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At least one title in that USA-PATRIOT act was written by John Kerry, and he contributed to others

Silly me, I thought John Yoo wrote the act.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1615418/p osts

I know, after all the flap about junior's cronyism, and poor hiring practices, it was just so perfect a setup for a joke about reforming the CIA's "retired in place" managers, though it should be noted that most of those managers in question were hired when senior was in charge. Just my luck I attracted the attention of the only SlashDot reader without a sense of humor.

Goss has a tough haul ahead of him, the CIA's worst problem, really, is the competition from StratFor and other private firms (it's a little known, but thriving industry) for top talent. (see this reprint in Free Republic from the New York Times magazine http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/897621/po sts)

The really talented analysts and field personnel can make a lot more money in private industry (last november, one bragged he made $2 million last year in a private 2 person startup he created because he was bored with retirement. I believe him. Information has always been money in Wall Street, and even the leavings are immensly valuable)

Goss is left with a lot of people who dedicated and patriotic enough to stay...and a lot who couldn't cut it. His major challenge will be identifying the deadwood, and attracting new talent.

I wish Goss well...the CIA still has an important role to play, and, despite the current hype, terrorism is only a minor blip on the radar, if that. We still live in world where nation competes against nation, and the CIA's prime mission remains the same, helping America gain whatever advantage it can.

This is going to be slightly off-topic. Fair warning, mods.

You're one of the only active Democrats in power which I don't desperately want to punch in the throat

1. That's because he's actually a Republican, and he's going to be replaced this year by the fed-up netroots. Lieberman was one reason Gore failed to get enough votes to overcome the fraud in 2000. And what power? The Republicans control congress, the judiciary, and the executive branch. What power do Democrats have at all?

2. Fear is what motivates wingnuts. You also like Lieberman because, like yourself, he's a coward. He's afraid of the terrorists, and so, like the Republicans who control the Congress at the moment, he's willing to give away our civil rights to the terrorists in exchange for some perception -- any perception, however false -- of safety. This is really important to understand, everyone. The wingnuts are AFRAID. The Shrub administration runs on fear.

A successful Democratic candidate in 2008 will be one who stands up and says "we are the heirs of Patrick Henry; we will never stand down in the face of a threat to our domestic tranquility. To the terrorists, I say: we will find you and root you out; we will never submit to your tyranny-by-proxy and to your threats. We will not surrender our civil rights."

3. Why do Republicans always resort to violence as the first response to anything? If Karl Rove was a Democrat, some demented wingnut such as yourself would have long since assassinated him. Bush's approval rating is now far below Clinton's approval rating at any time during the Clinton presidency, and yet you don't see anyone firing bullets at the white house.

If there's anyone you should want to "punch in the throat," it should be Osama bin Laden. Where's your enthusiasm for that, where's your passion for finding and killing the real enemies of the state? Why is it all aimlessly pointed at harmless centrist targets like Hillary? Why not Laura Bush, who actually did kill someone (accidentally, mind you, according to the police record)?

4. I don't understand why Hillary sends all you wingnuts into incoherent rage. Discounting the tinfoil hat fairytales Limbaugh spews, she's a great match for the right wing: she has your sense of professional ethics and morality. Loves to pander to the rich and powerful. Loves to be right-wing. Will give away civil rights at the drop of a hat. Loves Iraq as a US colony. About the only thing you shouldn't like about her is her stand on healthcare, but she's flexible like her husband, so I don't think you have anything to worry about. She's hardly the moral beacon that this country will really need after eight years of the corrosive Shrub and his Halliburton-fellating cronies.

Great idea! I think the government should let the markets decide, and stop subsidizing oil companies.

After all, the market has clearly decided that the big oil companies, with their record-breaking profits, are the appropriate market solution to our energy problems. So why is the government interfering with the market and giving away $7 billion to the oil companies?

"spam as a medium"

Already been done.

Extremist groups were hiding messages in jpg's on bad porn sites years ago. You just neede to know what site, what pic, adn how to decrypt it.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/907970/post s

They just put winning elections ahead of national security.

