Free Republic

One of the Left’s great agonies and frustrations of the past fifteen years has been its abortive quest to field a counterpart to Rush Limbaugh. Fully cognizant of the massive damage inflicted on it by talk radio, a number of contenders placed bids to mount a counterattack. To their bitter dismay, they all came to grief despite the great hype and hope that surrounded each successive attempt. A decade and a half worth of feverish effort thus produced no headway, not even a single nationally viable liberal host. With nothing to show for, the time has surely come to ask...

Pursuant to an agreement Rush has reached with state prosecutors in Palm Beach, Florida, they are finally abandoning their two-and-a-half year quest to criminalize a human tragedy—addiction to medication prescribed because of severe pain. Unlike most of us, who get to keep our private struggles private, Rush’s celebrity ensured that his would be played out publicly. With characteristic candor and humility, he admitted he had a problem. And he did it in a way that is rare today, although one that came as no surprise to those of us privileged to know Rush. He took real responsibility. He didn’t pretend...

<p>Rush Limbaugh's attorney has issued a statement announcing a settlement of the Florida prosecutor's investigation into alleged doctor shopping by Rush Limbaugh.</p> <p>Details have been read by Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh. Basically, the charge of doctor shopping is dismissed, with some conditions.</p>

The original mega-thread: CIA Fires Officer For Leaking Classified Information to Media I think this is as big as rathergate.   Dana Priest's Pulitzer has just turned to dust. Not only that,  the Pulitzer's are finally dust themselves...it is up to us and others to find out, because  the Drive-By Media will ignore the story. Let's Play Connect the Dots Let’s connect some dots in the Mary McCarthy CIA leak tale, shall we? (Hat tip: WordWarp).Mary McCarthy leaks the secret CIA prisons story to Dana Priest, in what may have been a sting operation.Mary McCarthy and Joe Wilson served at the...

This is a question that no one seems to be asking. And so I've asked it. And here, in essence, is what I think is the answer. (The answer, of course, applies to Ford and Chrysler, as well as to General Motors. I've singled out General Motors because it's still the largest of the three and its problems are the most pronounced.) First, the company would be without so-called Monday-morning automobiles. That is, automobiles poorly made for no other reason than because they happened to be made on a day when too few workers showed up, or too few showed...

Instead of listening to talking heads or talk show callers to learn about gasoline prices I decided to just sit down for ten minutes and do a little math. You know...the kind of math we learned in elementary school? In any case, I first checked out some facts on the internet (all figures are rough estimates rounded off): 2004 average cost of a barrel of crude oil: $37 2004 average cost of a gallon of gasoline at the pump: $1.85 Cost of crude oil as a percentage of the total: 47% This means that the crude oil cost came to...

While lawmakers in Washington debate whether to forgive illegal immigrants their trespasses, a small but increasing number of local and state law enforcement officials are taking it upon themselves to pursue deportation cases against people who are here illegally. In more than a dozen jurisdictions, officials have invoked a little-used 1996 federal law to seek special federal training in immigration enforcement for their officers. In other places, the local authorities are flagging some illegal immigrants who are caught up in the criminal justice system, sometimes for minor offenses, and are alerting immigration officials to their illegal status so that they...

ARCADIA -- Jake got around. Got to be pretty well known in Arcadia, in fact. He liked to hang out near the downtown courthouse. Folks grew to expect to see him there during daily walks. He got along with everyone. Some thought of him as "Arcadia's dog." "I think just about everybody who came to the courthouse has seen Jake," Garry Phillips said. Garry and Jake were buddies. Lived under the same roof. One day, while hanging out on the courthouse lawn, Jake met U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris, who fawned over him and petted him. Cameras snapped pictures. Jake loved...

Rush interviewing Tom DeLay. Tom says he is liberated and will now be able to devote full energies to working for tax reform, specifically the Fair Tax, and other worthy conservative goals. He's going to be a big help.

Nationally known anti-tax crusader George Henry "Nick" Jesson will serve 27 months in prison for tax fraud, a judge has ruled. U.S. District Judge Percy Anderson on Monday also ordered Jesson, 55, to pay $215,454 in restitution to the federal government. The Fountain Valley resident, who ran for California governor in 2002, was taken into custody after his sentencing. Assistant U.S. Attorney Sandra Brown said she believes the sentence was "wholly appropriate" and would deter others from considering anti-tax protests. Jesson's wife, Trina Thi Vu, declined to comment after the sentencing, as did her attorney, citing pending state tax charges...

