Free Republic

What can anyone tell me about Robert Parry and consortiumnews.com? I am working in another forum where there are a number of left-wingers trying to convince people that the high price of gas is because of GWB and his "Oil pals" manipulating supplies and fixing prices. The reference work they're quoting to prove this is an article in consortiumnews, which is edited by Robert Parry. I think this was the guy who broke the Iran/Contra "scandal" too. Thanks, in advance, for any/all information.

WASHINGTON - If Sen. John F. Kerry [related, bio] captures the White House this fall, several politically connected Bay State legal, lobbying and consulting firms could see their stock in Washington soar, cashing in on their close ties to the Bay State senator. Leading the Kerry parade in the power corridors of Washington would be the law firm of Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, the Dewey Square Group, and Perkins Smith and Cohen, a Beacon Hill law firm. The senator's younger brother Cameron works for Mintz Levin, but he is not a lobbyist. Cam Kerry has emerged as...

It's the eve of D-Cup Day. The groundwork has been laid: extra ads, more supervixen staff, full humidors, limos on call. Now, the gentlemen's clubs and the restaurants where waitresses are hotter than the barbecued wings are waiting on the players in town for the Democratic National Convention. The Republicans can claim to be the party of Lincoln; this is the party of Linkin Park. The big tent surely can accommodate Summer and Misti and The Men Who Tip Them Handsomely. At Hooters, a long outlet pass away from the FleetCenter, manager Stephen Caruso anticipates a 50 percent boost in...

I just heard John Gibson on Fox say that Tommy Franks was about to publish a naming-names book that would change the political landscape.

A "smart bullet" that can be fired at a target and then wirelessly transmit back useful information has been developed by US researchers. The projectile, created at the University of Florida in Gainesville, US, is 1.7 centimetres in diameter can be fired at from an ordinary paint-ball gun. The front is coated in an adhesive polymer that sticks it to the target. Inside, the elongated projectile holds a sensor, a tiny wireless transmitter and a battery. This enables it to report back its findings to a laptop or handheld computer up to 70 metres away. It can also reusable, because...

At the very moment Americans are rightly incensed at the Iraqi prisoner abuse in Abu Ghraib, Al Qaeda cut off Nick Berg's head in front of a camera, plastered the snuff film all over the Internet, and claimed the murder was an act of "retaliation." Western journalists predictably and repeatedly broadcast Al Qaeda's spin on their own atrocity. The way CBS reported it was typical: "A video posted Tuesday on an al-Qaeda-linked Web site showed the beheading of an American civilian in Iraq and said the execution was carried out to avenge abuses of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison."...

Democratic activists say they are receptive to the idea of eliminating the nomination from their nominating convention to give John Kerry a better financial shot against President Bush. Several Democratic National Convention delegates said that Kerry has to do whatever he can to avoid taking a political beating from President Bush between the Democrats' gathering and the Republican National Convention. Many interviewed Saturday by The Associated Press also said the convention would lose some of its excitement if the nomination came later.

A frustrated Mayor Thomas M. Menino yesterday urged Sen. John F. Kerry [related, bio] to make good on plans to accept the Democratic presidential nomination in the Hub, bluntly telling Kerry to "just do it." Menino, peeved that Kerry didn't clue him in on planning that could render the Boston convention irrelevant, said it's too late for ideas like Kerry's. "My advice? Do what everybody else has done in the past," Menino told reporters. "Just do it. Just get it done." The mayor led what could become a rising tide of opposition to the Kerry trial balloon suggesting the nomination...

Windsor police Chief Robert W. Harris Jr. was humming down Route 9 on his personal Harley-Davidson when the moose clambered over the guardrail just in front of the town fire station. Harris tried to swerve, but it was too late. In a hot second the man and the moose, a pregnant female weighing 800 pounds, were lying in the road with broken legs. ``He's been in the hospital for days and he's really hurting,'' said Windsor officer Peter Pyskaty. ``We had to destroy the moose.'' Moose-vehicle crashes are on the rise in Massachusetts. Harris' accident is the 10th recorded by...

<p>George W. Bush isn't helping, either.</p> <p>The president has taken to promoting marriage as a way to stem the country's supposed moral decay and save the government money on welfare. But besides preach, he hasn't done much for my friend lately. He certainly hasn't offered any ideas for finding a good husband.</p>

Faced with a sluggish job market, huge student loans, credit card debts and rents that are simply out of reach, young adults in large numbers are opting for the comforts of home - a move many in their parents' generation would have cringed at when they were young. The latest Census figures show that 56 percent of men and 42.5 percent of women aged 18-to-24 are living at home with one or both parents. Even a fair number of 25- to- 34-year-olds are apparently having trouble leaving the nest, with 12.1 percent of men and 5.4 percent of women living...

