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If there's a silver lining in the continued popularity of non-scientific healing techniques, it's the fact that the scientific community is at long last putting these so-called treatments and potions through vigorous testing. And one by one they fail to live up to their purported benefits. Here are five alternative therapies that were debunked or denounced in 2009.

A parody of "Draggin the Line" by Tommy James and the Shondells about Climategate. Thanks also to JibJab.com for their great animations, I covered up their logo so people didn't think they made this or condone this message.

Several remarkable things recently became clear: The left is unable to injure an opponent through a boycott. This must be a horrible shock as the boycott has been a successful labor union and leftist tactic for more than a century. Worse yet, Beck’s ratings rose substantially and, at least one boycotter, GEICO, is losing at least 6500 customers. I personally cancelled my Progressive policy (was previously unaware of the Soros, et al. connection) in response, and I am sure I have company. We conservatives do not preen our “goodness” with public statements; we simply cease to patronize the enemies of...

As climate change reemerges as an issue in the national policy debate, it may help define the legislative legacies of two men who once vied for the White House: Sens. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.). Both men have championed the issue of global warming for years, including when they served as their party's presidential nominees in 2004 and 2008, respectively. But, for the moment, McCain is barely engaged in the issue beyond criticizing the climate bill passed by the House, while Kerry has emerged as one of the chamber's leading dealmakers. The fact that the two no...

I was reading the Chron’s piece about Sheila Jackson Lee’s town hall, when something caught my eye: One supporter, Dr. Roxana Mayer, a physician who does not live in Jackson Lee’s district, praised the reform plan for overhauling a broken system. “I don’t know what there is in the bill that creates such panic,” she said. In this video, Mayer claims to be a general practitioner, eliciting applause and even a hug from Queen Sheila: I’m not sure why, but something didn’t smell right. So my colleagues and I did a little digging, and wouldn’t you know it? Roxana Mayer...

OPINION THE RECORD The Mahwah shooting Tuesday, April 4, 2006 THE RECORD'S EDITORIAL STAFF THE TRAGIC weekend altercation between state park police officers and Ramapough Mountain Indians demands a rigorous and thorough investigation by Bergen County Prosecutor John Molinelli. So far, the information about the shooting incident simply does not add up, and the prosecutor's silence on the case has only compounded the problem. Although the incident in the Mahwah section of Ringwood State Park occurred on Saturday afternoon, only a tiny bit is known with any certainty. During a confrontation between park police officers and an estimated two dozen...

(Obama) received financial aid as a foreign student from Indonesia (while at Occidental, through Fulbright) Via court ordered release of information. Also see links to be posted at post #2.

Vice President Joe Biden may also have some difficult questions to answer, according to John Hempton who blogs at Bronte Capital. Tyler Durden at Zero Hedge says: John Hempton, who writes the insightful blog Bronte Capital, has done some amazing dot connecting in what, if true, and not swept promptly under the carpet by the powers that be, could expose a hedge fund scandal that could rival the Madoff fiasco, for the simple reason that it implicates none other than Barack Obama’s right hand man: Joe Biden.... This is an intricate story. And it is my no means conclusive. But...

... while the online question portion of the White House town hall was open to any member of the public with an Internet connection, the five fully identified questioners called on randomly by the president in the East Room were anything but a diverse lot. They included: a member of the pro-Obama Service Employees International Union, a member of the Democratic National Committee who campaigned for Obama among Hispanics during the primary; a former Democratic candidate for Virginia state delegate who endorsed Obama last fall in an op-ed in the Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star; and a Virginia businessman who was a...

CHICAGO – A Chicago minister told The Associated Press he and other black pastors who previously supported U.S. Sen. Roland Burris now plan to ask him to resign. The minister spoke Thursday on condition of anonymity because a meeting with Burris hadn't yet been scheduled. Many of the city's black pastors supported seating Burris because of his scandal-free reputation — even though he was appointed by then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich after the governor was arrested. But revelations that Burris attempted to raise money for Blagojevich while seeking the Senate job have eroded some of his support. Blagojevich is accused of trying...

In his first weeks in office, President Barack Obama shut down his predecessor’s system for reviewing regulations, realigned and expanded two key White House policymaking bodies and extended economic sanctions against parties to the conflict in the African nation of Cote D’Ivoire. Despite the intense scrutiny a president gets just after the inauguration, Obama managed to take all these actions with nary a mention from the White House press corps. The moves escaped notice because they were never announced by the White House Press Office and were never placed on the White House web site. They came to light only...

