Free Republic

The Kurdish region of Iraq and Turkey, border Iran, and Syria. Kurds have a well developed, effective government, parliament and security force. The region has had nearly total independence since Iraq's defeat in the 1991 Gulf War. // Snipp // Largely corrupted remnants of U.S.-trained Iraqi Army, crumbled under the Saudi-wahhabi push East. Peshmerga recovered strategic northern positions, including suburbs of now, wahhab dominated City Mosul. //Snipp// Many Kurdish Iraqi leaders believe ever blossoming federal cronyism, and recently demonstrated national defense atrophy, lay bare a chronic Humpty Dumptyism. The Nation may best function as a Republic. “I don’t think Iraq...

The Baltic Sea is not known for its flesh-stripping tropical fish, but this season, a close relative of the piranha reputed to have a fondness for nibbling on men's testicles has appeared in the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad on the Baltic. A local fisher nabbed several South American pacu in a city pond and handed them over to marine biologists for identification, Interfax reported Friday. The pacu is a cousin of the omnivorous piranha. Unlike its fearsome relative, it mostly subsists on a pacific diet of nuts and algae, but last summer media dubbed the pacu the "ball cutter" when...

Unfortunately, competition is under attack in my beloved Wisconsin when it comes to energy choice. For the state where I grew up watching my father decry and fight like hell against the ruinous policies of Robert LaFollette Jr., who turned the state into a progressive “paradise” of which only Karl Marx and Gus Hall could be proud, I want nothing more than a vibrant competitive market. While Gov. Scott Walker has done more than any other Wisconsin governor in recent memory to undo policies that threaten competition, he’s missing the boat on energy choice in the state.

A 44-year-old married Zhejiang man went to the doctor after experiencing stomach aches and blood in his urine, only to discover he was on his period. Not only that, but he had a full set of female reproductive organs. Man-strual cramps Chen knew something was wrong when he found himself constantly feeling fatigued and having a swollen face and legs. Even worse, he found blood in his urine. However, he never expected the CT scan to reveal that he had a uterus and ovaries. Results from chromosome examination also showed that Chen had a pair of XX sex chromosomes, meaning...

According to insiders, NBC political director and chief White House correspondent Chuck Todd is the rightful heir to Gregory, but he has not been officially offered the job. Other names said to be in the frame include “Today” anchor Savannah Guthrie, who comes from a political background but is unlikely to be released from the flagship morning show where she’s hugely popular. Guthrie is also due to give birth to her first child next month and will return to “Today” after maternity leave. MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” team of Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski have also been said to be angling...

Russia has released military monitoring data, which shows Kiev military jets tracking the MH17 plane shortly before the crash - and posed yet another set of questions to Ukraine and the US over the circumstances of the tragedy. Military officials – chief of General Staff of the Armed Forces Lt. Gen. Andrey Kartopolov and chief of the Air Force Main Staff Lt. Gen. Igor Makushev - posed a number of questions to Kiev and Washington concerning the possible causes of the catastrophe in Eastern Ukraine that killed almost 300 people last Thursday. 1. Why did the MH17 plane leave the...

The Libyan charged over the deadly attack on the US mission in Benghazi pleaded not guilty in a US court on Saturday. Ahmed Khatallah has been indicted on a charge of conspiracy to provide material support... FBI Director James Comey hailed Khatallah's capture as a "major step forward", US officials suggest that the suspect was "hiding in plain sight"...

Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford urged to back off plans to cut funding ($550 million contract for Rosoboronexport, Russian supplier of the Mi-17), claiming it would have a “catastrophic” effect on Afghanistan’s ability to conduct operations. By the end this year, U.S. will abandon its position in Afghanistan. Russian forces who will replace US are flight ready with the Mi-17, though many would prefer American class equipment.

The U.S. military has grounded all its new F-35 Joint Strike Fighters following an incident on June 23, when one of the high-tech warplanes caught fire on the runway of a Florida air base. The no-fly order — which affects at least 50 F-35s at training and test bases in Florida, Arizona, California and Maryland. F-35 is on track to become by far the military’s most numerous warplane. It was designed to replace almost all current fighters in the Air Force and Marine Corps and complement the Navy’s existing F/A-18s.

