Free Republic

He made it awkward with one fell scoop. President Biden raised eyebrows Wednesday when he invited children to join him on an ice cream run, telling the youngsters that “Daddy owes you.” “I want to say one thing to your children. I know some really great ice cream places around here and Daddy owes you, so talk to me afterwards,” Biden, 80, told a packed crowd in the East Room of the White House, according to a clip shared on X (formerly Twitter) by RNC Research. The seemingly off-script remark came during the octogenarian’s speech marking the first anniversary of...

... We’ll get away from firearms this trip, and look at something else related to personal safety: recognition of pre-assaultive behavior cues..... Being able to recognize body language associated with imminent violent action can allow you to, in the best-case scenario, disengage and leave the scene. At worst, it can give you time to activate a plan of self-defense soon enough to effectively protect yourself and those for whose safety you are responsible. Danger signals The eyes, it is said, are the windows to the soul. Often, the way in which a hostile person looks at you can be a...

Here's a bit of advice real "safety experts" are giving kids — and parents. It's poisonous. But first, the back story: The other day, a blogger named Lisa Flam wrote on a popular parenting website that her seventh-grader came home one day and announced he "didn't do it." Didn't do what? He and his friend were walking home from school (points for that!), when a white-haired lady stood in her doorway and requested the boys' help. "She asked them to move a medium-size package from her front step into her house," Flam wrote. "On the sidewalk, the boys wondered what...

Dramatic CCTV footage has emerged of the moment a convicted killer allegedly tried to kidnap a young girl at a Walmart store. Seven-year-old Brittany Baxter was grabbed by the man at the store in Bremen, Georgia, USA, on Wednesday. In the footage a man can be seen grabbing the girl and trying to carry her away through an aisle of the large store.

The third Stranger Danger Alert in as many weeks went out in Metro Detroit. This week; it was the second in Sterling Heights. This happened Wednesday when a 13-year-old Sterling Heights girl was approached that morning by a male driving a blue SUV as she was walking to school. According to WDIV-Channel 4, the Sterling Heights police have notified parents after a second Stranger Danger incident has been reported in the city in the last month which has to have parents and the community to be thinking what else can be done. The answer to this dilemma might just be...

Jarred Harrell, 24, who had lived in Orange Park, Florida last year according to AP reports has been named a “person of interest” in the abduction and murder of 7-year-old Somer Thompson after he was arrested last week on federal child pornography charges. Somer’s body was found in a south Georgia landfill last October, and her suspected murderer is reportedly fighting...

Experts fear today's empty playgrounds http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070709/A_NEWS/707090322 http://tinyurl.com/3d4fpu By Jennifer Torres July 09, 2007 Record Staff Writer Heat on Friday nudged outdoor playtime earlier and cut it shorter than scheduled for nearly 70 children at Stockton's Seifert Community Center day camp. Once it got going, though, campers cheered on teammates during a running, jumping, twirling relay race, while other groups played basketball or made up their own games on playground equipment. Some outdoor play - any outdoor play - is important, recreation leader Michaiah Martin said. "Keeping them inside compresses a lot of the negative energies." According to environmentalists, child-development specialists...

How children lost the right to roam in four generations http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=462091 http://tinyurl.com/yt6geg By DAVID DERBYSHIRE Last updated at 01:03am on 15th June 2007 When George Thomas was eight he walked everywhere. It was 1926 and his parents were unable to afford the fare for a tram, let alone the cost of a bike and he regularly walked six miles to his favourite fishing haunt without adult supervision. Fast forward to 2007 and Mr Thomas's eight-year-old great-grandson Edward enjoys none of that freedom. He is driven the few minutes to school, is taken by car to a safe place to ride...

Go outside and playhttp://www.cleveland.com/living/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/living/1158309564312510.xml&coll=2 http://tinyurl.com/pg6bd That's the advice nature educators have for increasingly reined-in kids and their very protective parents Friday, September 15, 2006 Susan Glaser Plain Dealer Reporter When Steve Cadwell was a kid, he had the North Chagrin Reservation in his back yard, and he used to disappear for hours. "My mom said, 'Go outside, and don't come back until the streetlights are on,' " said Cadwell, 47, now executive director of the Nature Center of Shaker Lakes. Rare is the mother who issues that directive these days. Thanks to everything from fears about stranger danger to video...

One day a few years ago, Khady Lusby's twins were 5 and playing by themselves in the park that abuts their Arlington house when another mother called her at home. "She said, 'Do you know your boys are at the playground playing?' And I said, 'Yes, I know,' " recalled Lusby, who is from Senegal. "She said, 'Oh, you know this is not the way we do things here,' meaning in America. I just made a joke: 'Well, I'm African -- wherever I go I take my African way,' and she said, 'Well you can be reported.' " Undaunted, Lusby...

Nature-deficit disorder is ruining our kidshttp://www.nevadaappeal.com/article/20060816/OPINION/108160053 http://tinyurl.com/zchy3 by jim stiles August 16, 2006 No matter how old I live to be, there will never be a place so full of mystery and adventure as a place of my childhood called The Woods. The stories that grew out of those trees still kindle powerful feelings, even after all these years. My friends and I knew the place was haunted. It had no boundaries, and in our 10-year-old minds, it went on forever. Jump ahead a few decades to a familiar topic: the commercialization of wilderness. What created the demand for such...

Dangerous occasionshttp://www.theage.com.au/news/books/dangerous-occasions/2006/08/03/1154198267699.html http://tinyurl.com/oaq6r August 6, 2006 The Iggulden brothers' instructions make short work of children's fears. By Frances Atkinson. It's a miracle the Iggulden brothers survived their very "dangerous" childhood. First Conn fell through the garage roof, then he made his little brother, Hal, jump off it. Moments before take-off, Conn told him, "If you yell out, 'Fly like an eagle,' when you jump - it won't hurt." "It was a lie, of course," says Conn talking from his London home. "But it did teach him about fear and a bit about not trusting his older brother quite so much."...