Free Republic

despite what you may have heard, the frequency of mass shootings hasn’t changed much over recent decades. In fact, such shootings are rare and account for a tiny fraction of overall gun deaths in America. About 33,000 people are fatally shot in the U.S. each year. About two-thirds of these deaths are suicides. Another third of these are homicides, which have been steadily declining for decades. In 2015, some 13,286 people were killed in the U.S. by firearms in non-suicide related deaths. In 1993, that figure was 18,253. In most of the years in between, part of a decades-long trend...

Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA) suggests the odds of passing gun control when the Senate reconvenes in September are better than ever. Toomey is specifically referencing the gun control bill he and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) first pushed after the December 14, 2012, Sandy Hook Elementary School attack; a bill which they have now revived as part of their push for universal background checks. CBS News reports that Toomey has been talking with White House about he and Manchin’s bill, and Politico quotes Toomey saying the chances of passage now are “better than they have ever looked at any time.”

When shots rang out last year at a high school in Parkland, Florida, leaving 17 people dead, President Donald Trump quickly turned his thoughts to creating more mental institutions. When back-to-back mass shootings in Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso, Texas, jolted the nation earlier this month, Trump again spoke of "building new facilities" for the mentally ill as a way to reduce mass shootings. "We don't have those institutions anymore and people can't get proper care," Trump lamented at a New Hampshire campaign rally not long after the latest shootings. Now, in response to Trump's concerns, White House staff members...

Joe Biden might have set a personal record last week for the most gaffetastic gaffe of his storied, fact-mangling career. According to the Washington Post, in describing the awarding of a medal to a military member: "In the space of three minutes, Biden got the time period, the location, the heroic act, the type of medal, the military branch and the rank of the recipient wrong, as well as his own role in the ceremony." Nice work, Joe! So, will the Democrat primary electorate hold against Biden his history of mangling the truth? A CNN panel this morning fretted that...

The difficulty of accurately measuring average temperatures around the globe and across the United States has helped fuel the conflicting claims regarding climate change. Purveyors of the belief that mankind is catastrophically impacting the global climate insist it's getting warmer year by year. But a new, improved system to assess surface temperatures established in 2005 by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA, indicates otherwise. In fact, the U.S. Climate Reference Network -- comprised of 114 pristinely maintained temperature stations spaced relatively uniformly across the lower 48 states -- finds there has been no warming for the past 14 years...

There's no such thing as a single "gay gene" that drives a person's sexual behavior, concludes the largest genetic study ever conducted on the issue. Instead, a person's attraction to those of the same sex is shaped by a complex mix of genetic and environmental influences, similar to what's seen in most other human traits, researchers report. "This is a natural and normal part of variation in our species," said researcher Ben Neale, director of genetics with the Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. "That should also support the position that we shouldn't...

African migrants protest denial of passage through Mexico to get to the United States AUG 30, 2019 12:00 PM BY CHRISTINE DOUGLASS-WILLIAMS Those who have advocated for open-door immigration have created a free-for-all, leaving Western nations under constant threat. “Hundreds of African migrants are finding themselves trapped in Mexico’s southern border region after new immigration rules no longer allow them safe passage to the U.S. The rule changes now say they must naturalize in Mexico or exit through its southern border.” Many of the migrants are downright angry, as globalists have fed them the expectation that it is their right...

Elizabeth Smart is "grateful" for her brutal kidnapping as a 14-year-old, the victims' rights advocate revealed in a lengthy Instagram post. Now 31, Smart reflected on her nine-month ordeal at the hands of Brian David Mitchell and Wanda Barzee nearly two decades ago. "I never thought I would say that I'm grateful for what happened to me as a 14 year old girl but I can honestly say that I'm not sorry it happened to me because of what it has allowed me to do, the people I've been able to meet, and the cause that has become and driven...

Is there a "gay gene"? Major new study says no By Dennis Thompson August 29, 2019 / 8:33 PM / HealthDay There's no such thing as a single "gay gene" that drives a person's sexual behavior, concludes the largest genetic study ever conducted on the issue. Instead, a person's attraction to those of the same sex is shaped by a complex mix of genetic and environmental influences, similar to what's seen in most other human traits, researchers report. "This is a natural and normal part of variation in our species," said researcher Ben Neale, director of genetics with the Stanley...