I'm so glad we have those Republicans running things. They've got the good sense to know that the proper priority is to put corporate profits ahead of national security. Just think of the hotels and farm megacorps, how their bottom lines would be absolutely terrorized if the government had actually bothered to close up our borders and keep all the cheap labor out. And those people volunteering to defend our borders like the government should be? Good thing Bush "showed them". Man, the nerve of those people! Forming a well-regulated militia to defend our land from invaders, what were they thinking?

What a delicious troll you are.

Regardless, I am inclined to bite, but only responding to a minor point. And I will cite sources, instead of conjecture.

P.S. That's the explanation why USA has such high crime rate.

Im fairly certain you are not from G.B., but I will use crime statistics from there just as a point of fact.

Please consult this article, from a few years back (outdated, I suppose, could be your argument, but I think it is still valid.)

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/798708/post s
Quote: "The survey, which is likely to prove embarrassing to David Blunkett, the Home Secretary. shows that people are more likely to be mugged, burgled, robbed or assaulted here than in America, Germany, Russia, South Africa or any other of the world's 20 largest nations. Only the Dominican Republic, New Zealand and Finland have higher crime rates than England and Wales."

Lets continue, shall we?
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/cri_bur_percap You should check this site out. Certainly, the US is pretty high in Murders, but is that the only metric of crime? Try Burglaries/Robberies, and other statistics.

I'm not saying that the US has a low crime rate, but I am saying that your claim that we have the "worst" crime rate is a little simplistic and a lot incorrect. Good day.

in the 2000 election. It isn't a stretch to see them cheating the same way again. Just that this tme, like that time, they didn't cheat ENOUGH.

http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3a0c85230a29.ht m

Just in the order that caught my eye...

"[...] Hmmm, the Russians used Progress to dump Mir trash? Dayam, I'm either a chump, or some aspect of the ISS trash needed the Shuttle to handle."

You're a chump, but we love you anyway... :^)

Here's a NASA article. Scroll down to "Who takes out the trash?" You'll like the line about how, when the Shuttle leaves ISS, it "becomes the world's most expensive trash hauler." But read the next paragraph.

That said, there are different sorts of trash. For example, if you look at this article, you'll note that things like coffee cups end up in the Progress. But things like broken exercise equipment end up waiting for the Shuttle.

"My understanding of why the ISS was limited to two people was the garbage problem, or else we could have had a third ISS crewmember doing the useful microgravity experiments you talk about."

Garbage is probably part of it. But it has more to do with consumables like air and water. Less people means fewer resupply missions necessary. Of course, fewer resupply missions means fewer Progress drones to get rid of garbage in.

Well - you folks have just showed your complete ignorance of what is REALLY going on there. Most of the reporting is either happening by folkis who are too chicken to move outside of their hotel rooms OR in doing so, they only focus on the death toll.

Explain the letter from the mayor of an Iraqi city quoted in this link. Don't be afraid that it's on freerepublic - it won't poison you - except you might learn something.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1581867/p osts

Please identify a single "pro-hetero" or "hetero-rights" organization that isn't considered to be hateful/homophobic/other nasty things. There clearly exists a double standard: wearing a "straight pride" t-shirt will get you expelled while a "gay pride" would be defended as free speech. Somebody try forming a WoW "heterosBwe" guild and see how long it takes for you to be warned, if not kicked out of the game entirely.

I believe "Do not photograph under pain of severe penalties" was at one point a standard sign on 1950s era train stations and other installations in the USSR and Warsaw Pact countries.

Yeah, and WTF was Bush doing between Jan 20/01 and Sep 11/01 when the REAL planning was going down??? Read this timeline and try to blame it on the previous administration again, yeah most of the sleepers got in here under Clinton, but the majority of the planning didn't happen until W's time in office. Anyhow, it's all about a break down in communication, and the amount of noise in the channels, that's still a problem to this day. They get moutains of this type of information every day and if we were to head for the hills every time Chicken Little claimed the sky was falling, nothing would get done around here. The point isn't that we NEED MORE information, it's that we NEED BETTER FILTERS on our information.

