Free Republic

WASHINGTON (AP) -- WorldCom Inc., already facing charges over nearly $4 billion in disguised expenses, told the government Monday that it is investigating possible irregularities in its reserve accounts. Stock of the embattled telecommunications company plunged 90 percent to 6 cents a share in early trading after a three-day halt following its disclosure of accounting irregularities. More than 250 million shares changed hands in frenzied trading in the first 15 minutes. Before the market opened, WorldCom submitted a sworn statement to the Securities and Exchange Commission, which had demanded a report after filing the civil fraud charges on Wednesday. WorldCom's...

BOSNIA: Police Corruption and Terrorism June 30, 2002; In addition to the rampant criminality, there is a growing problem with police being compromised with bribes and offers to go into business with criminals. Some foreign policemen who serve to advise and help supervise Bosnian police have been accused of openly cooperating with criminal gangs. Foreign policemen who go into business on the side are not disciplined, even if the business is a brothel. All this is becoming quite a scandal, as it is feared that the growing number of "dirty cops" are also being bought off by Islamic organizations engaged...

It has been one week now since President George W. Bush delivered the long awaited speech outlining his vision of a future Middle East peace. The speech was troublesome and the world's reaction to it has been troubled. It was a strange speech. One we have been told went through 28 revisions. The final product appeared to reflect two distinct and contradictory approaches. It was, one might say, a "compassionate [neo-]conservative" speech. There were, for example, parts of the speech that spoke passionately about Palestinian suffering and Palestinian needs to be free of occupation and to have a state of...

Washington - James Furnish is hardly the kind of person you'd expect to quit his government job on principle during the Bush administration. A political conservative and an evangelical Christian, he voted for President Bush and plans to do the same in 2004. As a deputy chief of the U.S. Forest Service, he was eager to give his new bosses the benefit of his more than 30 years of experience in the agency. He realized his conservationist ethic might not always prevail. But he was ready to say his piece and then accept the new administration's direction. Instead, Furnish reluctantly...

<p>Eight former and current Modesto police officers refused to testify during a hearing for a central figure in the Police Department's gun-sale scandal of the late 1990s, according to a court document.</p> <p>Their silence played a critical role in an arbitrator's April 30 decision ordering Carol Mosconi reinstated as the department's records manager.</p>

Afghan official, residents say 250 killed, 400 wounded in blast BREAKING NEWS MSNBC STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS KABUL, Afghanistan, July 1 — A bomb dropped by a U.S. plane killed at least 250 members of an Afghan wedding party in an attack on a village in Uruzgan province southeast of Kabul on Monday, residents and a source from the Afghan Ministry of Defense told NBC News on Monday. Pentagon officials said an errant bomb was dropped during a bombing run over a suspected enemy target in southern Afghanistan overnight. While the U.S. officials acknowledged there have been reports of civilian...

Doctors in northern India have removed a 1.2 kg ball of hair from a 16-year-old girl's stomach. The Dainik Ujala newspaper says doctors operated on Kiran Singh at a hospital in Dharampur near Shimla. Her parents say she's pulled out her hair and swallowed it since early childhood. Her father Ajit said: "No-one thought much of it initially. It was only when she came of age that she began to over-do the eating. "Now the doctors have relieved her of her misery we hope she gives up the dreadful habit. Someone might just wonder whether we don't feed her enough...

Saying too many people have been injured in the cross-fire, Fort Mitchell has banned using squirt guns and water balloons at its annual Fourth of July parade. “Last year, some people got overzealous and threw frozen water balloons,” said Fort Mitchell City Administrator Bill Goetz. “There was some minor bruising, so we've notified this year's participants that we're not allowing any water apparatus at all.” The water fights started about five years ago when firefighters in the parade pumped water into the air. By the next year, the crowd came armed with its own water weapons and was shooting back....

