Free Republic

An appellate court has upheld a $156 million judgment against two organizations found to have provided financial support to Hamas and sent the claim against a third back to district court for a new trial. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals issued a ruling Wednesday that eliminated the distinction between supporting the violent and social wings of a terrorist group. "If you give money to an organization that you know to be engaged in terrorism, the fact that you earmark it for the organization's nonterrorist activities does not get you off the liability hook," Judge Richard Posner wrote for the...

Male and female students can room together without parents' permissionThe University of Chicago, proud home of Nobel laureates, will undertake a bold experiment in chemistry: coed dorm rooms. The pilot program allowing male and female students to sleep in the same room will start next month. It's not intended for romantic couples, but they won't be excluded, because the university won't ask students why they want to live together. The proposal was a student-led initiative, university officials said. Coed dorm rooms are allowed at more than 30 campuses nationwide, but they have generally been socially liberal institutions . . ....

CHICAGO - Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama held his daughters' hands when he escorted them to their first day of school. The girls arrived at the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools Monday in a five-SUV motorcade after a short drive from their South Side home.

At the University of Chicago no man looms larger than Milton Friedman, the Nobel laureate who led the “Chicago school” of economics and who died in 2006. When the university announced plans for a $200m economics institute in May, it seemed fitting that the centre should be named after him. But a small war broke out. On June 6th more than 100 faculty members wrote to the university’s president to protest against the institute. Armed with academia’s common weapons, indignation and verbosity, they said they were all “disturbed by the ideological and disciplinary preference implied by the university’s massive support...

There is a huge blogswarm going on about this photo, from Chicago Magazine, of Obama's unrepentant terrorist associate, Bill Ayers stomping on the American flag. The photo was taken in 2001, the same time Obama served on the Woods Fund Board with Ayers. This was also the same time that Ayers donated to Obama's campaign. ... many political bloggers are saying it is long past due for Obama to disown his association with this controversial radical. ... It's worthy of recycling this to further probe into Obama's judgment, the one thing he says he should be measured by.

A 2001 photo of William Ayers, an associate of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, shows the former terrorist stepping on an American flag. The photo was taken to promote Ayers’s book, “Fugitive Days” and published by Chicago Mag for their August 2001 issue. As Obama has gained national prominence as a Democratic presidential contender media figures have questioned his relationship with Ayers. Ayers once hosted a fundraiser for Obama and the two have served together on the board of a philanthropic organization. In a nationally televised debate Obama compared his friendship with Ayers to that of conservative Republican Sen. Tom...

During the April 16 debate between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, moderator George Stephanopoulos brought up “a gentleman named William Ayers,” who “was part of the Weather Underground in the 1970s. They bombed the Pentagon, the Capitol, and other buildings. He’s never apologized for that.” Stephanopoulos then asked Obama to explain his relationship with Ayers. Obama’s answer: “The notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was eight years old, somehow reflects on me and my values, doesn’t make much sense, George.” Obama was indeed only eight in...

The sordid tale now making the rounds in the "mainstream" press of a rogue Pentagon intelligence operation has all the elements of an urban legend: heavy breathing, a secret basement office "down by the ramp" and government officials who form a hidden alliance based on long-ago ties to an obscure but influential university guru. Only the work of a few good men with the courage to face up to this "cabal" - and a few crusader-journalists to help them - can make the demons scatter and scare the dark ones into the light. Or so the story goes on those...

The White House on Friday nominated Randall S. Kroszner, a conservative economics professor from the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business, to fill one of two vacancies on the seven-member Federal Reserve Board of Governors. --snip-- "We're on different sides of the aisle, but he's extremely intelligent," said Goolsbee. "He's one of the two or three people in the world you'd turn to on banking regulation. I think any economist who knows Randy would say `Wow, what a good choice.'" --snip-- Kashyap said Kroszner has a libertarian bent when it comes to issues like taxation and entitlement programs. He...

<p>Kathy Boudin, carrying roses she was given after her mother died, walks out of a Westchester prison yesterday (above). She was jailed 22 years ago for her role in the infamous Brinks heist that left two cops and a guard dead.</p>

<p>The anonymous posters began to speckle the campus of St. Lawrence University in upstate New York last month. They carried an eye-grabbing message--"Republicans: The Other White Meat."</p> <p>Elizabeth Wardell, a senior, thought she knew who was responsible for their appearance: a certain assistant professor with the reputation of a provocateur. Surfing around her school's Web site, she landed on the sociology department's homepage and read a paragraph about Robert J. Torres. Then she clicked on his name and was transported to his personal blog. There, Ms. Wardell--who is president of the local College Republicans--discovered an entry headlined "Fascist, Racist College Republicans."</p>