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As D.C. continued to dig out from Snowmageddon and is keeping an eye on another storm system, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration was busy making a climate change announcement. NOAA, part of the Department of Commerce, is going to be providing information to individuals and decision-makers through a new NOAA Climate Service office. “More and more, Americans are witnessing the impacts of climate change in their own backyards, including sea-level rise, longer growing seasons, changes in river flows, increases in heavy downpours, earlier snowmelt and extended ice-free seasons in our waters. People are searching for relevant and timely information...

When Republicans take President Obama up on his invitation to hash out their differences over health care this month, they will carry with them a fairly well-developed set of ideas intended to make health insurance more widely available and affordable, by emphasizing tax incentives and state innovations, with no new federal mandates and only a modest expansion of the federal safety net. It is not clear that Republicans and the White House are willing to negotiate seriously with each other, and Mr. Obama has rejected Republican demands that he start from scratch in developing health care legislation. But Congressional Republicans...

A federal immigration judge will decide Thursday whether President Obama's aunt, who has been in the United States illegally for years, will be allowed to stay. Zeituni Onyango, 57, applied for political asylum in 2002, citing violence in her native Kenya. She is the half-sister of the president's late father.

Congress has been working on a health care bill for the better part of a year. The coverage of the legislation inevitably takes on a day-to-day, blow-by-blow account of the political machinations in Washington, D.C. The public option is in, then it's out, then maybe it's in with a trigger, then it's out, then maybe Medicare is expanded to include some as young as 55, then that's out. The legislation will have changed more between the time we write this and you read it. Anything to come up with 60 votes in the Senate in a big hurry. What's easy...

Let's see now... Over in Copenhagen, we have Robert Mugabe, perhaps the most brutal and corrupt despot in Africa, whose life's work has been to destroy the once-prosperous country of Zimbabwe, lecturing the West on the "hypocrisy" of its position on climate change. (Zimbabwe doesn't have to worry about greenhouse gas emissions, because, thanks to Mugane, its economy is in a state of collapse.) We have the government of China, which won't allow its citizens free access to the Internet, complaining that the climate summit is "not transparent." We have Hugo Chavez, who took time off from shutting down Venezuela's...

The fight over global warming science is about to cross the Atlantic with a U.S. researcher poised to sue NASA, demanding release of the same kind of climate data that has landed a leading British center in hot water over charges it skewed its data. Chris Horner, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, said NASA has refused for two years to provide information under the Freedom of Information Act that would show how the agency has shaped its climate data and would explain why the agency has repeatedly had to correct its data going as far back as...

The Norwegian Government has allocated NOK 92 million to cover extraordinary costs in providing security for US President Barack Obama when he arrives in Oslo to accept his Nobel Peace Prize in December. The police will have NOK 80 million to draw on, and the Norwegian Defence NOK 12 million. Justice Minister Knut Storberget has said that if needed, another NOK 42 million will be available, depending on the length of Obama's visit. Nothing is official as yet, but the President may make a short stop-over at the UN climate conference in Copenhagen, before landing in Oslo on December 9th...

Will Obama save Christmas? How many of you are planning for your Christmas and devising ways to not spend? This has been a big theme for the past month or so in my family. Our family decided 'regifting' this year is the way to go. We're drawing names and giving something unused from our house that we don't need. Stuff like picture frames, platters, duplicate power drills or screwdrivers, and odd things that are nice, but we don't use. Presents we've gotten over the years. My junk in storage. Nice things we just don't need or use. This Christmas, I...

Friday, October 9, 2009 The Nobel Farce By David Reagan Once again the Norwegian Nobel Committee has surprised the world with its Peace Prize Award by granting it to President Barack Obama. Keep in mind this is the same group that gave the award to Al Gore in 2007 and Jimmy Carter in 2002. What was Al Gore’s accomplishment? The production of a documentary film that propagandized the myth that global warming is due to carbon emissions. Big deal! And Jimmy Carter? Well, the worst president of the 20th Century distinguished himself as a rabid anti-Semite, a vociferous America-basher, and...

The most popular headline at the Real Clear Politics Web site the other day was: "Is Obama Becoming A Joke?" With brilliant comedic timing, the very next morning the Norwegians gave him the Nobel Peace Prize. Up next: His stunning victory in this year's Miss World contest. Dec. 12, Johannesburg. You read it here first. For what, exactly, did he win the Nobel? As the president himself put it: "When you look at my record, it's very clear what I have done so far. And that is nothing. Almost one year and nothing to show for it. You don't believe...

