Free Republic

I've been looking at new (or slightly used) laptops. Many if not almost all have touchpads that do not also have any kind of associated buttons or a trackball. So, if I am working in a document and want to select a sentence or block of text to copy and paste, how is that readily accomplished? I've read reviews by owners of such in which they complain of no easy way to do such selections, which seems like an astonishing lack of functionality. The laptops I've been looking at are 14" or 15.6", so there is certainly lots of real...

Have you ever wondered why there is such a lack of commonality in political discourse today? In America, you are either a Trump-supporter or not. There is absolutely no bridge or commonality between the two groups. It is almost as if there is one type of person who is composed of fire, and the other type of person is composed of water. Why is this? Well, there is a theory that precisely explains this dichotomy of behavior. This theory is called the “r/K Selection Theory in Evolutionary Ecology”, and it is based on the observed survival behaviors of creatures. It...

The Illinois tollway contends its no-bid process that uses a selection committee to makes recommendations to the board on expensive engineering contracts is independent and transparent. But when asked to provide meeting minutes, the agency blacked out the names of committee members in a majority of cases, making it impossible to see who is voting -- a response criticized by attorney and public access expert Don Craven as improper under Illinois open records law. When the names did surface they included tollway board Director Corey Brooks, who like all directors is appointed by Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner, countering claims the...

Eric Parker, Ricky Lovelien, Steven Stewart and Scott Drexler are back in a Vegas courtroom for a retrial of charges related to the 2014 Bunkerville Standoff.Judge Gloria Navarro declared a mistrial in the case in April when the jury could not reach a consensus for the majority of charges against the defendants.Two of the defendants, Gregory Burlson and Todd Engel, were found guilty on some of the charges and will not be retried on the remaining charges. They are scheduled to be sentenced later this month.Jury Selection in the new trial began this week with Judge Navarro immediately taking over...

'); } //--> The peahen (at left) and the peacock (at right). The peacock's elaborate plumage and many other similar animal ornaments posed a troubling difficulty for Charles Darwin in his development of the theory of evolution, since they seemed to have no value for survival. The peacocks that were everywhere present in English gardens were a frustrating and ever-present reminder of the difficulty. "The sight of a feather in a peacock's tail", Darwin wrote, "whenever I gaze at it, makes me sick!". Darwin solved the problem with his theory of sexual selection, which posits that such ornaments evolved...

“There are few Republicans who have betrayed our conservative principles more than John McCain,” SCF President Ken Cuccinelli said in an email to supporters Tuesday of the party's 2008 nominee for president. “John McCain lost his way a long time ago and it's time to replace him with a strong conservative leader who will support and defend the Constitution.”

Genetically screening our offspring to make them better people is just 'responsible parenting', claims an eminent Oxford academic. Professor Julian Savulescu said that creating so-called designer babies could be considered a "moral obligation" as it makes them grow up into "ethically better children". The expert in practical ethics said that we should actively give parents the choice to screen out personality flaws in their children as it meant they were then less likely to "harm themselves and others". The academic, who is also editor-in-chief of the Journal of Medical Ethics, made his comments in an article in the latest edition...

It seems that all abortion is equal. But some varieties are more equal than others. In Britain, where even Iron Lady Margaret Thatcher was iron-hearted enough to vote for abortion, authorities have found a type of abortion they will not abide: that based on sex. While such abortions have long been illegal in the U.K., an undercover investigation by the Daily Telegraph found abortionists willing to perform them at three of nine abortion mills investigated. Writes the paper, “Doctors at British clinics have been secretly filmed agreeing to terminate foetuses purely because they are either male or female. Clinicians admitted...

Minister of Science and Technology Daniel Hershkowitz (Jewish Home) used uncharacteristically blunt words to condemn Likud ministers who opposed the bill that would make Supreme Court nominees subject to parliamentary hearings before confirmation. He said they were "serving the Left" by opposing the vetting process. The bill, which was initiated by MKs Yariv Levin and Ze'ev Elkin (Likud), will be debated at the Ministerial Committee for Legislation next week. It was supposed to be debated today (Sunday) but the controversy around it caused the discussion to be postponed by one week. "It is strange that ministers from the Likud are...

I should start by acknowledging that repeal of the Seventeenth Amendment is hardly a mainstream issue and certainly not anything likely to come about (which is an understatement). However, the fact that there are people out there seeking its repeal is sufficient to garner comment, especially since said persons were significant enough within factions of the Tea Party movement to actually get some Senate candidates to state that they were in support of the repeal. Further, every once in a while I will get a commenter who is favor a repeal, so it seems worth some discussion.The proximate cause of...