Every year since 2001, the Sonoma County grand jury has reviewed what police call “critical incidents” – officer-involved shootings and the deaths of suspects or criminal defendants in custody. Until this year. The 2013-14 grand jury, whose term ended June 30, declined to examine such cases. That includes the October fatal shooting of teenager Andy Lopez by Sonoma County Sheriff's Deputy Erick Gelhaus, among other deaths involving law enforcement in the past year. Citing a lack of expertise, financial support and public misconceptions about their role, Sonoma County grand jurors decided to diverge from the longstanding custom.

BAGHDAD — Kurdish security forces took over two major oil fields outside the disputed northern city of Kirkuk before dawn Friday and said they would use some of the production for domestic purposes, further widening a split with the central government of Prime Minister Maliki. The president of the Kurdish (prior, no fly) zone has said the areas won't be returned — including the highly disputed, flashpoint city of Kirkuk — and he called for Kurdish lawmakers to prepare to hold an independence referendum in the area, a move strongly opposed by Baghdad, Turkey and the United States. //Snip// http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/7/11/iraq-parliament-dysfunction.html,...

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced a decision to reinterpret the Japanese constitution, allowing Tokyo to militarily support partners that are under attack.

Middleweight Championship Chris Weidman (c) (11-0) vs Lyoto Machida (21-4) Women Bantamweight Championship Ronda Rousey (c) (9-0) vs Alexis Davis (16-5) Heavyweight Stefan Struve (29-6) vs Matt Mitrione (7-3) Middleweight Uriah Hall (9-4) vs Thiago Santos (9-2) Bantamweight Marcus Brimage (6-2) vs Russell Doane (13-3)

SOCCER: PART DEUXANN COULTER July 2, 2014 PARIS -- Soccer fans have decided to prove me wrong about soccer being a fruity sport by spending the last week throwing hissy fits. This, in defense of a "sport" where the losing players cry on camera. The massive and hysterical response to my jovial sports piece proves how right I was. Nothing explains the uniform, Borg-like caterwauling, but that soccer is a game for beret-wearers. Most of the articles attacking me are verbless strings of obscenities, their subject matter identified only in the title. Consequently, I've decided to emulate The New York...

One-time Wu-Tang Clan-affiliated rapper Christ Bearer says that, despite the fact that he cut his penis off in a much-written about incident in April, his member has reunited with his body and is now fully functioning. In fact, he hopes to prove both points by doing a porno film. -snip- TMZ’s crack interviewer asked the rapper if any drugs were involved in his self-castrating incident, which led to a series of bleeped-out expletives; however he does say, “PCP was involved!” and adds, “Kids, say no to drugs!”

The owners of a chain of stores called Hobby Lobby don't like Obamacare. In particular, they really don't like the part that requires insurance companies to cover contraceptives. Normally, people who don't like a law petition the government to change that law. That's how a nation of laws works. But these men are Christians. The Supreme Court ruled Monday that Christian business owners are special. Their deeply held religious belief that some particular form of contraception is immoral carries more weight than the force of law, five conservative Christian justices ruled. The court -- in a fairly bald admission that...

A gang threw excrement at the office of a gay organization in Rome, while shouting death threats against people inside, Italian media reported on Friday. \Di Gay Project (DGP) in southern Rome was attacked on Wednesday night, with the crime being reported to police on Friday, Corriere della Sera said. A mob threw excrement and other items, such as wooden boxes and vegetables, at the organization’s office, as people were rehearsing a theatre performance inside. Members of the gang, estimated to be aged between 15 and 40, also shouted threats such as “We’ll set you alight” and “you deserve to...

Feels like this soccer crap is being forced on us on ESPN, etc. Yes, just change the channel but why is there this effort to make believe that Americans love soccer and love the WNBA? They are two artificially created.

Almost 800 babies and children were buried in a mass grave in Ireland near a home for unmarried mothers run by nuns, according to new research Wednesday which throws more light on the Irish Catholic Church's troubled past. Death records suggest 796 children, from newborns to eight-year-olds, were deposited in a grave near a Catholic-run home for unmarried mothers during the 35 years it operated from 1925 to 1961. Historian Catherine Corless, who made the discovery, says her study of death records for the St Mary's home in Tuam in County Galway suggests that a former septic tank near the...