AP: OSLO, Norway. A woman who was troubled with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind Obama through security today, and touched the hem of his garment. The woman claimed that she said within herself: "If I shall touch only his garment, I shall be healed." And Obama, turning and seeing her, said, "Be of good heart, daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole. And the woman was made whole from that hour." In response, Obama was granted the Nobel Prize in Medicine.

Former Vice President Al Gore and current White House climate change czar Carol Browner are warning companies and lawmakers that the courts will step in to regulate greenhouse gases if Congress fails to act. "All of the discussion has been about the president and the Congress," Gore told journalists at a U.N. press conference Tuesday. "We have a third branch of government: the courts."

Kane cheated. But don't expect him to be contrite. Local radio host Kane of 99.5 FM said on his show Wednesday that he was responsible for engineering and perpetuating a bogus story that national media covered widely last week. Repeating a stunt that had been successful in other radio markets, Kane deployed an intern to stand by the side of Leesburg Pike near Tysons Corner with a sign announcing infidelity: "I cheated. This is my punishment." Then the young man, who called himself William Taylor, gave Kane an exclusive interview about the whole affair. Kane (who refuses to disclose his...

Before the Senate takes its summer break, a handful of Senators are taking a chance to trash the climate bill. A group of moderate Senators wrote a letter to Barack Obama telling him that they cannot support the climate bill unless it's further weakend ease the burden of cap and trade policies. Seperately, John McCain ripped the bill while talking to Stephen Moore at the Wall Street Journal. . . . . . Over at the Wall Street Journal, John McCain takes a harder stance, saying, "this 1,400-page bill is a farce. They bought every industry off—steel mills, agriculture, utilities...I...

<p>Fellow Freepers, which sort of conservative described in this list are you?</p>

Time magazine devotes a feature of more than 4,700 words to the dispute between George W. Bush and Dick Cheney over the former’s refusal to pardon Lewis “Scooter” Libby, the vice presidential aide convicted of obstructing an investigation into the leaking of a CIA officer’s identity

Next time someone tells you intelligent design is “based on religion,” you might point him to American Founder Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of Independence. As I explain in a special July 4th edition of ID the Future, Jefferson not only believed in intelligent design, he insisted it was based on the plain evidence of nature, not religion. Ironically, the critics of intelligent design often think they are defending the principles of Jefferson. The National Council for the Social Studies, for example, claims that intelligent design is religion and then cites Jefferson’s famous Letter to the Danbury Baptists calling...

Rooters AFPUPI, 09-JUIN-23 Jimmy Carter today declared today that Iran's June elections were conducted in a "free and fair" manner, especially when compared with the USA's 2000 and 2004 elections which were "obviously flawed". He blamed the current violence on an "irresponsible" 2008 speech to the Iranian people by former president Bush that instigated anti-social tendencies in some the voting public of the nation of 70 million workers.

"We need to send a message to Congress and the president that we want them to take the actions that are needed to preserve climate for young people and future generations and all life on the planet," says Hansen, who has likened coal-fired power plants to "factories of death" and claims he was muzzled by the Bush administration when he warned of drastic climate changes.

Antarctic warming isn't evidence of climate change – despite what scientists would have us believe Just about every major outlet has jumped on the news: Antarctica is warming up. Most previous science had indicated that, despite a warming of global temperatures, readings from Antarctica were either staying the same or even going down. The problem with Antarctic temperature measurement is that all but three longstanding weather stations are on or very near the coast. Antarctica is a big place, about one-and-a-half times the size of the US. Imagine trying to infer our national temperature only with stations along the Atlantic...

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) pauses during a ceremony in Janusz Korczak Square at Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem, July 23, 2008. Obama began a visit to Jerusalem on Wednesday pledging staunch support for Israel and saying that if elected, he would work to reinvigorate the Middle East peace process. REUTERS/Jim Young (JERUSALEM) US PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION CAMPAIGN 2008 (USA

CARACAS, Venezuela - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez urged Colombian rebels on Sunday to lay down their weapons, unilaterally free dozens of hostages and put an end to a decades-long armed struggle against Colombia's government. Chavez sent the uncharacteristically strong message to the leaders of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, saying their ongoing efforts to overthrow Colombia's democratically elected government were unjustified. "The guerrilla war is history," said Chavez, speaking during his weekly television and radio program, "Hello President." "At this moment in Latin America, an armed guerrilla movement is out of place." Such declarations were unexpected from...

