Free Republic

Unfounded stories, or those based mainly on hyperbole, focus attention on hypothetical risks and divert attention from real problems. While we acknowledge that media coverage of health stories is, of necessity, brief and cannot take all nuances of scientific and medical research into account, there is considerable room for improvement in health reporting—particularly when it comes to sorting out health facts from health hype. In reviewing 2006 health stories for this report, we found several characteristics that made many much less than reliable: ...Ignoring the basic toxicological principle that ”the dose makes the poison.” Some stories suggest that the tiniest...

NEW YORK — Former Miss Nevada USA Katie Rees asked for a second chance today, after being stripped of her title due to raunchy photos of her that surfaced on the internet. "This photographs were from an isolated incident during my teenage years," Rees said during a press conference today. "This incident does not reflect who I am, or who I plan to be. I have no intention of further disgracing the state of Nevada, the Miss Universe organization, or Mr. Donald Trump." Rees said she had contacted the Trump organization and was awaiting a response. Donald Trump stripped Rees...

U.S. Sen. Barack Obama came to Hillary Rodham Clinton's turf for a fundraiser and told reporters the New York senator would be a strong presidential candidate. Obama was the speaker at a dinner that raised $700,000 for Kids in Distressed Situations, the New York Daily News reported. Tickets went for $2,500 each. "I have the utmost respect for Hillary Clinton," he told reporters. "She has been a friend and an ally. She could win if she ran." Neither Clinton nor Obama has made a formal announcement about seeking the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008.

The Russian Space Agency has no objections to Madonna's plans for a space flight, but the American pop diva could make a space trip no earlier than 2009, the agency's spokesperson said Wednesday. Alexei Mitrofanov, a flamboyant lawmaker from the ultra-nationalist LDPR party, earlier proposed that Madonna's desire to make the trip, which she expressed during her two-day visit to Russia, be fulfilled - a proposal that met with rejection by Russian lawmakers. "We are aware of today's debates in the State Duma [the lower house of the Russian parliament] as to the proposed flight by Madonna to the International...

LOS ANGELES -- The creators behind the Internet video mystery teen Lonelygirl15 have revealed themselves and want their fans to know they are not a front for a big Hollywood studio marketing some upcoming film. Instead, the three friends launched the adventures of the doe-eyed, 16-year-old homeschooled "Bree" as an experiment in storytelling that they intend to continue on their own Web site that was launched Tuesday.

SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 11 - Despite the tragic human and economic toll from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita along the Gulf Coast in 2005, the much-discussed "toxic-soup" environmental pollution was nowhere close to being as bad as people thought. That's the bottom-line message from dozens of scientific papers scheduled for presentation at a four-day symposium that opened here today at the American Chemical Society's national meeting, according to symposium organizer Ruth A. Hathaway. Entitled "Recovery From and Prevention of Natural Disasters," it is one of the key themes for the meeting, which runs through Sept. 14. James Lee Witt, former director...

The current session of the Legislature wrapped up last week with an orgy of back-slapping and congratulation-swapping. Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez and Senate President Don Perata joined Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in trumpeting an “extraordinarily productive” year in state government. Much of the media joined in this chorus of “Sacramento the Beautiful” in analysis pieces and editorials asserting times had changed on the state government front. Don't believe a word of it. On the most important issues, nothing has changed. A credible argument can be made that the governor and the Legislature did far better on the process front this year...

Fueled by fire. Dell has an ad campaign showing flames allover a desktop pc. Talk about bad timing. You have to see this. Follow link to Dell site.

A U.S. marine crew are being questioned after allegedly crashing their helicopter while trying to catch a glimpse of Hollywood star Kate Hudson. The stunning actress was wearing a swimsuit, diamond collar and high heels on the set of You, Me & Dupree in California when the chopper buzzed low overhead before crashing just yards away. Hudson, married to Black Crowes rocker Chris Robinson, says, "We heard this huge crash. A sort of huge plywood thing came falling on to my car from a rooftop. Then the cops were there and the Marines were there and I'm in this outfit....

