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New York man pleads guilty to smuggling nearly 40,000 piranhas into the U.S. (CNN) -- New York City resident Joel Rakower bit off more than he could chew when he smuggled nearly 40,000 piranhas into the United States. Rakower pleaded guilty Wednesday in federal court in Brooklyn to smuggling the deadly piranhas from 2011 to 2012, according to a U.S. Department of Justice statement. The federal Lacey Act combats trafficking in "illegal" wildlife, fish and plants. In a plea agreement, Rakower admitted that his company purchased piranhas from a Hong Kong tropical fish supplier and imported them to the city,...

Manasquan, NJ --(Ammoland.com)- Saiga 12’s, Benelli M4’s and virtually any other tactical/military shotgun can no longer be banned from import by the ATF. A little noticed provision tucked into a large appropriations bill obviously flew under the radar of the “Brady Bunch” and the “Illegal Mayors.” The new law effectively kills ATF’s plan to stop tactical/military shotgun imports by way of abusing the “sporting purpose” requirement and their agency rulemaking powers. The “Fiscal Year 2012 Agriculture, Commerce/Justice/Science (CJS) and Transportation/Housing/Urban Development (THUD) Appropriations bills”, also known as the “Mini-Bus”, was passed by Congress, and signed into law by President Obama...

With Obamacare now law, PhRMA, it seems, can breathe a sigh of relief. Their $80 billion deal with the Obama administration held. Not so fast, says Sen. Byron Dorgan (D., N.D.). He tells NRO that he “intends” to offer an amendment in the near future to allow prescription-drug imports. “It became clear that I didn't have the votes on the health-care reform bill, but there are not any agreements beyond that.”

WASHINGTON – The Senate rejected a plan Tuesday to allow Americans to import low-cost prescriptions from abroad, handing drug makers a victory that may help secure passage of President Barack Obama's health care overhaul.

I watched a documentary last summer about the loss of jobs in America. Small, middle class towns formerly supported by jobs in maufacturing (such as Thompson TVs, Rubbermaid, RCA, etc) are dead and defunct because the plants closed. Can you guess why? The Trade Agreement with China (thanks Willie!). Here are a few interesting facts: Wal-Mart is the largest corporation in the world. Dell+IBM+GM+GE+Microsoft+HP = Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart buys its product from 6,000 suppliers. Wal-Mart built its gargantuan buying headquarters in China, because 80% of those suppliers are in China. They buy finished products in China (where the factory workers are...

The purpose of FreeRepublic.com's multiple message boards is to limit the topics for each board to particular topics. Posting the same message on all the boards defeats the purpose of multiple-boards for special topics. It is very annoying to see the same message on every bulletin board. PLEASE! DO THE READERS A FAVOR. STOP CROSS-POSTING YOUR MESSAGES!

CONCLUSION On the basis of its evaluation of proposals to date, CBO has concluded that permitting the importation of foreign-distributed prescription drugs would produce at most a modest reduction in prescription drug spending in the United States. H.R. 2427, for example, which would have permitted importation from a broad set of industrialized countries, was estimated to reduce total drug spending by $40 billion over 10 years, or by about 1 percent.(14) Permitting importation only from Canada would produce a negligible reduction in drug spending.

On Monday, December 8, 2003, President Bush signed into law a Medicare prescription drug benefits package designed to help American seniors pay for their medications. This month, the Kerry campaign released a TV ad attacking President Bush’s Medicare record stating, “The very next day George Bush imposes the biggest Medicare premium increase in history while prescription drug costs still skyrocket.” There are several problems with this ad, namely that fact that 1) Kerry skipped the December 8 vote and 2) Kerry voted to support the increase in Medicare premiums that he now criticizes. The Kerry campaign offers no specifics on...

FDA Takes Steps to Shut Down Company Importing Drugs From Canada By Lauran Neergaard The Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) - The federal government moved Thursday to shut down another company that imports cheaper Canadian drugs to the United States. The Food and Drug Administration gave Expedite-Rx of Temple, Texas, 15 days to quit or face legal action. The warning letter marks the third time the FDA has moved to shut down suppliers who defy its ban on the importation of foreign drugs. Expedite-Rx supplies drugs to some employees and retirees of Montgomery, Ala., one of two U.S. cities so far...

**snip** Trade Issues Q. Will the import of certain products from Canada impact U.S. export markets? A. We have been in close communication with our export partners regarding these actions. After failing to implement appropriate BSE preventative measures---measures that have been in place in Canada and the United States since 1989---Japan has had seven reported cases of BSE. The Japanese consumer received mixed messages about BSE and consumer confidence fell. Japan’s government responded by requesting an identification process from all beef suppliers----and this was being discussed prior to BSE in Canada. We do not feel that the Japanese government is...