http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/by:neverdem/ en-us Sun, 21 Mar 2010 18:20:29 GMT Focus Forum 15 http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2476129/posts Without a blush of shame, this week’s Science magazine just ran an article called “Contributions of stratospheric water vapor to decadal changes in the rate of Global Warming.” After wiping off the unnecessary words we’re left with: “Global Warming would be here — except for that damned water vapor.” It’s the “woulda coulda shoulda” of the True Believers. Al Gore’s Ptolemaic epicycles are being rolled onto the scientific stage, to be piled higher and deeper until they fit the curve of real temperatures – a nearly flat line with a little bit of jitter. You could just turn it into... mensnewsdaily.com http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2476129/posts#comment Sun, 21 Mar 2010 18:20:29 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475848/posts "We know that the moment of greatest danger to a society is when it comes near realizing its most cherished dreams." - Eric Hoffer From its origins in Athens some 2,500 years ago, it has been obvious to some astute observers that democracy, like all other forms of government, carries with it a certain type of energy. Barack Obama rode this unique democratic energy into the White House over a year ago. He called it a "righteous wind" and promised something rather vague that he called "change." To many otherwise innocent American voters, "change" likely meant the change from... American Thinker http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475848/posts#comment Sun, 21 Mar 2010 06:19:56 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475836/posts On the cover of its November 24, 2008 edition, Time Magazine photo-shopped Barack Obama into a classic image of a jaunty Franklin Delano Roosevelt, right down to the politically incorrect cigarette holder. The article is headlined, "The New New Deal." There is no question mark. Back in those heady days of hope and change, Obama promised to remake Washington in his own image, much as FDR had before him. "His top priority will be stabilizing the financial system," Time ingenuously reported, "followed by investing in renewable energy, universal health care, middle-class tax cuts and education reform." A year and a... American Thinker http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475836/posts#comment Sun, 21 Mar 2010 05:34:22 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475825/posts Just occasionally you find yourself at an event where there is a sense of history in the air. So it was the other night at the Royal Society, when a small gathering of luminaries turned up to hear that extraordinary nonagenarian, the scientist James Lovelock. They had all come: David MacKay, chief scientist at the Department of Energy and Climate Change; Michael Green, Lucasian professor of mathematics at Cambridge; Michael Wilson, producer of the James Bond movies; Chris Rapley, director of the Science Museum; and more. You knew why they had answered the Isaac Newton Institute’s invitation. They wanted to... The Sunday Times (UK) http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475825/posts#comment Sun, 21 Mar 2010 04:56:57 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475787/posts Enlarge Image Springboard. This little vibrating widget has been eased into the simplest quantum state of motion. Credit: O'Connell et al., Nature, Advance Online Publication (2010) The weird rules of quantum mechanics state that a tiny object can absorb energy only in discrete amounts, or quanta, and can literally be in two places simultaneously. Those mind-bending tenets have been amply demonstrated in experiments with electrons, photons, atoms, and molecules. Ironically, though, physicists have never observed such bizarre quantum-mechanical effects in the motion of a human-made mechanical device. Now, Andrew Cleland, John Martinis, and colleagues at the University of California,... ScienceNOW http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475787/posts#comment Sun, 21 Mar 2010 03:29:47 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475744/posts Enlarge Image Limit breaker? The crystal structure of Fe16N2, which one group of researchers says beats the predicted limit for magnetism in a material. Credit: Jian-Ping Wang PORTLAND, OREGON—There are limits to just how magnetic a material can be. Or so researchers thought. A compound of iron and nitrogen is about 18% more magnetic than the most magnetic material currently known, a team of materials scientists claims. If such magnets could be produced commercially, they could, for example, allow electronics manufactures to equip computer hard drives with smaller "write heads" capable of cramming them with more information. Other researchers... ScienceNOW http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475744/posts#comment Sun, 21 Mar 2010 02:31:27 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475647/posts If the House Democratic majority passes Obama's health care