Free Republic

Tide of opinion turns against Venice dam By Hilary Clarke in Venice (Filed: 29/01/2006) A multi-billion pound project to stop Venice disappearing under water is itself in danger of sinking under the weight of opposition from the city's mayor and the European Commission. Brussels is concerned about the impact the £2.9 billion Moses dam project could have on the environment, while Venice's own council believes the cash would be better spent on maintaining buildings. Water levels in Venice have risen by 32in since the 18th century, when Canaletto painted the lagoon city. Its tourist centre, St Mark's Square, floods more...

Brescia and Naples, 18 Nov. (AKI) - The three Algerians detained on Tuesday in the Italian cities of Brescia and Naples were planning a massive terror attack - "on a ship as big as the Titanic, packed with explosives" - that aimed to kill "at least 10,000 people", as well as an attack on "Italian citizens and interests" in Tunisia, according phone conversations between the three men, which Italian anti-terror police say they intercepted after al-Qaeda's deadly 7 July attacks on London and on the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh. In their tapped phone conversations, Yamine Bouhrama, Mohamed...

ROME (AFP) - A steep rise in sea levels swamped part of the historic lagooon city of Venice amid storms and heavy rains that have beaten down on Italy over the past 24 hours. On the other side of the peninsula, at La Spezia, a storm slammed a bulk carrier against a jetty, holing it and dumping thousands of litres of fuel into the harbor, the Italian news agency ANSA said. Venice was hit by a common seasonal phenomenon as winds and tides backed up the Adriatic waters, causing levels in the lagoon to rise. According to the city's flood...

VENICE (Reuters) - Ang Lee's "Brokeback Mountain," a tale of homosexual love in the wilds of Wyoming, won Venice's Golden Lion on Saturday, beating film festival favorite George Clooney in the race to take the top prize. The latest film by the director of "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" is adapted from a short story by Annie Proulx and stars Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal as love-struck cowboys whose forbidden affair begins in 1963 and ends 20 years later. Lee describes "Brokeback Mountain" as a story of love against adversity. Independent and low-budget, like several U.S. entries at the festival, it...

NPR.org, April 2, 2005 · "Tip O'Neill was correct," says Father Tom Reese, editor in chief of America, the Catholic weekly magazine. "All politics is local... even in the Catholic Church." Reese suggests that instead of focusing on the possible papal candidates as a bookie would look at horses in the starting gate, try to think about the election from the point of view of the electors, the cardinals who cast the votes. "Each cardinal is thinking, how will this candidate go over in my diocese?" Reese says. "If you're from the Third World, you're concerned with people who are...

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200501/s1281642.htm

A recent visit to Venice tells me that, for many Jews, ritual and a sense of connection to Jewish civilization override theology. I had heard that Venice was a place of romance; a magical city built on canals. But once there, we also discovered Venice's "Jewish problem." Two factions – one foreign, small and missionizing, the other indigenous, threatened and struggling – are engaged in a love-hate relationship. Jews began to settle in the area in the 13th century. Venice's economic elite needed them; the Church despised them. Which is how it came to be that on March 29, 1516...

As has become a local tradition of sorts, the Republican Club of South Sarasota county (Venice, Florida, specifically), held yet another inspiring, upbeat and well-attended rally in front of our campaign HQ at 250 Tamiami Trail (business Highway 41). The focus of these were, as usual, to publicly show our support of incumbant President George Bush, our Congresswoman, Katherine Harris, and Senatorial hopeful Mel Martinez. Special interest was generated this fine, sunny, southwest Florida day by the fact that Katherine Harris was in town to dedicate the reopening of the south (or "circus") bridge over the Intracostal Waterway, and after...

Once again, we GOP activists from sunny Venice, Florida were out in force to show our colors and spread the good word for our candidates for this election season! This time it was at the Venice “Sun Fiesta” parade, an annual celebration of sun & fun that starts off with a big parade down the main street of town, and then goes on through the weekend with rides, food, entertainment, vendor booths of various types, and thousands of folks partaking of the festivities. The Republican Club of South Sarasota County organized our entry in this year’s parade, consisting of a...

The news director of the state-run radio network Radio France Internationale (RFI) resigned on Monday after he was accused of making anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist statements in the promotion of his new book on Israel's separation fence. Alain Menargues, speaking last week on Radio Courtoisie, an extreme right-wing Catholic radio station, said, "I was very shocked by the wall. Read Leviticus in the Torah. What is it about? Separation between pure and impure. To pray, a Jew must be pure and whatever comes in the way of this purity must be separated. Where was the first ghetto? It was in Venice....

