Free Republic

News Corp.'s board is set to decide Wednesday whether to proceed with a split of the media conglomerate into two companies, carving the bigger and more profitable entertainment businesses from the newspapers. If the board approves the split, News Corp. is expected to announce the restructuring Thursday morning, said a person familiar with the situation. News Corp. stock jumped 8.3% Tuesday to its highest level since 2007 after the company confirmed it was contemplating a split, without giving any details. News Corp. is mulling splitting its 20th Century Fox film studio, Fox broadcast network and Fox News channel from its...

MILTON Friedman was notoriously sceptical of the euro, predicting it was "going to be a big source of problems, not a source of help". When crisis hit, monetary union would prevent the eurozone countries from adopting solutions tailored to their individual circumstances. As large fiscal transfers between countries became necessary, old enmities would resurface and the edifice would collapse. Though Friedman was not one to rejoice in the misfortunes of others, one can imagine a wry smile as he watches, from wherever he may be, the European debacle, in which the euro bears a central responsibility. Without the euro, Greece...

Although Israel is a physically small country - it's one-third the size of Tasmania - most of its seven million people distribute themselves over incredibly diverse cities. Jerusalem is an eternal city: the centre of Judaism, the fountainhead of Christianity and an important site for Islam. Visually it is stunning, its character maintained by the most enlightened civic ordinance on record: that all new buildings must be constructed of white Jerusalem stone. Like most Israeli cities it has several diverse communities: ultra-orthodox religious Jews who don't serve in the army and often don't work, Arab Muslims, Arab Christians (a small...

Sean Hannity, the conservative Republican commentator who takes on such controversial issues as Hillary Clinton's legal work in a communist law firm, could be on his way out of the Fox News Channel as a result of Rupert Murdoch's decision to turn the company over to his liberal son James. James Murdoch, 34, who buys into global warming hysteria, has in recent days been labeled the "News Corporation Heir" and "Son King" because of changes in the company that have dramatically increased his power. The Fox News Channel is one part of Murdoch's News Corporation. While James Murdoch is based...

HAVING won the war in Iraq, the United States military risks losing the peace. And in the process, the Americans are doing profound damage to the prospects for democracy in the Middle East and the prosecution of the war on terrorism. Opponents of the war in the US argue that growing casualties make Iraq like Vietnam. Right comparison, wrong example. Just 700 Americans have died in Iraq compared with about 50,000 in the Vietnam War. The challenge in Iraq is to win the hearts and minds of ordinary Iraqis by ensuring their freedom and safety, and to demonstrate the US...

Two Sydney brothers, Bilal and Maher Khazal, have been sentenced in absentia to 10 years' jail in Beirut for terrorist offences. So why is nothing happening? The Lebanese Government says that it is considering whether to seek the brothers' extradition, while the Australian Government is saying that it can do nothing until such a request is forthcoming. But while the two governments execute their elaborate diplomatic dance, like debutantes at the ball, the Khazal brothers can do as they wish on the streets of Sydney. And we are supposed to be alert but not alarmed? Bilal Khazal's passport was confiscated...

Ali Ismail Abbas's dream has come true - he has been fitted with a new pair of arms. It will be a few months before he can fully use the prosthetics, but the 12-year-old Iraqi has made startling progress since losing his arms - and his parents - in a US missile attack on Baghdad just six and a half months ago. Getting new arms and "being whole again" was the first in a long list of goals he set himself, which still include driving a car, eating with a spoon, brushing his teeth and eventually supporting his six sisters...

THERE was something wonderfully strained about how various media organisations dealt last week with the news of the deaths of Qusay and Uday Hussein. From the BBC to Reuters, there was palpable – if sternly repressed – dismay. One of the first headlines that the Ba'athist Broadcasting Corporation put out on the news was: "US celebrates 'good' Iraq news." The quotation marks around "good" did not refer to any quote or source in the text. They were pure editorialising on behalf of the BBC, whose campaign to undermine the liberation of Iraq is now in full swing. It was not...

The Australian's journalist Peter Wilson and photographer John Feder have been arrested by Iraqi police in Basra. Editor of The Australian newspaper, Michael Stutchbury, said fears were raised last night when Mr Wilson and Mr Feder, currently covering developments in Iraq, had not contacted Australian bureaus. Mr Stutchbury, who was called by the pair this morning, said they were "safe and sound" and awaiting a decision by Iraqi officials as to whether they would be expelled or allowed to stay in the country. Mr Wilson and Mr Feder had been travelling through Iraq in a 4WD as non-embedded journalists...