<p>NEW YORK — He's an all-American movie star, but Tom Cruise said his children will be making All the Right Moves — by moving out of America.</p> <p>"I think the U.S. is terrifying and it saddens me," he told the British paper the Daily Express. "You only have to look at the state of affairs in America."</p>

<p>Republican objections to tax hikes derail the spending plan by five votes.</p> <p>SACRAMENTO -- California will begin a new fiscal year today without a state budget, the 14th time that has happened in the past 25 years.</p> <p>A new spending plan fell five votes short Sunday night in the Assembly as Republicans warned about a looming "fiscal train wreck" and Democrats accused the GOP of holding up the budget to try to defeat Democratic Gov. Gray Davis in November.</p>

<p>Last year's rate hikes are still in effect, although wholesale prices are lower.</p> <p>LOS ANGELES -- Blackouts have ended and wholesale power costs have plummeted, but California's energy crisis continues to haunt consumers.</p> <p>Californians aren't paying any less for electricity even though wholesale power costs one-tenth of what it did when the state Public Utilities Commission approved a 30 percent rate hike 15 months ago.</p>

A New Jersey man died after his rifle barrel exploded while he was target shooting over the weekend at the Easton Rod and Gun Club in Northampton County, authorities said Sunday. The accident happened Saturday at the club's Lower Saucon Township firing range at 11:30 a.m., said Lehigh County Coroner Scott Grim. There was an explosion in the barrel of the rifle that Glenn deRuiter, 54, of 268 W. Portal Road, Bethlehem Township, Hunterdon County, was firing, Grim said. The blast sent out shrapnel, and one piece hit deRuiter in the head, Grim said. DeRuiter died at 2:30 p.m. at...

Israel reveals evidence of menagerie of hate by Kieren McCarthy The civilised world recoiled in disgust as a horrifying photo of a Palestinian kitten dressed as a suicide bomber was released by Israel yesterday.It is said to have been found at a militant's home in the West Bank city of Hebron and appears to be genuine. And it is a bleak new symbol of despair in the turmoil of the Middle East. The cat wears a belt of explosives and two bandoliers of bullets. The Israeli army, which released the picture, says it was found during a search. There...

Ruined lives Gen. Sherman and the mystery of the Roswell Mill women BY GLEN SLATTERY DO OUT-OF-TOWN FRIENDS and relatives visit you and wonder where the Civil War went? Are they disappointed when you can't show them huge antebellum mansions like those in Natchez, Ala. or a stout old fort, such as Charleston's Sumter? Take heart, and tell them history lurks in curious places. You just have to know where to look. When planning a big production like the Burning of Atlanta, you have to rehearse before the premiere. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman, he of "War is hell" fame, therefore...

Members of the elite team of federal witness-protection specialists are quitting in unprecedented numbers. The dwindling of the force that protects those in the witness-security program (WITSEC) has been a well-kept secret within the U.S. Marshals Service, which would prefer that Congress not ask too many questions about what happened to some $60 million earmarked for WITSEC. But past and current inspectors are standing by waiting to spill their guts to Congress about a program that they say was eviscerated in the Janet Reno era at the Department of Justice. "WITSEC security is stretched so thin that at times...

Declaring War on the United Nations "The Security Council shall determine the existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression and shall make recommendations, or decide what measures shall be taken ... to maintain or restore international peace and security." – Article 39 of the United Nations Charter ***** The moral underpinnings of the war against terrorism have created some uncomfortable diplomatic situations for the United States over the last nine months. When U.S. troops were sent to Afghanistan, the legal oppression of women was often cited as one of the evils we...

BREAKING: "Friendly Fire" U.S. Bomb Kills At Least 250 At Afghan Wedding At least 400 injured...searching for wire copy.

Rising Global Obesity Reflects Changes in Diet and Lifestyles By RON WINSLOW and PETER LANDERS Staff Reporters of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL If American affluence is the envy of much of the rest of the world, there is a steep price to pay in aspiring to it: obesity. On every continent of the globe, even including regions where malnutrition is rife, the number of people who are either overweight or obese is rising at an alarming clip. The major culprit: the same combination of high-calorie diets and sedentary behavior that fuels the epidemic of fat in the U.S. "There is...

The saying "It's as American as the flag, motherhood and apple pie" may soon be destined for the dustbin of history - at least if a handful of liberal congressmen and congresswomen get their way. While apple pie apparently remains sacrosanct, 11 congressmen made it clear last week that they're not too thrilled about pledging allegiance to Old Glory, at least not as long as they have to utter the words "One nation, under God." That's how many House Democrats voted either "nay" or "present" on a resolution backing the traditional pledge after the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals...

Dole’s Campaign on Road to Losing Senate Seat The Dole Campaign in North Carolina is destined to lose in the November election for the U.S. Senate seat to be vacated by Senator Jesse Helm. Why? First the Dole campaign is more interested in Money than people. As it has been said, If you ain’t got a 1000 dollar check taped to your forehead, they don’t want to talk to you. All across the state of North Carolina, the voters are resenting the fact that the Dole campaign seems not to care about the average voter. Mrs. Dole has to have...