proposals, one of two things will happen by Election Day, 2010 -- and neither one will be healthy for the Democrats seeking re-election. Either the Medicare cuts will take effect or they will be postponed by a terrified Congress. If they take effect, physicians' fees will be slashed 21 percent and hospital reimbursements for Medicare patients will be cut by $1.3 billion. Tens of thousands of doctors and thousands of health care institutions -- hospitals, hospices, outpatient clinics and such -- will refuse to treat Medicare patients. Entire cities will be... realclearpolitics.com http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475647/posts#comment Sat, 20 Mar 2010 23:47:41 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475590/posts It came as a surprise this month to Wang Jianwei, a graduate engineering student in Liaoning, China, that he had been described as a potential cyberwarrior before the United States Congress. Larry M. Wortzel, a military strategist and China specialist, told the House Foreign Affairs Committee on March 1o that it should be concerned because “Chinese researchers at the Institute of Systems Engineering of Dalian University of Technology published a paper on how to attack a small U.S. power grid sub-network in a way that would cause a cascading failure of the entire U.S.” When reached by telephone, Mr. Wang... NY Times http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475590/posts#comment Sat, 20 Mar 2010 21:33:47 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475404/posts Welcome to DeemocracyIf youÂ’re sick of talking about health care, youÂ’d better move to Tahiti now.  On Thursday, the California Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board voted to set up a committee to examine whether condoms should be required on all pornographic film shoots within the Golden State. California has run out of money, but it hasn’t yet run out of things to regulate. For a government regulatory hearing, the testimony was livelier than usual. The porn star Madelyne Hernandez recalled an especially grueling scene in which she had been obliged to have sex with 75 men. The bureaucrats nodded... NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475404/posts#comment Sat, 20 Mar 2010 15:52:57 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475220/posts The Cambridge, Massachusetts Climate Emergency Congress (CEC) is more than a grassroots group of out-of-touch leftists. Rather, it is a casebook study of a new movement of "climate community activism" that pushes sustainability issues in municipal governments. It is a worldwide movement that bears watching. The largest player in this movement was founded in 1990 to fight ozone pollution under the name "International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives." It is now known as the ICLEI-Local Governments for Sustainability. ICLEI is a global organization of 1,124 municipalities and regional organizations. The Clinton Foundation's Climate Initiative is also a major force in... American Thinker http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475220/posts#comment Sat, 20 Mar 2010 07:12:39 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475207/posts The Supreme Court recently heard arguments in what will be a landmark case for the Second Amendment: McDonald v. Chicago. A ruling is expected this June. A bit of history is in order. In 2008, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of gun rights in Heller v. The District of Columbia. The basis for Heller was that Washington, D.C. prohibited ownership of a handgun. The Court ruled that a federal enclave (D.C.) could not, through legislation, deprive law-abiding citizens of their constitutional rights. The ruling was a major victory for gun owners, the Constitution, and personal liberty.   Since the 2008... American Thinker http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475207/posts#comment Sat, 20 Mar 2010 05:45:35 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475182/posts ALBANY — The campaign for the Republican nomination for governor was blown wide open on Thursday as the party’s presumptive frontrunner, Rick A. Lazio, lost key support after a last-minute entry into the race by a conservative Long Island Democrat. The Democrat, Steve Levy, was quickly amassing Republican endorsements, just hours after he said he would switch parties and seek the Republican nomination. Mr. Lazio, seeking to contain the damage and play down the growing number of defections from his campaign, hit back on Thursday, calling Mr. Levy, the Suffolk County executive, a “rank opportunist.” “The people of New York... NY Times http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475182/posts#comment Sat, 20 Mar 2010 04:25:53 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475151/posts As Congress continues to struggle its way toward new energy legislation, climate scientists are getting a little hot. A series of major attacks from the global-warming skeptics—including last year's Climategate affair and unfair accusations stemming from the subsequent discovery