Free Republic

Top News Story Ahmadinejad said Israel is reaching "its finishing line." The Jerusalem Post reported that Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, declared that Israel had "pushed the button of its own destruction" by launching its military campaign against the Iranian-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon.   But Iran will not fight Israel in Lebanon? Iranian Student News Agency reported that Iran will never be brought into the Lebanon war.   Iran's military angry at the Arab lack of support of Hezbollah. Iranian Student News Agency reported that Iran's general staff chief commander commented that closing all oil pipelines to Israel was the...

Top News Story Shipment of radio active materials bound for Iran interdicted. Iran Press News reported that officials in Bulgaria stopped a truck carrying radio active materials to Iran.   Iran experts tell US Senate its time for a regime change in Iran. AxcessNews reported that Iran experts argued to US Senators that a Western-backed incentive package to abandon its nuclear ambitions would not yield results. The overthrow of the mullah is the only option to quell the threat of a nuclear Iran.Michael Ledeen, U.S. Senate Committee Testimony, reminded the Senators that if we could help Change the Iranian...

HARARE, Zimbabwe - President Robert Mugabe opened a new legislative year Tuesday with a speech to Parliament blaming economic problems on the U.S., Britain and other Western critics of his human rights record. Zimbabwe is in a state of economic collapse, suffering from the world's highest inflation rate — more than 1,000 percent — and shortages of all basic goods. A quarter of its 16 million people has emigrated since 2000 and millions more are dependent on aid. "My tribute goes to the gallant people of Zimbabwe for continuing to exhibit great fortitude despite the prevailing economic challenges which are...

THE HEZBOLLAH and Hamas provocations against Israel once again demonstrate how terrorists can exploit human rights and the media in their attacks on democracies. By hiding behind their own civilians, the Islamic radicals issue a challenge to democracies: Either violate your own morality by coming after us and inevitably killing some innocent civilians, or maintain your morality and leave us with a free hand to target your innocent civilians. This challenge presents democracies such as Israel with a lose-lose option and terrorists with a win-win option. There is one variable that could change this dynamic and present democracies with a...

Top News Story The West prepares to seize an opportunity to rein in Iran. The Times Online reported that Britain blames Iran for the eruption of fighting in Lebanon and wants to use crisis talks to build an alliance for its long-term “containment”.Michael Ledeen, The National Review Online argued that Iran appears to have miscalculated in fueling the present crisis between Hezbollah and Israel. Never before have Saudis, Egyptians, Jordanians, Kuwaitis, and Iraqis spoken so forcefully against the terrorists (Hamas and Hezbollah, Sunni and Shiite) and their state sponsors in Tehran and Damascus and this provides a unique opportunity...

Top News Story Why the Arab community is not supporting Hezbollah. Michael Rubin, The Wall Street Journal explains why the Arab world has not rallied to Hezbollah's defense it's present war with Israel. A must read.USA Today reported that Hezbollah' and Hamas' attempt to drag the whole Arab world into their war with Israel has drawn flak in the form of Arab public opinion that neither militant jihadist organizations anticipated. It seems Iran has overplayed its hand.   Iranian military in Lebanon operating some of the equipment used to attack Israel? The New York Sun reported that an Arab...

A week into the renewed violence between Israel and Lebanon triggered by the kidnapping of two Israeli soldiers, 56% of Americans say that Lebanon-based terrorist group Hezbollah is to blame for the conflict. Just 18% place the blame on the government of Lebanon and 12% say Israel. Men and Republicans are more likely than women and Democrats to blame Hezbollah. Our survey was conducted Monday and Tuesday, July 17 and 18. The question wording did not identify Hezbollah in any way. Respondents were simply asked about “the government of Israel, the government of Lebanon, or Hezbollah.” (See question wording and...

Top News Story Ahmadinejad promises news the will cause "rejoicing" for Muslims "soon."  What is he up to? The Jerusalem Post reported that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad promised a "rejoicing" for Muslims in the Middle East "soon." Ahmadinejad said the "volcano of rage" at the "arrogant powers" was "on the verge of eruption."   How will the world deal with Hezbollah? The Telegraph reported that the Bush administration made clear that it saw the crisis in the Middle East as an opportunity for the world to deal once and for all with Hezbollah and to rein in its sponsors,...

Top News Story For the first time: Arab nations blame Hezbollah. The New York Times reported that key Arab governments have taken the rare step of blaming Hezbollah. Saudi Arabia, with Jordan, Egypt and several Persian Gulf states, chastised Hezbollah for “unexpected, inappropriate and irresponsible acts.”IranMania reported that Druze leader Walid Jumblatt charged "The war is no longer Lebanon's ... it is an Iranian war."   G8 Nations back Bush's call for Hezbollah to disarm. Eli Lake, The New York Sun reported that leaders of the world's most powerful nations handed President Bush their support for his call for...