Everyone who has been in the military, especially to Iraq or Afghanistan, within the last few years needs to watch the first part of this video. Look at the "military equipment" CBS is pushing as recently stolen or "looted" from US Forces. You will notice that it's equipment we aren't even issued. Also, they blatantly lie when attempting to show night vision equipment, which isn't night vision equipment at all. (see video at link) Right off I see many inconsistencies with the equipment they say is stolen from US forces. 00:02 the video shows some a series of boots. Out...

Liberals have practiced secular politics since the 1960s, but with the ascent of Barack Obama, the left discovered it can actually keep the faith. When I was a high school kid in 1969, my church youth group leader took a bunch of us to Berkeley in the aftermath of the People’s Park uprising so we could soak in the café scene and experience some of what he was witnessing as a young seminarian at the Pacific School of Religion. The rigid establishment was being overthrown – in politics and the church – and something new in activism was being caffeinated....

As Republicans sort out the reasons for their defeat, they likely will overlook or dismiss the gorilla in the pulpit. Three little letters, great big problem: G-O-D. I'm bathing in holy water as I type. To be more specific, the evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy branch of the GOP is what ails the erstwhile conservative party and will continue to afflict and marginalize its constituents if reckoning doesn't soon cometh. Simply put: Armband religion is killing the Republican Party. And, the truth -- as long as we're setting ourselves free -- is that if one were to eavesdrop on private conversations among...

Philadelphia’s CBS 3 has joined WFTV on the Obama interview ban list. The station interviewers gave Biden tough questions that he apparently did not like, resulting in the same punishment as was dolled out to an Orlando station for another tough interview. Perhaps the Obama campaign should send out a list of acceptable questions before interviews happen. Then again, Biden could just give straight answers and the questions would stop.

After Comrade George W. Bush nationalised the two giants of the US mortgage market, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, earlier this month, Anatole Kaletsky wrote in The Times of London that ''the most capitalist administration ever, in the world's most capitalist country, [has] decided to wipe out the private owners of its biggest and most important financial companies and replace them with state-appointed bureaucrats''. Wikipedia defines ''nationalisation'' as ''the act of taking an industry or assets into the public ownership of a national government. It is a central theme of certain brands of state socialist policy that the means of...

Why the Rescue Plan Can Work> Last Update: 22-Sep-08 08:21 ET The government plan to buy mortgage-backed assets from financial institutions is likely to be a win-win. It will be a win for financial institutions because it would finally provide a legitimate buyer for mortgage-backed assets. It will be a win for the government because these assets are trading well below their intrinsic value. The government could make a large profit. The Crux of the Problem The essence of the problems plaguing the U.S. economy (as discussed in the August 18 Big Picture column) is housing. The impact, however, is...

THE MORE I LISTEN TO AND READ ABOUT “the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate,” the more I like him. Barack Obama strikes a chord with me like no political figure since Ronald Reagan. To explain why, I need to explain why I am a conservative and what it means to me. In 1964, at the age of 16, I organized the Dallas County Youth for Goldwater. My senior thesis at the University of Texas was on the conservative intellectual revival in America. Twenty years later, I was invited by William F. Buckley Jr. to join the board of...

The family of Joe Biden, who will be officially nominated as the vice presidential candidate of the Democratic Party's 'reform Washington' ticket with Barack Obama Thursday night, appears to be enmeshed in the same D.C. money game that Obama denounces. One of the senator's sons -- Hunter, a Washington lobbyist -- and the senator's brother, James --received a $1 million investment in their purchase of a hedge fund company from the senator's largest political donor, an Illinois law firm, SimmonsCooper. The brother and the son subsequently repaid the $1 million to the law firm, which specializes in representing asbestos victims....

Last year Americans spent $22.5 billion on dietary supplements, taking everything from a standard multivitamin to fish oil for the heart to magnesium for healthy bones. But how do we know which vitamin pills we need and which we don't? And at what doses do the risks outweigh the benefits? Dr. Eric Rimm at the Harvard School of Public Health sat down with ABC's Medical Editor Dr. Tim Johnson to discuss some of the more talked about vitamins, how much of them we should be taking and whether too much can be detrimental to our health. In a field filled...

BREAKING NEWS: Barry Bonds is charged with 14 counts of lying and one count of obstruction of justice in a new indictment stemming from a steriod probe. Full article coming shortly.

