Free Republic

8.57 a.m. ET (1410 GMT) December 4, 1999 NEW YORK — Who says we suffer from Clinton fatigue? After seven years of Clinton's presidency, unprecedented scrutiny of the first couple's personal lives and a marriage exposed for its weaknesses like no other, the latest political buzz is about yet another book on Bill and Hillary Clinton. "Hillary's Choice,'' a look by author Gail Sheehy at the Clintons' marriage, is a top talk-show topic, is fueling tabloid gossip columns and made its way to the upper echelons of online Amazon.com's "Hot 100'' book list. Even aides to Hillary Clinton, while ...

WTO Summit Ends in Failure By MICHAEL PAULSON and ROBERT McCLURE SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTERS The world's trade ministers last night abandoned their effort to launch a new round of global trade negotiations, bringing an ugly conclusion to an ugly week. The meeting of the World Trade Organization, hampered throughout the week by sometimes violent protests, broke up just before 10 p.m. when delegates from 135 nations said they could not agree on an agenda for future trade talks. "Essentially, they just could not get the work done," said WTO spokesman Keith Rockwell. The defeat for the trade ministers was a ...

As of 25 minutes in to C-Span's Washington Journal, 3 of 7 callers talked about Alan Keyes' performance at Thursday's debate and the lack of media coverage about him afterwards.Guest Jodie Allen of the weekly U.S. News and World Report ignored Keyes during the first caller and spoke about Bush and McCain.After the second call about Alan Keyes, Allen said that Keyes' ideas are so radical that if he were white he would get no coverage.The third caller prompted Allen to say that maybe the press should cover Keyes more, if only to expose how radical and unusual his ideas ...

The glass is (more than) half-full side of the story The Pentagon's internal report on race relations in the armed forces turned up in newspapers largely as A Glass Half-Empty. For example, take the Page 1 story in The Washington Post (a story that the Post-Dispatch ran). Its headline read, "75 Percent of Military's Minorities See Racism." USA Today took a similar tack. Its headline read, "Poll: Most Minority Troops Encounter Racism in Military." Among the papers I saw (including my own), only The New York Times acknowledged in its headline that the glass might have a half-full aspect. The ...

It's more than a month since the crash of EgyptAir 990, but the families of the victims could face fresh heartache as soon as next week. Jim Hall, chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board for five years, said Friday a large contract ship should arrive Monday at the crash site, in the Atlantic Ocean off the northeastern U.S. coast. Its mission, he said, is to recover the remains of the 217 people on board, 101 of whom were Americans. "There were six different nationalities represented on the aircraft," Mr. Hall said, "and three different religions -- Judaism, Islam and ...

"Terrorist Networks Being Broken In South America"here"Iranian Investment In Columbia Raises Suspicion"here

10.43 p.m. ET (354 GMT) December 3, 1999 CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — A paperwork error is forcing NASA to recheck an electrical wire aboard space shuttle Discovery, and the extra work could delay its Dec. 11 launch to the Hubble Space Telescope. Discovery's 10-day mission to fix the ailing Hubble is already running two months late. NASA wants to launch the shuttle by mid-December to avoid any possible Y2K problems. Otherwise, it will have to wait until January. NASA discovered Friday — just one day after setting a Dec. 11 launch date — that the paperwork on one ...

This isnt really a needed post, but while having beer and chicken wings at Woodys on Chapel Hill road in Cary NC last night i was playing NTN Trivia and the question was asked "What candidate in last nights presidental debate accused the media of being racist?" And as we all know, the great man Alan Keyes was the answer. I and only 1 other person got it right for the full 1000 points...and was probably the guy sitting near me, because i rather loudly said the answer followed by "Thats my man!"

Kennedy praises Bush Friday, 3 December 1999 14:11 (GMT) (UPI Focus) Kennedy praises Bush BOSTON, Dec. 3 (UPI) - Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Edward M. Kennedy said Friday that Republican presidential front-runner Texas Gov. George W. Bush "meets the bar" to be president. At the same time, Kennedy told the Boston Herald he has not decided yet whether to endorse Vice President Al Gore in the Democratic presidential primary race. While criticizing Bush's record on health care, Kennedy suggested the governor run on his strong record of education reform. Kennedy also said Bush's failure to answer foreign policy questions from ...

PASADENA, Calif. (AP) — While scientists and space fans waited for a signal from the Mars Polar Lander, school principal Douglas Hogg was on a mission to give two dozen students an insider's view of the potential encounter with the Red Planet. The principal, who heads the Pinewood Academy in La Canada Flintridge, took the students to join nearly 2,000 others on Friday who packed an auditorium at Planetfest '99 where they waited for the signal. "I view this as our first step to colonizing Mars,'' said Hogg, 53. "For mankind we won't have all our eggs in one ...

