Free Republic

There are now conflicting polls in the race to represent Texas in the U.S. Senate. On Tuesday, Quinnipiac University released a poll showing Ted Cruz with a nine-point lead. But Wednesday, an Ipsos poll put Beto O'Rourke up by two points... ...Tuesday, Cruz was up by nine points in the polls and then Wednesday, a different poll had O'Rourke up by two points. That's a significant shift because Wednesday's poll is the first to give O'Rourke the the lead... ...But how can the polls have such different results? "There are different polling techniques," said Sherri Greenberg , Clinical Professor at...

Reuters is carrying an editorial today on how the DC "government has failed us – again." Knowing Reuters's record on articles like this, you might wonder why I stopped to read it. It was the title of the article, "The Sanity Caucus," that caught my eye. Surprised by the title, I scanned down, wondering if the article would make the point that the Tea Party folks, despite their methods, had the right ideas: Stop the expansion of the US government by any means possible, at least long enough to make a serious point about a serious issue. This wasn't...

A manager from a U.S. Internal Revenue Service office in Cincinnati where staff have been accused of unfairly subjecting conservative groups to extra scrutiny has said his agents were not influenced by any political agenda. John Shafer, who described himself as "a conservative Republican," told congressional investigators he sought advice from his boss on how to handle the first Tea Party application he and a lower-level agent came across in February 2010 because it was a new, high-profile issue. The furor since then has led to the ousting of the IRS chief by President Barack Obama, an FBI investigation and...

Priests and thousands of other Georgians broke through police barricades and forced gay rights activists to flee on Friday, cutting short their rally to mark the international day against homophobia. Holding banners saying "Stop Homosexual Propaganda in Georgia!" and "Not in our city!" the demonstrators swarmed into a square in central Tbilisi where about 50 Georgians were rallying in support of gay rights. Police escorted the gay rights supporters onto buses and drove them away to avoid violence. Several people, including some journalists, received minor injuries, Georgian media said. "We won't allow these sick people to hold gay parades in...

Libyan rebels are begging for the international community to establish a no fly zone in the skies over Libya. One soldier in the rebellion called upon the President of the United States to come to the aid of the Libyan people. Not, however, the sitting President: "'Bring Bush! Make a no fly zone, bomb the planes,' shouted soldier-turned-rebel Nasr Ali, referring to a no-fly zone imposed on Iraq in 1991 by then U.S. President George Bush."

The photo with the knife was published in a Turkish newspaper. They are also accused of hiding the soldier's (or a soldier's) blood by cropping it out of a photo. Both photos below.

U.S. right-wing groups, militias surge: study 8 mins ago PHOENIX (Reuters) – The number of right-wing "Patriot" groups that see the U.S. government as their enemy more than doubled in the last year, fanned by anger over the economy and a backlash against the policies of President Barack Obama, according to a study published this week. The report by the Southern Poverty Law Center said 512 anti-government Patriot groups were active in the United States last year, a leap from 149 in 2008. The "Rage on the Right" report (www.splcenter.org) found that militias, the paramilitary arm of the Patriot movement,...

NEW YORK (Reuters.com) --The Obama administration's plan to cut more than $1 trillion from the deficit over the next decade relies heavily on so-called backdoor tax increases that will result in a bigger tax bill for middle-class families. In the 2010 budget tabled by President Barack Obama on Monday, the White House wants to let billions of dollars in tax breaks expire by the end of the year -- effectively a tax hike by stealth. While the administration is focusing its proposal on eliminating tax breaks for individuals who earn $250,000 a year or more, middle-class families will face a...

That the press in general is sympathetic to the tenets of global warming and environmental alarmism in general is nearly beyond dispute. But Reuters, the wire service that U.S. news outlets heavily rely on for international news, has taken its environmental bias further and has crossed the line into open advocacy. Consider a few graphics I captured at various Reuters reports during the past week. (GRAPHICS at link)...

(REUTERS/Jim Bourg)(REUTERS/Jim Bourg)< (AP Photo/Seth Wenig) (REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton)

Are these decent pictures of Gov. Sarah Palin published by Reuters and Associated Press?

