Free Republic

Much of the American press, the Democratic party, and the public is seized with a hysteria over global warming that may waste billions of dollars that could be better spent on other things, including saving human lives. It's almost universally accepted in print and on television that global warming is an imminent menace to the earth--in total disregard of the fact that scientists are deeply divided over whether there is any danger at all. Democratic Sen. Al Gore (Tenn) has made it onto the bestseller list with an apocalyptic book declaring that the so-called greenhouse effect is `the most serious ...

Raising concerns about the city's ability to handle the year 2000 computer problem, a test of the emergency system at a sanitation plant went awry Wednesday night, spilling about 4 million gallons of untreated sewage into part of the Sepulveda Dam Recreation Area before officials could stop it. Officials at the San Fernando Valley plant had been testing a backup electricity system in anticipation of a possible Y2K power outage when they learned from a park ranger shortly after midnight that sewage was gushing from a maintenance hole in the 2,100-acre recreation area. City and commercial crews largely succeeded in ...

Starting next year, the age at which Americans can qualify for full Social Security benefits will slowly increase. But large numbers of workers are unaware of the changes, a current survey reveals. The Retirement Confidence Survey, sponsored by the Employee Benefit Research Institute in cooperation with the American Savings Education Council and Mathew Greenwald & Associates, found that: o Only 16 percent of workers know when they will be able to claim full benefits and 42 percent expect to be eligible one to three years sooner than they actually will. o When workers were asked what they expect to be ...

NEVER VOTE REPUBLICAN Voting for any third party is better than voting for any Republican and there are good reasons for this. No, it is not because there is no difference between the Democrats and Republicans. There is a very important difference. The Republicans are by far the greater threat. No, I am not a Democrat or a socialist. I simply judge people and parties by their accomplishments rather than their speeches. Under the Republican congress social spending has increased faster than when the Democrats were in control. The last three budgets passed by a Democrat controlled congress (1992-1994) ...

Larry Nichols talks with George Putnam on KIEV (Friday, 18 June 1999) GP: Welcome Larry. A threat against Larry Nichols is under investigation. I cannot disclose details due to investigation. LN: This is a tough one, (I'm) nervous. This is a never ending thing with me. Law enforcement gave me the word. Unbelievable - what they have got. The work they (the threateners) put into it. GP: We damn well know who it is - Arkansas mafia; it can be understood. LN: I have tried to go to Congress, they let other people say crap but no they will ...

Larry Nichols talks with George Putnam on KIEV (Friday, 18 June 1999) GP: Welcome Larry. A threat against Larry Nichols is under investigation. I cannot disclose details due to investigation. LN: This is a tough one, (I'm) nervous. This is a never ending thing with me. Law enforcement gave me the word. Unbelievable - what they have got. The work they (the threateners) put into it. GP: We damn well know who it is - Arkansas mafia; it can be understood. LN: I have tried to go to Congress, they let other people say crap but no they will ...

A Malaysian court ordered a set of dentures returned to a man accused of arson, because he was having trouble eating. Police confiscated false teeth belonging to construction worker Wan Kwok Keong after a suspected arson attack on a restaurant in the capital Kuala Lumpur, the official Bernama news agency said. They also collected gasoline, cloth and ashes. The Sessions Court judge said he had no problem ordering the false teeth returned to the accused. "Take it. I don't want it either," the judge said. article

The "Huckleberry" reincarnation of Mr. Gore dates back to his 1988 presidential campaign when he boasted to tobacco growers: "I've plowed the ground, put in seed beds, I've planted it, hoed it, wormed it, suckered it, cut it, spiked it, put it in barns, stripped it, and sold it. I know what it's about, how important that way of life is." This conjured farm-boy fantasy was so important to Gore that, as Bob Zelnick recalls in his book, "Gore: A Political Life," "Only a year after his sister's death (from cancer) Gore was testifying before Congress in support of protecting ...

   "CHARLTON HESTON’S 10 COMMANDMENTS do not include gun control legislation." That’s the reaction from the American Jewish Congress on the House of Representatives’ passage of an amendment to the juvenile crime bill approving the display of the 10 Commandments in public buildings, including schools -- while simultaneously rejecting gun control legislation and again paying homage to Heston’s National Rifle Association. Phil Baum, American Jewish Congress director notes that a display of the 10 Commandments will only serve as a reminder that the commandment, "Thou Shalt Not Kill" can be easily violated by anyone who has unrestricted access to a gun ...

PRIZREN, Yugoslavia -- (AP) -- German soldiers detained 25 ethnic Albanian rebels today after finding one elderly man dead and more than 15 others hurt in a police station that had been under control of the Kosovo Liberation Army since early this week. Most of the victims seemed to be ethnic Albanians or Gypsies between the ages of 50 and 60, said Lt. Col. Dietmar Jeserich, a spokesman for the German army serving in the Kosovo peace force in the region. During the Kosovo conflict that started February 1998 and ended in a peace deal last week, the KLA ...

