Free Republic

<p>I can't imagine the Obama campaign is psyched that this USA Today photo of an anti-death penalty judge in Ohio shows two posters in his office — one of Che and one of Barack.</p>

The Father of Capitalism, Adam Smith, is probably turning over in his grave as we speak. The day after the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), perverted the definition of free market to advocate his global warming platform, along comes left-wing billionaire George Soros suggesting traditional free-market theory is flawed in the May 13 USA Today. The profile by David J. Lynch touted Soros' “theory of reflexivity,” which asserts classic free market theory is flawed because it assumes everyone acts rationally “to maximize their individual welfare or profits." "Of course, real life never matches up exactly with the...

It is unfortunate when major media discuss constitutional issues yet exhibit zero understanding of why we have a Constitution and what it means. The latest example is the cover story in USA Today on 12 May, 2008, entitled “Reagan's influence lives on in U.S. courts.” The general premise of the article is absolutely true. The influence of judges appointed by any President extends far beyond his term and often beyond his lifetime. However, the article gets lost in discussing why that’s so, and what it means. In 1,572 words about the interpretation of the Constitution, the article never even uses...

A federal judge held a former USA Today reporter in contempt of court Friday and ordered her to pay up to $5,000 a day if she refuses to identify her sources for stories about a former Army scientist under scrutiny in the 2001 anthrax attacks. U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton said Toni Locy must pay fines out of her own pocket as long as she continues to defy his order that she cooperate in scientist Steven J. Hatfill's lawsuit against the government. Hatfill accuses the Justice Department of violating his privacy by discussing the investigation with reporters. Locy had...

WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge says he will hold a former USA Today reporter in contempt if she continues refusing to identify sources for stories about a former Army scientist under scrutiny in the 2001 anthrax attacks. At a hearing Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton said that reporter Toni Locy (LOW-see) must cooperate with Steven J. Hatfill in his lawsuit against the government. Hatfill is suing the Justice Department, saying the agency violated the federal Privacy Act by giving the media information about the FBI's investigation of him. In addition to Locy, the judge is considering whether...

Newspaper publisher and broadcaster Gannett Co Inc (NYSE:GCI - News) posted a 31 percent decline in quarterly profit on Friday due to lower broadcast and print ad sales and an impairment charge. Gannett said it faced a "softer" economic environment, echoing the comments of other U.S. newspaper publishers this week. The USA Today publisher said fourth-quarter net income fell to $245.3 million, or $1.06 per share, from $353.5 million, or $1.51 per share, a year earlier. Revenue fell 12 percent to $1.9 billion, below the average Wall Street forecast of $1.99 billion, according to Reuters Estimates. Excluding an impairment charge...

Iowa was barely over caucusing when USA Today Editors decided they knew better than Republicans in the other 49 states and better than the not yet chosen delegates to the 2008 Republican Party National Convention, who is worthy to continue the race for the Republican Party Presidential Nomination. My question for the USA Today Editors is, who in the name of democracy made you the politburo? Click link to read the USA Today Editorial Iowa results hold lessons for the long road ahead Note: The remainder of this post is a re-write of my comments to the Editors of USA...

Please vote this gun issue question with USA Today. It will only take a few seconds of your time. Then pass the link on to all the pro gun folks you know. Hopefully these results will be published later this month. This upcoming year will become critical for gun owners with the Supreme Court accepting the District of Columbia case against the right for individuals to bear arms. First - vote on this one. Second - launch it to all the pro-gun folks and have THEM vote - then we will see if the results get published. To vote in...

Here is the kind of story that really proves how little the MSM bothers to research things, how they often simply print glorified press releases without doing any real "journalism," and how the defective end product gets picked up and regurgitated like it is suddenly a "fact." In this one we have the story of "the Lakota Sioux Indians" announcing that "they" have withdrawn from agreed upon treaties with the US government and that they are now a sovereign nation, no longer to be called citizens of the USA. Problem is "the Lakota Sioux Indians" that have made this announcement...

USA Today will no longer be printed in Hawaii and its distribution will be significantly scaled back after Dec. 28. The nation's largest circulation newspaper, which had been printed and distributed by The Honolulu Advertiser for three years, will stop delivering to hotel rooms, subscribers and hundreds of news racks around the Islands at the end of the month. Instead, newspapers will be flown in from the West Coast every weekday afternoon for sale at a limited number of locations, mostly at airports. The move was made to cut costs. Advertising revenue at USA Today was down 6.1 percent in...

