Free Republic

A man who said he bought a device that let him change traffic lights from red to green has received a $50 ticket on suspicion of interfering with a traffic signal. Jason Niccum of Longmont told the Daily Times-Call that the device, which he bought on eBay for $100, helped him cut his time driving to work. "I guess in the two years I had it, that thing paid for itself," he told the newspaper Wednesday. Niccum was cited March 29 after police said they found him using a strobe-like device to change traffic signals. "I'm always running late," police...

Main Site: with activities for kids Lockheed Martin Inspires Central Florida Students to Pursue Technical Careers During National Engineers Week 2006 ORLANDO, Fla., Feb. 20 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Lockheed Martin's Central Florida businesses will support local activities to promote math and science education for students during National Engineers Week, February 19-25. Through fun hands-on activities, students will learn about engineering and engineering careers.excerpt...General Dynamics Hosts Student Events for National Engineers WeekARLINGTON, Va., Feb. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- General Dynamics Advanced Information Systems, a business unit of General Dynamics (NYSE: GD - News), is sponsoring events nationwide during National Engineers Week beginning Feb....

We have two house dogs. One is a Lab mix we rescued from the pound about a year ago. She was picked up as a stray at 8-9 months old and wasn't fixed (she is now). She was always gentle and non aggressive. In August we picked up a pure lab 1 month old male puppy. At the time we thought our first lab would like a friend. That might of been a bad idea. They had always play fought and puppies tend to bite at everything. But recently the older Lab mix who's 1.5-2.0 years old has become aggressive...

I am really tired of Westerners (yesterday, on this blog it was a Canadian - CANADIAN!) chastizing me about not being Arab enough, not fighting Israel enough, not pushing for the Arab cause enough. What in the world is that? [Sorry for this storm of emotion, but I believe blogs are the place to publicly display righteous indignation.] Who in the world is a Canadian to tell me such things? Because he thinks I should be fighting for the Arab cause, I need to: live without electricity; live under constant bombardment; live with terrorism; live without running water; live in...

On Monday, the British newspaper "The Observer" quoted an accident investigator who claimed that three dozen U.S. military dolphins, supposedly trained in secret near Lake Pontchartrain, had been washed away by Hurricane Katrina. ...OLBERMANN: Make sure I'm right on this one point here, that dolphins could not actually fire poison dart guns, even if they are wearing them, even if they are loose, because they don't have hands. Am I right about this so far? SOLANGI: No, I think that's science fiction. And these animals are trained. It's common knowledge, to look for underwater mines and divers. But I think...

If any of you are not familiar with "Sluggy Freelance" it is one of the most popular and long running comics on the web. It has been a-political since the beginning. It appears that they are starting a new Harry Potter parody piece about the Lastnamelessone (Clinton) being a murder escaping from prison and hunting Torg. An interesting path for the author Pete to take.

This website contains a series of riddles that get more difficult with each level. It starts at [level one] with over a hundred levels in all. I'm currently at level 6. Regardless of its title, there's nothing objectionable on the site as far as I know.

David Bradley describes how he invented CTRL-ALT-DEL, then tries to packpedal after he inadvertantly slams Bill Gates for making it famous. link to video

The United Way of Metropolitan Atlanta will withhold $1.3 million in funding to the Boy Scouts pending an investigation into alleged minority membership inflation. Without much discussion Wednesday, the agency's Board of Directors unanimously agreed to pledge that amount to the Boy Scouts of America-Atlanta Area Council for 2005-06, but hold it in escrow starting July 1, the beginning of the council's budget year. Board members won't decide how much to turn over to the Scouts until they see the membership report and learn how the council will handle any negative findings. The tentative decision to maintain current funding is...

