Free Republic

Arrested Last Year on Drug Charges: SAN DIEGO, Mar. 24, 2007 - The man who once sang as the police officer in the Village People band was arrested again. Victor "Macho Man" Willis was taken into custody Friday in University City. A woman, who described herself as Willis' girlfriend, told police she had been choked and threatened with a knife. Last year, when Willis was arrested in San Francisco for drug possession, he gave officers a fake name. They didn't know who he was until Willis was fingerprinted. "Our officers recognized him," says San Diego police Sgt. Jim Schorr. "We...

MONROE (TV8) - A Choudrant woman's eagle eye and sense of patriotism has led to what an Office Depot executive tells her will be a nationwide recall of stationery. The paper, printed in asia, has an image of the American flag flying backwards. Sue King is patriotic to say the least. Her father, grandfather, and two uncles are all veterans of the armed forces. Sue honors her family by organizing a veterans reunion every summer. She usually prints the invitations on this patriotic paper. This year she simply can't. "It will be coming out on plain paper. I refuse to...

SALEM, Ore. - Supporters of a bill being considered by state lawmakers say it would close a loophole in the state's private indecency law. House Bill 3317 would amend the law by making exposure illegal when it is in view of a place where another person has an expectation of privacy. For instance, it would make it illegal to run around your yard naked in view of others. That is what Rainier's so-called "naked neighbor" Jimmy "Mack" McKenzie has been doing for years. A Team 2 investigation on McKenzie's nude - and some would say lewd - behavior outside his...

NEW ORLEANS - Sixty-four-year-old Vivian Westerman rode out Hurricane Katrina in her 19th-century house. So terrible was the experience that she wanted two things before the 2006 season arrived: a backup power source and a gun. "I got a 6,000-watt generator and the cutest little Smith & Wesson, snub-nose .38 you ever saw," she boasted. "I've never been more confident." People across New Orleans are arming themselves - not only against the possibility of another storm bringing anarchy, but against the violence that has engulfed the metropolitan area in the 19 months since Katrina, making New Orleans the nation's murder...

(CNSNews.com) - If Jesus washed his disciples' feet at a Georgia college in 2007, he'd likely be accused of "hazing." That's the position a Christian ministry at Savannah State University has found itself in, after it washed the feet of its new members. The campus ministry Commissioned II Love (C2L) was also accused of "harassing" students by sharing their faith. Washing of feet is a symbolic gesture of servitude in the Christian faith, following the example of Jesus, who washed the disciples' feet during their last meal before his crucifixion, as recounted in the New Testament gospel of John (13:1-17)....

Sex offenders, drug dealers and gang members are not welcome in New Orleans. That's the crux of a measure passed by the U.S. House of Representatives. The bill would prohibit people convicted of certain crimes from living in the soon-to-be re-opened housing projects in New Orleans, while at the same time giving others priority to return. The measure proposed by Congressman Bobby Jindal will make it easier for handicapped, elderly and working people to move back into New Orleans public housing, while locking out those with shady pasts. Some evacuees say it's a racist move by politicians they don't trust....

TIVERTON — The Easter Bunny was to have made a stop at a craft fair at the Tiverton Middle School tomorrow, appearing for photos with students as part of a fundraising effort sponsored by the school’s Parent-Teacher Council. But Schools Supt. William Rearick called a halt to the use of the word “Easter” at a school event, just as the word “Christmas” is out of bounds in school publications and activities. Instead of the Easter Bunny, the Parent-Teacher Council booth will offer photos with Peter Rabbit. Similarly, Rearick said, he has told officials of the Tiverton Land Trust that a...

In New Orleans, they aren?t shedding a tear over Louisiana Gov. Blanco?s decision not to seek a second term. A letter from the Garden District. WEB-EXCLUSIVE COMMENTARY New Orleans, 18 months after Katrina, is still a city of considerable ups and downs. Tuesday was no different; as usual, the bad news came first. The first e-mail I received informed me that a block and a half from our new house, at 1:30 in the afternoon, two hold-ups occurred in less than 10 minutes?and I live in Garden District, still perceived as a ?nice? neighborhood, despite the alarming frequency of similar...

America’s most inept mayor is at it again. Seems like it’s taking him too long to turn NOLA into the Chocolate City of his dreams but he knows why. New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin has suggested that the slow recovery and rebuilding of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina — which has prevented many black former residents from returning — is part of a plan to change the racial makeup and political leadership of his and other cities. “They are studying this model of natural disasters, dispersing the community and changing the electoral process in that community.” That’s right, boys...

Mark Crowley of San Ramon is on his way to the White House this week to mark the fourth anniversary of the war in Iraq. He plans to unfurl a flag on the Mall and wave it with pride. "My son did not die in vain," said Crowley, who left San Francisco last week with the Move America Forward caravan headed for Washington to provide a counterpoint to the big anti-war protests planned for today. At a time when polls are showing a nation turning against its president, and congressional lawmakers are getting louder in their demands for troop withdrawal,...

