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Abstract: The rollout of booster doses of COVID-19 vaccines to the general population is controversial. The ratio of vaccine risk to benefits likely has swung more towards risk than during the original randomized trials, due to dose-dependent adverse events and to fixation of immune responses on a variant no longer circulating, yet the evidence underpinning mass use of boosters is weaker than was the evidence for the original vaccine rollout. In light of an unsatisfactory risk-evidence situation, aggregate weekly data on excess mortality in New Zealand are used here to study the impacts of rolling out booster doses. Instrumental variables...

Australia's 2021 Census reveals that the percentage of people identifying as Christian has dipped below 50% for the first time, a drop of 17 percentage points over the last 10 years. At the same time, the number of people who describe themselves as "non-religious" has risen.The diversity in the religions Australians identified is increasing, "reflecting continuing changes in our social attitudes and belief systems," the Australian Bureau of Statistics said in a statement.While Christianity remains the most common religion in the Oceania country, with 43.9% identifying as Christian, it's down from 52.1% in 2016 and 61.1% in 2011.The Sydney Morning...

One of the more popular grievances from the contemporary left revolves around the notion that our nation has been subverted by “minority rule.”Here is the pollster Nate Silver:“Despite the various, very serious threats to American democracy, things would *mostly* be fine if the balance of elected power more closely reflected the popular will (e.g. Senate seats proportional to population, no Electoral College, less gerrymandering).”Silver is confusing the inability to coerce others with minoritarianism. It is not a serious threat to American democracy that New Yorkers are unable to dictate Oklahoma’s abortion laws. Nor that Texans can’t compel Rhode Islanders to...

Police in Georgia reportedly are investigating an explosion Wednesday targeting the Georgia Guidestones monument, which the state says is known as "America's Stonehenge." Images circulating on social media purportedly show significant damage to the granite tourist attraction in northeastern Elbert County. The Elbert County Sheriff's Office is among the law enforcement agencies investigating and a bomb squad has been called to the scene, according to Fox5 Atlanta. "Known as America's Stonehenge, this 19-foot-high monument displays a 10-part message espousing the conservation of mankind and future generations in 12 languages," according to a description on the state of Georgia’s tourism website....

This Fourth of July, watching people fight over what the Constitution means, I ask people, if you could change the Constitution, what would you change?"The forefathers knew what they were doing," said one woman.But the Constitution originally accepted slavery. It's good that we can amend it.So what should we change?"Add a balanced budget amendment," suggests Glenn Beck.David Boaz of the Cato Institute recommends 18-year terms for the Supreme Court. "Maybe confirmation fights would be less bitter and partisan."Others suggest term limits for Congress. Stossel TV's Mike Ricci takes the idea further. "If your father, mother, siblings, uncle, cousins were elected...

Joe Biden’s Department of Justice is challenging a new Arizona law that, among other restrictions, requires residents to prove citizenship to vote in presidential elections. Arizona was one of several battleground states plagued by irregularities in the 2020 election. The new law, HB 2492, was signed into law in March when the legislature sought to improve election integrity after a forensic audit of the 2020 presidential election vote in Maricopa County found 53,214 ballots impacted by irregularities of medium, high, and critical severity last September — well above Joe Biden’s state-certified margin of victory.The Biden administration insists that election integrity...

GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. — A Colorado funeral home operator accused of illegally selling body parts and giving clients fake ashes has pleaded guilty to mail fraud in federal court. The Daily Sentinel reports that Megan Hess faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison after entering the plea Tuesday in Grand Junction. Other charges against Hess will be dropped under a plea agreement, the Sentinel said. Hess, 45, and her mother, Shirley Koch, operated the Sunset Mesa Funeral Home in Montrose. They were arrested in 2020 and charged with six counts of mail fraud and three counts of illegal...

In April 2014, four naval aviators narrowly escaped disaster. Just as they entered highly controlled airspace for a training exercise, their two F/A-18F fighter jets nearly collided with an unidentified flying object (UFO). To the frustration of dozens of their fellow aviators, such a near-catastrophe was inevitable. For months before and after the incident, aircrews flying in “exclusive use” training areas off the U.S. East Coast frequently observed unknown objects exhibiting highly anomalous flight characteristics. *snip* For fighter pilots armed with an array of advanced sensors, the confusion and bewilderment reflected in the reports is striking. *snip* According to Graves,...

SEATTLE, WA -- Amazon employee Emily Thomas began to wonder this morning if the company offering to pay to kill her child really had her best interest in mind. "I just don't know if murdering kids to make female employees more productive is really what's best for women," said Mrs. Thomas. "Maybe I'd believe them more if they at least let us have bathroom breaks. But my boss always says, 'No potty break unless it's for an abortion!'" After the Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe v. Wade, several major corporations announced large cash prizes for women who would still travel...

