Free Republic

A nine-year-old Florida girl’s brave actions were recognized by police after she punched a robber in the face as he mugged her mother. The incident occurred outside of Sabor Tropical Supermarket in West Palm Beach on November 2, when Danielle Mobley and her daughter, Journee Nelson, were loading groceries into their vehicle, according to the Miami Herald.

Oregon just decriminalized personal useage of heroine and cocaine, but continues to ban their commercial scale manufacturing, distribution, and sale. How exactly is that supposed to work? Oregon voters just approved a ballot initiative which decriminalizes personal usage of small amounts of heroin and cocaine.However, it is still illegal to manufacture, distribute, or sell these drugs on a commercial scale.Therefore, people who use these drugs will still be getting them from illegal manufacturers, distributors, and sellers.Which means that the problems of contamination, unknown levels of potency, gangs, drive by shootings, etc., will still be possible.In order to get rid of these...

Tyra Winters, a high school senior and cheerleader, was on a parade float when she saw the desperate mom crying for help. "I see the kid. I see a little bright red face, and his mom is holding him up begging for help, screaming, asking, 'Someone help me. Someone help me,'" Winters said. "My very, very first thought was like, 'Oh my God. I got to help this child.'" "Her kid is turning purple, so I immediately jumped off the float. I ran down to the kiddo, and I was like, 'I got it,' and I just grabbed him from...

...South Dakota...Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin and Missouri, before concluding in central Illinois...the balloons are intended to “provide a persistent surveillance system to locate and deter narcotic trafficking and homeland security threats”,...The balloons are carrying hi-tech radars designed to simultaneously track many individual vehicles day or night, through any kind of weather...Sometimes it’s referred to as ‘combat TiVo’ because when an event happens somewhere in the surveilled area, you can potentially rewind the tape to see exactly what occurred, and rewind even further to see who was involved and where they came from.”

Drugs and syringes have become such a problem in Starbucks bathrooms that the company is installing needle-disposal boxes in certain locations Starbucks is installing boxes for safe disposal of syringes in the bathrooms of certain locations, following workers' reports of discarded needles and sometimes concerning conditions. The coffee giant is exploring remedies after employees expressed fears about being pricked by uncapped needles and experiencing related health risks. Starbucks is testing solutions, including installing sharps-disposal boxes, using heavier-duty trash bags to prevent needle pokes, and removing trash cans from certain bathrooms.

A teenage girl in Washington state is being credited with saving her 6-year-old brother from being attacked by a cougar earlier this month. Amaya Simpson, 16, of Colville, picked up a bow and arrow and struck the animal behind one of its ears, scaring it off.

Dec 29 (Reuters) - Zach Lazarus, chief executive officer of A Green Alternative, a marijuana dispensary in San Diego, California, has lost count every time he re-opened a bank account after it was closed because of his connection to the cannabis industry. Lazarus has had to play a game of "whack-a-mole" with banks, likening his frustrations to a popular arcade game in which a player repeatedly gets rid of something only to have it re-appear somewhere else. Lazarus and other marijuana business owners in the $8 billion industry resort to cash-only transactions for business and to pay employees because they...

A female U.S. sailor was recognized last week for her efforts during the January incident that resulted in Iran detaining 10 Americans. Military.com reports the only female among the two crews of the Navy riverine boats that entered Iranian waters off Farsi Island in the Persian Gulf managed to activate an emergency beacon while she was kneeling, bound, and being held at gunpoint with her colleagues.

Officials told residents of a small Colorado community not to drink or shower in tap water Thursday because one of the town’s wells may have been contaminated with THC, marijuana’s intoxicating chemical. No illnesses have been linked to the water in Hugo, a town of about 730 people some 100 miles southeast of Denver, said Lincoln County Public Health Director Susan Kelly. THC was detected in tests conducted with field kits, although other field tests were negative, sheriff’s Capt. Michael Yowell said. More definitive laboratory tests were underway, he said. …

2004-The billionaire political impresario George Soros gambled $27 million on the campaign to defeat President Bush and came up empty-handed. But no one should conclude that he has lost his eye for a winning investment. The smaller wagers that he and his family have placed on New York politics appear to be paying off in spades. After years of debate, state lawmakers just agreed to reduce the penalties for drug crimes in New York, which have been among the stiffest in the country. In Albany County, voters just elected a maverick district attorney who is promising to go easier on...

