Free Republic

INDEPENDENCE, Mo. -- Police in Independence conducted a driver checkpoint on Thursday, but it wasn't to look for drunken drivers. For about an hour Thursday afternoon, officers stopped vehicles to make sure drivers had valid licenses. But some are questioning the legality of holding such a checkpoint. Independence police have arrested more than 1,300 drivers this year for driving without a valid license, KMBC's Jim Flink reported. On Thursday, police stopped about 300 drivers on a busy street. Independence Officer Tom Gentry said drivers without licenses pose a safety concern. "It's a public safety issue. On public highways, you don't...

<p>The U.S. Senate has passed Ted Kennedy's so-called "hate crimes" bill. In the words of the Traditional Values Coalition, it will criminalize a person's thoughts and provides unequal penalties for the same crime—depending upon the motivation of the accused. That means that the media that possibly provoked or influenced commission of the crime will come in for scrutiny. Yet our liberal media have remained silent on the constitutional and First Amendment implications of this approach.</p>

The Millennium Challenge Act, a new foreign aid scheme I wrote about back in May, received its hoped-for $2.5 billion from Congress last week. Only 41 members of Congress supported an effort to strip the funding, demonstrating once again that the two parties are not serious about reducing federal spending. Considering all the rhetoric in Washington about runaway spending, one would think a new foreign welfare program would be among the easiest things to cut politically. Since American foreign aid programs began in earnest decades ago, tens of billions of US tax dollars have been given to nations around the...