<p>FLASH: Bob Novak will break his silence tomorrow night in two separate interviews with FOXNEWS CHANNEL, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned. Novak will appear on Brit Hume (6pm/et) and Hannity & Colmes (9pm/et) . . . this marks the first time Novak will discuss the Plame leak investigation in his own words... Developing...</p>

NEW YORK, June 29 /PRNewswire/ -- 64% of Americans could identify the Dixie Chicks as the Country music group with a #1 hit album while only 46% of Americans knew that Donald Rumsfeld is the United States Secretary of Defense. More participants also knew that Jennifer Aniston is dating Vince Vaughn than knew that former Vice President Al Gore's new movie, "An Inconvenient Truth" is about global warming. These results are part of a recent VH1 telephone poll measuring 18-49 year olds' knowledge of pop culture and hard news.

BEIRUT, Lebanon - The Syrian president warns of growing al-Qaida presence in neighboring Lebanon, and the state media in his closed nation quickly breaks news of gunbattles between police and Islamic militants in the Syrian capital. Syria is touting what it calls an increasing threat of Islamic extremists, fueled by popular anger over the violence in Iraq. But opponents of President Bashar Assad's regime claim it's a dodge with a number of aims: to score support with the United States, to defuse international pressure and to provide a pretext for Syrian meddling in neighboring Lebanon. Washington has long labeled Damascus...

<p>I got this in my email this morning showing how f'ing stupid nanny staters can be over the last couple of centurys. I wonder how many of these "highly intelligent" people went on to get cushy government jobs? Pay very close attention to the comic books qoute. Why anyone ever listens to people like this is a mystery but im sure there will be people right on this board agreeing with almost everything here and calling for big governemnt solutions to solve these societal ills.</p>

Bird flu's human-attack pathway revealed 18:00 22 March 2006 NewScientist.com news service Debora MacKenzie Two separate research groups have independently discovered why the H5N1 bird flu virus causes lethal pneumonia in people, but is – so far – hard for people to catch. In the process, they have found a way to predict which mutations might make the virus more contagious, and potentially become a pandemic strain. To date, confirmed human deaths from the disease stand at 103 worldwide The H5N1 virus binds to sugars on the surface of cells deep in human lungs, but not to cells lining the...

Scare headlines about the possibility of a deadly flu pandemic have been with us for a few years now, ever since the H5N1 bird-flu virus that first appeared in Hong Kong in 1997 resurfaced in the region in 2003. But in the past month the drumbeat of such stories has grown faster and louder: Avian Flu Arrives in Poland. Turkey. Azerbajian. Germany. Denmark. And, just last Friday, Israel. The good news, according to Dr. Michael Osterholm, the director of the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, is that the arrival of infected birds in North America—sometime...

The CP interview: Dr. Michael Osterholm of the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy talks about the flu bug that could bring the world to its knees. BY STEVE PERRY3-22-2006 Scare headlines about the possibility of a deadly flu pandemic have been with us for a few years now, ever since the H5N1 bird-flu virus that first appeared in Hong Kong in 1997 resurfaced in the region in 2003. But in the past month the drumbeat of such stories has grown faster and louder: Avian Flu Arrives in Poland. Turkey. Azerbajian. Germany. Denmark. And, just last...

Ah, March, the time of year when the music business heats up, the world's hot bands descend on Texas and the hipsters get their marching orders on which groups to worship for the next few months. By the time you read this, Racket will be in Austin, wallowing in the rock and roll phantasmagoria of South By Southwest – more than 1,100 bands playing on probably twice that many stages amid fields of fajitas, kegs of Lone Star, breakfast tacos by the ton and caramel-colored oceans of Shiner Bock, all at the world epicenter of twitching, frenzied, clench-jawed hype. While...

