Free Republic

Next time you’re tempted to badmouth paint (if that’s something you’re wont to do), consider that it might someday soon be saving the lives of our troops. Researchers have developed a special kind of paint that can absorb dangerous chemicals, reports The Engineer. The special paint is a collaboration between The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (in the UK, hence the orthography) and the global paint giant AkzoNobel. The paint’s topcoat contains silica gel, which can absorb nerve gas and prevent it from getting in, say, a tank. The undercoat of the paint is designed with the optimal amount of...

“Ice cores from Summit show that melting events of this type occur about once every 150 years on average. With the last one happening in 1889, this event is right on time,” says Lora Koenig, a Goddard glaciologist and a member of the research team analyzing the satellite data. ----------------------------------- I covered this over the weekend when Bill McKibben started wailing about the albedo going off the charts. I thought it might be soot related. The PR below and quote above is from NASA Goddard. I had to laugh at the title of their press release, where they cite “Unprecedented...

Sally Ride showed Generation X girls the sky’s the limit — literally. We could do anything boys could do and sometimes better. If we wanted to go into space, our gender couldn’t — and wouldn’t — stop us. If we studied hard enough and trained our brains, the glass ceiling could be shattered. Amid all the girl power that Ride taught women, one barrier the first American woman in space chose not to break was sexuality. When she died on Monday at age 61 from pancreatic cancer, it emerged that Ride had a partner. As one friend on Facebook wrote,...

According to The Generation X Report, based on the Longitudinal Study of American Youth at the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research, the demographic group born between 1961 and 1981 is even less concerned about climate issues than they were two years ago. The group is “uninformed about the causes, unconcerned about the potential dangers, and doubt it is happening,” writes Hank Campbell on the blog Science 2.0. “Even with most of the country mired in a historic drought, a spate of storms that left millions without power in the mid-Atlantic, and seemingly more frequent natural disasters, people have...

BBC News today reported that “two blind British men have had electronic retinas fitted”. Chris James, 54, and Robin Millar, 60, took part in a clinical trial coordinated by Oxford University and funded by the National Institute of Health Research. Both men have retinitis pigmentosa, a rare hereditary condition that causes gradual deterioration of the light-detecting cells in the retina, which can lead to blindness. The electronic retinas are implants containing light detectors designed to replace the lost light-detecting cells. Immediately following the procedures, when the implants were switched on, both men were able to detect light and are now...

In the first three years of the administration's of Barack Obama and George W. Bush, Obama hit Americans with 106 major heavy-handed regulations costing taxpayers $46 BILLION. By contrast for the same period in Bush's first three years, there were 28 major regulations at a cost of $8.1 BILLION. The report cites a Gallup poll from earlier this year that found 46 percent of small business owners are not hiring because they are worried about new government regulations. In addition to current regulations, the report found that proposed regulations continue to generate uncertainty and could result in significant additional costs...

Picture a child of 8 or so. He wakes up and carefully makes his bed before going downstairs and emptying the dishwasher. He fixes himself a bowl of cereal and calmly eats it at the table, then clears his place, rinses the bowl and spoon, and places them both in the now-empty dishwasher. If this seems like some sort of mythical youngster from a faraway culture or a bygone age, you may be in the market for one of the parenting books smartly reviewed by Elizabeth Kolbert in this week’s New Yorker. Summing up the point of both the books...

fter granting permission, my Entire Food Shelf Life Summary Article was published in the Journal of Civil Defense, Volume 43, Issue Number 2, Year 2010. The Journal of Civil Defense has an extremely wide distribution and readership including all the Congressmen in the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. Publisher's Mailing Address: The American Civil Defense Association, 11576 S. State Street, Suite 502, Draper, UT 84020 Publisher's Web Address: www.tacda.org.

I appreciated the comments of Leroy Stucky (Western Front, June 28) defending the biblical view of the beginning of mankind, the world and the universe, otherwise known as creationism. Creationism will always be a very difficult doctrine to accept, as long as people exclude the supernatural influence and presence of an almighty God who, in my opinion, started the whole process. I have never read an issue of The American Spectator magazine, but recently at the library I happened to pick up the May 2012 issue. The magazine, I found out, is very conservative, but not necessary Christian. However, included...

From the told ya so department, comes this recently presented paper at the European Geosciences Union meeting. Authors Steirou and Koutsoyiannis, after taking homogenization errors into account find global warming over the past century was only about one-half [0.42°C] of that claimed by the IPCC [0.7-0.8°C]. ------------------------------------------------ Here’s the part I really like: of 67% of the weather stations examined, questionable adjustments were made to raw data that resulted in: “increased positive trends, decreased negative trends, or changed negative trends to positive,” whereas “the expected proportions would be 1/2 (50%).” And… “homogenation practices used until today are mainly statistical, not...