Whirlpool Corp.'s Evansville, Ind., plant has suspended 39 workers for smoking while claiming on their health insurance they were nonsmokers.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - After just two early contests in the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign, some environmental groups are already declaring a winner: the issue of climate change. "Four candidates, two states, one winner," was how the League of Conservation Voters put it after Tuesday's New Hampshire primary victories for Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican John McCain and Iowa caucus wins for Republican Mike Huckabee and Democrat Barack Obama. "The true frontrunner in the 2008 presidential campaign so far is the issue of global warming: all four winning candidates to date support capping greenhouse gas emissions and solving the global warming...

How mayor of A.C. was exposed as impostor Increased national scrutiny led Bob Levy to admit he was no Green Beret. By Edward ColimoreInquirer Staff WriterJames Simmons was suspicious.The Vietnam veteran had read a newspaper article referring to Atlantic City Mayor Bob Levy as a former Green Beret and wanted to recruit him for a veterans' group.But when Simmons sent the mayor a letter more than a year ago seeking proof of his service in the Army's Special Forces during the Vietnam War, he received no reply and began checking for himself.He used Internet military databases such as homeofheroes.com, enlisted...

The roller-coaster career of maverick trader Victor Niederhoffer took a sharp downturn after losses mounted and a key investor withdrew money from his firm, demonstrating how the market's recent volatility has shaken even some veterans. Mr. Niederhoffer's hedge-fund firm, Manchester Trading LLC, ran into difficulties a decade after Mr. Niederhoffer lost most of his personal savings when his previous hedge fund collapsed. Last month, Mr. Niederhoffer's largest hedge fund, Matador Fund Ltd., was liquidated after suffering losses of more than 70%, according to people close to the matter. Adding to Mr. Niederhoffer's problems, according to a person close to the...

Soledad Aviles dreamed for years of owning a home, with a plot of land where he could grow corn and chiles as he did in his native Mexico. So he felt blessed last year when he learned he could buy a three-bedroom, single-story stucco house on West La Verne Avenue in Santa Ana. Referred to a local loan broker by a trusted friend, he borrowed the entire purchase price of $615,000 from Washington Mutual at a high interest rate typical of sub-prime loans. The monthly payment, as he says he understood it, would be $3,600 -- steep for a glass...

Last month Pajamas Media published an in-depth report on the scandal surrounding the “Baghdad Diarist” articles by Scott Thomas Beauchamp in The New Republic. Now PJM’s Bob Owens interviews Major John Cross, who led the U.S. Army’s investigation into Private Beauchamp’s shocking claims. Even more shocking is what Cross reveals below: Among other findings, there is no credible evidence that TNR made any attempt at fact checking prior to publishing the articles. Furthermore, not one of the soldiers interviewed under oath in the investigation corroborated Beauchamp’s story. Click link for more: http://pajamasmedia.com/2007/09/new_republic.php

Norman Hsu, the Democratic fund-raiser whose 15-year fugitive odyssey began and ended with skipped court dates and cut a trail of fraud, tainted donations and blindsided candidates, seemed to be at the end of his rope yesterday, hospitalized under guard in Colorado after his latest vanishing act failed. Mr. Hsu, a 56-year-old Hong Kong businessman born Yung Yuen Hsu, who raised large sums for presidential races and many major political figures, who reveled in circles of power and even became a university trustee (with a scholarship in his name) — all while on the run from a three-year prison term...

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign said yesterday that it would give to charity $23,000 it had received from a prominent Democratic donor, and review thousands of dollars more that he had raised, after learning that the authorities in California had a warrant for his arrest stemming from a 1991 fraud case. The donor, Norman Hsu, has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for Democratic candidates since 2003, and was slated to be co-host next month for a Clinton gala featuring the entertainer Quincy Jones. The event would not have been unusual for Mr. Hsu, a businessman from Hong Kong who...

ACLU urges CU regents not to fire Ward Churchill July 20, 2007 The American Civil Liberties Union sent a letter to the University of Colorado's Board of Regents on Thursday, urging them not to fire professor Ward Churchill. "I think that the protection of the First Amendment rights is vital in the university and in the general public," said Cathy Hazouri, executive director of ACLU of Colorado.

Early this summer, Paul Crouch of the Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN) wrote to supporters, telling them that the network's spring "Praise-a-Thon" was a success. For five days, Crouch and a slate of other televangelists had raised money on-air for TBN, the largest Christian television network in the world. "TBN is debt free," Crouch wrote. "Free to invest every penny into expansion to the rest of the world!" For TBN, that means investing in broadcasting its Christian-themed programs on thousands of cable systems and more than 5,000 television stations. But it also means investing in something else: Southern California real estate....