“We’ve fanned the flames of fear about this stuff,” said CNN’s Jack Cafferty on March 18. He was talking about bird flu, and his admission just confirmed the Free Market Project’s ongoing analysis of media coverage. The “In the Money” co-host’s comments came as the show’s panel looked at “Stock of the Week” Tyson Foods (NYSE: TSN), which has seen a 20-percent loss in value recently from overseas bird flu scares. Co-host Jennifer Westhoven marveled at the American public’s apparent nonchalance about the H5N1 avian flu virus. “I’m amazed that Americans at this point are really fairly unconcerned” about bird...

Fargo might soon lose its only local presence in the national media. Ed Schultz, who has been on television, radio or both in Fargo since the early 1980s, evolving from sportscaster to political commentator, is thinking about moving the home base for his nationally syndicated liberal talk show. He says he’s been talking about the potential move with station managers in some of the top markets where he’s doing well, like WINZ in Miami and KPTK in Seattle. Two main reasons Schultz may split: First, he wants to have better access to a satellite uplink so he can raise his...

"Brokeback Mountain" and a slew of other arty, less-widely seen Oscar-nominated flicks are expected to take the polish off ABC's ratings for the Academy Awards this year. With no big-budget films like "Titanic," "Gladiator" or "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King" in this season's crop of nominees, ABC may be staring down the barrel of one of the lowest-rated Oscar telecasts in recent memory when it airs on March 5, say TV-industry analysts.

OSLO, Jan 17 (Reuters) - Landslides kill 800-1,000 people a year and climate change may be adding to the risks from hillside slums in Latin America to Egypt's Valley of the Kings, U.N. experts said on Tuesday. Asia suffered most with 220 landslides in the past century out of about 500 that caused human deaths, they said. Many of the most deadly mudslides were in Latin America and the costliest in Europe. About 800-1,000 people died in landslides in each of the past 20 years, the U.N. University said in a statement. About 100 experts will meet in Tokyo on...

- French President Jacques Chirac's office denied a report that he pushed for a family friend to be the leading lady of "The Da Vinci Code", when he met with the movie's makers last year. The film's American director Ron Howard and producer Brian Grazer were invited to meet the French president in December last year as they were holding auditions in Paris for the top female role. "They discussed a certain number of their acquaintances, such as Audrey Tautou, Paul Newman, Michele Laroque, Gregory Peck or Jean Reno, but without linking them to the casting of the film," a...

Former Clinton communications director-turned-ABC "This Week" host George Stephanopoulos charged Monday that President Bush deliberately hyped intelligence on Saddam Hussein's nuclear threat that he knew wasn't true. "There's no question that the administration hyped the nuclear program," Stephanopoulos told radio host Don Imus. "Especially when they go out and say, you know, there could be a mushroom cloud coming from Iraq." "They knew better than that," the one-time top Clinton aide declared. In a nationally televised address on Oct 7, 2002, President Bush warned of "the threat gathering against us" from Iraq, adding: "Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot...

Oil Spills Seen as the Only Exception NEW ORLEANS, Sept. 14 -- Early tests on the floodwater that covered most of this city do not suggest it will leave a permanent toxic residue or render residential areas uninhabitable for more than a short time, officials of both state and federal environmental agencies said yesterday. The pollution consists primarily of fecal matter and slightly elevated concentrations of metals such as lead and chromium that were in the city's soil before Hurricane Katrina. There are also trace amounts of many petroleum-based chemicals and some pesticides. Despite descriptions of the floodwater as a...

The federal government will no longer bring evacuees from the Gulf Coast to the St. Louis region despite an areawide effort to provide facilities for thousands. Eleven days ago, the federal government ordered agencies here to make preparations for up to 2,000 people displaced by Hurricane Katrina. Now officials are deciding what to do with a Boeing hangar at Lambert Field that hundreds of volunteers and dozens of agencies worked feverishly to turn into a virtual city. St. Louis County also coordinated an effort to transform the long-abandoned Gumbo Jail in Chesterfield for about 300 Katrina evacuees... That's not to...