He probably meant England as a whole.

The page is OK -- it loads super-fucking-fast, works with lynx.

It is ugly. I think that this website, which has similar pages, looks a lot better (never mind the content -- it is neocon):

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/browse

Craigslist will kill E-bay, eventually.

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2005/12/18/2214 52.shtml http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1553101/p osts

I'm going to assume you actually aren't aware of what's going on, and that you're not deliberately trying to pretend, and supply you with some reading material. Please consider the following articles in support of my statements:

Let's start with the no-fly list:

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2003/07/25/no_fl y/index_np.html
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2002/ 09/27/MNNOFLY.TMP&nl=top
http://www.globenet.free-online.co.uk/reports/prot estersdetained.htm
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/957183/po sts

This one's just fun: they barred Ted Kennedy (the senator):
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/08/19/senator_on _terror_watch/

And this one just basically says the No-Fly list is managed rather stupidly:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/04/07/aclu-suit/

Now lets look at the Patriot act:

First, this google search returns almost 3 million hits on patriot act abuses:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22Patriot+Ac t%22+abuses&btnG=Google+Search

Here's a detailed analysis by the ACLU about what's wrong with the Patriot Act:
http://www.aclu.org//safefree/general/17203leg2003 0214.html

Here's a Register article about how the Patriot Act isn't being used against terrorists, but rather regular criminals (a group for which the act was not meant to be used, I'd consider that an abuse), side-stepping their civil liberties:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/05/22/us_antiter ror_law_used_against/

Here's an article about an interesting talk that went on at Harvard about the subject:
http://www.pbs.org/weta/washingtonweek/voices/2003 10/1010abuses.html

Here's a fun reprint of a Village Voice article about the NYPD seeking to spy on protestors and such:
http://www.refuseandresist.org/police_state/art.ph p?aid=619

I could go on and on, but I think I've made my point. The Patriot Act should be quietly killed off and our civil liberties re-affirmed.

Enjoy your readings...

The missing board from the Loral Intelsat satellite is no mystery. It quickly became obvious that Chinese engineers removed the special electronics and kept the board for examination. The stolen Loral electronics consist of radiation hardened, encrypted telemetry chips, stored in a secure flight control box similar to those found on airliners. The NSA changed all U.S. satellite codes as a result of the stolen Loral chips, costing American taxpayers millions of dollars.

When quoting, please provide a link so I can look into the context and background information. I know it's difficult for a conservative as they are naturally disinclined to provide context and background information beyond that provided by the Drudge Report.

For the record, I think the Clinton approval was a bad idea, but not disastrous as you would imply. I think the whole "free trade China love" period that continues to this day is a REALLY BAD idea. I thought the Bush administrations approval to allow the Chinese military to buy out Magnaquench (http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/962493/posts -- look I even sourced a right wing bulliten board on this one) was a remarkeably BAD IDEA!!!!

The trends of outsourcing and selling out to the Chinese run deep through the Democratic and Republican parties (don't let Sen. Bayh's protests on Magnaquench fool you. He's a free trader in the DLC. The only reason he opposed the Magnaquench deal is it was a constituent issue). There are still patriots on BOTH sides of the isle, but unfortunately they do do not have control of their respective parties. The globalists are in charge now (including the Clintons and the Bush clan).

You Amuricans still have an unfiltered Internet (except that you might not write "anal" or "Lolita" on MSN Spaces, just like the Chinese may not write "democracy" or "freedom on MSN Spaces)

Corporations can choose to block what they choose - its called a free market. You can write it, you just won't get results. Deal with it.

but it really was the Bush administration who initiated the SURVEILLANCE trend, after the unfortunate little intermezzo in New York in 2001.

No, it started with Carter back in the 70's http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1543688/p osts. And then Clinton later instated similar laws allowing not only wiretaps but physical search and seizure http://www.drudgereport.com/flash8.htm.

