Free Republic

ROME — An Italian psychologist has proposed modifying people’s unconscious prejudices and stereotypes by subjecting parts of the brain to electric and magnetic impulses. Over the past 20 years, researchers have attempted to alter people’s ethnic and racial stereotypes and prejudices by providing information that counteracts the prejudice, writes Maddalena Marini, yet these interventions, while effective to some extent, have produced only limited results, especially regarding duration. A postdoctoral researcher at the Italian Institute of Technology (IIT), Marini says that these stereotypes are so instilled in the human mind that “the only way to change them is to change the...

Pic at link. An Ohio seventh grader who won $15,000 during the Huron County Fair livestock sale this month has reportedly donated all of his winnings to St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital. Western Reserve Schools in Cleveland announced Diesel Pippert's donation on Facebook over the weekend, calling him "a hero" for giving his large animal sale funds toward research for young children's illnesses. "A young man lives amongst us who should be an example to us all," the Facebook post reads. "WR 7th grader Diesel Pippert donated all of his livestock premiums to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital today at...

Video interview by Sen Cruz of Dr. Robert Epstein.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), a 2020 White House hopeful, on Monday acknowledged the controversy over her claim of Native American heritage, saying she has made "mistakes." “Like anyone who's been honest with themselves, I know that I have made mistakes," Warren told attendees at the Frank LaMere Native American Presidential Forum in Sioux City, Iowa. "I am sorry for harm I have caused. I have listened and I have learned a lot, and I am grateful for the many conversations we have had together," she added. Warren faced backlash late last year when she released results of a test that...

The tech giant is a leader in artificial intelligence products for China. Microsoft has partnered with several Chinese universities to create an open AI platform and several of its employees train government bureaucrats on how to use its advanced technology. These universities are well-connected to the Chinese military, which effectively makes Microsoft a collaborator. The tech giant has denied this assertion, claiming it only works with benign academic researchers. That claim is only believable if you ignore who uses the technology developed by these humble academics. At least three AI projects have been developed with China’s National University of Defense...

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio's wife Chirlane McCray has rejected public calls to build a statue honoring a Christian saint and will, instead, build a monument paying tribute to drag queens.New Yorkers were asked to take part in a public vote on who to honor with a statue celebrating women who built NYC.The initiative is part of a program called “She Built NYC” which was launched by McCray last summer.

Middle East The ban came after LGBTQ group Al-Qaws was planing to hold a gathering for its members in Nablus. The Palestinian Authority banned members of the Palestinian Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer (LGBTQ) community from carrying out any activities in the West Bank. The ban came after the grassroots group Al-Qaws for Sexual & Gender Diversity in Palestinian Society (Arabic for “the bow”), which engages and supports Palestinians who identify as LGBTQ, was planning to hold a gathering for its members in Nablus at the end of the month. The group operates both in the West Bank and...

Democratic presidential candidate Marianne Williamson, calling for a national "atonement" over the treatment of Native Americans, vowed Monday to rescind medals of honor for those who fought against them and even take down President Andrew Jackson's portrait from the Oval Office if she's elected. The spiritual author, who has gained a devoted following in recent weeks for her memorable debate performances, called for a “new era of American history” with Native Americans during an appearance at the Frank LaMere Native American Presidential Forum. "We can atone. We can make amends," Williamson said. "And if and when I'm president of the...

Arizona and Nevada are facing the first-ever mandatory cuts in the amount of water they can take from the Colorado River next year. The two states are among seven that have agreed to drought contingency plans for the river system that serves about 40 million people and 6,300 square miles of farmland from Wyoming to Southern California. The cuts are triggered by water levels expected in Lake Mead, a giant reservoir on the river at the Arizona-Nevada border. On Jan. 1, Lake Mead's level is projected to be 1,089.4 feet, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation said late last week. That's...

“It’s not going to be like in the past when seals had a bounty on them and were wiped out,” King said. “As long as the federal government protects the species, the problem is not going to be solved.”

Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) have remained silent after the Palestinian Authority banned LGBT activity in the West Bank. These members of "The Squad" have supported legislation praising the Boycott-Divestment-Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel and voted against legislation condemning it. PJ Media reached out to them for comment on the move, and they have remained silent. Early Monday morning, The Jerusalem Post reported that the PA and Palestine Police had outlawed LGBT activity in the West Bank and threatened to arrest members of the LGBT group Al-Qaws for Sexual & Gender Diversity in Palestinian...