Crude oil prices struck a record high of $70.85 in New York trading on August 30. If you believed all the hype surrounding the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina – e.g., it was Bush’s fault and the economy will be in ruins – well, you may just have been a victim of the TV talking heads’ hysteria, and that of the New York Times, LA Times, etc., etc. A few days after Katrina ravaged the Gulf Coast, the news networks kept showing the “startling” image of a gas station sign advertising $5.87/gallon – I believe it was in Atlanta. Of course,...

Fertility expert Lord Winston says the potential benefits of embryonic stem cell research have probably been oversold to the public. He will warn in a speech on Monday that if science fails to deliver on some of the hype around the cells - as he fears will happen - there will be a backlash. He says the notion that a host of cures for serious, degenerative disorders are just around the corner is fanciful. Lord Winston believes some of the uncertainties need to be emphasised. "Both in Britain and America, huge publicity has been given to stem cells, particularly embryonic...

Somewhere out on the Internet, an Electric Bong may be in danger. The threat: a well-crafted Google query that could allow a hacker to use Google's massive database as a resource for intrusion. "Electric Bong" was one of a number of household devices that security researcher Johnny Long came across when he found an unprotected Web interface to someone's household electrical network. To the right of each item were two control buttons, one labelled "on," the other, "off."

The West was smitten overnight by the Ukrainian revolution last year. It was a brief affair, though. The West became quickly disenchanted after taking a better look at the product in the orange wrapper. The European press were initially raving about "progressive," democratic" reformer Viktor Yushchenko. The media changed its outlook for Ukraine"s glorious future eight months after the coup d'etat. The West will not help Mr. Yushchenko out Below are some recent headlines printed by the world's leading periodicals: "Ukrainians' euphoria faded away" (Financial Times Deutschland); " 'Orange' impotence" (Die Tageszeitung, Germany); "Orange revolution loses its splendor" (The Financial...

WHAT the hell is wrong with you all? It’s only a book. Have you run quite mad? Can you really get so excited about a book? Can a book really be your reason for getting up in the morning? Is it any sensible way to establish a moral code, just because some bright-eyed attention-seeker bumbles around doing good deeds, all on the pages of a book? It’s a book. You’re nuts. Get over it. [snip] What’s it called? Harry Potter and The Thingamying Whatchacallit? Something like that. They all are. What happens today, tonight, at the stroke of midnight, while...

This week a new empirical study claiming to show that public schools do a better job than private schools has made a big media splash. But the study is deeply misleading. The authors make claims their statistical method can’t possibly justify. And if you guessed that the study got off the ground with help from the educational status quo, you’d be right. If there’s one thing education research has shown, it’s that private schools do a better job than public schools. The consensus in favor of this among empirical studies is as strong as on anything in education-policy research. Indeed,...

It's time to revisit some of the sensationalized allegations that were trumpeted from the Mainstream Media's minarettes over the past few years, only to be largely ignored when they unraveled. You remember the headlines, now learn how they actually ended: "George Bush was not elected; he was selected by the Supreme Court." "Energy industry magnates had too much influence over Vice President Dick Cheney's Energy Task Force." "The economy is recovering, but it's a jobless recovery." "America is outsourcing all of its jobs to overseas workers." "100,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed in the Iraq war and occupation." "300+ (the...

