Free Republic

Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger has invited Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin to join the sexy girl group, if her election campaign fails in November.

Election-year novelty dolls of Barack Obama, John McCain and Hillary Clinton have been ordered off the shelves of Walgreen drugstores nationwide because of customer complaints about the battery-operated figures. The 13.5-inch(34.3-centimeter)-tall dolls moved as they sang parodies and recited messages that were not approved by the presidential candidates. Walgreen Co. spokeswoman Tiffani Bruce told The Grand Rapids Press for a story published Friday that some customers were offended by what the dolls said or did. The Clinton figure referred to itself as a "broad" in one song parody. The Obama doll was sold in a box that proclaimed, "The senator...

'Dara and Sara' have been created by the Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults in an effort to promote traditional Muslim values in the country. Unlike their American counterparts, the toys come dressed in modest clothing. They also have pro-family backgrounds and each of the four models of Sara comes with a white headscarf. They will be sold for just a third of the price of a Barbie doll. Toy seller Masoumeh Rahimi welcomed the dolls, noting that the image of Barbie as buxom, blonde and wearing revealing clothing was "more harmful than an American missile."...

If the interest in Sarah Palin’s eyeglasses is any indication, the Oxford, Conn., company making her action figure will be inundated with requests. But not everyone is amused. HeroBuilders.com has made three action figures of the Alaska governor and vice presidential candidate. The figures include the Sarah Palin business figure, complete with glasses, a suit and her hair pulled back in a bun. The Sarah Palin hero action figure looks like something from the movie “The Matrix,” with a long black coat opened to show a gun holster on the thigh. But it is the Sarah Palin School Girl that...

One company is hoping to cash in on Governor Sarah Palin's rise to national prominence. The company is selling Sarah Palin action figures, starting at $28. The company is offering three versions of the doll, and one is the Sarah Palin executive action figure. It's 1 feet tall and is dressed in a navy blue tailored pant suit. There's also a school girl model and a Sarah Palin super hero action figure, which is dressed in a mini-skirt and equipped with a leg-holstered handgun.

Looks like the DNC thinks the FEC has dominion over dolls.

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - A top Iranian judiciary official warned Monday against the "destructive" cultural and social consequences of importing Barbie dolls and other Western toys. Prosecutor General Ghorban Ali Dori Najafabadi said in an official letter to Vice President Parviz Davoudi that the Western toys was a "danger" that needed to be stopped.

TEHRAN, Iran - A top Iranian judiciary official warned Monday against the "destructive" cultural and social consequences of importing Barbie dolls and other Western toys. In the latest salvo in a more than decade-old government campaign against Barbie, Prosecutor General Ghorban Ali Dori Najafabadi said in an official letter to Vice President Parviz Davoudi that the doll and other Western toys are a "danger" that need to be stopped. "The irregular importation of such toys, which unfortunately arrive through unofficial sources and smuggling, is destructive culturally and a social danger," said the letter, a copy of which was made available...

TEHRAN: Iran’s toy market is being inundated by models of Barbie, Batman, Spiderman and Harry Potter and the young must be protected from their harmful cultural effects, the prosecutor general was quoted as saying on Sunday. “Promoting figures like Barbie, Batman, Spiderman and Harry Potter and the uncontrolled import of CDs of video games and films should alarm all the country’s officials,” Ghorban Ali Dori Najafabadi was quoted as saying by the student ISNA news agency. “We need to find substitutes to ward off this onslaught, which aims at children and young people whose personality is in the process of...

With their bling-bling glittering through the plastic of their stylish boxes, they dish out attitude on the Barbie aisle. Happy D., Kiyoni Brown, Liam, P. Bo, Tika and Tre. Hip-hop culture in a box. Setting out to give older girls a reality check, this month Mattel introduced Flavas, its first doll designed to catch the eye of a modern tween (8- to 12-year-olds). Wendy Wedemier-Hinds, 33, of Miramar, says when she looks at the dolls, "I automatically think of hip-hop." Even the name Flava (hip-hop slang for personal style) is trendy. "It's Barbie with a twist," says Robert Rosenberg, manager...

