Free Republic

A high-profile White House meeting on Treasury’s $700 billion Wall Street rescue plan ended Thursday on a sour, contentious note, with no joint endorsement by the two presidential candidates, Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama. Democrats complained of being “blindsided” by a new conservative alternative to the plan first put forward by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson. And the outcome casts doubt on the ability of Congress to move quickly on the matter, even after leaders of House and Senate banking committees reached a bipartisan agreement Thursday on the framework for legislation authorizing the massive government intervention. It was McCain who...

Pro-whaling nations call anti-whalers 'imperialists'; Japan suggests quitting IWC Pro-whaling nations issued a draft statement Thursday accusing anti-whaling countries of "imperialism" for imposing a ban on commercial hunts, and Japan threatened to quit the International Whaling Commission unless it is reformed. The statements came at the end of a three-day conference in Japan aimed at reforming the IWC. The meeting, however, was boycotted by half the commission's membership, including anti-whaling nations the United States, Britain and Australia. Japan and other pro-whaling countries argue the IWC is too polarized to be effective and has strayed from its original purpose of managing...

The burial of Terri Schiavo's cremated remains didn't bring an end to the acrimony between her husband and her family. Michael Schiavo angered his late wife's family Monday by not notifying them about the burial beforehand and by inscribing on her bronze grave marker the words "I kept my promise." Michael Schiavo _ who said he promised his wife he would not keep her alive artificially _ also listed Feb. 25, 1990, as the date his wife "Departed this Earth." On that date, Schiavo collapsed and fell into what most doctors said was an irreversible vegetative state. Schiavo actually died...

Hillary is trying to say her bill says one thing. Nickles says the extension for unemployment benefits is much longer.