-everphilski-

Don't bother using encrypted emails, because if you're not sending anything incriminating, THERE'S NO NEED.

I love this type of thinking.

Check out the 60 minutes inteview on Echelon:

KROFT: (Voiceover) Is it possible for people like you and I, innocent civilians, to be targeted by Echelon?

Mr. FROST: Not only possible, not only probable, but factual. While I was at CSE, a classic example: A lady had been to a school play the night before, and her son was in the school play and she thought he did a--a lousy job. Next morning, she was talking on the telephone to her friend, and she said to her friend something like this, 'Oh, Danny really bombed last night,' just like that. The computer spit that conversation out. The analyst that was looking at it was not too sure about what the conversation w--was referring to, so erring on the side of caution, he listed that lady and her phone number in the database as a possible terrorist.

KROFT: This is not urban legend you're talking about. This actually happened?

Mr. FROST: Factual. Absolutely fact. No legend here.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1543347/p osts

Here's that in their business model.

• Millions of Americans still think that Iraq had something to do with 911.

• Millions also think that Bush is a good President and that he's "protecting" America by invoking a conventional or perpetual WWIII.

• 2.(a) IN GENERAL- That the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons. [My emphasis]

Critical thinking isn't a fact of life 'round these parts anymore.

With the military Considering Anti-war protest groups a security threat, you're taking a big chance that they won't invent something to take you in on, using the logic that 'if you weren't doing anything wrong, you would have nothing to hide.'

And yes, an anti-war group can be a security threat. Too many of these "peacenicks" have (and even wear in public!) Che Guevarra T-shirts and other Commie symbols, and openly support such "peaceful folks" as Fidel Castro, FARC, Shining Path, and the Nepalese insurgents. These organizations wage war against their countries' governments, and ours opposes them.

It is perfectly logical to prepare for their supporters trying to attack our interests. Disbanding/banning/incarcerating them would violate the Constitution, but being prepared seems fine to me.

The Chinese government, in particular, sees its reliance on Microsoft as a potential threat. Conspiracy buffs believe certain patches in the Windows code might give U.S. authorities the power to access Chinese networks and disable them, possibly during a war over Taiwan.

Fukcing terrorists. But thats also what you get for being soft on terrorists.

Allow me to quote Dr. Mirecki verbaitum: "I don't think most Catholics really know what they are supposed to believe, they just go home and use condoms and some of them beat their wives and husbands." (Found at http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1531697/p osts) Could the problem perhaps be less a matter of him loudly disagreeing with the teaching of pseudoscience than a matter of him just being loudly disagreeable? If he had made a similar statement about people of Islamic, Jewish, Hindu, or Buddhist faith I doubt he would have many defenders. Let's recognize this for the straw-man it is.

Dude, you're describing the situation as it existed circa 1990, or even 1980. But it's 2005 now [almost 2006 - yikes!], and everything you've foreseen has come to pass.

Compare the story of Mr. Charles "Roscoe" Heaton:

Ex-con. Emory grad. Would you hire him?
Sunday, November 27, 2005

He thought he had paid his debt to society by serving two years in prison. He thought his accomplishments since would open doors to a successful future. But nine years after his release, Roscoe has found he's a marked man. His criminal record may be a life sentence...

http://www.ajc.com/sunday/content/epaper/editions/ sunday/news_34981681f67ca08200e2.html

If it is in Limbo then it is likely to gone for good. The Vatican seems to have abolished it.

So are Floridians. The state set up the Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund so that people can buy hurricane insurance. This state-created fund reimburses insurers for losses.

The pattern of lots of people living in unsafe areas is actually widespread in this country. And the pattern of the governments stepping in to help those people after or in preparation for a tragedy is also common, even tragedies that are _totally_ foreseeable.

The condition of New Orleans and its levees had much to do with federal projects diverting silt from the Mississippi away from the delta, both sinking the city further by receding the delta itself and destroying protective wetlands (see http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/581820/po sts and the great editorial at http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/frontpage/index.ssf?/ base/news-4/1132475704190650.xml). These projects benefitted upriver development and offshore drilling to New Orleans' detriment.

