Free Republic

BERLIN (AFP) - Former Federal Reserve chief Alan Greenspan cast doubt on the ability of the central bank to prevent a US recession in an interview to appear on Thursday. Greenspan told the German weekly Die Zeit that the Fed or political policies could "probably not" keep the world's biggest economy from sliding into recession, as financial markets widely expected the US central bank to cut its main lending rate. "The influences of the global economy today are stronger than almost any monetary or budgetary response," the German-language weekly quoted Greenspan as saying. Although he left the post of Fed...

VAN METER, Iowa - Cradling a cup of coffee on his knee, the Rev. Paul Porter welcomes five neighbors to his home, leads them in a brief prayer and gets down to business. "We're here to help elect Mike Huckabee the next president of the United States," he says. "He's a decent, moral man." His neighbors nod their heads "When you go to the caucuses," Porter continues, "are there any questions about Mike Huckabee that you're nervous about answering?" Again, the heads nod. "Is it the attacks?" he says "Are you worried that he can't withstand the attacks?" Nan Cooley,...

ROME - Biofuels like ethanol can help reduce global warming and create jobs for the rural poor, but the benefits may be offset by serious environmental problems and increased food prices for the hungry, the U.N. said Tuesday in its first major report on bioenergy. In an agency-wide assessment, the U.N. raised alarms about the potential negative impact of biofuels, just days after a climate conference in Bangkok said the world had both the money and technology to prevent global warming blamed in part on greenhouse gas emissions. Biofuels, which are made from corn, palm oil, sugar cane and other...

GOV. Arnold Schwarzenegger's ambitious plans for his second term may crumble if the state's nonpartisan legislative analyst is correct with her numbers. While the governor pitched a $2.1 billion surplus when he unveiled his budget in January, Elizabeth Hill estimated that due to slower-than-expected revenue projections, Schwarzenegger's plan would actually leave the state with a $726 million shortfall for fiscal 2007-08. If we assume Hill to be correct — and she often has been — this a warning that must be heeded. Economists have said that a slugglish housing market has hurt economic growth, and state revenues in January were...

BAGHDAD, Iraq - An Iraqi tribunal is incapable of fairly and effectively trying Saddam Hussein and six others on genocide charges stemming from an Iraqi campaign that killed an estimated 100,000 Kurds in the 1980s, a human rights group said Friday. New York-based Human Rights Watch said the Iraqi High Tribunal must "improve its practices if it is to do justice" in the trial scheduled to start Monday. The case involves Saddam's alleged role in "Operation Anfal" — Arabic for "spoils of war." The 1987-88 operation intended to crush independence-minded Kurdish militias and clear Kurds from the sensitive Iranian frontier....

SENIOR military officers have warned the US administration that bombing raids against Iran would fail to destroy the country's nuclear program due to a lack of reliable intelligence, the New Yorker magazine reported overnight. Pentagon officers "have told the administration that the bombing campaign will probably not succeed in destroying Iran's nuclear program," Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Seymour Hersh wrote in the magazine's latest edition. The military officers are concerned about contingency plans to launch air strikes against Iran because of the absence of actionable intelligence or concrete evidence of bomb making, the magazine said, citing unnamed active duty and...

NEW YORK - An expert on ancient Egyptian texts is predicting that the "Gospel of Judas" — a manuscript from early Christian times that's nearing release amid widespread interest from scholars — will be a dud in terms of learning anything new about Judas. James M. Robinson, America's leading expert on such ancient religious texts from Egypt, predicts in a new book that the text won't offer any insights into the disciple who betrayed Jesus. His reason: While it's old, it's not old enough. "Does it go back to Judas? No," Robinson told The Associated Press on Thursday. The text,...

Unusual things are happening in the feminist world. The Hungarian representative to UN’s Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) said that, in the future, abortion will be viewed by women in the same way that torture is now viewed by human rights advocates. Now, given how often the UN turns a blind eye to torture, Saddam Hussein’s regime being a fine example of the carefully shielded glance, we may justifiably wonder if this means torture will become acceptable or abortion unacceptable. But even so, the possibility that CEDAW members are beginning to question the practice is telling....

It's correct that there is political commotion mounting in opposition to the Iraq war. It is important to distinguish between two kinds. One, which is gaining attention, centers on misrepresentations. The so-called Downing Street Memo is cited. This records an exchange at 10 Downing St. on July 23, 2002, at which, it is said, the representatives of Mr. Bush made it clear that the president had resolved to proceed against Iraq irrespective of what the United Nations might do. Rejecting that account, the Bush people have said that the invasion was not finally planned until after the appeal to the...

Sen. Hillary Clinton is "abusing the system" -- using New York State voters as a springboard to the presidency, according to a 38-year-old Republican who would like to stop Mrs. Clinton in 2006, well before the 2008 Democratic race for president. "[Clinton] is not even running for U.S. Senate, she is running for president and she clearly has no intention of fulfilling a six-year Senate term if she is re-elected," said likely GOP Senate candidate Adam Brecht in an interview with Cybercast News Service. "Unfortunately, she's abusing the system," Brecht said. "I think putting everyone through the charade of a...

