Free Republic

Comedian and U.S. Senate candidate Al Franken said in a taping of the "Late Show with David Letterman" on Wednesday that the country needed an "Apollo project" to create more renewable energy. Franken took a poke at President Bush in arguing that the country should be abiding by the Kyoto Protocol, the treaty that requires 35 industrial nations to cut greenhouse gases. The Bush administration argues that Kyoto would hurt the U.S. economy and objects that high-polluting developing nations like China and India are not required to reduce emissions. Franken told Letterman: "One of the dumbest things that this president...

Meat has become a rare commodity in Venezuelan supermarkets. Government price controls have driven all but the least palatable scraps, like chicken feet, from the marketplace. President Hugo Chavez blamed the food supply problems on unscrupulous capitalists. “These greedy pigs insist they must make a profit if they are to be able to serve their customers,” Chavez said. “They defy my decree that need must take precedence over profit. Their pleas that they cannot afford to take the losses will not turn me away from my determination to bring socialism to my country.” “We will confiscate every business, we will...

A BRITISH swimmer who felt the pinch after losing his wallet during a late-night dip in the sea was convinced it had vanished - until it turned up clamped between a lobster's claws. The wallet was recovered by a diver who caught the crustacean red-handed on the sea bed. After picking up the offending lobster, he pried the wallet from the creature's claws and after finding a business card inside, handed it into a hairdressing salon. Swimmer Paul Westlake, 30, from Plymouth on the southwest English coast, received a surprise telephone call from a staff member at the salon he...

SANTA FE -- A stuffed bear is creating quite a stir at the governor's office. A little boy in Maryland had been missing his stuffed bear named Popeye. He and his classmates sent out traveling bears as part of a geography lesson. All the kids got their bears back in May, but 8-year-old Branden Murphy didn't. The last three people to admit seeing the bear were in Oklahoma, Kansas and Arizona. Bear sleuths finally tracked the bear to Gov. Bill Richardson's campaign office. “He wanted to stick around, wanted to see the Rail Runner open,” Joshua McNeil of the governor’s...

FORT PAYNE, Ala. (AP) — Police say a 14-year-old boy is in juvenile detention today after he apparently decided he wanted to fly a Cessna aircraft. Fort Payne Police Chief David Walker said the Rainsville youngster was apparently wandering around the Fort Payne Municipal Airport when he found a set of keys inside the cockpit. The incident happened last night at about 11:20 p.m.. Walker said the boy started the plane's engine and after driving around the runway he took off. Police estimate the teen flew about five minutes and then landed. But he took off again and flew the...

MILWAUKEE -— Racine motorcycle salesman Dave Bink says he will fight a lawsuit against him by the recording industry concerning music he says his daughter downloaded to his computer off the Internet. "I'm going to take it to court, even though I can't afford a lawyer,'' Bink,48, said. "I'll probably get chewed up and spit out. But I just don't think it's fair.'' The recording industry has been searching the Internet for people who used Kazaa and other Internet software to share and download copyrighted songs. It has sued 11,000 users for copyright infringement, including 104 in Wisconsin, including Bink...

Former adviser Berger expects another domestic terrorist attack BY KEN MCLAUGHLIN Knight Ridder Newspapers Posted on Wed, May. 11, 2005 SAN JOSE, Calif. - (KRT) - Two former national security leaders say they are perplexed that suicide bombers have not targeted Americans on U.S. soil. "The threshold of entry into this business of suicide bombs is not very high," said Sandy Berger, national security adviser in President Clinton's second term. "All you need to do is strap something to you and walk into some place where there are a lot of people. It's a little bit of a mystery to...

A teenager had to be rescued from an avalanche of peas after he forced open an industrial container in New Zealand. The 17-year-old, and two friends, used a lighter to burn plastic ties securing the shipping container in Ashburton port, reports Stuff.co.nz. But as the doors opened the teenager became stuck in a chest-high deluge of peas. Police and ambulance were called to the scene and were forced to use a forklift truck to free him. He was sentenced to 200 hours community work and to pay damages of £77, half the value of the peas.

