Free Republic

BELLEVUE, Wash., Dec. 21 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A ten percent drop in murders during the first six months of this year at a time when gun sales were up dramatically is more proof that there is no correlation between gun ownership and violent crime, the Second Amendment Foundation said today. The FBI released data Monday that shows murders dropped by 10 percent from the same period in 2008. Meanwhile, according to data released by the FBI's National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) shows that during the first six months of this year, gun sales were up. January 2009 background checks...

Sixty-six percent (66%) of Americans celebrate Christmas as a religious holiday. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that another 20% celebrate the event as a secular holiday. Of those who celebrate Christmas, 81% believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God sent to earth to die for our sins and 72% say Jesus was born to a virgin. Among all Americans, whether they celebrate Christmas or not, 82% say the person known to history as Jesus Christ actually walked the earth 2,000 years ago. Only three percent (3%) say he did not and 15% aren’t sure. Christians...

The estimated time when whites will no longer make up the majority of Americans has been pushed back eight years - to 2050 - because the recession and stricter immigration policies have slowed the flow of foreigners into the U.S. Census Bureau projections released Wednesday update last year's prediction that white children would become a minority in 2023 and the overall white population would follow in 2042. The earlier estimate did not take into account a drop in the number of people moving into the U.S. because of the economic crisis and the immigration policies imposed after the Sept. 11,...

The drive-through is where one American obsession—mobility—meets another: consumption. Lately, though, this societal combo platter has come under fire, as people question the drive-through's environmental impact, its place in the evolving landscape of obesity (a 1,420-calorie Hardee's Monster Thickburger without having to leave your seat!), and even who has the right to step up to its crackly intercom. There has always been something odd in the encounter between automobility and architecture; the driver momentarily breaks her sense of hermetic enclosure, while the fast-food employee briefly thrusts himself out of the window, the two meeting amid the sickly sweet commingling of...

Mainline Protestant churches seem to have weathered the past decade better than many people have assumed, but the future is raising serious challenges to continued stability, said a Christian pollster. George Barna analyzed data for The Barna Group's latest report examining mainline denominations. Weekend attendance at mainline churches has remained relatively stable, ranging from 89 to 100, over the past decade but the report suggests that they may be "on the precipice of a period of decline." Mainline bodies – which the research group identifies as American Baptist Churches in the USA; The Episcopal Church; the Evangelical Lutheran Church in...

Our Annual Predictions For 2010. Good News And Bad News (Kitco)Roger WiegardDec 1 2009 1:54PM Will 2010 be a 1930 or, comparable to 1937? Is it different this time? When one nation state of a formerly high productive stature destroys itself with inflation, the untouched others can soften the blow and in time bail out the fallen one. This was Germany’s fate in the 1920’s. In our current instance, most all of the world’s economies are on their knees with some hurting worse than others. Who can help with recovery this time? There is no one. It will not be...

“The world has been chilling sharply for about twenty years. If present trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but eleven degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age.” • Kenneth Watt, Ecologist “Scientists have solid experimental and theoretical evidence to support…the following predictions: In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution…by 1985 air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half….” • Life Magazine,...

Trendy Baby Names a Sign of Group Think? The Latest Trends in Baby Names May Annoy People in Adulthood By LAUREN COX Dec. 4, 2009— In the future, names like Dick, Jane and Mary may sound exotic to the ears of the little Emmas, Ethans and Madisons who are just starting kindergarten now. Since the 1960s, whole sets of names seem to rise and then burst in popularity bubbles faster than the stock market. Many parents are surprised to find out that the seemingly unique name they picked for their child is shared by what seems like half the kindergarten...

Water-on-moon discovery doesn't align with 'trends' Tuesday, November 24, 2009 3:18 AM By JOE BLUNDO A few days have passed since we learned that the moon has water, but I'm still not over it. Water on the moon! It's astounding, isn't it? At least a little? I checked Google Trends for Nov. 13, the day NASA made the announcement. "Water on the moon" finished 10th -- behind search terms such as "Tony Alamo," "Tia Mowery wedding pictures" and "Wal-Mart Black Friday." The next day, the topic didn't make the list. Granted, Google Trends -- a daily look at the most...

