Free Republic

When the progressive coalition won the election in Poland on Oct. 15, there was an expectation that there would be major changes in the public sphere. However, when the new government was formed on Dec. 13 under leadership of Prime Minister Donald Tusk, it immediately started to attack its predecessors with police tactics and make threats of prosecution and removal of virtually all top officials in Poland. These aggressive attacks were billed as the restoration of the rule of law, but they rather signify the destruction of constitutional order and bring lawlessness. The essence of the Tusk political and police...

A Rasmussen Reports poll released Thursday finds large majorities of black and other minority likely U.S. voters are concerned about a potential shortage of police officers in their communities. According to the survey, 84 percent of black likely U.S. voters expressed concern about a possibile shortage of police officers, while 70 percent of other minorities, and 66 percent of whites shared the same concern. The poll focused on the beliefs likely U.S. voters have about the recent violent attacks against police and concerns about the repercussions of these attacks.Of those surveyed, 59 percent said they believe a war on...

SEATTLE — The financially strapped U.S. Postal Service is proposing to cut its workforce by 20 percent and to withdraw from the federal health and retirement plans because it believes it could provide benefits at a lower cost. The layoffs would be achieved in part by breaking labor agreements, a proposal that drew swift fire from postal unions. The plan would require congressional approval but, if successful, could be precedent-setting, with possible ripple effects throughout government. It would also deliver a major blow to the nation’s labor movement.

Two big questions hang over President Obama's radical "Green Jobs Czar" Van Jones. Is he still a communist? Is he a security threat? Many have assumed that Van Jones' committment to communism ended when the organization he helped to lead STORM (Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement) dissolved in 2002. Yet a 2004 treatise Reclaiming Revolution: History, Summation, and Lessons from the Work of Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement written and endorsed by a majority of former STORM members makes it clear that most ex STORMers are still committed to the revolutionary movement; From page 49. When...

Dawn Wells, the actress that played Mary Ann on "Gilligan's Island," was busted with marijuana in her car after driving home from her birthday party -- and she's 69!

How could these Republicans help Labor Unions to victory? Stop S.2123 now! Call your Senator To all who read this: Copy and paste it and send it along to your family and friends. Call your Senator now to stop S.2123. The misnamed and egregious "Public Safety Employer-Employee cooperation act of 2007" was introduced by Senator Gregg on October 1 with enough Republicans (nine Republicans) to invoke cloture and pass the Bill.

APTara Gruber and staff demonstrating a schoolteachers' instruction session. Teachers claim yoga helps students with attention-deficit disorder and may help lower childhood obesity. SAN FRANCISCO -- In Tara Guber's ideal world, American children would meditate in the lotus position and chant in Sanskrit before taking stressful standardized tests.  But when she asked a public elementary school in Aspen, Colo., to teach yoga in 2002, Christian fundamentalists and even some secular parents lobbied the school board. They argued that yoga's Hindu roots conflicted with Christian teachings and that using it in school might violate the separation of church and state....

BELLE CHASSE — A discussion about not duplicating pre-Katrina “concentrations of poverty” when New Orleans’ ravaged rental stock is rebuilt raised the temperature Thursday during a Louisiana Recovery Authority meeting. While authority members and authority Executive Director Andy Kopplin were discussing two “Road Home” rental housing programs and an accompanying objective of not replicating what a Road Home handout called “pre-storm excessive concentrations of poverty,” New Orleanian Elizabeth Cook sprang to her feet and gave the board an earful.

DUBAI — DP World, which has just weathered a storm over its aborted takeover of six US ports following a $6.8 billion acquisition of P&O global operations, is facing unexpected yet snowballing opposition from India on fears that the Dubai-based company will have a monopoly of the subcontinent's container terminal operations. With the acquisition of P&O assets, DP World has under its control India's three major container terminals: Nhava Sheva, Mumbai; Chennai Container Terminal, Chennai; and Mundra International Container Terminal, Gujarat; apart from a share in the Vishaka Container Terminal at Vishakapatnam and the new container terminal in Vallarpadam, Kerala...

The opponents of the DP World purchase of terminal leases at six US ports owe Sen. Chuck Schumer a bottle of champagne. If not for the Herculean efforts of Sen. Schumer, Arabs would control several terminals at the ports in New York, New Jersey, New Orleans, Miami, Philadelphia and Baltimore. Without even having to get involved in a bidding war, some US based terminal operator is going to own the leases that DP World is giving up. By using a campaign of complete and total misinformation while under the influence of a jilted US terminal operator and fanning the flames...

