

Boston bands Aerosmith and New Kids on the Block, singer-songwriter James Taylor and country singer Jason Aldean will headline a concert to benefit the victims of last month's Boston Marathon bombing, organizers said on Friday... All proceeds from the concert will go to The One Fund, which was set up by Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino. Tickets priced from $35 to $285 go on sale on Monday.

Chechen Group Behind Beslan Claims Attack Kadyrov Vows To Wipe Out Islamic Militants June 29, 2009 MOSCOW (Reuters) -- The Chechen rebel group behind the 2004 Beslan school massacre has claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing last week that badly wounded the president of Russia's southern region of Ingushetia.

Reuters) - George Soros, who died XXX at age XXX, was a predatory and hugely successful financier and investor, who argued paradoxically for years against the same sort of free-wheeling capitalism that made him billions.

President Barack Obama may have made a slow start on gay rights issues, but by the end of his first term his record was such that a news magazine dubbed him the nation's "first gay president." Now activists want more. Fresh from historic Supreme Court arguments over same-sex unions, advocates want Obama to use his executive powers to fight discrimination at businesses, schools, and military bases and stop waiting for action from a reluctant Congress. The Supreme Court is expected to rule in June on big issues: the constitutional right to gay marriage and the right of gay married couples...

North Korea seen moving mid-range missile to east coast: reports SEOUL | Wed Apr 3, 2013 9:13pm EDT (Reuters) - North Korea has moved what appears to be a mid-range Musudan missile to its east coast, South Korea's Yonhap news agency said on Thursday, quoting multiple government sources privy to intelligence from U.S. and South Korean authorities. It was not clear if the missile was mounted with a warhead or whether the North was planning to fire it or was just putting it on display as a show of force, one South Korean government source was quoted as saying.

Media tycoon Rupert Murdoch has held a dinner meeting with Nigel Farage, leader of the anti-European Union UK Independence Party, prompting critics to accuse him of using his clout to interfere in Britain's debate about the European Union. Prime Minister David Cameron promised to try to renegotiate Britain's membership of the EU and to hold a referendum on staying in or leaving by the end of 2017, a pledge which fuelled public debate between supporters and opponents. A spokesman for UKIP, which favours Britain leaving the EU, said the dinner took place at Murdoch's London flat on Tuesday. He declined...

A British exit from the European Union would be a catastrophe despite disagreements over capping banker bonuses that have left London increasingly isolated, German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble told an Austrian newspaper. His comments are his strongest so far in trying to avoid a messy split that would send shock waves through politics and financial markets. Britain failed this week to secure backing to water down new EU rules limiting bonuses, a measure that could threaten London's dominance as a financial centre. Schaeuble acknowledged Britain's interest in the subject, given the major role its financial centre plays, but told Der...

House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner ruled out tax increases as a way to address the nation's deficit after talks with President Barack Obama on budget cuts set to take effect later on Friday. "The discussion about revenue, in my view is over. It's about taking on the spending problem," Boehner said

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government is its final stages and will be unable to survive as more parts of the country slip from his control, the head of Germany's foreign intelligence agency (BND) said. "Armed rebels are co-ordinating better, which is making their fight against Assad more effective," Gerhard Schindler told the Frankfurter Allgemeinen Sonntagszeitung newspaper, in an interview made public on Saturday. "Assad's regime will not survive." Rebels fighting to topple Assad declared Damascus International Airport a battle zone on Friday, while Moscow and Washington both sounded downbeat about the prospects of a diplomatic push to end the conflict...

U.S. Republicans say, "No way" to ceding debt limit power Photo 7:36pm EST By Rachelle Younglai WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican lawmakers took a firm stand on Wednesday against an Obama administration proposal that would make it easier for the president to increase the nation's debt limit, worried it would undercut their leverage to cut government spending. Republicans introduced a non-binding resolution in the House of Representatives that, if approved, would put the chamber on record opposing the plan, and a Senate Republican began circulating a letter to President Barack Obama saying it was critical that Congress' role in setting the...

