Free Republic

Trouble in the Skies Adam Shapiro FOX Business' "Trouble in the Skies," a six month investigation of the FAA’s new hiring practices, uncovered changes that may put the nation’s flying public at risk as well as allegations that the newest air traffic control recruits had access to answers on a key test that helped them gain jobs with the FAA. snip... Also uncovered was an FAA effort to promote diversity that discarded 3000 qualified college graduates with degrees in air traffic control despite their following FAA procedure and obtaining FAA accredited degrees.

Black Beach Week used to get all the glory: Every Memorial Day weekend, 300,000 black people gathered in Miami Beach to get their freak on. And also create a tsunami of violence, robbery, shootings, carjackings, vandalism, mayhem, noise and trash. snip... Last year, a local radio personality said all the ruckus was just one big misunderstanding. She could speak for all of those who still refuse to believe that black mob violence exists out of proportion on Memorial Day. And every other day: "You had many more people up that way than previous years," said Jill Tracey. "You have that...

Randallstown High School students dressed in cap and gowns–fighting on graduation day. The video is going viral with thousands of views. Two people are now under arrest. snip... It was graduation day for Randallstown High’s Class of 2014. Cell phone video captured quick shots of adults and students throwing punches. It was an all-out brawl outside Towson University’s SECU Arena just as the ceremony ended.

For those -- and you know who you are -- who have been socially promoted to this semi-worthless diploma, I must tell you in all honesty that you are the functional illiterates of 2014.

RALEIGH, N.C. -- North Carolina's journey toward new political boundaries for the Legislature and Congress for the next decade is about to detour again into court. Civil rights, election reform and union groups are planning to file a lawsuit Friday challenging the recently approved boundaries in state court. The groups' moves come even after the U.S. Justice Department announced late Tuesday it wouldn't object, for now, to the maps based on a portion of the federal Voting Rights Act. North Carolina's redistricting maps are subject to prior approval by the Justice Department or federal courts because of past discrimination.

After more than one hundred years of service, in 1898 Congress finally passed a bill authorizing establishment of the U.S. Navy Hospital Corps.From Loblolly Boy to Bayman to Pharmacist's Mate to Corpsman, we've seen and done it all.

PLEASE, would you do me the kind favor of sending this to as many people as you can? Christmas will be coming soon and some credit is due to our U.S service men and women for our being able to celebrate these festivities. Let's try in this small way to pay a tiny bit of what we owe. Make people stop and think of our heroes, living and dead, who sacrificed themselves for us.

ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. - Fishermen often brag about catching one as long as your arm. Sam Newton caught the arm. Newton, 66, was throwing his cast net off the St. Simons Island pier last week when he pulled up an artificial arm. "It scared the heck out of me,'' he said. "Hell, I'm hoping the rest of the person ain't coming up."

No more Misters Nice Guy — Senate Republicans go right after the president and his agenda. Their aim is clearly to go after those who voted for candidate Obama but may be disappointed or even shocked by what they are getting. (Like Maureen Dowd? Well, at least David Brooks.)

Well, that was fast. On March 20, only two months after the cosmic anointing, Vanity Fair, of all people, unloaded on Barack Obama, in the terms it had reserved for the past four or five years for the likes of George W. Bush. Well, not the whole magazine, but one of its writers, media writer Michael Wolff, took an axe to the president, in a posting beginning “Sheesh, the guy is Jimmy Carter,” ending “This guy is leaden and this show is in trouble,” and titled “Barack Obama is a Terrible Bore.”

After decades scaling the Democratic Party ranks, Nancy Pelosi reached a pinnacle in January 2007, becoming the first woman speaker of the House. For two years, alongside Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, she fashioned the party's agenda on Capitol Hill, fought a rear-guard action against the Bush administration and, more broadly, helped define what it means to be a Democrat. Now, however, it's gotten crowded at the top.

The recession has spread from Wall Street to Sesame Street. The home of Elmo and Oscar the Grouch announced on Wednesday that it would eliminate a fifth of its 355-strong workforce as market turmoil ate into its income and assets.

Not a week into her tenure, Gov. Beverly Perdue flew to Washington to tell North Carolina's congressional delegation she needs $18 billion to kick-start the economy -- on top of another unspecified amount to fill the state's budget hole.

Fort Lewis is the setting for an emotional Purple Heart ceremony more than 43 years after a young Marine was hurt in Vietnam. The corpsman who treated him attends.

In a scene that's becoming frustratingly familiar to supporters of predominantly black charter schools, two Raleigh charters are in danger of being closed by the state.

The Pentagon has decided that it will not award the Purple Heart, the hallowed medal given to those wounded or killed by enemy action, to war veterans who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder because it is not a physical wound.

Propping up ailing car companies is not what the government’s bailout for Detroit’s car makers is really about, says the man in the middle of the controversial plan.

Roads and bridges! What joy. Last week's announcement by President-elect Barack Obama of his massive public works initiative to stimulate the economy won loud applause from me. Not only does the decaying U.S. infrastructure need emergency attention but construction commissions will be far more substantive and enduring than the half-mythical 5 million "green" jobs that Obama was airily promising before the election.

North Carolina's probation system, designed to help low-level offenders rebuild their lives and stay out of costly prisons, is risking public safety by neglecting or losing track of thousands of criminals.

"I just interpret the Constitution" Clarence Thomas