Thirty years ago Congress passed protective measures regarding pornography. On May 21, 1984, President Ronald Reagan signed into law the Child Protection Act, which was supposed to protect persons younger than 18 from exploitation by pornographers. (Other measures were designed to keep those under 18 from accessing pornography.) Two months later President Reagan signed into law the National Minimum Drinking Age Act, designed to keep persons below age 21 from purchasing alcoholic beverages. Now, visualize this scene: Herbie, 13, walks into his local tavern and asks for a vodka martini—shaken, not stirred. Tex the barkeep asks, “Are you at least...

“……additionally there’s some forensic accounting investigation of Loretta Fuddy’s personal finances which resulted in a disclosure that she received a substantial - I believe she received a $50,000.00 dollars in cash shortly after she verified the Obama’s birth certificate as being legitimate. And, [I] may your listeners remember that it was late last year that Loretta Fuddy died in a very peculiar plane accident off the coast of Hawaii, shortly after Doug filed that sealed affidavit [ah] in the federal District Court in Washington………”

Senior writer John McCormack joined Greta van Susteren's political panel Monday on Fox News to discuss the protest at the Bundy ranch in Nevada. Watch the video below:(VIDEO-AT-LINK)Meanwhile, in this week's issue, the Scrapbook writes about the problems with Cliven Bundy's cause: Twenty years ago, the federal government, which owns the land on which Bundy grazes his 900 cattle, decided to impose a grazing fee. Bundy opposes that fee, has consistently refused to pay it, and the federal Bureau of Land Management now claims that he owes $1 million in unpaid fees. Bundy has challenged the grazing fee in federal...

This video has family pets eating, drinking and enjoying daily life in the back yard. The sound effects of the running brook was recorded from the Chepachet R.I. river. Voices are my grandchild and myself. The children song, sang by the eaglet is, (Is Anything To Hard For God).

Ukrainian troops are storming an airfield in the eastern city of Kramatorsk, said anti-Maidan activists as cited by RIA Novosti. The activists added that several people were injured. Ukrainian troops approached the military airfield in armored personnel carriers between the eastern cities of Kramatorsk and Slavyansk, the people’s militia located at the airfield told RIA Novosti on the phone. “They started negotiating with the people’s militia, which is in control of the airfield. The shooting started unexpectedly. There are injured among the people’s militia, and there may be deaths,” they said. Other members of the militia have blocked the entrance...

The following document was prepared by members of the Durham, N.C., branch of Workers World Party and updated on April 8, 2014. The goal of this document is to help inform discussion at the March 29th Hard Times Are Fighting Times Conference on Socialism by placing current anti-racist struggles in the U.S. South and the U.S. labor movement in the context of historic national oppression and previous setbacks in the South. The goal is to avoid past mistakes and build greater unity in and between the anti-racist and union movements. To accomplish this we will first lay out some...

So when did Ann's and Obama Sr.'s "whatever happened happened fast" wedding happen? For no apparent reason, confusion abounds among Obama's biographers over the wedding date: 1. Dreams claims that Ann and Obama Sr. were in married "in 1960"; similarly, Mendell's 2007 book claims that the couple were married "sometime in late 1960" when they "slipped off alone to the island of Maui"; and both Obamaland (2008) by Ron Jacobs (with contributor David Maraniss) and a 2007 Washington Post article claim that the two were married "late in 1960." 2. A 2007 Chicago Tribune article vaguely claims that Ann and...

Shrimpton reported Obama's purported mom was not pregnant in 1961 and that Obama was born in Kenya in 1960. He said Kenya was under British intelligence files and that Obama's father ran guns for the Mau Mau. He then dropped a bombshell claiming the CIA did covert DNA testing on Obama at a fundraising dinner and the test came back with no match to the claimed grandparents. Shrimpton said Rudy Giuliani's people knew and sat on the intelligence and further stated he spoke with Hillary Clinton's people and that they were quite interested.

WASHINGTON — Young Evangelicals argued that Christianity and libertarianism are compatible, and some even claimed that Christians should advocate for libertarian causes. "Christians actually ought to feel outraged that the redemptive power of charity has been taken from us and given to an unfeeling, coercive state," Leah Stiles Hughey declared at a Saturday panel at The International Students for Liberty Conference. She claimed that when government gets involved in giving to the poor it denies the God-given human dignity of both giver and receiver. Hughey's husband Jason explained that "the Bible is not a book of political theory." Nevertheless, "there...

