Free Republic

CHICAGO - A former high-ranking aide to Mayor Richard M. Daley was sentenced Monday to nearly four years in prison for covering up illegal patronage hiring at City Hall. "The offense is corruption — corruption with a capital C," U.S. District Judge David H. Coar told 43-year-old Robert Sorich. "For people to owe their jobs to political advancement rather than performance on the job stinks." The judge added: "I don't give a hoot whether this has been going on for 200 years — it still stinks." Sorich and two other men were convicted July 6 in a scheme to make...

Anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan waits for people to show up at her book signing near President Bush's ranch on Saturday, Nov. 26, 2005 in Crawford, Texas. Sheehan, whose 24-year-old Casey died in Iraq, called for anti-war activists to return to Crawford this week as Bush celebrated the Thanksgiving holiday.