Monday’s Early Show on CBS picked up on Time magazine’s promotional cover story "How The Democrats Got Religion." Reporter Jeff Glor used two guides to explore how the Democrats would "level the praying field," but didn’t exactly tell viewers that these guides were involved in the drive to help the Democrats. The first expert was Time magazine’s Amy Sullivan, who wrote a "God Gap" essay for the magazine. CBS didn’t explain she was an aide to then-Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle and during her stint with the liberal magazine The Washington Monthly, she advised the Democrats on how to "get...

Hillary Rodham Clinton looked enviously at her husband's malted milkshake at a roadside ice cream shop. Then, unable to resist, she dipped in a plastic spoon. Sitting side by side at the counter, cooing over the array of flavors, the Clintons seemed the picture of marital bliss, like any other husband and wife team that just happened to be running for president once again. Elsewhere during nearly three days of campaigning across Iowa, the couple hugged, touched and whispered in each other's ears. He would pat her back. She would touch his arm. In the Fourth of July parade in...

Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff is blasting the U.S. Senate for failing to pass an immigration bill, and claims the federal government doesn't have the ability to enforce laws when it comes to illegals working in America. "We're going to continue to enforce the law. It's going to be tough," Michael Chertoff said. "We don't really have the ability to enforce the law with respect to illegal work in this country in a way that's truly effective."

OK, fellow Freepers, try not to throw your computer through the wall! Many apologies if this has been posted already, but I searched "Illegal Immigration", "Dobbs" and "Cohen & Grigsby" before posting this YouTube video; and just in case, I couldn't let this pass... This, IMHO, is the epitome of digusting, traitorous attorneys at work. This is a clip of a legal seminar on how to exclude qualified U.S. citizens from legitimate job postings in their own country. Who are these people!!!?!??!?! I have to say, that I am absolutely ashamed of the fact that I share the same hometown...

A Bexar County review that apparently found illegal voting by undocumented immigrants has triggered a county investigation of voter fraud and a federal probe of false citizenship claims. County and federal officials acknowledged this week that they are looking into whether up to 41 non-citizens voted illegally in San Antonio, some repeatedly, in more than a dozen local, state and federal elections between 2001 and this year. Bexar County District Attorney Susan Reed's office has joined the investigation, which began in late May when the Homeland Security Department's Immigration and Customs Enforcement requested a report prepared by Bexar County Elections...

Sen. Jim Webb wants to narrow the scope of the bipartisan immigration-overhaul bill, but it was uncertain whether his proposal would be voted upon. Webb, D-Va., introduced an amendment yesterday that would allow perhaps 4 million or 5 million illegal immigrants to be offered a path to citizenship under the bill, ... Michel Zajur, president and chief executive officer of the Virginia Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, said he is aware of Webb's proposals. "There is a bipartisan effort to solve this problem. His amendment just complicates it." ... "This is legislative overkill," Webb said about the bipartisan proposal in a...

The top three Democratic presidential candidates participated in a forum Monday on the connection between their religious faith and political positions. The unusual gathering, broadcast live by CNN, was co-hosted by Sojourners, a Christian social justice network. The Rev. Jim Wallis, editor-in-chief of Sojourners magazine, and an organizer of the forum, has been telling Democrats not to cede religion to Republicans. He has spoken at several Democratic Party retreats, teaching Democrats how to speak about faith. Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York, John Edwards and Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois mentioned faith in a generic way, baptizing their liberal politics...

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology said Thursday that admissions dean Marilee Jones — a crusader for reducing the anxiety around college admissions — has resigned for misrepresenting her academic credentials to the university. Jones, dean since 1997, has been a highly visible campaigner for reforming the college admissions process. She issued a statement saying she had misrepresented her credentials when she first came to work at MIT 28 years ago and "did not have the courage to correct my resume when I applied for my current job or at any time since.

A senator has delayed submitting a resolution to honor pioneering environmentalist Rachel Carson on the 100th anniversary of her birth after a colleague signaled he would block it because of her aggressive fight against pesticides. Carson's 1962 book "Silent Spring" revealed the harmful effects of DDT and other pesticides and helped launch the environmental movement. The longtime resident of Silver Spring, Md., died in 1964. She would have turned 100 this Sunday. Sen. Benjamin Cardin (news, bio, voting record)'s resolution had intended to honor Carson for her "legacy of scientific rigor coupled with poetic sensibility." But Susan Sullam, a spokeswoman...

