Free Republic

The modernized America we know today is largely dominated by suburbs, the perfect mix of city and ranch, commonly on the outskirts of cities. Its not the stacked to Timbuktu apartments like in New York, Kansas City, and Chicago, but its not the "home on the range" sort of thing. We know the modern suburb as nicely assorted houses, separated by lush, thick, dark green lawns, that are neatly cut every weekend. We know them with the smell of barbeque every Sunday after the residents have come home from Church. Its these modern American paradises that house the factory-workers, the...

GRASS LAKE TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) - State police say they found about 1,200 pounds of marijuana in a tractor-trailer they were inspecting near Grass Lake.

Hello Hank Hill, propane and propane accessories. Not really. I would like to have a discussion about my lawn, though. Maybe just lawn mower talk in general. I have recently moved into a new house. The yard is very well groomed...moreso than I am used to. I am used to mowing patches of grass and weedeating a little and being done. This new yard is one of those "yard of the week" type yards. The people that owned it before me took pride in their gardening and obviously just enjoyed doing it. The grass is very lush and thick, although...

Hippies still trying to ruin the country By Jenean Mcbrearty CONTRIBUTING COLUMNIST America won't win another war until the 1960s flower children are pushing up petunias. Radicalized, the flower children morphed into lefty loonies who now masquerade as social progressives. No matter what they rename themselves, however, their agenda hasn't changed. They still want utopia, and it wouldn't be worth mentioning except that their naivetŽ has aged into a persistent denial of reality that may have devastating consequences. For example, consider their continued belief that America's armed forces are neo-Nazi stormtroopers who delight in burning babies to further the aims...

IN MEMORY OF JOACHIM FEST The Proud Loner By Matthias Matussek Joachim Fest has died. The author of a best-selling biography of Adolf Hitler and former editor of the conservative daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung has left an impressive life's work - one of the most important to be produced in Germany since 1945. Fest's memoirs "Not Me" are a masterpiece. They tell the story of a family that refused to bow to the pressures of history and society. Now he has lost his battle against illness after all. Joachim Fest had to muster the last of his strength to complete...

I can't cut my grass because there's about a million wasps (or something like wasps) flying around at ground level. What are they looking for and how can I get rid of them?

Gdansk councillors will not strip Grass of city honors 31.08.2006 The Gdansk city council has decided not to strip German writer Guenter Grass of his honorary Gdansk citizenship after hearing his letter explaining his membership in the notorious Waffen SS at the end of World War II. But local councilors of the ruling Law and Justice, who were for such a move, want to invite the writer to attend the nearest city council meeting. They argue Grass should personally explain to the people of Gdansk why he had hidden the truth for such a long time. They prepared an appeal...

Gdansk residents declare understanding for Grass 21.08.2006 The mayor of Gdansk has said that the wartime service of Guenther Grass in a Waffen SS unit cannot overshadow the writer’s merits. Pawel Adamowicz has repeatedly declared that the city authorities do not intend to strip the Nobel prize laureate of his honorary Gdansk citizenship, though the issue is still to be officially decided on by the City Council. Speaking for Polish Radio, mayor Adamowicz quoted a just conducted opinion poll on the matter among the city’s residents. 72% of respondents voiced the opinion that the council members should not motion for...

Dear Günter Grass, First: why an open letter? I have never written one before, whereas you have written dozens. You are, so to speak, Europe's leading man of open letters. I admit that the idea of turning the tables on you did appeal to me. But there is another, more personal reason for my decision to address you in this way. In a newspaper interview about your autobiography, "Peeling the Onion," you have admitted after 60 years, that you belonged to the Waffen SS. I want to make you aware of my feeling of betrayal — a feeling I believe...

Nobel laureate's memoirs sell out after SS confession By Lee Glendinning and agencies The publishers have brought forward the release date and German bookshops are struggling to keep up supplies. Such is the demand for Gunter Grass's autobiography, which has stunned Germany with revelations that the Nobel-prize winning novelist once served in Hitler's Waffen SS as a teenager. Grass, 78 - regarded by many as Germany's moral arbiter - recounted the secret shame that has weighed upon him for decades following his involvement in the elite military force, in a pre-publication interview with a German newspaper last weekend. His admissions...