CONCORD -- New Hampshire lawmakers are being asked to guarantee egg-laying hens will have room to spread their wings. Supporters of two bills told a House committee Friday that the chickens should not be kept in such small cages that they can't spread their wings. They said the cages -- called battery cages -- are usually about 67 square inches in size and don't allow chickens to move properly. One bill would ban the practice in New Hampshire -- though supporters acknowledge there's no evidence of abuse in the state. The ban also would apply to domesticated turkey, duck, goose...

CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts: French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin said the United States should pull out of Iraq within one year and work with Iraq's neighbors and Europe to resolve the crisis. Villepin, in a speech Friday at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government on Friday, said the United States' true strength "isn't its army." The United States in the 20th century constructed an economic and cultural model "and forged an ideal of modernity that inspired the admiration of the rest of the world," he said. "For us you represented the camp of freedom. You were the guarantors of...

MIAMI, March 16 (Reuters) - Defense lawyers want the word "terrorist" banned as too inflammatory in the U.S. trial of Jose Padilla and two other men charged with conspiring to aid Islamist extremists overseas. The word conjures up visions of someone with a bomb belt blowing up himself and others in a crowded cafe, Jeanne Baker, an attorney representing co-defendant Adham Amin Hassoun, said during a hearing in the high-profile case on Friday. "The word terrorist has nothing to do with this case," Baker said. "The word terrorist is used to label an enemy." U.S. District Judge Marcia Cooke, who...

WASHINGTON, March 16 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A group of seven high- ranking military veterans today responded to recent remarks by General Peter Pace, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who earlier this week called lesbian, gay and bisexual service members "immoral" and re-iterated his support for the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" ban on lesbian, gay and bisexual service members. The officers, who are all lesbian or gay, called on Congress to repeal the law, and demanded that General Pace apologize for his remarks. COL Stewart Bornhoft, USA (Ret.); CAPT Joan E. Darrah, USN (Ret.); CAPT Robert D. Dockendorff, USNR...

UNION -- A Monroe County elementary art teacher was suspended without pay for putting masking tape under the noses of about 25 third-graders in a joking attempt to quiet them, Superintendent Lyn Guy said. The Monroe County Board of Education voted Monday night to uphold the 10-day suspension of Donna Spangler, an art teacher at Peterstown Elementary School. Spangler's suspension ended Monday and she has since returned to work. "I didn't think it was very funny,'' Guy said Tuesday. "It wasn't right and she (Spangler) made a huge mistake in judgment and she has paid for it.'' Guy said the...

Dozens of immigrant workers protested working condition post-Katrina Tuesday, and activists said it was an example for thousands of recovery workers across the city. Stories were told of workers brought across the border with promises of good jobs, and then betrayed. “We will not exchange exploited black people for exploited brown people,” said civil rights attorney Tracie Washington. One worker said he came to the area to make money for his family in Mexico, but once he was here, the company that promised him a good job backed out, leaving him trapped with a VISA that would not let him...

A soothing summer sound may be making its way back onto Des Moines streets. The City Council will discuss the possibility of allowing ice cream trucks back into neighborhoods. The trucks were banned several years ago when a 9 year-old girl was killed when she was hit by a car while crossing the street. The meeting is scheduled for 4:30 this evening at City Hall.

A new study by a Tulane University professor puts New Orleans' murder rate as the highest in the country. The study estimates the city's 2006 murder rate at 96 per every 100,000 people. The new study, by demographer Mark VanLandingham, aims to fix the main flaw in previous per capita murder estimates for 2006: It takes into account the large change in New Orleans' population during the year, with far fewer people in the city at the beginning of 2006 than at the end. That change raises the murder rate substantially. "It's part of this big policy debate: How bad...

SARASOTA Co., Fla. - A high school teacher in Florida has been given an ultimatum by administrators – to quit his job, or quit his night job as a “male stripper.” Jason Brenner is a well-liked teacher at Lemon Bay High School in Charlotte County, Florida. But his night gig, performing in a theater production of ‘The Full Monty,’ is not sitting well with school officials. By day, Jason Brenner is a well-liked music teacher at Lemon Bay high school in Charlotte County, Florida. “That’s been my dream ever since I was 13-years-old,” Brenner said. “Everyone who comes to see...

BERLIN -- An EU official called on Germany to give up the famous freedom of its highways and impose speed limits on the autobahn to fight global warming -- a demand that drew angry responses on Sunday in a country that cherishes what it calls "free driving for free citizens." The call came as the German government makes action against climate change a priority of its current presidencies of the EU and Group of Eight. Still, the German environment minister showed little enthusiasm for EU Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas' suggestion and a group representing the country's auto industry said it...