Free Republic

Fisking Osama From todays message from Osama. I Hereby Commit "A Fisking". The Transcript taken from the BBC Translation page. My comments are in Bold... My message to you is about the war in Iraq and Afghanistan and the way to end it. Well now, that’s interesting. Saying “way to end it” is significantly different that pounding on your chest and talking about victory. I had not intended to speak to you about this issue, because, for us, this issue is already decided on: diamonds cut diamonds. Diamonds cut diamonds? What the hell does that mean? Either A) We (Bush...

Last week, two state legislators finally introduced the controversial Personal Protection Act, a proposal that would allow citizens to bear a gun, knife or — as ridiculous as it sounds — a billy club in public. The bill’s drafters include every gun-lover’s hero, Sen. Dave Zien, R-Eau Claire, a man with more rifles and shotguns on his office walls than the Madison police, and Rep. Scott Gunderson, R-Waterford, the Assembly’s alleged hunting expert. Undercutting progressive gun-control initiatives, state politicians around the country have bowed to the NRA-rabid right and their backward “more guns, less crime” rhetoric in their absurd belief...

Mayor Bloomberg apologized yesterday to a group of British tourists who were handcuffed and forced to kneel on a Broadway sidewalk after cops swarmed a sightseeing bus - even as another bomb scare rattled downtown Brooklyn. The mayor urged New Yorkers to call authorities if they see something suspicious, but added they should use "common sense" and avoid profiling people like the group of South Asian-looking visitors, who were Sikhs from Britain. "It turned out that these ... people did not present any threat whatsoever," Bloomberg said. "It's a shame, and I certainly apologize on behalf of the City of...

As there was no Free Republic in 1980, I was wondering about Carter's boycott of the 80 Summer Games in Moscow. Agree or disagree? Set aside for a moment that it was Carter. On the plus side, it certainly hurt them economically, and I think his gist was the human rights angle, which certainly has merit. However, I can see it from the point of view that it is just athletics, and we should have let the team go, and try to beat some Rooskie butt. I was only 14 at the time, and certainly not up on international affairs,...

Cops shoot family dog Family upset after incident in backyard By Melissa Pinion-Whitt Staff Writer Thursday, May 26, 2005 - ONTARIO - A police officer investigating a fraud case shot and killed a dog in a residential backyard Wednesday. The 6-year-old boxer named Rocky charged at the officer when he entered the backyard in the 900 block of West G Street around noon. Police were at the home to interview a man suspected of credit card fraud and walked into the backyard because they saw him and suspected he might try to flee. "The officer felt the dog was going...

The “suspicious package” that caused Interstate 75 and Daniels Parkway to be shut for more than an hour Monday was not an explosive pipe bomb — but rather wrapped-up plastic foot-long penis. “Someone took construction-grade plastic, molded it into a penis and wrapped it with duct tape,” said Lee County Sheriff’s Chief Deputy Charles Ferrante. “They wrote ‘Happy Father’s Day’ on the duct tape.” The device was first described by the sheriff’s office as a prosthetic penis. Later, it cops described it as a paper sculpture made to look like a penis. "(The rumor that it was actually a prosthetic...

Jack McConnell has promised to "go further" than the Home Office in outlawing air guns in Scotland. Speaking at his weekly Holyrood question time on Thursday, the first minister said the devolved executive would act "in a measured way" in response to the shooting of a two year-old boy in Glasgow last week. But he pledged to introduce tighter controls on the sale of firearms north of the border if the Westminster government does not do enough to satisfy voters concerns in the wake of Andrew Morton's death. Labour MSP Frank McAveety asked the first minister "what action will be...

The inane and bitter Richard Cohen spewed forth a few days ago and -- shockingly -- he wrote of the Democratic movement rustling through the Mideast: '...something momentous is stirring: democracy, freedom, independence. Something. Or, as an Arab acquaintance just e-mailed me from the region, "I can smell the winds of change in the air wherever I go." ...' A gracious and glowing concession to the Reaganesque moves of the administration? Of course not. '...Given what's happening, it's understandable that many eyes have shifted to Washington with a new sense of appreciation. Could it be that the neocons were right...

At first glance, the term "gun nut" would appear to be nothing more than an ad hominem against the more enthusiastic weapon owners of this country. However, as one reads the literature espoused by gun nut organizations, the reasoning behind this term becomes startlingly clear. Gun nuts are called as such because they are incontrovertibly insane. The gun lobby has adopted the same attitude toward politics as Rush Limbaugh: "Don't confuse me with facts, I've got my mind made up!" Gun nuts are so obsessed with opposing gun control laws that no amount of factual evidence against their position will...

