contributions

by Michael Moore
NEW YORK - Welcome, Republicans. You’re proud Americans who love your country. In your own way, you want to make this country a better place. Whatever our differences, you should be commended for that.
But what’s all this talk about New York being enemy territory? Nothing could be further from the truth. We New Yorkers love Republicans. We have a Republican mayor and governor, a death penalty and two nuclear plants within 30 miles of the city.
New York is home to Fox (…)

The text of a speech by California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, as prepared for delivery Tuesday at the Republican National Convention:
Thank you.
What a greeting!
This is like winning an Oscar! ...As if I would know! Speaking of acting, one of my movies was called "True Lies." It’s what the Democrats should have called their convention.
My fellow Americans, this is an amazing moment for me. To think that a once scrawny boy from Austria could grow up to become Governor of California (…)

By ERICA WERNER
NEW YORK - California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (news - web sites) drew on his childhood in Soviet-occupied Austria to praise President Bush (news - web sites)’s war on terror. "Terrorism is more insidious than communism," the bodybuilder-turned-politician said Tuesday in a speech to the Republican convention.
Bush "knows you don’t reason with terrorists. You defeat them. He knows you can’t reason with people blinded by hate," he said in prepared remarks.
Putting his (…)

By Caren Bohan
NASHVILLE, Tenn. One day after saying the war on terror could not be won, President Bush sought on Tuesday to calm a political storm over his comments and said America would prevail.
On the second day of the Republican convention, Bush found himself on the defensive as the campaign of his Democratic challenger, Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, took aim at the president’s comments to a television interviewer suggesting the war on terror was not winnable.
In the interview (…)

By ROBIN TONER and DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK
Republicans approved a platform yesterday that puts the party firmly on the record against legalized abortion, gay marriage and other forms of legal recognition for same-sex couples, reflecting the political clout of social conservatives and setting up a stark contrast with the Democrats for the fall campaign. The platform also hails President Bush’s fight against terrorism, advocates making his tax cuts permanent and calls for the creation of (…)

For the past few years, the mainstream media have marched in lockstep with the Bush administration. Now it’s time to march on the media.
Whether the issue is corporate abuse, the 2000 Florida recount, the Patriot Act or post- 9/11 detentions, the mainstream media have behaved more like lapdogs than watchdogs. When the Bush administration pursued a plan to attack Iraq, the media amplified the charges of the Bush partisans and ignored or downplayed dissenting views.
And it’s important to (…)

by Igor Bukker
How will the Soldier of Fortune look like?
Personal name card of lieutenant colonel Wolfgang Althoff dressed in camouflage reads: "Technical perfection group of infantry division." Senior officer Althof teaches in infantry school in Hammelburg. He has kindly agreed to be our guide and tell us about technological innovations in the sphere of rearmament of Bundeswehr (The German Armed Forces). Germans can fight really well; who knows this better than us?! Today, we will (…)

As the Republican convention kicked off in Madison Square Garden, the party’s influential conservative activists were holed up across the street — with a handful of reporters and a large bag of fortune cookies.
By Barry Yeoman
As the image-conscious Republicans gaveled open their national convention Monday morning — kicking off a four-day festival of faux moderation — the conservative activists who helped shape the party platform were nowhere to be seen at Madison Square Garden. In fact, (…)

EQUATORIAL Guinea has requested international arrest warrants for Mark Thatcher - son of ex-British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher - and other Britons implicated in an alleged coup plot in the oil-rich West African nation, officials said yesterday.
"We have asked for international arrest warrants for all responsible in this coup d’etat," Equatorial Guinean Deputy Prime Minister Ricardo Mangue Obama Nfube said at a Press briefing in Malabo, the country’s capital.
Nfube named 51-year-old (…)

Julian Borger in New York
George Bush admitted yesterday the war on terror could not be won, as the Republican party convention, designed to showcase the president as a resolute leader at a time of national peril, was launched in New York.
The White House rushed to limit the potential damage as Democrats seized on the remarks as a sign of defeatism. A spokesman for the president said he was simply pointing out the unconventional nature of the conflict.
However, the timing of the (…)