In 1939, Albert Einstein sent a letter (written largely by Leó Szilárd) to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The pressing concern was that Nazi Germany might be conducting research to create atomic bombs, and the letter suggested that the United States should begin researching the possibility itself. This was the impetus for the Manhattan project, which culminated in the explosion of the first atomic bomb at the Trinity Site in New Mexico. Socorro, New Mexico, a little more than an hour’s drive south of Albuquerque, is one of the meeting places for those who plan to visit the Trinity Site. Socorro,...

This week, the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released a "proposed" rule updating what Doctors and Hospitals will be paid under ObamaCare. The Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (MPFS) ushers-in changes to the "Physician Quality Reporting System," and makes changes to the "Physician Value-Based Payment Modifier." Considering that Obama and Democrats in Congress cut $500 Billion from Medicare, I would love to hear Physicians weigh-in on this "proposed rule." Under the MPFS, a relative value is assigned to each of more than 7,000 types of services to capture the amount of work, the direct and indirect (overhead) practice expenses,...

The House Energy and Commerce Committee unanimously approved a resolution that urges President Obama to resist any international attempts to regulate the Internet. The United Nation’s International Telecommunication Union (ITU) will meet in Dubai this December and initiatives that will put the Internet under greater government control are expected to be up for vote. The committee-approved resolution, introduced by Rep. Mary Bono Mack (R-Calif.), is intended to show the international community that the United States is united behind an open and innovative Internet, free from government control. But the World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT), the ITU meeting that will...

Thank God for air conditioning. I mean it. I'm not being casual about Whom to thank. I thank the everlasting Creator who imparted his universal wisdom into a series of inventions and ideas until a misguided therapy for malaria gave us the means to create ice. God bless! And then some Luddite, glacier-chopping Ice King quashed John Gorrie's idea in order to save his own fortunes, and we sweated for 50 more years. I hope Hell's thermostat got an upgrade of 50,000 extra degrees just for Mr. Tudor's arrival. Air Conditioning is a miracle of civilization but it's not a...

How to make a PVC Water Hand Pump to use when you have no power April 8th, 2011 | Author: Lady Apprentice Today we will learn how to create a PVC hand pump to get the water from your well when you have no power and how it all works. I have a few plans to show you on how to make them, which we will get to later, but first let’s understand how a PVC hand pump would work, or most any pump for that matter. If you look at the picture below you can see for yourself how...

The Virginian Pilot, my local paper has receives national attention recently. Its editor decided that a black mob attacking a pair of his reporters was not news. When the story finally surfaced, the Pilot’s editorial judgment was … questioned … exposed … revealed for the sorry mix of bad judgment mixed with political correctness for which the paper is notorious. As you may have heard, the Mid-Atlantic area has been hit by some pretty strong wind and thunderstorms recently which left millions without power and dozens dead. Meanwhile summer temperatures between 90 and 100 degrees are forcing people from their...

alas, to statist ends... As many of you are likely aware, the 1970 Plymouth Superbird was a special 'aero' version of the popular Plymouth Roadrunner created as a NASCAR homologation special (the company was required to build a minimum of 500 cars in a street version of any specific model to qualify in NASCAR as a 'production car'). Similar to the aerodynamically-advanced 1968 Dodge Charger 500 and further-evolved 1969 Dodge Charger Daytona, Plymouth's 1970 Superbird was intended not only to hit 200mph on NASCAR Superspeedways like Daytona and Talladega, but was also an attempt to lure King Richard Petty back (from Ford) to...

The massive western wildfires could have been avoided with intelligent forest management and less hysteria from the greens. As I write these lines, vast wildfires are sweeping through my home state of Colorado and other areas of the American west. Last week, two of my employees had to leave work early to rush home to evacuate their families from imminent danger. Hundreds of houses have already been destroyed, and thousands of acres of trees incinerated, and unknown myriads of wild animals burned alive. This disaster was predictable, and promises to get worse. Over the past decade, from British Columbia to...

The Arabunna people live in the area around Lake Eyre in Southern Australia. It is a hot, hostile desert region, which is no surprise, because … well … it’s in Australia. ------------------------ (Lake Eyre region in South Australia.) ------------------------ A new report from the University of Everybody-Panic is a study of the horrendous future faced by these poor folks: "The first stage of University of Adelaide research released today shows that South Australia’s Arabunna country, which includes Lake Eyre in the far north, is likely to get both drier and hotter in decades to come. “'Temperatures could increase up to...