This may be remembered as the week when America woke up to politics and decided the year 2000 promises a real election involving decent candidates. Say what you will about Texas Gov. George W. Bush's vagueness on some key issues: His campaign kickoff was a success, because he made it clear he'll redefine the Republican Party. If compassion and inclusion are his talismans, education his centerpiece and national unity his promise, we may say a final, welcome goodbye to the wedge issues that have divided Americans by race, ethnicity and religious conviction. But the true surprise of the week ...

Clinton Circumvents Senate for First Homosexual Ambassador Smith, Inhofe Battle Clinton Over Hormel Nomination BY JOSEPH A. D'AGOSTINO   Conservative Senators James Inhofe (R-Okla) and Bob Smith (R-N.H.) have vowed to block all future appointments by President Clinton unless and until he vows never again to make a recess appointment without first notifying the Senate.   Two weeks ago, when the Senate left town for one week for the Memorial Day holiday, Clinton jumped on the chance to take advantage of a little-used constitutional provision. The provision allows the President to make executive branch appointments, without confirmation by the Senate, when the ...

Behind the Headlines by Justin Raimondowww.antiwar.com June 18, 1999 MY FAVORITE ATROCITY STORIES Atrocity stories are the very woof and warp of war propaganda: from Belgian babies bayoneted by bloodthirsty Huns during World War I, to Kuwaiti babies murdered in their incubators by Saddam’s sadistic henchmen, the manufacture of lies has been the growth industry of the 20th century. By now, of course, the public is so inured to exaggeration and outright falsehood that most have developed an immunity to anything but the crudest hyperbole: it is the strong stuff, or nothing. This is why the screaming headlines about the ...

MR. MCLAUGHLIN: Issue one: Some victory. PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON: (From videotape.) I can report to the American people that we have achieved a victory for a safer world, for our democratic values, and for a stronger America. SEN. CARL LEVIN (D-MI): (From videotape.) Here we are on the verge of a huge success, of restoring a million-plus people to their homes. MR. MCLAUGHLIN: Democrats have seized on Kosovo as a foreign policy win and an election year issue in the year 2000. Is this a legitimate victory for Clinton and his party, or is it more spin from the president ...

A decade ago, the social theorist Francis Fukuyama wrote a provocative essay titled "The End of History." In it, he argued that market economics and democratic politics were slowly sweeping the world and that their triumph would gradually erase most historic strife. It was a dubious prediction, but the phrase stuck. So let me modify it to suggest a less momentous change: The End of News. The Internet and the explosion of cable and satellite TV channels are blurring the boundaries between news and information. This does not mean the end of newspapers or TV news programs. It surely ...

OTTAWA (CP) -- The federal government is using a secret international computer surveillance network to collect personal information about Canadians, says a former Canadian spy. Canada is part of a Cold War-era electronic interception network, known as Echelon. Until recently the existence of the network, which monitors almost all electronic communications, was almost impossible to prove. But a report by the European Parliament, published May 10, detailed how Echelon works and how Canada is involved. The report, Development of Surveillance Technology and Risk of Abuse of Economic Information, describes Echelon as "part of the post-Cold War developments based on ...

House Rejects Gun Control Bill 2.44 p.m. ET (1844 GMT) June 18, 1999 By Laurie Kellman WASHINGTON — The Republican-controlled House rejected a gun control bill Friday that would have lessened some current restrictions while imposing others. The vote against was 280-147. The bipartisan rejection came at the end of a tumultuous three-day debate as lawmakers struggled to respond to this spring's high school shootings in Colorado and Georgia. The vote leaves the fate of gun control legislation uncertain. The Senate last month approved stronger restrictions, and compromise talks with the House are likely to begin this summer. Most of ...

It All Began in a Place Called Hope by dead While surfing the web this morning, I came across this site It all began in a place called Hope.. It contained the following idiotic blather. I thought I’d share it with you all, and rile you up for the weekend.Italics mine. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Only 16 more years to puberty!" Bill Clinton was born (a poor black child, named) William Jefferson Blythe III on August 19, 1946, in the small town of Hope, Arkansas. He was named after his (purported) father, William Jefferson Blythe II, who (like dozens of other Clinton ...

Hatch asks why Justice put Starr probe on hold By Jerry Seper THE WASHINGTON TIMES he chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who has challenged a Justice Department ethics investigation of independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr, questioned Thursday why the department had delayed the probe. Sen. Orrin G. Hatch, Utah Republican, told Attorney General Janet Reno in a terse letter that a Justice Department decision to defer the inquiry until after June 30 when the Independent Counsel Act expires was inappropriate and that Mr. Starr "should either be exonerated or sanctioned in a timely fashion." "Delaying an inquiry into the ...