SCOOP: WHO ARE THE WHINY KIDS? By Michelle Malkin   ·   March 23, 2006 04:11 PM An anonymous tipster sends some intriguing information about the "whiny kids grow up to be conservatives" study conducted by left-wing UC Berkeley prof Jack Block. Wondering where the nursery school kids who were the subjects of the study came from? Check this out: I know exactly which "nursery school" was used as the basis of this study. It is not mentioned anywhere in the text of the 16-page pdf you provided for downloading, but I know because -- well, because I know people who were...

Pupils launch bid to save Americans $2.3B in electric costs; seek Oprah's help in plan to dole out lightbulbs Qiana Marks and 200 other North Babylon students hope to save the Earth - and also save the American public $2.3 billion in electric costs. It's all part of a campaign begun yesterday in the Robert Moses Middle School to "fight global warming one lightbulb at a time," said Kenny Luna, eighth-grade science teacher. Luna and his students want to give an energy-saving compact fluorescent lightbulb to every school child in America, "all 50 million between pre-kindergarten and 12th grade." They're...

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands · The camera focuses on two gay men kissing in a park. Later, a topless woman emerges from the sea and walks onto a crowded beach. For would-be immigrants to the Netherlands, this film is a test of their readiness to participate in the liberal Dutch culture.

Apple has made changes to its podcast delivery service to enable restricted access to some iTunes podcasts, according to a new report by political radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh. After receiving requests to make his popular audio and video podcasts via iTunes, Limbaugh said that he has been working to Apple to achieve a solution to allow members of the (paid) Rush 24/7 service to access restricted content on iTunes: "There's no additional charge for the podcast service, but it's only available to members, and so having it downloadable via iTunes was not compatible with Apple's method of doing...

MANY residents of UAE thought — mistakenly as it turns out — that they knew the Clintons. Former president Bill and former co-president/current New York Senator Hillary were deemed to be friends of the UAE — and the Arab world in general. While Hillary hadn’t visited the UAE recently, Bill is a regular — at least when he’s invited for a paid speech or appearance. Sometimes, he’s graced us in person — other times via a video conference. President Bush, everyone agreed, was an anti-Arab cowboy, worthy of little more than derision.

The principals in the Able Danger story have filed suit to restrain the Department of Defense from retaliating against Tony Shaffer and to allow these witnesses to retain counsel during the closed hearings that Congress has scheduled into the data-mining program. Mark Zaid, representing Shaffer as well as contractor J. D. Smith, filed the suit on Monday against the DoD, DIA, the Army, and their attorneys in the DC district court. I've copied the text into the extended entry of this post. Most of those who have followed Able Danger will not be surprised by the allegations in the lawsuit....

I've created an Able Danger Podcast blog to generate a podcast feed so folks can subscribe to this feed and easily obtain any Able Danger audio (mp3) files. Here is the podcast feed for the Able Danger podcasts. The link to this feed is easy to find at the top left corner of my main blog, QT Monster, just above the Able Danger blog roll. Folks can subscribe to this podcast feed through iTunes. From the iTunes interface pull down the Advanced menu, click on subscribe to podcast, and in the dialogue box paste the URL for this podcast feed:...

Sources close to the ongoing Department of Defense investigation into the controversial Able Danger data mining intelligence program, which purportedly identified Mohammed Atta and three other 9/11 hijackers a year before the worst terror attacks in US history, say the mystery person who actually obtained a much-disputed photograph of Atta for the Able Danger team has now been identified. Ever since the Pentagon-ordered destruction in 2000 of 2.5 terabytes of data unearthed by Able Danger – allegedly including a chart featuring Atta’s photograph that revealed terrorist links and patterns when clicked on – skeptics have long raised doubt about the...

The first 20 minutes or so of the Able Danger conference call was previously posted here. The next three audio clips are here, here and here. Attending this conference call with Congressman Weldon were: AJ Strata from The Strata-Sphere, Dana from Common Sense Political Thought, Curt from Flopping Aces, Mike of Able Danger Blog, QT Monster, Rory O’Connor, Pierre from Pink Flamingo Bar & Grill, Bluto from Jawa Report and The Dread Pundit Bluto.

EAGLESWOOD TOWNSHIP, N.J. (AP) - To students at Eagleswood Elementary School, she used to be Mr. McBeth. Now, after undergoing a sex change, 71-year-old Lily McBeth is ready to return to teaching as Miss McBeth. Despite criticism from parents, the school board on Monday stood by its decision to allow McBeth to resume working as a substitute teacher. After two hours of public debate and a private meeting with McBeth and her lawyer, the board took no action on calls by several parents to bar McBeth from returning to the school where she taught for five years before becoming a...