1. Put this in your "God is really, really smart. Humans? Not so much." file. Within just the last few years, farmers all over the U.S. have noticed a strange and completely heretofore unseen incidence of SULFUR deficiency in crops. Odd. Why would sulfur deficiency issues suddenly appear where they had never been seen before? It turns out that the sulfur in the diesel burned by the tractors would aerosolize in the exhaust, and then precipitate and FERTILIZE the ground at planting and harvest as the tractor effectively covered the entire field. When the tyrannical government removed pretty much all...

Twenty-year-old models which have suggested serious ice loss in the eastern Antarctic have been compared with reality for the first time – and found to be wrong, so much so that it now appears that no ice is being lost at all. “Previous ocean models … have predicted temperatures and melt rates that are too high, suggesting a significant mass loss in this region that is actually not taking place,”

We're used to Andrea Rossi making statements about his work on the Journal of Nuclear Physics web site. Some are more dramatic than others, and this latest one could be considered more on the dramatic side: Italo R. June 24th, 2012 at 10:42 AM Dear dr. Rossi, in these hot summer days we all are sweating. What about you, near your 600 °C device? Warm (or, better, fresh) regards… Italo R. - Andrea Rossi June 24th, 2012 at 1:37 PM Dear Italo R.: Actually, I am in the USA, close to 20 reactors working above 600 Celsius. We must collect...

When a kids see other kids being bullied, current teaching advises them to speak up for the victim. But when the victim is an adult, the common response is to freeze. "I think that's the next wave we're going to see," said Edie Raether, a psychotherapist and author of "Stop Bullying Now." "It is David and Goliath in reverse. Kids run in packs....and an adult is never in either pack or camp and thus it is more risky to speak up...It is a confusing situation, and a confused mind is frozen, passive." Raether, who speaks internationally on bullying intervention, intends...

The tragic thing about the thoughtless use of a stereotype (denier) is that it reveals that you really think of people in terms of its projected meaning. In particular, even in your response you seem to equate the term “skeptic” with “denier of AGW”. ----------------------------------------------- For this honest doubt and skepticism that the highly complex global climate models are correct you have the temerity to socially stigmatize them in a scientific journal with a catch-all term that implies that they are as morally reprehensible as those that “deny” that the Nazi Holocaust of genocide against the Jews? For shame.

Hey ya'll come to Lansing, there'll be plenty of vaginas.This whole controversy disgusts me, but hey, it's part of the reason why I'm not a Democrat. The false narrative that the media is running with on the vagina controversy in Lansing is basically what the Democrats say it's about. According to female Democrats, women are being censored on the House floor for daring to say the word vagina. So, in order to really really get those evil male Republicans to pay, the women plan to talk about taking mirrors to view the female genitalia, how the hair feels, orgasms, and...

US First Lady Michelle Obama's ancestry can be traced to a slave owner from what is now Northern Ireland, who emigrated to America in the 1700s. A new book claims that Andrew Shields, who fought against the British in the American War of Independence, was Mrs Obama's great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather and his family were slave owners. Her great-great-great-grandmother Melvinia was a slave who had children by Charles Shields, grandson of Andrew Shields. One of those children, Dolphus Shields, born in 1859, was Michelle Obama's direct ancestor. The claims are made in American Tapestry: The Story of the Black, White and Multiracial Ancestors...

On December 2, 1929, deep within a Chinese cavern, four scientists slid into a narrow chasm and discovered the site where the fall of man began nearly half a million years ago, where the original sin was committed. The crime scene that they uncovered was so vile that the artifacts were made to disappear and the implications covered up. While deep in our psyches we still retain a memory of this horror, our elites work to erode the customs developed over eons to keep the terror at bay. This is the fascinating story of these artifacts, the forty skulls of...

The quotation of the week last week had to be that of Harvard professor Daniel E. Lieberman in an opinion piece for the New York Times. Lieberman, a professor of human evolutionary biology, was among those who publicly defended New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's plan to ban the sale of sugared soft drinks in cups larger than 16 ounces. And he did so using, of all things, evolution. Now, we all know that humans have always needed — or evolved to need — carbohydrates for energy. So how could evolution argue for Mayor Bloomberg's ban on sugar, a pure...

ALL EUROPEAN LIFE DIED IN AUSCHWITZ By Sebastian Vilar Rodrigez I walked down the street in Barcelona , and suddenly discovered a terrible truth - Europe died in Auschwitz ... We killed six million Jews and replaced them with 20 million Muslims. In Auschwitz we burned a culture, thought, creativity, talent. We destroyed the chosen people, truly chosen, because they produced great and wonderful people who changed the world. The contribution of this people is felt in all areas of life: science, art, international trade, and above all, as the conscience of the world. These are the people we burned....

