Free Republic

A Pennsylvania mom admitted giving her teen daughter psychedelic mushrooms and marijuana during a “bonding experience,” authorities said. Brandy Lee Betz, 42, was charged with felony child endangerment after she was reported to cops in June regarding her drug use earlier this year with her 14-year-old daughter, according to an affidavit obtained by the Patriot-News. The referral indicated Betz gave the teen “shrooms” and marijuana while in her Middletown home. Dauphin County child welfare officials conducted a parallel probe and Betz confessed to smoking pot with the girl, according to the affidavit.

Although cats have a reputation for being aloof, a new study says they bond with humans much like dogs do. Researchers at Oregon State University discovered that cats — just like dogs and young children — can form secure or insecure bonds with their humans. “Like dogs, cats display social flexibility in regard to their attachments with humans,” Kristyn Vitale, study author and researcher at Oregon State University’s Human-Animal Interaction Lab, said in a statement. “The majority of cats are securely attached to their owner and use them as a source of security in a novel environment.” Vitale and her...

I recently had the privilege of representing residents in eastern Connecticut that were opposed to the construction of the proposed state police gun range immediately adjacent to Pachaug State Forest. I personally thanked Gov. Ned Lamont for keeping his word in opposing this project. In politics, you are only as good as your word. That is why Lamont must also keep his word and not institute tolling on cars in Connecticut. Leaders in Hartford are missing the mark when it comes to tolling. They always seek to find alternate revenue sources through taxes or fees before first examining priorities, spending...

Original source: http://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/health/new-paradigms-in-addiction-therapy-chemical-substances-are-not-the-main-factor/ I'm fairly averse to starting threads. But this is an important issue--and--with the help of my housemate, I'm willing to bother. We would be willing to discuss it with seriously interested folks. Portugal's changed laws and treatment of addiction issues has changed their statistics and the results in individual's lives and the lives of their family members has yielded dramatic success. We can do better, as Christians, conservatives and Americans. From the original source article (same is in referenced article): QUOTE: A true enveloping substance addiction is gritty, and tends to be enabled by a varying degree...

Children who have a poor emotional relationship with their mother are more than twice as likely to become obese, research claims. A study found toddlers who struggle with their mothers are at higher risk of being grossly overweight by the time they are 15. Those who had the worst emotional relationship were almost two-and-half times more likely to be obese at 15 than those with a strong bond. Meanwhile, only 13 per cent who had close bonds in their formative years became obese. U.S. researchers studied nearly 1,000 toddlers and their mothers at play then rated how strong the bond...

In general, low self-esteem and a lack of self-love are the basis for the ideology of liberals. Liberals are those who would use government to reduce the freedoms of some people to provide benefits for others. Liberals argue for fairness and equality for all people, but neither is possible. Other than identical twins all people are genetically different and without exception each has unique life experiences that are interpreted differently. We are necessarily and naturally unequal in a worldly sense. (If "all men are created equal" in a Godly sense nothing more needs to be done to ensure it.) Liberals,...

Late last year, President Obama put a delicate question to the highest-ranking women on his staff at a private White House dinner: Should he be worried about a nagging perception that his administration was a testosterone-fueled boys' club? The dinner led to the formation of an informal group of women at the White House - a women's club of sorts - to help female aides navigate the upper echelons of the administration. The boys' club story line had been around since the days of the Obama presidential campaign, which was run by a tight inner circle of mostly male advisers,...

The domestic cat is a contradiction. No other animal has developed such an intimate relationship with humanity, while at the same time demanding and getting such independent movement and action. The cat manages to remain a tame animal because of the sequence of its upbringing. By living both with other cats (its mother and littermates) and with humans (the family that has adopted it) during its infancy and kittenhood, it becomes attached to and considers that it belongs to both species. It is like a child that grows up in a foreign country and as a consequence becomes bilingual. The...

Why do men need war? It's male bonding Reports by Roger Highfield and Nic Fleming (Filed: 09/09/2006) Men need threats, rivalry and war for them to work together the most effectively, according to a study of the "male warrior effect". The issue of why men start wars has been investigated in a series of experiments by Prof Mark van Vugt of the University of Kent. They reveal that conflict is part of male bonding. "We all know that males are more aggressive than females but with that aggression comes a lot of co-operation," Prof van Vugt said yesterday. While male...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and legislative leaders on Friday were trying to agree on what would be the largest bond issue in California history, pressing to meet a March 10 deadline for placing a proposal on the June ballot. Any agreement between the governor and leaders from both parties requires support from two-thirds majorities in the Assembly and Senate. The governor has vowed to work through the weekend if necessary, even though the secretary of state had set Friday as the deadline to reach an agreement. Senate Minority Leader Dick Ackerman, R-Tustin, said Senate Republicans were ready to vote for a...

Today and over the weekend, high-level nogotiations are taking place among the legislative leadership and the Governor - the focal point of these discussions - infrastructure investment. LOOK CAREFULLY at what comes out of the negotiations. Were the Republican Governor and Republican legislative leaders able to hold the 'line in the sand' against the big-government, spend-a-holic Democratic leaders? Does the plan: 1) HAVE A SIGNIFICANT PAY-AS-YOU-GO COMPONENT FOR FY '07-'08 AND BEYOND?2) HAVE A 6% BORROWING CAP?3) CONTAIN CEQA AND OTHER NEEDED REFORMS?4) LIMIT THE BORROWING TO MORTOR-AND BRICK REAL INFRASTRUCTURE?*From Senator McClintock:5) LIMIT GENERAL OBLIGATION BONDING TO STATE SCHOOL...

Sydney filmmakers, it has emerged this week, are making a documentary about fathers who pretend to breastfeed their new babies. Apparently, the fathers believe that this aids the bonding process. At the same time, a Herald report claims men will soon be able to create babies, without the assistance of any female genetic material. It's great that men want to be women, and women want to be men, but what will it all mean? Here's a list of just some of the ways the world would change if men and women swapped roles: There would be proper paid maternity leave....

HOW MOM TEACHES DAUGHTER TO YELL AT DAD J. Grant Swank, Jr., POB 1984, Windham ME 04062 Pastor, New Hope Church, Windham ME It is very, very subtle — over time, involving complicated life situations, supported by fem bonding, allowing for anti-male emotions, pulling from the baser nature of the female, and so forth. Writing about this subject can be raw and refined. The refined part has to do with psychology and ethics. The raw part has to do with real life — madness, meanness, and basically lack of respect for father / husband. So let’s start with the bottom...