Your sanctiomny was misplaced.

Great work taking the Pelosi quote out of context. Her comment, although arguably erroneous, was on whether congress had the power to in effect "overturn" Kelo. (She was arguing that they didn't) It was not praising the decision necessarily. Here's a little more detail from some slightly more honest Libertarians.

Furthermore, I don't really see why you all hate Kelo so much. Libertarians are all for giving power to State and Local Governement until the local government does something they don't like then they want to Federal government to get involved.

Prove it. Mods, this parent is seriously flamebait. I could say the exact same thing about sites like FreeRepublic (in fact, I've seen many calls to violence over there, just not towards George/Dick).

Jihad at San Francisco State

CU prof's essay sparks dispute - Prof Ward Churchill says 9/11 victims were not innocent people

USF Professor Sami Al-Arian calls for "Death of Israel" and "Damn America"

University of New Mexico Professor Richard Berthold addressed the terrorist attacks in his morning class on Western Civilization, remarking, "Anyone who can bomb the Pentagon has my vote

US Universities have been especially anti-American since the '60s.
Of course, they don't mind that the government helps to pay their salaries.

you'll probably need some additional energy to power the communication equipment. A solar-powered plane would already have solar cells for that.

Nuclear power plants are far, far less polluting than coal-fired plants, and they conveniently store *all* of their pollution in spent fuel rods rather than tossing it willy-nilly into the atmosphere.

And those fuel rods still need to be stored somewhere, millions of years and not the 10,000 the government says, before they aren't dangerous. And disposal of them is just one of the ways the government subsidizes the nuclear power industry.

Hydropower is even less polluting than that, but it commits the blaspheming act of *altering the environment to satisfy human needs*, an unforgivable crime in environmental circles.

Hydro power can does do that but it also can do much more. Because of China's Three River Gorge Dam millions are being forcibly relocated. Dam projects in India are forcing others to be relocated as well. The World Bank which finances or financed many dams has found that they can have significant social impacts. Dams may provide benefits, the WB admits however without proper provisions being made, these dams can also cause considerable damage to upstream and downstream ecosystems.

Environmentalists go on and on about "alternative" sources of energy, conveniently ignoring the fact that it isn't possible to power the entire economy on solar or wind, nor is it practical in many places

You're right, there are places solar or wind isn't possible but where one isn't the other may be. Where neither are feasible there are other possibilities, clean coal perhaps being one. Biodiesel and hydrogen may work as well. While it may be some years before hydrogen and fuel cells are ready, biodiesel is here now. Rudolph Diesel designed his diesel engine to run on most any vegetable and seed oil. On his Iron Mountain Estate Henry Ford designed and built a car that both used hemp in it's construction and was fueled by methanol made from hemp.

solar cells have an extremely dirty and poisonous manufacturing process, something greenies never seem to think is worth mentioning

This is something I've been thinking about for some tyme, but I have yet to come to any conclusion. Maybe the waste from the manufacture of PV cells can be used as input for another manufacturer.

Hell, even wind power is being blasted by some environmentalists because wind farms occasionally kill birds.

Older wind genies earned the rep for killing birds, however many of those spun relatively fast whereas new wind genie designs are proving to generate as much power at slower blade speeds than older ones and at slower speeds birds aren't at as high a risk of being killed. Other measures are being taken to reduce the hazzard to birds as well. There's also the NAMBY factor.

And if there were a true 'free market' in power generation, the plants would be even cheaper. And less safe, as well. But certainly cheaper than an equal power production capacity in gas, oil, or coal. Transportation savings alone would be enormous.

