Free Republic

The biggest gift came from Swift herself. The singer has donated $250,000 to schools around the country that she's either attended or worked with. The money will pay teachers' salaries as well as buy books and fund various educational programs. "Something I wanted to do at the end of this amazing year and especially on my birthday was give back to something I really believe in, which is education," says Swift. "The schools that I went to and the amazing people I got to learn from really turned me into who I am, and I wanted to give back."

Tens of thousands of osteoporosis sufferers will be denied drugs unless their condition worsens, the NHS medicines rationing body has ruled after a year long legal battle. Campaigners branded the decision 'unethical' and called for the guidance to be reviewed next year. Patients with the disease, which causes the bones to thin and become brittle and prone to fracture, will have fewer treatment options if they do not respond to the first drug, it was argued. The original guidance was issued in October last year and since then the National Institute for health and Clinical Excellence has been embroiled in...

11/23/2009 US Foreign Policy Obama's Nice Guy Act Gets Him Nowhere on the World Stage By Gabor Steingart AP US President Barack Obama is back in the US after an Asian trip that produced few results. When he entered office, US President Barack Obama promised to inject US foreign policy with a new tone of respect and diplomacy. His recent trip to Asia, however, showed that it's not working. A shift to Bush-style bluntness may be coming. There were only a few hours left before Air Force One was scheduled to depart for the flight home. US President Barack Obama...

By Richard Knox In his full-bore battle against brain cancer, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy resorted to treatment many consider experimental -- proton beam radiation therapy. Sen. Kennedy returns to Senate last year after treatment for brain cancer. Medicare pays for it. But his death leaves open a slew of questions about the costly treatment, which delivers high doses of radiation to tumor cells while largely sparing healthy tissue from damage. Did it do him any good? Should Medicare (or private insurers) pay for the unproven treatment? And most politically fraught, should Kennedy's legacy issue -- universal health care -- include...

How much is one additional year of your life worth? Or one more year of life for your father or your wife? For your child? In Great Britain, the government has settled on a number: $45,000. That’s how much a government commission with the Orwellian acronym NICE has decided British government-run health care will pay for one additional year of life for a British subject. Think it could never happen here? Then you need to pay closer attention to what Washington is planning for your health care.

Health Care: There might not be a "death panel," as Sarah Palin described it, but federal bureaucrats will be making end-of-life decisions. That's why state-run medicine is a leading cause of death in Britain and Canada.A post on the former Alaska governor's Facebook page has caused a stir by discussing openly what many privately fear and something we have written about. End-of-life counseling and efforts to measure cost-effectiveness of treatment will combine in a perfect storm to ration care in a way that lets the government decide who lives and who dies. "The America I know and love is not...

Rationing: In the recesses of the House health care "reform" bill is a provision for end-of-life counseling for seniors. Don't worry, granny, they're from the government and they're here to help.At a town hall meeting at AARP headquarters in Washington, D.C., President Obama was asked by a woman from North Carolina if it was true "that everyone that's Medicare age will be visited and told they have to decide how they wish to die." At first, the president joked that not enough government workers existed to ask the elderly how they wanted to die. The idea, he said, was to...

This is my first posting and I aplogize that it is a vanity. But every morning I get up at 5:30 and check into what is happening on FR. My wife appears at about 6:30 and asks what's going on. After a few minutes of me railing, she always asks if there are any "fluffy bunny" stories. Normally, I would consider a perp getting shot, a fluffy bunny story, she is looking for something different. Stories about baby pink elephants are good. Srories about an old WW2 vet getting his H/S diploma are good. So could the FR team help...

GRAPHIC footage of a youth's brutal bashing at a train station shows three attackers taking turns to kick him in the head. Detectives investigating the vicious assault say they are appalled by the level of violence, which left the 23-year-old man from Sunshine in Melbourne's west with serious head injuries. The man was beaten even after he handed over the backpack that appeared to be the motive behind the gang-attack.

For anyone who doubted that NICE people don't exist, here is their website. NICE, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence, is the organization in the UK that sets the guidelines on healthcare rationing for the NHS. Look around the site. See what you find. You'll find quite a bit. Like this gem which I found under Implementation Tools, Costing Tools, CG24 Lung cancer: costing template (England).Click here to go directly to the source. Check out in the first column, second row of the chart..."cost of futile surgery avoided". Note that while the analysis does mention how they can...

