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CHARLESTON (--) Gary Caouette follows Clemson football, has a Southern-born wife and counts NASCAR racing as his favorite sport. But he says being from the North has sometimes been a drawback since he moved from Massachusetts to the cradle of secession. His Northern connection has cost him jobs and promotions in South Carolina, Caouette said, and he formed the Southern Association of Yankees as a nonprofit support group. "There just needs to be a voice for Yankees in South Carolina and especially the South," said Caouette, 36, a native of Oxford, Mass. About 10 people have shown an interest in ...

Sunday September 9 7:07 AM ET Cops: Man Kills 4 Former Co-Workers Cops: Man Kills 4 Former Co-Workers By DON THOMPSON, Associated Press Writer SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) - A suspended security guard fatally shot four former co-workers on Saturday, then handcuffed a fifth guard before fleeing in her car, police said. Joseph Ferguson, 20, of Sacramento, remained at large early Sunday and was believed to be heavily armed and possibly wearing body armor, said Sacramento Police spokesman Sgt. Daniel Hahn. Ferguson was believed to be driving a green car stolen from the former co-worker who was handcuffed at the Sacramento ...

<p>Reports of a shrinking budget surplus have prompted a rash of hand-wringing among federal lawmakers as they prepare to resume work on the spending bills they left behind at the beginning of August.</p> <p>Some warn that the Social Security surplus will have to be tapped. How can Congress cope?</p>

THE ANIMAL RIGHTS 2001 CONFERENCE The Annual Meeting for 2001 Training Sessions: Hunters are already divided, keep dividing them, stress issues that divide hunters. Get to children early in school so they learn to hate hunting. Legal rights for all animals. Terrorism is justified. Put bricks through widows to intimidate wives and children. And lots more ... by Jim Beers After several requests by Conservation Force, an international sustainable use conservation organization located in Louisiana, I agreed to attend the annual animal rights meeting. The Conference ran from 30 June to 5 July at the Hilton Hotel in McLean, Virginia. ...

MEDIUM RARE By Jim Rarey September 8, 2001 IS CHANDRA AT FORT LEE AFTERALL? The day after an anonymous tip was received by the WeTip organization, and forwarded to law enforcement authorities, the FBI foreclosed any investigation when spokeswoman Mary Johlie was quoted, The FBI.determined that there is no site on or around the Fort Lee military base that corresponds with information in the anonymous tip." Unnamed Fort Lee officials were quoted as saying, "the last construction project on the base was completed in October 2000." Presumably the FBI decided not to investigate the tip based on someone's representation that ...

<p>Washington -- It's a game that draws the biggest crowd at the carnival. Your ball hits the target. The big shot falls into the water.</p> <p>Next November, the most enticing target in the country will be Jeb Bush, governor of Florida. Nail Jeb hard and his littler, older brother -- that's the president! -- will fall with a splash into the icy tub. Last week, Janet Reno, attorney general during the Clinton administration, took a prominent place in line to "Throw at Jeb!" But by declaring her candidacy, Reno erected a new attraction on the American midway: "Throw at Janet." Beat her and you've struck a blow against the FBI; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms; the federal government; the Clinton cotillion; the gun control crowd and Fidel Castro to boot.</p>

Foreign troops on the way to Kosovo started passing through Yugoslav territory. Yugoslav Ministry of Defense has made a detailed plan for passing of foreign military convoys. So far, Russian, Slovakian, Ukrainian, Turkish and troops from Finland have passed. Soldiers are traveling apart from their weapons and equipment. Only stops on the road are permitted, for no Yugoslav objects are available for use.

 Little Ashley Cowan managed to keep her spirit intact after doctors took away most of her limbs when she was just 18 months old.  "When she came out of her coma (after) a month and went through the amputation I knew she was a fighter," her mom Shurlene recalled of Ashley's bout with meningitis that led to gangrene and, finally, amputation.  "She asked for her shoes right away," Shurlene said yesterday of the prosthetic limbs the little girl accepted and jumped on at the first opportunity.  The mother who kept a vigil at the little girl's hospital bedside every ...

President Bush's guest list for his first formal state dinner, honoring Mexico's President Vicente Fox last Wednesday night, was light on two normally favored categories: White House staffers and financial contributors. The usual platoon of presidential aides was radically reduced. Among the uninvited were intimate Bush advisers Karen Hughes and Karl Rove. All senior staffers, however, were welcome to attend post-dinner entertainment and dancing. First lady Laura Bush reduced the size of the dinner and made it clear she did not want guests who ''pay their way in''--that is, financial contributors. Nevertheless, the invitation list included a few Texas campaign ...

"What gay ideologues, inflated like pink balloons with poststructuralist hot air, can't admit, of course, is that heterosexuality is nature's norm, enforced by powerful hormonal cues at puberty. In the past decade, one shoddy book after another, rapturously applauded by p.c. reviewers, has exaggerated the incidence of homosexuality in the animal world and, without due regard for reproductive adaptations caused by environmental changes, toxins or population pressure, reductively interpreted bonding or hierarchical behavior as gay in the human sense." About the writer: Camille Paglia is professor of humanities and media studies at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia.

