Free Republic

NEW YORK (AP) - Mix blatant bigotry with poor spelling. Add a dash of ALL CAPS. Top it off with a violent threat. And there you have it: A recipe for the worst of online comments, scourge of the Internet. Blame anonymity, blame politicians, blame human nature. But a growing number of websites are reining in the Wild West of online commentary. Companies including Google and the Huffington Post are trying everything from deploying moderators to forcing people to use their real names in order to restore civil discourse. Some sites, such as Popular Science, are banning comments altogether.

Links to the pro-Phil Robertson online petition drive have been flagged for content on the social media platform.In the latest development in the ongoing culture war surrounding Duck Dynasty star Phil Robertson’s controversial remarks on homosexuality, the pro-Robertson website iStandwithPhil.com has been flagged on Twitter, prohibiting users from posting messages containing links to the page. ***** Twitter generally does not act to block content until receiving a report from another user or group of users. That complaint is then reviewed by Twitter, who decides whether to take action or not.

In addition to my career as a PhD chemist, I am one of a select few who enjoy the privilege of moderating content on reddit.com’s science forum. The science forum is a small part of reddit, but it nonetheless enjoys over 4 million subscribers. By comparison, that’s roughly twice the circulation of The New York Times. The forum, known as /r/science, provides a digital space for discussions about recent, peer-reviewed scientific publications. This puts us (along with /r/AskScience) on the front line of the science-public interface. On our little page, scientists and nonscientists can connect through discussions on everything from...

As President Obama wrapped up his conversation with Chris Matthews at American University, he took a swipe at the partisan media for dividing the country and making compromise more difficult. Obama said being the Commander-in-Chief for so long “makes you humbler, as opposed to cockier,” and compared himself to Sisyphus, rolling the boulder up the hill for eternity with little success. He spoke of how enthusiastic young people encourage him and give him confidence, only for the media to take that enthusiasm and use it to divide people. “The American people are good and they are decent, and yes, sometimes

The new and improved Obamacare website struggled under heavy traffic loads on Monday, but still appeared to operate pretty much as the Obama administration has promised: Okay, but not perfect. After a weekend of final, intensive fixes, officials unveiled a somewhat repaired HealthCare.gov on Sunday and promised that it will work well enough to serve the Americans who want insurance exchange coverage by New Year’s.

The US Justice Department is intervening in a private lawsuit against H&R Block for violating the Americans with Disabilities Act. H&R Block is a large provider of American tax services and informational services for tax payers.

Many groups have claimed that the NSA’s surveillance program is an unconstitutional violation of privacy. But a different type of challenge is growing teeth. Led by civil liberties group the Electronic Frontier Foundation, more than 20 organizations, with interests ranging from marijuana to guns, are currently suing the federal government. They believe the NSA surveillance program has a chilling effect on speech, thus violating the First Amendment. It’s difficult to prove this, though. There’s no way to quantify the students who don’t join their college’s “legalize marijuana” club, or the number of Arab-Americans who avoid political topics via email. Absences...

On Thursday, Fox News’ Ed Henry tweeted that MSNBC hosts Ed Schultz and Lawrence O’Donnell, as well as Ezra Klein of the Washington Post and Fox News’ Juan Williams, had been invited for a private off-the-record chat with President Obama. Obama’s signature program, Obamacare, has been flailing in the press for weeks, and Obama apparently believes that it is about time to reshift the narrative:

Hate speech is code word for speech I do not agree with; speech I want stopped. In the United States of America and any previous English colony, the term “hate speech” should be considered with grave skepticism. What brought me to write about this topic today are several items that came up via electronic media. First, was an Ann Curry accusation of hate speech leveled at Kirk Cameron. I will not address this directly because it is too predictable, but I will argue Cameron’s point of view shortly. Second, there were numerous articles citing Dan Savage making statements that tended...

(CNSNews.com) - At a Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee event in Philadelphia on Thursday night, President Barack Obama ended his speech by bemoaning what he called “a level of polarization that seems unique”—citing as one cause to blame for this phenomenon “the Balkanization of the media.” “Obviously, this year and over the last three years, we’ve seen a level of polarization that seems unique,” said Obama. “But the truth is, is that as you travel around the country, the country--ordinary folks--aren’t as polarized as Washington would make us think.”

Schools: Opposition is rising to new national education standards pushed on public schools. They have turned schools into re-education camps for liberalism, with political statements masquerading as English lessons. If one had to include one speech by President Ronald Reagan as recommended reading in a national standardized curriculum it might be the one in which he stood in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin and said, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" One might pick Reagan's first inaugural address when he said, "Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem." Or even his 1964 "A...

Former green jobs czar Van Jones, during a roundtable discussion over the rollout of Obamacare on ABC’s “This Week with George Stephanopolous,” said President Barack Obama’s detractors have “Obama Derangement Syndrome.” “It’s silly season. Literally, they have this sort of Obama Derangement Syndrome where Obama is this absent, weak, ineffectual dictator and tyrant who’s destroying America,” Jones said. …

ALCON - FYI, the Air Force servers are back to not letting me log in to FR due to its "political and activist" nature. I thought we were through with this crap...

Comments can be bad for science. That's why, here at PopularScience.com, we're shutting them off.It wasn't a decision we made lightly. As the news arm of a 141-year-old science and technology magazine, we are as committed to fostering lively, intellectual debate as we are to spreading the word of science far and wide. The problem is when trolls and spambots overwhelm the former, diminishing our ability to do the latter.That is not to suggest that we are the only website in the world that attracts vexing commenters. Far from it. Nor is it to suggest that all, or even close...

No excerpt from IHE allowed, story here. To summarize, an engineering education magazine publishes a letter by a professor critical of homosexuality, and many are appalled.

<p>The nation’s capital has denied a “no stop” permit for the “2 Million Bikers to DC” rally on Wednesday, meant to “remember those who were killed on 9/11 and honor our armed forces.” The group said in a statement Sunday that D.C. officials denied their request for a special nonstop ride through town with a waiver for red lights, stop signs and other traffic signals.</p>

Rodeo fans and conservatives by the thousands rode to the defense of a rodeo clown Tuesday, less than 72 hours after he took part in a controversial weekend skit involving a masked figure of President Barack Obama. But the passionate support did not overcome the lingering anger over the Saturday skit at the Missouri State Fair. The president of the group that organized the rodeo — Mark Ficken — resigned Tuesday, blaming the group’s failure to sanction the clown for his behavior. It marked a third straight day of heated disagreement over the implications of the rodeo stunt. “I think...

When it comes to investigative reporters, how do you change a bulldog into a lapdog? Easy: change the occupant of the Oval Office from a Republican into a Democrat. Witness Carl Bernstein's pitiful performance on today's Morning Joe. The man who teamed with Bob Woodward to bring down Richard Nixon now credulously claims that he "can't imagine" that President Obama is possibly involved in the IRS targeting of conservative groups. Bernstein instead blames the "hyper-partisanship" in Washington. Yeah, cause politics were so kumbaya in 1972, Carl. View the video here.

CAIR Claims Victory Over AP Stylebook’s Restrictions on Word 'Islamist' April 5, 2013 By Elizabeth Harrington (CNSNews.com) – The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) praised the Associated Press (AP) for revising its stylebook to forbid the use of the word “Islamist,” if it is used to describe Islamic militants or extremists. In a press release on Friday, CAIR said revising the term is a "step in the right direction,” and that they helped influence the AP’s decision. “Late last year, the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) approached AP about modifying the reference, which had been added to its influential...