It has been a long and slow devolution from the Federalist Papers to Monday Night Raw. ... Monday night, in a state of utter disbelief, I witnessed the intersection of surrealism that may portend the downfall of America. Osama bin Laden could not have devised a more fiendish way of eradicating American self respect, or of amplifying inanity to near-atomic destructive levels. Our presidential candidates appeared and talked smack on a professional wrestling television program. ... When I caught wind that McCain, Clinton and Obama would make appearances on a wrestling telecast, I had an overwhelming urge to crack open...

OKLAHOMA CITY -- The federal government is investigating whether the Oklahoma Department of Public Safety violated the civil rights of Iranian immigrants by refusing to provide them with driver's license tests in their native Farsi language. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration launched the investigation in March after a complaint filed on behalf of two Iranian nationals living in Bartlesville accused the state agency of unlawful discrimination based on their national origin, according to a letter from the NHTSA to Public Safety Commissioner Kevin Ward. Public safety officials said Tuesday that offering state driver's license tests in Farsi could force...

Earlier this week, I argued that Canada's human-rights censors have managed a seemingly impossible task: They've found a way to rehabilitate the image of neo-Nazis, transforming them from odious dirtbags into principled free-speech martyrs. Case in point: At this week's much-anticipated human-rights hearing in Ottawa, a team of journalists and bloggers were campaigning openly in support of hatemonger Marc Lemire. The villains were Canadian Human Rights Commission (HRC) investigator Dean Steacy and the other apparatchik who've made a career out of parsing Lemire's phobic Web postings. Tuesday's hearing probably won't change the outcome of the case against Lemire: Like a...

OTTAWA -- Investigators at the Canadian Human Rights Commission share control of an online identity called Jadewarr, which they have used to anonymously monitor and contribute to controversial far-right and white supremacist Web sites, in a strategy that a prominent defendant calls entrapment. The admission came in testimony Tuesday at the final day of the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal's hearing in the case of Marc Lemire, who is charged with violating the Human Rights Act's controversial hate speech section because of comments posted on his FreedomSite. Legally, the admission by CHRC investigator Dean Steacy, and the subsequent cross-examination by Mr....

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon named actor George Clooney, who has campaigned for refugees in Darfur, as a U.N. "messenger of peace" on Friday to promote the world body's peacekeeping efforts. Clooney is the ninth U.N. messenger -- people chosen from the fields of art, music, literature and sports who have agreed to help focus attention on the United Nations' work. U.N. spokeswoman Michele Montas said Clooney would have a special emphasis on peacekeeping. She said he had been "recognized for focusing public attention on crucial international political and social issues." Clooney, who is currently in Sudan, will...

The Republican presidential candidates shown leading the race in recent polls all believe global warming is a serious threat and caused by human activity. When asked at today's Des Moines Register debate in Iowa to raise their hands if they believed climate change were indeed a real problem caused by people, Sen. John McCain, former Mayor Rudy Giuliani, former Gov. Mike Huckabee and former Gov. Mitt Romney all responded in the positive. "Climate change is real. It's happening. I believe human beings are contributing to it," Giuliani said, calling for a "Manhattan Project" to wean America off foreign energy sources....

(AFFP) 07MAY07 Paris. Hundreds of U.S.-trained election attorneys boarded transatlantic flights this morning to form an army of lawyers demanding a full and fair recount of yesterday's nationwide election. Following the dramatic triumph of conservative Nicolai Sarkozy over rival progressive Sego Royal widespread calls of election fraud have been reported from New York to as far as Los Angeles and Hollywood, CA. A hastily formed team of specialists from the newly formed Kerry, Rodham and Gore LLC firm organized the campaign challenge and its spokesperson R. Emmanual feels optimistic, "We can clearly show some form of cognitive dissonance is afoot...

A Farce and an OutrageBy Mona CharenFriday, February 2, 2007 "As I was walking up the stair/ I met a man who wasn't there./ He wasn't there again today./ I wish, I wish he'd stay away." -- Hughes Mearns Mearns captures the spirit of Washington, D.C. We are in the midst of a criminal trial concerning the leaking of CIA covert operative Valerie Plame's name to the press. The man on trial did not do the leaking. The man who did the leaking is not on trial. The woman who is the subject of the fictional leak was probably not...

