Free Republic

N O T E B O O K Zarqawi Planning U.S. Hit? Intelligence officials say operatives may infiltrate via Central America to strike at soft targets on American soil By ADAM ZAGORIN, TIMOTHY J. BURGER AND BRIAN BENNETT Sunday, Mar. 13, 2005 Two weeks after intelligence officials confirmed that Osama bin Laden had sent a message to Jordanian-born terrorist Abu Mousab al-Zarqawi, urging him to plan attacks on U.S. soil, details are emerging from one of al-Zarqawi's lieutenants about what the man behind many of the terrorist attacks in Iraq could have in mind. Intelligence officials tell TIME that interrogation...

Lancaster County Sheriff's deputies have arrested a father and grandfather of a Lincoln boy on suspicion of felony child abuse. The alleged abuse was blowing marijuana smoke in the face of a 5-year-old boy. According to a sheriff's office report and Sheriff Terry Wagner, here's what happened: When the boy's mother, who lives in Crete, picked him up Friday for a weekend visitation, the boy smelled like marijuana. The boy said his grandfather had held him and blew marijuana smoke in his face, forcing him to inhale. The boy said he did not like the smoke in his face, but...

BY CINDY GONZALEZ WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER RELATED STORY -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- » Immigrants go home for holidays 'Twas approaching midnight on South 24th Street and a group of gift-laden passengers had gathered at Jose Montañez's storefront. Surrounded by bags, Felisardo Suares waits outside Montañez's storefront on South 24th Street Dec. 10 for the van that was taking him and other Omahans to Mexico. It's part of an annual Christmas migration back to Latin America for thousands of Midlanders. Up pulled a pair of jumbo vans with cargo trailers. Parents, singles and young people who had been waiting climbed aboard the coaches that...

New Kobe furor: Says Malone made a pass at his wife By KEN PETERS, AP Sports Writer December 13, 2004 LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Another Kobe conflict for the Lakers. Bryant has accused Karl Malone of making a pass at his wife at a game last month. Talking before Los Angeles' 105-98 win over Orlando on Sunday night, Bryant said he felt betrayed by a man he considered a friend. ADVERTISEMENT ``He was like a mentor, like a brother to me, so when something like that happens, you're upset, you're hurt,'' Bryant said. He said he called Malone and told...

WASHINGTON - President Bush (news - web sites) expressed no alarm Saturday about a warning from his outgoing top health official that the U.S. food supply is vulnerable to terror attacks but would not deny the assessment and assert that the nation's food is safe. Reuters Photo Thompson Resigns From Cabinet Post (AP Video) Bush was questioned, after an Oval Office meeting with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, about comments by Health and Human Services (news - web sites) Secretary Tommy Thompson about the vulnerability of the U.S. food supply. Thompson spoke Friday as he announced his coming departure from the...

SHANGHAI, China (AP) - Never heard of Sanjiu? Bluestar? Baosteel? Minmetals? You soon might. Workers check rolls of steel at a Baosteel production line in Shanghai in eastern China. The company is one of many in China that are expanding their overseas holdings. These Chinese companies aren't yet in the pantheon of globally known names like Sony, Daimler-Chrysler or Citigroup, but China Inc. is fast raising its international profile with a corporate buying spree, spending billions on companies and resources to feed its growing industrial juggernaut. Metals trader China Minmetals Corp. is leading a bid by a consortium of major...

For more than a decade, federal authorities painstakingly built a criminal case against the man they suspected of being the main drug supplier to the Hell's Angels of Minnesota. After spending untold hours on surveillance, cultivating informants inside the outlaw motorcycle gang, digging through garbage for clues and unraveling cryptic financial transactions, prosecutors this summer prepared to take the case to trial. Then, on the brink of proceedings in U.S. District Court in St. Paul, veteran IRS special agent Jim Shoup came forth with a stunning confession: He was tangled in a romance with the wife of the alleged drug...

Terrorists Cross From Mexico By David Johnson On September 11th I spoke at a convention in California in remembrance of 9-11. I was but one of about a dozen experts on Islam including several Arabs, Palestinians and Sudanese who certainly know what they are talking about. I also had the opportunity to visit Walid and Maria Shoebat in their home. What a fine and courageous man he is. We had met before but took this time to cement a real friendship and future working relationship. I have long stated that Muslim terrorists are crossing into the United States from both...

By Debbie Schlussel debbie@politicalusa.com 6/17/2002 Get Updates You’d be surprised that your morning cup of coffee is tied to terrorism. But for Americans who buy coffee—or anything else—at Caribou Coffee, their “Cuppa Joe” is tied to the Muslim brotherhood, the Muslim boycott of the West, and a bunch of Saudi Sheiks. Caribou is closely tied to a prominent religious Muslim leader, Dr. Yusuf (a/k/a Youssef) Abdullah Al-Qaradawi, who said, “Now we see our brothers and children in Al-Aqsa and the blessed land of Palestine generously sacrificing their blood, giving their souls willingly in the way of Allah. All Muslims must...

http://www.omaha.com The federal ban on sale of assault weapons will be allowed to expire. Should there be a movement to pass a new one? Yes, even in the form that is expiring. Yes, but only if it would be effective. No, because no such law could be effective. No, because it violates the Second Amendment. I am undecided / I don't have an opinion.

BAGHDAD, Iraq - The spokesman for militant Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr tempered threats to continue fighting Monday, saying his movement only planned to wage "peaceful resistance" against the interim government. Al-Sadr issued a statement Sunday from his office in the Shiite holy city of Najaf calling the new interim Iraqi government "illegitimate" and pledging "to continue resisting oppression and occupation to our last drop of blood." But Sadr's spokesman in Baghdad, Mahmoud al-Soudani, called a news conference Monday to clarify that the statement was not a call to arms. He said that many of al-Sadr's supporters in Baghdad had begun...

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Spain's visiting foreign minister moved to soothe US anger at the Spanish decision to withdraw troops from Iraq (news - web sites) by promising future cooperation with the United States in the global war on terrorism, Middle East peace efforts and the Balkans. "We are looking to the future," Miguel Angel Moratinos said after meeting US Secretary of State Colin Powell (news - web sites). "The decision to return the troops (from Iraq) is the decision of yesterday." Moratinos denied suggestions that his talks with Powell -- which came just two days after Washington scolded Spain for...

Speaking last week at George Washington University's 15th Annual Institute on Current Issues in International Taxation, Assistant Treasury Secretary for Tax Policy Pam Olson set out her views on the United States' international tax policy. 'Viewed from the vantage point of an increasingly global marketplace,' said Ms Olson, 'our tax rules appear outmoded, at best, and punitive of U.S. economic interests, at worst. Most other developed countries of the world are concerned with setting a competitiveness policy that permits their workers to benefit from globalization. As Deputy Secretary Dam observed recently, however, our international tax policy seems to have been...

Voted YES on banning partial birth abortions. This legislation, if enacted, would ban the abortion procedure in which the physician partially delivers the fetus before completing the abortion. Status: Bill Passed Y)63; N)34; NV)3

Ex-Husker football star missing in Indonesia blast Full Article WASHINGTON - A father, husband and former Cornhusker offensive lineman was missing Sunday at the site of bomb blasts in Bali, Indonesia - possibly the first American reported dead in yet another overseas terror attack. Jake Young, a consensus All-American center for NU in 1988 and 1989, was reportedly at a nightspot and restaurant in Bali when explosions, apparently set by terrorists, killed at least 187 and injured many others.