ERMELO, South Africa -- In a country cursed by one of the world's highest murder rates, being a white farmer makes a violent death an even higher risk. Whether attacks have been motivated by race or robbery, a rising death rate from rural homicides is drawing attention to the lack of change on South Africa's farms nearly two decades after the end of apartheid -- and to the tensions burgeoning over enduring racial inequality. Some of South Africa's predominantly white commercial farmers go as far as to brand the farm killings a genocide. 'Potentially explosive' issue On the other side...

Roughly 5 percent of respondents in Reuters/Ipsos polls said they chose the Republican contender in 2008 and will switch to Obama in 2012. Who are these defectors? The McCain-to-Obama switchers are 55 percent male, and 34 percent of them are 55 or older. (Overall, Obama trails Romney 34 percent to 52 percent among white men over 50.) About 72 percent of them are white. They are largely from the East Coast; nearly 4 in 10 live in the mid- or South Atlantic. Nearly 3 in 10 finished their education after high school, and nearly 2 in 10 have a bachelor's...

Two shocking photos coming off the wire of Benjamin Netanyahu addressing the United Nations moments ago.

Scientist and children’s television personality Bill Nye, in a newly released online video, panned biblical creationism and implored American parents who reject the scientific theory of evolution not to teach their beliefs to their youngsters. “I say to the grownups, ’If you want to deny evolution and live in your world that’s completely inconsistent with everything we’ve observed in the universe that’s fine. But don’t make your kids do it,’” said Nye, best known as host of the educational TV series “Bill Nye the Science Guy.” The video, titled “Creationism Is Not Appropriate for Children,” was posted on Thursday by...

FAYETTEVILLE, North Carolina (Reuters) - They call it "rahowa" - short for racial holy war - and they are preparing for it by joining the ranks of the world's fiercest fighting machine, the U.S. military. White supremacists, neo-Nazis and skinhead groups encourage followers to enlist in the Army and Marine Corps to acquire the skills to overthrow what some call the ZOG - the Zionist Occupation Government. Get in, get trained and get out to brace for the coming race war. If this scenario seems like fantasy or bluster, civil rights organizations take it as deadly serious, especially given recent...

(Reuters) - In his first week as a Republican U.S. vice presidential candidate, Paul Ryan has quietly moved away from the Medicare reform plan that has defined his political career. At campaign stops, Ryan has made little mention of the Medicare and budget savings that conservatives cheered when presidential candidate Mitt Romney announced his running mate. When Medicare comes up, it's more often than not in an attack on Democratic President Barack Obama. "Do you think raiding Medicare to pay for Obamacare is an achievement? Why don't we just get rid of Obamacare all together?" Ryan said at a rally...

Abdelbasset Sida, head of the Syrian National Council, said the United States had realized that the absence of a no-fly zone to counter Assad's air superiority hindered rebel movements... A no-fly zone imposed by NATO and Arab allies helped Libyan rebels overthrow Muammar Gaddafi last year. The West has shown little appetite for repeating any Libya-style action in Syria, and Russia and China strongly oppose any such intervention... Rebels who seized swathes of the city three weeks ago have been fighting to hold their ground against troops backed by warplanes, helicopter gunships, tanks and artillery... Aleppo and the capital Damascus,...

For Tea Party activists uninspired by Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, the choice of fiscally conservative Congressman Paul Ryan as his vice presidential running mate might allow them to vote in November without holding their noses. Hours after Romney's announcement on Saturday, Tea Partiers' reactions ranged from "Wow!" to "a step up from Romney" to "this doesn't change a thing for me" - what one would expect from a notoriously fragmented coalition bound by a desire for smaller government. Many hailed the selection of as a sign of fiscally conservative movement's growing influence on the Republican Party platform. Others said...

