Free Republic

By Edwin Chen July 11 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama said his $787 billion stimulus bill “has worked as intended” as he pushed back against Republican criticism that his recovery program has failed to rescue the economy. “It has already extended unemployment insurance and health insurance to those who have lost their jobs in this recession,” Obama, who is traveling today in Ghana, said in his weekly Saturday radio and Web address. “It has delivered $43 billion in tax relief to American working families and business.” Were it not for the stimulus program, the president said, “state deficits would be...

Voters now trust Republicans more than Democrats on eight out of 10 key electoral issues, including, for the second straight month, the top issue of the economy. They've also narrowed the gap on the remaining two issues, the traditionally Democratic strong suits of health care and education. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that voters trust the GOP more on economic issues 46% to 41%, showing little change from the six-point lead the party held last month. This is just the second time in over two years of polling the GOP has held the advantage on economic issues....

New Data Shows Slaughterhouse After Los Angeles Spay/Neuter Law LA Shelter Admissions and Euthanasia 11 Times Higher Than State Average, Predict Disaster If SB 250 Becomes State Law by JOHN YATES American Sporting Dog Alliance http://www.americansportingdogalliance.org asda@csonline.net This report is archived at http://eaglerock814.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=general&thread=51 SACRAMENTO, CA (July 10. 2009) – Yesterday, the California Department of Public Health released 2008 annual data for every county’s animal shelter system. In comparison to 2007 data, last year saw an expected increase in shelter admissions, owner surrenders, abandoned dogs and euthanasia rates that can be attributed mostly to the severe recession that has devastated the...

An outbreak of swine flu occurred in Mexico this spring that eventually affected 4,910 Mexican citizens and resulted in 85 deaths. By the time it spread to the United States, the virus caused only mild cases of flu-like illness. Thanks to air travel and the failure of public health officials to control travel from Mexico, the virus spread worldwide. Despite predictions of massive numbers of deaths and the arrival of doomsday, the virus has remained a relatively mild disease, something we know happens each year with flu epidemics. Worldwide, there have only been 311 deaths out of 70,893 cases of...

"The victim only spent a day in Nunukan. He was being forced to give some money to a group of people but refused. Then someone from the group pulled out a knife and had a one-on-one fight with him,'' he said. The police chief said the alleged killer, a man named Basri bin Ismail, had been arrested.

WASHINGTON — Supporters of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor are quietly targeting the Connecticut firefighter who's at the center of Sotomayor's most controversial ruling. On the eve of Sotomayor's Senate confirmation hearing, her advocates have been urging journalists to scrutinize what one called the "troubled and litigious work history" of firefighter Frank Ricci. "The whole business of getting Supreme Court nominees through the process has become bloodsport," said Gary Rose, a government and politics professor at Sacred Heart University, Fairfield, Conn. On Friday, citing in an e-mail "Frank Ricci's troubled and litigious work history," the liberal advocacy group People for...

Twenty milligrams; that's the average amount of carbon emissions generated from the time it took you to read the first two words of this article.

SALT LAKE CITY -- A gay couple say they were detained by security guards on a plaza owned by the Mormon church and later cited by police, claiming it stemmed from a kiss on the cheek. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints said that the men became argumentative and refused to leave after being asked to stop their "inappropriate behavior." The men say they were targeted because they are gay. Matt Aune said he and his partner, Derek Jones, were walking home from a concert nearby on Thursday night, cutting through the plaza near the Salt Lake City...

When Mickey Hanning first saw the annual running of the bulls in Pamplona on television when he was 15, he knew that one day he would travel to Spain and be in that number. What he didn't know was that he would bring the tradition to life in his hometown of New Orleans, spawning a national trend. Hanning is a co-founder of San Fermin in Nueva Orleans: The Running of the Bulls in New Orleans, happening Saturday. Modeled after the festival of San Fermin in Spain, which started Tuesday, the local event involves hundreds of people in white and red...

Just had a small earthquake (magnitude somewhere around 3) off the coast of San Diego. It was one sharp upward jolt then over. This is an image taken from a USGS data feed displayed in Google Earth. The red dot to the West of San Diego is the epicenter of the quake. The other little colored dots are small older quakes that have happened in the last day or so.

