Free Republic

But she has gone too far -- too much disturbing stuff, some of it shocking in its coarseness. For instance, she added the coy "As far as I know" to her "60 Minutes" statement that Obama is not a Muslim. More important, she offered a weak and disingenuous defense of her Senate vote in support of going to war in Iraq. But more recently came her stunning Moses Moment, that polygraph buster about being under sniper fire in Bosnia. It was a defining time in her campaign, not because she exaggerated or lied -- call it what you want --...

Whether it's wildfires in the West, or floods in Florida, the consequences of ill-conceived land-use policy is wreaking havoc in the lives of too many citizens. Until the late 1900s, land-use policies were based on principles that included free enterprise, multiple use of public lands, and private-property rights. These principles have given way, first to what has been loosely called "conservation" principles and, more recently, to what's called "sustainable development." This "wrenching transformation," as Al Gore described it in "Earth in the Balance," has taken land-use policy decisions away from local elected officials, and empowered a hierarchy of bureaucrats, and...