http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/facts/ en-us Mon, 18 Mar 2013 23:06:40 GMT Focus Forum 15 http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2998210/posts You hear a lot about the politicization of science, but the real problem is the moralization of science. The New York University psychologist Jonathan Haidt has made a compelling case that moral differences drive partisan debates over scientific issues. Dan Kahan and others at the Yale Cultural Cognition Project have identified cultural differences that bias how people assimilate information. Together, Haidt and Kahan’s research suggests that what you believe about a scientific debate signals to like-minded people that you are on their side and are therefore a good and trustworthy person. Unfortunately, this means that the factual accuracy of beliefs... Reason http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2998210/posts#comment Mon, 18 Mar 2013 23:06:40 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2998133/posts Only a paltry 15 percent of MSNBC’s programming stuck to “factual reporting, according to Pew. Fox News, by comparison, had a breakdown of 55 percent commentary and opinion and 45 percent "factual reporting." NewsMax http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2998133/posts#comment Mon, 18 Mar 2013 19:18:42 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2996537/posts For release March 13, 2013 Gun Facts Version 6.2 Released 13 Years of Debunking Gun Control Myths San Francisco, CA – March 13, 2013: The latest edition of the de facto desk reference for debunking gun control mythology was released today and marks its thirteenth year in production. See www.GunFacts.info. “Another tragedy, and one again the gun control industry is on the move,” said Guy Smith, editor of Gun Facts. “Yet as in 2000, their rush to crush civil rights meets the brick wall of facts, perspective and reason. The gun control industry won’t get far.” Gun Facts categorizes gun... Gun Facts http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2996537/posts#comment Wed, 13 Mar 2013 20:57:31 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2990803/posts The Washington Post's Bob Woodward tells POLITICO Playbook that the White House is muddling the facts on the sequester - "a classic case of distortion and confusion." **SNIP** "The White House pushback is a classic case of distortion and confusion," Woodward said in an email to Playbook. "We unfortunately have seen this too often in recent presidential history... I do not think it is willful. They are just mixed up, surprisingly so." Politico http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2990803/posts#comment Sun, 24 Feb 2013 22:11:39 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2979661/posts Warning about "weapons designed for the theater of war," President Obama on Wednesday called for immediate action on a new Federal Assault Weapons Ban. He said that "more of our fellow Americans might still be alive" if the original assault weapons ban, passed in 1994, had not expired in 2004. Last month, in the wake of the horrific shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Conn., Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D., Calif.) promised to introduce an updated version of the ban. She too warned of the threat posed by "military weapons." After the nightmare of Newtown, their concern is understandable. Yet... WSJ http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2979661/posts#comment Sat, 19 Jan 2013 00:21:07 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2979556/posts While President Barack Obama is moving ahead with executive orders and legislation to further tighten gun control in response to the mass murder committed by Adam Lanza at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., neither the toxicology report on Lanza’s corpse nor the police report on his crime have been completed. Lanza attacked the school on Dec. 14, killing 26 people, including 20 children. Before going to the school, he killed his mother at the home where he lived with her. When police arrived at the school during his murder spree, Lanza shot and killed himself. … Despite... Cybercast News Service http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2979556/posts#comment Fri, 18 Jan 2013 19:44:00 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2974767/posts Old truths decay and new ones are born at an astonishing rate.Dinosaurs were cold-blooded. Increased K-12 spending and lower pupil/teacher ratios boost public school student outcomes. Most of the DNA in the human genome is junk. Saccharin causes cancer and a high fiber diet prevents it. Stars cannot be bigger than 150 solar masses.In the past half-century, all of the foregoing facts have turned out to be wrong. In the modern world facts change all of the time, according to Samuel Arbesman, author of the new book The Half-Life of Facts: Why Everything We Know Has an Expiration Date (Current). Fact-making... Reason http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2974767/posts#comment Fri, 4 Jan 2013 03:37:50 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2972378/posts In the wake of the Newtown school massacre, we've noted a strong uptick in our site traffic by people wanting to find out how different the U.S. might be if the nation adopted Canada's much more restrictive firearms laws. This post gathers all our analysis on that topic from 2011 in one place. Who Kills Who We examine the FBI's data on the race of victims and their killers. We find that the vast majority of offenders prefer to kill their own kind (that evidence is borne out elsewhere, where criminals also seem to prefer killing other criminals!) U.S. vs... Townhall.com http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2972378/posts#comment Wed, 26 Dec 2012 17:57:18 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2970873/posts <p>Newt Gingrich said that conservatives will have to accept marriage equality after three more states this year voted to allow same sex marriage and more will likely do the same in the 2014 election.