Weiner heckled by his own mom BY MAGGIE HABERMANDAILY NEWS CITY HALL BUREAU Anthony Weiner got a public reminder yesterday that "Mother knows best." As the Democratic mayoral hopeful blasted Mayor Bloomberg's educational policies yesterday, he was quietly corrected by his own mom. After Weiner's first major education speech, the congressman told a West Side Chamber of Commerce breakfast that music, arts and language programs have been "decimated" under Bloomberg. "You basically have one choice in school now in terms of a second language and that's Spanish," said Weiner (D-Queens, Brooklyn), a public school alum. But his mom, Fran, a...

Subject: articles Date: Mon, 01 Nov 2004 22:53:23 +0000 From: bob.wallace@att.net To: Webmaster@freerepublic.com Your site is permanently banned from posting any of my articles from LewRockwell, Strike the Root, Libertarian Enterprise, Price of Liberty, and Endervidualism. Bob Wallace

A thread that I started got pulled without explanation by a Jim Robinson. I'm new here and don't know how to ask the appropriate person (Jim Robinson) why. How do I do that please?

Having family living within minutes of Jimmy Carter's hometown of Plains, Ga., I have long respected the former President as a man of honor and integrity. Regrettably, his recent partisan broadside...

I wrote a brief amazon.com review of Garrison Keillor's "Homegrown Democrat," one of the most vile, bigoted tracts published by a major publisher this year. Apparently the lefties have been voting against my review in droves! Please stop by and vote for it. Muchos Gracias!

Garrison Keillor doesn't beat about the Bush when he explains why he wrote "Homegrown Democrat.'' "I want to strengthen and encourage my fellow Democrats because I think they have been so extensively beaten up on, especially on radio, with Rush Limbaugh and 10,000 imitators,'' Keillor said in an interview before he left town for season-ending performances of his "A Prairie Home Companion" radio show. "There are people in this country who cannot comprehend why anyone would vote for a candidate other than George W. Bush. My book is addressed to that. This is an intuitive book, not a closely reasoned...

Hofstra University's commencement speaker, E.L. Doctorow, didn't break new ground when he used his time at the pulpit to launch a scathing attack on President George W. Bush over the weekend. In fact, many commencement speakers use this kind of forum to explore political issues that seek to poke, prod and reveal changes in society. But where Doctorow crossed the line was using a strident, personal and partisan attack in an environment where families gather to celebrate personal accomplishment and academic excellence. If they wanted to hear the author excoriate the president, they would have probably preferred a venue such...

WASHINGTON - Republican Sen. John McCain on Thursday defended Sen. John Kerry's record on national security, undercutting the Bush-Cheney campaign's latest attacks on the Democratic presidential challenger and frustrating conservatives hoping for a unified front against the Massachusetts senator. "I do not believe that he is, quote, weak on defense," McCain, R-Ariz., said on NBC's Today show. Earlier, on the CBS Early Show, when asked if he agreed with Vice President Dick Cheney's claim that Kerry is a threat to national security, McCain said: "I don't think that. I think that John Kerry is a good and decent man. ....

Fort Bragg soldier flees to Canada Jeremy Hinzman enlisted to make a difference, then learned what being a soldier is really all aboutBy Patrick O'Neill (First of Two Parts) February 11, 2004 NEWS FEATURE On New Year's Eve, Jeremy Hinzman sat in a McDonald's on N.C. 401 in Fuquay-Varina explaining his precarious situation. On Dec. 20, Hinzman, a U.S. Army specialist stationed at Fort Bragg, got the news he had dreaded. His unit--the 504th Brigade, 2nd Battalion--would be shipping out to Iraq shortly after the new year for an indefinite deployment in the war on terrorism. Last year, Hinzman, 25,...

Mon Dec 1, 8:41 PM ET Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean (news - web sites) laughs after seeing a student wearing a Bush-Cheney campaign T-shirt behind him during a taping of 'Hardball,' with host Chris Matthews, Monday, Dec. 1, 2003, at Harvard University's Institute of Politics in Cambridge, Mass. (AP Photo/Elise Amendola)

Rep. LaTourette’s wife says he wants a divorce after admitting to D.C. affair ‘I think Washington corrupts people’ By Albert Eisele The wife of Rep. Steve LaTourette (R-Ohio) said Monday that her husband of 21 years has asked her for a divorce after admitting he is involved with another woman, a Washington lobbyist. “He called me on Friday and said he wants a divorce,” Susan LaTourette said in a telephone call from her workplace near the Cleveland suburb of Madison Village, where she, her husband and their four children live. Susan LaTourette, who said she doesn’t know where her...