Free Republic

Here are the news stories, editorials, and videos that conservatives dugg Friday, September 4, 2009. Please take a moment to digg these articles at Digg.com, then get back over here! News Articles Bloomberg: Jobless Rate Hits 9.7%AP: Unemployment Rate Rises to a 26-Year HighNYT: Teenage unemployment rate highest in recorded historyOpen Market: Support for organized labor lowest in recorded historyAP: US recovery difficult as jobless rate hits 9.7%CNS News: 1.3 Million to Lose Jobless Benefits by Year's EndHot Air: CBO: ObamaCare will increase prescription plan premiums 20%WSJ: Job Losses Weigh on RecoveryRasmussen: 52% see no need for withdrawal or a...

The Supreme Court appears poised to wipe away limits on campaign spending by corporations and labor unions in time for next year's congressional elections in a case that began as a dispute over a movie about Hillary Rodham Clinton. The justices return to the bench Wednesday , nearly a month early , to consider whether to overrule two earlier decisions that restrict how and when corporations and unions can take part in federal campaigns. Laws that impose similar limits in 24 states also are threatened. The court first heard arguments in March in the case of whether "Hillary: The Movie,"...

Senator Olympia Snowe of Maine has a reputation for what her supporters call “independent thinking” — which in the past has essentially meant that she only supports her party on matters of procedure in the Senate. Since Arlen Specter finally switched parties, Snowe has been the leading light of the so-called RINOs (Republicans in Name Only), or, rather, the most infuriating example. What has most irked people of late? Snowe volunteered to head to the White House to ensure that Obama’s socialized medicine proposal continues along its merry way. While commentators on both sides of the aisle have declared the...

A mother who watched her premature baby die when doctors refused to help him has condemned medical guidelines which said he should not be saved. Sarah Capewell gave birth to a baby son when she was 21 weeks and 5 days into her pregnancy. Her pleas to doctors and midwives to admit the newborn to a special care baby unit were rejected. Staff at James Paget Hospital, in Gorleston, Norfolk, told her that if her son Jayden had been born two days later, at 22 weeks, they would have tried to help him. Instead, Miss Capewell, who had previously suffered...

The Pro-life Debate Between Bill Johnson and Rand Paul-- 10:10am, EST 9.02.09Press release from Bill Johnson's Senate Campaign... The Bill Johnson for U.S. Senate Campaign continues to run a low cost and fiscally responsible campaign.  Rand Paul, a doctor, and Trey Grayson, a lawyer, are engaged in a battle about who can raise and spend the most money in a primary campaign.  This conflict is typical Capitol Hill politics where tax and spend is the norm.  How much money is enough?  Instead of focusing on bank accounts, Johnson is concerned about Mr. Paul’s position on abortion as stated at the...

Republicans have their senior's bill of rights, trying to win the elderly to their side in the health care debate. Democrats retaliated this evening with a new TV ad that accuses the GOP of wanting to kill Medicare, the main government health program for seniors. The Democratic National Committee cited a vote earlier this year in the House in which 137 Republicans voted for a budget proposal offered by the Republican leadership that the DNC says would have ended Medicare for Americans under age 55. Instead, the proposal called for younger workers to enroll in private plans and receive subsidies...

Here is a video report saying Missouri Sen. Kit Bond has sent a letter to the head of the "Senate Green Jobs Committee" calling for an investigation into the appointment of Van Jones. The report contains some video of Jones making his outrageous attacks on President Bush, and then talks to Jeff Birnbaum of the Washington Times. Birnbaum says his sources say Jones is "not gone yet," but he feels it may be close since White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs did not really "back Jones," but instead only pointed out Jones "still works in this administration." . . ....

Apple Inc. is expected to unveil an updated line of iPods at an event next week as it aims to boost slowing demand for the music players. The Cupertino, Calif., company issued invitations Monday to media and analysts for a "special event" in San Francisco on Sept. 9 that Apple indicated would be related to its iPod music players. The email invitation showed the dancing silhouette of a person with an iPod and the words: "It's only rock and roll, but we like it". --snip--

Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal was often hazardous to the health of the American economy. Sometimes it was even hazardous to the health of Americans. An example is Roosevelt ’s almost-forgotten decision in 1934 to cancel the federal airmail contracts. Here is the story. Airmail service began in 1918, and the first such flights were done by the U.S. Army Air Corps. Private airlines, however, were improving so rapidly that soon after 1918 the government bid out contracts to major airlines to deliver the mail. By 1930, with almost all airlines losing money, President Hoover’s postmaster general, Walter Brown, decided to...