of errors in the latest IPCC report—have left those in the research community understandably angry. Having spent eight years calling attention to the politicization of climate science by the Bush administration, they now find themselves on the other end of the same allegations. Whatever raw emotions this reversal might produce were on display a couple of weeks ago in yet another... Slate http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475151/posts#comment Sat, 20 Mar 2010 03:13:31 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475129/posts A former American general blamed "open homosexuality" in the Dutch army for the failure to prevent the Srebrenica massacre in 1995. The Dutch government condemned the comments by Gen John Sheehan, a former Nato commander and senior marine officer, as outrageous. Gen Sheehan made the remarks at a Senate hearing where he argued against plans by President Barack Obama to end a ban on allowing gays to serve openly in the US military. Gen Sheehan said that after the end of the Cold War, European militaries changed and concluded "there was no longer a need for an active combat capability."... telegraph.co.uk http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475129/posts#comment Sat, 20 Mar 2010 02:21:52 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475099/posts LOCKPORT — The county Legislature is calling on local members of the New York State Legislature to help block a trio of gun-control measures proposed by downstate legislators. Legislators John Syracuse, R-Newfane, and John Ceretto, R-Lewiston, put up resolutions Tuesday denouncing three proposed state laws that affect gun ownership. The resolutions were approved by unanimous vote of the county body. One state bill calls for mandatory renewal of pistol permits every five years. Another calls for a ban on magazine-fed pistols, magazine-fed semiautomatic rifles and pump-action shotguns. Another redefines the sale of guns between private citizens as “gun show” and... The Tonawanda News http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475099/posts#comment Sat, 20 Mar 2010 01:16:27 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475071/posts Annabel Park, the purported creator of the Coffee Party movement does damage control with the help of CNN, claiming that her movement, aided by Soros-funded organizations and planned at RootsCamp, a left wing organizing workshop held at the teachers union NEA Headquarters, is actually a spontaneous, self-organizing movement. Why I started the Coffee Party By Annabel Park "As the Constitution dictates, we want a government of the people, by the people, for the people. Coffee Party USA is a democracy movement, and our goal is to have the government truly reflect the will of the people." Someone should tell Ms.... American Thinker http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2475071/posts#comment Sat, 20 Mar 2010 00:23:16 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2474926/posts In 2005, the late Dr. Michael Crichton wrote a book of fiction called State of Fear. The plot of the storyline is the exposé of the fraudulent science behind the global warming theory in the middle of a fictitious court case. The book was a bestseller, and in a strange twist of circumstances, it landed Dr. Crichton in front of a Senate committee. Now it seems that life is indeed imitating art. In the past few years, there have been many court cases concerning the actions of governments to the alleged threat of global warming. The latest has been filed... American Thinker http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2474926/posts#comment Fri, 19 Mar 2010 21:42:36 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2474771/posts Another Partisan Push for Another ‘Comprehensive ReformÂ’?Obama has already started two partisan brawls; if he decides to tackle illegal immigration, heÂ’ll get another.  Candidate Barack Obama promised immigration activists, “I think it’s time for a president who won’t walk away from something as important as comprehensive reform when it becomes politically unpopular.” Now pressure groups are demanding Obama come through on his pledge. In response, the administration may trump the health-care debate with another divisive issue — “comprehensive reform” on immigration — that is surely just as “politically unpopular.” After the failure of the polarizing cap-and-trade bill and the current... NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2474771/posts#comment Fri, 19 Mar 2010 17:52:22 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2474697/posts The Fearful Forty; 40 Dems who are persuadable on health care reform you should call NOW editor's note Ed Whelan over at the Corner has made it easy for you to call congressmen who are wavering in support of or opposition to health care reform: The "(S)" means that the member voted for the Stupak amendment last fall. The full House phone directory is here. "Yes" on Obamacare Last Time but Might Want to Switch: Gabrielle Giffords, (D., Ariz.)-202-225-2542 Ann Kirkpatrick, (D., Ariz.)