Free Republic

A biological medication already widely used to treat plaque psoriasis may be able to slow the accumulation of amyloid plaques in the brain that are the hallmark of Alzheimer's disease, a new study has found. The same study found that in older mice with established Alzheimer's, this treatment approach, which suppresses the brain's immune reaction to beta amyloid, brought a marked improvement in cognitive function and may even halt or reverse early signs of Alzheimer's. The new study was published this week in the journal Nature Medicine. Conducted by researchers in Switzerland and Germany, the study offers a glimmer of...

NBC sportscaster Bob Costas used his weekly monologue on “Sunday Night Football” to discuss the fallout of the tragedy in Kansas City, urging viewers to move past the cliched coverage of the “perspective” gleaned from the news that linebacker Jovan Belcher killed his girlfriend and then himself Saturday morning. Costas focused much of his monologue on a column by Fox Sports’ Jason Whitlock, which argued that “current gun culture simply ensures that more and more domestic disputes will end in the ultimate tragedy.” Costas said that although he often doesn’t agree with Whitlock, he found his argument to be spot...

Sen. Lindsey Graham said President Barack Obama’s plan to prevent American from going over the fiscal cliff is “a joke.” “I think we’re going over the cliff,” the South Carolina Republican said Sunday on CBS’ “Face the Nation.” “It’s pretty clear to me they’ve made a political calculation. This offer doesn’t remotely deal with entitlement reform in a way to save Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security from imminent bankruptcy.” …

Billionaire Warren Buffett, always popular among Democratic redistributionists, says he wants a “minimum tax” on the very rich. Never mind that we already have one, and that what he proposes would hurt both the economy and the middle class. … Last year, according to the Treasury Department, the U.S. deficit was $1.1 trillion. According to a study by Congress’ Joint Committee on Taxation, a Buffett-style 30% tax on all millionaires would generate just $5 billion. That’s less than one-half of one percent of our budget. In short, Buffett’s proposal is a fiscal joke. …

“We’ve lost the battle in Washington” for now, says Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C. The new goals, he says, are for conservatives to prove their principles work in states and to defend against President Obama’s effort “to steamroll what’s left of the Republican Party here in Washington.” As a guest on “Istook Live!,” DeMint agreed that Obama aims to crush his opposition now so they cannot resist his agenda over the next four years. Said the senator, “They smell blood in the water and they’ll keep pushing … they’re not coming our way or coming to the middle to try and...

Much tighter controls have already been introduced for anyone seeking access or photocopies of the Holy See's archives, dossiers and documents.

Participating states include New York, Massachusetts, Colorado, Tennessee, and Connecticut. The decision is all part of an initiative to be more competitive with other nations on a global level... Federal, state, and district funds will afford the increase in school hours along with the Ford Foundation and the National Center on Time and Learning.

Russia’s Vladimir Putin has declared war on the Internet, and not just within his country’s own borders. Putin’s war may be coming soon to a laptop or smart phone near you. For years we’ve been told by Putin’s apologists that his moves against traditional media didn’t matter because it was impossible to strangle Russia’s feisty Internet. But for a KGB dictator, “impossible” is a meaningless term. Putin’s campaign consists of a three-part pincer movement, and now that he has essentially been made “president for life”, he is pursuing it with greatly renewed vigor. … Throughout Putin’s first twelve years in...

Dozens of Chinese mothers are giving birth to their babies in a house atop a hill in a wealthy neighborhood of Chino Hills, California - and they're paying thousands of dollars for the privilege. Neighbors say the home is a 'maternity mansion,' a hotel where Chinese women stay for the last few months of their pregnancy so their children are born on American soil - and are therefore American citizens. Experts say the practice is widespread and that authorities are nearly powerless to stop it. The 14th Amendment guarantees that any person born in the United States is an American...

The right to build a home or a business on your own land is basic to the very concept of property rights. Of course, government can impose reasonable conditions for health and safety, but too often, officials misuse land-use permitting to enrich the public sector rather than for legitimate regulation. In fact, many bureaucrats view the right to develop one’s property as a privilege landowners must purchase, sometimes at the cost of their constitutional freedoms. Thankfully, the U.S. Supreme Court recently accepted a Florida case that could force an attitude change on regulators across the country. Koontz v. St. Johns...

Lakeshia R. Hall came back to her West Town home Saturday to find her boyfriend watching television with another woman, leading her to believe he had been unfaithful, prosecutors said today. That sight launched Hall, 28, into a violent rage that earned her an attempted murder charge and sent her boyfriend to the hospital, prosecutors said.

