Free Republic

A new exhibition featuring preserved dead bodies having sex opened in Berlin on Thursday with critics saying a maverick German anatomist dubbed "Doctor Death" has gone too far this time. The couple, part of Gunther von Hagens's exhibition "The Cycle of Life", is the "low point in his tastelessness", Michael Braun, culture expert from the conservative CDU party, told AFP. Von Hagens said his copulating couples show the sexual act in "bracing clarity".

As Judge Fernando Andreu of Spain's National Court decided on Monday to push on with the inquiry into a 2002 IAF bombing in Gaza that killed Hamas terrorist Salah Shehadeh and 14 others, Almagor, the Terror Victims Association, was finalizing a lawsuit against NATO personnel who approved bombings in Yugoslavia in the 1990s that killed some 2,500 civilians. In this July 23, 2002 photo, people sift through the rubble of a Gaza house destroyed in an IAF strike, in which Hamas military wing head Salah Shehadeh and 14 other people were killed. Photo: AP [file] SLIDESHOW: Israel & Region |...

Lanny Davis talks to Bill Clinton on release of the torture memos, and prosecution of Bush officials, from todays washingtontimes. No doubt Bill Clinton, deep down, would love to see Bush officials prosecuted, to level his image as President...

Police Swoop on Beijing University 2009-04-22 Comments by a Beijing professor enrage petitioners, who descend on his office and prompt a police crackdown. Police in Beijing move in on petitioners in the capital in several locations during a sensitive anniversary year. HONG KONG—Authorities in Beijing have begun moving to clear large numbers of people from the capital who have a grievance against the government as security tightens, with local residents and petitioners reporting detentions in several sensitive locations. Hundreds of protesters have traveled from all over China to the capital's prestigious Beijing University following recently reported remarks about petitioners by...

An international human rights group demanded Thursday that NATO be held accountable for civilian casualties in the bombing of Serbia's state television headquarters a decade ago, calling the attack a "war crime." Sixteen civilians were killed and 16 others injured during the attack on April 23, 1999, on the headquarters and studios of Radio Television Serbia in central Belgrade. Amnesty International called on NATO and its member states to ensure independent investigations, full accountability and redress for victims and their families.... ....The bombing was a part of a 78-day air-raid campaign against then-President Slobodan Milosevic to halt his onslaught against...

Barney Frank's Rental ReversalApril 21, 2009 BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Now, we've got a couple Barney Frank spites here. He's always good for a couple sound bites. We thought about getting a Barney Frank translator in here but that would sorta destroy it. I mean, I can do it myself but sometimes it's better to leave Barney Frank un-translated. He was on Tavis Smiley's show, PBS, last night, and Smiley said, "What did you do today relative to low-income housing?" FRANK: One of the causes of the terrible crisis we had over the last few years, which has given us today's...

If the rumors are true, PetroChina, a Chinese “Government Controlled Entity” (pdf), is on the verge of buying McDermott International, a company that, as I understand things, is the U.S. Navy’s sole provider of nuclear fuel and nuclear fuel assemblies. McDermott, a Panama “based” corporate tax-avoider, also manages the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve. (along with a lot of other critical national defense infrastructure. Take a look.)

Gan Yulan, a woman from a small town in Jianxi Province of China, was blindfolded and forced to have a sterilization operation by local township officials on March 23. Gan told a reporter that she was assaulted by the deputy director of the Local People's Congress on the way to the hospital and was forced to be sterilized without any family members present. Four officers took her into custody without showing any legal warrant. The officer who assaulted her on the way to the hospital was deputy director, Wang Xuebing. When asked why he hit her, Wang said: "You are...

Michael Montgomery BBC Radio 4, Crossing Continents The man spoke plainly as he explained the horrors he lived through in a Kosovo Liberation Army prison camp 10 years ago. He told me about how he watched people beaten with steel pipes, cut with knives, left for days without food, and shot and killed. Civilians were detained by the KLA and kept in prisons where some were killed "What can you feel when you see those things?" he said. "It's something that is stuck in my mind for the rest of my life. You cannot do those things to people, not...

I really went on a rant today about the number of out of wedlock pregnancies in the U.S. It's too long to post here but I'd love some feedback on it. K3nn3th aka Angry Black Man. HA!

