Free Republic

A digest of comments on the Census Department's report on poverty in the U.S...A few thoughts I would like to share: "This is sad to read, so many hard working people struggling to make ends meet either in the private or public sectors..." "The enormous problems this country faces are not the fault of either side and this argument and election will not fix any of them. After WWII we built a gigantic infrastructure and a gigantic technology. They were designed to make life easier and replace human effort...." "Although I don't dispute that the safety net has prevented those...

A selection of the best readers' comments on Christine O'Donnell's primary victory... A few thoughts: "Both parties have vastly underestimated the level most Americans are fed up with the status quo of US politics." "Insulting others for thinking differently is counterproductive. I don't expect perfection in my political leaders nor am I willing to discount someone because they are not perfectly poised and polished. I admire hard work, personal responsibility, and a bent towards financial responsibility. Show me these attributes, and I will vote for you." "What I would like to convey to my liberal friends is being a conservative...

Why should any visitor to a Christian country be offended by Christian traditions and decorations? I’m not offended by the overt signs of other countries’ differing religions and traditions; in fact, I enjoy them. What is more, I know for sure that there are Christmas trees and decorations in Dubai, that go up as the Eid celebration finishes. One officious counter lady in our local PO tried to stop me using a proper (ie Religious) stamp on a card to Dubai 2 years ago. She was astonished when I told her that she would see Christmas decorations there...

In October 1929, Oklahoman Edgar Bledsoe believed a newsboy's cry of "Stock Market Collapse" referred to a disaster at an Ardmore cattle auction barn. By 1932, Bledsoe had been riding the rails for two years picking cotton and doing menial work that rarely provided a living for the 18-year-old and two cousins. That summer the trio rode a freight to Comanche, Oklahoma heading back to his cousins' home on a drilled-out oil field. They had to walk the last 13 miles through the woods. "We ran across a log cabin deep in the blackjack oaks. It had a well in...

“We found the houses taken down and the place very strongly enclosed with a high palisade of great trees, with curtains and flankers very fortlike, and one of the chief trees or posts at the right side of the entrance had the bark taken off, and five feet from the ground in fair capital letters was graven CROATAN, without any cross or sign of distress. We entered the palisade, where we found many bars of iron, two pigs of lead, four fowlers, iron sacker-shot and such like heavy things, thrown here and there, almost overgrown with grass and weeds.” --...

The key players are now all in place in Washington and in state governments across America to officially label carbon dioxide as a pollutant and enact laws that tax we citizens for our carbon footprints. Only two details stand in the way, the faltering economic times and a dramatic turn toward a colder climate. The last two bitter winters have lead to a rise in public awareness that CO2 is not a pollutant and is not a significant greenhouse gas that is triggering runaway global warming. How did we ever get to this point where bad science is driving big...

"On the return flight from a meeting at NASA headquarters a couple of years ago, my mind was reflecting upon the Space Shuttle program...its milestones...its tragedies...and its soon-to-be fleet retirement. While gazing out over the clouds through the airplane window, a number of thoughts swirled in my head: Instead of retiring the Space Shuttle, and simply moth-balling the orbiters at museums and "rocket parks" around the country, could we give the fleet a heroic assignment? A grand mission commensurate with their thirty years of service? The concept: • Fly two Space Shuttle orbiters into earth orbit. • Rendezvous and connect...

In 1929, James San Jule's father was a successful businessman in Tulsa, Oklahoma. San Jule graduated from Tulsa Central High School and had been accepted at Amherst college in Massachusetts, planning to go on to Harvard Law School. Because of his youth, his father wanted him to wait a year and arranged for him to work as an office boy in the Exchange National Bank at Tulsa. "I didn't think much of money in those days. It was just something we had," said San Jule. "My father was probably a millionaire. We owned fancy cars, a fancy house, fancy everything....

I collaborated with the late James A. Michener on his South African novel, The Covenant and later went on to write my own epic on Brazil. My plan for A Novel of America is to follow the same plan Jim Michener and I used in crafting our books, with a key difference of letting these multilayered tasks unfold on the Web. Much of my work is presented blog-style: current entries reflect a search for ideas big and small that will inspire and shape my story of America. As I go along, I share "Working Notes," "Research Links," "Images" and "Maps"...

It was among the juicier post-election recriminations: Fox News Channel quoted an unnamed McCain campaign figure as saying that Sarah Palin did not know that Africa was a continent. Who would say such a thing? On Monday the answer popped up on a blog and popped out of the mouth of David Shuster, an MSNBC anchor. “Turns out it was Martin Eisenstadt, a McCain policy adviser, who has come forward today to identify himself as the source of the leaks,” Mr. Shuster said. Trouble is, Martin Eisenstadt doesn’t exist. His blog does, but it’s a put-on. The think tank where...

"A real Fascist dictatorship?" "Nonsense! Nonsense!" snorted Tasbrough. "That couldn't happen here in America, not possibly! We're a country of freemen." "The answer to that," suggested Doremus Jessup, "if Mr. Falck will forgive me, is 'the hell it can't!' Why, there's no country in the world that can get more hysterical--yes, or more obsequious!--than America. Look how Huey Long became absolute monarch over Louisiana. Listen to Father Coughlin on the radio--divine oracles, to millions. Remember how casually most Americans have accepted Tammany grafting and Chicago gangs and the crookedness of so many of President Harding's appointees? "Remember our war hysteria,...

Under the title, The Discreet charm of Republican Women, Boston Globe columnist, Alex Beam, breaks with the liberal herd's view of Sarah Palin: "Whoever picked Palin must have been a genius. So she's not exactly sure what the Bush Doctrine is - who cares? The whole point of electing a new president is to get rid of the Bush Doctrine once and for all. Newspaper editorialists who cackle at her creationist leanings might want to look at some poll numbers. God still trumps Darwin, last time I checked. Is there a line connecting Laura Bush to Sarah Palin? I think...