Free Republic

Workers Taped Together Explosive Pieces By MATT KELLEY, Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON - Workers at the only U.S. factory for dismantling nuclear weapons risked an explosion this month by taping together broken pieces of high explosive being removed from the plutonium trigger of an old warhead, federal investigators said. The unorthodox handling of the unstable explosive increased the risk that the technicians would drop it and set off a "violent reaction," the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board said Tuesday in a letter to Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham (news - web sites). Such a reaction could have "potentially unacceptable consequences," board...

Have you seen the Dos Equis “Most Interesting Man in the World” ads? Well now check out "Bill White: the Most Mysterious Liberal in the World" ad!

Imagine a hotel room at the Plaza Hotel, shopping at Bloomingdales and dining at the Rainbow Room in Benghazi. Yes Benghazi, after all the most feared leader, Muammar Gaddafi is dead and all is calm after the attack on American interests in 2012. So, never let a good crisis go to waste. Libya had and has a deadly history where some elites had high aspirations for a new Libya. Trey Gowdy, the Chairman of the Benghazi Commission likely has some documented trails on Hillary’s future dreams for Libya, but you don’t and should know even more of the story. Libya,...

The economic prophet who foresaw the Lehman crisis with uncanny accuracy is even more worried about the world's financial system going into 2015. Beggar-thy-neighbour devaluations are spreading to every region. All the major central banks are stoking asset bubbles deliberately to put off the day of reckoning. This time emerging markets have been drawn into the quagmire as well... "We are in a world that is dangerously unanchored," said William White, the Swiss-based chairman of the OECD's Review Committee. "We're seeing true currency wars and everybody is doing it, and I have no idea where this is going to end."...

The insurance commissioner of Washington DC was fired a day after criticizing President Obama's plans to fix problems with the Affordable Care Act, the Washington Post reported -snip- Some regulators were also skeptical, among them DC commissioner William White, the Post said. According to the paper, White issued a statement Thursday saying the president's fix "undercut the purpose of the exchanges." By the next morning, the Post reported, the statement had been removed from the web, and by Friday afternoon, DC officials fired White.

William White predicted the approaching financial crisis years before 2007's subprime meltdown. But central bankers preferred to listen to his great rival Alan Greenspan instead, with devastating consequences for the global economy. William White had a pretty clear idea of what he wanted to do with his life after shedding his pinstriped suit and entering retirement. White, a Canadian, worked for various central banks for 39 years, most recently serving as chief economist for the central bank for all central bankers, the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), headquartered in Basel, Switzerland. Then, after 15 years in the world's most secretive...

he night before her son left for Kuwait, Ruth Aitken argued with him on the telephone for nearly three hours. From her living room in State College, Pa., she told him that a war with Iraq made no sense, that it was really a scuffle over oil. Her son, an Army captain based at Fort Stewart, Ga., countered that America needed to be protected from terrorists. "Mother," he finally told her, "it's my job." The argument — a "major confrontation" in Ms. Aitken's memory — was by no means their first debate over the war, but it was their last....

Miyuki Cawley, the wife of U.S. Marine Staff Sgt James Cawley, holds the flag from her husband's casket in her lap during graveside services at the Roy City Cemetery Thursday, April 10, 2003 in Roy, Utah. Cawley died March 29, 2003 while serving in Iraq and also was a member of the Salt Lake City police force. Bishop Jaime Soto is shown Friday, April 11, 2003, at St. Joaquim Catholic Church in Costa Mesa, Calif., at the funeral of U.S. Marine Cpl. Jose A. Garibay, shown in foreground. Garibay was killed March 23, 2003, after encountering Iraqi troops near...

Names of the four US Marines who died in yesterday's helicopter crash: Maj. Jay Thomas Aubin, 36, of Waterville, Maine Capt. Ryan Anthony Beaupre, 30, of Bloomington, Ill. Cpl. Brian Matthew Kennedy, 25, of Houston, Texas Staff Sgt. Kendall Damon Watersbey, 29, of Baltimore, Md. The Pentagon has just released the names of two more US Marines who were killed in Iraq. I'll post as soon as I find that.

Some of Houston's best political precognitives are hard at work this summer trying to prevent what they foresee as an electoral disaster. Operating out of the Department of Pre-Elections, these agents have detected a frightening scenario in the making: Houstonians wake up after the first round of the city elections in 2003 and find their only remaining choices for mayor are named Orlando and Sylvester. More and more, the future is looking like a reflection of the past, with a likely confrontation between previous runoff losers. In 1991, state Representative Sylvester Turner squeezed ten-year incumbent Kathy Whitmire out of contention....