A Berkeley store owner has agreed to stop selling candy bars and sodas to middle school students who come to his store for a morning fix in a move school officials say is a first in the city. That means students seeking Snickers, Twix or Coca-Cola will be out of luck from 8 to 9 a.m. before they start their day at Longfellow Middle School. Friendly Market owner Yaser Musid, who has five kids of his own, said he will lose up to $100 a day in the deal. But he agreed with school counselor Rosina Keren that keeping junk...

While I was never a fan of Senator Ted Kennedy for a variety of reasons, I watched his funeral on television last Saturday. I prayed for the repose of his soul, the forgiveness of his sins, the consolation of a large Kennedy family who allowed the world to share their grief and sorrow once again on the public stage. I know of no family that has allowed the entire world into so many moments of personal grief, tragedy and loss over the years as the Kennedys. Among that great lot are some very good people. Eunice Kennedy Shriver, who preceded...

The president and his media enablers are outraged, just outraged, that anyone would suggest the prospect of, let alone come up with a name for, government panels designed to ration care for the elderly — and as the president said, “pull the plug on grandma.” Nothing lower, the left punditocracy fumed, than coming up with the “death panel” slur. Except that is precisely what Obama and his ilk want. We need look no further than the worshipful David Brooks, Obama’s political soul mate. He confesses, in a sort of Jack Nicholson code red moment that yes, darn it, he wants...

Two Bangladeshi newspapers have apologised after publishing an article taken from a satirical US website which claimed the Moon landings were faked. The Daily Manab Zamin said US astronaut Neil Armstrong had shocked a news conference by saying he now knew it had been an "elaborate hoax". Neither they nor the New Nation, which later picked up the story, realised the Onion was not a genuine news site. Both have now apologised to their readers for not checking the story. "We thought it was true so we printed it without checking," associate editor Hasanuzzuman Khan told the AFP news agency....

China considers bailing out of costly futures contractsGIVEN its vast reserves and seemingly healthy economy, a default by China’s government or one of its tentacles should be one of the lesser concerns for international markets. This perception was jolted on August 28th by reports that the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC) might endorse a move by large state-controlled enterprises under its umbrella to break derivatives contracts that were purchased last year from international banks to protect them from rising commodity prices. Details, inevitably, are fuzzy. There is no official comment; terrified international bankers are silent. But reports in...

I find it surprising that so many analysts and news reporters seem to think the Obama Administration's stimulus programs are working. A recent article in the Wall Street Journal is unfortunately typical of the lack of nuance and understanding of the complexity of the current economy, the series of stimulus-type packages passed by both Bush and Obama, and the role these efforts play in the economy: Economists say the money out the door -- combined with the expectation of additional funds flowing soon -- is fueling growth above where it would have been without any government action. Many forecasters say...

It remains a curiosity and a bit of a historical mystery why the world is divided over something as basic as which side of the road to drive on. The fact that most people are right-handed has a lot to do with it; that's why, for much of history, travelers have stuck to the left. Ancient Romans using chariots are believed to have held the reins with their right hands and a whip with their left; to avoid whipping oncoming drivers, they favored the left-hand side of the road. It's also easier for right-handers to mount a horse from the...

Bay Area environmental activist and White House adviser Van Jones is under attack from Republicans for signing a 2004 petition calling for a congressional investigation into the actions of the administration of former President George Bush surrounding the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Via Verum Serum, a golden oldie from the vault of Freedom Fighter Music, for which Jones’s Ella Baker Center for Human Rights was a “sponsoring non-profit.” The man himself has a cameo around 3:45 calling for a Palestinian right of return, which, once this gets picked up in Israel, should drop The One’s approval rating there to … actually, it can’t get any lower than it is now, can it? Either way, it’s got a great beat and you can dance call for the end of Zionism to it. Below that, via Breitbart, more leftist faux profundity about “soulful activism”...

What's your overall opinion of Sarah Palin? 50 - 50 currently. Win one for the Cuda! http://news.aol.com/article/dinner-with-sarah-palin-auctioned-on/657137

UNIONTOWN, Pa. – A Pennsylvania history buff who recreates firearms from old wars accidentally fired a 2-pound cannonball through the wall of his neighbor's home. William Maser, 54, fired a cannonball Wednesday evening outside his home in Georges Township that ricocheted and hit a house 400 yards away...