Free Republic

CNN pollster Vinod Gupta, who controls the Opinion Research polling firm, has already declared Hillary Clinton the winner of the 2008 election and contributed the first of his donations to her campaign. Anyone who thinks the CNN polls won't be rigged to favor Hillary should have their head examined. CNN hires Clinton-controlled Opinion Research Corp. for 2008 Presidential Polling - "She'll be the next President" - CNN pollster Vinod Gupta - From FECInfo.com - Gupta, Vinod 2/20/2007 $1,000.00 Omaha, NE 68127 infoUSA Inc./Chairman/CEO [Contribution] HILLARY CLINTON FOR PRESIDENT EXPLORATORY COMMITTEE INC Gupta, Vinod 2/27/2007 $10,000.00 Omaha, NE 68127 Info USA/Chairman...

Barack Obama, caught up in the fervor of a campaign speech Tuesday, drastically overstated the Kansas tornadoes death toll, saying 10,000 had died. The death toll was 12. "In case you missed it, this week, there was a tragedy in Kansas. Ten thousand people died—an entire town destroyed," the Democratic presidential candidate said in a speech to 500 people packed into a sweltering Richmond art studio for a fundraiser. Obama mentioned the disaster in Greensburg, Kan., in saying he had been told by the office of Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius that the state's National Guard had been depleted by its...

This qualifies as one of the outrages of the year: Virgin Atlantic Airlines is showing the evil, dishonest 9/11 conspiracy film Loose Change as inflight entertainment.

Ending an investigation that clouded the tenure of former Senate majority leader Bill Frist, federal prosecutors have decided not to file insider-trading charges against the Tennessee Republican for his sales of stock in a family-owned chain of hospitals. The U.S. Attorney in the Southern District of New York and Securities and Exchange Commission staff sent Frist letters last week signaling that they had closed their joint, 18-month investigation. The letters essentially cleared him of wrongdoing. Frist said in a statement that he "acted properly" and that his only reason for selling stock in his trust accounts was to "eliminate the...

What rhymes with 'I was wrong'? Renowned Canadian poet David Solway once embraced the received wisdom of the left-wing intelligentsia-- then came 9/11 Barbara Kay, National Post Published: Wednesday, April 11, 2007 'It is in its way a perversely exhilarating spectacle," writes David Solway, summarizing the message of his just published book, The Big Lie: On Terror, Anti-Semitism and Identity. "Not many people get to see in their lifetime a civilization coming to pieces before their very eyes, like a star going supernova." Solway, whom some consider Canada's greatest living poet, equally at home amongst both anglophone and francophone...

Paper Photog Quits Over Altered Picture Monday April 9, 2007 11:01 PM By JOHN SEEWER Associated Press Writer TOLEDO, Ohio (AP) - A staff photographer for The Blade who digitally altered a front-page photo has resigned, the newspaper said Monday. Allan Detrich had told Blade editors that he altered a photo of a college baseball team for his personal files and mistakenly sent it to the newspaper. The photo showed Bluffton University players kneeling March 30 at their first game after a bus crash killed five players in Atlanta. Photos of the team in other Ohio newspapers showed the legs...

Scientists: Global Warming Could Wipe Out ¼ Of All Species Local Group: Swift Action by Congress, Pennsylvania Could Help Avert Worst Predicted Impacts POSTED: 12:52 pm EDT April 6, 2007 UPDATED: 1:26 pm EDT April 6, 2007 Approximately 20 to 30 percent of plant and animal species are at risk of extinction if the global average temperature increases by another 2.2 to 4 degrees Fahrenheit, according to a major consensus report released Friday by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The IPCC is a United Nations body charged with assessing the scientific record on global warming. "More droughts, floods, forest...

Rough treatment of war protesters violates rights The worst lesson of the Iraq war has been what it has done to this country. At last Saturday’s march, we met two women who had been attacked by Gathering of the Eagles thugs as they walked by the war memorials. One of the women, aged 65, had her arm wrenched behind her back. The other woman was thrown to the ground and her peace sign taken from her and ripped up; she showed us the bloody gash on her leg. Both reported that the D.C. police stood by and watched, never offering...

Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson wants to impeach President Bush. In arguing that point, he asked Fox News' Bill O'Reilly on Tuesday, "Have you seen the National Intelligence Estimate that was provided in October of 2002, in which the intelligence agency under the State Department said that Iraq was not building up a nuclear capability, that this whole story about the aluminum tubes (reportedly sought by Saddam Hussein in Niger) was completely off base?" I decided to re-read the NIE excerpts that the administration released. What does the report say? "Baghdad has chemical and biological weapons as well as...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 19 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Speaker Nancy Pelosi addressed the National Press Club this morning to deliver Democrats' national Address on the State of Our Union. The new Democratic Congress is committed to working in a bipartisan fashion to make America energy independent, to express the overwhelming opposition of the American people to the President's plan to escalate the war in Iraq, and to take America in a new direction. Below are their remarks as prepared: Speaker Nancy Pelosi: It is an honor to be here with my friend Senate Majority Leader Reid for...