Mounting evidence that independent voters have soured on the Democrats is prompting a debate among party officials about what rhetorical and substantive changes are needed to halt the damage. Following serious setbacks with independents in off-year elections earlier this month, White House officials attributed the defeats to local factors and said President Barack Obama sees no need to reposition his own image or the Democratic message. Since then, however, a flurry of new polls makes clear that Democrats are facing deeper problems with independents—the swing voters who swung dramatically toward the party in 2006 and 2008 but who now are...

Prowling through the election returns in the governor races two weeks ago, I was surprised to find that Middlesex County, New Jersey, voted for Republican Christie over Democratic incumbent Corzine by a 48%-44% margin, almost exactly the same as Christie’s 49%-45% statewide margin. Middlesex County has been a Democratic county for as long as I have been studying election returns (going back to the 1960 election). In close elections it voted 58%-42% for John Kennedy in 1960, 46%-43% for Humphrey in 1968 (when he failed to carry New Jersey), 51%-47% for Carter in 1976, 46%-38% and 56%-32% for Bill Clinton...

In November 2008, 658,000 Americans under 30 voted in New Jersey and 782,000 did so in Virginia. In November 2009, 212,000 Americans under 30 voted in New Jersey and 198,000 did so in Virginia. In other words, young voter turnout this year was down two-thirds in New Jersey and three-quarters in Virginia

Real Witches Practice Samhain: Wicca on the Rise in U.S. More Americans Are Wiccan, and Will Celebrate Samhain, Not Halloween, Saturday By RUSSELL GOLDMAN Oct. 30, 2009— Patti Wigington is a soccer mom. She is the vice president of her local PTA. And she's a witch. This Saturday while her neighborhood outside Columbus, Ohio, is crawling with costumed witches in search of candy, Wigington and a group of other local witches will not be celebrating Halloween, but the new year festival Samhain, which also occurs Oct. 31. In her backyard, Wigington and six other local women who make up...

A new Gallup poll finds that conservatives outnumber moderates and liberals. The poll found that 40 percent of Americans say their views are conservatives, 36 percent call their views moderate and only 20 percent say they are liberal...

Good news, but a tad underwhelming when you look at the numbers. Right now it breaks out at 40/37/20 among conservatives, moderates, and liberals, respectively. Between 2006 and 2008, when the left was routing us at the polls, it was roughly … 37/37/22, a testament to how toxic progressives’ brand is even at the best of times. In fact, between the second and third quarters of this year, conservatives actually lost a point while moderates gained two. Not sure what explains that, although as The One moves further left, crazy wingnut ideas like “we shouldn’t create a new federal health-care...

Good news, but a tad underwhelming when you look at the numbers. Right now it breaks out at 40/37/20 among conservatives, moderates, and liberals, respectively. Between 2006 and 2008, when the left was routing us at the polls, it was roughly … 37/37/22, a testament to how toxic progressives’ brand is even at the best of times. In fact, between the second and third quarters of this year, conservatives actually lost a point while moderates gained two. Not sure what explains that, although as The One moves further left, crazy wingnut ideas like “we shouldn’t create a new federal health-care...

Can anyone really be surprised? Conservatives continue to outnumber moderates and liberals in the American populace in 2009, confirming a finding that Gallup first noted in June. Forty percent of Americans describe their political views as conservative, 36% as moderate, and 20% as liberal. This marks a shift from 2005 through 2008, when moderates were tied with conservatives as the most prevalent group. ~~~ Conservatism is most prevalent among Republicans. However, the overall increase in this ideological stance since 2008 comes largely from political independents, among whom 35% say they are conservatives thus far in 2009 — compared with 29%...

Snoods are this season’s style essential and the chicest way to stay warm this fall. What can add an elegant touch and distinctive look to your fall ensemble more than a luxurious fur snood? To elevate your cool weather chic, loop it around your neck with sweater dresses, slouchy knits, or wear it on your head with lots of layering.

The Susan B. Anthony List, the antiabortion movement's answer to the pro-abortion rights group EMILY's List, set an ambitious organizing goal at the beginning of this year: getting supporters to send 300,000 letters and E-mails to Congress on abortion-related issues. But the group quickly surpassed that benchmark, recently tracking the millionth piece of congressional correspondence sent by a Susan B. Anthony List backer in 2009. "We used to have to nag and nag our members to get their voices heard," says Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Northern Virginia-based group. "Now it's not a matter of nagging. We're seeing a tidal...

