Free Republic

The wife had jury duty at the Douglas County courthouse in Castle Rock, Colorado yesterday. She found they, too, now have the backscatter nude imaging machines, and they are mandatory. So, to excercise our constitutional rights to the courts or to appear as mandated by the court we must submit to a strip search and radiation. According to the TSA web site, these machines are also in other courthouses throughout the country. Just thought you should know.

The US State Department now issues a Passport Card as well as the Passport Book, which every one is familiar. Here are some interesting comments about it from the U.S. Department of State web site: "We began production of the U.S. Passport Card on July 14, 2008. As of March 2010, more than 2,700,000 Passport Cards have been issued to U.S. citizens." "The passport card is the wallet-size travel document that can only be used to re-enter the United States at land border-crossings and sea ports-of-entry from Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Bermuda. The card provides a less expensive, smaller,...

It seems someone picked up s pistol off a vendor's table and shot a friend in the chest. More to follow.

I just received this spam in my Freepmail box from 'brady jonathon' campaigning for Ron Paul. I did a search on 'brady jonathon' and the account has never made a single post. I don't think it is correct for anyone to be using FReepmail for commercial purposes, and, yes, political campaigns are as commercial as anything else. I don't support Ron Paul. While he has some good ideas he is also a wimpy coward that would get Americans killed. I hate spam in all forms; phone calls, emails, FReepmail, letters on the front door, all of it. Nothing pisses me...

Washington, D.C. -- House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi released the following statement today on the Bureau of Labor Statistics' announcement that 470,000 people abandoned their job searches in July and that 3.2 million private sector jobs have been lost since President Bush took office: “The fact is that President Bush’s misguided economic policies have failed to create jobs. Since President Bush took office, the country has lost 3.2 million jobs, the worst record since President Hoover. And today we learned that in July nearly half a million people gave up looking for a job. “Job losses are taking a real...

Narrative: An Air France Airbus A330-200 was destroyed when it crashed into the sea while on transatlantic flight from Rio de Janeiro-Galeao International Airport, RJ (GIG) to Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport. The airplane carried 12 crew members an 216 passengers. Flight AF447 departed at 19:03 local time (May 31) from Rio de Janeiro (GIG). Last radio contact with the flight was at 01:33 UTC. The crew was in contact with the Atlantic Area Control Centre (CINDACTA III) when the flight reported over the INTOL waypoint, estimating TASIL at 02:20 UTC. INTOL is an RNAV waypoint located in the Atlantic Ocean,...

... When oil prices soared in 2008, propane suppliers quietly reduced by two pounds the amount of gas pumped into each 20-pound tank, saying they wanted to avoid raising prices.

Community leaders yesterday announced a gun buy back program that offers $50 to anyone who turns in a gun — “no questions asked.” Organized by black community leader Alvertis Simmons, the program attempts to remove guns from the streets to curb future violence. On Dec. 6, from noon-3 p.m., gun owners will be able to turn in their guns — working or not — for $50 per gun. The rally will take place at City Park in front of the Martin Luther King, Jr. statue. The program has been approved by the Denver Police Department, but organizers promise that no...

Here is an update to the Google layoffs story we reported on last Monday. On Wednesday, just as everyone was leaving for Thanksgiving, Google confirmed to the WSJ that it was “significantly” reducing the number of contract workers. Google also confirmed that it had 10,000 contract workers or 1 contract worker for every 2 full-time employees. Trip Chowdhry, analyst at Global Equities Research, said that about 3,000 contract employees have been cut, or about 30% of the company’s roughly 10,000 contract workers as of the end of the third quarter. He also says that about 300 full-time employees have been...

Google has been quietly laying off staff and up to 10,000 jobs could be on the chopping block according to sources. Since August, hundreds of employees have been laid off and there are reports that about 500 of them were recruiters for Google. By law, Google is required to report layoffs publicly and with the SEC however, Google has managed to get around the legal requirement. In fact, one of the ways Google was able to meet Wall Street’s Q3 earnings expectations was by trimming “operational” expenses. Google reports to the SEC that it has 20,123 employees but in reality...

BERLIN: German logistics giant Deutsche Post will on Monday announce thousands of job losses in the United States in the wake of heavy losses, a German newspaper reported.

Just thought I'd kick off the voting part of this election cycle. I wasn't going to vote for McCain (or Obama) but his selection of Sarah Palin and many of his actions on the campaign trail says he isn't perfect but he'll do. McCain loves this country. Obama is a skinny little kid who hates this country and is only running for the money and power. McCain doesn't frighten me like Obama does; not even close. Just thought I'd kick off the voting cycle.

I put together a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet that shows the national debt, year by year, showing the political party of the President, Senate, and House. It shows the year, debt, and percent change, with a summation by party. It is available for online viewing and download from Google Docs.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Federal officials unveiled an extraordinary takeover on Sunday of troubled mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, signaling the most dramatic move to date aimed at shoring up the nation's housing market.

Kelly Anderson and Leonard Sun Voted Cutest Vegetarians Alive! For our third annual Cutest Vegetarian Alive contest, peta2 received more than 3,500 entries from adorable vegetarians and vegans around the world. And we asked all of you to help choose the winners. The response was overwhelming this year, with more than 50,000 votes cast. It was a mighty close race, but big congrats go out to Leonard Sun and Kelly Anderson for taking home the top honors.

Affidavit used in the FLDS raid as a PDF: Click Here.

A pilot and his family were in their Cessna Stationair on Tuesday, preparing to take off from a dirt runway in Baja California, when they were forced at gunpoint to abandon the airplane, Bob Collins, president of the Aircraft Crime Prevention Institute, told AVweb. "Three men jumped the fence, then three others in a Nissan Sentra pulled onto the runway, blocking it," Collins said. "One of them had a gun, and they broke a window in the airplane and forced the family out. They pushed the Sentra off to the side and torched it, then all six of them climbed...

In 1973, a Frenchman named Jean Raspail wrote a bitter and paranoid novel about the "invasion" of his native land by starving Third World refugees. The book was a racist vision of the consequences of non-white immigration, aided and abetted, in the author's view, by the weak-minded liberals who failed to resist it. For almost 35 years, The Camp of the Saints has been a Bible to the radical right. Now, courtesy of former Navy SEAL Matthew Bracken, comes the American version — a portrait of the apocalypse Bracken fears will overtake America thanks to undocumented immigration from the south....