Family's two pit bulls kill Hamtramck girl, 6 4/5/2005, 4:28 a.m. ET The Associated Press HAMTRAMCK, Mich. (AP) — Two pit bulls attacked and killed their owners' 6-year-old girl in the backyard of a home near Detroit, state police say. Cassidy Jeter was killed Monday morning, said state police Lt. Harold Love. The girl had known the pit bulls since they were puppies, The Detroit News said. Cassidy and a younger child were walking down an alley next to the home about 9 a.m. when the dogs attacked, Love said. The family recently moved out of a home around the...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Regular gasoline pump prices in the United States may average as high as $2.50 by Memorial Day, shattering the records as futures prices climb to new peaks, analysts said on Friday. U.S. retail gasoline is already running above $2.15 a gallon, well beyond last spring's peak of $2.05, according to government and industry surveys. "Surging NYMEX futures are certainly an upward pressure on prices at the pump, so I would certainly expect to see retail prices move up sharply over the next few weeks," said Tim Evans, analyst with IFR Energy Services. Gasoline futures on the...

Farmed salmon pose a major health risk to their wild cousins, according to a Canadian study that found migrating salmon were 73 times likelier to become infected by a deadly parasite when they passed by a fish pen. Biologists at the University of Alberta in Edmonton studied infections of sea lice among 5,500 juvenile pink salmon, sampled along a 60-kilometre route in British Columbia as the young fish migrated out to sea. The team netted out a pink salmon or a chum salmon every one to four kilometres (0.5 to 2.5 miles) and counted the lice on its body. The...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 23 - All week, Doug Wead has said the reason he secretly recorded some of his phone calls with President Bush was for history's sake. But Wednesday, after a blast of criticism, Mr. Wead abruptly decided he had spoken too soon. "History can wait," he said, promising to turn over the tapes to Mr. Bush. The disclosure that he had such tapes, recordings that spanned two years before the 2000 presidential election when he was an evangelical adviser to Mr. Bush, was published in The New York Times on Sunday. Since then, Mr. Wead has appeared on several...

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer today became the latest Microsoft executive to say some vague but intriguing things about company's plans for the next-generation Xbox console. (See this earlier post and the second item in this article.) His comments came in response to questions from the audience during an event for minority high-school students this morning on the company's Redmond campus. Here's what he said in response to the first one:"When you see the new Xbox, you're going to think it's un -- well, let me say it politely -- unbelievable. Just unbelievable. The Rumors are that we'll see that product...

The U.S. House of Representatives approved on Thursday a sweeping set of rules aimed at forcing states to issue all adults federally approved electronic ID cards, including driver's licenses. Under the rules, federal employees would reject licenses or identity cards that don't comply, which could curb Americans' access to airplanes, trains, national parks, federal courthouses and other areas controlled by the federal government. The bill was approved by a 261-161 vote. The measure, called the Real ID Act, says that driver's licenses and other ID cards must include a digital photograph, anticounterfeiting features and undefined "machine-readable technology, with defined minimum...

Kerry aide accused over 'Superman' stem cell claim 13/10/2004 - 15:02:05 Vice-presidential hopeful John Edwards has sparked a row by claiming that under a John Kerry administration “people like Christopher Reeve will get up out of that wheelchair and walk again”. Mr Edwards raised eyebrows with the pledge at an election campaign rally, a day after the death of the paralysed Superman actor was announced. The Kerry team has repeatedly promised that it would allow stem cell research if in power, opening the way for potential cures for diseases. By contrast President George Bush has placed strict limitations on the...

You know what makes me nervous about President Bush? It's not his facial expressions. Nor his verbal clumsiness. I don't care about his alleged weakness at the podium. What concerns me more than anything else is his demonstrated weakness at our borders. Immigration enforcement is the six-ton elephant in the room. Barely two sentences were devoted to border control in the first presidential debate, despite the fact that the major issue of the showdown was leadership on national security. Both President Bush and Sen. Kerry bloviated about throwing more money at the Department of Homeland Security, while ignoring the fundamental...

