Free Republic

Breathless in Arizona Regulating carbon dioxide emissions could leave Arizonans out of breath By Byron Schlomach, Ph.D. The Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ) appears to want to regulate our very breath. But not with mandates for regular doses of Listerine in the morning. The problem is carbon dioxide, the gas we expel with every breath. It has become public enemy number one. ADEQ's director, Steve Owen, wants to impose rules on Arizona's economy similar to those California has proposed for the regulation of the so-called greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide. Ironically enough, it is the federal government and the Environmental...

Brazen Bureaucrats Proposed health coverage for domestic partners violates separation of powers By Clint Bolick Extending health benefits to domestic partners of government employees is a fiercely contentious issue. Arizona voters decided last year not to prohibit such benefits, but efforts to create them have come up empty in the state legislature. No problem, says the Department of Administration, a state executive agency: we'll mandate insurance coverage for domestic partners of state employees and retirees by bureaucratic fiat. And it did just that in a proposed rule filed last November 30 to expand the term "dependent" to include domestic partners....

In a stunning upset victory, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton beat Sen. Barack Obama in Tuesday's Democratic presidential primary election in New Hampshire.

PERRY , Iowa, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Democratic presidential hopeful Bill Richardson told potential Iowa caucus-goers Monday that Iraq should be the No. 1 issue in this election. Speaking at a campaign stop in Perry, Iowa, the New Mexico governor stood by his suggestion that Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf should step down. Richardson also said U.S. aid to Pakistan should be suspended in the wake of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto's assassination last week. "You're going to see al-Qaida forces get stronger unless Musharraf leaves office," Richardson was quoted by The Hill as saying. Richardson, who trails in the polls, said...

via translation - ALERT - Pakistan: legislative postponed for at least one month ISLAMABAD - The legislative elections scheduled Jan. 8 in Pakistan will be postponed "at least four weeks if not more", told AFP a senior government under cover of anonymity, four days after the assassination of 'opponent Benazir Bhutto.

Link

via translation - ALERT - A message from Osama bin Laden on Iraq released soon WASHINGTON - The head of the Al Qaeda network, Osama bin Laden, will soon speak on Iraq in a message, said Thursday a special centre in the interception of communications by Al-Qaeda, the company SITE Intelligence Group .

via translation - Afghanistan: The two arrested were British Europeans KABUL - Two Europeans were arrested in Afghanistan after being accused of posing a threat to national security are British nationals, said Tuesday an official who requested anonymity. "They were British and were arrested five days ago," he told AFP. When questioned, a spokesman for the British Embassy in Kabul was unable to comment on this information. The arrest for threat to the national security of two Afghan Europeans "high-ranking" was previously announced unspecified government source on the nationality of the two men. They should be expelled from the country....

"Many Vietnamese Americans from California ... have flocked to Houston, lured by cheap real estate, a lower cost of living, bountiful business opportunities and a thriving, growing Vietnamese community," The Los Angeles Times reports. "Houston offers a slice of the American Dream to Vietnamese Americans who couldn't find it in California. In San Jose and Orange County, home to the country's largest Vietnamese enclaves, skyrocketing rents and staggering housing prices -- even in a down market -- have become too much for some." In the policy analysis "The Planning Tax: The Case Against Regional Growth-Management Planning," Cato senior fellow Randal...

This is the time of year, as Hillary Clinton once put it, when Christians celebrate “the birth of a homeless child” — or, in Al Gore’s words, “a homeless woman gave birth to a homeless child.” Just for the record, Jesus wasn’t “homeless.” He had a perfectly nice home back in Nazareth. But he happened to be born in Bethlehem. It was census time and Joseph was obliged to schlep halfway across the country to register in the town of his birth. Which is such an absurdly bureaucratic over-regulatory cockamamie Big Government nightmare it’s surely only a matter of time...

via translation - The Turkish army confirms that bombed targets Kurds in Iraq ANKARA - Turkish fighter aircraft bombed during the night from Saturday to Sunday Kurdish targets in northern Iraq, has confirmed the Turkish army in a news release on its website. The air raids were aimed "Zap regions, Hakurk and Avasin, and the massive Qandil," which serves as a hangout for Kurdish rebel PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party), said the General Staff of the Turkish army in its press release. The shelling began to local 01H00 (23H00 GMT) and all aircraft returned to their base in local 04H15 (02H15...

via translation - ALERT - Bali / climate: the United States reject a final compromise text NUSA DUA (Indonesia) - The United States on Saturday rejected a proposal to Bali final agreement on climate change, demanding additional commitments of developing countries.

We know about air quality issues and the joined at the hip relationship of energy and water, but what, you ask, does dirt have to do with energy? Nothing.

NASA Concerned ABC World News Vanity

Dear friends, The Eighth Circuit recently clarified the law surrounding government funding for faith-based services that address America's intractable social problems. Americans United for Separation of Church and State had challenged the state of Iowa's establishment of the InnerChange Freedom Initiative (IFI), a reentry program for prisoners launched by Prison Fellowship. In the ruling, the Eighth Circuit held that Judge Pratt's injunction ordering the program in Iowa be shut down doesn't apply to programs that aren't funded by the state. Because the IFI program in Iowa is no longer partially funded by the state, the injunction does not apply to...

Consumers put aside worries about the weak economy and high gasoline prices to storm the shopping malls, pushing up retail sales in November. Wholesale prices shot up by the largest amount in 34 years, which could be a harbinger of higher prices to come for shoppers. The Commerce Department reported Thursday that retail sales jumped by 1.2% last month, double the gain economists had expected. It was the biggest increase in six months and followed a much weaker 0.2% rise in retail sales in October.

via translation - MOSCOW - Dmitry Medvedev, candidate of presidential power to the Russian in 2008, called Tuesday for Putin to the post of prime minister once from the Kremlin. "It is important to maintain the effectiveness of the team. So I think important for our country to remain extremely important to the post of executive power, the Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin," he said in a affidavit to Russian television.

via translation - Strong explosion in the Supreme Court of Algiers ALGIERS-A powerful explosion, the nature of which is not yet known, occurred Tuesday at 8:45 GMT in Algiers near the Supreme Court of Algeria, Ben Aknoun, on the heights above the town, noted journalists of AFP . Many ambulances, sirens hurlantes, were directed at the scene of the explosion which was climbing a thick column of black smoke. A security cordon was immediately deployed and the road leading to the area, including housing the Supreme Court and the Constitutional Council, has been closed to traffic.

The fundamental problem is that people took out loans they could never afford. The answer, painful as it may be, is for these people to either find affordable loans or find housing they can afford – not to shift part of the bill for their rotten judgment to taxpayers and to holders of legal contracts. We acknowledge the argument that a wave of foreclosures could roil Wall Street and spur a recession. But there is no reason to assume such a downturn would be long-lived. The fundamentals of the U.S. economy remain strong, and more than 19 out of every...