Free Republic

Whether it’s delivered with flashlight pointed skyward below the chin as all are gathered around an open fire, or, as Halloween fades, it comes in the form of the latest horror movie or Charlie Brown TV special, most everyone enjoys a scary story. For the most part, people like these stories because it enlivens their imagination and thrills their spirit. People also enjoy these stories because they know—no matter how realistic they may appear—they are fantasy, make-believe. In movie making they call it “willing suspension of disbelief.” I am no different, but there is a story that deeply frightens me...

LIBERAL backbencher Alby Schultz has warned against the freeing-up of stem cell research laws, saying it could lead to the practice of "Frankenstein science" in Australia. Prime Minister John Howard has signalled he will allow MPs a conscience vote that could overturn a Cabinet ban on therapeutic cloning. But Mr Schultz, who lost an eye several years ago in a domestic accident, said he would not back the vote - even on the chance that the research might give him a new eye. "It's the precursor, in my opinion, if the vote goes through to embryonic cloning and I have...

One morning earlier this month, the pilot of a Gulfstream jet radioed a tiny airfield high in the Colorado mountains, asking for permission to land. On board the private plane, which had taken off two hours earlier, were two senior members of the controversial Church of Scientology. As it taxied to a halt at the end of the runway at Telluride Airport, the emissaries were met by a blacked-out sports utility vehicle and driven three miles to the secluded 250-acre estate of actor Tom Cruise. Their mission was not, however, to minister to the Hollywood superstar. Instead, their appointment was...

Science’s Stem Cell Scam By Michael Fumento Thursday, July 20, 2006 Embryonic stem cells (ESCs) receive tremendous media attention, with oft-repeated claims that they have the potential to cure virtually every disease known. Yet there are spoilsports, self included, who point out that they have yet to even make it into a human clinical trial. This is even as alternatives – adult stem cells (ASCs) from numerous places in the body as well as umbilical cord blood and placenta – are curing diseases here and now and have been doing so for decades. And that makes ESC advocates very, very...

Oregon's two senators voted with the Senate majority Tuesday to overturn the president's limits on embryonic stem-cell research, setting the stage for the first veto of the Bush administration. "Please, Mr. President, don't veto this bill," said Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore., noting that his family has a history of Parkinson's disease. "Such a veto, I fear, may only throw out hope, healing and human life along with the unused embryos." Sixty-three senators voted to allow federally funded researchers to conduct medical research on surplus embryos from fertility clinics. The bipartisan vote was enough to move the bill to the president's...

WASHINGTON (AP) President Bush has issued the first veto of his presidency, rejecting a bill to expand federal research on stem cells obtained from embryos.

"The clip I used is several years old, but I only recently saw it for the first time and felt so inspired that I had to do this. It was too perfect not to try," Daphne writes in introducing her 3:42 minute video on YouTube. Daphne's video combines clips from "Young Frankenstein" and various appearance of Microsoft CEO Steve "Monkey Boy" Ballmer. "Young FrankenSteve" was added to YouTube on May 16, 2006, but, thanks to MacDailyNews reader "Frank," we only now stumbled upon it. As of this post, the video's only been viewed 4,900 times, so for those who haven't...

Two women create a baby!!!! Watch out! Here's some news for all those people who have it stuck in their mind that if there were only females left on earth they would not survive because they could not reproduce without sperm. Your going to have to come up with another reason two women shouldn't be together. "Scientists have created mice pups from two female mice. No male mice or sperm were involved. The offspring were all female. How did this happen and will humans soon have the option to create babies without men? Parthenogenesis, or virgin birth, is defined as...

WAUWATOSA, WI (AP) -- Gov. Jim Doyle directed the state on Tuesday to spend $5 million to help recruit stem cell researchers to Wisconsin.The state Department of Commerce will spend the money marketing the state as a leader in stem cell research under the executive order Doyle signed Tuesday at the Medical College of Wisconsin. "I think we should settle for nothing less than being the stem cell leader, not only in this country but in the world," Doyle said. Doyle said during this year's State of the State address that he wants Wisconsin to capture 10 percent of the...

While Air America Radio's loss of two affiliates in Phoenix and Missoula, Montana is generating news this week, the company itself probably hasn't been able to give either city a second thought. Why? In a development sure to rip the heart right out of the liberal radio network's already ailing body, it appears extremely likely their leased New York City flagship station WLIB-AM will soon abandon Air America programming. Even worse, litigation looks probable over the station's lease. While the network's last day on WLIB isn't known for certain, an internal source providing backing documentation points to the end of...