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Are autopsies medical records or public records? South Carolina's Supreme Court will begin grappling with that question Wednesday, when it hears a lawsuit by a Sumter County newspaper against the county's coroner. The Item newspaper wants the high court to toss out a lower court's ruling that said autopsies do not have to be made public because they do not fall under the state's Freedom of Information Act.

A Highway Patrol trooper who caught another officer speeding to an off-duty job at 120mph is suing for more than $500,000 - saying his allies harassed her after he was fired. Florida's Donna Jane Watts made national headlines after handcuffing Miami Police Department officer Fausto Lopez, while he was in full uniform and driving a police car. Since the incident in 2011 she claims she has had threatening calls on her cell phone, police cars idling outside her house and fellow officers accessing her private driver's license information. Ms Watts - who is suing more than 25 police agencies -...

A Bay Area woman was shocked to receive an insulting piece of mail from the Bank of America. A Visa credit card offer from the bank sent to Lisa McIntire was addressed to "Lisa Is A Slut McIntire." McIntire thinks a data entry person entered the offensive address, but said she doesn't understand how it got through the bank's system. She took to Twitter to get the Bank of America's attention. The bank apologized in response and said they are looking into the situation.

MONTGOMERY, Alabama -- Bestiality is one step closer to being illegal in Alabama after the Alabama Senate today passed a bill to criminalize sexual contact with animals. -snip- Currently, bestiality is still legal in 14 states and the District of Columbia.

Ali C is a handsome woman. She has a soothing voice, striking eyes and, I imagine, hair that smells like gardenias. She has an apartment in the Financial District, which is where she hosts her clients. But Ali C is not a prostitute, nor is she a masseuse or a dominatrix or any traditional career in which people "host clients" in their homes. She's a Professional Cuddler, and she claims to be the city's first. Ali C (not her real name) is 47-years-old, and not particularly rotund, which does seem like it might afford a slight upper-hand in the pro-cuddle...

Sarah Palin was very busy last night. Too busy and important to watch the State of the Union, but she did catch it on her “truck radio” and she’s very concerned about that man in the White House. He’s arrogant and dangerously full of hubris. He dared to act like a President and use presidential powers. Something must be done! She warned her flock on Facebook today, “We the People” don’t have to be “We the Sheeple” and just get shepherded towards a fundamental transformation that’s against America’s will.” To remedy this horrible, big government intrusion, she says we can...

A group of students set a questionable record when they drank almost 5,000 Jägerbombs in a night.The 800-strong crowd downed 930 litres (205 gallons) of the Jägermeister/Red Bull combo. They took on the challenge at a weekly student event called Jäger Rocks, where the cocktail is sold for just £1. Organiser Student Republic tweeted the results, posting: ‘News just in: you guys drank a record 4,764 Jägerbombs at last Thursday’s Jäger Rocks #cheeky.’ But the boozy boast was met with mixed reviews. One psychology undergraduate told student newspaper The Tab: ‘It’s always a mental night but it was better than...

As congressional appropriators, slashed Afghanistan by half and barred U.S. defense officials from embarking on major new infrastructure projects Obama had long hoped to describe the end of America's longest war as a (yet another) foreign policy success. But Washington's appetite to remain engaged in Afghanistan appears to be eroding precipitously, because of the poisonous its relationship with the country's president.U.S. officials said the cuts and restrictions might appear starker than they actually are because agency heads will retain significant flexibility to use unspent funds from previous years or draw from other sources. President Karzai, has refused to sign a...

A family from Bulawayo's Nketa 7 suburb dumped its tenant's "goblin" at the Tshabalala Police Station, sending cops fleeing in different directions. The incident occurred at about 8 pm on Wednesday. A family that claimed a lodger owned the goblin brought it to the station in a suitcase. "We heard some screaming from the charge office and most officers who had knocked off rushed to see what was happening. At first everyone gathered around the suitcase, wanting to see what was inside," said a cop. The officer said a traditional healer who had come with the family opened the...

I blame global warming.

Joanna Dennehy, 31, who has pleaded guilty to murdering three men and the attempted murder of two others in England, is seen stretching out her pierced tongue in a wild smile in what authorities say are photos taken only minutes before she selected her next two victims.Photos capturing the smiling face of a deranged serial killer just before she knifed her fourth and fifth victims in a bloodlust frenzy in England last spring were shown before a court this week. Joanna Dennehy, 31, is seen stretching out her pierced tongue in a wild smile in what authorities say are self-taken...

