Free Republic

Iran’s “supreme leader” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warned his underlings in a meeting on Wednesday that making a “nontactical retreat” would meet the “divine wrath” of Allah as the world awaits a highly touted attack by Tehran on neighboring Israel. Iranian officials have been boasting that they would attack Israel for all of August following the elimination of Hamas “political” chief Ismail Haniyeh on July 31. Haniyeh was killed by a yet-unexplained explosion in his lodgings in Tehran, which he was visiting to attend the inauguration of President Masoud Pezeshkian. Iran is believed to be one of the top funders and...

When JoJo McKibben was the victim of a hit-and-run on April 3 as she biked to work, she wasn't all that surprised. She was hit while biking by a drunk driver last summer and has come to expect that cars won't realize she's riding on two wheels. McKibben's boyfriend Brendan Sharpe said he has also been seriously injured by cars while he's biked in Austin, once in 2009 and again in 2015... Katie Delleoz, the executive director of Bike Austin, said she personally has nearly been struck at the same intersection McKibben was hit at last week

PORTLAND, Ore. -- A woman in Portland said her local grocery store refused to allow her to pay for her shopping cart items with $32 in loose change. The shopper, who was too embarrassed to use her name, said the clerk at the Save-a-Lot store would only accept $5 of the change, claiming it was store policy, KATU reported. The woman told KATU that she tried to use her loose change at another area grocery to buy her family food -- a Fred Meyer store -- but the manager there directed her to a coin exchange machine instead, where the...

The impatient president is "the one" of "now, now, now". Or, perhaps, the president of "Rush" (and I don't mean Limbaugh). Have you noticed that there seems to be a direct correlation between the size of the spending bill and the speed in which the president desires to cram it through Congress, all reading aside?

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Callous wealthy nations are indifferent to the plight of the poor as they pursue selfish policies which enrich the few at the expense of the many, South African President Thabo Mbeki said on Tuesday. "These billions of poor people are increasingly becoming impatient because every year they hear us adopt declaration after declaration and yet nothing practical is done to assuage the hunger pains that keep them awake at night," he told the United Nations General Assembly. At the Millennium Summit in September 2000, world leaders at the United Nations agreed a series of goals to...

WASHINGTON - In a warm-up for next week's immigration debate, impatient senators flirted with the fringes of the issue with separate bills to crack down on border tunnel builders and insist that the national anthem be sung in English. A compromise that would protect most of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants from being deported faltered in the Senate in April. Senators, however, were unwilling to wait to express their disdain for a recently released version of the national anthem in Spanish or to delay legislation for imprisoning smugglers convicted of digging tunnels under the U.S.-Mexican border. The Senate approved...

A producer for The O'Reilly Factor, who has accused the show's host of sexual harassment, reportedly caused a scene with customers at a New York hotel bar. Bethenny Frankel claims she was with friends last Friday at the Peninsula Hotel when she asked producer Andrea Mackris if she could borrow an extra chair at the TV producer's table, causing Mackris to became irate, the New York Post reported Friday. She literally verbally attacked and abused and harassed us ... like a raving lunatic. It was very strange, said Frankel, a chef and owner of a cookie-making company. Mackris' attorney confirmed...

"Iraq's most influential religious leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, declared Thursday that he would sanction a six-month delay in the nationwide elections that he had demanded be held this summer, giving the U.S. civil administration crucial leeway in its plan to formally end its occupation and transfer power to an Iraqi government by June 30," The Washington Post reports. "But Sistani, who has emerged as a key power broker in Iraq, said he wanted the date of an election -- the end of 2004 -- enshrined in a U.N. Security Council resolution. He also insisted that an interim government must...

Impatient Iraqis Throw Stones at British Monday January 12, 2004 12:01 AM By NADIA ABOU EL-MAGD Associated Press Writer AMARAH, Iraq (AP) - Impatience with Iraq's occupying forces boiled over Sunday as unemployed Iraqis pelted British troops with stones and a top Shiite Muslim cleric demanded the country's next parliament be elected - a position at odds with American plans. Also Sunday, a U.S.-backed Iraqi politician said an ongoing purge of members of Saddam Hussein's Baath party had pushed 28,000 Iraqis from their jobs, with a similar number expected to follow. In the southern city of Amarah, waves of protesters...

Iraqi opposition leader impatient with US An Iraqi opposition leader is urging the US-led interim administration to stop working on plans to run the country and move quickly into Iraq. With an eye on taking power after a transition, several prominent Iraqis are planning a meeting of political factions on Saturday in Nasiriyah to lay the foundations of what could become a provisional government. The rapid collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime is leaving Iraq with a power vacuum filled only by the US and British military. An interim administration led by retired US General Jay Garner plans to co-ordinate humanitarian...