Every so often a problem child does something wrong just to get punished. Maybe it’s testing the limits to see where the boundaries are. But in the case of New York State, it appears to be much more malignant. Space prohibits an exhaustive review, but it’s quite certain that New York’s new gun law is an in-your-face, single-finger salute to the Supreme Court in response to the Bruen decision. It’s likely to get all the respect a parent should give to that misbehaving offspring.SCOTUS said that NY was not allowed to demand “good cause” to get a permit. So, NY...

FOURTEENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME MATTHEW 10:1–7 Friends, in today’s Gospel, Jesus commissions the twelve Apostles. Perhaps we can see here a fulfillment of his prophetic invitation to the first disciples: “Come after me and I will make you fishers of men.” “Come after me.” This is a Hebraicism that indicates discipleship. Jesus is not offering a doctrine, a theology, or a set of beliefs. He is offering himself. He’s saying, “Walk in my path; enter into the world that I have opened up.” “And I will make you fishers of men.” This is one of the best lines in...

The Jewish Agency denied a media report claiming it had been ordered to cease its work in Russia and said that it is still fully operational there. The Jerusalem Post reported on Monday that the Russian government ordered the Jewish Agency to immediately cease its operations in the country, claiming that the agency has been illegally collecting information on Russian citizens and transferring the data in violation of the law. The organization release a statement shortly afterwards saying that “no instruction has been received from the Russian government to cease operations by the Jewish Agency.” The Jewish Agency is a...

A top Russian official warned the US Wednesday that it could face the “wrath of God” if it pursues efforts to help establish an international tribunal to investigate Russia’s action in Ukraine. Dmitry Medvedev, the deputy secretary of Russia’s Security Council chaired by President Vladimir Putin, denounced the US for what he described as its efforts to “spread chaos and destruction across the world for the sake of ‘true democracy.’” “The entire US history since the times of subjugation of the native Indian population represents a series of bloody wars,” Medvedev charged in a long diatribe on his Telegram channel,...

Joe Biden is busy blaming gas station owners for the soaring prices of filling up at the pump.Why, those dirty birds!It's his latest scheme to deflect blame for the nasty price shocks he's brought on us, with gas going for about $5 a gallon nationwide, and $6-something in tax-happy, save-the-planet California.He's also blamed Putin, Big Oil producers, oil refineries, Republicans, and anyone but himself when it's obvious enough that the root of the problem is his crush-the-oil industry policies that he launched on day one in the name of "going green." Combine it with his monster rounds of federal money-printing...

The past several weeks of farcical hearings initiated by the United States House Select Committee on the January 6 attack have displayed the lengths to which the American political left will go to in their efforts to derail the prospects of a second Trump administration. The hearings began with a June 9 televised hearing on prime-time TV that was carried by virtually every major network in the United States. Holding them when television viewership is at its highest for the day was obviously no accident, as an audience of at least 20 million Americans tuned in to watch, according to...

FILE - This 2003 electron microscope image made available by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows mature, oval-shaped monkeypox virions, left, and spherical immature virions, right, obtained from a sample of human skin associated with the 2003 prairie dog outbreak. U.S. health officials are expanding the group of people recommended to get vaccinated against the monkeypox virus. They also say they are providing more monkeypox vaccine, working to expand testing, and taking other steps to try to get ahead of the outbreak. (Cynthia S. Goldsmith, Russell Regner/CDC via AP, file) The number of confirmed monkeypox cases in New...

Cabinet ministers - including the new chancellor Nadhim Zahawi - have sent the chief whip to Number 10 to tell Boris Johnson to resign, Sky News understands. The delegation of senior politicians, which also includes Transport Secretary Grant Shapps and Welsh Secretary Simon Hart, have told Chris Heaton-Harris than the PM's position is untenable and they want him to deliver the news. Sky's political editor Beth Rigby has been told the chief whip is in the building, while deputy political editor Sam Coates understands he will deliver the "final ultimatum" to Mr Johnson, saying "you go or we do".

What’s unusual about this molecule is that the ion’s electric field distorts the atom in such a way that it causes the dipole’s orientation to flip at a particular distance. At shorter distances, the atom and the ion repel, while at larger distances, they attract. The distance at which this dipole flip occurs determines the bond length of the molecule. To make this molecule, the researchers prepared a cloud of rubidium-87 atoms at a temperature of just 20µK, since higher temperatures would risk the thermal energy of the atoms and ions overcoming the weak strength of the bond. The team...

"We've got to take this stuff seriously, as seriously as you are because you have been forced to take this seriously," Harris said to the press and Highland Park residents.

Former Lehigh County congressman Charles Dent and former Bucks County congressman Jim Greenwood, both Republicans, have endorsed Democratic state Attorney General Josh Shapiro in his campaign for governor over Republican nominee Doug Mastriano. “I’ve been a Republican my entire life, and I have always supported Pennsylvania’s Republican Governors – but in this election, I am proud to endorse Josh Shapiro,” Dent said in a statement released by Shapiro’s campaign. Josh has integrity and always works to bring people together. We may not always agree on every policy position, but that is to be expected. His focus on improving our economy,...