Free Republic

There's more than one bird flu, experts warn 16:13 03 May 2006 NewScientist.com news service Shaoni Bhattacharya, Singapore The deadly H5N1 bird flu which is currently sweeping across the globe is not the only potential candidate virus for the next human flu pandemic strain, experts have warned. At an international meeting of top scientists and policymakers in Singapore on Wednesday, several other avian flu viruses were highlighted. Hiroshi Kida, at Hokkaido University in Sapporo, Japan, told New Scientist he was concerned that only the H5N1 virus was being considered in terms of producing a human vaccine. “There are other possibilities,”...

'There's no such thing as the United Nations' (Filed: 19/03/2005) The wit and wisdom of John Bolton, President George W Bush's nominee for the job of US ambassador to the UN: "There is no such thing as the United Nations." —On the United Nations itself"If you lost 10 storeys, it wouldn't make a bit of difference." —On UN headquarters in New York"If I were redoing the Security Council, I'd have one permanent member: the United States." —On the UN Security Council"A gleam in one beholder's eye but looks like flat-out aggression to somebody else." —On humanitarian intervention"It is a big...

SUMMARY: Registration fee rankles some medical marijuana proponents, but hardly is unreasonable. Adam Smith famously said there's no free lunch, meaning everything costs something. Were he in Montana today, Smith might add that there's no free pot, either. A story first published in the Dec. 22 Missoulian and since found careening around the world through the Internet quoted a backer of Montana's new medical marijuana law complaining about the registration fee for people signing up to make use of marijuana to alleviate pain and other symptoms from serious illness. That fee is $200. "Extortion," declares one participant in the marijuana.com...

Woman Sues Over Condom Found in Soup Irvine restaurant's lawyer says it's a mystery how the rolled-up item got into the chowder. By Jeff Gottlieb, Times Staff Writer An Orange County woman is suing an Irvine restaurant, saying she found a condom in her clam chowder. Laila Sultan, 48, said she was eating at McCormick & Schmick's Seafood Restaurant on Feb. 26, 2002, when something rubbery stuck to her tooth. "We said, 'Of course. You're chewing on a clam,' " said Paula Wild, one of three friends with her — all eating clam chowder, and all of whom have joined...