Free Republic

As much of Europe struggles with double-digit unemployment this year, the United States has been creating an average of 200,000 new jobs a month. One of our great advantages is the relative ease with which Americans can start new businesses. Physical disability, the desire to stay home with young children, racial or religious discrimination -- all of these can be obstacles to traditional employment, but they are less serious barriers to starting your own business.

One of the major techniques of modern politics is to take every important event and tie it to the back of one's own particular hobby horse. One of the more ludicrous examples was the utterly absurd claims that the Asian tsunami was caused by global warming. But it happened.

A profound tragedy is unfolding in New Orleans, the most beautiful city in America, with the richest cultural history and the most wonderful style of living. I lived in New Orleans for seven years. I was married there. My children were born there. I have many friends there

It's been a tough time for French fries lately. First there was the unpleasant association with, well, all things French that led to one of America's favourite foods being renamed, at least within the Beltway, Freedom Fries. Then there was the New York City fat police "request" that restaurants stop using trans fats for frying fries, a move that many restaurant owners say will adversely affect the taste of fries. And finally there was the new scientific study from the Harvard School of Public Health that suggests that eating French fries as a child might lead to breast cancer later...

On August 3, Steven Vincent earned the dubious distinction of being, according to the New York Times, "the first American reporter to be attacked and killed in the current Iraq war." He was shot dead and left outside of Basra, where he had been living for the last few months. Vincent published an op-ed in the July 31 New York Times in which he lambasted the British for their failure to inculcate Iraqi police trainees with principle alongside procedure. As many as 75% of the new officers, according to one of his sources, hold allegiance to militant clerics

Which of the following describes your party affiliation? (a) I identify with the platform and leading spokesmen of the Democratic Party (b) I identify with the platform and leading spokesmen of the Republican Party (c) None of the above If you choose (c), then you are a member of what I call the political Long Tail. Like Chris Anderson's Long Tail of the distribution of books or music, the Long Tail in politics is larger than the "head," which in this case consists of the two major parties

Monsignor Rabban al Qas, a Chaldean bishop in Iraq, was recently interviewed by a foreign journalist, who asked him, "Twenty-three Iraqis are killed every day in Iraq. Nearly two years after the fall of Saddam Hussein, there is no security as yet. Is there still hope in Iraq?"

The War on Wal-Mart continues apace this week in New York City. There, the cost of living is high -- as is the demand for Wal-Mart's services. But the labor movement's tactics, as always, are lower than low. Their latest tactic: a bill that will require grocery stores in the five boroughs with 35 or more employees to provide their workers with "prevailing" health-care benefits.

What do we do about terrorist incitement on the internet? I have noted on several occasions that the main enemies of democracy and pluralistic Islam -- al-Qaida, the ultra-Wahhabi clerics of Saudi Arabia, and jihadists in Pakistan -- seem to have far surpassed the antiterror forces in use of this versatile and effective form of media. Those of us who have studied terrorist sites and video products are struck by how much more sophisticated and impressive they are, in their presentation, when compared with U.S. government and other outreach efforts.

Am I the only diehard baseball fan in America not particularly put out by the ongoing baseball steroids scandal, now starring Baltimore Orioles slugger Rafael Palmeiro? The well-regarded Raffy -- by the end of this season, he will almost certainly join Hank Aaron and Willie Mays as only the third major leaguer to have 3,000 hits and 600 home runs -- is coming off a 10-day suspension for using steroids. That infraction may not only hurt his relationship with his fans and teammates but also send his Hall of Fame chances to the showers.

Growing up in Africa, I witnessed first hand the benefits of prescription drugs. My stepfather, a South African, survived polio as a child in the 1940s; 40 years later, I survived a severe case of malaria while I was living in Kenya. Considering my upbringing, I was discouraged to learn that Focus Features was developing a film version of John Le Carre's book, The Constant Gardener, which will open on Aug. 26. The story is a penetrating criticism of drug companies and the abuse of poor people to further cures for wealthy Westerners. I believe that this criticism is founded...

Something odd is happening. Support for a non-defense discretionary spending hike is coming from some surprising quarters. Big-government liberalism is nothing new; the time when liberalism was associated with laissez-faire economics is long past. In recent years, as Republicans have gained a taste for drunken-sailor spending habits, we've had to contend with big-government conservatism. But now comes the strangest beast of them all: big-government libertarianism.

Questions are being raised in some quarters about Supreme Court Nominee John Roberts' apparently devout Catholic faith. Christopher Hitchens, for example, tackles the issue with his usual sensitivity and couth: The Roman Catholic Church claims the right to legislate on morals for all its members and to excommunicate them if they don't conform. The church is also a foreign state, which has diplomatic relations with Washington. In the very recent past, this church and this state gave asylum to Cardinal Bernard Law, who should have been indicted for his role in the systematic rape and torture of thousands of American...

Casualties of war. That phrase conjures up thoughts of the young drafted soldier who never returned to the farm he grew up on. It makes us think of generals ordering grand armies to sweep across plains or ships sunk by the cruel torpedoes of a submarine. "Casualties of war" never makes us think of art critics or filmmakers. Art critics almost never have anything to do with war except perhaps as protestors, and while filmmakers sometimes end up orchestrating battles and ordering actors to fake death, they are usually detached from actual combat.

If power companies invested in infrastructure like the Department of Homeland Security fights terrorism then a resident in New York City wouldn't be able to run a hairdryer but every cowboy in Bozeman, Mont., could light up a stadium. Because of the rules set by Congress, Homeland Security provides every state with a guaranteed minimum amount of grants regardless of risk, need or how they support national priorities and the goal of making all Americans safer.

As I have previously put forth, there exists recent precedent militating against asking a Supreme Court nominee such as John Roberts close questions about how he might adjudicate certain cases. That precedent is entirely justifiable as well, given the need of judicial nominees to keep from prejudging cases that may come before them. A judge is expected by Canon 5A3(d) of the Model Rules of Professional Responsibility to refrain from making "statements that commit or appear to commit the candidate with respect to cases, controversies or issues that are likely to come before the court." (Emphasis added.)

What does embryonic stem cell research have to do with the space shuttle? Seemingly nothing. Dig deeper, though. Whatever NASA may claim, there's little the shuttle can do that unmanned spaceships cannot - at much lower costs. But NASA knows what sci-fi writers always have, that we're enamored of manned space flight. The shuttle's main mission is maintaining NASA's prestige and budget.

With the recent bombings in London, most concerns about terrorist strikes on the US focus on the jihadist movement. But the next major terrorist strike in the US could come from an unexpected direction -- the extremist animal rights and environmental movements. According to FBI Deputy Assistant Director John Lewis, the Earth Liberation Front (ELF) and the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) are "one of today's most serious domestic terrorism threats." Skeptics, including The New York Times editorial page, argue that this threat is over hyped as these groups have confined themselves to property crime, unlike the well-established record of deadly...

Radio France Internationale is like most other French media…but more so. Not to be confused with "public radio," RFI is part and parcel of the government-owned and controlled Radio France organization that stretches across the FM band from France-Inter to France Info. But RFI is more directly controlled than its fellow stations; it is the voice of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, known by its geographical nickname as the Quai d'Orsay (comparable to Foggy Bottom), which is itself a state within the state. Governments come and go; the Quai d'Orsay endures. France's international influence shrinks, but the Quai struts...

I am honest-to-goodness shocked. What's more, along with pretty much every pundit out there, from the talking heads on CNN and Fox News to the blogosphere's pajamaheddin, I have quite a bit of egg on my face.