Free Republic

Visit the Museo de la Revolución in central Havana, and two things about the museum’s photo displays will immediately capture your attention. First, it’s clear that the battle to control Cuba in the late 1950s was ultimately won by the cool guys. Young, bearded and ruggedly handsome, the rebel warriors of Fidel Castro’s 26th of July Movement look like Beat hipsters and rock stars—Fidel tall and imposing in his fatigues; Camillo Cienfuegos grinning under his broad-brimmed cowboy hat; Ernesto “Che” Guevara looking smolderingly photogenic in his black beret. By contrast, the U.S.-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista and his cronies look...

In New York, U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein has ordered the release of eight more grand jury transcripts from the famous 1951 spy case that led to the conviction of the husband and wife pro-Soviet spy team of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. Reuters reports this story as if there is some cloud of doubt still hanging over the Rosenberg's conviction despite that their guilt is no longer debatable. Yet here is Reuters giving cover to those who stubbornly wish to cast doubt on the U.S. prosecution of the Rosenbergs. It also gives Reuters and U.S. detractors the opportunity once again...

Perhaps the most reviled figure in American history is Senator Joseph McCarthy. "McCarthyism" has become the term of choice for false, destructive accusations. Yet a new book shows that Senator McCarthy was right in his allegations. Blacklisted By History: The Untold Story of Senator Joseph McCarthy and His Fight Against America's Enemies by M. Stanton Evans, chairman of the Education and Research Institute, shows that McCarthy was right about there being significant communist infiltration in government, his investigative methods were careful, thorough and of the highest standard, and his adversaries were the ones who practiced so-called "McCarthyism." It is McCarthy,...

TRANSCRIPT OF THE PRIME MINISTER THE HON JOHN HOWARD MP ADDRESS TO THE QUADRANT MAGAZINE 50TH ANNIVERSARY DINNER, FOUR SEASONS HOTEL, SYDNEY Thank you very much Paddy McGuinness, Chief Justice, Justices, Your Eminence, Your Grace, my Parliamentary colleagues and ladies and gentlemen. I’m finally succumbing to Peter Garrett’s advice and its great to embrace an evening of culture and poetry and all of that after overdosing on my Philistine sporting pursuits over the weekend in almost the four corners of the Earth, from one side of the country to the other. But it really is an enormous pleasure for Janette...

This should be a list of who is planning to close their business on Monday, May 1 in response of the Great American Boycott. We should compile it and boycott them ourselves if possible! Remember to go shopping or work overtime on May 1!

I found the title of this DUmmie THREAD, "Can freepers be deprogrammed?" especially amusing since I just received a personal FreepMail message at the Free Republic from none other than DUmmie Doohickie. In case you don't remember DUmmie Doohickie, he was the author of some of our FAVORITE DUmmie threads called "I BELIEVE" in which he was cheerleading the DUmmie to BEEEELEEEEVE that John Kerry was going to be inaugurated on Jan. 20, 2005. These threads began shortly after the 2004 election and lasted until early Jan. 2005 when Doohickie took an embarrassed exit from DUmmieland but has recently...

In a July 17 story, Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen of the Washington Post had to admit, in recapping White House statements about the Valerie Plame case, that White House spokesman Scott McClellan was usually careful to disavow involvement "in any illegal leak, though his public statements clearly left an impression of a White House aloof to the affair." This is the key to understanding White House statements about the case and the reported White House role. If you read the transcripts of McClellan's briefings, it is clear that McClellan had denied a White House role in a criminal disclosure...

In outlining their tactics and strategy for anarchist protests during the inauguration of President George W. Bush on January 20, the Anarchist Resistance website has called for an end to the United States. Below is their "Call to Action" posted on their website http://www.anarchistresistance.org/anarchistcall.shtml *************************************************************************************** All out for an anarchist mobilization against centralized power...at the 2005 Presidential Inauguration: Washington, DC - January 15-20th. As George W. Bush is coronated on January 20th, the question is not if there will be protests, but what shape these protests will take. Thousands are organizing to oppose Bush's Inauguration. As the liberal and authoritarian...

Listening to Lewis & Floorwax (radio personalities out of Denver, CO on 103.5). Boulder High School is having a talent show Friday night. One of the acts is a band that includes 2 teachers, the band name is "The Taliband". They will be performing a song they worte titled "I Wish George Bush was Dead". This was reported by a parent. The band had to audition in front of a group including two other teachers and were selected to perform Friday night.