Self-Proclaimed Indian Ward Churchill has relished in his undeserved quasi-celebrity status that was brought on when one of his many anti-American rants was made public. The University of Colorado professor has attempted to play up any angle for publicity from victim to anti-American hero to martyr. But with fame comes scrutiny. And with scrutiny comes meltdown.

Police are searching for a pistol-wielding robber who stole female leather bondage gear and an inflatable sex doll from an erotica store in Milan Wednesday. The clerk at the "Night Shop" speculated that the kinky crook might have been unsatisfied with the payout of his hold-up, which only yielded him about 60 euros ($78). "There was just a little cash," the clerk, who declined to be named, told Reuters by telephone. "Then he took some stuff ... an inflatable doll and a leather outfit for a woman," he said.

An Economy That Works for Everyone Dear Friend, Yesterday, we made a spur-of-the-moment stop at a construction site in Davenport, Iowa, where we spotted a very large Kerry-Edwards banner on display. I had a chance to talk to some of the workers there and to listen to their concerns about the economy. Just an hour later, I spoke at an economic summit with business leaders where I heard CEOs of some of America's largest corporations voicing the same concerns. The day underscored that all of us are in this together. This week, I have been writing to you each day...

Affordable Health Care for Every American Dear Friend, Something very special is happening out here. Yesterday we stopped in Milwaukee and Beloit, Wi., and Davenport and Dubuque, Ia. So much hope has been pinned on this campaign -- we can feel that in the incredible size of the crowds and in the energy and excitement at each campaign stop. Thousands are even lining the sides of the road, waiting hours just to watch our caravan drive by. Nothing like this has ever happened during a presidential campaign as early as August. We have come to listen -- but also to...

The classified reading room is on the 6th floor of the National Archives at College Park complex - the world's largest and most advanced archival facility in the world. The records vaults (each larger than most people's homes) for classified docs are also on that floor, as are the offices for the archivists and technicians who handle them. Employees can go up to that floor, but once there, everything is super-secured. You can't get out of the hall without the proper clearance and magnetic access badge that doubles as your ID badge. At the time, I had a Secret-level...

'THE PASSION' UNLEASHEDRobber turns himself in after watching film Says Gibson movie caused deep stirring, prompting confession Posted: March 18, 200412:11 p.m. Eastern © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com After more than two years as a fugitive from a bank robbery, a Florida man says he turned himself in to police after watching Mel Gibson's film "The Passion of the Christ." James Anderson now admits he grabbed an employee of a Palm Beach Gardens bank in December 2001 and forced tellers to hand over $25,000, the Palm Beach Post reports. The case stumped police, but on Tuesday the 53-year-old man walked into the Palm Beach...

<p>Lucas County Treasurer Ray Kest has spent at least $418 and possibly up to $1,200 in taxpayers’ funds for textbooks for his doctoral classes in economic development at Cleveland State University.</p> <p>The book expenditures were charged against a different county fund than the one Mr. Kest used to pay for $9,600 in tuition bills and for $100-a-night hotel stays when he was too tired to return to Toledo on the night of classes.</p>

Woman shoplifter flees in wheelchair A wheelchair-bound woman didn't let her handicap hinder her escape after she was spotted shoplifting in a western Norwegian town Monday. She simply gave full power to her motorized wheelchair and sped off, crashing through a glass door and literally shaking off pursuers along the way. Shocked witnesses at the Co-op grocery store in Sandnes, outside Stavanger, described the incident as a scene taken right out of a Hollywood action film. The drama began around 1:30pm, when a store security guard spotted the woman tucking food items into a bag. When she later cruised past...

The Bush administration's reported plan to increase American aid to the Palestinian Authority by another $20 million is raising some eyebrows. The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) notes that these intentions are puzzling in light of "the PA's ongoing terrorist war against Israel and the widespread financial corruption and misuse of funds among PA officials." The ZOA notes that the U.S. has provided the PA with $100 million each year since 1994, and that the Bush administration has recently been pressing Congress to approve an additional $50 million this year to repair damaged areas in PA-controlled territories - damages resulting...