Free Republic

I said here last night that the California GOP audience cheering the announcement that Texas has executed 234 condemned murderers under Rick Perry was a vile, repulsive thing. Even when I was for capital punishment, I believed this. Justice may require execution, but we should never rejoice in taking the life of another human being. At best, capital punishment is a necessary evil. I quit believing in capital punishment when I became convinced that the state is not trustworthy to use this power responsibly. It happened about 10 years ago, when it emerged that a forensic scientist in Oklahoma whose...

The 2004 execution of Cameron Todd Willingham in Texas remains one of the most controversial death penalty cases in modern U.S. history, with forensic evidence that indicates an innocent man was put to death. Now, activists in Austin would like to make Mr. Willingham Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s running mate. With Mr. Perry surging to front-runner status in the Republican primary race, a slew of activities are planned to raise the profile of the Willingham case, and the aftermath that directly involved Mr. Perry. Anti-death penalty activists that run Cameron Todd Willingham website are recruiting activists in Iowa and New...

See scanned documents detailing the Elijah Willingham Sexual Harassment Claim (Google Documents): https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0B0Q-lAhWOW_WMTQxYTU3NTYtZWE5ZS00OWM1LWI0Y2YtZmJiZjZmZDdhYTEw&hl=en_US

ALBANY -- The husband of County Legislator Wanda Willingham was paid more than $45,000 over three years by the county Social Services Department to care for the couple's grandchildren through a program that helps working mothers. But, while it is legal, the arrangement has raised eyebrows. Willingham is chairwoman of the Legislature's Social Services Committee, which in December approved an annual payment of $233,000 from the county to the Capital District Child Care Council. The council provides registration, training, investigations and approves child care providers for county Social Services. Elijah Willingham, the lawmaker's husband, was approved by the council and...

Police also say Mrs. Willingham called 911 before she was killed but they aren't releasing any information about that call. When deputies arrived at the house, the couple was dead. "We're looking at that, we've got it recorded and detectives are reviewing it," said Sheriff Arnott.

In Texas, they're conducting the first state-sponsored review of a capital punishment case. Specifically, they're looking into the case of Cameron Todd Willingham, who was convicted and executed for setting a house fire that killed his three children. An expert on fire science says there was "no basis" to rule the fire an arson, the Chicago Tribune reports. The state fire marshal on the case, Beyler concluded in his report, had "limited understanding" of fire science. The fire marshal "seems to be wholly without any realistic understanding of fires and how fire injuries are created," he wrote. The marshal's findings,...

<p>When I saw the final score of the Notre Dame-USC game, something about it caught my eye. It wasn’t that USC demolished the Irish. The score itself — 38-0 — looked familiar.</p> <p>So I did some checking and found that not only did Notre Dame lose to Michigan by that same 38-0 score last month, it also lost to Michigan 38-0 under Tyrone Willingham.</p>

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- The assistant to Notre Dame's president shaved her head to protest Tyrone Willingham's firing as football coach, saying she will remain bald until the Irish win a national championship. "Because when we do, that will be justification for some people of why we fired Tyrone Willingham," Chandra Johnson said. "Not for me, but for some people." Johnson, 50, assistant to the Rev. Edward A. Malloy, Notre Dame's president, said she shaved her head last Saturday. Johnson, the school's highest-profile black administrator, told the South Bend Tribune she was shocked at the firing of Willingham _ the...

Fearing shares will be worthless, they're playing hardball with managementLast month, when the formerly bankrupt Kmart bought Sears, one group of investors was paying particularly close attention. They are the stockholders of Atlanta merchant energy company Mirant, in Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection since July 2003. In Kmart's rags-to-riches, back-from-bankruptcy tale, Mirant's stockholders saw a hint of what might be lying in wait for them. Nothing. The retailer's story line goes like this: A hedge fund billionaire who bought large amounts of Kmart's debt becomes controlling owner of its new post-bankruptcy stock. He unloads stores and people, pumping billions into the...

If you believe in equal opportunity in sport, Tuesday might have been the saddest day in the history of American college football. I was in a state of disbelief when Dr. Fritz Polite, my colleague at the University of Central Florida, emailed me that Ty Willingham had been fired from the University of Notre Dame. I thought he was joking. Dr. Polite knows how closely I follow the situation of the dearth of African-American head coaches in Division I-A football. I have been so involved that when Fitz Hill resigned from San Jose State just over a week ago, we...

Call For Change Rally on Campus at 5:30 at the Golden Dome. AP should be there. We want Ty Willingham (head coach) amd Athletic Director Kevin White FIRED. Tell all you know that the students are in revolt for their beloved Irish.

PALM SPRINGS, Calif. - Noble Willingham, who worked steadily as a supporting actor over the last 30 years and left his role as a saloon owner on the series "Walker, Texas Ranger" to run for Congress, has died. He was 72. Willingham died Saturday at his Palm Springs home, his manager, Sandy Josephs, said Tuesday. He died of natural causes, according to the Riverside County coroner's office. He played barkeep C.D. Parker on "Walker, Texas Ranger" from 1993-99. His character was a former Texas Ranger who provided advice on cases to Ranger Cord Walker, played by series star Chuck Norris....

******Excerpt from the South Bend Tribune January 3, 2017 STUNNING EVENTS AT NOTRE DAME South Bend (AP) – In a dramatic turn of events today, Notre Dame Deity Tyrone Willingham unexpectedly resigned his Head Coaching duties, accepting a demotion to become the Commissioner of the College Football Association. The career change is seen by most objective observers as a significant step down from the lofty heights the coach has ascended to as the Fighting Irish’s field general over the last 15 years. Inside sources have revealed that the university insisted that Willingham, the most successful head coach in Notre Dame’s...

********Satire********* SOUTH BEND, IN - September 21 (AP) The decades-long game of cat and mouse between the University of Notre Dame and the Big Ten Conference took a surprising turn today as Notre Dame was offered and declined the Big Ten football championship. Reading from a prepared statement, Big Ten Conference Commissioner Jim Delaney (of the Ulster Delaneys) indicated that at the close of play on Saturday conference athletic directors met by emergency teleconference and determined that the best path to national respectability would be to award the championship to the Irish, (4-0), who have eliminated half of the top...