Free Republic

The White House fired back after social media users criticized first lady Melania Trump over a coat she wore in a photo tweeted by President Trump on Wednesday to mark the 18th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks. White House spokesperson Stephanie Grisham, who previously worked with the first lady, told USA Today it was "ridiculous" that some Twitter users called the coat insensitive. Some Twitter users noted that the trim on the back of the first lady's coat appeared to resemble a skyscraper with a smaller object hovering nearby, which some said resembled the images of the World Trade...

A three-judge court panel ruled Wednesday that a World War I memorial in the shape of a cross in Bladensburg, Maryland, is unconstitutional, a decision that a legal scholar says could imperil other similar memorials. In a 2-1 decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit said the 40-foot cross erected 92 years ago violates the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause. “The monument here has the primary effect of endorsing religion and excessively entangles the government in religion,” Judge Stephanie Thacker wrote for the majority. “The Latin cross is the core symbol of Christianity. And here, it is 40...

Using NASA data and 3D modeling, Indiana University Bloomington professor Bernard Frischer and his research team have dispelled a long-held theory regarding the relationship between two famous monuments in ancient Rome. The Ara Pacis Augustae, or Altar of Augustan Peace, was built in 9 B.C.E. in ancient Rome's Campus Martius. The marble altar stood as a propagandistic celebration of the peace and prosperity ushered into the new empire by Rome's first emperor, Augustus. Near the Ara Pacis sat a 71-foot-high granite obelisk brought from Egypt by Augustus, which served as the gnomon, or pointer, of a meridian line. Following a...

Old Issues Resurface for Benedict XVI, the Last Pope before the Prophesied "Petrus Romanus" Arrives by Steve Eastman, Raiders News Network Last week ended with the death of a Pope. No, it wasn’t Benedict XVI. 88 year-old Shenouda III was the 117th Pope of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Egypt. He had been suffering from kidney disease. Benedict XVI, the 111th Roman pontiff of St. Malachy’s Prophecy of the Popes, sent his condolences Sunday. It is likely the event reminded Benedict of his own impending death. He turns 85 next month and his health has been declining. Last November Cardinal...

Since 1881, the obelisk known as Cleopatra's Needle has stood in New York's Central Park, but a letter from the secretary general of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities indicates that this may change if the monument is not taken better care of. Recently, Zahi Hawass, the aforementioned secretary general and archaeologist, wrote to the Central Park Conservancy and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg to inform them that if steps are not taken to protect the obelisk, it would be removed. "I am glad that this monument has become such an integral part of New York City, but I am...

WASHINGTON — Al Qaeda's Internet communications system has suddenly gone dark to American intelligence after the leak of Osama bin Laden's September 11 speech inadvertently disclosed the fact that we had penetrated the enemy's system. The intelligence blunder started with what appeared at the time as an American intelligence victory, namely that the federal government had intercepted, a full four days before it was to be aired, a video of Osama bin Laden's first appearance in three years in a video address marking the sixth anniversary of the attacks of September 11, 2001. On the morning of September 7, the...

Tourists take in the new landscape changes to the Washington Monument, Saturday, April 1, 2006, in Washington. The Monument reopened to the public after several months of security renovations. (AP Photo/Lawrence Jackson) WASHINGTON — In landscape architect Laurie Olin's mind, the approach to the most soaring of the capital's monuments had to be friendly and simple _ and safe. The Washington Monument stretches more than 555 feet in the air from the National Mall. But for years there was nothing grand about the asphalt walkway that led to the obelisk. And adding jersey barriers in the age of terrorism diminished...

The Axum Obelisk Coming Home to Ethiopia Mon Apr 18, 2005 By ANTHONY MITCHELL, Associated Press Writer AXUM, Ethiopia - A teenage Abebe Alenayehu watched Italian soldiers haul away Axum's revered obelisk nearly seven decades ago and never thought he would live to see its return. But if the weather cooperates, he will see the dream he shares with his nation come true Tuesday when a giant cargo plane returns the monument's 82-foot top section to this wind-swept town that was the seat of the ancient Axumite Kingdom. "The memory still leaves a bitter taste in my mouth," Abebe said...

Italy Returns Stolen Obelisk to Ethiopia By Rossella Lorenzi, Discovery News Nov. 23, 2004 — A cyclopean task will put to an end a decades-long diplomatic dispute between Italy and Ethiopia over a looted obelisk, according to a bilateral agreement signed last week in Rome. Signed by Ethiopian Foreign Minister Seyoum Mesfin and Italian Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Alfredo Mantica, the deal set up the final details over the transport of a 160-ton granite stele from Rome to the city of Axum. “ This is a symbol of national identity to Ethiopians. ” The monument is one of a group of...

SACRAMENTO - A bill meant to create a memorial to gay veterans cleared its first legislative hurdle Tuesday after changes were made in it designed to neutralize past opposition. If the legislation succeeds, a memorial candidate would be the obelisk at Desert Memorial Park cemetery in Cathedral City. The obelisk, built with private funds in 2001, is believed to the only memorial in California that honors gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender veterans. "The governor said in his State of the State speech that he didn't want to preside over the decline of California, but that he wanted to preside over...

<p>ROME, Italy (Reuters) -- Lightning has damaged a 3,000-year-old obelisk which Italian dictator Benito Mussolini's troops plundered from Ethiopia and brought to the heart of Rome before World War II.</p> <p>Lightning struck the obelisk late on Monday and chipped chunks of stone from the top of the 24-metre (75-foot) artefact, looted from the holy city of Axum in 1937 after fascist Italy annexed the Horn of Africa country.</p>