When Thomas White spotted a cougar approaching his teenage son outside their home in rural Washington state last week, there was only one thing to do - hand a gun to his 11-year-old daughter. Without a moment's hesitation, Shelby White killed the female cougar, and wildlife officials suggested that the animal may have been sick. The mountain cat was 4 years old and weighed about 50lbs, which is about half of what an animal that age should weigh.

For a magazine that styles itself Reason, it’s surprisingly unreasonable. Nick Gillespie of Reason attacks Truth Revolt’s Ben Shapiro for writing that “Philip Seymour Hoffman['s] self-inflicted death is yet another hallmark of the broken leftist culture that dominates Hollywood, enabling rather than preventing the loss of some of its greatest talents. Libertarianism becomes libertinism without a cultural force pushing back against the penchant for sin; Hollywood has no such cultural force.”It’s a point that’s rather hard to argue with. Freedom opens up the arena for individual character to define how people will use it. Freedom alone is a blank slate...

A woman in a wheelchair and a 10-year-old were the unlikely heroes at a Decatur apartment fire Thursday. A mother's desperate action to save her babies turned neighbors into rescuers. "I caught the newborn baby from falling. Before it had hit the ground I caught it," said Zna Gresham, 10. Gresham said she just did what was asked after she ran out of her burning apartment to safety outside. "Then when I was getting out, the lady from upstairs, she was dropping her babies and she asked me and my sister can she get the babies for her," Zna told...

Michelle Malkin was in top form tonight in Washington DC for the AFP Defending the American Dream Summit. Michelle told the conservative audience: “My parents didn’t come here with nothing. Not knowing anybody. Not having a dime in their pockets… For me to be a wallflower. So that I could sit here while the American dream is being destroyed.” Michelle then pointed to the American Dream banner and told Barack Obama, “You didn’t build this!” The audience loved it!

Mother loses legs protecting children from tornado INDIANAPOLIS — An Indiana woman who saved her two children by binding them together with a blanket and shielding them with her body as a tornado ripped apart their house lost parts of both her legs, which were crushed by the falling debris, her husband said Monday.

U.S. Honors Belgian Nurse for Valor in World War II BRUSSELS (AP) — A Belgian nurse who saved the lives of hundreds of American soldiers during the Battle of the Bulge at the end of World War II was given an American award for valor on Monday. The nurse, Augusta Chiwy, who is 93, received the Civilian Award for Humanitarian Service medal from the American ambassador, Howard Gutman, in a ceremony at the military museum in Brussels. “She helped, she helped and she helped,” Mr. Gutman said. He explained the long delay — 67 years — in presenting the award...

Grizzlies are high profile this year. A lingering winter and late berry crop kept bears in proximity to humans longer than normal, perhaps contributing to a stream of headlines about grizzlies killing people and people killing grizzlies. Meanwhile, a young lady on a big horse charged out of the pack of grizzly stories near Glacier National Park. In a cloud of dust, the 25-year-old wrangler likely saved a boy’s life while demonstrating that skill, quick-thinking and guts sometimes are the best weapons against a head-on charging grizzly.

New York businessman James Lieto was an innocent bystander in a fraud investigation last year. Federal agents seized $392,000 of his cash anyway. An armored-car firm hired by Mr. Lieto to carry money for his check-cashing company got ensnared in the FBI probe. Agents seized about $19 million—including Mr. Lieto's money—from vaults belonging to the armored-car firm's parent company. He is one among thousands of Americans in recent decades who have had a jarring introduction to the federal system of asset seizure. Some 400 federal statutes—a near-doubling, by one count, since the 1990s—empower the government to take assets from convicted...

Nancy Wake, Australia's greatest World War II heroine and a prominent figure in the French Resistance known as the "The White Mouse" for her ability to evade the Germans, has died in London. Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard said the woman who was once the Gestapo's most wanted person, was "a devastatingly effective saboteur and spy". "Nancy Wake was a woman of exceptional courage and resourcefulness whose daring exploits saved the lives of hundreds of Allied personnel and helped bring the Nazi occupation of France to an end," Gillard said. Wake, who died in a London hospital on Sunday just...

A rural New York town clerk has resigned her post rather than grant marriage licenses to same-sex couples.