Poland's Walesa says Grass owes Poles explanation By Natalia Reiter REUTERS 8:58 a.m. August 18, 2006 WARSAW – Polish Solidarity hero Lech Walesa urged German author Guenter Grass on Friday to prove that a confession about his membership in Hitler's SS was not just a marketing ploy to promote his new novel. The former Polish president also said he would give up his honorary citizenship of Poland's city of Gdansk, if Grass, also a holder of the same title, failed to explain why he decided to confess when his autobiography 'Peeling Onions' came out. 'If Grass will not address his...

Jewish leader criticizes Grass 2 hours, 11 minutes ago BERLIN - The head of Germany's main Jewish organization has criticized writer Guenter Grass for waiting decades to reveal that he had served during World War II in the Waffen-SS, the Nazis' dreaded military force. Charlotte Knobloch, president of the Central Council of Jews, said Tuesday that the admission negated Grass' longtime criticisms of German politics and society for not adequately dealing with the Nazi past. "His long years of silence over his own SS past reduce his earlier statements to absurdities," Knobloch was quoted as saying by the Netzeitung online...

Walesa wants Grass to give up Gdansk honorary citizenship after SS admission By: The Canadian Press at 21:42 on August 13, 2006, EST. BERLIN (AP) - Nobel peace laureate Lech Walesa wants German novelist Guenter Grass to give up his honorary citizenship of the Polish city of Gdansk after admitting that he served during World War II in the Waffen-SS, a German newspaper reported Sunday. Grass, 78, revealed in a weekend newspaper interview that he was called up at age 17 to a division of the combat arm of Adolf Hitler's dreaded paramilitary forces. Asked why he was making the...

Nobel prize winner Grass admits serving in Nazi SS Fri Aug 11, 2006 8:37 PM BST BERLIN (Reuters) - Nobel prize-winning German author Guenter Grass has admitted for the first time that he served in the Waffen-SS, Adolf Hitler's elite Nazi troops. In an interview with the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Grass, 78, said he volunteered for submarine service towards the end of World War Two. He was called up instead to serve in the Waffen-SS in the eastern city of Dresden. The author, best known for his first novel "The Tin Drum" and an active supporter of Germany's Social Democratic...

Escaped golf-course grass frees gene genie in the US 09 August 2006 Andy Coghlan A nondescript grass discovered in the Oregon countryside is hardly an alien invasion. Yet the plant - a genetically modified form of a grass commonly grown on golf courses - is worrying the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) enough that it is running its first full environmental impact assessment of a GM plant. It is the first time a GM plant has escaped into the wild in the US, and it has managed it before securing USDA approval. The plant, creeping bentgrass (Agrostis stolonifera, carries a...

WADSWORTH, Ohio - Firefighters dousing a fire in a new home were confused when the man they thought was the owner suddenly left — until they found $700,000 worth of marijuana plants in the basement, officials said...

Bush: Freedom is Nukes, Grass and Rocks

NASA Earth Observatory has this neat graph of the lawn area in the United States. It's a very close match to the "night light" image made a couple of years ago. I linked the little picture below to the bigger one (which is only 380 K). Click on the link for the accompanying article. Yann-Arthus Bertrand took this impressive photograph of the "crater lake" inside the caldera from the Pinatubo eruption of 1991:

Parents are smoking dope with their kids. What are they thinking? MARNI JACKSON "It was a little weird, seeing my parents stoned," Tom confesses. The Toronto high school student was describing the first time he'd smoked marijuana -- at home last spring, just after turning 17, when he shared a joint with his hard-working, middle-class parents. "But I had an amazing, fantastic connection with my dad, and it was a good experience for all of us. They showed me how to take the seeds and stems out of the pot. Then, basically, we ate. My mom ordered sushi, and we...

“Cannabis is still seen as a risk-free drug despite mounting evidence that it can lead to serious mental health problems, particularly amongst young teenagers, people with a family history of severe mental illness and in long-term users.” The charity called for the money to be spent on a massive public education campaign to inform users and potential users of the well-founded mental health dangers of using cannabis at a young age and over a long period of time. Rethink chief executive Cliff Prior told the committee: “Cannabis is still seen as a risk-free drug despite mounting evidence that it can...