Free Republic

June 24— By Kate Kelland LONDON (Reuters) - Drugs Minister Bob Ainsworth urged communities across Britain Monday to cooperate with police to tame the spiraling problem of crack cocaine use. Speaking at a national conference on how to address the serious social and health problems created by the drug, Ainsworth said crack was now as great a threat as heroin."All communities are at risk from crack cocaine and the associated problems of crime, violence and decline," he said."I would like to see more projects ... addressing the particular community problems posed by crack cocaine."He said that while the provision of...

BAGRAM, Afghanistan, Jun 24, 2002 (AP Online via COMTEX) -- A rocket was fired near U.S. special forces in southeastern Afghanistan, a spokesman said Monday. The attack came soon after nearby British forces seized a large stash of weapons that may have been left by al-Qaida and Taliban fighters. None of the troops was injured in the rocket explosion near the town of Khost. The soldiers searched for the firing site but did not find it, said Col. Roger King. In the nearby village of Organ-e, residents told U.S. troops that rockets might be aimed at the Americans in the...

BEIRUT, Lebanon, Jun 24, 2002 (AP Online via COMTEX) -- Osama bin Laden and his No. 2 man are both alive and well and their al-Qaida network is ready to attack new U.S. targets, bin Laden's spokesman said in audiotaped remarks aired Sunday. The message also claimed responsibility for a deadly April fire at a Jewish synagogue in Tunisia. The Qatar-based Al-Jazeera satellite television network, which has in the past aired videotaped messages of bin Laden and his top lieutenants, said that it received a recorded audiotaped message from Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, the Kuwaiti-born spokesman for bin Laden. There was...

Don Hollywood The Mafia gave the movies material. The movies gave John Gotti a script by JAMES PONIEWOZIKMonday, Jun. 17, 2002 John Gotti thought of himself as the Caesar of the Mafia. But he was really its Commodus. As with the emperor in the movie Gladiator, when Gotti took over the Gambino crime family in 1985, some saw his ascension as a step backward for the family. He was muscle, a grunt, an obscure and none-too-bright soldier who wouldn't have become boss if so many of his betters weren't already in jail. So, like Commodus, Gotti, who died of cancer...

In the war against terrorism, America and Israel face an enemy whose implacable evil is difficult to comprehend. The mentality of the people launching suicide bombing attacks against Israel is perhaps best revealed not in those they kill, but in those they injure. We need to think about the state of soul required to pack bombs full of shrapnel and nails and rat poison, intended to embed in flesh, to maim children and condemn them to months or years of agonizing rehabilitation, and lifelong disfigurement and disability. This kind of weapon manifests a will to exterminate, utterly to obliterate, the...

Enviros are NUTS! In Sacramento, last week, the U.S. Forest Service said it will remove 80 percent of the dead trees burned last August on some 2,400 acres of federal land burned near Lake Tahoe in the Star Fire. But more than 16,000 acres burned in that fire – no plans yet for those dead trees. But the environmentalists already say "no"! They want more trees left because they say the plan concentrates too heavily on removing wood that could feed another fire. Say again?!? They want to feed fires? We're in the midst of a flaming disaster. The pictures...

One of the most destructive elements of political correctness involves its preference for emotion over accuracy – the casual disregard of normal standards of evidence and objectivity in pursuit of some "higher" cause. Two recent distortions, in the worlds of motion pictures and education, demonstrate this preposterous preference for feelings over facts. The ambitious new film "Windtalkers" bills itself as an historical epic, complete with the declaration (featured prominently in the ads), "INSPIRED BY TRUE EVENTS." The story attempts to re-create a fascinating sidelight of the Pacific campaign in World War II, in which the Marine Corps recruited nearly 400...

Every year in late June and early July – at least in areas where selling fireworks is still legal – groups like churches, service clubs, schools, etc. raise money by selling fireworks to the public. In 2001, for instance, fireworks sales totaled an estimated $650 million, according to the American Pyrotechnics Association. So what's wrong with selling fireworks? Am I worried about accidents? Actually, no. In fact, while sales of fireworks are way up, fireworks-related injuries are way down – falling over 86 percent in the last 24 years. No, my concern about the sale of fireworks is completely different...

China to Promote Democracy in State, Collective-owned Factories   State- and collective-owned factories plus those with shares mainly held by state or collective-owned companies should open up their internal affairs to all their staff   The general offices of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and the State Council made this call in a joint circular dated June 3, which was made public on Sunday. The document was issued to provincial-level party committees and governments, ministerial-level departments, the General Political Department of the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA),and leading non-government groups. Since the 15th Party Congress in 1997,...

China Works out Six Simulated Humans for Medical Use Diagnosis and treatment that can not be carried out on real human body now can be tested on virtual human instead. As the most important preparatory work of China's "simulated human project", six virtual human models have been worked out using bionic materials, according to professor Lin Daquan with Sichuan University. Jointly initiated by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Peking University and Tsinghua University, the virtual human project will be formally proposed to the State Ministry of Science and Technology by the end of this month. "Virtual human" means to gather...