LET THE WATER FLOW! "The rights of man come not from the generosity of the statebut from the hand of God." President John F. Kennedy--Inaugural Address Free Republic has a rich history of activism -- we pull together when the going gets rough, and we're making headway! On behalf of Jim Robinson, who has so kindly consented to authorize this thread for the Breaking News category, I would like to invite you all to take five minutes from your very busy lives and make a phone call, send a fax or write an e-mail. If you would like to ...

:: ARAFAT BRANCHING OUT? According to a DEBKAfile report, Arafat has made initial overtures to extremist elements in the international anti-globalist movement. He is checking out their organizational infrastructure to find usable launching pads for Palestinian-sponsored terrorist operations against American, Jewish and Israeli targets in the United States, Canada and Europe, reviving memories of former Palestinian infiltrations of protest movements in the sixties and seventies. The DEBKAfile believes the Palestinian approach was made to factions of the Black Bloc anarchists, who last month turned the international demonstration outside the Group of Eight summit in Genoa into a rampage. An ...

An 8-foot-long Amazonian monkey on the loose in southern New Hampshire has local authorities hanging bananas and oranges in the trees around Danville, but as of yesterday the woolly primate had yet to take the bait. ``Our main concern is he won't make it through winter,'' town animal control officer Denise Laratondo said. ``I just want to catch the poor guy. We won't destroy him; he's an endangered species.'' The first sighting of the critter believed to be a Humbolt's woolly monkey came Aug. 31, when town Fire Chief David Kimball saw it leap across Kingston Road and disappear. ...

POTEAU -- The topic of conversation at the weekly Rotary Club luncheon is how Le Flore County and Oklahoma fall short. But Gov. Frank Keating didn't come to talk about Cavanal Hill, a point of pride north of town that qualifies as the world's tallest hill because it is two feet short of being a mountain. Instead, he's looking a few miles east to the Arkansas border and the Ozarks, where he says economic development is thriving at Oklahoma's expense. He says a lot of it is because of Oklahoma's failure to pass a right-to-work law as Arkansas and 20 ...

Harare - Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe is still studying last week's agreement to end his controversial land seizure drive, the country's foreign minister said in an interview published on Sunday. Mugabe has made no public comment on the pact, reached in the Nigerian capital Abuja on Thursday. He returned home early on Sunday after a week's "working holiday" in Libya, Zimbabwe state radio reported. In an interview with the state-owned Sunday Mail newspaper, Foreign Minister Stan Mudenge said Zimbabwe would announce its next move once Mugabe had finished studying the document. But he said the agreement to halt farm ...

<p>GETTING OFF?</p> <p>QB Jeremy Wien (right), on the sidelines last week, and teammates will probably not face charges for their lewd party, cops say.</p> <p>September 9, 2001 -- The high-school jocks who cavorted with a stripper at a boozy, pot-smoking party in Chappaqua last weekend appear to have dodged punishment despite startling evidence that similar parties are not uncommon in the affluent Westchester County suburbs.</p>

Currency switch for trade starts next month &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Each side will offer credit facility as well &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Malaysia and Thailand will start trading with each other in their own currencies for 34 &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; products by the end of the month, Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; said yesterday. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mr Mahathir discussed the trade arrangement during a meeting with Prime Minister &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Thaksin Shinawatra. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mr Thaksin was visiting Malaysia to lend moral support to Thai athletes competing &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; in the 21st Southeast Asian Games. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; ``He [Thaksin] urges that trade between Malaysia and Thailand be done in each ...

Sunday September 9 8:19 AM ET Seven Dead in Frenzy of Middle East Violence Seven Dead in Frenzy of Middle East Violence Photos Reuters Photo Slideshows AP Photo Mideast Conflict Audio/Video Meeting Between Arafat, Peres Planned (Reuters) &nbsp; By Christine HauserNAHARIYA, Israel (Reuters) - A Palestinian suicide bombing, car bomb explosions at a major Israeli intersection and a West Bank shooting killed seven people Sunday in a frenzy of violence that threatened efforts to convene truce talks.Deadly events unfolded by the hour and Israel retaliated with helicopter missile strikes in West Bank cities, hitting two empty offices of Palestinian President ...

Harare - Voting went ahead peacefully on Sunday on the second day of crucial local elections in Zimbabwe, a day after police arrested three opposition members, opposition candidates said. The two elections - a by-election in Makoni West and a mayoral election in Bulawayo - are seen by many as a popularity test for President Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe African National Union - Patriotic Front (Zanu-PF) party. "The situation is calm and peaceful," said Remus Makuwaza, the opposition Movment for Democratic Change's (MDC's) candidate in Makoni West, eastern Zimbabwe. Meanwhile, three MDC members picked up by police from the party's ...

<p>Memo to certain college newspaper editors: David Horowitz soon will give you another chance to prove your devotion to free speech isn't just lip service.</p> <p>Here's hoping you don't blow it the way you did last time.</p> <p>Yes, Mr. Horowitz, a former anti-Vietnam War activist-turned conservative commentator, plans to take another shot at the experiment he tried on college journalism a few months ago. He harbors little hope that this exercise -- submitting a paid ad that will deal with "something about college professors," he told a recent gathering at the Washington-based Eagle Forum -- will fare any better than the previous one. But he's willing to try.</p>