After the Mumbai jihad there was a response of "Do good deeds." The Jews of Chabad (the sect that had its members tortured to death) asked for Jews to do "mitzvahs," good works. A yoga group that had some of its members killed believes that love will triumph. Then Deepak Chopra weighed in with his "think good thoughts" campaign. Chopra's effort has the "magic" of if a million people pledge to think good thoughts the world will change for peace. All of these efforts may be summarized by one phrase: Be Nice.

Comity artist, John McCain, told a nice little lady at one of his townhall meetings standing up to state she was afraid of Obama becoming president that, ’Senator Obama is a nice family man, a good man whom McCain would not be afraid of to be president.’ Sorry, that’s just stupidity, not comity. Barack ’ACORN’ Obama is not a nice man, he’s a nightmare for the Republic. Barack Obama is not a nice family man, he‘s a proven liar. A nice man doesn't work legislatively to protect infanticide in Illinois. A nice man doesn't train and fund an army committing...

NICE, France: In patients with multiple sclerosis (MS), immunosuppressive therapy followed by autologous haematopoietic stem cell transplantation elicited high response rates and improved quality of life for up to 6 years. The results of the study were presented here at the 18th Meeting of the European Neurological Society (ENS) by Tatiana Ionova, MD, PhD, Department of Haematology, Pirogov National Medical Surgical Center, Moscow, Russia. During the last decade, high-dose immunosuppressive therapy followed by autologous haematopoietic stem cell transplantation has been used with increasing frequency as a therapeutic option for patients with MS. "The aim of the study was to assess...

The economics of nice folks A basic tenet of economics is that people always behave selfishly, or as the 18th century philosopher economist David Hume put it, "every man ought to be supposed to be a knave." But what if some people aren't always knaves? Sam Bowles argues in Science June 20 that economics will get it wrong then, sometimes badly so. He points to new experimental evidence that people do often act against their own personal self-interest in favor of the common good, and they do so in predictable, understandable ways. Poorly-designed economic institutions fail to take advantage...

This is one of the kindest things I've ever experienced. I have no way to know who sent it, but there is a kind soul working in the dead letter office of the US postal service. Our 14 year old dog, Abbey, died last month. The day after she died, my 4 year old daughter Meredith was crying and talking about how much she missed Abbey. She asked if we could write a letter to God so that when Abbey got to heaven, God would recognize her. I told her that I thought we could so she dictated these words:...

KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Larry Stewart, a millionaire who became known as Secret Santa for his habit of roaming the streets each December and anonymously handing money to people, died Friday. He was 58. Stewart died from complications from esophageal cancer, said Jackson County Sheriff Tom Phillips, a longtime friend. Stewart, who spent 26 years giving a total $1.3 million, gained international attention in November when he revealed himself as Secret Santa. He was diagnosed in April with cancer, and said he wanted to use his celebrity to inspire other people to take random kindness seriously. "That's what we're here...

Our northern neighbor thinks being all multicultural and sucking up to the United Nations will keep the terrorists away. Think again. A FEW YEARS AGO I wrote a cover story for National Review with the subtle and nuanced title, "Bomb Canada: The Case for War." It caused quite a stir up there. My argument at the time was that Canada needed to be slapped out of its delusions and forced to stand up for itself in ways other than the Potemkin courage it shows in "standing up" to the United States. Had I thought of it at the time, maybe...

They help create an hour-glass figure — tucking in the waist, enhancing the cleavage and lending a slimmer, sexier look to the feminine form. Corsets have been in fashion since time immemorial. They were a rage in the Renaissance period and continued to be a hit in the Victorian era, when the desire to reduce the waist and exaggerate the bustline made them popular, mainly as lingerie. Today, corsets are back in fashion with a bang, but with a difference. They’re being paraded down the catwalks and flaunted by modern brides as tops and blouses, teamed with skirts, lehngas and...

THIS HEAT must be frying brains at City Hall. How else to explain the banning of Miss Universe from Nathan Phillips Square? Yes, you read that right. Natalie Glebova, 23, Toronto's own queen of the world, was to star at the Tastes of Thailand festival on the weekend. The Thais are very big on Natalie. She won the Miss Universe title in Bangkok seven weeks ago. Thailand made her an honorary ambassador. Beauty pageants may have waned here. But Miss Universe is mobbed on many streets of the world. And she is from Jarvis and Carlton, for crying out loud....

The municipal drama that plays out each day in City Hall has a reliable cast of characters, their daily arrival as inevitable as budget deficits and comptroller reports. There are the lawmakers on the east side of the building, the mayor on the west, and the lobbyists, advocates and reporters sprinkled throughout. They join with the rest of the powerful and the seeking and the perpetually aggrieved who descend on city government each day. And then there is the challah lady. Soft spoken and unassuming, she strides up the steps of City Hall each week with a few toasty loaves...

