Free Republic

Rebekah filmed herself opening the package, in which she found a handwritten note from Swift. “I was thinking about you today, and how you have been there cheering me on in the most thoughtful and creative ways,” Swift wrote to Rebekah, mentioning a video and other posts Rebekah made. Swift continued, “I got out my paints for the first time in a while today and made you something. I really, really, really hope you like it. I’m not a good painter, but you’re so beautiful and positive, even though you’re dealing with the stress life brings, so I wanted to...

If, when in February Victoria Nuland infamously launched a (not so) covert campaign to replace the ruling Ukraine president oblivious to the human casualties, resulting in a civil war in east Ukraine, NATO encroachment along the borders of Russia, and a near-terminal escalation in hostilities between Ukraine, Russian, and various regional NATO members, the US intention was to provoke the Kremlin so hard that the nation with the world's largest reserves of mineral and energy resources would jettison the US Dollar and in the process begin the unraveling of the USD reserve currency status (as much as Jared Bernstein desires...

John Kerry, speaking on Face the Nation, defended Barack Obama’s delay in implementing action against Bashar Assad while he goes to Congress for authorization. Host Major Garrett asked, "I know you believe the president’s decision to seek congressional authorization is courageous, but isn’t it bowing to a political reality that had been communicated to the president late this week that there would be significant congressional backlash if he didn’t give Congress a role, and that backlash, in part, reflected the inability of the Administration to make its case this past week?" Kerry responded that President Obama had not shown any...

Taylor Swift is adding to her property portfolio after securing a $17.75 million deal for a new seaside home in Rhode Island. The I Knew You Were Trouble hitmaker recently went house hunting along the U.S. northeast coast with her mother Andrea, father Scott and younger brother Austin, and she appears to have settled on a lavish estate in the town of Westerly. The property, which boasts five bedrooms and sweeping views of the Atlantic Ocean, had reportedly been on the market for $20 million - but Swift managed to use her charms to negotiate the lower price -- she...

SALT LAKE CITY — Undocumented and legal Latinos gathered with a diverse crowd Wednesday night in Salt Lake to send a message to Washington: They want change in U.S. immigration laws. "This is a human issue and ... these are families that are being separated," said Itza Hernandez. "We need some kind of change to the broken immigration system." Hernandez, a member of the Salt Lake Dream Team, is an undocumented immigrant who has lived in Utah since she was 4 years old. She and others who spoke at the vigil hoped that lawmakers in Washington and neighbors at home...

Iran may impose a blockade on oil exports that threaten the world’s economies as a reaction to new unprecedented sanctions, says its former intelligence minister Ali Fallahian. Belgium’s Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT), which handles most international bank transfers, has eliminated Iran from its services. The move is a “direct result of international and multilateral action to intensify financial sanctions against Iran," said SWIFT CEO Lazaro Campos. The embargo on Iran took effect Saturday and reduces Iran’s ability to use a secure network to receive payments. It also will affect Iranians wanting to receive money from relatives outside...

While we have long known that the drachma, and recently the lira, have seen significant "when issued" interest by institutional clients desiring to hedge their currency collapse exposure, and thus early markets by various trading desks, little did we realize just how destabilizing this fact to the system would be, at least according to SWIFT. According to the WSJ, this organization, best known for making an abrupt appearance any time one wishes to do a wire transfer, then promptly disappearing until the next such instance, ended up promptly shutting down any Plan B optionality when "at least two global banks...

Enlarge Image Breathing fire. A distant cosmic explosion detected 28 March (left) continues to put out a series of high-energy flares (right). Astronomers believe it's a star being consumed by a black hole 3.8 billion light-years away. Credit: (left, galaxy) ASA/Swift/Stefan Immler; (right, diagram) NASA/Swift/Penn State/J. Kennea Astronomers have observed possibly the biggest blast ever seen in the cosmos. When NASA's SWIFT space observatory first spotted it 10 days ago, observers thought it was a massive star blowing up as a supernova and expected it to fade within hours or even minutes. But the high-energy radiation from the source...

OMAHA — Federal officials say a JBS Swift & Co. meatpacking plant should give Muslim employees prayer time and not retaliate against workers who ask to pray. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed a lawsuit Monday on behalf of more than 80 Somali Muslims. A message left at JBS Swift's U.S. headquarters in Greeley wasn't immediately returned. Hundreds of Muslim workers walked off the job at the Grand Island, Neb., plant during Ramadan in 2008, saying they needed time to pray at sunset and break a day-long fast. Management adjusted the work schedule the next day. Non-Muslims protested and the...

Any new agreement on providing bank data to the United States - for example via the SWIFT system - must avoid "bulk data" transfers until they can be processed within the EU, warned MEPs on Wednesday. As for Passenger Name Records, Parliament opted to postpone its vote on the existing agreements with the United States and Australia and called for those accords be renegotiated on the basis of new criteria. MEPs voted on two resolutions in Brussels today, one on the opening of negotiations for an EU-US agreement to provide the US Treasury Department with bank data to combat terrorism,...

