Free Republic

Suicide bombers detonated explosives at three international hotels in Amman, Jordan's capital city. So far the death toll stands at about 53 people and with scores of wounded. Unfortunately, the causality figures may be amended as events unfold. According to witnesses, there have been explosions at the Radisson, the Grand Hyatt, and a Day's Inn motor hotel. All three are located in Amman. Two of the blasts were caused by suicide bombers with explosives strapped to their bodies. The third was perpetrated by a bomber in a vehicle containing explosives. Police believed earlier that the Radisson blast had been caused...

House GOP leaders have decided to drop an Arctic oil drilling proposal from a budget bill.

Anyone know where it is. I believe I saw it on here a few days back!

A Korean-American who spent about eight years in jail for illegally passing U.S. military secrets to Seoul returned to South Korea on Sunday where he was given a heroes' welcome. Robert Kim was greeted by scores of reporters and well-wishers upon his arrival at Inchon airport near Seoul. Supporters cheered his arrival and one held a placard that read "Our country loves you." Kim, a computer specialist who had worked at the U.S. naval intelligence office, is scheduled to meet with Nobel Peace Prize winner and former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung. A U.S. court convicted Kim of illegally passing...

Many Americans, more then likely a resounding majority, do not understand the European reluctance on the War on Terror. I think a lot of it has to do with the immigration invasion of Muslims into Europe. An article out of France, wrote by Suzanne Daley of the New York Times, shows in October 2001 that Europe was nervous: In the wake of the terror attacks in the United States, Gerard Herault, mayor of this tidy Paris suburb, took the step he could to reduce immigration to France: He decided he would no longer issue "certificates of welcome," the papers required...

ROME (AP) An Italian lawmaker says the government warned the United States before the Iraq war that documents about Iraqi efforts to buy uranium in Africa were forged.

Yesterday Senator Harry Reid forced the Senate into a closed session to discuss "an investigation of the intelligence underpinning the 2003 invasion of Iraq" Afterwards they came out, and said that three members from each party would: appoint a bipartisan group of senators to assess the progress of the "Phase 2" probe, the office of Majority Leader Bill Frist said. The three Republicans and three Democrats are to report back to Senate leaders by November 14. Reid immediately stated that his three Senators were Durbin, Rockefeller and another Senator (still looking for the official list). This concerns me, mainly over...

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Let the revolution begin. In what I would call the reinvigoration of the Conservative movement, and an expression of American democracy, Harriet Miers has withdrawn. It was not unexpected from me and many others. The division it caused in the ranks of the Republican Party was a division along truly conservative lines, among the moral and idealists and the blind followers of Bush and the White House. Over at Free Republic the moon bat reactions are astounding from those who defended Harriet Miers only on her church membership. Observe: From one freeper Just remember most of the people who opposed...

WASHINGTON: The US and Russia had both emerged victorious at the end of the Cold War, former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev said. "I would not be making a mistake to say that perestroika won. It succeeded," he said during a celebration of the 20th anniversary of reforms that ultimately ended the hostilities between the two nations. Mr Gorbachev also reflected on the current state of world affairs, noting the role of the US as the sole superpower. "America has a right to be a leader," he said, adding that "this leadership should be realised through partnership, not domination". Former US...

Russia's population has shrunk to 143 million, with the federal statistics agency announcing that the country had seen a decline of 506,400 since January. Alcoholism, poverty, emigration and poor healthcare have caused a drop in the birth rate and life expectancy, which is now 58 for men and 72 for women. There are now more abortions registered than live births. President Vladimir Putin has allocated funds to try to reverse the trend. The United Nations Development Programme warned in a report released last week that by 2050 the population could be 80 million.

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) Voting has begun in Iraq's historic constitutional referendum.

Republicans, who these days are as likely to be members of the corporate establishment as the evangelical establishment, are more suspicious of intellectuals and ideas, and more likely to believe that politics is about deal-making, loyalty and power. You know you are in establishment Republican circles when the conversation is bland but unifying. You know you are in conservative circles when it is interesting but divisive. Conservatives err by becoming irresponsible. Republicans tend to be blown about haplessly by forces they cannot understand. For the first years of his presidency, George Bush healed the division between Republicans and conservatives by...

No, I do not intend to wait around for another list ranking the various Presidents of the United States for their intelligence, courage, whatever. I already have my nomination for the dumbest, dopiest, most goofy President we ever elected to office. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Jimmy Carter! For those old enough to remember this simpleton, he was elected after the debacle of Richard M. Nixon’s famed Watergate mess. There was such a mass revulsion against the criminality practiced by Nixon and the gang of nitwits around him that, when Jimmy came along, the Democrats could not believe their...

(AP) MEDFORD, Ore A registered sex offender who fashioned a loin cloth from a rope and piece of lawn furniture was arrested near a high school, where he asked four girls for a ride to the mall or a motel, police said. Kelly James Bailey, 33, of Greenwater, Wash., was wearing only the rope when he shocked a Medford woman by appearing in her back yard Thursday morning. Before he left, Bailey, who appeared to be covered in feces, ran away with a strip of leopard-print vinyl peeled from the seat of lawn chair, said Medford police Lt. Mike Moran....

DENVER - It sounds like a great idea: Let's just blast hurricanes like Rita and Katrina out of the sky before they hurt more people. Or, at least weaken the storms and steer them away from cities. ADVERTISEMENT Atmospheric scientists say it's wishful thinking that we could destroy or even influence something as huge and powerful as a hurricane. They abandoned such a quest years ago after more than two decades of inconclusive government-sponsored research. Private companies have conducted tests on a much smaller scale, but have made little progress despite initially claiming to erase storm clouds from the atmosphere....

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) An Indonesian jetliner has crashed in a residential neighborhood in Medan, the largest city on Sumatra island.

As the dust begins to settle around the dream that was Iraq, the finger pointing is beginning. 'Who lost Iraq?' is the simple, but profound question that many are beginning to ask. As one who was in Iraq during the time of Saddam and has been their since as an Assyrian Christian, the indigenous people of Iraq the answer to that question is not just academic - it directly relates to the future of our people, the Assyrian Christians who are the original people of Iraq long before the Arabs came. We are the people of 'Nineveh' to whom Jonah...

GULFPORT, Miss. (AP) An emergency official has confirmed 50 hurricane-related deaths in Mississippi's Harrison County.

The following are excerpts from the interrogation of captured Iraqi terrorist Ramzi Hashem Abed, which aired on Al-Fayhaa TV on August 12 and Al-Iraqiya TV on August 7, 2005."(To view this clip, visit http://memritv.org/search.asp?ACT=S9&P1=813.) Al-Fayhaa TV Interrogator: "What is your full name?" Abed: "Ramzi Hashem Abed." Interrogator: "What is your alias?" Abed: "'Ubeidi." Interrogator: "Where do you live?" Abed: "Nabi Yunis in Mosul." Interrogator: "What organization do you belong to?" Abed: "Ansar Al-Islam." Interrogator: "What organization is this?" Abed: "It is bin Laden's group." [...] Abed: "Mullah Al-Shafi'i said that we were going to carry out operations in Najaf." Interrogator:...