WHAT A DAY!

Bush2000 to Try Being Nice for One Week It's an experiment. What the Hell...

NICE, France (Reuters) - A bomb has exploded at an air forces barracks in the French Riviera city of Nice, at a building targeted in past attacks linked to separatists from the unruly Mediterranean isle of Corsica, a local prefect says. Local government prefect Pierre Breuil confirmed that the explosion was caused by a bomb. The explosion wounded a woman guarding a school beside the barracks and shattered windows in the area around the building, witnesses on the scene said on Friday. There was no immediate claim of responsibility. Last July, Corsican separatists, who regularly target state buildings on their...

Suspicious explosions hit government buildings in France Paris-AP -- Two French government buildings have been rocked by explosions today in Nice (NEES). At least 16 people were slightly hurt, including a police officer. One person was hospitalized for observation. The explosions hit the Treasury and Customs buildings, shattering windows for 150 yards and destroying several shops and parked cars. The second one happened soon after firefighters arrived. No word yet if they were bombs, but the French finance minister seems to think so. He says the explosions resulted from "cowardly attacks." Local officials say they're not ruling out any leads,...

Author's "Truth" More Fancy Than Fact Pablo Wegesend Recently, filmmaker and political satirist Michael Moore has been getting some publicity. His most recent book "Stupid White Men" has been on the New York Times bestseller list for a while and his latest film "Bowling for Columbine" has received great applause at the Cannes Film Festival recently. His earlier works include his book "Downsize This", films "Roger and Me" and "The Big One," and the canceled TV show "TV Nation." Some of you may not be familiar with Moore's work. Michael Moore isn't a mainstream star, but he is a...

XXXXX DRUDGE REPORT XXXXX SUN JAN 05, 2003 19:25:38 ET XXXXX WHITE HOUSE ANGER AT BOOK BY BUSH 'AXIS OF EVIL' SPEECHWRITER; CONCERN MEDIA TOUR WILL MUDDLE MESSAGE; FRUM DESCRIBES PRESIDENT AS 'TART' **World Exclusive** Former Bush speechwriter David Frum -- credited with the phrase 'Axis of Evil' -- has infuriated top officials at the White House with his controversial new book, the first insider account of the W. Bush Administration, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned. Frum helped make international headlines when President Bush's 2002 State of the Union address linked international terrorists to Iran, Iraq and North Korea. But...

Dems Get The Naughty Version

I am looking for a safe, conservative community for my family. I live in the middle of liberal La-la land and homeschool my children. There are some changes in our lives and I now have to work and the children need to be in schools. They are not going to be quite as supervised or protected as before and I need to provide a safe community for them. I have a gifted and talented daughter who could take college courses. I have three younger children who I need to place in good public or Christian schools. Safety and conservative culture...

THE most alarming of the many arguments being put in favour of a Yes vote on the Nice Treaty referendum relates to the marginalising of this country. It was put by a group of heavyweight members of the Irish Alliance for Europe in the form of unspecified but dark threats about our future fate. Estimable men, including Garret FitzGerald, John Bruton and Noel Dorr, the former Secretary General of the Department of Foreign Affairs all suggested that Ireland would be treated punitively if there was a No vote. Garret FitzGerald was reported as saying he was "terrified" at the prospect...

EU makes plans for second Irish 'no' vote on Nice treaty referendum By Stephen Castle in Brussels..... 30 May 2002 A new nightmare scenario for Europe is looming, EU officials fear: a second rejection of the Nice treaty by Irish voters which would plunge into chaos the European Union's plans to admit up to 10 new countries. In the wake of big protest votes in elections in France and the Netherlands, and few signs of a clear change of opinion about Nice among Irish voters, diplomats are beginning to contemplate the prospects of another major setback for the EU at...

Johnny Carson kept much of America laughing for 30 years. As the host of The Tonight Show, he ruled the late night airwaves with a rapier wit and a guest list that wouldn’t stop. Carson gracefully retired about a decade ago, and has stayed pretty much out of the public eye. That ends this week, as Esquire magazine publishes an extended interview with him. On Monday the Drudge Report carried an exclusive about the article. In it, Carson criticizes Fox Broadcasting for being excessively patriotic in its coverage of this year’s Super Bowl. Johnny is quoted: "It’s nice to live...