JENIN, West Bank, June 24 (Reuters) - Israeli forces partly destroyed a commercial building housing a bank in Jenin on Monday in what Israeli officials said was a controlled explosion of a bomb laboratory hidden in the complex. Residents said the northern part of the three-storey building, including a section of the Jenin branch of the Cairo-Amman bank, were destroyed in the explosion. Military officials said two large containers of liquids used to prepare bombs, a large quantity of explosives ready for use and parts of rocket launchers were found in the building during searches by troops that have reoccupied...

I didn't post the article. What is interesting is the prominence they've given it on their website. Main page, front and center. Trying to prove to the Israeli's that they "care" after Israel threatened to drop them from their satellite. It's actually promoting Wolf Blitzer's 5 part special that they're airing beginning tonight about Israeli victims.

Remedial CondescensionAre We Sure This Is What We Want?        An obvious truth that one dare not utter: White America, and in particular the media, academia, and government, holds blacks in utter contempt. This becomes clear the moment one looks at behavior instead of asseveration. It is especially true of those people who imagine themselves to be liberal. Let me back up. Decades ago, I decided that blacks should be judged on their individual merits, just as everyone else should be, without regard to race, creed, color, or national origin. For this I was called a liberal and...

Stunning videos of Arab atrocities and violence training – available only from WorldNetDaily.com – will be featured tonight on Fox News Channel's "Hannity & Colmes" show. The two videos, "The Trojan Horse" and "Israel: The War of Images," were produced by French documentary filmmaker Pierre Rehov. Featured last week on MSNBC's "Making Sense With Alan Keyes," they expose Arab atrocities against Israel and duplicity by the Palestinian Authority as revealed in its own television broadcasts. The documentaries contain actual footage documenting Yasser Arafat's call for destruction of the Jewish people and annihilation of Israel. They also document the brainwashing of...

Nuances of US China-Taiwan policyBy Chris Wu \î¤ZUS Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz is one of the "hawks" in the George W. Bush administration. He advocates a hard line toward Beijing and is friendly toward Taiwan. But beginning on May 15, in several public statements, Wolfowitz expressed the China policy of the Bush administration by saying, "Washington has no intention, has no desire to separate Taiwan from the mainland ... [This is] another way of saying we're opposed to Taiwan independence." He emphasized that the US has a "one China" policy that includes two premises: the US does not...

The owner and creator of a pair of popular pro-life websites claims he is being denied access to online audiences because Internet service providers either dump him after he becomes a customer or refuse to sell him bandwidth at all. Neal Horsley, publisher of Pathway Communications and creator of The Christian Gallery and AbortionCams.com, says "dozens" of Internet service providers, or ISPs, have taken his money over the past three years, only to "shut me down later because they receive complaints about my work." Horsley's "Nuremberg Files" websites first gained national prominence because they contained graphic depictions of abortions. Pro-abortion-rights...

HICAGO — DARRYL KILE was supposed to pitch at Wrigley Field last night. But the St. Louis Cardinals have been turned inside out, and a rookie, Jason Simontacchi, took the mound instead. Kile's body was found Saturday afternoon in his hotel room before the Cardinals were to play the second game of a three game series against the Cubs. The game was called off, and yesterday the Cook County coroner's office reported that Kile had severely blocked coronary arteries.

The White House lobbied last week to kill a Senate Republican effort to effectively stop commercial human cloning in the United States, Senate sources have told Human Events. Although President Bush has endorsed a complete ban on human cloning sponsored by senators Sam Brownback, R.-Kan., and Mary Landrieu, D.-La., White House lobbyists contacted Republican senators June 18 to ask them to vote that morning for cloture (a closing of debate to bring a legislative question to a vote) on the Senate's terrorism insurance bill (S 2600), thus preventing an up-or-down vote on a human cloning amendment that Brownback wanted to...

Despite U.S. claims, Sudan's recent capture of a suspected failed al-Qaida member is hardly an example of cooperation from a regime whose leaders have direct ties to Osama bin Laden's terrorist network and run international jihad camps with al-Qaida instructors, according to some close observers of the African nation. The arrested Sudanese citizen, Abu Huzifa, was described by unnamed U.S. administration sources as an important operative with links to al-Qaida's leadership, the Washington Post reported. The June arrest is seen by some U.S. officials as evidence that Sudan, accused by the House of Representatives of genocide, is cooperating with the...

WASHINGTON U.S. officials blasted the notion yesterday that Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein might blunt White House plans to topple his regime by simply handing over power to his son. Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Bob Graham (D-Fla.) said Iraq needs a regime change — not just a Hussein change."Just having his son become the puppet leader of Iraq, with probably the father still pulling the strings in the background, is not ... sufficient," Graham told "Fox News Sunday."Quoting Arab diplomats in Baghdad, the Sunday Times of London reported that Saddam is considering not running for reelection this year — and...