Free Republic

Free Republic has something of a reputation in many circles as being home of raving mad fanatics or rednecks like Cletus from The Simpsons. What always strikes me though is how smart, thoughtful and well-read the average Freeper is. It's not just compared to the stereotype, but to almost any news forum. Take the forums on Democratic Underground or The Guardian. You'd expect the Liberal Elite to be out in force there. But all you really see are morons who can't reason or think or handle argument. So I want to know a bit more about the average Freeper. What...

FRIDAY, MARCH 21 -- "Good Lord," said Strange de Jim yesterday in the Civic Center, "all these people protesting the opening of the Asian Art Museum?" ... A demonstrator bearing a sign reading "No Blood for Oil" paraded in front of the Museum. "I hope the protesters know we have no connection to world politics," said PR whiz Martha Shaughnessy who was working the opening for Landis Communications. "We have oil paintings -- but not crude oil paintings." ... A tourist who had somehow wandered into the Civic Center from the Tenderloin saw the be-helmeted, truncheon-toting SWAT squad posted in...

It is a measure of our natural deference to America, cultural and military, that when the New York Times rang up and asked for a piece, I was thrilled. The New York Times, I thought. Three million registered readers in the most powerful country on earth! All the news that’s fit to print! You betcha. So I sat up for an hour or so, cracked out an article on Blair, Bush and Iraq, and fired it off to the charming NY Times op-ed editor, whom I shall call Tobin, because that is his name. Tobin and I spoke the following...

<p>SAWFAN, Iraq — U.S. Marines hauled down giant street portraits of Saddam Hussein in a screeching pop of metal and bolts Friday, telling nervous residents of this southern Iraqi town that "Saddam is done."</p> <p>Milling crowds of men and boys watched as the Marines attached ropes on the front of their Jeeps to one portrait and then backed up, peeling the Iraqi leader's black-and-white metal image off a frame. Some locals briefly joined Maj. David "Bull" Gurfein in a new cheer.</p>

But they have also been warned some of them may not return from Iraq alive. Lieutenant Colonel Tim Collins gave the battlegroup of the 1st Battalion of the Royal Irish the pep talk as the US deadline for Saddam Hussein to leave Iraq or face action ticked away. Reporters said the men listened in silence to the address at Fort Blair Mayne desert camp, 20 miles from the Iraqi border. "We go to liberate not to conquer. We will not fly our flags in their country," he said. "We are entering Iraq to free a people and the only flag...

The West might be superficially divided between hawks and doves, but there is a deeper division: between foxes and hedgehogs. In a famous essay on Tolstoy, Isaiah Berlin said the division was ‘one of the deepest’ among human beings. The distinction applies just as well to politicians and governments. Foxes, said Berlin, are sophisticated, pluralist, usually atheist, and distrustful of absolutes. Hedgehogs are anti-intellectual, single-minded, often religious, and comfortable with certainties, chief among which are ‘good’ and ‘evil’. Foxes think many small things; hedgehogs think one big thing. The UN and the EU are fox heaven. They stand for multilateralism...

Is it in the UK's interests to build strategic relationships with the US or Europe?Please cast your vote for the US.

First let me declare an interest: I drink almost every day of my life. In fact, I can hardly remember the last day when I didn’t have a drink. It is almost as certain that I shall drink this evening as that the sun will rise tomorrow. According to the slightly purse-lipped organisation, Alcohol Concern, this makes me one of the three million British problem drinkers who can’t get through the day without a drink. Well, I could, of course – I just don’t want to. Honestly. It is clear to any unbiased observer, however, that we in Britain do...

Can anyone give me a link to a site that broadcasts Michael Savage's show, or with recordings of them? I am keen to listen in.

The posting on the Internet message board is headlined, ‘I want lots of Christmas Gifts: Leeds UK’. The message wasn’t left by a child who had been anxious to maximise his return from Father Christmas. It had been posted by Jon, a gay librarian from Leeds. The ‘gifts’ this 28- year-old is after don’t come wrapped in shiny paper, and, unlike the average Christmas present, they will last way beyond Boxing Day. The gift that Jon wants is HIV. I came across Jon and other ‘bug-chasers’ while working on a television documentary about the search for extreme pleasure in a...

