Free Republic

CONCORDIA, Argentina (Reuters) - In Argentina's poorest city, people rummage through trash for scraps of food alongside pigs and wild dogs, unemployment tops 40 percent and even the mayor says ''hell'' is just around the corner. Desperate and hungry as Argentina suffers its worst economic crisis, dozens of jobless gather every day at Concordia's city dump to sift through mounds of plastic bags, shards of glass and cigarette butts in search of lunch. ''You used to be able to find some chicken skins or maybe a piece of potato to take home to your kids, but now too many...

<p>NEW YORK (CNN) -- Former President Bill Clinton said Thursday he supports steps President Bush is taking in the Middle East.</p> <p>"It sounds to me like the administration is moving in the right direction now," Clinton told reporters as he ended a visit to a high school in the Bronx. He applauded the recent decision to send Secretary of State Colin Powell to the region, saying, "I think the more America is there, even if we don't make something really good happen, fewer bad things will happen."</p>

A Glimpse of Hell Over the Horizon Arizona Fire Report By Tina Terry Sierra Times Ranch Hand Published 06. 20. 02 at 23:52 Sierra Time   As I send this out, Show Low, Heber and Overgaard, Arizona - to the north of me, and not that far away, are burning out of control. Flames are leaping through the giant Ponderosa pines, destroying everything. Thousands of wild animals are being killed, injured and being displaced. Thousands of people are evacuating, and hundreds, perhaps thousands, of homes are being destroyed. My family is preparing in case we need to evacuate from...

Mineta, Magaw and Ridge Deserve to Be Removedby Joseph P. TartaroExecutive Editor, GunWeekJune 10, 2002 Within hours of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon across the Potomac from Washington, DC, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) was the first voice heard calling for Congress to pass legislation allowing airline pilots who volunteered and were trained to carry guns in the cockpit as a last line of defense in similar future hijackings. Congress acted and passed such enabling legislation just a few months after...

Donkeys Married To Appease Hindu Rain God India's Drought Aggravated By Heat Wave Posted: 2:29 p.m. EDT June 20, 2002 NEW DELHI, India -- The drought-plagued residents of a small village in southern India organized a ceremonial wedding for two donkeys to appease the Hindu god of rain, a news report said Thursday. Dressed up like a bride and groom, the donkeys were escorted to a temple in the village of Sakkayanayakanur in Tamil Nadu state on Wednesday, the Press Trust of India reported. There, a local priest chanted prayers and led the donkeys in a ritual ceremony to...

Over the course of Church history change within the Church has been a slow and at times agonizingly slow, process. Despite the great strides the Church has made since the beginning of the Protestant Reformation in 1517 A.D. in ridding false teaching, more yet remains. And, false doctrine is far from being the innocuous matter it is veiwed as being by many professing believers today. Erroneous, that is to say, unbiblical, teaching or doctrine, though it is rarely seen as such, is in fact spiritual idolatry. Unfortunately, the prevailing attitude today in many sectors of Churchdom is that sound doctrine...

Sufferers Advised To Eliminate Certain Foods From Diet Updated: 6:36 p.m. EDT June 20, 2002 Summertime for a lot of people means picnics and barbecues -- but the foods that often accompany those gatherings can be a real pain for the more than 45 million headache sufferers in the United States. Dietary triggers do not necessarily contribute to headaches in all headache sufferers, but particular foods may trigger attacks in certain individuals, according to the National Headache Foundation. People who find themselves suffering from headaches after grabbing a sausage off the grill or adding a slice of Cheddar to...

John F. Kennedy Jr., the famous son whose life began as a fairy tale and ended as a tragedy, will be the subject of a TBS biopic to star Jacqueline Bisset and Portia de Rossi as the two key women in his life, his mother and his wife. "America's Prince: The JFK Jr. Story," from Fox TV Studios, is based on Christopher Andersen's 2000 biography "The Day John Died." Bisset will play Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, while de Rossi will portray Carolyn Bessette Kennedy. The project from FTVS' Fox TV Pictures division is in preproduction. "America's Prince" is one of two...

Enterprising farmers began drawing water from the Colorado River in 1901 to transform the Imperial Valley desert east of San Diego into a lush agricultural empire. Today, the Imperial Irrigation District sucks as much as 3.2 million acre-feet a year from the river to irrigate 450,000 acres of cropland--nearly six times the amount of water the city of Los Angeles uses in a year. Why do crops come before people even as California's growing population strains the state's water supply? It's not because growing crops in the desert makes more sense. It's because state water law gives preference to those...