-202-225-2315 Harry Mitchell, (D., Ariz.)-202-225-2190 Vic Snyder, (D., Ariz.) (S)-202-225-2506 Marion Berry, (D., Ark.) (S)-202-225-4076 John Salazar, (D.,... American Thinker http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2474697/posts#comment Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:24:26 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2474272/posts In The Conversation, David Brooks and Gail Collins talk between columns every Wednesday. If the future of our health care system depends on Senator Max Baucus, a Democrat from Montana, and Senator Chuck Grassley, a Republican from Iowa, the republic will surely crumble. Gail Collins: David, when I went off on vacation I left you to converse with Dick Cavett. Really, what could be more fun? All the while I was gone I was imagining what a great time the two of you were having. Well, O.K., not all the time. But the thought definitely occurred. Then I got back... NY Times http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2474272/posts#comment Fri, 19 Mar 2010 02:24:54 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2474223/posts The New York Republican Party, no stranger to controversy in the past year, has a new internal battle brewing over its gubernatorial nominee that could lead to a New York-23 like split for the GOP. Rick Lazio, the former Long Island Congressman who unsuccessfully challenged Hillary Clinton in the 2000 U.S. Senate race, appeared well on his way to securing the nomination. Endorsements included former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and former Gov. George Pataki, as well as a slew of county chairmen and local officials. But others in the party, said to be concerned over what is described as... realclearpolitics.com http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2474223/posts#comment Fri, 19 Mar 2010 00:58:31 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2472851/posts If a stranger came up to you on the street, would you give him your name, Social Security number and e-mail address? Probably not. Yet people often dole out all kinds of personal information on the Internet that allows such identifying data to be deduced. Services like Facebook, Twitter and Flickr are oceans of personal minutiae — birthday greetings sent and received, school and work gossip, photos of family vacations, and movies watched. Computer scientists and policy experts say that such seemingly innocuous bits of self-revelation can increasingly be collected and reassembled by computers to help create a picture of... NY Times http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2472851/posts#comment Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:20:18 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2472697/posts People are strangeWhen you're a stranger Faces look ugly when you're alone Women seem wicked when you're unwanted. Streets are uneven, When you're down.  -The Doors For much of my life, I felt like a Stranger in a Strange Land. This is not unusual. Look at the history of most leftists, and you'll find the very same thing. I grew up with a surname that wasn't my own. My father anglicized it years before I was born, trying to ward off the anti-Semitism that shadowed him. I grew up without God. My parents had no use for a God... American Thinker http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2472697/posts#comment Wed, 17 Mar 2010 05:43:00 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2472630/posts Climate scientists say they had received threats and ugly correspondence in the past from people objecting to the idea of climate change, but since Climategate, the tone has become more abusive and more threatening. MagicErik A logo for Climategate. Those scientists accused of conspiring to manipulate science in the titillating media scandal known as Climategate say they have been receiving abusive emails. Some scientists claim they have received death threats. Climate change has always been a divisive subject, with strong believers in pro- and anti-climate change camps. However, the theft and release of email correspondence exchanged between climate scientists... Digital Journal http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2472630/posts#comment Wed, 17 Mar 2010 02:56:06 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2472600/posts The liberal media watchdog group Media Matters is fuming over CNN’s hiring of conservative RedState blogger Erick Erickson. In a document provided POLITICO that Media Matters plans to post on its blog Tuesday, the group accuses Erickson of having a “long history of incendiary, sexist and racially charged statements.” “If you need any further proof that the liberal media bias is a myth, CNN just hired someone who called David Souter a goat——ing child molester,” Media Matters Vice President of Research and Communication Ari Rabin-Havt told POLITICO. The document includes many other profane Erickson statements, including the vulgar phrase highlighted... Politico http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2472600/posts#comment Wed, 17 Mar 2010 02:05:17 GMT