Only Newsweek, followed by the rest of the liberal press, could take one badly flawed Newsweek political poll -- disproportionately conducted in the Pacific time region (e.g., which includes the Left Coast liberal enclaves of L.A., Portland and Seattle) and transform that limited poll into conclusive proof of a dramatic Kerry comeback after the first presidential debate. First off, the purported Newsweek sampling of American public opinion was badly skewed. Not only was the poll conducted exclusively in the Mountain and Pacific time zones (likely leading to a disproportionate sample over-representation of registered voters from liberal Southern California). Not only...

-snip- The former daytime TV star — who recently launched a gay- family cruise line — is trying out a talk show tomorrow night by subbing for Jim Bohannon Bohannon is syndicated by Viacom/CBS's Westwood One, causing rampant industry speculation that the network is testing O'Donnell for her own radio show. -snip- "I think she'd do fine because she's a colorful, offbeat, opinionated character with a showbiz background, but strong interests in politics and controversial lifestyle issues," said Talkers magazine publisher Michael Harrison. "However, radio is very demanding," said Harrison, warning that a three-hour talk show, live each day, is...

President Bush Enters the No Spin Zone By: Bill O'Reilly for BillOReilly.com Thursday, Sep 23, 2004 President Bush doesn't really like the press and with good reason. The media "gotcha game" has been elevated to almost hysterical levels, and any mistake or misstatement by a President is front page news. Would you want to walk a high wire everyday? So the President rarely gives in-depth interviews, and his press conferences are held to a minimum. One on one, Mr. Bush is an engaging guy, but it's tough to be relaxed when every word you say is parsed and dissected. Unlike...

Bush Coming on O'Reiley Soon

Oreilly just said the interview will be aired Monday to build hype. He said it was a very good intervierw and that we will learn a lot about bush that perhaps we did not know before. He said Bush had some very interesting answers....

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Google Inc. slashed the size of its closely watched initial public offering nearly in half to less than $2 billion on Wednesday, splashing cold water on what has been touted as the hottest Internet IPO in years. The revision came as Google disclosed in an amended filing that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has asked for "additional information" about the publication of a Playboy magazine article featuring an interview with Google's co-founders. The IPO of the world's most popular Web search engine is now slated to raise as much as $1.9 billion, far lower than...

McGreevey's Successor a Veteran of Political Wars By RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD Published: August 15, 2004 EAST ORANGE, N.J., Aug. 13 - Just a few weeks ago at the Democratic National Convention in Boston, Richard J. Codey and other current and former politicians took stock of the bubbling scandals this summer in Trenton and played the old parlor game "What if?" "He always talked about being governor, and when we were in Boston one scenario was what if McGreevey resigned," said Brendan T. Byrne, the former New Jersey governor and an ally of Mr. Codey. Mr. Byrne said Mr. Codey left...

LAS VEGAS - Unveiling bright new billboards with his beaming visage and the message that "Arnold says California wants your business," Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger came to the city of glitz and hype Wednesday to kick off a national ad campaign singing the state's virtues as a place to make money. The Republican governor, who griped repeatedly during his run for office that California had become a lousy place to do business, employed some of the same elaborately staged promotional gimmicks he mastered long before coming to Sacramento to trumpet his message that California - with him in charge - gets...

Too many Washington sources are telling us this, so it may be imminent. Israel is set to attack Iran's nuclear facilities, fearing that the Islamic regime will use atomic weapons on the Jewish state. Israel has long assumed the right of pre-emption -- that is, the right to attack and even make war with Arab states that are developing nuclear weapons. "They are ready to go," a top former American diplomat with close ties to Israel tells a source close to NewsMax. There have been mutterings that time is short and Israel will do to Iran what it did to...

As if kissing every powder-blue hiney thats paraded in front of him isn't bad enough, now it seems (according to the June 28 issue of The New American) President Bush is pushing to spend $606 million (Defense Dept dollars) to help train a UN standing army. More of our tax dollars spent on UN social elite globalists. How lovely. My disenchantment with President Bush all started with his amnesty for illegals scheme and things seem to be going downhill. I wonder... is he trying to make me not vote for him??