Are you sick and tired of those "conservative" fairy tales? Are you an American liberal or someone from Europe who thinks those fairy tales teach values that no longer need to be promoted in today's world? Well, RWN is coming to your rescue with our "Politically Correct Fairy Tales!" ===== Hansel and GretelHansel and Gretel were lost in the woods when they came upon a house made of candy and cake. An old witch invited them in and then captured both of them intending to eat them. Gretel had a chance save both of them by pushing the old woman...

http://www.rallyforchoice.com/

GARY ALDRICH HAS a good post at Townhall on the way homosexuality has changed from a sexual practice to the level almost of a political ideology. As he notes, an absurd consequence of this is the way in which supporters of the traditional family and those who value Christian morality are now judged to be somehow expressing hatred of 'gay' men, the ideology and the person having been so conflated. I am not homophobic, but I do think gays should keep their “housekeeping” and intimate matters to themselves. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to hear about...

GARY ALDRICH HAS a good post at Townhall on the way homosexuality has changed from a sexual practice to the level almost of a political ideology. As he notes, an absurd consequence of this is the way in which supporters of the traditional family and those who value Christian morality are now judged to be somehow expressing hatred of 'gay' men, the ideology and the person having been so conflated. I am not homophobic, but I do think gays should keep their “housekeeping” and intimate matters to themselves. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to hear about...

Tony Blair appears to have set himself his toughest task yet. Neither reforming public services nor maintaining economic stability compares in difficulty to the mission he took on yesterday. For a Labour politician to confront anti-Americanism is to set himself up in opposition to the dominant ideology of the contemporary Left. Knocking America off its superpower pedestal has long supplanted taking control of the commanding heights of the economy as the idea which holds the Left together. Forget Clause Four. That was a dead red letter. It’s opposition to Uncle Sam which is the glue in the Left coalition, the...

IAIN DUNCAN SMITH faces a collapse of confidence in his leadership among Conservative supporters according to a new poll which will fuel speculation among MPs about a challenge to him. The poll for The Times, conducted on Friday and Saturday by the Live Strategy consulting group, shows that the Tories have failed to benefit from the increasing unpopularity of Tony Blair and the Government. By contrast, the Liberal Democrats are continuing to advance, to their strongest position for nearly a decade. Labour is now on 37 per cent, down five points compared with the 2001 general election, but the Tories...

'Human shields' head for Iraq Paul HarrisSunday December 29, 2002The Observer A convoy of anti-war activists, likely to include dozens of British volunteers, will leave London next month to act as human shields protecting strategic sites in Iraq. The convoy to Baghdad is being organised by former US marine Kenneth Nichols, who served in the first Gulf war and won a combat medal but has now become a vociferous opponent of another Gulf conflict. British protesters are also heading for the country in advance of any Anglo-American bombing. Nichols, 33, aims to gather scores of volunteers together in London and...

This is a shortened version of the Prime Minister's speech yesterday to the National Confederation of Food Service EmployeesWhen the Labour Party established the National Food Service in 1948, life expectancy in this country was far lower and avoidable diseases such as rickets were commonplace. The NFS - with its founding principle that food should be free at the point of eating and available equally to all - transformed this nation's diet and wellbeing.The Labour ethical principles underlying free universal food provision are as valid today as then. Society evolved because humans learned that cooperation, not competition, is essential to...

The last general election was a disaster for the opinion polls. They were wildly wrong. They are now again being quoted as though they were broadly reliable, and some of the interpretation, particularly on the Today programme, is so naive as to suggest invincible ignorance. These are the facts. The Labour Party won the 2001 election with a lead in the United Kingdom of 9.0 per cent over the Conservatives, a swing of 1.75 percentage points to the Conservatives. This swing was not reflected in seats because of increased tactical voting by Liberal Democrat supporters in Labour marginals. The Times...

C'mon over, baby, a whole shakin' o' Lott goin' on. On the face of it, it seems incredible that a mere month after Bush's election triumph, the Beltway should be immersed in a discussion of where the 2002 Republican Party leadership stands on segregation. For this, we have Trent Lott to thank. The incoming Senate majority leader couldn't even wait till he'd come in to start screwing up. Insofar as he has any conservative defenders, the defense is this: Hey, relax, Trent isn't racist, just stupid. You're telling me. If he were still majority leader in 2004, the NAACP would...