  YUGOSLAVIA NEWS Russian General Threatens Kosovo Force Review MOSCOW, Dec 3, 1999 -- (Reuters) An outspoken general said on Thursday Moscow could review Russia's involvement in the KFOR peacekeeping force in Kosovo if NATO continued to "ignore international norms," RIA news agency reported. Colonel-General Leonid Ivashov stopped short of saying Russia would pull its contingent out of Yugoslavia's Serb province of Kosovo but told RIA that Moscow had asked the United Nations to call in the KFOR chief and U.N. civilian head. "First it carried out a military aggression against sovereign Yugoslavia," he said, referring to NATO's bombing campaign earlier ...

She got an A!!!!! thanks to all of you. Only comment from liberal Professor was "most gun control papers are horrible. But this one was good!!" We will post a final revised copy with the teacher's comments when she gets her paper back. The draft copy can be found here. 208.138.42.193/forum/a3838b00c4ec4.htm

HILLARY CLINTON IS TOO POLITE, at least in public, to use words like "thug" and "goon" to describe her political opponents. Like her husband, she leaves that sort of brass-knuckles politicking to campaign henchman James Carville, who last week tossed both four-letter epithets at the First Lady's likely opponent in next year's Senate race, New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. "What else," Carville asked, "do you call somebody who jails the homeless at Thanksgiving?" The Clinton candidacy is underway, and its first target is Mayor Giuliani's new policy of forcing New York's homeless population into shelters or hospitals—or jails, if ...

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) - The Blue Dogs may be a dying breed in Florida. The conservative wing of the Democratic Party dwindled further Friday with the defection of Rep. Joe Spratt to the Republicans. Spratt, of LaBelle, was the second conservative Democrat to switch parties in two days, following Irlo "Bud" Bronson, and the sixth House Democrat in two years to join the GOP. The Florida House now stands at 75 Republicans and 45 Democrats. The Democrats held a majority in the House as recently as 1995, when there were 63 Democrats and 57 Republicans. The current breakdown is ...

What is a "conspiracy theory"? Why, the answer is quite simple, and has nothing to do with "conspiracy", and very little to do with "theory": a "conspiracy theory" is any fact, knowledge, anectdotal evidence, or first-hand testimony which is at odds with official "truth", as promulgated by the official truth outlets. The term "conspiracy theory" has long been with us, but exploded into popular consciousness with the advent of the information age and especially the internet. As people began sharing knowledge which was contradictory to the "official truth", a label (unifying symbol) was needed to group, differentiate and discredit these ...

If you have doubts that Hillary Clinton is serious about running for the Senate in New York, lay them aside. One who was not serious would not have unleashed the ultimate political weapon on New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, her prospective opponent. James Carville, the Cajun trash-mouther exploded on the New York political scene by calling Giuliani a thug. That's tame compared to some of the things Carville will call Giuliani and anyone who rises to support him between now and election time. There's been a lot of talk about the rough and tumble of New York politics and whether ...

Massacre of Civilians Reported in Chechnya 6.36 a.m. ET (1204 GMT) December 4, 1999 MOSCOW — U.S.-sponsored Radio Liberty reported Saturday that Russian troops descending on the Chechen capital Grozny had massacred a column of some 40 refugees fleeing the city. Andrei Babitsky, a correspondent for Russian-language Radio Liberty, quoted eyewitnesses as saying masked Russian troops had opened fire at close range on the column of refugees. In a conflict that has seen large numbers of civilian casualties from artillery and air strikes, it was the first report of such a large-scale massacre by troops on the ground. Russia's ...

The purpose of this newsletter is to provide you with information regarding the RCMP Blood Task Force investigation to date. This particular newsletter is being sent to all complainant groups, and infected/affected persons who have been identified by the Task Force. Please feel free to share this newsletter with members of your group. For those of you who have received the newsletter in the past, certain items have been repeated for the benefit of all readers. RECENT MEDIA RELEASE: Regarding a recent media release during the week of November 15, 1999, the RCMP BTF would like to clearly state, ...

The Republican-controlled Congress is usually at its lowest ebb each year right after budget negotiations with President Clinton, who usually wins most of the budget battles. This year was no different. Republican lawmakers went into the fall talks with the White House on a post-impeachment surge -- apparently vindicating former House Speaker Newt Gingrich's, R-Ga., claim that in the long run his party would actually benefit from trying to remove Clinton from office. But the numbers plummeted as the budget deal progressed. As they usually do each year, the Republicans looked weak in the talks -- which hardly helps ...

Christian Theory of Just War Americans Against World Empire By Llewellyn Rockwell When does war accord with justice? When does it not? No philosophical system is better equipped to deal these most profound of political questions than Catholicism. Long before the advent of 'Catholic social teaching"-an unfortunate phrase that implies a chasm between individual morality and political systems--there were the political writings of St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, and the Late Scholastics. A jewel of these writings is the doctrine of Just War. To pacifists the phrase Just War sounds like an absurdity. How can mass killing and maiming, the ...