Free Republic

Scientists have discovered 100 million-year-old regions in the DNA of several plant species which could hold secrets about how specific genes are turned 'on' or 'off'. The findings, which are hoped will accelerate the pace of research into crop science and food security, are detailed by University of Warwick researchers in the journal The Plant Cell. By running a computational analysis of the genomes of the papaya, poplar, Arabidopsis and grape species, scientists have uncovered hundreds of conserved non-coding sequences which are found in the DNA of all four species. These non-coding sequences are not genes, but are located in...

Full Title: Report: Fiscal cliff deal emerging — including one-year debt-ceiling increase; Update: Obama concedes on new, higher income threshold for tax hikesI didn’t believe this when I saw it at WaPo yesterday, then I started to wonder when I read Ed’s post this morning, and now Ezra Klein claims Democrats are telling him the same thing. I thought the GOP’s big Plan B alternative to a grand bargain was to extend the Bush tax cuts for the middle class, let them lapse for the rich, and then go home so that they can fight another day when it’s time...

GREENBURGH, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) — After a Westchester County town supervisor called for the annual gun show to be canceled following the Newtown, Conn. school shooting that left 26 teachers and students dead, the county announced it would not be renewing the show’s contract. In a statement Monday, county officials said, “First and foremost, Westchester County mourns with the nation for the families who lost loved ones in the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School. The county stands ready to assist the residents of Newtown, Connecticut in any way it can and specifically has made available its Psychological Response Team, a...

When President Barack Obama spoke to shell-shocked residents of Newtown, Conn., his words were meant to comfort. "We can't tolerate this anymore," he said two days after a gunman murdered 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School. "These tragedies must end. And to end them, we must change." But the first change that could come from stepped-up efforts to prevent mass shooting is one the president doesn't intend: A surge in gun sales, and in profits for firearms manufacturers. One irony of the gun-control movement is that gun sales usually rise whenever there's talk of new efforts...

Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) has an A rating from the National Rifle Association — and a new perspective on gun control since Friday’s mass shooting at a Connecticut elementary school. “I‘ve been a strong supporter of Second Amendment rights,” Warner said Monday outside the Virginia Capitol, where he was attending an unrelated meeting. “I’ve got an A rating from the NRA. But the status quo isn’t acceptable. I’ve got three daughters. They asked me on Friday evening, ‘Dad, what are you gonna do about this?’ There’s got to be a way to put reasonable restrictions, particularly as we look at...

Despite New Zealand’s reputation for tight gun regulation, one anti-gun lobbyist says we are still leaving ourselves exposed. Professor Kevin Clements, director of the National Centre of Peace and Conflict Studies at Otago University, says current laws around gun registration are loose and leave room for abuse. “The registered arms owners [might have] a large amount of weapons but we don’t know how many, where they are, what sort they are and whether they might fall into someone else’s hands,” he says. The recent massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School has reignited the debate on gun regulation in the United...

Following the second-worst mass shooting in American history, US Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) said hunters and sportsmen need to "step up." He urged them to support what he called "reasonable restrictions" on the types of weapons that can be purchased and on large ammunition magazines. Durbin said average citizens don't need access to the kind of military-style equipment used by the gunman in Newtown, CT. "I'm told that he was wearing body armor at the time. A question I have to ask: Why in the world does anyone need to buy body armor? I can see where the military would....

(Post-publishing note: My wife, Gena, and I join the rest of the nation in mourning with and praying for the families and friends of the 20 children and six adults who lost their lives at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. We are so incredibly sorry for your loss, and want you to know it is for you and in honor of the precious souls of your loved ones that we continue to fight for a more peaceful, safe and charitable America.) There are two weeks remaining for Washington to take action before the George W. Bush tax...

Germany's economy is headed for a "noticeable" contraction in the current quarter and will probably tread water next year, the central bank wrote Monday, reiterating the downbeat forecast it issued earlier this month. Some major sentiment reports suggest that the economy could be bottoming out. "Current indicators point to a noticeable drop in economic production at the end of the year," largely due to weakness in the country's key industrial sector, the Bundesbank wrote. The outlook for German companies has "deteriorated" amid a slowdown in global growth and falling demand from the rest of the euro zone. Earlier this month,...

"No set of laws can eliminate evil from the world, or prevent every senseless act of violence in our society." So said President Obama in words of comfort in Newtown. The president was right to speak of evil, but mistaken when he called the massacre "senseless." For this was a premeditated and purposeful act of mass murder, and the devil that did it knew exactly what he was doing and why. When he put four bullets into his mother's head while she lay in bed, Adam Lanza wanted her life ended along with his. When he headed for Sandy Hook...