Posted on August 29, 2019 by Msgr. Charles Pope St. John the Baptist, Martyr for the Sanctity of Marriage The Memorial of the Passion of St. John the Baptist celebrated on Thursday speaks to a critical issue in our times. Herod both resisted and violated his own conscience; he feared the opinion of the crowd more than that of God, ordering the hideous and unjust murder of John the Baptist. Unfortunately, such acts are commonly committed by some leaders and others who compromise with evil in order to survive and flourish in an evil world. The reason for John’s...

he money is going to pensions and health care.” The comments underscore the persistent fiscal pressure on New Jersey, a high-tax state contending with massive debts to employee pension funds after years of failing to set aside enough to cover the $212 billion of benefits that have been promised.

Back when the world was young, I was taught that four visionaries’ theories shaped modernity: Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud and Albert Einstein. Of them, only Einstein’s could be subjected to scientific scrutiny. The rest remained hypotheses, resistant to such standard scientific tests as falsifiability, replicability and predictability, but so beautiful in their comprehensiveness that the intelligentsia accepted them for what they were not: settled science. Time has proven unkind to Freud’s and Marx’s theories, but very kind to Darwinism. Why? Shhh. If you dare to ask, you invite ridicule. Because the minute one expresses doubt about Darwin’s basic...

If Juniper Eastwood is feeling particularly motivated on a training day, she’s up at 6 a.m. She eats a banana and plugs in a podcast before taking off on an 11- to 12-mile run. She should stretch, but is often short on time. After a shower and getting dressed, she heads to work as a camp counselor for a youth empowerment program. Eastwood’s routine is similar to that of other college athletes practicing in the offseason. She has to prepare for grueling cross-country practices while balancing work or school. The difference between Eastwood and her teammates on the University of Montana’s cross-country team is the...

Trump supporters say they’re “tired of being called racists.” At a recent rally in Cincinnati, the Atlantic reported, white attendees defended themselves against the charge by citing the “evidence”: They had donated money to help black foster children; they deeply loved their black and mixed-race grandchildren. Shortly after rejecting the “racist” label, however, these same rallygoers made racist remarks to the journalist who interviewed them. Regarding Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), who came to the United States as a Somali refugee, one woman offered: “I don’t want her stinkin’ Muslim crap in my country.” Making racist remarks while claiming not to...

President Trump’s statement portrays loyalty to the Jewish homeland as positive and consistent with devotion to America US President Donald Trump never criticized Jews for “dual loyalty.” The president did the opposite: He urged greater Jewish loyalty to Israel. Moreover, the president’s statement urging greater loyalty to Israel and the Jewish people was certainly not antisemitic. Rather, it was the opposite of antisemitic; it was philosemitic. Antisemites depict loyalty to Israel as a negative, and as inconsistent with American interests. By contrast, the president upheld loyalty and caring about Israel as a positive good. The president’s detractors also ignored the...

Former Canadian Prime Minister Kim Campbell said she is hoping for a bull’s-eye hit by Hurricane Dorian on Mar-a-Lago, President Trump’s prized Florida resort and so-called Winter White House. “I’m rooting for a direct hit on Mar a Lago!” Campbell, who served as the 19th Canadian prime minister for less than five months in 1993, tweeted on Thursday.

From pick-up games to livestreamed tournaments, China loves basketball in every shape and form. Pass by a public sports complex on any given day and you’re likely to find row upon row of courts at full capacity. Basketball as entertainment is just as, if not more so, prevalent — almost half a billion people watched the NBA’s most recent season through Tencent, the entertainment and tech giant that last month extended its exclusive digital partnership with the NBA for another five years.As China gears up to host the 2019 FIBA Basketball World Cup from August 31, here’s a look...

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Democrats “have to stir up fear, tears, [and] terror” by “saying that President Trump is a racist” because “they don’t have any substantial platform issues,” said Dr. Alveda King, director of Priests for Life’s Civil Rights for the Unborn project and the niece of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., in a Wednesday interview on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Tonight with hosts Rebecca Mansour and Joel Pollak. Dr. Alveda King said, “African-American men really turned out for [Donald Trump]. That’s because they were listening, and still are, when he says, ‘We’re going to bring the jobs back. We’re going to get people...

At Pizza Heaven in Upper Darby, the after school rush after only one full day of school has become unbearable. The kids, they say, from Upper Darby High School forced them to close early. Corinne Gountis, of Pizza Heaven said, “It starts off with a group of 10, then 30, and then they’re jumping on tables.” They say so many kids came in on Wednesday, acting up, they requested police outside their shop Thursday. […] Upper Darby Police Superintendent Michael Chitwood says they have to keep the kids safe. But it’s coming at the expense of the safety of the...