A federal judge has ordered a series of closed hearings to determine if Vice President Cheney's former top aide, I Lewis "Scooter" Libby, can use certain classified information as a defense during his trial in the CIA/Leak case. Judge Reggie Walton ordered two sets of closed door hearings. The first, to begin on September 25th, and "continue everyday thereafter until completed," will be to make all determinations concerning the use, relevance, or admissibility of classified information that would otherwise be made during the trial. The second set of closed hearing, set to begin October 10th, will deal with classified information...

SACRAMENTO – Students who came to the country illegally could apply for state financial aid when they attend California colleges and universities under legislation approved Tuesday by the Assembly in a party-line vote. Supporters said immigrant children who have graduated and completed at least three years of high school in California should not be penalized for their parents' decision to bring them to the U.S. illegally. “It is one small measure to help these kids that are working their butts off to live the American dream,” said Assemblyman Hector De La Torre, D-South Gate. The bill would build upon existing...

Hizbollah mourners on a funeral parade shoved aside anti-tank barriers at a United Nations base in Lebanon yesterday in a demonstration of their new political strength. The party had been told it would be allowed to bury three "martyrs" at the Naqoura town cemetery inside the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (Unifil) compound, but only if there was no flag-waving or political sloganising. When the chanting procession, several hundred strong, reached the gates, it found the way barred by cruci-form steel tank traps. Mourners argued with the French guards, but failed to gain entry. A mob of young men then...

This guy, Stack, is one of the war protesters at the Columbia Post Office on Saturday morns. Will he do the same "fasting" as Mother Sheehan? LOL

Bush Fetes Border Security Improvements CRAWFORD, Texas - With 6,000 National Guard troops deployed to Southwestern states, President Bush said Saturday he has fulfilled his pledge to help beef up border security and challenged Congress to give him legislation that will welcome more foreigners into the country. Speaking in his weekly radio address, Bush said immigration reform can only be successful if the get-tough border security to keep people from sneaking in is combined with opportunities for more immigrants to enter the country legally.

The United Nations Security Council this week passed a resolution that gives Iran a stark choice: suspend its uranium-enrichment activities or face possible economic sanctions. There has been mounting alarm over Iran's nuclear activities. Tehran insists that it is merely exercising its right as a member of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) to develop a peaceful nuclear-energy program. That means carrying out all facets of the nuclear-fuel cycle -- including uranium enrichment and nuclear-fuel reprocessing, which can also be used to develop a nuclear bomb. Arguing that it enjoys the right to peaceful nuclear technology, Tehran has suspended talks with...

[I wrote to Boortz today about this, but he didn't respond. I didn't expect him to. Maybe he will discuss it if enough people here make noise.] The Fair Tax - Why we are all being fooled... ... and why it is just lip service. Since the start, way back in the days of CATS (Citizens for an Alternative Tax System), I have been an advocate of the Fair Tax. Back then I was naive. I was doing the cool thing. I have learned a lot about what this "Alternative Tax System" has evolved to... The Fair Tax.

Just curious. Has Hillary Clinton prime sponsored evenone bill that has passed a senate vote ?I'm guessing Not.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - After spending half his life in a Pakistani jail, Tahir Mirza Hussain is scheduled to hang on his 36th birthday for killing a taxi driver _ even though a court acquitted him 10 years ago. Hussain, a British-Pakistani, claims he is innocent. He was cleared by a secular court but retried and found guilty in an Islamic one. He now faces execution June 1 unless President Gen. Pervez Musharraf intervenes. His muddled case, spanning two decades, is emblematic of Pakistan's corrupt and bifurcated legal system, described by a leading rights activist as "flawed" and in desperate need...

Americans are coming to realize the United Nations is not the organization we once trusted, even revered. The United Nations betrays the idealism expressed in the preamble to its charter, forged over 60 years ago in San Francisco, which states, "We the peoples of the United Nations determined ... to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small ..." Two recent events demonstrate why the American people and their elected officials should be scrutinizing our country's subsidization of the...

Will CIA-leak prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald indict Karl Rove? Who knows? While some observers search the tea leaves for answers, the only real answer right now is that nobody outside of Fitzgerald’s office knows for sure. And it’s possible that nobody inside Fitzgerald’s office knows for sure either.But let’s say, for the sake of argument, that Rove is indicted. If that were to happen, it appears he would be charged with lying to Fitzgerald’s grand jury and not with any underlying crime, such as exposing a covert CIA agent.In that event, a Rove prosecution would probably resemble the case of Lewis...