John Bolton, President Bush’s nominee to be Ambassador to the United Nations, is a certified tough guy. That’s one of the reasons we support him wholeheartedly and without reservation, for the job. Under different circumstances, different qualifications might be in order, but one of the unique requirements of the presidency is perspective of time and circumstance, including the selection of key administration personnel. This time and this circumstance dictate a John Bolton to be Ambassador to the U.N. The organization that was once the hope for world peace of Miss America contestants and their political counterparts is broken, corrupt and...

WASHINGTON (AP) - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's push to redraw political district lines is running into skepticism from California House members, including from some fellow Republicans who fear the party risks losing seats. "From a realistic standpoint, it looks like we can lose more than we gain," Marysville Republican Rep. Wally Herger said Wednesday, a day after the state's GOP House delegation met on the issue. "My sense is the majority were probably against it, but I think everybody has their ears open ... and wants to do what's best for the state." As part of the reform plan he unveiled...

Editor's note: Readers may also be interested in Moderate Islam or Fata Morgana? and freemuslims.org Speaks Out.There is good news to report: The idea that "militant Islam is the problem, moderate Islam is the solution" is finding greater acceptance over time. But there is also bad news, namely growing confusion over who really is a moderate Muslim. This means that the ideological side of the war on terror is making some, but only limited, progress.The good news: Anti-Islamist Muslims have found their voice since September 11. Their numbers include distinguished academics such as Azar Nafisi (Johns Hopkins), Ahmed al-Rahim (formerly...

EVEN by its own disturbing standards, this was a hallucinatory week in Iraq. Beheadings, kidnappings, bombings, outbreaks of deadly disease and everyday mayhem were accompanied by interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi's upbeat statement to Congress: "We are succeeding in Iraq." Are we? The discordant images and messages captured a central difficulty of defining an Iraq policy. In the absence of any semblance of agreement on what the situation is, or even who is behind the insurgency, setting a course is problematic. But with more than 1,000 Americans already dead, and more dying each week, one question has begun to be...

DISCLAIMER: This is not necessarily my opinion but I am putting it out for discussion. This article appeared in the Washington Times two days ago. It's written Arnaud de Borchgrave, a long-time member of the Times. His belief is that Iraq was and continues to be a mistake for the US. My take? de Borchgrave has written articles like this over the last few years so he is consistent in his beliefs. He is a knowledgable, worldly guy so his opinions aren't easily arrived at. Opinions on this article anyone?

Recently, some veterans wrote defending John Kerry. Have these people bothered to do any research or are they just reading from Kerry’s Web site? What would these people think about the fact that veterans who served with Kerry are saying his ads don’t resemble the truth at all? These veterans have been asked to be removed from Kerry’s ads. Then there is the combat scene Kerry staged to help win medals. How about Kerry admitting to committing war crimes? Or admitting to lying before Congress about the war, lies that the North Vietnamese subsequently used to justify torturing Americans? When...

BOSTON - With a "Kerry-Edwards" placard in her lap, three Democratic Party pins on her jacket and a Louisiana delegation sign swaying above her head, Cynthia Morrell is the picture of Democratic unity. But don't get her started about the campaign's decision to pull ads from her state. "A state like mine can't just be tossed away," she says from her front-row floor seat at the Democratic Convention. "We have a good chance of winning if they take us seriously." Kerry has eliminated or reduced his ad campaign in Louisiana, Arkansas, Virginia, Missouri and other states to meet needs elsewhere,...

Athens airs Olympic doubts for first time By Harry de Quetteville in Athens (Filed: 04/06/2004) The first cracks in the Greek government's united front in promoting this summer's Olympics have appeared after ministers questioned publicly whether the Games were worth all the bother. After foreign criticism over delays and mishaps in the preparations, the public works minister, Giorgos Souflias, who is in charge of many Olympic building sites, left colleagues in the Greek parliament aghast by airing his "doubts as to whether we should have undertaken the Olympic Games". Giorgos Alogoskoufis, the finance minister, announced that the spiralling costs had...

Dog doubts over Tasmanian tiger By Jonathan Amos BBC News Online science staff TASMANIAN 'TIGER' * The thylacine was a large marsupial carnivore * It ranged widely from Papua New Guinea to Tasmania * Many scientists doubt cloning technology can bring it back The dingo it seems had an accomplice in driving the Tasmanian "tiger" off mainland Australia - human hunters. There appears little doubt the famous feral dog out-competed the tiger for food and helped push it back to its final island habitat 3,000 years ago. But researchers say changes in Aboriginal land use, population size and technology taking...

Dowd doubts: In our business, when you goof, you fix it 07/27/03Editor Mobile Register The following is an e-mail that I sent to Gail Collins, editorial page editor of The New York Times, this past Monday. Dear Ms. Collins: Now that the Times is settling in with a new editor, I need clarification on a matter that came up during all the post-Jayson Blair newsroom tumult. As editor of the Mobile Register, I subscribe to The New York Times Wire Service. Until earlier this summer, we printed Maureen Dowd's columns on our op-ed pages. We stopped running her column after...