MIAMI -- Former Attorney General Janet Reno got up and sang Aretha Franklin's "Respect" at a Miami fundraiser Thursday night. The karaoke performance was caught on tape. It happened at an event honoring the 10th anniversary of the Human Services Coalition. Proceeds went to help fight poverty. Reno suffers from Parkinson's disease, but that hasn't stopped her public appearances. Recently, she gave speeches on law enforcement at the University of Iowa and Pennsylvania State University.

<p>WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Sen. John Kerry has decided to support a filibuster to block the nomination of Judge Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court, CNN's Congressional Correspondent Ed Henry reported Thursday. Kerry, in Davos, Switzerland, to attend the World Economic Forum, was marshaling support in phone calls during the day, Henry said.</p>

Since it was on one of the lower rated Sunday shows (and well... is Kerry), I figured this might have been missed by alot of people. For your entertainment... Pt 1 Pt 2

MEIRA, Pakistan - Former U.S. presidential candidate John Kerry toured earthquake-devastated parts of northern Pakistan on Saturday, distributing school uniforms and meeting local leaders at a tent village funded partly by both the United States and communist Cuba. The visit came amid warnings that heavy snow would blanket the quake zone over the next four to five days, possibly triggering avalanches along the jagged peaks and promising more misery for the 3.5 million people left homeless by the Oct. 8 quake. "The relief operations will be affected badly," the Pakistan Meteorological Department said. Kerry toured a camp housing some 18,000...

British scientists are seeking permission to create hybrid embryos in the lab by fusing human cells with rabbit eggs. If granted consent, the team will use the embryos to produce stem cells that carry genetic defects, in the hope that studying them will help understand the complex mechanisms behind incurable human diseases. The proposal drew strong criticism from opponents to embryo research who yesterday challenged the ethics of the research and branded the work repugnant. Plans for the experiments have been put forward by Professor Chris Shaw, a neurologist and expert in motor neurone disease at King's College London, and...

Mixed chicks sing song of a different species Bird brains hardwired to learn own songs By ANNE MCILROY McGill University researcher Evan Balaban performs brain transplants on chickens to make them sing like quails. He takes bits of brain from quail embryos and attaches them to the brains of embryonic chickens still snug in their eggs. When they hatch, the chickens look normal, except for the dark, quail-coloured feathers sprouting out of their heads. But they do not sound normal. Instead of crowing the classic cock-a-doodle-doo, they sing the two introductory notes and the long trill of a quail song....

HOUSTON, October 27, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) - An experiment has been underway for a month in a Houston Texas where parents are permitted to ask scientists for a child with the gender of their choice. The procedure involves preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) which is able to detect the sex of embryos created by in vitro fertilization (IVF) prior to their implantation in their mothers' wombs. While sex selection via PGD has been allowed in some cases where sex-linked diseases are concerned, the clinical trial is seeking to gage the impact of sex selection at the whim of the parents. According to...

"And so basically, what it looks like is going to happen is that Libby and Karl Rove are going to be executed" because "outing a CIA agent is treason," left-wing author and radio talk show host Al Franken asserted Friday night, to audience laughter, on CBS's Late Show with David Letterman. Franken qualified his hard-edged stire: "Yeah, and I don't know how I feel about it because I'm basically against the death penalty, but they are going to be executed it looks like." Franken later suggested that President Bush is at risk of receiving the same punishment, since Karl Rove...

Artificial wombs will be "reality" within 20 years, according to the London Times. Indeed, 20 years seems a conservative estimate given an earlier report in The Guardian, another UK newspaper, which predicted them for 2008. Discussion of ectogenesis — growing an embryo outside the mother's womb — may sound wildly futuristic. But a few years ago, cloning and genetic modification seemed impossible. A few years before that, the idea of a 66-year-old woman giving birth was absurd; it happened last January. And only last week, British scientists received an official go-ahead to create human embryos from two mothers with no...

BRITISH scientists have been given permission to create human embryos that will have three genetic parents. The fertility watchdog cleared a team at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne yesterday to conduct an experiment to prevent genetic disease by merging single-cell embryos with donated eggs. The decision to approve the procedure on appeal, after two previous applications were rejected, is controversial because it could eventually lead to the birth of children who carry genes from two mothers and a father. It also opens the possibility of “germ-line” genetic engineering, because any children born would carry added genes that would be...