Imagine 99 identical Barbie dolls in green Army fatigues and boots arrayed in parade rank before a crimson backdrop. It's an image of militaristic, monolithic power that pretty much sums up artist Mina Cheon's decidedly dim view of totalitarian rule. But in 99 Miss Kims (2005), on view at C. Grimaldis Gallery in the exhibit Mina Cheon: Addressing Dolls, Cheon marshals nearly 100 smaller-than-life doll figures as surrogates for the tense, larger-than-life human drama unfolding on the Korean peninsula. The piece is a not-so-veiled reference to the ideological and cultural regimentation imposed by North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Il, and...

They're marketed as the all-American girls, each representing a different period in American history. But CBS 11 found the American Girl dolls that teach our heritage aren't really American.

Stockholm's most prestigious department store, Nordiska Kompaniet (NK), has had to remove a set of black ragdolls from its Christmas window display after receiving a number of complaints from concerned customers. A visit to NK's Christmas displays has been a part of Stockholmers' staple holiday traditions ever since 1915. This year's theme was “A dream Christmas”. Puppies, dragons and polar bears danced side-by-side with sugar plum fairies and... what appeared to be golliwogs. When the windows were first available for public consumption on Sunday, one featured three of the black dolls emerging from a Christmas package. "The company that does...

The Indonesian mother who created the Salma Muslim doll hopes the toy will help to inspire the virtue of modesty among girls. 28-year-old Sukmawati Suryaman's Barbie-like creation is the latest must-have toy for girls in Indonesia. Head scarfs and ankle-length dresses are in - bikinis and short skirts are out. "She's so cute in her long-sleeves and ankle-length dress," 8-year-old Nabila said.

A foot-high plastic Jesus doll that quotes Scripture and a three-inch Daniel in the lions' den are about to do battle with Barbie and Bratz in toy aisles across America. The nation's largest retailer, Wal-Mart, has announced that it will start carrying a line of faith-based toys in 425 of its 3,376 stores later this month to see if characters such as Spirit Warrior Samson can rival the popularity of superhero figures like Spiderman. The move is a first for the chain, which has carried religious-themed products including stationery and books before but never a line of toys. A spokesman...

Real love is hard to find for one Japanese man, who has transferred his affection and desires to dozens of plastic sex dolls.

With popular children’s doll lines featuring sexy clothing and gossip magazines aimed at preteens, society is turning girls into sexual objects earlier and earlier.   This was the lament of a senior Catholic bishop, who said such premature sexualizing of girls at a tender age should be one of the most serious issues confronting Philippine society. “The messages they receive through popular culture is that to be attractive, to be accepted by society, you have to dress and behave in a sexual manner. There are now lingerie clothing lines for preteen girls, and bras for girls under 10, T-shirts with...

A shopkeeper was told by police to remove Golliwogs from her window display - because they were offensive. Moira Pickering, 62, was warned that she risked breaching race hate laws if she failed to take them down. Recently bereaved widow Moira has been selling the dolls in her shop Stalybridge Reproductions in the town near Manchester for years and said they had never caused offence. Moira said the action was political correctness gone mad She said: "A woman came in and began taking photos. I thought she was taking a photo of the table and chairs, but then she went...

Hanging with Saddam novelty toy. Saddam is at the end of his rope in this funny toy.

A note arrived recently from Lori Bell-Santek, who is frustrated because she has been unable to find African-American Baby Alive dolls for her two biracial granddaughters. She made the rounds at Target, Wal-Mart and a few other stores and all she could find were white versions of Baby Alive. "In Wal-Mart," she wrote, "I took a moment to look up and down the aisles. It was the day after Thanksgiving, and the store was filled with shoppers. In the doll aisle were several little girls of color, and they were all looking at the same 'white, blond, blue-eyed' dolls. I...