Free Republic

With military operations against Iraq's Saddam Hussein seemingly inevitable, House Democrats have plunged into a thorny internal debate over whether and how strongly to challenge President Bush as he presses ahead with the war on terror.The discussion is essentially taking place in the gray area between Congressional prerogative in war matters and the genuine wariness - even dissent - at the left-liberal end of the Democratic Caucus about the president's aims, particularly in Iraq. Caucus insiders say the debate is likely to produce a relatively innocuous statement about the need to include Congress in deliberations. But it has readied...

BY GREG MCCARTAN  NEW YORK--Leaders of the Socialist Workers Party met here June 22-24 to chart a course to meet the opportunities to recruit workers and youth to the communist movement and prepare the SWP’s 41st Constitutional Convention, scheduled for July 25-27 in Oberlin, Ohio. The focus of the reports and discussion at this National Committee meeting was the possibilities and need to transform the work of party members and branches in order to meet the potential to recruit workers. The party has already been successful in beginning to integrate itself into the resistance of workers and farmers in town...

Minor league hockey team on eBay By RACHEL D'OROAssociated PressANCHORAGE, Alaska - For the second time in a week, the financially strangled Anchorage Aces hockey team was listed on sale with eBay on Friday, a day after a $2.3 million bid turned out to be invalid. Within hours of its second listing, the minor league team had received four offers on the Internet auction site, including a $2 million offer.The West Coast Hockey League franchise filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection last month. The team is more than $2 million in debt and owes more than 100 creditors. Last season,...

LONDON, July 1 — The pressure on Jean-Marie Messier to resign as the chief executive of Vivendi Universal intensified over the weekend, after two French directors asked him to step down, a person close to the board said today. The two directors, Jacques Friedmann, who is also a director of BNP Paribas, the large French bank that is among Vivendi's lenders and Henry Lachman, the chief executive of Schneider Electric, were speaking on behalf of Vivendi's five other French directors, this person said. Mr. Messier, he continued, had lost virtually all support among the 14 non-executive directors, making his resignation...

Coming Out of the Closet These guys won't be victims. EDITOR'S NOTE: A version of this article first appeared in the June 30 New York Post. With a colorful parade down Fifth Avenue, June's Gay Pride celebrations were in full gear Sunday afternoon. A two-year-old group called Pink Pistols is among the worthiest organizations that marked last month's nationwide festivities. Boasting 2,350 members and 30 chapters in 22 states, Pink Pistols encourages gay people to use firearms for recreation and self-preservation. "Pick on someone your own caliber," declares the group's website. "We are dedicated to the legal, safe and responsible...

I read Pilger in the Mirror ..and I got angry at the world SEPTEMBER 11 was a shocking day for the world, and a life-changing experience for many people.For pop superstar George Michael, the horrific events unfurling in New York also represented a weird and distressing coincidence.Watching the World Trade Center towers collapsing on TV in a North London recording studio, George burst into tears.He felt anguish for the thousands dying in the mayhem and also bewilderment - because he'd spent the past few months writing a song based on the very world turmoil that led to the attack.That song,...

EVERY time you think the lords of baseball cannot become more callous, greedy and inhumane, they go and prove you wrong. The other day they slipped a fastball by us. They quietly announced the Mets' June 4 rainout in Atlanta will be made up as a split doubleheader at Turner Field in September. Not just any September day, but 9-11, 2002. One year to the date that the Twin Towers were destroyed by terrorists and 3,014 people were brutally murdered, the Braves and Mets are going to play a split doubleheader - meaning there will be two separate gates for...

20:31 Jul-01-02, 21 Tammuz 5762 Fatah Vows to Strike US and Israeli Targets (IsraelNN.com) A flyer released by Fatah vowed to strike out against US and Israeli targets everywhere" is response to the campaign against Yasser Arafat.

Bird Calls An olive tree bestrides a cracking mount, Its blackened boughs bescrawled by dirty talons. The hour befalls our moments lacking count… A predawn pall of dark and light imbalanced. An owl hoots alone. Where is his query? What pang predates his instinct that he prays? When awe lives in his eyes that makes him tarry Upon the branch an instant… Who delays. A thief would find no watchmen there to look, But in the air's deduced unspoken calls. The raven caws to find his master's brook. The owl takes his roost on broken walls. The cock crows...

Dog runs as write-in candidate against Katherine Harris SARASOTA, Fla. - (AP) -- The newest candidate challenging Secretary of State Katherine Harris in her bid for Congress is truly an underdog: a border collie mix. Percy the dog is running as a write-in candidate in the Republican primary, said his owner and campaign manager, Wayne Genthner.Genthner is offering up his canine candidate as both satire and as a protest against the political establishment.''No one has a realistic expectation that a dog can get elected,'' Genthner said. ``But plenty of people will be willing to vote for a dog to...