Three women who protested against Vladimir Putin in a "punk prayer" on the altar of Russia's main cathedral went on trial on Monday in a case seen as a test of the longtime leader's treatment of dissent during a new presidential term. The women from the band 'Pussy Riot' face up to seven years in prison for an unsanctioned performance in which they entered Moscow's Christ the Saviour Cathedral wearing masks, ascended the altar and called on the Virgin Mary to "throw Putin out!" Maria Alyokhina, 24, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, 22, and Yekaterina Samutsevich, 29, were brought to Moscow's Khamovniki court...

Protesters broke windows of least a half-dozen storefronts in Anaheim on Tuesday and five people were arrested in the second major clash between police and demonstrators since an officer shot dead an apparently unarmed man. Tom Tait, mayor of the southern California city, had called on Monday for a state and federal review of the shooting of the man, a suspected gang member. Over 600 demonstrators gathered at City Hall on Tuesday, where officials were holding a regular meeting, police said. Some threw patio chairs through the windows of a Starbucks, according to a Reuters witness. No one in the...

Russian President Vladimir Putin has approved a law that will tighten controls on civil rights groups funded from abroad, the his press office said on Saturday, a step opponents say is part of a campaign to suppress dissent. The law, which was cleared by the upper house of parliament earlier in July, will force non-governmental organizations (NGOs) engaging in "political activity" to register with the Justice Ministry as "foreign agents" and to file a report to officials every quarter. Opposition groups say Putin is trying to silence groups whose criticism of his human rights record has undercut his credibility and...

At 8:42 PM Central, it was already certain to any sentient human being that incumbent Republican Scott Walker had romped contender Tom Barrett in the Wisconsin recall election. Yet, despite the crater-sized percentage gap, here is what CNN, via Reuters, was reporting:Maybe this is why CNN is hemmorhaging viewers like nobody's business. But it's Fox that invents news, right?But what interested me was the main photo on this Reuters page. What the $^*@ is that doing hanging there like some third world Commie dictator's poster in a voting location???

Reuters is worried that new tough anti voter fraud laws will hurt Barack Obama’s chances of reelection next November. Complaining that such laws “could” reduce Obama’s supporters by “hundreds of thousands” the media outlet apparently sees no irony in its own position. Reuters doesn’t feel at all self-conscious about the implication that only fraudulent applicants have to be concerned about these new laws and honest people would not be disadvantaged in the least. “Republican” led Legislatures Further exposing its support for voter fraud the media giant cites “Republican-led legislatures” in 12 states as the culprits who are sharply restricting fraudulent...

They’re ladies first – Ninjas second There are now reportedly 3,500 black lady ninjas in Iran ready and willing to defend the evil regime. MSNBC, CNN and Reuters reported on these female trained killers last month. The dreaded Iranian she-ninjas sued Reuters today on defamation charges. Iran Press TV reported: Last month, Reuters showed a number of Iranian girls training martial arts in a city near Tehran, claiming Iran was training more than 3,000 female ninjas to kill any possible foreign invaders. The distorted Reuters report was picked up by other British media outlets. Following the strong reaction of Iranian...

More than half of Americans support President Barack Obama's apology for U.S. troops burning copies of the Koran, an incident that triggered a spate of bloody protests and attacks on U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan. In a Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Monday, 56 percent of those surveyed backed Obama, who has been criticized by U.S. Republican presidential candidates for apologizing to Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Twenty-three percent disagreed. While the spasm of violence that erupted following the incident on a NATO base in Afghanistan does not appear to have significantly altered Americans' perspective on the war, 66 percent of those polled...

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stepped up pledges to curb Jewish zealotry in Israel on Sunday after an 8-year-old girl complained of being menaced by ultra-Orthodox men who deemed her dress immodest. While his conservative government insists such incidents are fringe phenomena in the mostly secular country, Netanyahu's repeated announcements on the matter reflected concern about widening religious and political schisms. "In a Western, liberal democracy, the public realm is open and safe for all, men and women both, and neither harassment nor discrimination have any place there," he told his cabinet in broadcast remarks. Netanyahu said he had ordered law...