Free Republic

Blink and you could miss them - but mysterious sightings of an extremely rare butterfly have set the hearts of enthusiasts fluttering. The species, previously described as extinct in Britain for nearly 100 years, has suddenly appeared in countryside on the edge of London. Small numbers of black-veined whites have been spotted flying in fields and hedgerows in south-east London. To the non-expert, they could easily be mistaken for the common or garden cabbage white butterflies seen in Britain every summer. But there's nothing common about the black-veined white on this side of the Channel. First listed as a British...

Is anyone gonna watch? This is something that you may only get to see one time in your life. Most networks are going to start the telecast at about 5am Eastern time. PBS will start much earlier, simulcasting the BBC.

Terrifying Haunting or Clever Hoax? Was Mompesson's ghost a genuine spirit? In 1662 English landowner John Mompesson began telling the world that his household was haunted by an evil and mischievous spirit. In a letter to William Creed, Regius professor of Divinity at Oxford and a relation by marriage, he said that he had initially thought that the disturbances were the work of burglars, before being forced to conclude that they could only be supernatural. He blamed the visitations on the witchcraft of William Drury, a drummer he had caused to be arrested in March for claiming money under false...

Ex-president Bill Clinton sounded confident on Monday when he told a Philadelphia crowd that John Kerry would win the White House and "make America the comeback country." But yesterday in Florida, the recuperating heart patient sounded a little less certain. "I think it is slightly more likely that he will win, but this thing is tight as a tick," Clinton told the Magazine Publishers of American gathering in Boca Raton. One reason for the uncertainty: Dubya enjoys "negative campaigning" in a way his father, who Clinton defeated 12 years ago, never did. "It was a pretty negative campaign, but I...