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Explosion Hits London Subway Station LONDON (AP) -- A large explosion went off near a London subway station early Friday, injuring several people, emergency services said. London Fire Brigade said it received reports of a blast near Ealing Broadway station in west London just after midnight. Scotland Yard police a warning had been received, but the cause of the explosion was not yet known. ''Everything shook and I felt the wind through my hair and the vibration, ''said 43-year-old Boo Abbass, who was eating in a nearby cafe. ''I knew immediately it must be a bomb, it was terrifying. The ...

Court Upholds $1.3 Million Award Against DEASAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A federal appeals court on Thursday upheld a $1.3 million judgement against the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), ruling the government was liable in the killing of an Arizona man by a DEA agent because the agent had not acted in self-defense. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals voted 2 to 1 to uphold a lower court's award to the family of David Aguilar, 44, killed in 1997 by a DEA agent who was involved in a drug surveillance operation. According to testimony during the trial, Aguilar was shot and killed ...

The Corporatist Manifesto We, the multinational corporations of the world, in order to promote our own interests, herein declare that we own and rule the world and everything and everyone in it. We have the right to make the laws that govern the people of the world, and to set up the structures of governance that promote our interests. We define this to be democracy. We have the right to use the powers that we allow governments to have in order to exercise unlimited control over the entire range of physical, psychological, and spiritual aspects of human existence, everywhere and ...

Congress considers fixing tax trap for stock option holders WASHINGTON (AP) -- Congress will consider a tax break for people who faced huge tax bills after they exercised incentive stock options in 2000 and then saw their stock plummet during the technology swoon. Legislation introduced Thursday would provide one-time relief for people who owe the alternative minimum tax because of paper stock profits they never actually realized. Tens of thousands of people, many of them lured by stock options to work at technology companies, are facing bills that can run into millions of dollars. Many are going into debt, draining ...

Dear fellow Freepers, Last weekend the lovely Princess Lisa (my girlfriend... and also secretly my Sith apprentice) and I were visiting my parents' place near Greensboro, NC. Great trip, but while driving around Greensboro we were seriously taken aback at the number of those RIDICULOUS red light cameras that have sprung up all over town. We counted perhaps five or so on the route we took. I don't like the red light cameras, for a lot of reasons that have been articulated here on Free Republic: they aren't an accuser you can face in a court of law. There is ...

The man whom police say knowingly spread the AIDS virus to over a dozen young women was denied parole Thursday. Nushawn Williams, was sentenced in 1998 to 4 to 12 years in prison for rape, reckless endangerment and drugs charges. Authorities say he infected women through unprotected sex even though he knew he was carrying HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. The two-member parole panel said Williams in incapable of understanding the severity of his crimes, adding that he has had numerous disciplinary problems while incarcerated. The 24-year-old made national headlines when he exposed 48 women and teenage girls ...

United States Urges China to Talk to Dalai LamaWASHINGTON (Reuters) - Secretary of State Colin Powell has urged the Chinese government to open a dialogue with the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, the State Department said on Thursday. Powell made the suggestion in talks with Chinese leaders during a visit to Beijing which ended last Sunday. U.S. officials did not mention it at the time. "The secretary raised human rights, including in Tibet, during his meetings in Beijing. He pointed out that these issues are important to the American people and to U.S.-China relations," spokesman Richard Boucher said. ...

House now voting on the Norwood amendment to the PBOR.

I was just watching Katrina vanden Hoevel (sic?), the editor of The Nation, on Hardball with Chris Mathews. Mathews asked her who her congressman is, and she hesitated and started changing the subject. He asked her again and again, as it became obvious that SHE DIDN'T EVEN KNOW WHO HER LOCAL CONGRESSMAN IS! It was a hoot. I immediately fired off an email to The Nation at letters@thenation.com to tell them we all caught it, baby! Did anyone else see this spectacle?

The Indy Freepers are meeting this evening at 7:30 at the Fox & Hound. It's on the south side of 82nd Street between Castleton and Clearwater shopping areas, behind Logan's Steakhouse. Sorry for the short notice - I should have posted this yesterday. Story of my life . . . a day late and a dollar short! Sure hope some thoughtful Indy Freeper can cover me when I'm short on my tab. Everyone come and have fun - you'll recognize us from the smiles on our faces and the great conversations going on.

George W. Bush may seem defiantly simple. But he’s a man with a plan Every presidency has its defining moment. George W. Bush’s arrived the other day in the ornate Mansfield Room of the Capitol. He’d come to the weekly luncheon of Senate Republicans. The meal, by new custom, was order-and-pay-for-your-own. Our 43rd president chose his favorite: peanut butter and jelly. Specifically, (for five bucks), creamy peanut butter with raspberry jelly on wheat. So now we know. Bush is the PB&J president. BUSH’S DEFIANT SIMPLICITY has become the vivid hallmark of his suddenly not-so-new presidency. He’s taken stark, stubborn—and, critics ...

