Free Republic

A German shepherd puppy named Gavel couldn't quite cut it as a police dog, as he was too friendly with strangers to catch criminals. Not every pup is cut out to be a police dog. One such puppy, a German shepherd named Gavel, flunked out of police training in Australia in February after he was found to "not display the necessary aptitude for a life on the front line." As BBC reports, the problem was that Gavel was "too sociable," and enjoyed meeting strangers a little too much to make a career out of catching criminals. Unfortunately, he was too much...

When President Donald Trump withdrew the United States from the Paris climate agreement, he acted in concert with 22 Republican senators, who collectively receive $10,694,284 in contributions from the coal and oil industries. These 22 senators wrote to Trump, asking him to pull out of the accord. The president and the senators put their own political and economic interests above the safety, security and indeed survival of the American people and the entire planet. The climate accord is a landmark deal, in which 195 countries responsible for 95 percent of carbon emissions worldwide agreed to voluntarily reduce their greenhouse gas...

Bodies and debris were found in the water on Thursday after a Myanmar military plane vanished over the Andaman Sea with 122 soldiers, family members and crew on board, the military said in a statement on its official Facebook page. Three bodies, including two adults and a child, were found by a navy ship 35 km (22 miles) from the southern costal town of Launglon, the military said.

President Donald Trump is by no means popular—compared with his predecessors, his approval rating has been remarkably low during his time in the White House. But there's some small solace for the president this week: His approval rating is, at least for the moment, a hair better then where President Bill Clinton stood at the same point in his first term. Different polling outfits put Trump at varying levels of approval, but the RealClearPolitics average had him at 39.8 percent Tuesday, while the weighted average from FiveThirtyEight had him at exactly 39 percent. Not great numbers, but still better than Clinton. On Day 138 of...

Several drugs are scoring big wins against common cancers, setting new standards for how to treat many prostate, breast and lung tumors. There's even a "uni-drug" that may fight many forms of the disease. What's especially striking: The drugs are beneficial in some cases for more than a year, much longer than the few months many new drugs provide.   Here are some highlights from the world's largest cancer meeting, the American Society of Clinical Oncology conference in Chicago:

An Arctic methane explosion that took place close to 12,000 years ago resulted in several large craters at the bottom of the ocean, a new study has discovered. But what stands out as interesting is the fact that thousands of years later, gas is still seeping out slowly from the seafloor. The study published earlier this week in the journal Science details yet another set of findings regarding these explosions that took place over the past thousands of years. And with climate change very much a hot-button topic these days, scientists are wondering whether it’s possible that these Arctic methane...

President Trump’s triumphant Rose Garden ceremony announcing his withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement sent a message loud and clear to his supporters: Promise kept. But the move also served as a clarion call to angry Democrats, potentially complicating the political path for Republicans facing tough midterm challenges and, ultimately, Trump’s own reelection bid.

President Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris climate accord has put the world on notice that “America First” is not just a campaign slogan — it’s his administration’s guiding doctrine. Trump on Thursday delivered on a key campaign promise by announcing he will pull the U.S. out of a 190-country agreement that former President Obama entered into less than nine months ago. Obama had hailed the Paris Agreement as a “turning point for our planet” and the culmination of “an intense diplomatic effort” that drew scores of countries, cultures and governments into a pact aimed at slowing the rise...

I will be announcing my decision on Paris Accord, Thursday at 3:00 P.M. The White House Rose Garden. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 1, 2017

A screaming man tried to storm the cockpit of a Malaysia Airlines jet shortly after takeoff Wednesday night in Australia, but passengers tackled him before he could reach the pilots, authorities and witnesses told NBC News. Melbourne Tullamarine Airport, Australia's second-busiest airport, was closed for hours overnight as armed tactical officers swept Malaysia Airlines Flight MH128, which had been bound for Kuala Lumpur, as well as the airport, officials said.

