Free Republic

Before the last presidential election I ran into many people I had considered reasonably well-informed and educated, only to be surprised by the extent to which they had been utterly taken in by the obviously ghostwritten Obama hagiography and the media airbrushing of his background. It was scary. A first hand view of how easily manipulated public opinion is. I was astonished that few of these people knew anything about Obama's failures in his one prior job -- getting the asbestos out of Altgeld Gardens -- and his singular executive endeavor, managing (at terrorist Bill Ayers' recommendation) millions of dollars...

ONLY one week after Live Earth, Al Gore's green credentials slipped while hosting his daughter's wedding in Beverly Hills. Gore and his guests at the weekend ceremony dined on Chilean sea bass - arguably one of the world's most threatened fish species. Also known as Patagonian toothfish, the species is under pressure from illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing activities in the Southern Ocean, jeopardising the sustainability of remaining stocks. The species is currently managed by the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Living Marine Resources, the body which introduced a catch and trade documentation scheme as an attempt to tackle...

Without acknowledging his comments yesterday when he said the "war is lost," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said President Bush and his allies "attacked those of us with courage to ask the tough questions and tell the truth about Iraq." He described their criticism of him and other Democrats as "an effort to shift attention from this Administration's failed policies" in Iraq. In a remarks on the Senate floor after Bush's speech today, Reid did not repeat the "war is lost" comments. Instead, he said that "the longer we continue down the president's path the further we will be from...

Carter defends Mideast book as accurate By CHARLES ODUM, Associated Press Writer 29 minutes ago Former President Jimmy Carter said Saturday that the storm of criticism he has faced for his recent book has not weakened his resolve for fair treatment of Israelis and Palestinians. "I have been called a liar," Carter said at a town hall meeting on the second day of a three-day symposium on his presidency at the University of Georgia. "I have been called an anti-Semite," he said. "I have been called a bigot. I have been called a plagiarist. I have been called a coward....

WASHINGTON -- Senator John F. Kerry is placing himself at the center of congressional action over the war in Iraq this week with a crisply worded resolution to require President Bush to withdraw almost all US troops by the end of this year. The measure has exposed Kerry to attacks from Republicans and some Democrats, as critics rushed to tag the plan as a ``cut-and-run" strategy. But it also has made him a rallying point for antiwar activists. The sweeping resolution amounts to the senator's sharpest condemnation of the war and his broadest repudiation of his own vote to authorize...