Free Republic

A House-approved bill that the president supports would expand the draconian penalties he supposedly wants to abolish.When he ran for president in 2020, Joe Biden repudiated his long history of pushing harsh penalties for nonviolent drug offenses, calling for the abolition of mandatory minimum sentences. "Biden supports an end to mandatory minimums," his campaign said. "As president, he will work for the passage of legislation to repeal mandatory minimums at the federal level." But by endorsing a bill aimed at cracking down on fentanyl analogs, Biden is doing exactly the opposite. The HALT Fentanyl Act, which the Republican-controlled House of...

Germany hardened its stance Thursday against Turkey over its military offensive against a Kurdish militia in Syria, which threatened to end a thaw in frosty relations between the NATO partners. Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel voiced "great concern" about Turkey's cross-border military incursion, called for NATO to discuss the situation and said Berlin would put on ice any weapons deals. Most painfully for Turkey, he postponed for at least several months a request to upgrade German-made Leopard tanks which Ankara has deployed in its operation against the Syrian-Kurdish militia YPG.Gabriel said Berlin and Paris were committed "to stopping a further escalation,...

  The Department of Justice has ended its Obama-era Operation Chokepoint initiative, which aimed to block some businesses, including firearm dealers and payday lenders, from having access to bank loans. The department made the revelation in response to an inquiry from House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte Thursday. In a letter to Goodlatte and ranking committee member John Conyers, Assistant Attorney General Stephen F. Boyd wrote that DOJ considers Operation Chokepoint a “misguided initiative conducted during the previous administration.” The news was first reported by Politico. “We share your view that law abiding businesses should not be targeted simply for...

As new U.S. sanctions against Russia loom, the Kremlin has shut down—at least for now—intensive high level communications between top U.S. and Russian officials. Since the invasion of Crimea, President Vladimir Putin and President Barack Obama have had regular phone calls in an often half-hearted attempt to deescalate the ongoing crisis inside Ukraine. But as the U.S. and EU prepare to unveil new sanctions against Russia, Putin has decided the interactions should stop. The Kremlin has ended high-level contact with the Obama administration, according to diplomatic officials and sources close to the Russian leadership. The move signals an end to...

It’s about dang time this happens. Heck, just last week evangelical Christians were once again lumped in with extremists at Fort Hood. And a few weeks ago it happened at Camp Shelby. You can’t tell me there isn’t some mastermind behind these briefings. After all, we know the Obama administration is replacing commanders in the military with ones who agree with them. Which means ‘radicals’. FOX NEWS – The Secretary of the Army has ordered military leaders to halt all briefings on extremist organizations that labeled Evangelical Christian groups as domestic hate groups. The shutdown comes just four days after...

During the 2010 midterm elections, California voters rejected Prop. 23 – a provision that would have postponed the implementation of the state’s cap and trade program until unemployment was down for five consistent years. But in a ruling published on Monday, a San Francisco superior court judge went a step further and halted the entire program, arguing the California Air Resources Board (CARB) was “unable to make an informed decision” because it had failed to consider other alternatives. In his 35-page ruling, Judge Ernest H. Goldsmith wrote that the cap and trade plan “fails to provide meaningful information or discussion...

The Hamas-affiliated Palestinian Media Center quoted Israeli National Radio as reporting that the US had halted funding for the wall currently being built along Egypt's 14-kilometer border with the Gaza Strip and recalled American engineers working on the project. According to the center, the US canceled US$500 million that had been initially allocated for the wall, deciding instead to grant the US-backed Palestinian Fatah movement US$400 million following a recent visit to the US by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

NEW ORLEANS – A bolt of lightning struck the ship capturing oil from a blown-out BP well in the Gulf of Mexico on Tuesday, igniting a fire that halted containment efforts in another setback for the embattled company in its nearly two-month struggle to stop the spill, the company said. The fire was quickly extinguished and no one was injured. BP said it hopes to resume containing oil from the well sometime Tuesday afternoon. The fire occurred on the Discoverer Enterprise, where engineers are siphoning about 630,000 gallons of oil a day through a cap on top of the well....

President Obama's new offshore drilling plan opens up some new areas for oil and gas exploration but also cancels some Alaska lease sales planned for the next two years, putting billions of barrels of oil out of reach for now. The long-awaited plan, announced Wednesday, expands drilling opportunities off the coast of the southern Atlantic seaboard, in the Gulf of Mexico and some parts of Alaska, but halts other future sales in Alaska's Chukchi and Beaufort seas that drilling advocates say could account for far more oil than the new areas the president proposes to open up.

Health care workers in New York will no longer be forced to get the H1N1 swine flu vaccine, CBS 2 has learned. A state Supreme Court judge issued a restraining order Friday against the state from enforcing the controversial mandatory vaccination. The order came as the Public Employees Federation sued to reverse a policy requiring vaccination against the seasonal and swine flu viruses, arguing that state Health Commissioner Richard Daines overstepped his authority. Three parties – the Public Employees Federaion, New York State United Teachers, and an attorney representing four Albany nurses – challenged the order and for now the...