Gannett Sees 4Q in Range of Wall Street 11:16 AMNEW YORK (AP) - Gannett Co., the largest newspaper publisher in the country and owner of USA Today, on Wednesday guided for fourth-quarter profit in range of Wall Street's expectations. AP

The websites of CNN and USAToday joined their "Big Three" network brethren in covering the march in Jena, Louisiana to support the so-called Jena 6, while at the same time, either burying mention of the teenager who was beaten by the six high school students, or not mentioning him at all. CNN.com’s report, in which CNN correspondents Susan Roesgen, Tony Harris, Kyra Philips and Eliott McLaughlin were contributors, didn’t mention Justin Barker until the twenty-second paragraph of the story. The teens were initially charged with attempted murder after they allegedly knocked out Justin Barker -- a white classmate -- while stomping...

Can the Second Coming be far distant? Given the glimpses of truth beginning to filter through the pages of darkness typically published by the Main Stream Media, one wonders. First, in June, The New York Times surprises all several hundred of its remaining readers with a major news story reporting the developing sense of peace spreading across the battlefield that was Anbar province. Anbar, for nearly three years it was regarded as the most hopeless space and people in all Iraq. It was hopeless. A year after putting into effect the strategies developed by General David Petraeus, Anbar knows evenings,...

Cannot post due to Navy Times copyright whining. Story deals with new movie dramatizing the story of LTJG Dieter Dengler, one of just a few to escape from a Communist POW camp. Critics of movie claim it is dishonest and distorted. Link

HONOLULU -- The violent attack on a military couple two weeks ago in Waikele is making national news. A story about the road rage altercation is on the front page of Wednesday's USA Today under the headline: "Racial Tensions are simmering in Hawaii's Melting Pot." Police arrested a Native Hawaiian man and his teenage son in the attack of the Caucasian couple after a fender bender in the Waikele Shopping Center parking lot.

Gasoline and crude oil prices are both on a downward trend and some media outlets even are reporting the story. But USA Today’s Barbara Hagenbaugh presented a negative spin on the positive development and failed to disclose her source also linked lower gas prices before the election to a possible conspiracy. “[D]rivers who expect gas prices to fall as sharply as oil prices in recent weeks will likely be disappointed,” the paper’s Barbara Hagenbaugh lamented in the first paragraph of her January 16 front page story. According to the AAA’s FuelGaugeReport.com Web site, regular unleaded is down to $2.22 a...

The Wall Street Journal, whose wide pages and text-rich look have long been an icon of the American newspaper business, is about to undergo several changes that include cutting three inches off its width. Along with the size reduction, which is equivalent to about one of its columns, the newspaper will add more color and graphical elements, including greater use of photographs. It also will have fewer stories "jump" inside the newspaper. The changes, which take effect Jan. 2, were to be unveiled at a press conference in New York on Monday. Robert Christie, a spokesman for Dow Jones &...

Kudos to USA Today, As Paper Recognizes America's 21st Century Heroes In a fitting Veterans Day tribute, this morning?s USA Today recognizes America?s ?21st Century Heroes,? a relatively small group of U.S. military servicemen who received our country's highest honors for their valor in Iraq and Afghanistan. Good for USA Today. There hasn?t been much coverage of America's military heroes ? indeed, back in June the Media Research Center noted that a three-week time period saw three times more network TV coverage of allegations of military misconduct than coverage of America?s top military heroes over a five year period. This...

The MSM has had a field day trumpeting an impending editorial in "military newspapers" calling for Defense Secretary Rumsfeld's resignation. But as NewsBusters John Stephenson and Michael Bates have documented here and here, here's what the liberal media didn't disclose: Despite the official-sounding ring of "military newspapers," these are commercial, private-sector operations owned by Gannett, the chain whose leading outlet is the left-leaning USA Today. The editorial was roughly as representative of the official military view on the Secretary as the New York Times' latest anti-Rumsfeld rant.While the MSM tried to multiply the significance of the editorial by mentioning that...

UPI Headline, and many other publications.."Military mags to call for Rumsfeld. SAN FRANCISCO, Nov. 3 (UPI) -- Four publications of the Military Times Media Group plan to call on U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to resign, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. The Army Times, Air Force Times, Navy Times and Marine Corps Times will issue the call in an editorial scheduled to run Monday, the newspaper said. The Chronicle published the text of the editorial on its Web site Friday. The editorial says the truth about the war in Iraq "been difficult to come by from leaders in Washington."...