Guantanamo Saudi 'kills himself' Reuters | Thursday, 31 May 2007 A Saudi Arabian prisoner has died of an apparent suicide at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, the US military said. "The detainee was found unresponsive and not breathing in his cell by guards. The detainee was pronounced dead by a physician after all lifesaving measures had been exhausted," the US Southern Command in Miami said in a statement. The military did not indicate how the prisoner died nor release his name. He is the fourth detainee to die of apparent suicide at the detention camp, which opened in January 2002...

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - More than two dozen Israeli motorists manoeuvred around the dead body of a road accident victim lying in the middle of a busy intersection, failing to stop to help in an incident captured by a traffic camera. ... Israelis have a reputation for rushing to the scene of accidents or Palestinian bombings to help victims, and the apparent apathy shown in Yisraeli's case touched off a public debate over whether Israeli society has become uncaring.

He initiated uproar that exposed ethics breach The furor over a photograph began in such a quiet, ordinary way. Mike Thorson, a Janesville artist and part owner of a tool distribution company, was sitting at his computer on a Saturday, checking a few news sites after looking at his e-mail. On Yahoo, he came across a Reuters photograph purporting to show the smoky aftermath of an Israeli air raid on the Beirut suburbs. "As soon as I saw it something looked very strange," said Thorson, 39. What he found led to a story that raced around the globe and resulted...

1) Man arrives with suitcase full of American toys and dismantles doll in pink dress. (AP) 2) Man carries dismantled doll, minnie mouse and teletubbie for placing in dramatic poses. (Reuters) 3) Fauxtographer takes pictures when props are in position.(Reuters)

Altered war Manipulated photos highlight untruths in Mideast conflict By LICIA CORBELLA They say the first casualty of war is Truth. Yesterday, the respected news agency Reuters issued an unprecedented announcement. Essentially, it admitted it unwittingly published propaganda as straight news. In a released statement, the wire agency announced the withdrawal of all 920 photographs by freelance Lebanese photographer, Adnan Hajj from its database "after an urgent review of his work showed he had altered two images from the conflict between Israel and the armed group Hezbollah," said the statement. Wishful thinking on Reuters' part. The breaches go far deeper...

TEHRAN (Reuters) - To deserve a statue in central Tehran, you normally need to be an 11th-century Persian poet. However, Venezuela's 19th-century independence leader Simon Bolivar surveys passers-by in Goftogou Park. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, wearing the checkered headscarf of the Basij volunteer Islamic militia, stressed the cordiality of Tehran-Caracas relations when he unveiled the statue of his hero on an icy November day in 2004. Right-wing Venezuelan and U.S. media have attacked Chavez's growing ties with Tehran. In their most fanciful conspiracy theory, Iran is planning to ship nuclear warheads to Venezuela in a re-run of the 1962 Cuban...

Wall Street whoops as Mexico leftist faces defeat By Greg Brosnan MEXICO CITY, July 3 (Reuters) - Wall Street on Monday cheered the apparent defeat of a Mexican leftist presidential candidate whose spending promises raised debt fears, but a looming vote dispute and a longer-term political crisis may ruin the party. Conservative candidate Felipe Calderon declared victory on Monday after Sunday's hotly contested election, and official returns appeared to show that leftist favorite Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador could not catch him. "The market thought that Lopez Obrador was going to win," said Benito Berber, an economist at HSBC Securities. "Suddenly...

U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney speaks during his keynote address to the U.S. Labor Department's 2006 National Summit on Retirement Savings at the Willard Hotel in Washington March 2, 2006. REUTERS/Larry Downing

Reuters Says Bush Photo Not 'Malicious,' Reports Wide Interest In it By E&P Staff Published: September 15, 2005 4:30 PM ET NEW YORK With confirmation today that an accidental photo of President Bush at the United Nations on Wednesday, writing a note to Secretary of State Condeezza Rice about a “bathroom break,” was indeed real, newspapers around the U.S. and abroad are now planning to run it widely. But many, it seems, will treat it as something more than a joke. A source at the Washington Post tells E&P that the paper is considering it for prominent play tomorrow morning,...