JAKARTA (AFP) – Drinkers in Indonesia are facing the daunting possibility of a dry festive season, with hotels, restaurants, bars and clubs across the Muslim-majority nation hit by an extreme shortage of alcohol. Many top brands have disappeared from shelves while prices for lesser known and even poor quality labels have skyrocketed after a government crackdown on a flourishing black market in booze. The measures are the latest in Indonesia's anti-corruption fight, with the finance ministry moving against alleged collusion between customs agents and illegal importers trying to bypass stiff import duties as high as several hundred percent. With the...

President Evo Morales has announced he is suspending "indefinitely" the operations of the US Drug Enforcement Administration in Bolivia.Mr Morales accused the agency of having encouraged anti-government protests in the country in September. He did not say whether its staff would be asked to leave the country, as coca- growers have been pressing him to do. Bolivia's first indigenous president once served as the leader of the country's union of coca-growers.

SEATTLE - A federal judge issued a preliminary injunction Wednesday to stop Weyerhaeuser Co. from logging in spotted owl habitat on four parcels of private land in Washington. U.S. District Judge Marsha J. Pechman did not grant, however, an additional request by the Seattle Audubon Society to stop the state of Washington from granting permits to log in spotted owl habitat. The injunction from logging covers spotted owl habitat within 2.7 miles of the center of four circles of land in southwestern Washington that are owned by Weyerhaeuser. "It really shows the Endangered Species Act still has some teeth in...

LAGOS, Nigeria (Reuters) -- Villagers with sticks and machetes staged a protest at a major U.S.-operated oil production facility in Nigeria on Monday, forcing it to halt 42,000 barrels a day output, authorities said. It was the latest in a string of attacks on Western oil industry targets in the world's eighth largest exporter, which has curbed Nigerian output by a quarter and helped fuel a global oil price rally. The protest at the gates of Chevron's Abiteye flow station in the western Niger Delta, which feeds the 160,000 barrel per day Escravos export terminal, was triggered by alleged delays...

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - A federal judge halted a $320 million irrigation project Thursday for fear it could disturb the habitat of a woodpecker that may or may not be extinct. The dispute involves the ivory-billed woodpecker. The last confirmed sighting of the bird in North America was in 1944, and scientists had thought the species was extinct until 2004, when a kayaker claimed to have spotted one in the area. But scientists have been unable to confirm the sighting. Still, U.S. District Judge William R. Wilson said that for purposes of the lawsuit brought by environmental groups, he had...

A federal appeals court on Friday ordered a temporary halt to logging in two sections of the Eldorado National Forest east of Sacramento that were damaged by wildfires in 2004. A lower court in August denied a request by two environmental organizations to immediately end the logging, but the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the Earth Island Institute and the Center for Biological Diversity are likely to eventually win their lawsuit. Allowing logging to continue could cause too much damage to the forests while the lawsuit proceeds, the San Francisco-based appeals court ruled. Many of the trees killed...

Riot by migrant workers halts construction of Dubai skyscraper Brian Whitaker and agencies Thursday March 23, 2006 The Guardian (UK) Construction of what is expected to be the world's tallest building was halted yesterday after 2,500 workers in Dubai rioted over pay and conditions, causing damage estimated at £500,000. The trouble broke out on Tuesday night when buses due to take labourers to a residential camp at the end of their shift were delayed, witnesses said. Workers from the Burj Dubai tower site and surrounding housing developments then chased and assaulted security officers, broke into offices, smashed computers and files,...

Non-Lethal Laser Weapon Halts Aggressors By Eva D. Blaylock / Air Force Research Laboratory Directed Energy Directorate Public Affairs KIRTLAND AIR FORCE BASE, N.M., Nov. 1, 2005 – A laser technology being developed by Air Force Research Laboratory employees at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M., will be the first man-portable, non-lethal deterrrent weapon intended for protecting troops and controlling hostile crowds.The weapon, developed by the laboratory's Directed Energy Directorate, employs a two-wavelength laser system and is the first of its kind as a hand-held, single-operator system for troop and perimeter defense. The laser light used in the weapon temporarily...

MIAMI (AP) - Authorities in Florida are sending convicted sex offenders to jail for violating the terms of their probation by having men's magazines such as Maxim. Andrew Calderon, 23, was jailed for six days before a judge ordered his release after officers found a racy poster and calendar and copies of Maxim in his home earlier this year. A judge will decide next month whether Calderon's probation should be revoked or extended and whether the materials were innocent. Corrections officials said Calderon, who was on probation for the sexual battery of a mentally disabled relative, committed a violation by...

COVINGTON, Tenn. (AP) - Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen put a halt Friday to document shredding in the state personnel department after learning that files were destroyed involving sexual harassment investigations of two men he appointed. The governor ordered the move until a new law can be passed to address the handling of such documents. The order requires the agency "to retain all investigative records, including those related to workplace harassment," said his spokeswoman, Lydia Lenker. The state's previous practice was meant to "protect people who would come forward," the governor said during an appearance in Covington, explaining that department investigators...