Are the NYT's and James Risen at fault here? Investigators of the failed car bombing in Times Square are looking for a money courier they say helped funnel cash from overseas to finance a Pakistani-American's preparations to blow up the crude gasoline-and-propane bomb in the heart of New York, a law enforcement official told The Associated Press. Investigators have the name of the courier they believe helped Faisal Shahzad pay for the used SUV and other materials to rig up a car bomb that would have caused a huge fireball in Times Square if it had gone off, the official...

I first have to admit to the fact that I am a total and complete pop culture drop-out; I have never seen an episode of "Sponge Bob", I didn't know what "I'd hit it." meant for the longest time and I really hadn't a clue about who Paris Hilton was, nor what she had done to become so incredibly famous. A word to the wise, DO NOT google Paris Hilton and if you do, make sure the kids are out of the room. Anyway, my daughter, who is 8 years old, came home from a playdate signing Taylor Swift songs....

A tractor-trailer loaded with canned beans was struck by a southbound Norfolk Southern freight train at the Coile Street railroad crossing off Snapps Ferry Road about 6:45 a.m. this morning. No injuries were reported as a result of the collision. GPD Officer Jeff Craft said at the scene this morning that Bobby Coffey, the driver of the Swift Transportation tractor-trailer, told police he had been attempting to enter the lot of the So-Pak-Co plant when he encountered a closed gate and came to a stop. The rear of the trailer was on the Norfolk Southern railroad tracks, police said. As...

The title of this thread pretty much says it all! NOTE: The author of this comic requests that you visit his web site and please refrain from copying the cartoon within this thread. Thanks!

At Obama's main celebrity inaugural ball, Kanye West was interviewed by a CNN anchor during "Anderson Cooper 360" about his feelings about the election. Rather than solely focusing on Obama's victory though, Kanye West ended up using the air time to DEFEND PRESIDENT BUSH. He wasn't even being asked about him. "At the end of the day, Bush, he was a human being...a real person with feelings and hurts too... and a lot of things got overshadowed...it's a shame." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2bs22JsdA0 (Statement is made at the last 1 minute of the interview)

Why would the New York Times divulge information that could prove harmful to the national security of the United States? Is it so consumed is it by hatred of anything outside their left wing agenda that the paper actually wants America to lose the war on terror. One case in point was an article the Times published on June 30, 2008, Amid U.S. Policy Disputes, Qaeda Grows in Pakistan, which quoted from a "highly-classified Pentagon order" describing internal disputes at the Pentagon over plans to capture Osama Bin Laden and defeat al Qaeda. In June 2006, both The New York...

Cheney's "Secret Counterterrorism Program" Not So Secret After All On Sunday the Times hinted darkly about a "secret counterterrorism program" Dick Cheney concealed from Congress. Now the details are out -- and it turns out the Times reported the program (killing Al Qaeda's leaders) on its front page back in December 2002. Posted by: Clay Waters 7/14/2009 2:04:26 PM The Times' lead story Sunday was on a C.I.A. program allegedly hidden by Dick Cheney, and abruptly ended by new C.I.A. director Leon Panetta when he learned of it. The headline to intelligence reporter Scott Shane's story huffed: "Cheney Is Linked...

Dear Obamaphile -- We knew healthcare reform would face fierce opposition -- and it's begun. As we speak, the same people behind the notorious "swiftboat" ads of 2004 are already pumping millions of dollars into deceptive television ads. Their plan is simple: torpedo healthcare reform before it sees the light of day by scaring the public and distorting the President's approach. We need the resources to take them head on with an urgent, grassroots campaign to pass real healthcare reform in 2009. When the swiftboaters flood the airwaves with distortions, we'll flood the streets with volunteers armed with facts....

One thing about Liveshot, he knows when to back a loser By Howie Carr | Friday, May 8, 2009 | http://www.bostonherald.com | Columnists Sen. John Forbes Kerry has spent the week futilely trying to prop up two of his oldest, dearest friends - the Boston Globe and a convicted kiddie-porn pervert named Wade Sanders. You know about the Globe. Despite Kerry’s Senate hearings into the implosion of arrogant left-wing newspapers, El Globo continues to circle the drain. You’ve heard less about Wade Sanders, or nothing at all if you rely on the Globe. He’s a liberal and a pervert and...

Chrysler, the nation's third-largest automaker, filed for bankruptcy protection yesterday, with President Obama promising that court relief would give the company a "new lease on life." The administration's efforts to avert a bankruptcy filing were frustrated by some hedge funds, which Obama referred to as "a small group of speculators," that rejected the government's final offer to settle their claims against Chrysler out of court. Now largely under government control, Chrysler will seek in court to strip itself of its overwhelming debts. Then, according to the administration plan, the company will get roughly $10 billion in new government aid and...