The jumpsuit has been a major feature at many of the catwalk shows for the last few seasons. I can only liken the jumpsuit to Marmite, you either love it or you hate it, definitely an acquired taste. Even those that love the jumpsuit still feel the need to justify and defend their decision to step out of the house wearing an all in one. But Why The jumpsuit has earned itself a reputation for being a difficult style to wear. Then there is the practicalities of going to the bathroom. But as every true fashionista knows, there are so...

It has been 11 months since The One was elected and vowed to "fundamentally transform America." Well, he is trying to do that, but hasn't succeeded in anything other than passing an $800 billion pork bill and raising the cigarette tax. Everything else, from Gitmo, to Cap and Trade, to Afghanistan, to Health Care has been either a failure or is an impending failure. Those policies that gave the Democrat Party wings in 2008 have in 2009 turned into cement shoes that are dragging them to the bottom. The trends tell the tale.

Bruce Feiler September 25, 2009 Where Have All the Christians Gone? The number of people who claim no religious affiliation, meanwhile, has doubled since 1990 to fifteen percent, its highest point in history. Christianity is plummeting in America, while the number of non-believers is skyrocketing. A shocking new study of Americans’ religious beliefs shows the beginnings of a major realignment in Americans’ relationship with God. The American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) reveals that Protestants now represent half of all Americans, down almost 20 percent in the last twenty years. In the coming months, America will become a minority Protestant nation...

This data is current upto 28 September 2009. http://www.google.org/flutrends/intl/en_us/

Mike Matthews, editor of Answers magazine, spoke with Al Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, about one of the most pressing questions in the church today: “With so many children leaving the church by their twenties, what are we doing wrong, and what solutions can the church and parents implement?”...

Hartford, Conn. - A new study of the 34 million American adults who do not identify with any particular religious group finds that they now largely mirror the wider population in other aspects. However, the group tends to be young, male, politically independent and of Irish ancestry. The number of “Nones” grew greatly in the 1990s. In 1990 they made up 8.2 percent of the population and grew to 14.2 percent by 2001. In 2008 they made up 15 percent. The Nones were the only group to have increased in every state and region of the country during the past...

Americans have tamed their wanderlust during this recession, according to the latest data released by the U.S. Census Bureau. Only about 2.4% of Americans moved from state to state in 2008, down from 2.5% the previous year. "The mobility rate is lower than it has been in years," said Robert Lang, a demographer with Virginia Tech University. "There's a recession and a housing bust. People can't sell their homes in California and move to Las Vegas or sell their condo in Florida and move to North Carolina." "People are hunkering down, trying to hold on to what they have," added...

HARTFORD, CT - A new report finds that American adults who claim no religious affiliation increased from 14 million in 1990 to 34 million in 2008. The new profile of America's "No Religion Population" takes a deeper look at data collected for the American Religious Identification Survey 2008, which was released by Trinity College. The new report says those who don't claim any religious affiliation are more likely to be male, young, living in the West and politically independent.

According to a new study from Trinity College, 15% of Americans don't associate with a religious denomination. Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/lifestyle/2009/09/22/2009-09-22_new_study_americans_are_losing_their_religion_choosing_to_be_nones_instead_of_nu.html#ixzz0SDnQoSOr

Atheist and religious skeptic student groups are on the rise across the country's high school and college campuses. The Secular Student Alliance added its 160th affiliate campus group last week and reports that demand for their group starting packets are high. "It’s been a challenge to keep up with the demand for services, especially group-starting packets and follow-up," said Lyz Liddell, senior campus organizer, in a statement earlier this month. "That’s a nice problem to have." The number of SSA campus affiliate groups has increased from 100 in 2008 to 160 this year. In 2007, the alliance counted only 80....

The first pics of the much anticipated Jimmy Choo for H&M collaboration have leaked out. As it was announced, the menswear and men’s accessories will also hit the stores when the whole collection launches on November 14, 2009. The folks over at mencloset.com have a sneak preview of the men’s clothes, belts, shoes and bags which look so surprisingly cool, we’ll probably grab something for ourselves.

It's a long and ignominious list. First there was Newt Gingrich. Then came Larry Craig, Mark Foley, David Vitter, Chip Pickering and Vito Fossella. Now starring John Ensign and Mark Sanford. Politically, sex scandals are equal-opportunity destroyers. For every David Vitter, there is an Eliot Spitzer. For every John Ensign there's a John Edwards. For every Bill Clinton there's... well, there's only one Slick Willie. But you get the point: Sexual scandal knows no party. Yet, a common denominator linking many political sex scandals of the last few years is the involvement of conservative Christian politicians who, it seemed, had...