Northrop Grumman to Acquire TRW for $60 Per Share in Stock $7.8 Billion Transaction Positions Northrop Grumman As Nation's Second Largest Defense Contractor Adds Significant Strengths in Satellite Systems, Missile Defense and Systems Integration Capabilities TRW's Board Achieves Goal of Enhancing Shareholder Value Northrop Grumman Confirms 2002 Financial Guidance; Says It Will Achieve Double-Digit Growth for 2003; and Projects Double-Digit Growth for 2004 2003 Sales Expected to Be $26 to $27 Billion LOS ANGELES and CLEVELAND, July 1 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE: NOC) and TRW Inc. (NYSE: TRW) jointly announced that they have entered into a definitive merger...

Mediaweek.Com Rosie: My Mag Is Not Riveting Lisa GranatsteinJULY 01, 2002 -The departure last week of Rosie editor Catherine Cavender after little more than a year at the helm has exposed a host of challenges facing the 3.5 million-circulation women's monthly, published by G+J USA and owned jointly by G+J and Rosie O'Donnell. Cavender's exit came seven months after the magazine's publisher was replaced when advertising pages began to head south.While O'Donnell was not the catalyst for Cavender's departure -- the decision to replace her with Susan Toepfer, deputy managing editor of Time Inc.'s People, was made by G+J president/CEO...

MOSCOW (AP) -- The Russian government said Monday that leaky torpedo fuel caused the explosions that destroyed the Kursk nuclear submarine, wrapping up nearly two years of sensitive investigation into one of the country's worst post-Soviet disasters. The announcement that the vessel was destroyed by an internal malfunction -- and not a foreign submarine as had once been theorized -- was an uncomfortable admission for Russia's struggling military. The Kursk was one of the navy's most advanced submarines when it sank in the Barents Sea in August 2000, killing all 118 men aboard. Industry and Science Minister Ilya Klebanov, who...

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Two Iranian nationals seen by a New York police officer photographing city landmarks were just tourists nearing the end of their stay in the United States, Iran's mission to the United Nations said on Friday."It was these two guys on Saturday, June 22, taking pictures of themselves in Battery Park" at the southern end of Manhattan, said Mohammad Hossein Nosrat, mission spokesman. The two, who work as security guards at the mission and do not have diplomatic immunity, took 1 minute 40 seconds of videotape of the park and environs, Nosrat said. At that point, a...

Man Pleads No Contest To Impregnating Daughter Cerros Fathered Two Children With 15-Year-Old Daughter POSTED: 11:58 a.m. PDT June 27, 2002 BAKERSFIELD, Calif. -- A Bakersfield man has pleaded no contest in Kern County Superior Court to one count of continuous sexual abuse for twice getting his daughter pregnant. Jose Roberto Cerros, 55, faces 16 years in prison for sexually abusing his 15-year-old daughter. Two other molestation charges and a rape charge against Cerros were dismissed Wednesday in the deal between prosecutors and the public defender. Authorities said Cerros was suspected of impregnating his daughter a year ago, but the...

Police: Smoke Shops Sold Meth Pipes Four Shops Have Received Citations POSTED: 6:19 p.m. PDT June 27, 2002 UPDATED: 6:32 p.m. PDT June 27, 2002 BAKERSFIELD, Calif. -- Four local cigarette and cigar shops are in hot water for allegedly displaying meth pipes, KERO 23 News reported. Two cigarette outlet stores on Columbus and Mount Vernon streets, and both Havana House stores on Stockdale Highway violated health and safety codes by having paraphernalia used for a controlled substance, according to police. Police said it is illegal to sell, possess or display pipes used for methamphetamine, crack, or heroin, but legal...

Pop star George Michael's latest pop video has depicted Prime Minister Tony Blair as a "poodle" to US President George Bush in a cartoon political satire. It also features a scene in which the singer, dressed in a leopard-print thong, apparently tries to seduce Cherie Blair. Michael had begun writing the song Shoot the Dog before the US attacks on 11 September, but because of the nature of the lyrics it was delayed until its release on 12 August. His previous video, for the song Freeek, featured sexual images which prompted the Broadcasting Standards Commission to rap BBC One for...

Bush Too Mum On Current Events President's Last News Conference Was March 13 POSTED: 1:41 p.m. EDT June 28, 2002 UPDATED: 1:59 p.m. EDT June 28, 2002 WASHINGTON -- American-style news conferences may be catching on with world leaders. British Prime Minister Tony Blair gave one a try last week and seemed to like it. So did Russian President Vladimir Putin during a two-hour marathon with 700 journalists this week. Even Emperor Akihito of Japan has held some. But President George W. Bush has shied away from the formal Q-and-A sessions. He and his staff obviously do not feel they...

Jul 1, 2002 Boy Accidentally Shoots, Kills 3-Year-Old Sister, Chicago Police Say The Associated Press CHICAGO (AP) - A 6-year-old boy playing with his grandfather's handgun accidentally shot and killed his 3-year-old sister, police said. The shooting happened Sunday evening after the children's mother stepped out of the room, police said. The girl climbed the headboard of a bed, found the gun in its case and removed it, police said. Her brother took it away from her and was playing with it when it discharged, striking the girl in the head, police said. The coroner's office pronounced her dead at...