Free Republic

Thailand's King Vajiralongkorn has stripped his royal consort of her rank and titles for "misbehaviour and disloyalty against the monarch". An official announcement said Sineenat Wongvajirapakdi had been "ambitious" and tried to "elevate herself to the same state as the queen". "The royal consort's behaviors were considered disrespectful," it said. She was appointed in July, just two months after the king married Queen Suthida, his fourth wife. Sineenat, who was a major-general and is a trained pilot, nurse, and bodyguard, was the first person to be awarded the title of Royal Noble Consort in nearly a century.

An animal rights group and six members were convicted Thursday of inciting violence against a company that tests drugs and household products on animals. The group, Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty, maintained its actions were protected under the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of speech. The government charged that SHAC waged a five-year campaign of threats, harassment and vandalism against Huntingdon Life Sciences and posted information on the SHAC Web site about the lab's employees and those who do business with Huntingdon. Many of those targeted saw their homes vandalized, and they and their families received threatening e-mails, faxes and phone...

Reggie Love, one of the people seen most frequently with President Obama, is planning to leave the White House before 2012, the Washington Post reported late Wednesday. He's functioned as a personal assistant for the president.

Just announced on CNBC Europe.

Consort's death rocks Kim Jong-il Michael Sheridan, Beijing November 15, 2004 HARDLINERS have tightened their political grip on North Korea while Kim Jong-il, the Stalinist state's dictator, has retreated into virtual seclusion after the death of his favourite consort from cancer. Chinese and Western sources say the regime has prepared for a state of siege as it confronts a re-elected US administration under George W. Bush that is determined to break Pyongyang and disarm it of nuclear weapons. As Japanese envoys tried to persuade the North Koreans last week to rejoin multinational talks, Mr Kim's absence from the scene led...