</p> <p>The former Speaker of the House said he didn’t expect gay rights to become the “wave” issue it has, but that he can accept the difference between a marriage in a church and a legal document, reported Huffington Post.</p> Newsmax http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2970873/posts#comment Thu, 20 Dec 2012 23:05:19 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2970480/posts Yesterday morning, Soledad O’Brien had on her CNN show economist John Lott, of More Guns, Less Crime fame (also an NRO contributor). As I’ve discussed before on NRO, O’Brien has a habit of bringing on conservative guests and then spitting out Democratic talking points under the glib guise of a non-partisan moderator calling them to account on the facts.But her encounter with Lott, the video of which you can view below, is a new low: Rather than parroting liberal arguments (which typically involve at least a few facts) in order to confront Lott’s arguments, she merely relates her bewildered sentiments... National Review Online http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2970480/posts#comment Wed, 19 Dec 2012 21:46:57 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2926460/posts CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The Obama campaign said Tuesday that they care about the truth of their attacks. "We work very hard to get it right. We look at the facts. We vet what we say," Obama spokesman Ben LaBolt said in an ABC/Yahoo News panel. politico44 http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2926460/posts#comment Tue, 4 Sep 2012 15:54:27 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2926446/posts Are You Better Off Than You Were at the End of the Bush Administration? A Data-Based Assessment I've heard a lot about the "four years ago" comparison. Four years ago, we were on the cusp of Don Luskin’s famous prediction (“... we're on the brink not of recession, but of accelerating prosperity.”), and Phill Gramm had two months earlier decried the ongoing “mental recession”. [0] It seems to me the more appropriate marker is the last election, in 2008Q4. We can then assess what the data tells us about 2012Q2 vis a vis 2008Q4. Aggregate Measures of Activity and Income... EconBrowser http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2926446/posts#comment Tue, 4 Sep 2012 15:21:08 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2910547/posts Random thoughts on the passing scene: Even squirrels know enough to store nuts, so that they will have something to eat when food gets scarce. But the welfare state has spawned a whole class of people who spend everything they get when times are good, and look to others to provide for their food and other basic needs when times turn bad. The 14th Amendment to the Constitution prescribes "equal protection of the laws" to all Americans. But what does that mean, if the President of the United States can arbitrarily grant waivers, so that A, B and C have... TOWNHALL http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2910547/posts#comment Wed, 25 Jul 2012 15:37:34 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2885612/posts "Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but they are not entitled to their own facts." -- Daniel Patrick Moynihan Conservatives and liberals may disagree on reasons, motivations, and excuses for Barack Obama's performance, but the facts are still facts. There may be many reasons that a pro football coach goes 1-15, but everyone can agree that his record is still 1-15, right? Well, here are some basic facts about how the country is faring with Barack Obama in the White House. Take a look at the numbers, sans commentary, and make your own judgment about whether Barack Obama deserves... Townhall.com http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2885612/posts#comment Sat, 19 May 2012 11:50:13 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2877932/posts A quick review of the long and illustrious career of Facts reveals some of the world's most cherished absolutes: Gravity makes things fall down; 2 + 2 = 4; the sky is blue. But for many, Facts' most memorable moments came in simple day-to-day realities, from a child's certainty of its mother's love to the comforting knowledge that a favorite television show would start promptly at 8 p.m. Over the centuries, Facts became such a prevalent part of most people's lives that Irish philosopher Edmund Burke once said: "Facts are to the mind what food is to the body." To... Chicago Tribune http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2877932/posts#comment Sun, 29 Apr 2012 22:57:39 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2866986/posts Since when is something we do every day taboo, like profiling? Every American who can think, profiles. If you are looking for a mate, you profile. In fact, if you search for a mate on line, the first thing you do is establish a profile. You profile yourself! When you fill out a resume to look for a job, your resume is a profile. When you show up for the interview, you are being profiled by your potential employer. You beginning to get the picture? The doorman at a trendy bar profiles, and you won't see anybody getting into one... American Thinker http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2866986/posts#comment Mon, 2 Apr 2012 14:00:21 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2864689/posts I spent a little time browsing FBI Crime Stats for 2010(Last year that has been finalized) and made some interesting discoveries. Did you know that 90% of blacks are murdered by blacks, and 83% of whites are murdered by whites? Did you know that there are 14.82 murders per 100K by blacks versus 2.17 per 100K for whites? Per capita there are 7x more murders committed by blacks than whites. I didn’t make this up. It comes directly from the FBI. I just cut the numbers in a more revealing manner. