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VATICAN CITY (AP) -- Pope Francis, laying out his hopes Wednesday for the just-begun year, urged people to work for a world where everyone accepts each other's differences and where enemies recognize that they are brothers.

Saudi religious police warn against celebrating New Year’s Eve Monday, 30 December 2013 10:50 AM Saudi Arabia’s religious police has warned that “punitive measures” will be taken against those who celebrated New Year’s Eve on December 31, Arabic daily Okaz reported. The Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vices (Haia) based its warning on a religious edict issued by the Council of Senior Islamic Scholars banning such celebrations, the newspaper said. The conservative Islamic kingdom follows the Muslim lunar calendar rather than the Gregorian calendar, which stems from the Christian religion. Its new year is based...

For about 5 years now, various Americans from across the political spectrum have talked about taking back their country and restoring strict adherence to our Constitution and Bill of Rights. Patriots; There has been a lot of talk, not much action and even less success. In truth, there has been an even further erosion of our liberties as our government continues to expand its power and because less transparent and accountable to WE THE PEOPLE. With that perspective, it seems essential that WE THE PEOPLE commit to a 2014 New Years Resolution focused on turning back this erosion of our...

Rightwingpatriot.com would like to wish everyone a happy new year. Let us hope and pray that some sanity is restored to our country in the upcoming year and that, as a nation, we can alter our downward course and set ourselves back onto the path of prosperity and liberty. Let us make a new year's resolution to work harder to support and elect conservatives to all levels of government: local, state, and federal. We need to kick out of office those who do not hold to conservative principles and seek to limit the size and scope of governmental power. Once...

Every New Year’s, we write personal lists of resolutions for ourselves. Lose the weight, advance the career, learn a skill, write that book. A good concept, especially if we really do accomplish some of them! But the problems America faces today aren’t going to be resolved that way. We are being impoverished by a leviathan state, and problems caused by government action can only be solved by government action. There’s no point in my proposing any resolutions to the Democratic Party; as a non-member, I have no right to expect them to listen to me. But as a lifelong Republican,...

But once a year, Applebee’s goes high-end. The chain’s franchise-owned restaurant in the heart of New York’s Times Square offers a $375-a-person New Year’s Eve bash that’s billed as “a night to remember.” (Those under 12 can get in for $250.)

The same Disney that suspended 'Duck Dynasty' star Phil Robertson from its A&E network for expressing his religious views about homosexuality (until being forced to reverse it after a massive viewer revolt), clearly has no problem pushing the homosexual agenda in the faces of millions of Americans who watch the annual Tournament of Roses Parade on its ABC network on New Year's Day. That's right. Two Los Angeles men plan to celebrate their "gay marriage" on a float in this year's parade in Pasadena, California. The move has understandably sparked controversy and even a boycott. Danny Leclair, 45, and Aubrey Loots, 42,...

There is a New Year stampede developing that we have not seen for a long time. Gun stores are swamped with panicking customers. They are looking for handguns, semiautomatic rifles, and as much ammunition as they can afford. But buyers are not just camouflaged hunters, conspiracy theorists, and gun hoarders. Instead, many of those purchasing firearms and ammo are so-called ordinary people, convinced that this administration will soon begin to centrally register — and then ban — far more than assault rifles. There were probably lots of reasons why Adam Lanza shot 26 innocent children and adults at Sandy Hook...

Elizabeth, a 13-year-old British girl, had a favorite poem, which was published in a small book, titled “The Desert,” which was authored by a hardly-known poetess, Minnie Louise Haskins. “Lilebet,” as the young lass was affectionate known by her family, so loved the poem that she shared it with her father. And he, in turn, shared it with all of Britannia. You see Lilibet’s dad was King George VI. And in a 1939 broadcast, marking the holiday season, he read aloud the poem his daughter, the future Queen Elizabeth II, entrusted to him. Haskins’ Spirit-filled prose resonated with the British...

Key West Florida rings in the New Year by dropping a drag queen, who rides down in a high heeled shoe. "Sushi," as she calls herself, has been doing this for 16 years.

A New Year's Eve possum drop that attracts thousands of people to a tiny western North Carolina town will go on this year, with one big change: It won't involve a live possum.

Ring out the new, ring in the old. No, hang on, that should be the other way around, shouldn't it? Not as far as 2011 was concerned. The year began with a tea-powered Republican caucus taking control of the House of Representatives and pledging to rein in spendaholic government. It ended with President Obama making a pro forma request for a mere $1.2 trillion increase in the debt ceiling. This will raise government debt to $16.4 trillion – a new world record! If only until he demands the next debt-ceiling increase in three months' time. At the end of 2011,...

Now that you have read the results of the various economic forecasting models that have served so many so badly in recent years—they are predicting the U.S. economy will grow in 2012 at an annual rate of between 1.5 percent and 2 percent—let me offer an alternative way of looking at things. It is called ‘pick your if.’ If you believe that the recent decision of the European Central Bank to make unlimited cash available to eurozone banks for the next three years, and that the meeting next week of German chancellor Angela Merkel and French president Nicholas Sarkozy will...

“In my end is my beginning.” – T.S. Eliot, East Coker As we come to the end of another year, we remember that endings are merely beginnings, as Eliot reminds us. “In my end is my beginning” is the final phrase of his poem East Coker, second of the Four Quartets. We are reminded that for the new to come in, the old must be released. So as we enter a new year, a new experience, we remember to stand in the field of possibility. A new year is an opportunity to begin again. In Rent, Jonathan Larson reminds us...

“In my end is my beginning.” – T.S. Eliot, East Coker As we come to the end of another year, we remember that endings are merely beginnings, as Eliot reminds us. “In my end is my beginning” is the final phrase of his poem East Coker, second of the Four Quartets. We are reminded that for the new to come in, the old must be released. So as we enter a new year, a new experience, we remember to stand in the field of possibility. A new year is an opportunity to begin again. In Rent, Jonathan Larson reminds us...

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The South Pacific Nation of Somoa is moving the International Dateline from west of their country to east as of their local midnight. Friday, December 30 2011, will not occur in that country.

So what will the Washington Post's Headline be the day BEFORE Election 2012? The day AFTER?

“Get ready, America. Pull up a chair and a box of your finest wine, because you’ve never seen a New Year’s Eve show like this,” said Griffin. “Kathy Griffin scares me. I’ve said this often to CNN management directly and through my attorneys,” joked Cooper.

Chinese Year of the Rabbit officially comes today, or it already came Wednesday due to a 12-hour time difference between the U.S. and China. Chinese New Year, or the Spring Festival according to the literal translation of its Chinese name, is the most significant holiday for more than one quarter of the world's population. It begins on the first day of the first month of the lunar - lunisolar more accurately - calendar, based on exact astronomical observations of the longitude of the sun and the phases of the moon by ancient Chinese astrologists. Though the exact date of Chinese...