Signs of dirty politics By Tommy McIntyre, Staff WriterVenice Gondolier10/13/2004 Election campaign vandals keep pushing the envelope. But this is the worst year GOP campaign worker and Venice businessman Joe Brower has ever seen. "I just want this known so the Democratic leaders will get their crazies in check," Brower said. "This is the kind of stuff that happens in Bolivia." Sarasota County Democratic Party Chairman Harold O. Miller said he also is upset about the vandalism and Brower's comments. He particularly derided Brower's remark about Bolivia. "He (Brower) is completely wrong and it is shocking to hear him make...

Howdy, FReepers, Below are some pix I shot of the two "Bumper Stick-a-thons" that our local Republican club had here in Venice, Florida yesterday, Saturday, 10/9/04. I apologize for the low quality and size of these -- I just got this camera a few days ago and haven't had a chance to experiment with it much. Our first set of pictures is on the main street through town, Business Hwy. 41, or "Tamiami Trail". This location was right in front of our HQ.: A happy sign-waver! You can't read it ('cuz of my lousy photography!), but the sign above the...

VENICE (Reuters) - "Vera Drake," Mike Leigh's tough tale of a working-class mother who is caught performing illegal abortions in 1950s England, scooped up the prizes at the Venice Film Festival Saturday, including the coveted Golden Lion.

VENICE (Reuters) - While stars sip martinis poolside at the Venice Film Festival, down the beach hundreds of activists are staging a "camp-in" to protest against Hollywood blockbusters and high ticket prices at the competition. The T-shirt and flip-flop wearing crowd has stormed the red carpet twice, marched down the Lido's main avenues in anti-war protests and on Sunday night they occupied the exclusive terrace at the Excelsior Hotel where actors go to see and be seen. "That was our masterpiece, our crowning achievement so far," said Luca Casarini, an anti-globalization activist and one of the organizers of the anti-festival...

VENICE, Italy (AFP) - US actor Tim Robbins took the film version of his ribald anti-Bush play "Embedded/Live" to the Venice film festival, while audiences delighted in Indian director Mira Nair's colourful adaptation of Thackeray's classic novel "Vanity Fair". Robbin's angry satire about the Bush administration's war in Iraq (news - web sites) and the complicity of the mainstream US media in its reporting from the early days of the war is the polar opposite of Nair's sumptuous examination of race and class. "Embedded" was born as a play in a 30-seat theatre in Los Angeles in July 2003 and...

Over the centuries the belief lingered on that here had been a great, wealthy, powerful commercial city that dominated the mouth of the Po and the shores of the Adriatic, a city of luxury and splendor, a kind of ancestor and predecessor of Venice, founded more than a thousand years later. Classical scholars also knew about Spina, for ancient literary sources indicated that there must once have existed a thriving maritime trading settlement of great economic importance, until the Celtic invasion of the Po valley destroyed it... The final key to its ultimate discovery came from aerial photography. Some...

Italy nabs eight new al Qaida suspects By Eric J. Lyman From the International Desk Published 7/13/2002 10:34 AM ROME, July 13 (UPI) -- Italian police said Saturday they had arrested eight men suspected of providing logistical support for Osama bin Laden's al Qaida terrorist network, as local authorities tightened security in Rome, Florence and Venice amid reports of possible additional attacks. The suspects -- all but one of whom are North African Muslims -- were apprehended Thursday after a sting operation in Milan. A ninth suspect eluded police and is being sought. In a statement released Saturday, police said...

Ghost fleet 'shows Pisa was an ancient Venice' By Bruce Johnston in Rome (Filed: 22/11/2003) The chance discovery of a Roman "ghost fleet" buried in mud just outside Pisa has led experts to conclude that the city was built on a lagoon much like an early Venice. Archaeologists believe that traces of a community dating back to a pre-Roman era, a sort of "Etruscan Venice", may lie beneath the ships. The end of the lagoon civilisation may also offer clues to the fate of modern Venice - the waterways were silted up by violent floods over a long period. "The...

Italy Kicks Off Venice Flooding Project VENICE, Italy - Premier Silvio Berlusconi inaugurated an ambitious $4 billion project to ease the flooding that regularly deluges this celebrated canal city. The "Moses" project — named after the Biblical figure who parted the Red Sea — is expected to take about eight years. Hinged barriers will be built on the seabed just off Venice and will be raised when high tides threaten the city. "Venice is magnificent, the pride of all Italy," Berlusconi said on Wednesday as officials prepared to lay the first stone of the project. "Attention to saving this patrimony,...