Today, a group of 14 free-market organizations, including Digital Liberty, urged the Federal Communications Commission to approve a deal between Verizon and a group cable companies that will free more spectrum for wireless broadband. Under the Obama administration, the FCC has failed to bring new spectrum online to meet rapidly growing demand for wireless broadband. The result is a growing "spectrum crunch," with consumers in dense urban areas already feeling the pinch. (Instead of blaming your wireless carrier for a dropped call or slow speeds, point your finger at the FCC.) The Verizon-SpectrumCo deal presents a rare opportunity to bring...

Jeff Masters and I recently received an interesting email from Ken Towe who has been researching the NCDC historical temperature database and came across what appeared to be some startling inconsistencies. Namely that the average state temperature records used in the current trends analysis by the NCDC (National Climate Data Center) do not reflect the actual published records of such as they appeared in the Monthly Weather Reviews and Climatological Data Summaries of years past. Here is why. ------------------------------------------- Yet as we have seen time and time again, with the exception of a -0.05°C cooling applied for UHI (which is...

The Pacific Institute is pleased to welcome Dr. Peter Gleick back to his position as president of the Institute. An independent review conducted by outside counsel on behalf of the Institute has supported what Dr. Gleick has stated publicly regarding his interaction with the Heartland Institute. This independent investigation has further confirmed and the Pacific Institute is satisfied that none of its staff knew of or was involved in any way.

Let us stipulate that the government shouldn’t be making loans to companies in the first place. It’s not a proper role for government, which perhaps more than any other entity on the planet is most incapable of understanding what makes private businesses profitable. That said, how have the two candidates for president differed when they have done what governments shouldn’t be doing in the first place? . . .

We were saddened last night as deadline approached and it seemed as if Proposition 29 was going to pass, adding yet another tax on Californians, even if it would fall directly only on those people who have yet to kick their cigarette habits. But as dutiful journalists on deadline, we were obliged to report the situation as it stood as we sent the paper to the presses. So, the newspaper you received on your porch included our editorial saying that to our dismay, Prop. 29 appeared to be passing. But . . .

As Texas appears to be getting more serious about enticing SpaceX to build a spaceport near Brownsville an environmental group has stepped forward to oppose the project.At issue is the threat of “noise, heat, vibration, fencing and hazardous material spills” from the proposed spaceport that could lower the value of nearby Boca Chica Park and the Lower Rio Grande Valley Natural Wildlife Refuge.Here’s the full text of a news release issued today by Environment Texas: Environment Texas launched a petition drive today to stop the proposed construction of a spaceport on private land almost completely surrounded by a south Texas...

This is our favorite news item this week, hands down. The Europeans, so enamored by things green that they have implemented subsidies, mandates and regulations that have nearly strangled their economy, have found a way out of their dilemma. “Energy from gas power stations has been rebranded as a green, low-carbon source of power by a €80bn European Union programme, in a triumph of the deep-pocketed fossil fuel industry lobby over renewable forms of power,” reports the Guardian in Great Britain. There you have it. To make the green quota, simply reclassify a fossil fuel as green enough. Voila! ....

We are winning; defeating the evil that is liberalism in large and small battles ways every day. What is happening to the Susan B. Komen for the Cure Foundation governing board is a good example of our victories. Last January when the Komen board was confronted with the fact that secretly produced videos proved Planned Parenthood would knowingly arrange an abortion for a supposed under aged prostitute, it did the right thing and stopped funding the death mills. They listened to their donors who demanded they stop giving their money to a group devoted to killing babies. Nevertheless, within days...

LONDON, May 31, 2012 (Reuters) — Bans on drugs like ecstasy, magic mushrooms and LSD have hampered scientific research on the brain and stalled the progress of medicine as much as George Bush's ban on stem cell research did, a leading British drug expert said on Thursday. The British government's former chief drugs adviser, David Nutt, reacts as he speaks during a news conference announcing the formation of the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs, in London January 15, 2010. REUTERS/Suzanne Plunkett David Nutt, a professor of neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College London and a former chief adviser on drugs to the...

This is pretty wild... A phenomenon known as a 'roll cloud' -a very rare form of Arcus cloud- was seen in eastern Texas early this morning... it's formed when a cool outflow of air from a substantial thunderstorm jets-out ahead of the system in a rotating rope that can run 50 miles long... More at Reaganite Republican ____________________________________ KTLV-TV   Wikipedia  h/t Doug Welch

The Sun News Network in Canada extensively covered our Seventh International Conference on Climate Change at the Hilton Chicago. For that, The Heartland Institute is very grateful — but the viewers of the excellent network should be even more appreciative. The sharp and entertaining Ezra Levant anchored the coverage, and his dispatches are not to be missed. Below you can view seven videos of his reports for his program, “The Source.”