Top Ten Surprises In ABC's Bird Flu Movie (Presented By Britney Spears) 10. Thanks to sponsorship deal, flu is cured by delicious taste of Dr. Pepper 9. Humans attacked by pigeons with tire irons 8. 20% of population comes down with less dangerous "bird hiccups" 7. Every time someone says, "chicken," all the characters chug a beer 6. Hilarious scene in which Leslie Nielsen confuses his Tamiflu with his Viagra 5. Every single person in the world ends up at General Hospital 4. The big villain? Larry Bird 3. Sad conclusion in which Charlie Brown puts a bullet in Woodstock...

UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei is in Tehran for talks aimed at defusing an international stand-off over Iran's nuclear activities. He said he hoped to convince Iran to suspend its uranium enrichment "until outstanding issues are clarified". There has been mounting international criticism of Iran over its announcement on Tuesday that it has successfully enriched uranium.

DEPENDING on whom you talk to in Hollywood these days, Hillary Clinton is either too conservative, too polarizing, too famous, too stiff or — keep this to yourself! — too sexy. And those are just the opinions of the celebrities who vote Democrat. (Don't even ask what the few Republicans had to say.) Once the darling of the industry's liberal set, Clinton has come under attack from some as she starts to line up support for what many feel will be a run for the presidential nomination. But that's not unusual for Hollywood — it's almost like a rite of...

Updated: 07:49 AM EST AOL Welcome page headine: "It started with her son's death. See how Cindy Sheen became a force."Acutal article headline: 'Peace Mom' Still Campaigning Against War By MICHELLE LOCKE, AP Jakub Mosur, APSAN FRANCISCO (March 5) - Lunching in the Mission District in a dark skirt, black cardigan and unfussy hairdo, Cindy Sheehan looks every bit the anonymous suburban mom she was not long ago. As the nation's best-known anti-war campaigner, Cindy Sheehan has drawn praise for her efforts, but others believe she has become a tool of liberal groups. That doesn't deter a man who stops...

Bye-Bye, Kyoto One thing George W. Bush got exactly right was Kyoto. The treaty isn't working, and a lot of folks who bought into it are now looking for an exit strategy | By Dan SeligmanTHE YEAR JUST ended was a fateful time for the Kyoto Protocol. It was the year in which the treaty, negotiated in 1997 as a way to slow global warming, formally took effect. That was in February. It was also the year in which Kyoto became operational, i.e., a whole bunch of rules were adopted at a conference in Montreal. That was in November. Finally,...

Valerie Plame's Last Day at the CIA Sources Confirm Betrayed Agent's Departure From Agency By PETE YOST, AP WASHINGTON (Dec. 9) - Valerie Plame, the CIA officer whose exposure led to a criminal investigation of the Bush White House, spent her last day at the spy agency Friday. Neither the agency nor Plame's husband would confirm her departure, but two people who have known Plame for a number of years confirmed she was leaving. Married to Bush administration critic and former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson, Plame was working at agency headquarters in Langley, Virginia, in 2003 when her CIA status...

by Mark Finkelstein December 5, 2005 - 15:39. Someone, quick: buy the man a Valium. Make it a double! I'm sure most here remember the hysterics in which Shep Smith engaged while reporting from New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina. He was back at it today, shouting, screaming and accusing as he zinged the government for its shortcomings as detailed in the just-released 9/11 Commission 'report card' on implementation of its national security recommendations. Thankfully, Shep had James Carafano, across the video lines, to hold his hand, burp him on the back and assure him that the sky wasn't...

Uniformed Mexicans with guns, bulldozer seize drug-bust truck from Border Patrol U.S. Border Patrol agents were backed down this week by armed men, dressed in what appeared to be Mexican military uniforms and carrying military weapons, who seized a captured dump truck filled with marijuana from the U.S. agents and dragged it across the border into Mexico with a bulldozer. The border incident occurred Thursday evening when Border Patrol agents attempted to pull over a dump truck on Interstate 10 in Hudspeth County, Texas. The driver fled from the agents, exiting the freeway and driving toward the Rio Grande which...

By Elizabeth Pineau and Sophie Louet PARIS (Reuters) - President Jacques Chirac on Sunday vowed to restore order in France after riots in Paris spread across the country and began to unnerve his European neighbours. "The Republic is quite determined, by definition, to be stronger than those who want to sow violence or fear," Chirac said after a special domestic security council met to respond to the latest violence in which 1,300 vehicles went up in flames. "The law must have the last word," Chirac said in his first public comments since the riots started in the poor suburbs, noting...