On Tuesday, the markets bid higher following a statement from the U.S. Trade Representative’s office that tariffs will commence on September 1st, but that some products will be delayed until December 15th. To wit: “…some tariffs will take effect on Sept. 1 as planned, ‘certain products are being removed from the tariff list based on health, safety, national security and other factors and will not face additional tariffs of 10 percent. Further, as part of USTR’s public comment and hearing process, it was determined that the tariff should be delayed to December 15 for certain articles.” The only part the...

President Trump recently promised that "America will never be a socialist country" -- at least not while he's in office. But some members of his administration didn't get the memo. The Department of Health and Human Services still plans to impose socialist, European-style price controls on advanced drugs administered through Medicare. The proposal would tie Medicare's drug reimbursement rates to the average prices paid by governments that impose price controls on medicines. HHS officials hope their scheme will reduce pharmaceutical spending here in America -- and force other developed nations to foot more of the bill for drug research and...

Stacey Abrams defended her refusal to concede last year’s Georgia gubernatorial election on Monday, arguing that adhering to the democratic norm of conceding to a victorious opponent would make her “complicit” in a “rigged” system. Abrams has consistently refused to acknowledge the legitimacy of Republican Brian Kemp’s November gubernatorial victory and cites the dynamics of her loss as the motivating factor behind the launch of her national voting-rights-advocacy group Fair Fight 2020. During a Monday appearance on CBS This Morning, Abrams pushed back on the suggestion that her denial of the election result’s legitimacy resembles President Trump’s 2016 flirtation with...

A Democratic state senator from Illinois came under fire over the weekend after pictures were posted online showing his supporters at a fundraising event performing a mock assassination of a faux President Trump. “The tolerant left,” wrote a Facebook user in response to the incident. Photos posted by a woman who witnessed the mock assassination on Friday night show supporters of Sen. Martin Sandoval, who represents Illinois’ 11th District — which includes parts of Chicago — acting out in front of guests, according to WCIA. One of them can be seen pointing a fake machine gun at a man wearing...

Colin Kaepernick. Remember him? Below-average quarterback. Above-average poseur. Not “activist,” not really. Activists actually say stuff. Kaepernick almost never says anything. He’s like the Queen or most popes — you have to read the deep-background musings of supposed members of his inner circle to get a clue as to what he might be thinking. Kaepernick hasn’t played in the NFL since 2016, when anyway he was merely the disappointing starter on its worst team, and given that dozens of quarterbacks have entered the league since then and that he’s been gathering rust like the Tin Woodman for three years, he...

President Donald Trump is calling on the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates by at least a full percentage point "over a fairly short period of time," saying that such an action would make the U.S. economy even better and would also "greatly and quickly" enhance the global economy. In two tweets Monday, Trump kept up his pressure on the Fed and its chairman Jerome Powell, saying the U.S. economy was strong "despite the horrendous lack of vision by Jay Powell and the Fed." Powell is Trump's hand-picked choice for the top Fed job. He said Democrats were trying to...

An influential medical journal published a study Monday that links fluoride consumption during pregnancy with lower childhood IQs—a finding that could undermine decades of public-health messaging, fire up conspiracy theorists, and alarm mothers-to-be. The research was expected to be so controversial that JAMA Pediatrics included an editor’s note saying the decision to publish it was not easy and that it was subjected to “additional scrutiny.” “It is the only editor’s note I’ve ever written,” Dimitri Christakis, editor in chief of JAMA Pediatrics and a pediatrician, told The Daily Beast. “There was concern on the journal’s editorial team about how this...

The U.S. Marine Corps announced that the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle is officially ready to deploy, one year ahead of schedule. Marine Corps Combat Development Command, Combat Development and Integration said on Monday that the JLTV program had reached "initial operational capability," making the vehicles ready for use worldwide, on Aug. 2. The four-wheeled vehicle, developed with the U.S. Army, will fully replace the Marines' aging fleet of High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles. The new transports offer different variants with multiple mission package configurations, including packages for personnel, heavy guns and close combat weapons. "The warfighting capabilities the JLTV provides...

U.S. tech giants and an array of their trade groups slammed France over its new digital taxes law during a public hearing on Monday, arguing the legislation unfairly targets U.S. technology companies and could hobble their operations. Representatives from Google, Facebook, and Amazon testified before a group of government officials investigating the digital services tax, laying out their arguments to a largely sympathetic panel that referred to the French law as unprecedented. The United States Trade Representative (USTR) launched a probe into France's digital taxes last month, using the same aggressive process that previously resulted in the Trump administration's implementation...