One of the showcase companies of the green energy movement propped up by the federal stimulus questioned in recent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission whether it can survive with its mounting debt and problems with defective batteries. Yet, even with its struggles, its top executives were awarded sweetened severance packages that would give them an extra six-figures in payout if they lose their jobs. A123 Systems, which opened a Livonia lithium-ion battery plant that is to supply electric cars, has an accumulated deficit of $774 million, according to SEC filings, and stated in its quarterly report that its...

With so much information about Climate Science, are we really get the full information, or just parts of it that leave out other aspects of what we are told is the 'Great Debate' of our time. Either way, we are only getting one side of that debate. Here, Doctor David Evans explains with three videos some of the information we are not being told, from the other side of the debate. Joanne Nova, who runs the popular Australian Science site JoNova also adds a video explaining the other side of Climate.

Here is a five minute long special report on a power source for the 21st Century; one that the “greens”, climate change alarmists and global warming skeptics might all agree on (video link below). And here is my blog about that power source. JOHN COLEMAN’S BLOG May 21, 2012 THORIUM will power the world. That is the bumper sticker of the future. The ugly debate about energy has gone on and on. It is costing us billions of dollars. It is beginning to cripple our nation. I have been looking for a source of abundant, cheap electric power that short...

......I've often thought that God has a particularly acerbic wit. After all, FriedrichNietzsche, who famously proclaimed God is Dead, badly wanted to be known as a famous writer. He was granted his wish -after he became too insane to enjoy his fame. Obama seems to have wanted to become an uber-celebritycumpolitician in the worst possible way. How fitting it would be if presides over the bankruptcy of both systems. ..fabulists rising to some of the most esteemed positions in our society have potential impact far beyond what people suspect. They lay bare a rottenness at the heart of academia, the...

Sixty SouthCoast Residents learned about Agenda 21, SmartGrowth, Sustainable Development and other threats to their constitutional right to own property at an informative presentation at the Fall River Public Library in Fall River, MA. monday evening This group of patriotic and concerned citizens took time out of their busy lives to learn the facts about a devious plot hatched at the United Nations in 1987 under the guise of “saving the planet and the environment", called Agenda 21. They had all heard the horror stories of communities and businesses severely inundated by ridiculous environmental regulations and restrictions from a vast...

Environmentalism and ‘saving the world’ are almost exclusively preoccupations of the left. Outwardly they are noble pursuits, and yet they have always smelt a bit rotten. In order to find the source of the odor it is necessary to look beneath the surface and understand what is going on at the psychological level when someone takes up these causes. Clues are few and far between, so when you find something in the press that hints at a deeper malaise, it’s worth looking at it very closely. The following comment by English journalist Geoffrey Wheatcroft is one such. He said:...

Residents and businesses in Michigan are wrestling with the highest electric rates in the region — and with the best way to fix that situation. As is often the case in Michigan, a more competitive market versus a monopoly market is central to the debate, as is mandating an increase in the amount of renewable energy the state uses. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, Michigan's electric rates at the beginning of the year were 10 percent above the national average and had increased 8 percent over the previous year. With this reality as a backdrop, the state's energy...

MILWAUKEE — One of life’s simple pleasures just got a little sweeter. After years of waffling research on coffee and health, even some fear that java might raise the risk of heart disease, a big study finds the opposite: Coffee drinkers are a little more likely to live longer. Regular or decaf doesn’t matter. The study of 400,000 people is the largest ever done on the issue, and the results should reassure any coffee lovers who think it’s a guilty pleasure that may do harm. Java drinkers may live a little longer, according to a new study that linked longevity...

A sharp-eyed Power Line reader directed us to this C-SPAN video featuring Van Jones, President Obama’s short-lived “green jobs” czar, admitting around the 19:14 mark what is plain to anyone who pays attention, namely, that the environmental movement is basically an adjunct of the Democratic Party:

A massive block of limestone in France contains what scientists believe are the earliest known engravings of wall art dating back some 37,000 years, according to a study published Monday. The 1.5 metric ton ceiling piece was first discovered in 2007 at Abri Castanet, a well known archeological site in southwestern France which holds some of the earliest forms of artwork, beads and pierced shells. According to New York University anthropology professor Randall White, lead author of the paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the art was likely meant to adorn the interior of a shelter...