Even if they do prove safer, the new designs may not necessarily be cheaper. By the reckoning of the International Energy Agency (IEA), which has just produced a new analysis of the economics of nuclear power*, the capital cost for today's nuclear designs runs at about $2,000 per kW, against about $1,200 per kW for coal and just $500 per kW for a combined-cycle gas plant. History also suggests that not everything goes as planned when turning clever paper designs into real-life nuclear plants. What is more, the debts of any new plants, unlike the debts of existing plants, will not be written off. In fact, the t

Quite right, they shouldn't. If they accidentally overheard my conversation without intending to, they need not tell me so as long as they destroy the data. Why? Beacuse I was not harmed in any way and I do not need to know that FBI is performing wiretaps somewhere in my area. Maybe they meant to wiretap my neighbor (and they have the warrants and believe he is, say, a serial killer), but telling me about their accidental wiretapping would make me tell my neighbor about this, just as something interesting that happenned to me, and that would tip him off.

If you don't know about the wiretap how do you even know they destroyed the data and it didn't end up in a database? You may not find out until years later when applying for a job or loan. More and more businesses and loaners are not only checking credit worthiness but also for any criminal records and just having your name appear in some database somewhere, even if you don't know about it or it's a mistake, can have the employer or loaner deny your application. Even if you're innocent and/or don't know about any data it's existence could mess up your life. An example of how data can affect someone's life, take a look at the Do Not Fly lists, both Cat Stevens and Ted Kennedy were barred from flying. Even a senator had trouble getting his name off a "Do Not Fly" list. I trust government less than the distance I can throw it.

Quite right, they shouldn't. If they accidentally overheard my conversation without intending to, they need not tell me so as long as they destroy the data. Why? Beacuse I was not harmed in any way and I do not need to know that FBI is performing wiretaps somewhere in my area. Maybe they meant to wiretap my neighbor (and they have the warrants and believe he is, say, a serial killer), but telling me about their accidental wiretapping would make me tell my neighbor about this, just as something interesting that happenned to me, and that would tip him off.

If you don't know about the wiretap how do you even know they destroyed the data and it didn't end up in a database? You may not find out until years later when applying for a job or loan. More and more businesses and loaners are not only checking credit worthiness but also for any criminal records and just having your name appear in some database somewhere, even if you don't know about it or it's a mistake, can have the employer or loaner deny your application. Even if you're innocent and/or don't know about any data it's existence could mess up your life. An example of how data can affect someone's life, take a look at the Do Not Fly lists, both Cat Stevens and Ted Kennedy were barred from flying. Even a senator had trouble getting his name off a "Do Not Fly" list. I trust government less than the distance I can throw it.

Try http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/770788/post s/
I don't know if this was the study he was intending to quote, but it is on the subject.

You might be interested to read this story and the thread that ensued [with more than 1200 replies and more than 15,000 views]:

Woman in power is powerless when it comes to meeting men

You might be interested to read this story and the thread that ensued [with more than 1200 replies and more than 15,000 views]:

Woman in power is powerless when it comes to meeting men

You might be interested to read this story and the thread that ensued [with more than 1200 replies and more than 15,000 views]:

Woman in power is powerless when it comes to meeting men

Try these sites:

http://www.newsmakingnews.com/sexandcapitol7,18,01 .htm#article2

(full text of many news articles)

http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a388cd49f5ce8.ht m#article19

(Sex, Lies, Videotape, Teenagers, Drugs, Blackmail, and Death)

To see the entire "Conspiracy of Silence" documentary:

http://www.rense.com/general61/appallingconspiracy of.htm

#2 Don't use google

#3 ditto Microsoft

"What's actually profane is a company that built its future on the freedom provided by the American system helping a repressive regime censor such ideas." - http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1486268/p osts

I have seen articles in quite a few papers, as well as reports on the BBC, CBC, and NPR all stating that the number of cat 4 and 5 hurricanes has nearly doubled in the last 30 years due to rising water temperatures.

I realize it's a bit passe but you might try reading the second article linked to in the blurb for a good refutation for that. As seems to be the case very often, those pushing the global warming stuff seem to pick time periods for their studies based on what will disinclude data which might point to a natural cycle.
In the linked article, they show the data for the previous 25 years as well as the data from the last 30. Unsuprisingly, when the data from the previous 25 years is graphed next to the data from the last 30, the graph looks a lot more like a snapshot from a long cycle than it does a trend.