The percentage of people who claim no religion has nearly doubled since 1990. Meanwhile, the percentage of Christians is on the decline, according to a new study on American religious life. The 2008 American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS), released on Monday, shows that the percentage of Americans claiming no religion, which jumped from 8.2 percent in 1990 to 14.2 in 2001, has now increased to 15 percent. The findings were based on over 54,000 interviews conducted between February and November of last year. The 2008 survey was a continuation of ARIS surveys in 1990 and 2001, which are part of...

HARTFORD, CN - A new survey suggests that the number of American Jews who consider themselves religiously observant has dropped by more than 20 percent over the last two decades. The 2008 American Religious Identification Survey found that around 3.4 million American Jews call themselves religious, out of a general Jewish population of about 5.4 million. Those who call themselves only culturally Jewish rose from 20 percent in 1990 to 37 percent last year according to the study, which also found Jews more likely to be secular than other Americans.

WASHINGTON, Aug. 7, 2009 – U.S. military officers have “very great prestige,” and their status is climbing, according to a poll released this week. The Harris Poll ranked 23 occupations based on the responses of more than 1,000 adults polled last month. More than half of those polled gave military officers top marks, saying that the position held very great prestige. Military officers tied with teachers for 51 percent. Firefighters, scientists, doctors and nurses topped the list, and accountants, stockbrokers and actors were at the bottom of the list. Military officers garnered a 5 percent increase over last year’s poll...

What if America's greatest enemy is not al Qaeda or Iran, but America itself? The United States is hailed as a melting pot of ethnic and religious diversity. But could this trait actually stand in the way of a common vision that once made our nation so great? Researcher George Barna has spent 25 years analyzing faith and culture in America. In his new book "The Seven Faith Tribes," he breaks the nation down into seven belief groups: 1.Casual Christians 2.Captive Christians 3.Skeptics 4.Jews 5.Mormons 6.Pantheists 7.Muslims To renew America, each tribe must seek common ground, open dialog, and shared...

TO: Interested Parties FROM: Ed Gillespie and Whit Ayres DATE: July 15, 2009 RE: Political Shift Among Independent Voters In 2000, 2002, and 2004, Republicans won national elections in large part because Independents looked more like Republicans than Democrats on the major issues of the day. In 2006 and 2008, Independents looked more like Democrats than Republicans, and consequently voted for Democratic candidates by substantial margins Since April 2009, Resurgent Republic polling has shown Independents once again looking more like Republicans than Democrats on fiscal issues, interrogation of detainees, and health care reform. The longer debates continue on these issues,...

Unmarried Americans Tend to Be Democrats NEW GALLUP POLL July 13, 2009 Those never, married, single, or divorced or live in domestic partnership go heavily for Democrats. How do Republicans capture this vote? Or could it be captured at all while staying true to Republican principles of traditional values, limited government, and strong national security

KNOWLEDGE of the Bible is in decline in Britain, with fewer than one in 20 people able to name all Ten Commandments and youngsters viewing the Christian holy book as "old fashioned", a survey said today. Forty per cent did not know that the tradition of exchanging Christmas presents originated from the story of the Wise Men bringing gifts for the infant Jesus, while 60 per cent could not name anything about the Good Samaritan, the Durham University study found. Youngsters were particularly disillusioned, telling researchers that the Bible was "old fashioned", "irrelevant" and for "Dot Cottons" - a reference...

THE NEW RIGHT, ER, LEFT Steyn on Britain and Europe Monday, 13 July 2009 HAPPY WARRIOR from National Review Are you getting just a teensy bit tired of the ol’ “Whither The Right?” navel-gazing? Even with our good friends at The New York Times, The Washington Post et al so eager to offer helpful advice, there’s a limit to how much pondering of conservatism’s future a chap can take. So how about, just for a change, “Whither the left?” Exhibit A: The European parliamentary elections. The Continent’s economy has taken a far bigger clobbering than America’s: Capitalism is dead, declared...

Poughkeepsie, N.Y., Jul 10, 2009 / 01:33 pm (CNA).- A new poll commissioned by the Knights of Columbus supports other reports that say Americans are  increasing becoming pro-life. About 49 percent of Americans now describe themselves as pro-life, while 60 percent think abortion should be legal only in a few circumstances or not at all.The poll, undertaken in partnership with the Marist Institute for Public Opinion at Marist College in Poughkeepsie, New York, conducted a telephone survey of 1,223 Americans in May 2009 and claims a margin of error of plus or minus three percent.An October 2008 Knights of...

