Free Republic

Witnesses: Man Shook Parrot Until Feathers Came OutA 49-year-old Jackson man has been arrested in Ann Arbor following a fight with the pet parrot he carried in his backpack. Police said 911 calls started coming in around 9:30 p.m. Tuesday with witnesses reporting that a man on South Main Street was violently shaking the bird. Officers who responded to the call said the bird's feathers were scattered everywhere, and that the bird was limping. However, police said, the bird did bite the man several times on his hands, drawing blood. The man told police he had been trying to train...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – The fierce and escalating battle over health care reform Friday forced President Barack Obama to delay his departure on a trip to Indonesia and Australia by three days until Sunday, March 21. Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs made the announcement on his Twitter feed, a day after saying the trip would not be delayed, reflecting the fast-shifting debate on an issue that has put the president's political credibility on the line. Gibbs also said that Obama's wife Michelle and daughters Malia and Sasha would no longer join him on a poignant journey to the president's haunts in Indonesia...

Until now the Pellicano wiretapping case has seemed the kind of down-and-dirty imbroglio that could only happen in Hollywood, where a private eye's underworld patois could impress movie people familiar with noir clichés, allured by real physical danger and accustomed to getting whatever they want. But confidential F.B.I. records show that the scandal's tentacles have extended beyond show-business figures to reach people prominent in the rarified worlds of fine art and classical music. Among the government's most important witnesses, the F.B.I. records suggest, are Adam D. Sender, a prominent collector of contemporary art and a wealthy hedge-fund manager..........hired Anthony Pellicano,...

The question asked of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld by a Tennessee National Guardsman over the up-armored Humvee refit issue was quickly exposed as another instance of “gotcha” journalism after it was revealed that a hometown reporter had coached the Soldier who had asked the question. Not only was the entire exchange a set-up, but thanks to Newsmax.com, as relayed by the Washington Times, the reporter and Spc. Thomas “Jerry” Wilson were apparently unaware that, “…the Pentagon had already up-armored 97 percent of the vehicles in Thomas' 278th Regimental Combat Team, senior members of the Army's combat systems development and...

<p>There was a tinge of pride in Herb Wesson's voice Tuesday afternoon when he announced that a marathon, all-night session of the state Assembly to hammer out a final agreement on the overdue state budget had surpassed the infamous 1963 "lock-up" of Republicans by legendary Speaker Jesse Unruh.</p>