Free Republic

Expatriates hail reversal on Mexican car deposits By Michael Booth Denver Post Staff Writer Dec. 9 - Mexico's quick retreat last week from charging a deposit on American cars driving south across the border was a rare victory for Mexican expatriates in the Southwest. They remain wary of the Mexican government's hasty withdrawal of the deposit and its promise to "study'' the idea for the future, but immigrants were surprised to see that their protests for once reached a far-off government that often ignores their needs. "The bulk of the people here are illegal, and they belong to the lower ...

Media Bias in The Abortion Issue by Jack R. Voltz It's a sad fact that abortion exists, but even sadder is the system that's set up to perpetuate it. In the 27 years since the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision, the media--television, radio, newspapers, and magazines--have inundated society with predominantly pro-choice rhetoric and skewed statistics calculated to perpetuate abortion through misinformation. Despite lofty ideals and principles of generations of professional journalists from Benjamin Franklin to Horace Greeley, today's reporters seem to have forgotten a principle that was once held in high esteem by their predecessors--stick to the facts. ...

Wackos Of The World Unite Mark L. Melcher, Stephen R. Soukup   Well, the wackos were out in force in Seattle last week. Clearly high on an explosive mix of hubris, ignorance, and a false sense of their own importance, they came from everywhere to join in the festivities. Like a lot of Americans, I watched it on television, and found the whole thing to be extremely depressing. But of course, I am not much for bureaucrats, and international bureaucrats generally send me over the top. Fortunately, I didn’t have to see too much of these guys because the TV ...

  MILFORD — History has a way of popping up in the most unlikely of places — like Bedford, for instance.   There will be a crowd there Sunday with one hand on their wallets as a rare item goes on the auction block: a dueling pistol once used in regular competition by the infamous John Wilkes Booth. It is one of only three firearms known to be directly associated with the assassin of President Abraham Lincoln.   The pistol is certainly rare, but that's not unusual for auctioneer Joseph C. Devine of Milford, who began as a gun dealer back in the ...

WASHINGTON, DC -- There's less than a month left to block a federal regulation that will permit thousands of businesses and government agencies -- including banks, the FBI, and even the Environmental Protection Agency -- to examine your private medical records without your consent, the Libertarian Party warned today. And equally ominous: The same regulation will mandate that each American get a "Unique Health Identifier" -- a Social Security Number-style identifier from the government that will follow you throughout your life and be permanently attached to all your medical records. "If these proposals are enacted, you might as well ...

Thursday December 9 12:41 PM ET US Ready to Sell Emergency Oil in Case of Y2K Woes By Tom Doggett WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Clinton administration said on Thursday it has contingency plans ready to sell crude oil from the nation's emergency stockpile if already-tight supplies are disrupted by Y2K computer problems at year end. The potential sale of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve would be designed to protect consumers and businesses from a steep rise in world crude oil prices that have already soared to nine-year highs in recent weeks. ``The plans rely on the Strategic Petroleum ...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Clinton said Thursday he would tour depressed areas left out of the explosion of Internet access, while the commerce secretary convened high-tech corporate leaders, educators and minority groups to discuss the problem. "We must connect all of our citizens to the Internet, not just in schools and libraries, but in homes, small businesses and community centers, and we must help all Americans gain the skills they need to make the most of the connection," Clinton said in the White House Rose Garden. Clinton said he signed an executive memorandum to ensure closing the digital divide will ...

"We have to make it possible for people to be both effective workers and the best parents they can be." 12/7/99 Hillary in Support of Expanding the FMLA Hillary Supports Expansion of Family Medical Leave Act December 8, 1999 Manhattan - Hillary yesterday said that she supports expanding the Family Medical Leave Act so that working parents in small businesses can enjoy the same benefits of those working at bigger companies. The Family Medical Leave Act, enacted by President Clinton, allows parents up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for a sick child or newborn. The current ...

Issue date: 9 December 1999 Article source: Computer Weekly Columns / Opinions DON'T CENSOR Y2K The last thing we need from the Government is spin. The Government seems intent on a Y2K information lockdown. From next week it plans to centralise all news of millennium bug breakdowns - both at home and abroad - within the Home Office. There is a laudable aim behind this: to avoid rumour-fuelled panic. With much of the UK's critical IT infrastructure declared "blue" (ie safe) weeks ago, crisis planners think the real chaos could be caused by families stockpiling food, fuel and cash. But ...