In a 2005 article in the Journal of the American Medical Association, epidemiologist John Ioannidis showed that among the 45 most highly cited clinical research findings of the past 15 years, 99 percent of molecular research had subsequently been refuted. Epidemiology findings had been contradicted in four-fifths of the cases he looked at, and the usually robust outcomes of clinical trials had a refutation rate of one in four. The revelations struck a chord with the scientific community at large: A recent essay by Ioannidis simply entitled "Why most published research findings are false" has been downloaded more than 100,000...

Rachel Carson wrote Silent Spring--the book that got mosquito-killer DDT banned and launched the modern environmental movement--while struggling with cancer. The disease killed Carson in 1964, two years after Silent Spring came out. Today's Washington Post has a story on Carson--whose 100th birth anniversary occurs later this month--and her noble fight against cancer. A touching piece. But maddening, too! Because in the story's 34 paragraphs, there are only a buried pair, the 26th and 27th, that note the ongoing controversy about DDT's ban. A Maryland Congressman (evil Republican, of course ... wink, wink) is quoted as saying that malaria deaths...

The GOP Should Dump Its Litmus Test By Michael Reagan FrontPageMagazine.com | February 16, 2007 The philosopher Diogenes is said to have wandered around ancient Greece holding a lantern and seeking to find an honest man. My fellow Republicans, sans lanterns, are now wandering around the political landscape seeking to find the perfect Republican presidential candidate. I don’t know if Diogenes ever found that honest man, but I do know that those Republicans are never going to find the perfect candidate, simply because he does not exist. Some Republicans insist that the only perfect candidate would be a clone of...

Here are the three leading candidates for president in the Republican party, a party based in the South and in the interior, rural in nature, and backed in large part by social conservatives: the senior senator from Arizona, a congenital maverick with friends in the press and a habit of dissing the base of his party; the former governor of deep-blue Massachusetts, son of a Michigan governor, a Mormon who looks, sounds, and comes across as a city boy; and the former mayor of New York, the Big Apple itself, ethnic and Catholic, pro-choice and pro-gun control, married three times,...

She not only is a lifelong Republican, but an anti-big government conservative Republican who campaigned for Robert Dole in 1996. Oh, and one other thing. The mere thought of Hillary Clinton becoming president makes her stomach churn. As her husband, Robert Stross - also a conservative Republican - puts it, "We don't believe anything Hillary says, and we think she'll do whatever it takes to get elected." All of which makes the Madison couple's recent decision all the more intriguing: They've joined the Wisconsin chapter of DraftObama.org, a grassroots movement to help the progressive Democratic senator from Illinois win the...

Hillary Clinton has hired an "evangelical consultant” to help woo Christian conservatives in her likely 2008 presidential campaign. The move comes after a similar political operative successfully aided Democratic candidates in several states in the midterm elections. More than one-quarter of the nation’s voters identify themselves as evangelical — a voter bloc that has long been courted by Republicans. Clinton’s new hire is Burns Strider, an evangelical Christian who directs religious outreach for House Democrats and is the lead staffer for the Democrats’ Faith Working Group, headed by incoming Majority Whip James Clyburn of South Carolina. Incoming Speaker Nancy Pelosi...

Dixie Chicks to Split Up After Grammy's? -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- By Jim Roberts Dec 13, 2006 The Dixie Chicks just scored the big trifecta with Grammy nominations. The one-time country band that turned their collective backs on the music genre, its stars and its fans cleaned up with the three majors, Best Album, Song and Record for “Taking the Long Way” and the single, “Not Ready to Make Nice.” The Chicks were one of eight acts with five nominations each, as it appears that the Grammy's are desperately trying to give the gals some love for their America bashing ways. Now a...

The Dixie Chicks cleaned up this morning with Grammy nominations. They received the big three: Best Album, Song and Record for “Taking the Long Way” and the single, “Not Ready to Make Nice.” They got two more, for performance in the country category, and their producer, Rick Rubin, was also nominated. Not bad, considering the flack they took in the three years leading up to the album’s release

Contested Traffic Ticket May Be Crux Of Case TACOMA, Wash. -- For nearly 20 years -- ever since Pete Costello was 8 -- his mother has collected disability benefits on his behalf. In meetings with Social Security officials and psychologists, he appeared mentally retarded and unable to communicate. His mother insisted he couldn't read or write, shower, take care of himself or drive a car. But now prosecutors said it was all a huge fraud, and they have video of Costello contesting a traffic ticket to prove it.