Just Blame It on Bush BY JAMES LILEKS You can't call this the Arab-Israeli war of '06, since some of the usual belligerents have declined to participate. You could call it World War III, as Newt Gingrich has suggested, but that annoys everyone who wanted the Cold War to be WWIII, never mind that we got it out of the way without a nuclear swapmeet. You could call it the Israel-Hezbollah War, but that lets Syria and Iran off the hook.So let's just call it Bush's Fault. At least that's what Howard Dean proposes. The energetic head of the Democratic...

Hispanics are feeling more discriminated against, and to a large extent hold the Republican Party responsible for what they perceive to be the negative consequences of the immigration debate, according to a survey released today by the Washington, D.C.-based Pew Hispanic Center. More than half of the 2,000 Hispanics surveyed for the report said they saw in increase in discrimination as a result of the policy debate, and 75 percent said the debate will prompt many more Hispanics to vote in November. Although party affiliation among Latino registered voters has not changed significantly over the past two years, the share...

Breaking News on Indian News programs in India: Top Indian Government sources say that Pakistan has an hand in the Mumbai blasts. They say that there is very clear evidence. They are looking at a spate of calls from Mumbai to Karachi, Pakistan right after the blasts. They are also tracing calls to Dubai. Indian government also says that all talks with Pakistan is off, all confidence-building-measures are off. Sources say that they are on the verge of getting concret proof of Pakistan's hand in the blasts. Sorry for the spelling mistakes....

Racial discrimination has nothing to do with what's no less than an education meltdown within the black community. Where black education is the very worst, often the city mayor is black, city council dominated by blacks, and often the school superintendent is black, as well as most of the principals and teachers, and Democrats have run the cities for decades. I'm not saying there's a causal connection, just that one would be hard put to chalk up the rotten education to racial discrimination. ... No one can solve the educational problems that black people confront except black people themselves. First,...

Holy Land Christians blame Israel July 3, 2006 BY ROBERT NOVAK SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST On June 19, two young members of Congress received an extraordinary letter from Jerusalem. On behalf of Christian churches in the Holy Land, they were told a House resolution they were circulating blaming the Palestinian Authority for Christian decline there "is based on many false affirmations." The Very Rev. Michael H. Sellers, an Anglican priest who is coordinator of Jerusalem's Christian churches, said the real problem is the Israeli occupation -- especially its new security wall. Prior to hearing this, freshman Republican Rep. Michael McCaul of Austin,...

One of these days, if you lose a son, a daughter, a cousin or a good friend in a terrorist attack, blame whoever perpetrated the deed first, but secondly blame The New York Times, whose irresponsibility may have enabled the killers to obtain necessary financing. This story on how the government tracks terrorist funding likewise hurts the paper while also hurting America as a whole by telling the enemy how he might be found out. Said Tony Snow, presidential press secretary, the Times and other papers that broke the story "ought to think long and hard about whether a public's...

Individuals, not religion, carry out inhuman acts. By MAHMOOD A. QAZI Islam is a religion of peace, accepted and practiced by 1.5 billion people worldwide. It is the fastest-growing religion in the world, and if it was what some critics claim, why should the people from all walks of life from around the world keep embracing Islam? In Islam, a person has the right to defend himself, his family, his country or his neighbor(s), which, according to a June 2 writer’s own statement in The Tribune-Democrat, justifies the resistance being offered by the people of Afghanistan, Bosnia, Chechnya, Iraq, Kashmir...

Corps Takes Blame for Katrina Flooding By CAIN BURDEAU ASSOCIATED PRESS NEW ORLEANS (AP) - 0602dvs-blanco-fp A contrite U.S. Army Corps of Engineers took responsibility Thursday for the flooding of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina and said the levees failed because they were built in a disjointed fashion using outdated data. "This is the first time that the Corps has had to stand up and say, `We've had a catastrophic failure,'" Lt. Gen. Carl Strock, the Corps chief, said as the agency issued a 6,000-page-plus report on the disaster on Day 1 of the new hurricane season. The Corps said...

Wild birds 'partly' to blame for bird flu spread 19:03 31 May 2006 NewScientist.com news service Debora MacKenzie Wild birds have helped transmit the deadly H5N1 bird flu across Eurasia, a meeting of 300 scientists at the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) concluded on Wednesday. But killing them to prevent further spread of the disease is not the answer, they warn. In fact, Marc Choisy and Pejman Rohani at the University of Georgia at Athens in the US have shown that killing wild animals with a disease like flu could actually lead to more infected animals, not fewer. This...

LONDON, May 24, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - British pop music star Elton John has attacked the Catholic Church and its position on condom use as a reason for the demise of 60 of his friends to the sexually-transmitted disease, AIDS. Speaking at a business awards ceremony, he said, "We don't have a medical vaccine but we have a social vaccine and it's called education." He failed to include in his so-called education platform that condoms may be a leading reason for the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Even leading health experts at the United Nations have acknowledged that condoms have an estimated 10% failure...

This amateur show producer at the Ed Schulz show has always had thing about Catholics and religion. They need a few more conservative opinions over there.