FEDS ORDER STATES TO REPORT ALL HIV+ NEW HEALTH GUIDELINES ISSUED THURSDAY: STATES MUST NOTIFY FEDS OF ALL HIV CASES... TOLD TO REPORT HIV TEST RESULTS USING PATIENT'S NAME OR IDENTIFYING CODE... DEVELOPING URGENT...

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A woman who has been perched atop a giant redwood tree in northern California for nearly two years to protest logging is in negotiations with Pacific Lumber Co. to leave her bed-sized platform 180 feet (60 meters) above the ground and return to earth. Julia Hill, 25, said on Wednesday that her talks with the logging company were going well, although she had not yet set any kind of date to clamber down the giant tree. ``I am cautiously optimistic that we will find a resolution,'' she said in a telephone interview from atop the ...

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. BEIJING (AP) -- Fattened by rising exports, China's foreign reserves increased to $152.5 billion by the end of October 1999, a senior official said Thursday. The figure means that China's stock of hard currency grew by $5.4 billion in the June-October period, more than double the rise in the first half of the year. A rebound in exports after a sluggish first half contributed to the sharp increase in foreign reserves, said Wang Yafan, director-general of the capital division at the State Administration of Foreign Exchange. Previously released figures show China's ...

NATO must be called to answer for what it did in Yugoslavia. GENEVA, December 8 (Itar-Tass) - The American Bar Association and a group of Canadian law scholars have called for the institution of criminal proceedings against the NATO leaders, who are responsible for the wholesale massacres of civilians and for other military crimes committed in the course of the aggression against Yugoslavia. The communique, released by the Association in Geneva, says that this demand was made known to the Chief Prosecutor of the International Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia Carla del Ponte on November 19. Jacobs and Mandel handed over ...

NEW HEALTH GUIDELINES ISSUED THURSDAY: STATES MUST NOTIFY FEDS OF ALL HIV CASES... TOLD TO REPORT HIV TEST RESULTS USING PATIENT'S NAME OR IDENTIFYING CODE... DEVELOPING URGENT...

Evidence Bolsters Lone Pilot Suicide Theory WASHINGTON (AP) -- U.S. officials say the cockpit voice tape from EgyptAir Flight 990 does not contain the sounds of multiple people in the cockpit as the plane began its fatal plunge to the sea. Such a contention, made in recent Egyptian media reports, would undercut the theory of suicide by a lone pilot. One official, speaking Wednesday on the condition of anonymity, said there are a couple of points in the tape when it is not absolutely clear who is speaking. An Egyptian translator said he thought the speaker might be a ...

Why was Hillary ONLY asked about gays...and not adulterers???

At yet another emergency meeting of the UN regarding another conflict in the Middle East, the floor had finally been given to the Israeli Consul. He began, "Ladies and gentlemen before I commence with my speech, I wanted to relay an old story to all of you... When Moses was leading the Jews out of Egypt he had to go through deserts, and prairies, and even more deserts... The people became thirsty and needed water. So Moses struck the side of a mountain with his cane and at the sight of that mountain a pond appeared with crystal clean, cool ...

These 2000 years conceal something quite remarkable, says this eminent historian. What matters in history is not always the things that happen but also the things that obstinately refuse to happen. It was in 1882 that the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche made his celebrated and dire pronouncement: "God is dead." He was speaking for many intellectuals, who believed the progress of science would cause a decline in religious faith — with Christianity the principal loser. As the year 1900 approached, many leading secular thinkers, including George Bernard Shaw and H. G. Wells, argued that the dawning 20th century would ...

'Because I can win' falls flat for Bush By JOHN DiSTASO Senior Political Reporter SLIPPAGE. There's no ice in sight yet, but there's plenty of sliding going on this December in New Hampshire — mostly by George W. Bush in the Republican Presidential Primary. "It's just continuing," says Manchester pollster Dick Bennett in explaining the latest poll from his American Research Group, which shows Bush dropping eight more points and now trailing John McCain 37 to 30 percent, with publisher Steve Forbes at 10 percent. "We're hearing the same stuff from him again and again and it isn't working," says ...

Sir Cliff Richard is known in Britain as "the nice man of pop." The 59-year-old began his career as rock singer and actor almost 40 years ago and was knighted by the Queen recently for his services to the music industry. He became a Christian as a young man and since that time there has been not one ugly rumour or nasty comment about the man or his reputation. Simply, he is one of the good guys. And one of the good guys who has recorded a staggering 132 hits, even more than The Beatles, and topped the charts ...