Free Republic

A short film about my favorite post-apocalyptic hell-hole, the Salton Sea.

... Police spent hours trying to control a mob of teenagers at the Inner Harbor....

A somber event turned grim on Tuesday when a gunman opened fire on the memorial service of slain teen Jovany Diaz. Around 2:20 p.m. a man was heard shouting at the corner of Kildare and Hirsch in West Humboldt Park. The man, who had been at Diaz's memorial just before, then fired two shots into the air, The Sun-Times reports. Kim Janssen, who was on the scene as the shooting happened, said that the gunman then pointed his gun down Kildare and fired two or three more shots. The shots hit one victim, a 24-year-old man. The man was shot...

The owner of the Perkins and Marie Callender's restaurant chains filed for bankruptcy Monday with plans to close 65 of its 600 locations and cut 2,500 jobs, according to court documents. Perkins & Marie Callender Inc. became the latest food company to fall victim to a sluggish recovery and soaring food prices. Last week, chicken producer Allen Family Foods tumbled into bankruptcy. Perkins Restaurant & Bakery, which offers all-day breakfasts, plans to emerge from bankruptcy by giving ownership of the chain to holders of the company's unsecured debt, led by funds managed by Wayzata Investment Partners. The bankruptcy will wipe...

That average monthly benefit of $133.24 for 44.199 million people will help with the purchase of one third of a very edible iPad. Food stamp participation chart presented without further commentary.

1. Analyze your expenses. Budget your money. Find out where it's coming from and, more importantly, where it's going. This can be a very surprising and enlightening exercise for many people. 2. Find where you spend the most money on a monthly basis. The top two or three items are where you need to do the most work. 3. Is rent your biggest expense? If so, consider moving to a cheaper place. Consider getting a roommate to split the costs of living. Consider moving back in with your parents or guardians. Offer services (e.g. looking after a relative) in exchange...

If the election of America's first African-American president was expected to give blacks an economic boost, it hasn't emerged yet. Indeed, the percentage of African-American men with a job has dropped to its lowest level since records began in 1972, according to the government's monthly jobs report released last week. Even as the economy added a better-than-expected 244,000 jobs, the percentage of black males over 20 who are currently employed dropped slightly to 56.9, the Labor Department's April report shows. For whites, the equivalent figure is 68.1 percent. Before this recession, the percentage of black adult men with a job...

Developing ....added 225,000 jobs

43.6 Million Americans Living In Poverty Is The Highest Number Ever Recorded Joe Weisenthal Sep. 16, 2010, 10:31 AM This was expected, but it still hits you in the gut. Poverty in America has hit the highest level the Census has ever recorded, according to a new report out today. Image: Census[snip]

By this chapter of this curious tale, Mark von der Burg surely is wondering: Why me? What did I do to deserve this? He's the Eastside real-estate agent who, two months ago while prepping for an open house to sell a $3.3 million mansion in Kirkland, was stunned to find that complete strangers had moved in and were staking a tortured legal claim to the foreclosed property. ...

A near riot took place in Atlanta after city officials staged an event to hand out applications for section 8 housing. Police estimate that 30,000 people showed up at an East Point shopping mall in hopes of being placed on a waiting list for federal housing assistance. The number was three times what officials expected and only 13,000 applications were handed out to those waiting. 11Alive reports that a line for the applications began two days ago and grew into hundreds of people late Tuesday night. Officials report that some hopeful residents slept outside of the shopping mall that houses...

What level of depravity has a city reached when a uniformed police officer is no safer from a street robbery than anyone else? ItÂ’s a shame that the public has to be reminded of this from time to time, but any cop can testify to this inescapable fact of police work: Where there is no punishment for criminal behavior, crime will flourish.Nowhere has this been demonstrated with greater clarity lately than in Chicago, where the Sun-Times has taken notice and sounded the alarm. In a three-part series that concluded Tuesday, reporters Mark Konkol and Frank Main examined the violent incidents...

Obamaville (to the tune of Margaritaville by Jimmy Buffet) By: Jon Watts and Aaron Brakefield Nibblin’ on spin cake Watchin’ the banks break All of those beaches covered with oil Drummin’ my fingers A parade of humdingers Illegals flooding American soil Chorus: Wastin’ away again down in Obamaville Watchin’ my freedom under assault, All sides will claim that there’s another to blame But I know it's our own damn fault I don't know the reason That the jobs aren’t increasin’ Nothin to show but my GI humvee But it's a real beauty An Afghanistan cutie How it got here I...

At the height of the Great Depression in the 1930s, many Americans fighting for survival ended up living in crudely built shantytowns known as "Hoovervilles," in humiliating honor of President Herbert Hoover, who many blamed for the economic distress.

WAIPAHU » Pastor Joe Hunkin picked his way around rusted car axles, propane tanks and two-by-fours studded with bent nails to find a homeless encampment where people have been cooking and sleeping directly behind Waipahu High School, in an area that received unwanted national attention this month. Hunkin walked past a pit bull puppy and peered over a makeshift shelter of tents and tarp hidden by koa haole and elephant grass, then pointed toward the high school's athletic complex barely a football field away. "The school is right over there," Hunkin said last week. "This isn't right." The strip of...

In the immediate aftermath of the Bay of Pigs fiasco in 1961, President John F. Kennedy stood before the nation accepting the total blame for what had happened. He referred to an old saying about victory having a thousand fathers, but defeat being an orphan, and identified himself as the responsible officer in the government. Even though the whole initiative had been first devised and planned by the Eisenhower administration. JFK’s poll numbers moved dramatically—up. There is something refreshing—though sadly rare—about a political leader saying “My bad.” In the 19th century, a British politician stood in Parliament and remarked that...

Outrageous! If you ever get arrested breaking the law in Chicago just threaten to sue each police officer personally. That should make the police drop everything and stand idly by just to watch you commit your crimem then allow you to go home without being arrested. Oh you think that wouldn't happen? That's exactly what Chicago police did when homosexuals protested a Mass held at Chicago's Holy Name Cathedral. Homosexuals were in violation of the Chicago Municipal Code which states that someone is punishable for disorderly conduct whenever he "pickets or demonstrates on a public way within 150 feet of...

Tim Barker never thought he'd have to live in his truck. Four months ago, the plumber was in a one-bedroom apartment in California's San Fernando Valley, with a pool and a Jacuzzi. Then, on his birthday in October, he and 199 other plumbers were laid off by their union, Local 761 in Burbank. Now Barker's son sleeps on the sofa of his cousin's one-bedroom Hollywood apartment, and Barker sleeps on the roof of the apartment building - or in his 2003 Ford Ranger pickup. "I'm 47, and I've never lived in my car," says Barker, a husky 220-lb. single father...

The most enduring images of the Great Depression from 1929 through to the beginning of World War II for America in 1941 were those of homeless people, hobo camps, and of soup kitchens to feed the hungry. During the Reagan years, the media was filled with stories of the homeless as if to refute any improvement in the economy under a conservative president. These days, however, as America's national debt and deficit continues to spiral out of control, the poor and the hungry remain largely unseen and, most significantly, largely unreported. About the only thing one can find on the...

The story of the Great Depression is often told in pictures: while few people recognize the names "Smoot-Hawley" or "Schechter Poultry," photographs of bank runs and bread lines continue to pack a punch, almost 80 years after they were first snapped. But the Great Depression's position as our absolute standard for economic disaster carries an unintended consequence: The power of its images seem to overwhelm -- and minimize -- the economic troubles of our own time. After all, if it doesn't look like a Depression, how tough could things be? The problem is that Walker Evans' and Dorothea Lange's famous...