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2864689/posts#comment Tue, 27 Mar 2012 23:47:25 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2859595/posts The president looked at the phone and said "how wonderful" NY Magazine http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2859595/posts#comment Thu, 15 Mar 2012 21:39:51 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2832554/posts Rick Santorum - “I wrote the welfare reform bill in the Contract with America. I was the ranking member on that subcommittee. And when I came to the Senate, through a quirk, I ended up managing the bill on the floor of the United States Senate and working with President Clinton and getting a bill signed after he vetoed it twice to end welfare. We bloc-granted the program, got rid of the federal entitlement -- the only one in the history of the country that’s ever been done. And I was the principal author of it in the United States... Washington Post http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2832554/posts#comment Fri, 13 Jan 2012 17:48:20 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2830609/posts The left is hard at work assuring that Santorum remains an "also ran." Rick Santorum wanted people to pay attention to him. Well, he got his way. Now his every utterance is being parsed by the media and he is receiving special scrutiny from progressive pundits, who have been frantically quote-mining for material to use in their obligatory hit pieces. Among the nuggets they have unearthed involves an exchange Santorum had a month ago with a student at Dordt College, a small Christian school in Sioux Center, Iowa. The student cited a 2009 study about the number of people who... American Spectator http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2830609/posts#comment Mon, 9 Jan 2012 17:20:44 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2818896/posts Newt Gingrich broke though taboos against challenging Palestinian Authority double talk and re-writing history, forcing Mitt Romney to admit he is right – but adding that saying so is incendiary.” Gingrich, who is leading the polls for the Republican presidential nomination, angered the Palestinian Authority with his remarks in a televised interview in which he stated that "an invented Palestinian people…are in fact Arabs." PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad told reporters in response, “These are extremely trivial, demeaning and ridiculous remarks. Even the most extremist settlers of Israel wouldn’t talk in such a ridiculous way. Our people have been here... Arutz Sheva http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2818896/posts#comment Sun, 11 Dec 2011 12:02:11 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2784782/posts Waxman to Issa: Get Solyndra facts straightBy Ben Geman - 09/27/11 07:32 AM ET Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) is rebutting House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa’s (R-Calif.) claim that Waxman helped the now-bankrupt solar company Solyndra secure its $535 million federal loan guarantee. Waxman said in a letter to Issa on Monday that he had no role in the financing. “I am writing to let you know that I had no involvement in the selection of the Solyndra loan. In fact, the first time I met with representatives from Solyndra was in July 2011, when the company’s... The Hill http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2784782/posts#comment Wed, 28 Sep 2011 11:38:56 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2781249/posts This is the data for calendar year 2003 just released in October 2005 by the Internal Revenue Service. The share of total income taxes paid by the top 1% of wage earners rose to 34.27% from 33.71% in 2002. Their income share (not just wages) rose from 16.12% to 16.77%. However, their average tax rate actually dropped from 27.25% down to 24.31% Think of it this way: less than 3-1/2 dollars out of every $100 paid in income taxes in the United States is paid by someone in the bottom 50% of wage earners. Are the top half millionaires? Noooo,... Rush Limbaugh http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2781249/posts#comment Tue, 20 Sep 2011 21:49:19 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2766209/posts WASHINGTON, D.C., August 18, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The U.S. Centers for Disease Control has estimated that homosexual men account for 61% of the new HIV infections in the United States while they only amount to about 2% of the country’s population. Earlier this month, the CDC released estimates for HIV infections from 2006-2009 showing that new infections remained stable at around 50,000 for each of the four years. Homosexual men accounted for 29,300 of the estimated 48,100 new infections in 2009, and homosexual men aged 13 to 29 accounted for 27% of the new cases. The only group in which... Life Site News http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2766209/posts#comment Fri, 19 Aug 2011 19:24:24 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2763929/posts Well, goodbye Tim Pawlenty, hello Rick Perry. The Texas governor announced that he is running for president on Saturday, just hours before the Ames Straw Poll in Iowa that ended Pawlenty’s presidential aspirations. As has been our custom, we will take a look at some of the assertions made in Perry’s announcement speech and then render a blended Pinocchio rating. “Since June of 2009, Texas is responsible for more than 40 percent of all of the new jobs created in America. Now think about that. We’re home to less than 10 percent of the population in America, but 40 percent... Washington Post http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2763929/posts#comment Mon, 15 Aug 2011 17:26:40 GMT