President Trump is nearing a final decision on whether to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement, with one White House official saying Wednesday that the president is leaning toward an exit but three others cautioning that he has not reached a verdict. The matter has deeply divided the administration for months. Ivanka Trump and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson have urged the president to remain in the deal, and White House strategist Stephen K. Bannon and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt have been pushing for a withdrawal.

President Trump failed to commit to remaining within the Paris climate agreement during a two-day meeting with world leaders that ended here Saturday, but he tweeted that he was still considering it and would announce a final decision “next week.” In a final communique, the Group of Seven industrialized countries said that the United States “is not in a position to join the consensus.” The other six members reaffirmed their commitment to swiftly implement the 2015 accord to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

LONDON (Reuters) - British police have arrested a "large part of the network" behind this week's Manchester suicide bombing but more arrests are likely, the country's top counter-terrorism officer said on Friday. Mark Rowley said "immense" progress had been made in the investigation into Salman Abedi, who killed 22 people, seven of them children, at a pop concert in Manchester on Monday. "They're very significant, these arrests. We're very happy we've got our hands around some of the key players that we are concerned about. But as I say, there is still a little bit more to do," Rowley told...

Egyptian air force planes on Friday carried out strikes directed at camps in Libya where Cairo believes militants responsible for a deadly attack on Christians earlier in the day were trained, Egyptian military sources said. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said he had ordered strikes against what he called terrorist camps, declaring in a televised address that states that sponsored terrorism would be punished.

Pope Francis put climate change on the agenda of his first meeting with President Trump on Wednesday, and the subject is likely to come up again and again in the president’s encounters with other world leaders in the coming days. That could put Mr. Trump on the back foot after what had been an energetic swing through the Middle East. The pope presented the president with a copy of his influential encyclical on preserving the environment, while in a broader meeting, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican’s secretary of state, urged Mr. Trump not to pull the United States out of...

Eating chocolate has been linked with a reduced risk of heart disease and stroke, and now a new study from Denmark suggests that regular consumption of the treat may help to prevent the development of atrial fibrillation, a type of irregular heartbeat. Researchers found that adults in the study who ate chocolate at least once a month — or more frequently than that — had rates of atrial fibrillation that were 10 to 20 percent lower than those who ate chocolate less than once a month, according to the findings published today (May 23) in the journal Heart

“The National Science Foundation last year used your taxpayer money to fund a climate change musical. Do you think that’s a waste of your money?” asked the director of Office of Management and Budget director, Mick Mulvaney, during a White House briefing on Tuesday. He also noted the cuts to climate change research, saying that, under President Barack Obama, the “pendulum went too far to one side” and the government spent too much on climate science. “Does it mean that we are anti-science? Absolutely not,” he said. “We are simply trying to get things back in order to where we...

In a significant advance in the study of mental ability, a team of European and American scientists announced on Monday that they had identified 52 genes linked to intelligence in nearly 80,000 people. These genes do not determine intelligence, however. Their combined influence is minuscule, the researchers said, suggesting that thousands more are likely to be involved and still await discovery. Just as important, intelligence is profoundly shaped by the environment. Still, the findings could make it possible to begin new experiments into the biological basis of reasoning and problem-solving, experts said. They could even help researchers determine which interventions...

President Donald Trump's fiscal 2018 budget request would slash EPA spending by almost a third, according to a copy of the President's proposal obtained by CNN. The budget blueprint, which the White House plans to submit to Congress next week, would cut the EPA's total budget by more than 30% and its operational budget by 35% compared to current funding levels.

The unprecedented, global ransomware attack that started Friday has hit more than 200,000 companies, hospitals, government agencies and other organizations in 150 countries, the European Union's law enforcement agency said. Separately, Europol Jan Op Gen Oorth said Sunday that the number of individuals who have fallen victim to the cyberextortion attack could be much higher than is currently known as more people may find they were hit by the virus when they return to work Monday and switch on their computers.. He said it was too early to say who is behind the onslaught and what their motivation was. The...