I've been a little out of the loop over the past few months so this might of already made the rounds here. But for those of you that need a bit of humor today here's the transcript. (you can find the audio at the above source link)Dispatcher: Sheriff's department, how can I help you? Woman: Yeah, I'm over here . . . I'm over here at Burger King right here in San Clemente.* Dispatcher: Uh-huh. Woman: Um, no, not San Clemente; I'm sorry, I live in San Clemente. I'm in Laguna Niguel, I think, that's where I'm at. Dispatcher: Uh-huh....

A cross-dressing crook who appeared to resemble pop diva Whitney Houston robbed a Wachovia Bank in Atlanta Friday. Surveillance cameras captured several images of the bandit, who wore a tan trench coat, black boots, and sunglasses. The robber, who witnesses said was a man, entered the bank at 3019 Buford Highway about 11 a.m. through the lobby and approached the teller. He then produced a note that demanded money and specified that he had a weapon and would become violent if his demands were not met. The teller gave the robber a bag of money and he immediately left the...

For some reason the Free Republic opinion poll refuses to go down beneath my sidebar after I've voted. This started with the last poll on my mac at home. I just thought it was a screwy mac thing but now with the new poll the mac behaves ok but my computer at work (PC) now keeps the poll on top of my sidebars. The last time I voted at work I believe. This time I voted at home so maybe that has something to do with it. Anyone else having problems with this or know how to get the page...

It wasn't much of a protest, but it did turn heads. The San Jose Mercury News reports Monday a recent weekend impromptu protest by an unidentified Apple employee's husband who demonstrated his furstration about the overtime hours he said his wife was required to work at Apple. Michael Gough drove his car around the Apple main headquarter's parking lot in Cupertino, Calif. with a sign reading "KAPAO: Kids and Pets Against Overtime.'" "I was driving around with two teenage boys and a dog,'' Mr. Gough told the Mercury News, "and we had a loudspeaker on the car and our basic...

A total of 482 people signed up yesterday. That's better than the 2nd highest day 09/20/04 when 417 signed up. And Freerepublic chugged along quite happily all the while with no glitches that I noticed.

AT THE END of every election cycle, we hope to retire the clichés that have bedeviled us. Yet every four years, they reemerge from dormancy, causing pain, discomfort, and minor inflammation. We hold these clichés to be self-evident: (1) that this campaign season, like all those before it and without regard to actual history, will be deemed by some professor to be the most "negative" one ever; (2) that if an Ohio swing voter has a single unexpressed thought, a television producer will be dispatched to rectify that oversight; and (3) that some nitwit celebrity, who prior to the election...

A widely watched barometer of future economic activity edged lower in September for the fourth month in a row, suggesting a slowing in economic growth, a private research group reported Thursday. The Conference Board said that its Index of Leading Economic Indicators fell 0.1 percent last month, following declines of 0.3 percent in August and 0.3 percent in July. The group said that while the weakness over the last several months in the economy has become more widespread, the declines in the leading indicator index are not yet large enough nor have they lasted long enough to suggest that the...

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - A group of Swedish parliamentarians proposed levying a "man tax" to cover the social cost of violence against women.   "It must be obvious to all of us that society has a huge problem with male violence against women and that has a cost," Left Party deputy Gudrun Schyman told Swedish radio on Monday. "We must have a discussion where men understand they as a group have a responsibility," said Schyman, one of the party members to sign the motion for debate on the new tax. Sweden already has the highest taxes in the European Union (news...

Exerpted due to WSJ requirements. Also no link as this was from paper.... military's major weapons programs have come under scrutiny from prosecutors and military procurement specialists ... Darleen Druyun's courtroom admission Friday that she systematically steered various contracts to Boeing Co. Ms. Druyun was the Air Force's second-highest contracting officer for nearly a decade before she went to work as a Boeing vice president in December 2002. ... she negotiated her $250,000 Boeing job while overseeing the company's Air Force contracts, and on Friday was sentenced to nine months in prison for conspiracy to violate conflict-of-interest laws prohibiting such...

I just noticed today that Free Republic has a new URL icon. You know, those little icons that appear next to a web site's address. It's a darn nifty white star on a red and blue back ground.