Free Republic

Friday stitch and....gripe? Celebrate? Show off your latest project? Hug your kids? Talk about the project you would really like to do but never started?

A gun that spits out ball bearings after spinning them to extreme speeds is being developed by a US inventor. The novel design has already caught the imagination of some defence industry experts. The weapon, called DREAD, was invented by Charles St George, a veteran of the US firearms industry who founded the company Leader Propulsion Systems to promote the idea. He claims a major US defence company has shown an interested in developing it further and has produced a promotional video showing a prototype in action, which can be seen here (Quicktime). He says a new prototype will be...

LOWELL -- Last year when Cindy Kryston called city cultural leaders together to discuss Lowell National Historical Park's financial distress, she got a lot of support from Mike Smith. Smith, American Textile History Museum president, told Kryston, the national park's acting superintendent at the time, the park wasn't alone as it battled decreasing visitation, reduced funding and budget deficits. He wasn't kidding. Smith is in the fight of his 34-year professional life to keep the museum solvent, and, hopefully, in Lowell. The museum currently has a $600,000 operating deficit. Its budget has been reduced from about $2.5 million in 1997...

Voters not only angry, but unmoved by good fortune JAMES HOWARD GIBBONS wonders why conservatives take so little joy in their domination of U.S. politics at nearly every level. As this no-holds-barred election campaign proceeds, American voters are reported to be not only sharply divided but unusually angry. Calls to the Chronicle's editorial page office support both assertions. Several liberals complained that the paper has become hopelessly right-wing. A host of conservatives suggested in so many words that the Chronicle is now the willing tool of the liberal elite. All I can say is that both charges cannot be true....

I was suggesting to another freeper earlier that - somebody ought to start a thread to compile all examples today of disgusting, evil liberal spinning on ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, etc. It was disgusting from the very beginning of the news of the capture. An example stated on NewsMax; "Time Magazine columnist Joe Klein suggested that another 9/11 attack could revitalize Democrat hopes of defeating Bush next November. "This election, more than any other I've covered, is out of the hands of the politicians and in the hands of the events that take place in the world," he noted. "All...

A former US intelligence official who served under the Bush administration in the build-up to the Iraq war accused the White House yesterday of lying about the threat posed by Saddam Hussein. The claims came as the Bush administration was fighting to shore up its credibility among a series of anonymous government leaks over its distortion of US intelligence to manufacture a case against Saddam. This was the first time an administration official has put his name to specific claims. The whistleblower, Gregory Thielmann, served as a director in the state department's bureau of intelligence until his retirement in September,...

With Hillary at the helm the full-attack of desparation of losers, has begun. Look what the Official DNC Web Site is Spinning now! Also Click Here And, this is their main graphic.

ONE of the world’s biggest investment banks, Goldman Sachs, faces a probe into allegations that it engaged in some of the unethical business practices in London that have shaken Wall Street. MPs last night demanded an investigation by the Financial Services Authority (FSA), the City watchdog, after evidence emerged suggesting Goldman’s London office had issued cheap shares to favoured clients at the height of the stock market boom. Ordinary investors got access to the shares only after their value had started to soar. In one flotation organised by Goldman’s in April 2000, two long-term clients were allocated shares which immediately...

It was really refreshing to see proud liberal DemocRAT Brian Whitman put Jennifer Palmeri's feet to the fire. Jennifer, of course, is the RAT communications director. She sounds very sweet and very seductive. Brian challenged her regarding the RAT cartoon on the RAT website in which our president is purported to push a helpless woman in a wheelchair over the cliff. It was their attempt to attack the GOP regarding Social Security. In her mind it was "edgy" but not going over the line. After all, this was just like Wiley Coyote. Brian introduced my call warning her that the...

The great question of this new century is whether the age of interdependence is going to be good or bad for humanity. The answer depends upon whether we in the wealthy nations spread the benefits and reduce the burdens of the modern world, on whether the poor nations enact the changes necessary to make progress possible, and on whether we all can develop a level of consciousness high enough to understand our obligations and responsibilities to each other. We cannot make it if the poor of the world are led by people like Osama bin Laden who believe they can...

Mathematicians Solve Egg-Spin MysteryMARGIE MASONAssociated Press Writer Just in time for Easter, mathematicians have cracked the mystery of why a hard-boiled egg spun on a tabletop rises on one end and whirls like a top.The explanation, in an eggshell: Friction.Mathematicians from England and Japan spent six months filching eggs from their families' refrigerators and trying to explain the mysterious forces controlling this behavior. Their findings appear in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.Keith Moffatt of the University of Cambridge in England and Yutaka Shimomura of Keio University in Japan believed that demonstrating how this effect works would be a simple,...