Free Republic

Mohamed Al Fayed, the Egyptian-born businessman who owned the department store Harrods, has died aged 94. His death comes almost 26 years to the day after the car crash in Paris that killed his eldest son, Dodi, and Diana, Princess of Wales, on 31 August 1997. Fayed was born in Alexandria and was the son of a schoolteacher. In his homeland, he launched his own shipping business, before becoming an adviser to one of the world’s richest men, the Sultan of Brunei, in 1966. When he arrived in the UK in the 1970s, he joined the board of the mining...

Adnan Khashoggi, a Saudi middleman-for-hire who amas­sed huge wealth and influence peddling everything from American weapons to favors for Riyadh’s rulers and CIA spymasters, only to see his fortunes collapse amid the Iran-contra affair and other scandals, died June 6 at a hospital in London. He was 81, by most accounts. The cause was complications from Parkinson’s disease, the family said in a statement reported by the Associated Press. Mr. Khashoggi’s name may have lost its luster since his peak in the 1970s and 1980s, but not so the list of misdeeds and abuses that remain defining events of the...

He lives in a vivid fantasy world that would make Walter Mitty blush — never missing a chance to shamelessly play the hero or embellish a news story. Reality-challenged NBC anchor Brian Williams once boasted about abandoning a dying buddy to cover the death of Princess Diana — but said it was worth it because it won him worldwide fame. “I lost a very good friend to Agent Orange-related cancer,” he told Alec Baldwin in a March 2013 interview on the “30 Rock” actor’s “Here’s the Thing” show on WNYC radio. “I was in the hospital room with him. It...

Conservative commentator Ann Coulter expressed confusion over the hype on royalty during an “Insider” interview that appeared online Thursday, the day before what would have been Princess Diana’s 50th birthday. Coulter, author of the new book “Demonic: How the Liberal Mob is Endangering America,” told “The Insider” co-host Kevin Frazier that she was baffled by Newsweek’s latest cover story about the late Princess Diana. (Newsweek photoshops Kate Middleton, late Princess Diana together on magazine cover) “I find it a little baffling when Americans get so gaga-eyed over a princess,” Coulter told Frazier. “Particularly Lady Di, who was just this anorexic,...

There is no quick fix to $4.50-a-gallon gas, no way to provide instant relief to consumers we know are hurting. Yet President Bush and others continue to push the false promise of offshore oil drilling. Just this week, the president lifted the executive order banning drilling that George H.W. Bush put in place in 1990. And he's asked Congress to lift its own moratorium on oil exploration on the outer continental shelf -- which includes coastal waters as close as three miles from shore. This would be a terrible mistake. It would put our nation's precious coastlines in jeopardy and...

Last week, a London court began pondering the vexed question of whether Diana, Princess of Wales was, ahem, murdered. There was so much public suspicion, declared the coroner, Lord Justice Scott Baker, that it was time for the rumors to be either "dispelled or substantiated." So who killed her? On the night of Diana's death, there were apparently two top agents for MI6, the British secret service, on the loose in Paris, and possibly a third, if you believe Henri Paul, the chauffeur, was also on the spooks' payroll. That's the theory of Mohammed Fayed, Messr. Paul's employer and father...

Let's review the year 2006 in the Pop Culture arena. Princess Diana died in a car accident, or so the five millionth investigation into her death reports. Also, crocodile star Steve Irwin killed, Brad and Angelina have a baby, Britney wears no underwear and is short on her motherhood skills. Lots of weird and unusual, blind items-ASKED and GUESSED-all embellished by my fine, somewhat sarcastic, commentary.

A Brit newspaper is reporting that the US "secret services" -- presumably the CIA and NSA -- were spying on Princess Diana, bugging her telephone conversations in the summer of 1997, up to and including the day she died. But why would anyone bother? The British royals aren't much involved in politics or matters of national security. There's only one reason I can think of. Was Clinton wanting to get the lowdown on her before asking for a date? I am pursuing other information from experts, trusted sources, and the usual suspects

On the eve of the eighth anniversary of Princess Diana's death, she has been honoured with a new sculpture dedicated to both her and her companion Dodi Fayed, who also died in the 1997 Paris car crash. The bronze statue, entitled Innocent Victims, was commissioned by Dodi's father, Harrods owner Mohammed Al Fayed. Created by family friend Bill Mitchell, it is due to occupy a special place inside the legendary London store. The work depicts Diana and Dodi smiling into each other's eyes as they apparently run along a beach together, with a bird poised for flight at the tip...

DIANA’S SECRET TAPES FORCED CHARLES TO ADMIT HE IS AT CENTRE OF ROYAL SCANDAL by Gordon Thomas Prince Charles’ aides panicked him into revealing he is at the centre of a serious allegation – after the aides learned intimate details still exist on one of seven video tapes Princess Diana made before her death six years ago. The tapes were filmed at her request by a former BBC cameraman. Last week, he was interviewed by a senior MI6 officer at his home in California. Afterwards, he broke six years of self-imposed silence to disclose all he knows about the tapes...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A U.S. comic book publisher has decided to let Princess Diana rest in peace, dropping plans to reincarnate her as a mutant comic superhero this fall, the company said on Thursday. Marvel Enterprises Inc. said in a statement that "upon reflection" it will remove Diana and all references to the royal family in its upcoming "X-Statix" monthly comics. The about-face follows a recent announcement by Marvel Comics that it planned to introduce Diana as one of a team of super-powered mutants in a five-series storyline called "Di Another Day." Company spokespeople were not immediately available to...

<p>February 23, 2003 -- Producers of a televised séance being advertised as a bid to "contact the spirit" of Princess Diana seem to be struggling to make a viable connection with the living. A Web site set up to promote the worldwide screening of the pay-per-view show on March 9 has, so far, prompted just six people to sign up for access to a "members-only" bulletin board to discuss the special.</p>