A drunk German sparked a slow-speed police chase after stealing a tractor to get home from a nightclub after his girlfriend left without him, said police, who used pepper spray to try to stop the vehicle. "After his girlfriend abandoned him in a night club, the 23-year-old driver, who doesn't own a license, commandeered the vehicle to make his way home," a police spokesman said on Monday. Six police cars began trailing the tractor, which was chugging along at 20 km (12 miles) an hour, after they were alerted to the theft at about 5 a.m. Saturday. Officers tried holding...

Although millions of American have been watching Michael Jackson’s funeral, the new administration has been very busy in Russia and Europe. Heads Up America! There is a new world order taking place and guess what? A new world currency is coming to the US Mint soon. The Socialist/Keyensian economic policies have made their way across the oceans to American shores... "The US dollar cannot and should not take all the responsibility for the world monetary system. We need a stable and serious transition to new international monetary regime," argued Jeffrey D. Sachs, director of the Earth Institute of Columbia University...

July 10, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A men's advice column published on the sexually suggestive AskMen.com website, which describes a coercive plan of action for men on how to talk their pregnant girlfriends into aborting their unborn child, has prompted outrage from pro-life groups and commentators. The backlash over the column appears to have been so forceful that the site has now pulled the offending piece.The advice column was written by Isabella Snow, who is described as a Sex Education Correspondent. Snow offers what she claims to be an insider's look at how women react to becoming pregnant and the...

WASHINGTON -- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday she was not briefed by CIA Director Leon Panetta about the agency misleading U.S. lawmakers routinely. "I have not had that briefing from Director Panetta," the California Democrat said during her weekly news conference. Her comments came as seven House Democrats wrote a letter to Panetta saying he had testified the spy agency routinely provided misinformation to Congress since 2001, CNN reported. In addition, the chairman of the House intelligence committee accused the CIA of lying to the panel in a classified matter, The Washington Post reported Thursday. Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-Texas,...

The Well doesn't look much like the churches of Geneva, but it is influenced by John Calvin just the same. Never mind that the French reformer would be 500 years old this week; Calvin's theology has retained much of its potency. He provides theological underpinnings for churches such as The Well, a nondenominational congregation downtown with a commitment to Reformed theology. He also is a source of conflict for Southern Baptists and a steady draw for young Presbyterians. His legacy and life are being celebrated around the world this week after Friday marked the 500th anniversary of his birth. To...

GM considers new car listings on eBayPublished: July 10, 2009 at 11:45 PM DETROIT, July 10 (UPI) -- General Motors Corp. is discussing a possible partnership with eBay that would allow dealers to list new cars on the auction Web site, officials said. Rob Chesney, vice president of eBay Motors and Marketplaces, told The New York Times no deal is in place. In its initial statement Friday, GM suggested the program was ready for testing by dealers. "We hope to support GM's new company and vision going forward," Chesney said. "We are excited about a potential new adventure that supports...

Falling approval numbers, but that should be expected from a President who had a blank resume when he signed up for the job...

Russian sharks are feeding on their own blood By William Browder Published: July 6 2009 18:42 | Last updated: July 6 2009 18:42 When presidents Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev met on Monday for their first major summit, the main agenda items were arms control and Iran, and progress was made on the former, at least. This may encourage those who believe these issues can be dealt with in isolation from other challenges to US-Russia relations. As someone who has been familiar with the country for the past 15 years, I believe that approach ignores fundamental differences between Russia today...

Judge Bars Bush Crackdown on Illegal Workers By Michelle Malkin • October 10, 2007 04:42 PM Welcome to our open-borders judiciary: A federal judge barred the Bush administration today from launching a planned crackdown on U.S. firms that hire illegal immigrants, warning of the plan’s potentially “staggering” impact on law-abiding workers and companies. Issuing a firm rebuke of the White House, U.S. District Judge Charles R. Breyer of San Francisco granted a preliminary injunction against the government’s plan to pressure employers to fire up to 8.7 million workers with suspect Social Security numbers starting this fall. President Bush made that...

AMERICA’S recent history has been a relentless tilt to the West—of people, ideas, commerce and even political power. California and Texas, the nation’s two biggest states, are the twin poles of the West, but very different ones. For most of the 20th century the home of Silicon Valley and Hollywood has been the brainier, sexier, trendier of the two: its suburbs and freeways, its fads and foibles, its marvellous miscegenation have spread around the world. Texas, once a part of the Confederacy, has trailed behind: its cliché has been a conservative Christian in cowboy boots, much like a certain recent...