Free Republic

The U.S. government's food aid programs for low-income people are contributing to the high obesity rates of America's poor, according to a recent report from a Washington think thank. "Today, the central nutritional problem facing the poor -- indeed, all Americans -- is not too little food, but too much of the wrong food," writes Douglas Besharov in his paper, "We're Feeding the Poor as if They're Starving." The paper was published by the conservative American Enterprise Institute. "But despite a striking increase in obesity among the needy, federal feeding programs still operate under their nearly half-century-old objective of increasing...

A general strike in Venezuela, the fourth-largest exporter of oil to the United States, has contributed to a rise in oil prices in the last month. But the strike, which began on Dec. 2 and has resulted in a drastic decline in the country's oil production, was not initiated by left-wing labor unions, as many Americans may think. In fact, it was instigated by Venezuela's wealthy business elite. Underlying this crisis lies a central paradox of globalization, and of United States foreign policy: the combination of laissez-faire capitalism and free elections can create political and economic instability. Venezuela is only...

MENLO, Iowa -- A pickup truck crowded with passengers slammed into a semitrailer on Interstate 80 early Thursday, killing all nine people in the truck, authorities said. The eastbound pickup crossed the median and hit the semi in the westbound lane around 2:30 a.m., the Iowa State Patrol said. The driver of the semi was taken to a hospital in Greenfield. His name was not immediately released. "It was a mess," said Menlo Fire Chief Ben Gilman, who was first on the scene. "Everyone in the truck was dead. They probably died on impact."

WASHINGTON, Dec. 1 — It was several steps short of a full-blown purge, but a recent move by the strong-minded Republican House leadership to consolidate its power over the next Congress still packed enough force to jolt Capitol Hill. In a display of discipline applauded by some of the most conservative House members, the leadership pulled in the reins on the 13 Republican members who control most discretionary federal spending, a group of subcommittee chairmen so powerful they are known as the Cardinals. From now on, House leaders said, the chairmen will be selected not by seniority but by J....

A small Manhattan bank that prosecutors said accepted duffel bags full of cash without questioning their origin pleaded guilty yesterday to violating federal money laundering rules in what the government called the first case of its kind. Broadway National Bank pleaded guilty before Judge Thomas P. Griesa of Federal District Court in Manhattan to three felony charges for failing to file suspicious-activity reports on $123 million in cash deposits and failing to establish a program to curb money laundering. It will pay a $4 million fine immediately under a plea agreement. Prosecutors said the case was the first instance of...

MEXICO CITY -- Mexican President Vicente Fox called for high-level discussions to give legal status to at least some of the more than four million undocumented Mexicans living north of the border, saying that Mexicans in the U.S. pose no terror threat. President Bush, in a videotaped message to a cabinet-level meeting of the two countries, agreed that work on migration should continue but did not suggest that an agreement was high on his agenda. Mr. Fox told said it was important to establish a migration framework that "clearly distinguishes between those who arrive in that country to work and...

U.S. Banks Could Cash In On Immigrants' Transfers Remittances sent home by Mexican and Central American immigrants in the U.S. are growing at their fastest pace ever, a potential boon for U.S. banks. Such money transfers could reach as high as $25 billion by 2010, from $10 billion in 2000, according to a new report released Friday by the Pew Hispanic Center and the Inter-American Development Bank's Multilateral Investment Fund. The report notes that although immigration will be a key driver of remittances, growth should also be fueled by the aggressive entry of banks into a business hitherto dominated by...

The election is over, and Mr. Bush has a majority, however slim, in both houses of Congress. Thanks to close pals within the Bush team, I can now reveal what he has in mind for the second part of his term and for the new Congress. (Hint: Some people may not like it.) • Drill for oil in Malibu. • Drill for oil in Central Park, New York. • Drill for oil in Barbra Streisand's living room. • Knock down historic Georgetown east of Wisconsin Avenue and put in a stock car raceway. • Close the Boston MTA at Harvard...

The Blank Slate The long-accepted theory that parents can mold their children like clay has distorted choices faced by adults trying to balance their lives, multiplied the anguish of those whose children haven't turned out as hoped, and mangled the science of human behavior By Steven Pinker From the forthcoming book The Blank Slate by Steven Pinker. Copyright © Steven Pinker, 2002. Printed by arrangement with Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Putnam Inc. To be published in September 2002. If you read the pundits in newspapers and magazines, you may have come across some remarkable claims about the malleability...

LOS ANGELES -- A billion miles beyond Pluto, astronomers have discovered a frozen celestial body 800 miles across -- the biggest find in our solar system since the ninth planet was first spied in 1930. Astronomers do not consider the newfound object a planet. Instead, it is believed to be icy debris left over from the formation of the solar system 5 billion years ago. The object was provisionally named Quaoar (pronounced KWAH-oh-wahr) after a creation force in Southern California Indian mythology. It is about one-tenth the diameter of Earth and orbits the sun once every 288 years at a...