Voters have now witnessed 2.5 years of Democratic control over Congress and six months of total control in Washington, and they don't much like what they see. The Rasmussen survey now finds that likely voters trust Republicans more than Democrats on eight out of ten key issues, including a 46-41 margin on the economy and 52-36 on taxes. If these trends continue, we may see the beginning of a Republican comeback in 2010.

Despite the results of the 2008 presidential election, Americans, by a 2-to-1 margin, say their political views in recent years have become more conservative rather than more liberal, 39% to 18%, with 42% saying they have not changed. While independents and Democrats most often say their views haven't changed, more members of all three major partisan groups indicate that their views have shifted to the right rather than to the left.

The percentage of Hispanic Catholics in America has dropped, while the proportion of born-again Hispanics has increased, a new survey by the Barna Group found. Over the past 15 years, the proportion of Hispanics in America that is aligned with the Catholic Church has fallen by 25 percent. By comparison, the proportion of born-again Christians for this ethnic group has increased by 17 percent. “You cannot help but notice the changing relationship between Hispanics and the Catholic Church,” commented George Barna, whose company conducted the research. “While many Hispanic immigrants come to the United States with ties to Catholicism, the...

Despite the results of the 2008 presidential election, Americans, by a 2-to-1 margin, say their political views in recent years have become more conservative rather than more liberal, 39% to 18%, with 42% saying they have not changed. While independents and Democrats most often say their views haven't changed, more members of all three major partisan groups indicate that their views have shifted to the right rather than to the left. These findings, from a June 14-17 Gallup Poll, somewhat conform to Gallup's annual trends on Americans' self-defined political ideology. Thus far in 2009 (from January through May), 40% of...

Despite the results of the 2008 presidential election, Americans, by a 2-to-1 margin, say their political views in recent years have become more conservative rather than more liberal, 39% to 18%, with 42% saying they have not changed. While independents and Democrats most often say their views haven't changed, more members of all three major partisan groups indicate that their views have shifted to the right rather than to the left.

Poll: Americans becoming more conservative @ 10:56 am by Eric Zimmermann Americans' political ideology is shifting rightward, a new Gallup poll finds. 39% of respondents say they have become more conservative in the last few years, compared to 18% who have become more liberal. 42% have not changed. Here's the breakdown based on party identification: How does one square this poll with the results of the 2008 election, which Democrats more or less swept? First, look at the specific issues. Gallup tests the ideological trend by examining opinion changes on a number of policies. Americans have indeed become more conservative...

The concept of a home phone may soon be going the way of the corner pay phone. Government research shows that more and more households are getting rid of their land line. And for the first time, cell-phone-only homes outnumber those with just land lines. Kelly Fitzsimmons did not give up her phone without a fight. The instrument of gossip and grand plans, and the bearer of bad news and good, the land line to her was a lifeline. "I just had in my head you gotta have a land line. You gotta have a land line," she says. "That's...

We’ve seen some of the crazier creations of fashion like butt-less tights and umbrellas for shoes, and we’re not sure that we liked them. But we love this line of artistic sunglasses by Stevie Boi. They are crazy, they are freaky, but they are kind of funny. Click the button, and tell us, would you wear Stevie Boi’s crazy shades?

They look more like the brightly lit shelves of a chemists shop than the rows of a vegetable garden. But according to their creators, these perfect looking vegetables could be the future of food. In a perfectly controlled and totally sterile environment - uncontaminated by dirt, insects or fresh air - Japanese scientists are developing a new way of growing vegetables. Called plant factories, these anonymous looking warehouses have sprung up across the country and can churn out immaculate looking lettuces and green leaves 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Every part of the plant's environment is controlled...

A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE In sixteenth-century Paris, a popular form of entertainment was cat-burning, in which a cat was hoisted in a sling on a stage and slowly lowered into a fire. According to historian Norman Davies, "[T]he spectators, including kings and queens, shrieked with laughter as the animals, howling with pain, were singed, roasted, and finally carbonized." Today, such sadism would be unthinkable in most of the world. This change in sensibilities is just one example of perhaps the most important and most underappreciated trend in the human saga: Violence has been in decline over long stretches of history,...