A redistricting battle in New York could have an effect on U.S. Rep. James P. McGovern's congressional fortunes.     U.S. Rep. Louise M. Slaughter, a Democrat from the Rochester area who is one seniority step ahead of Mr. McGovern on the House Rules Committee, is fighting for her political survival.     If Ms. Slaughter were to lose in the fall election to U.S. Rep. John L. LaFalce, a Democrat from the adjacent district, the Worcester Democrat would become the second-ranking minority party member on the influential committee.     Mr. McGovern could even become chairman of the committee if Democrats in November win back the five congressional...

The University of California-San Francisco acknowledged Friday that scientists there conducted experiments in ``therapeutic cloning'' -- the controversial procedure that would be banned by legislation now before Congress. The work was conducted from 1999 to 2001 in the laboratory of Roger Pedersen, a leading embryonic stem cell researcher who left the university last year for England because of fears his research would be restricted in the United States. The experiments were funded by Geron, a biotechnology company in Menlo Park, with matching money from BioSTAR, a university-run program.In the experimental procedure -- also called ``somatic cell nuclear transfer'' -- Pedersen's...

BLOOMINGTON -- You can pick your friends. You can even pick your nose. But you can't wipe a booger on a friend. So say local authorities following the arrest of a Normal man who fought with his younger brother over a nose-picking spat earlier this week. Some may think it's funny, but it's not, say prosecutors. Just ask Spiro G. Pettas, 22, of Watterson Towers, who faces two counts of domestic battery and two counts of battery. One battery and one domestic battery charge allege Pettas wiped crusty mucus on his brother during an argument. That triggered a full-scale fight...

Jane Swift just can't seem to get the hang of this governor thing. First of all, in a lame-duck feeding frenzy, your main agenda should be hiring people, not firing them. They'll all be fired soon enough, just like you were. Second, shouldn't any sitting governor, even a toll-crazed embarrassment, be able to come up with a better consolation prize than a $42,600-a-year no-show with the U.S. Postal Service? Oh sure, the ``part-time'' post office gig is like stealing, and that's important to a serial kleptomaniac like Swift. Her dream of a $12 toll from Framingham to Logan may be...

BERKELEY, California A student here recently asked a Chinese colleague if there were Communist Party members who believe in democracy. The Chinese replied that this was the wrong question. The right one, he said, is "Does anyone in the party believe in communism?" That answer, familiar to all China specialists, is often a springboard to the assertion that the party is reforming itself. American social scientists now lecture on democracy and law at the Communist Party School, run by Vice President Hu Jintao, who last week visited the White House. Hu is expected to be China's next party chief and...

There's a good number of FReepers who, thankfully, do very creative things with photoshop and images. Having gotten up early this morning to do a pic for a presentation, I did my first bit of artwork for a work presentation using the new release of Photoshop and thought some of you might be interested in a thread about it and other related matters, especially Digital Assets Management (i.e., DAM). Being one of those people who was forever losing images and other stuff amid the clutter of disc and zip drives, I did two things to solve the problem: Upgrade...

Target practice (or how to end radar speed traps) A GOOD story deserves a good airing. What follows was spotted in Bike magazine, which had spotted it in Pilot magazine. Two members of the Lothian and Borders traffic police were recently having a pleasant time out on the Scottish moors, trapping speeding motorists with a radar gun. Suddenly their equipment went crazy, registering a speed of over 300 miles per hour. It then locked up completely. Seconds later the startled boys in blue understood why, as a low-flying Harrier jet screamed over their heads. Upset that their radar gun...

........... Survival in an Insecure World To defeat cyberterrorists, computer systems must be designed to work around sabotage. David A. Fisher's new programming language will help do just that Image: STEVE MELLON DAVID A. FISHER: PROGRAMMING PIONEER Ten years ago, hiked the entire Appalachian Trail in 180 days. First job: programming multiprocessor mainframes in 1965 at Burroughs. "We'll never see another plane hijacked and crashed into a building, because passengers now will sacrifice themselves if necessary to thwart it. That's an example of an emergent algorithm that contributes to survivability." As one of the primary lines of defense against...

Norman Lorentz might just have one of the worst jobs imaginable. Named the first chief technology officer of the Office of Management and Budget last fall, he oversees the federal government's $45 billion information technology budget and coordinates 24 e-government initiatives that span all agencies. His mandate? To make the federal government fast, efficient, and responsive--in short, everything it's not. The fix, Lorentz believes, is that government needs to be run more like a private company. (Yes, he is a Bush acolyte who refers to citizens as "consumers" and government services as "lines of business.") First on his agenda is...