The successful demonization of the Serbs, making them largely responsible for the Yugoslav wars, and as unique and genocidal killers, was one of the great propaganda triumphs of our era. It was done so quickly, with such uniformity and uncritical zeal in the mainstream Western media, that disinformation had (and still has, after almost two decades) a field day.The demonization flowed from the gullibility of Western interests and media (and intellectuals). With Yugoslavia no longer useful as an ally after the fall of the Soviet Union, and actually an obstacle as an independent state with a still social democratic bent,...

UNIONTOWN, Pa. — Police say a western Pennsylvania mother drugged her 13-year-old daughter so her boyfriend could get the girl pregnant. Uniontown police say 32-year-old Shana Brown is no longer able to have children, but wanted a baby with her boyfriend.

A western Pennsylvania mother has been charged with giving her 13-year-old daughter drugs and alcohol so the woman's boyfriend could impregnate the girl without her knowing, police said Thursday. Shana Brown, 32, is no longer able to have children but wanted to have a baby with her current boyfriend, Duane Calloway, said Uniontown Police Detective Donald Gmitter. The pair decided to drug the girl so Calloway, 40, could have sex with her, he added. "There's some sick people on this case," Gmitter said. Brown has been charged with endangering the welfare of a child. She turned herself in Thursday and...

In what has become an annual event over the last few years, there are another batch of rumors out of China that the DF-21 ballistic missile has been equipped with a high-explosive warhead and a guidance system that can find and hit a aircraft carrier at sea. The DF-21 has a range of 1800 kilometers and normally hauls a 300 kiloton nuclear warhead. It's a two stage, 15 ton, solid fuel rocket that could carry a half ton penetrating, high-explosive warhead, along with the special guidance system (a radar and image recognition system). As the story goes, the Chinese have...

EDMONTON -- Somewhere in the city, children as young as 11 and 12 are gathering in basements and playing intricate, graphic sex games. I first heard about these parties a few years ago from my 12-year-old daughter, who said kids at her school played games where each girl had to perform oral sex on several boys

VINA DEL MAR, Chile (Reuters) - U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said on Saturday his country's relationship with Spain went beyond disagreement over a Spanish decision to pull troops out of Kosovo. Biden and Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero held bilateral talks during a pre-G20 warm-up meeting of center-left leaders in the Chilean coastal resort of Vina del Mar on Saturday. "The relationship we have with Spain exceeds whatever disagreement we may have over Kosovo," Biden said at the end of the summit. "We talked about the need for expanding communications." .... Spain confirmed on Sunday it would...

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder jokingly asks U.S. President Barack Obama to stop talking during a ceremonial installation with his wife Dr. Sharon Malone at George Washington University in Washington, March 27, 2009 U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder (L) acknowledges the crowd and applause of U.S. President Barack Obama during a ceremonial installation at George Washington University in Washington, March 27, 2009 U. S. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., left, and Vivian Malone Jones' children, Michael Anthony and Monica Alicia, right, unveil a portrait of Jones Malone, first African American to graduate for the University of Alabama in 1965,...

It's become conventional wisdom that Alan Greenspan's Federal Reserve was responsible for the housing crisis. Virtually every commentator who blames Mr. Greenspan points to the low interest rates during his last few years at the Fed. [Commentary] Martin Kozlowski The link seems obvious. Everyone knows that the Fed can drive interest rates lower by pumping more money into the economy, right? Well, yes. But it doesn't follow that that's why interest rates were so low in the early 2000s. Other factors affect interest rates too. In particular, a sudden increase in savings will drive down interest rates. And such a...

A former college classmate, friend and financial account manager who handled money for former San Antonio Mayor Henry Cisneros pleaded guilty in federal court Wednesday to stealing $473,000 from Cisneros’ accounts over a three-year period. Cisneros’ former friend, Fred L. May III, appeared before Judge Orlando Garcia in U.S. District Court to plead guilty to a felony charge of fraud. The judge set May’s sentencing hearing for June 25. May was arrested on March 4, a day after the U.S. Attorney filed a federal lawsuit naming May as a financial account manager in San Antonio who had defrauded an unnamed...

SERBIANS marked the 10th anniversary of the start of a NATO blitz on the former federal republic of Yugoslavia on Tuesday with commemorations honouring over 3,000 victims. Air-raid sirens sounded at noon throughout the country, while schools opened classes with a minute's silence for the 89 children who were killed in the 78-day bombing campaign, which was initiated without UN security council backing. NATO claimed that it had launched Operation Allied Force in order to force then president Slobodan Milosevic to stop a military crackdown against Western-backed separatist insurgents in Kosovo province and pull out his troops. But the US...