Gerri Trumblay, a widow from Burbank, took the witness stand this week in a murder case that has been ignored. It is a case ignored by those who usually swarm around such cases, ignored by activists, protesters, politicians and reporters. Thomas Cooper, 21, of the Far South Side is on trial for allegedly murdering Roy Trumblay and for three other counts of attempted murder. Cooper allegedly clubbed Trumblay to death with a table leg in Bridgeport, a few feet from the Deering District police station, on the afternoon of Aug. 28, 1999. He clubbed the rest of the family too....

It's not every day that one finds oneself on a nationally televised talk show, two feet from a host who is completely unhinged and shrieking, "I want to tell the audience, this man is telling you a lie, a bold face lie." Then again, it's not every day one is on "The O'Reilly Factor." I didn't ask to be on the "Factor." The show called me last Wednesday, to ask what I had thought of the previous night's coverage. That one centered on a controversial interview in London, which Mr. O'Reilly had arranged with the Saudi embassy, featuring two American...

"In one country in this region, Zimbabwe, the lack of respect for human rights and rule of law has [helped] push millions of people toward the brink of starvation." Boooooo! "In the face of famine, several governments in Southern Africa have prevented critical U.S. food assistance from being distributed to the hungry by rejecting biotech corn." Hisssssss! The big story coming out of this week's World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg seems to be that Colin Powell was booed. This is being chalked up by some as one more global U.S. embarrassment, but the closer we inspect this event...

Repeatedly interrupted by jeers and protests from environmentalists, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell defended the Bush administration’s environmental record and its efforts to help the poor in the developing world at the Earth Summit’s closing day Wednesday. “THE U.S. is taking action to meet environmental challenges, including global climate change,” Powell said to loud booing from the rear of a hall filled with government leaders and delegates ranging from youth activists to environmentalists. The Bush administration has been strongly criticized by leaders and activists for rejecting the Kyoto Protocol, which many countries view as crucial for reversing a global...

Martha Stewart is lying low while investigators comb through her personal files, but the rest of the characters caught up in the ImClone insider trading scandal are living it up as if they don't have a care in the world. Stewart's socially connected Merrill Lynch broker, Peter Bacanovic, at first escaped to England to avoid the media spotlight, but for the past six weeks has been partying away on Fire Island. The handsome society walker, who loves to escort society's grand dames to balls and charity events, has been "out at Fire Island almost the entire summer," said our source....

BILL Clinton might have put more pressure on Saudi Arabia to stop terrorism if he hadn't been friends with Prince Turki al Faisal al Saud from their student days together in the '60s at Georgetown. Prince Turki was the head of Saudi intelligence and the secret police in the Clinton years, and he devised the strategy of appeasement with Osama bin Laden. His son, also known as Prince Turki, also went to Georgetown from '94 to '97. Meanwhile, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, who met with President Bush Tuesday, is the son of Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz al Saud, the Saudi...

LONDON -- As news conferences go, this one sounded promising. "The Satanic Alliance and the Islamic response," proclaimed the top line of an invitation resembling a circus flier. It added: "The most radical leaders of the Muslim community gather to give their uncompromising Islamic stance on the U.S. crusade against Muslims." But Thursday's news conference at London's Euston Plaza hotel turned into a standoff between two uncompromising and uncomprehending worlds -- before ending in a melee of overturned furniture and squealing car tires as the Islamists made their getaway from a frustrated press corps. The problem? The Islamists wanted to...

Voter backlash may have aided Rounds Republican gubernatorial candidate Mike Rounds accepted handshakes and commitments from his former opponents Wednesday, but a sense of mystery still swirled around his stunning primary victory. Rounds, considered by most observers to be running a distant third in the party's race to replace longtime Gov. Bill Janklow, gained MORE COVERAGE 44 percent of the primary vote Tuesday to defeat Attorney General Mark Barnett and former Lt. Gov. Steve Kirby. If the victory was surprising, Rounds' margin of success was even more so. And as Republicans scrambled to show support for their new nominee, political...

Twelve-year-old Brian Glennon planned to spend his summer calling balls and strikes for 8-year-old batters, earning $10 a game from the Darien Youth Club baseball league. But thanks to an anonymous complaint, Brian and 35 other young umpires have been fired before the first pitch. Citing child-labor laws, the Illinois Department of Labor told the league in March to stop paying umpires who are not yet 14. "It kind of stinks," said Brian, who completed umpiring classes during the winter to qualify for the job, "because there's absolutely no point to it if you're not going to get paid." Parents...

OLYMPIA, Wash. -- When Washington state voters banned fur trapping, the idea was to spare animals from cruelty. Little did they know they also were sparing one animal that many gardeners and lawn-lovers agree deserves to die by whatever means necessary: the mole. Washington's Initiative 713, passed in November 2000, with 55% of the vote, bans the use of "body-gripping traps" on "nonhuman vertebrates." While the law created exceptions for mice and rats, it overlooked one other pest. The result: A scissors-like trap, an extremely effective means for eliminating moles, has been outlawed, too. Now moles are popping up ...