Until recently, campus roommates were a non-negotiable item for incoming college freshmen. If a study-holic was matched with a party animal, too bad. But now, things are changing. When incoming freshmen receive their new roommate assignments, the first thing they do is look them up on Facebook. At the University of Florida, for example, the school decided to give in to the social media phenomenon by using a Facebook application called RoomBug so that students could check out prospective roommates’ habits i.e. their neatness and sleep schedules. More than 25 percent of this year’s incoming freshmen have used this service...

Arthur "A.B.'' Culvahouse, a prominent Washington attorney who served as White House counsel to President Ronald Reagan during the president's final two years and led Sen. John McCain's search for a running mate - a search that included a "long list'' of 26 candidates - told the tale today of picking Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. After the vetting of all the candidates, and paring them to a short list, McCain asked Culvahouse for the "bottom line'' on Palin. ""I said, 'John, high risk, high reward,''' Culvahouse said today. "His response - 'You shouldn't have told me that. I've been a...

ALBANY — Resistance is emerging among Democratic officials against Caroline Kennedy as she pursues Hillary Rodham Clinton’s seat in the United States Senate, with Gov. David A. Paterson bristling over suggestions that her selection is inevitable, according to his advisers, and other leading Democrats concerned that she is too beholden to Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg. The governor is frustrated and chagrined, the advisers said, because he believes that he extended Ms. Kennedy the chance to demonstrate her qualifications but that her operatives have exploited the opportunity to convey a sense that she is all but appointed already. He views this...

Firefox uses like myself used to use a cool tool called "view selection source" to steal text from article to post on FR. View Selection Source let you highlight the text you wanted to steal and you could right click your mouse and select that option and it showed JUST that part you highlighted in HTML form... You could then just copy and paste an article (or whatever text you wanted) to FR to post. This saved me tons of time instead of wading through tons of HTLM on the page just to see the simple HTML I wanted to...

A DNA mail order kit that checks the sex of an unborn child at just six weeks is under investigation after concerns it will lead to couples terminating unwanted children. The do-it-yourself home test can be ordered over the internet and shipped to Australia for less than $500. But the futuristic "pink or blue" kit has sparked an uproar among ethicists and anti-abortionists, who fear it will be used as a "sex select" tool.

Study Explains Why We're Not All Beautiful By Andrea Thompson LiveScience Staff Writer posted: 28 March 2007 09:47 am ET A new study explains why we aren't all born with Brad Pitt’s perfectly chiseled features or Angelina Jolie’s pouty lips. A long-standing thorn in the side of biologists has been the difficulty in accounting for the enormous variation between individuals when sexual selection by females for the most attractive mates should quickly spread the “best” genes through a population. “It is a major problem for evolutionary biology,” said study team leader Marion Petrie of Newcastle University. The lek paradox For...

In a letter in today's Wall Street Journal, American Bar Association President Michael Greco objects to our calling his outfit a liberal interest group that should lose its special role in vetting federal judicial nominees. Well, then what are we to make of the ABA's report last week accusing President Bush of abusing his power by explaining how he interprets the bills he signs into law? In its new "study," the ABA claims that Presidential "signing statements" are "contrary to the rule of law and our constitutional system" and urges Congress to pass a law giving itself the power to...

NY Ruling Could Impact Kansas Courts Print E-mail By Jalexson Wednesday, 15 February 2006 By Jalexson HUTCHINSON, KS -- The recent ruling by federal Judge John Gleeson in Lopez Torres v. New York State Board of Elections, could set the stage for a federal court challenge of some Kansas courts. The specific ruling, however, would not be applicable because of differences in the courts of the two states. The New York case involved the selection of judicial candidates for election to lower courts ( called “supreme courts” in New York ). Although voters choose judges, the mechanism for selecting the...

News Release March 29, 2004 Study Reveals That Dogs Resemble Their Owners As a Result of Selection Do people really resemble their pets? A resemblance in a movie or on TV between a pet and its owner has occasionally tickled our funny bone. The results of a recent study suggest that a resemblance between owner and dog may be actually determined by the pet lover's selection. The research, by Michael M. Roy and Nicholas Christenfeld, both of the University of California, San Diego, found that when people pick a pet, they seek one that, at some level, resembles them. These...

Charles Darwin, the 19th century geologist who wrote the treatise 'The Origin of Species, by means of Natural Selection' defined evolution as "descent with modification". Darwin hypothesized that all forms of life descended from a common ancestor, branching out over time into various unique life forms, due primarily to a process called natural selection. However, the fossil record shows that all of the major animal groups (phyla) appeared fully formed about 540 million years ago, and virtually no transitional life forms have been discovered which suggest that they evolved from earlier forms. This sudden eruption of multiple, complex organisms is...