I think I owe an apology to George W. Bush. William F. Buckley once noted that he was 19 when the Cold War began at the Yalta conference. The year the Berlin Wall came down, he became a senior citizen. In other words, he explained, anti-communism was a defining feature of conservatism his entire adult life. Domestically, meanwhile, the right was largely a “leave me alone coalition”: Religious and traditional conservatives, overtaxed businessmen, Western libertarians, and others fed up with government social engineering and economic folly. The battle against tyrannical statism abroad only buttressed the domestic antagonism toward well-intentioned and...

By REEM KHALIFA Associated Press MANAMA, Bahrain Just hours after reality TV star Kim Kardashian gushed about her impressions of Bahrain, riot police fired tear gas to disperse more than 50 hardline Islamic protesters denouncing her presence in the Gulf kingdom. The clashes took place just before Kardashian opened the Bahrain branch of her Millions of Milkshakes shop. An Associated Press journalist saw protesters chanting "God is Great" near the shopping complex in Riffa, some 20 kilometers (12 miles) south of the capital Manama. The demonstrators were cleared before Kardashian appeared late Saturday. Earlier, she posted glowing remarks about Bahrain...

Chatting with a group backstage on the set of Jimmy Kimmel Live! in October, Michelle Obama made it clear that she wasn’t thinking about what she might do in the future. “I’m just looking ahead to getting Barack back in office and continuing the work he’s been doing,” she said. “Supporting him is my focus.” But others think the first lady—who spent the past four years seeking to better the lives of military families and fighting to end childhood obesity before becoming one of the stars of her husband’s reelection effort this fall—could have bigger things ahead of her, if...

Lock Your Doors And Prepare To Defend Your Family By Michael Snyder December 2nd, 2012 Do you think that is an alarmist headline? Well, I am not the one saying this. Law enforcement authorities all over the country are telling citizens that they can no longer deal with all the crime and that people need to lock their doors and prepare to defend their families. Just recently, the city attorney of San Bernardino, California told citizens to "lock their doors and load their guns" because there is not enough money to pay for adequate police protection any longer. The murder...

Frosty the Snowman is there — and so is Santa Claus. But the Baby Jesus is stuffed inside a closet at Cottondale Elementary School — leaving many residents of this small town in the Florida panhandle outraged. The Nativity scene had been a part of the school’s holiday lawn decorations for years. But this year the yuletide display is strictly secular. Principal Brenda Jones told television station WJHG the decision to keep Baby Jesus in the closet came after an official with the Dept. of Education dropped by to discuss the separation of church and state. “The Dept. of Education...

Iran’s nuclear reactor at Bushehr was shut down for fear of an explosion. Saturday Dec. 1, an authoritative Russian nuclear industry source revealed the cause of its malfunction: “Indicators showed that some small external parts were… in the [Bushehr] reactor vessel….” They were identified as “bolts beneath the fuel cells.” Moscow sources report this information came from a source in the office of Sergei Kiriyenko, head of the Russian nuclear energy authority Rosatom, which supervised the construction of Iran’s first atomic reactor at Bushehr. According to our intelligence sources, Russian scientists and engineers were rushed from Moscow to Bushehr when...

60% Capital Gains tax – the real innovation killer Forget taxing the wealthy, forget big government, the French government is eliminating the one tangible reward for building new companies, creating innovation, and providing the French government with a few hundred new employees. This come at a time where France’s big companies are beginning to show their anti-global competitiveness roots - Peugeot is laying off thousands, Bouygues is laying off thousands, and this is just the beginning. For the record, the current Capital Gains tax is set at 32.5%, an 84.6% tax hike. The Pigeon Movement – France’s Last Hope for...

Revelations by the Albuquerque Journal that ties existed between a Columbus, N.M., gun trafficking conspiracy and the Fast and Furious gunwalking operation highlight a disconnect with pretrial testimony given by an ATF agent in yet a third case, that of the Reese family, a tip received this morning by Gun Rights Examiner from a source close to the case suggests. “Federal prosecutors have sought to distance the Columbus gun smuggling case,” reporter Mike Gallagher revealed in a story filed last Thursday. “But reports obtained by the Journal show that in April 2010, federal agents were aware that the leader of...

House Speaker John Boehner told host Chris Wallace on "Fox News Sunday" that President Barack Obama is "not being serious" about proposing a deal to avert the so-called "fiscal cliff," slamming the president and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner's initial offer. "It was not a serious offer," Boehner said. "I looked at [Geithner] and I said, 'You can't be serious?' "You know, we've got several weeks between Election Day and the end of the year. And three of those weeks have been wasted with this nonsense."