Court Allows Suit Against Air America Tuesday January 2, 5:24 pm ET Bankruptcy Court Allows Lawsuit Against Air America to Proceed WASHINGTON (AP) -- Government contractor CACI International Inc. has won bankruptcy court approval to proceed with its defamation lawsuit against liberal talk radio network Air America and one of its hosts, Randi Rhodes. A federal bankruptcy court in New York ruled Thursday that the case could proceed despite the fact that Air America has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Under federal law, legal proceedings against a company are frozen when the company declares bankruptcy. CACI International asked the...

Yesterday afternoon, after wrapping up our vacation with a couple of pleasant hours in the Elliot Bay Book Company, Sheryl, Madeleine and I started back to our hotel to pick up our bags and head home to LA. We were with our friend and my Pajamas colleague Gerard. He proposed we take a cab; he would drop us by the hotel before continuing to his home. We found one quickly. It was driven by an African guy. We had to instruct him about the location of our hotel; it was new. In the course of this I asked him where...

Mary, 'Palestinian refugee' -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted: December 30, 2006 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Joseph Farah -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- © 2006 WorldNetDaily.com When it comes to the politicization of the Christmas story, I thought I had seen it all. But the London Independent's shameless mischaracterization of Mary, the mother of Jesus, as "a Palestinian refugee" takes the proverbial cake. The story by Johann Hari published Dec. 23 begins: "In two days, a third of humanity will gather to celebrate the birth pains of a Palestinian refugee in Bethlehem – but two millennia later, another mother in another glorified stable in this rubble-strewn, locked down...

The History of a Nationwide Protest Against The Da Vinci CodeSumming it up: Rallies Take Sony to Task for The Da Vinci CodeA Time for Action—The Da Vinci Code RejectedFor all the Stories Telling the History of this Campaign, Click here  Where We Protested:Click the map below for a state-by-state look at the protest effort See the Protest Pictures   Click here for Photo Gallery Read the Blog of the CampaignClick The Da Vinci Code banner below for a two-week day-by-day account of the campaign's most intense days. Da Vinci Code Chronicle: Get the Arguments Against The Da Vinci...

"...The White County school board and the ACLU reportedly have reach a tentative agreement to settle a suit growing out of attempts to for a gay support club at White County High School...The paper, quoting sources close to the matter, says the school board, through its insurance company, has agreed to pay the ACLU $168,000 to cover court costs and another $10,000 to the student plaintiffs...White County must also set up an anti-bullying program at both the high school and the ninth grade academy, according to the report..."

Hillary Clinton has hired an "evangelical consultant” to help woo Christian conservatives in her likely 2008 presidential campaign. The move comes after a similar political operative successfully aided Democratic candidates in several states in the midterm elections. More than one-quarter of the nation’s voters identify themselves as evangelical — a voter bloc that has long been courted by Republicans. Clinton’s new hire is Burns Strider, an evangelical Christian who directs religious outreach for House Democrats and is the lead staffer for the Democrats’ Faith Working Group, headed by incoming Majority Whip James Clyburn of South Carolina. Incoming Speaker Nancy Pelosi...

The most explosive and far-reaching news story of the year has nothing to do with underage pages and a certain Republican ex-Congressman. This story involves ignition in the streets of Baghdad and six immolations that probably never occurred. While Mark Foley took down a congressional majority, the tale of Jamil Hussein may end up permanently damaging the credibility of the world's premier news gathering source, the Associate Press... The story begins on Nov. 24 when Qais al-Bashir, an Iraqi "stringer" working for the AP, wrote a story in which he alleged that Shiite militiamen avenging earlier attacks burned down four...

Another search through different avenues has failed to turn up AP’s source for more than 60 reports of atrocities and murders: The AP (non-)responds and another search comes up empty.

On Bill Maher's Real Time: "There are some, you know there are some anti-Semites in this country, but most of them would vote Republican anyway." You can watch it here. Yeah, because, you know, Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Keith Ellison, Michael Moore and other leading lights of American anti-Semitism are Republicans. Not to mention surveys demonstrating without question that Democrats are more likely to have unsympathetic views of Israel than Republicans. (No, I'm not saying you can't be anti-Israel without being anti-Semitic. But it's a signpost.) This was Chuck Schumer attempting to be jocular. Hardy-har-har.

Hey, everyone. Capone in the Windy City here in an interviewing frenzy, and there’s still more to come. It may surprise you to hear me say this, but the Dixie Chicks documentary SHUT UP & SING might be the hands-down finest doc of the year. Two years ago, I begged people to go see METALLICA: SOME KIND OF MONSTER, a superb film about a band I couldn’t have cared less about before the film in crisis. And everyone who saw it took it to heart. SHUT UP & SING has a similar appeal, with the small exception that this film...