Free Republic

If you want to see the best football code in the world, you have to visit Australia in April-September. Port Melbourne footballer Maddy “Maddawg” Patterson was a tree planter but now she’s a sparky. (Electrician.) Her focus and concentration on the game and on her team is cool, calm, poised and beautiful. And what is it on the field that drives Maddawg’s commitment to her club and her nation’s native game? It’s wonderful goals like this sublimely skilled evasion of opponents by teammate Kaitlyn O’Keefe.

I think that men and women should be treated as equal in everything except the three female spheres of activity of being pregnant, giving birth and breast feeding. But I think that there are subtle differences in abilities and tendencies between men and women such as a slight tendency for women to be more empathetic than men. Overall, empathy is also a very common quality in men, but my life experience has been to see a little more empathy in women than in men. To me there is an emotional beauty in the way that the Fitzroy footballer pictured in...

US, South Korea launch war games Sat Mar 25, 12:18 PM ET South Korea and the United States have launched large-scale war games as North Korea accused them of rehearsing for a nuclear attack on the communist state. Some 25,000 US troops backed by a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier are taking part in the week-long drill aimed at testing the capability of US and South Korean commanders to receive and deploy US reinforcements from abroad. "The RSOI (Reception, Staging, Onward Movement and Integration) drill started today as planned," said an official with the US military who asked not to be named....

ATHENS, Greece - The U.S. women’s volleyball players happily trickled off the court, stopping to chat with family and friends and answer questions about how they salvaged their chance at an Olympic medal. Perhaps a more fitting exit would have had all 12 of them holding hands, because the Americans finally figured out how to play like a team. Logan Tom scored 19 points to lead the United States to a 25-22, 25-12, 25-19 win over Cuba on Sunday and a spot in the quarterfinals.