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Philadelphia USA — Athens, Greece---- The mystery surrounding US Marine, Brian LaLoup’s missing heart has already drawn two nations into a Philadelphia federal court. Aug. 12, 2012, in a Greek government-run hospital in Athens, cut out their son’s heart. U.S. military officials never informed Brian's parents that their son’s remains were incomplete until well after his burial —Defense Department later located a heart and sent it back to the United States, but it was not Brian LaLoup’s. Dan Smith, US ambassador to Greece, “From the outset, this matter was a high priority for me. Three times before the procedure occurred,...

Eighteen-year-old Keith Vidal of Boiling Springs Lakes, N.C., shredded, following a schizophrenic episode. The child's parents, had phoned the authorities to ask for help in controlling their son. Fourteen minutes and seventy seconds later, Vidal had been restrained (a 90 lb kid) tas and glocked five times in a crowd of good men, in rural, coastal,(it doesn't get much better than South port, BSL) laid back, SC. Bryon Vassey's (Killer without a cause), Southport Police,> paid administrative leave and walks you'r streets tonight. //CliP// On Oct. 22, Deputy Sheriff Erick Gelhaus, a marksman with 24 years in the (police) department,...

BosGlobe..2013-04-15, Jahar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev; two brothers Boston Marathon Terrorism. SNIP 2013-04-22 Vo R, HuffPo, Ibragim Todashev had been arrested and charged with aggravated fight with great bodily harm in Florida. BEIJING, May 23 (Xinhuanet), Florida early Wednesday morning while a man was being questioned by an FBI agent in Florida, law enforcement officers, including an FBI special agent from the Boston field office, and two Massachusetts State Police troopers, interviewed for approximately eight hours at his apartment in Orlando, Florida, They said that he implicated both himself and Tamerlan Tsarnaev in the murders during the questioning and was beginning...

A mum who left her boyfriend fighting for his life after knifing him following months of bullying has been jailed. Rhiann Burnie, 21, was furious when Shane McMullen, 23, failed to ring her every two hours from a party and plunged an 8in carving knife into his shoulder when he got home, a court heard. She then puffed a cigarette as she mopped up his blood . The couple had been in a relationship for a year which was “happy and healthy” until Burnie’s “darker more sinister side” emerged, Burnley crown court heard. She had pulled a knife on him...

"The martial arts expert is a member of Arpaio's posse"

Just to recall a basic fact: Intercourse/PIV is always rape, plain and simple. This is a developed recap from what I’ve been saying in various comments here and there in the last two years or so. as a radfem I’ve always said PIV is rape and I remember being disappointed to discover that so few radical feminists stated it clearly. How can you possibly see it otherwise? Intercourse is the very means through which men oppress us, from which we are not allowed to escape, yet some instances of or PIV and intercourse may be chosen and free? That makes...

The release of names is a big mistake, say some lawyers, based on the court not knowing the difference between streaming and downloading copyrighted material.Thousands of porn watchers have had their personal details released by a German court. Some 20,000 people who watched porn on a U.S.-based website have had their names and addresses released by a court and could end up paying a fine. Cease and desist letters were sent to people who had accessed the smut site, Redtube. They were traced after a German court released their personal details in a case where people were claiming videos had...

Eunice, NM The URENCO USA uranium enrichment plant located outside Eunice, NM achieved a capacity milestone today by introducing uranium hexafluoride gas (UF6) into its newest centrifuge cascade. The activation of this cascade brings the enrichment plant to slightly over 3 million separative work units (SWU) of production capacity.

Arctic storms swirling around the top of the world are more common than previously thought with about 1,900 in the first decade of the century, researchers say. As they churn across the top of the globe each year they leave warm water and air in their wakes, melting sea ice in the Arctic Ocean, scientists at Ohio State University reported Wednesday.

India’s navy is training over 500 Vietnamese submariners... India (will) issue Vietnam a US$100 million line of credit for the purposes of enabling the latter to acquire four naval patrol vessels from the former, the report said. The Indian Navy's extensive experience in operating Russian Kilo-class submarines, which dates back to the mid-1980s, will be invaluable to Vietnam as its navy learns how to handle their new underwater vessels, according to the In December 2009, Vietnam signed a $2 billion deal to buy six submarines from Russia, which is due to deliver them all by 2016.