<p>WASHINGTON — Two conservative groups pounded Attorney General John Ashcroft on Thursday for allowing Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson to speak to a group of Justice Department employees at their annual Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Pride program held at DOJ headquarters on Wednesday evening.</p>

<p>Terry Barton stands at the scene of the Hayman Fire Sunday, June 9. She is now held in jail without bail.</p> <p>DENVER — The estranged husband of a U.S. Forest Service worker accused of setting the worst wildfire in Colorado history told investigators he had never written a letter to his wife, undercutting her story that she had accidently kindled the blaze by burning the letter in a campfire ring. That information came to light Thursday during a pretrial hearing for Forest Service recreation technician Terry Barton, 38, an 18-year veteran of the agency. Barton pleaded innocent in federal court to four felony counts lodged against her by a grand jury on Wednesday.</p>

THERE’S an old joke about a drunken Australian wedding which came to mind this week.As the revellers are getting into their stride, one of the ushers rushes in and announces: “Sorry, everybody, the wedding’s off. The best man just shagged the bride.” A couple of minutes later, just as the guests are finishing off their drinks and putting on their coats, he returns with the news: “Panic over, folks. He’s apologised.”I thought about that when I read Downing Street’s grudging apology for the Wicked Witch’s sympathy for Palestinian homicide bombers. After insisting that she was only stating the obvious,...

Deputies: Central Florida Man Kills Alligator, Burns House Suspect Charged With Arson Posted: 5:28 a.m. EDT June 21, 2002 FORT MCCOY, Fla. -- A 52-year-old man rammed his truck into his girlfriend's car, fatally injuring an alligator in her backyard, before he set both of their houses on fire, deputies said. Dennis L. Saunders was charged Thursday with arson of an unoccupied dwelling, a felony, for burning his own house. He was released from the Marion County Jail on a $10,000 bond. Saunders rammed his truck into his girlfriend's 1977 Camaro after she said she was leaving him, according...

BRUSSELS, June 21 (Reuters) - Jordan's King Abdullah said in an interview published on Friday that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat had substantially lost control of militant groups and warned that even worse violence lay ahead in the Middle East. "What I can say is that over the years I always thought Arafat was capable of controlling Palestinian public sentiment and extremism," the king was quoted as saying in an interview with the Belgian weekly Le Vif/L'Express. "I think that is no longer the case today." Abdullah, one of Washington's main Arab allies, renewed his call on the United States to...

<p>WASHINGTON -- Federal officials Wednesday identified 1,085 acres in the southern San Joaquin Valley as crucial for a vulnerable plant.</p> <p>By designating the land in Tulare and Fresno counties as critical habitat, the Fish and Wildlife Service hopes to preserve the endangered Keck's checkermallow.</p>

Hogwash handidi ARE you part of the conspiracy? It seems everybody else is. The pages of the official press daily announce new plots against the government. But nobody seems to be taking any notice. Perhaps it is a case of having "cried wolf" too often. Or perhaps the public have other things on their minds. Last Wednesday the Herald published an article by somebody calling himself Morgan Handidi who wove a convoluted web of intrigue that tied in British High Commissioner Brian Donnelly, the MDC, the Selous Scouts, the Law Society, Amani Trust, something called Mumvuri waDavid Coltart, a cartel...

Go here to vote. Looks like the libs got a hold of this one. Time to get to work!

At first glance, the official Web site of the ELN, an underground group in Colombia, looks like it's owned and operated by a respectable think tank. At second glance, as well. Unthreatening links to "the peace process," "human rights," "ideas and debate" and "drugs and corruption" lead to pages with well-written essays that analyze the crimes of the Colombia government against its citizenry. There are illustrations reminiscent of Amnesty International's, pictures of children and drawings of a peace dove with an olive branch in its beak. Nowhere does the site mention the hundreds of people the ELN kidnaps every year,...

Posted on Thu, Jun. 20, 2002 Despite post-Sept. 11 patriotism, many college students would evade draft By Cassio Furtado Knight Ridder Newspapers WASHINGTON - Thirty-seven percent of American college students would try to evade the draft if one were called today, according to a nationwide poll released Thursday. The survey by Republican pollster Frank Luntz, which comes nine months after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks prompted a surge in American patriotism, also shows that 79 percent of students do not think Western culture is superior to Arab culture. Asked whether they would accept being drafted into military service, another 35...