Well, lets see. Communism, the ultimate form of liberalism, was responsible for about a million dead. :)

But useless rhetoric aside, I assume that this large amounts of people you are implying refers to the Iraq war? I think it is only fair to point out that half a million died in Iraq under UN sanctions that the liberals supported and the conservatives wanted to do away with. In fact, Madeline Albright was quoted as saying that the price of five hundred thousand dead from disease and starvation (arguably the worst ways that somebody can die) was worth it for temporary peace.

http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1084

(oh and by the way, when CNN aired this interview with her, they edited out that portion of it, though I am uncertain of the exact reason why, but I think I have a good idea)

If you care to notice, the death rate in Iraq is now lower now than before the Iraq war, as well as people there now actually have access to large quantities of fresh water, food, and education whereas they didn't before. So if anything it seems to me that we are saving large amounts of people as well as improving their overall quality of life.

Also, for what it is worth (kind of off scope of the discussion,) many top democrats were supportive of the war prior to it actually happening. In fact, in many cases they were more vocal about Saddam having WMD's than Bush was. See a few quotes from them below:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1007910/p osts

Are abortion clinic bombings not counting as a form of protest?

No it is not, that is called terrorism and not protest (huge difference,) and those people are called fundamentalist terrorists, not conservatives, and we treat them just like we treat e.g. islamic terrorists (if not worse actually, because there's no ACLU like organization to defend their criminal activity.) Even the most hated (by liberals) conservative pundits such as Bush, O'reilly, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, etc will tell you the same thing and nobody in the Republican party endorses this at all.

These extremists don't even call themselves conservatives. In fact, groups like them and the KKK tend to hate the Republican party more than they hate the Democratic party. (Actually it is worth noting that the KKK started from the democratic party. In fact there are a few democrats currently in office, such as senator Robert Byrd, that are ex-clansmen.)

Is invading a country without the support of the world humble or putting yourself above them?

I don't like to answer a question with a question, but who is the world exactly? The US coalition in Iraq is officially backed by 30 other nations, and passively supported by approximately another 15. The "world" argument I typically see is only represented by the UN's voice. However, the UN's sanctions were what were responsible for the half million deaths in Iraq. Even the Clinton administration was getting on them about this, and he even knew that something needed to be done about Saddam very soon. George Bush knowing this decided to kill three birds with one stone, the third bird being that we need a powerful ally for a foothold in the middle east to better fight the war on terror. Iraq has a huge potential of being an economic superpower just because of it's oil reserves, so when people say this war is about oil, they are technically correct, but not in the sense that they otherwise believe.

But that aside, even if the entire world was against it, that doesn't mean they are correct. You should know that democracy itself isn't about majority rule, but rather the balance of power of all parties involved. Our constitution is designed exactly to this effect. FWIW, when Abraham Lincoln declared an end to s

hmm i thought i read this same comment posted some where else earlier today ;)

The current forecasts of several serious astrophysics forecasters, based on several current solar and astrophysical phenomena, is that substantial cooling is likely over the next 10-40 years, over the log(CO2) forcing. The Irkutsk crowd http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/981669/po sts, Corbyn http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/7.02/weather_pr .htmland Landscheidt http://mitosyfraudes.8k.com/Calen/Landscheidt-1.ht mlstate this quite emphatically in different ways. Stay tuned.

Maybe back to 70s (worried about global cooling and bell bottoms again). Guess the warming was nice while it lasted...

If thats the Free Republic I think you're writing of, it's actually .com, http://www.freerepublic.com/

E=mc2 is a "sexed equation". Newton's Principia (a "rape manual"):

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1076200/p osts

Thanks God I went to college a long time ago.

For what it's worth, i think this is called an excerpt. It is perfectly legal. See the decision against FR and how people on FR get around that now.

Their political leader is the smartest man since Einstein. His grand unified field theory will be presented at Evil Genius Con 2006, with a working Moon phaser proof of concept, shortly after he wins the Super Bowl and defeats Xur and the Ko-Dan Armada.