BEWARE at the gas pumps! Please read and forward to anyone you know who drives. My name is Captain Abraham Sands of the Jacksonville Florida Police Department. I have been asked by state and local authorities to write this e-mail to get the word out to car drivers of a very dangerous prank that is occuring in numerous states. Some person or persons have been affixing hypodermic needles to the underside of gas pump hanles. These needles appear to be infected with HIV positive blood. In the Jacksonville area alone there have been 17 cases of people being stuck by ...

Congressman Ron Paul once again will return a portion of his office's operating budget to the federal treasury. House administrative records show that Paul's office maintained an unspent balance of $52,440 at the end of 2000, marking the fourth straight year Paul has spent less than his allotted office budget. "I'm pleased we were able to save some taxpayer funds," Paul stated. "My office strives to spend only the amount needed to provide effective constituent services. Every part of the federal government, including Congressional offices, needs to exercise fiscal restraint." Paul stated that he would continue to seek new ways ...

RALEIGH -- As Democratic leaders struggled to find the votes for their proposed $600 million tax hike Wednesday, House Republicans took the unusual step of kicking out one of their own. House Republicans voted behind closed doors to boot Rep. Charles "Monroe" Buchanan from the GOP caucus. Buchanan is still a Republican, but he won't be allowed to attend the weekly meetings of Republican members and will lose near-automatic GOP support for his local bills. Republican leaders said they banished Buchanan because he voted for the tax increase last week in committee. They sent a clear message to other Republicans: ...

Congress recently considered several trade-related measures containing massive subsidies for American corporations that sell their products overseas. For example, the Export-Import bank received more than $750 million in appropriations funding last week. The biggest beneficiary of this money is China, which has used Ex-Im funds to build nuclear power plants, expand its state-run airline, and even build steel factories that compete directly with our own struggling domestic steel industry. Undoubtedly the American companies who benefit from contracts with China are happy with these trade subsidies, but American taxpayers should not be forced to pay for corporate welfare that simply benefits ...

Justices of the California Court of Appeal may have to sort out an Alameda County Superior Court judge's groundbreaking ruling that gives sweeping libel protection to Internet users. Last week, Judge James Richman dismissed part of a lawsuit filed by two physicians who claimed that a woman re-posted a libelous article that accused one of the doctors of stalking a Canadian journalist. "[A]s a user of an interactive computer service, that is, a newsgroup, [the defendant] is not the publisher or speaker of [the] piece. Thus, she cannot be civilly liable for posting it on the Internet. She is ...

SKOPJE, Aug 2 (AFP) - Efforts to avoid a Balkan war in Macedonia hit new snags on Thursday, as hardline leaders called for action to drive out ethnic Albanian rebels and fresh clashes in the north undermined progress towards a peace accord. As Macedonian and ethnic Albanian leaders took a break from peace talks for the country's national day, Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski threw a cat among the pigeons, saying government forces should push rebels from territory they have taken before a peace accord is signed. The comments came just a day after peace negotiators said they had reached agreement ...

`That's My Bush!' canceled by Comedy Central but producers dreaming of filmsLOS ANGELES (AP) The fictional president in Comedy Central's "That's My Bush!" didn't even make it through his first term. But he'll try for election to the big screen. The satirical White House sitcom from "South Park" creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone canceled after eight episodes will be the basis for a movie script, Stone said. "We're not done with this show," he said Thursday. "George W. Bush and the Secret of the Glass Tiger" is the proposed title for the film, which Stone and his partner plan ...

PROHOR PCINSKI, Yugoslavia, Aug 2 (Reuters) - Macedonia's Prime Minister on Thursday urged tougher action to recapture territory held by ethnic Albanian insurgents, saying it would be shameful to sign any peace deal under rebel threats. Ljubco Georgievski expressed hope that talks between leaders of Macedonia's fractious political parties, who made a breakthrough on Wednesday by agreeing wider use of the Albanian language, could end with a scheme to avert a new Balkan war. "But signing that document while our territories are occupied by terrorists would be a shameful agreement for Macedonia," he said in a speech in southern Yugoslavia ...

How the Bush tax cut crowds out spending on health and education. Plus, news on the new FBI boss and the race for Democratic whip The University of Akron graduated 60 nurses this year, enough to fill little more than a third of the nursing jobs open in the Akron area. The growing shortage of nurses is capturing headlines around the country and jangling nerves in the health-care industry. If current trends continue, the shortages will worsen into a crisis just about the time aging baby boomers need nursing care. But the seriousness of the situation has evidently escaped President ...