WASHINGTON - A Dubai-owned company will control 23 American ports - not six - as a result of the deal approved by a Bush administration panel in January. The takeover of the British company Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Co. involves almost every major Atlantic seaport from Portland, Maine, to Miami and along the entire Gulf Coast, according to an attorney fighting the deal. The list includes Port Arthur and Beaumont, Texas, which have handled about 40 percent of the war materiel the Army has shipped to combat theaters in Iraq and Afghanistan. It also includes Norfolk, Va., home to...

HOURS after boarding the luxury cruise that would result in her death, Dianne Brimble's friend warned her of a group of men who had been ogling female passengers, a Sydney inquest was told today. The next morning, Ms Brimble, 42, was found dead in a cabin belonging to some of those same men. Police allege she had been given a lethal dose of the date rape drug gamma-hydroxybutyrate before being sexually assaulted. The inquest was told Ms Brimble had been ecstatic, setting out on the "holiday of a lifetime" with family and friends on the P&O liner Pacific Sky on...

MAR. 9 12:29 P.M. ET A New Jersey judge on Thursday axed a bid by officials from two states to end Port Newark's lease with a company that plans to sell operations at major U.S. ports to an Arab-owned company. Superior Court Judge Patricia K. Costello denied a request by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to immediately terminate its 30-year agreement with London-based Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Co. However, the judge said the bi-state agency's lawsuit against the company can continue. ... Under the $6.8 billion deal, DP World would take over major commercial operations...

LONDON: A London High Court judge ruled on Thursday that Dubai Port World's (DPW) $6.85 billion proposed takeover of P&O can go ahead, despite objections from one of the British firm's partners in the United States. Justice Nicholas Warren sanctioned a so-called scheme of arrangement allowing the deal to proceed, rejecting submissions from US ports operator Eller & Co and two private P&O shareholders who oppose the takeover for different reasons. "The objections of Eller do not persuade me that I should not sanction the schemes," Justice Warren said. Lawsuits have been filed in the United States and London in...

Concerns over port security may be sky high, but the chief of security for the East Coast's main port operator, Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Co., hardly knew it when he sat before a Senate Commerce panel on Tuesday. More than a dozen senators grilled U.S. government officials, and the chief operator officer of Dubai Ports World, which is on the verge of acquiring P&O and all its world-wide port operations. But no senator had a single question for Robert Scavone, the man who oversees P&O's security for North America -- and will do the same for DP World. Scavone...

If you are looking to verify that most of America’s politicians and almost all of the mainstream press are more interested in the perpetuation of their own power than truth, you need look no further than the kafuffle over DP World buying out P&O’s interest in a couple of American maritime terminals. They have started a xenophobic stampede that even sober people have found inviting, but which I find nothing short of scandalous. Their case is fear based and the cornerstone of their reasoning rests on ignorance...

February 24, 2006JS-4071CFIUS and the Protection of the National Security in the Dubai Ports World Bid for Port OperationsHistory of the Dubai Ports World proposed acquisition of P&OAll members of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) understand that their top priority is to protect our national security, including homeland security. On November 29 of last year, two companies publicly announced a proposed transaction: Dubai Ports World (DPW), a state-owned company located in the United Arab Emirates, proposed to acquire The Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P&O), a British firm that operates in a number...

A Comprehensive List of Penninsular & Orient North American Operations Source Links: Interactive Flash Map of Global Container Operations Interactive Flash Map of ALL North American Operations Click the name on the map to jump to the info for that location...  P&O Ports in Portland, Maine P&O Ports New England provides terminal and stevedoring operations for a container feeder-service to and from the Port of Halifax, Nova Scotia. Portland International Terminal (PIT) is the home for this weekly container feeder service. P&O Ports has increased the quality and efficiency of service to its container customers in Portland by using a...

The general manager of a shipping company based in the United Arab Emirates has made an extraordinary claim at the oil-for-food inquiry. The executive said the British embassy, US Navy and the Royal Navy were all aware of kickbacks to Saddam Hussein in 2001. The statement from Michael Wallbanks, the general manager of P&O Nedlloyd only arrived at the commission this morning. He said that when he arrived in Dubai in 2000, he became aware that Iraq imposed a 10 per cent tax on all goods shipped to the country. The commission was told that most exporters chose to...

The Senate Armed Services Cmte. conducts an open briefing into the management of six American ports by Dubai Ports World. Sen. John Warner (R-VA) called the briefing to review national security issues raised by the deal, which transfers control from a British firm to one owned by the United Arab Emirates.