Shareholders of Call of Duty video game maker Activision Blizzard, Inc. (NASDAQ: ATVI) and other video game makers are nervous Monday related to fears about a potential backlash from Friday's horrible Sandy Hook school shootings, which left 26 dead, including 20 children. There have been reports from the Hartford Courant that alleged gunman Adam Lanza played "violent video game in which life-like characters engage in graphic battle scenes."

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. (Winston-Salem Journal) — Guns in local parks, and the question of what government – city or state – should regulate them, came up Monday night at a public meeting of the Winston-Salem City Council. The council members approved a long list of items that they want the state General Assembly to pay attention to during the next legislative session. On the list was the city council’s push to repeal a state law enacted in December 2011 that allows people in North Carolina with gun permits to carry those weapons in city and county parks. At issue is a...

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Republican Sen. Tom Coburn has released a breakdown of how much the federal government forgoes in tax revenue due to various credits and deductions that benefit everything from NASCAR owners to gamblers. It's a fairly comprehensive analysis that should get bipartisan support, but one of the categories that Sen. Coburn targets to raise taxes from may be surprising: "the rich." Coburn highlights $100 billion in tax revenue that could be raised over the next ten years by ending some of these deductions only on millionaire households. Over the 2006-2009 time period, Coburn notes, millionaires deducted over $20 billion in gambling...

Washington - Around 16 Congressmen signed off to a letter asking the Transportation Security Administration – the federal agency responsible for security of airports in the country – to stop racial profiling of people from South Asia and Middle East including Black, Sikhs and Muslims travelers. "Despite efforts to prevent profiling by its screeners, news reports indicate that (TSA) Transportation Security Administration screeners continue to subject Sikh, South Asian, Arab, Muslim and Black travellers to profiling. In the past few months incidents have occurred at airports in Massachusetts, Hawaii and New Jersey," Congressman Judy Chu said in his dear colleague...

Tim Scott, Nikki Haley, Jim DeMint: Republican diversity, Democrat nightmare First of all, let me say right off the bat: I do not want to do a whole DUFU on the DUmmies' demand for gun control. Not that there's any lack of material. All of DUmmieland, 90+% of the threads right now--this is ALL they're talking about. Here are some typical, actual thread titles: "F*** the 2nd Amendment!!!" "F*** THE NRA!" "Nobody needs to own a gun. NOBODY." "To the 2nd amendment extremists - you have the blood of children on your hands." "If there are bigger pussies in the...

Gun rights advocates have been on the defensive after the mass shooting in Newton, Conn. last week, but that didn't stop one group in Sacramento from demonstrating their opposition to gun control in a way that was sure to get attention. Sacramento police questioned and then released a group of men who walked down one of the city's busiest streets with shotguns over their shoulders Sunday evening. Two of the men in the group were carrying shotguns when police stopped them at 10th and J streets around 9:20 p.m., according to officer Michelle Gigante. They were found to be in...

A South African Air Force (SAAF) Douglas C-47 Dakota transport aircraft crashed in the Giants Castle area of the Drakensberg mountain range on 5 December, according to the South African government. The World War Two era aircraft was flying from Waterkloof air force base near the South African capital of Pretoria to Mthatha airport in the Eastern Cape Province when it went missing at about 09:45 local. "After the expected time of arrival and no communication from the aircraft, the SAAF activated a search and rescue mission. Severe weather conditions in the area hindered the continuation of the search and...

The element thorium, which many regard as a potential nuclear "wonder-fuel", could be a greater proliferation threat than previously thought, scientists have warned. Writing in a Comment piece in the new issue of the journal, Nature, nuclear energy specialists from four British universities suggest that, although thorium has been promoted as a superior fuel for future nuclear energy generation, it should not be regarded as inherently proliferation resistant. The piece highlights ways in which small quantities of uranium-233, a material useable in nuclear weapons, could be produced covertly from thorium, by chemically separating another isotope, protactinium-233, during its formation.The chemical...

President Obama promised “meaningful action” to prevent gun violence, but he didn’t explain exactly what that meant. Although a push for some kind of gun control legislation seems likely, there’s also the possibility of an anti-gun “informational campaign” as described in 1995 by then-U.S. Attorney Eric Holder. Holder, now Obama’s attorney general, proposed using various levers of media and pop culture to attach a social stigma to guns, just as smoking has been stigmatized in recent decades. “One thing that I think is clear with young people and with adults as well, is that we just have to be repetitive...