Hosts of ABC's "The View" Gang Up on Giuliani for Backing Bush Joy Behar ridiculed Giuliani for claiming that the first thing he said after the 9/11 attacks was "thank God" George W. Bush "was our President" and she insisted that "of course" Al Gore would have been just as "tough" on terrorism. Former CBS News correspondent Meredith Vieira, who participated Sunday in an anti-Bush march, seemed similarly ignorant, scolding Giuliani: "The implication is that if you disagree, I think, with the administration that somehow you are on the side of the terrorists. " Giuliani shot back: "That isn't who...

The heated argument consumed nearly eight minutes, so space permits only some limited excerpts as provided by the MRC's Jessica Anderson who caught the August 31 exchange: Joy Behar: "Did you really say that, 'Thank God he was our President'? That's the first thing you said? You didn't say 'Oh, expletive,' or something?" Rudy Giuliani: "No, no, that wasn't the first thing I said. That's one of the things that I said on September 11th to my police commissioner. It really came out because that was just a few months after that disputed election, and so I had called the...

There is a  whine issuing from the political left these days that opponents of the Iraq war are unfairly characterized as “unpatriotic.” In our view this whine is a case of guilt and projection. We are not acquainted with any supporters the war who characterize all their critics as “unpatriotic.” We certainly don’t. But we do judge critics of the war on their merits and we are of the opinion that not all criticisms are alike. Consider those like Michael Moore who side with America’s enemies and promote their victory – and our defeat. These are not "critics" of America. They are enemies...

Havana, Jul 9 (EFE).- Cubans will no longer have to find pirated copies of the controversial film "Fahrenheit 9/11" in the island's illegal "private video libraries" because the government has decided to debut Michael Moore's documentary across the country this month.

Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle -- embroiled in a tough re-election campaign in South Dakota -- distanced himself this week from documentary film director Michael Moore, whose "Fahrenheit 9/11" D.C. premiere he attended last month.     Mr. Daschle disputes a claim by Mr. Moore that he -- as the highest elected Democratic official in the nation -- hugged the filmmaker after the screening and promised to fight more vigilantly against the policies of President Bush.     "I know we senators all tend to look alike," Mr. Daschle said, according to the Rapid City Journal in South Dakota. "But I arrived late and...

Seems being close to Moore isn't playing well in Rapid City...

Already praised by the Communist Party USA and the Revolutionary Communist Party, Michael Moore's hit film "Fahrenheit 9/11" has a new honor – great notices in the today's edition of the Socialist Worker, the newspaper of the International Socialist Organization. "Millions upon millions of people in the U.S. are terrified at what George W. Bush has in store for them if he wins another four years in the White House," the story reads. "This is the secret of the success of Michael Moore’s 'Fahrenheit 9/11' – a documentary film that exposes the crimes of the Bush presidency, from the war...

For America's multimillion-dollar Superman industry, it's a serious problem. This is a guy who's from outer space — he was born on the planet Krypton, let's not forget — but he's also from another time. He debuted in the 1930s, when Americans liked their heroes like they liked their steaks: tough, thick and all-American. Nowadays we prefer our heroes dark and flawed and tragic. Look at the Punisher (wife and kids dead), or Hellboy (born a demon), or Spider-Man (secretly a nerd). Look at Batman: his parents were killed in front of him, and he dresses like a Cure fan....

Though I read them occasionally as a boy, I have never been overly interested in comic books, especially the American sort, the ones featuring superheroes dressed in super-tight costumes fighting super villains, none of whom ever seemed to receive super-long jail sentences for attempting, yet again, to destroy Our Way Of Life. A junior realist, I tended to read, instead, the British-produced, four-times-a-month Commando comics, which were generally set during the Second World War. Commando — whose fabulous titles included Hun Bait, Iron-Cross Yankee, Ghost Stuka, and the unforgettable Deserters Deserve Death! — abjured those pathetic ads one saw in...

Ben Levy, founder of ACLU here made his mark `All I wanted to do was to protect the right to speak freely without penalty, without being afraid.' The bullets always were fired at night, but the threats, curses and social snubs came at any hour of the day. Houston's early American Civil Liberties Union members often found themselves in conflict with groups willing to use unsavory means to maintain the status quo. Founded in 1957 by Houston lawyer Ben G. Levy and a handful of supporters, the organization eventually made its mark in prison, civil rights and First Amendment litigation....

We Will Beat Bush - Archives The "Mother" of All House Parties The East Bay for Kerry/MoveOn House party on December 7th combined the forces of two grass-roots organizations based in San Francisco East Bay Area. We had 200 guests eating, drinking, and watching the MoveOn Documentary “Uncovered” featuring Joseph Wilson and Rand Beers from the Kerry campaign.When Teresa Heinz-Kerry arrived, she handed me a pin that read in the center: “Asses of Evil” with “Bush”, “Cheney”, “Rumsfeld” and “Ashcroft” surrounding it. She met, greeted and talked to a jam-packed room of Kerry supporters and others who came for...