Free Republic

As has been posted here at RFNJ, the Parting Shot, putting the punctuation at the end of the sentence, our Russians friends this afternoon put their ICMB sky rockets in flight. In a related story, the USS George HW Bush put into port in Piraeus, Greece, leaving her sailors the opportunity to explore the neighboring cities including Athens, as well as take part in community relations events. "I am really excited to visit the Acropolis," said Aviation Ordnanceman 1st Class Chase Tallent, a member of VFA-31 aboard George H.W. Bush. "I also can't wait to learn about all the history."...

Maybe I am a little too focused on the Ukraine for a guy from New Jersey, probably because I partly concentrated on Russia in my study of economic history thirty some years ago. But this whole thing is just becoming hilarious. As the retrograde United States publicly draws down its military strength, we are reduced to the media propagandists telling the low information voters what is happening. While trying the catch the latest on on the Real Housewives of New Jersey, it wafts into our consciousness that President Obama on Friday issued a harsh warning against any further military action....

As I sat to write this post, I thought about Thanksgivings past. My childhood Thanksgivings in the 1960's included aunts uncles and cousins. There was turkey, stuffing and arguments. In my house, where I tried to do things differently, we had turkey, stuffing and tense discussions. So for me today, Thanksgiving makes me think of: It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was...

Slate and the Daily Beast have put out stories today calling the Knock Out Game a "right wing media myth." It seems the talking points are out on what is an old story here at RFNJ, which has become legitimate because the the big dogs have responded. The MSM deals only now with this longstanding embarrassment, by employing a technique from an old but very effective playbook. All you need to do is substitute the name of the group you have targeted as the source of the problem, and repeat this often: "It was difficult for a time to persuade...

Low altitude high g turns. Very unusual.

The Obama campaign took, "deep dives into exactly where each demographic and regional group was trending at any given moment." I said all the way back in November that such data, "must have been harvested from far deeper resources than an amalgam of voting lists and donor emails." I also put a little thought to how information incorporated into a map can show how a political message propagates, which is as good as gold for a political campaign. To me, it was obvious that the questions that the IRS required applicants to answer were drafted by a lawyer for...

I was in the office till about 9 last night, listening carefully to what some ordinary people were saying. As I was driving near to home, I was still looking closely at how people people behave in certain situations and listening carefully to what they say. So I just wanted to relate a little of what I saw and heard of the national discussion about race, as it took place among the those that are our future. I went down Springwood Ave. in Asbury Park, which up until the 1960's had jazz clubs, grocery stores, restaurants and parades. The...

George Zimmerman, because he's never been convicted of a crime, could have his gun back if he wants it. He should immediately put it up for auction. I know I'd pay several times the retail price of the gun to own "the gun that shot Trayvon Martin". And the money would surely go to a good cause. The George Zimmerman "victim of the race baiters" retirement fund. Do it George. Get your gun back, put together a package to ensure provenance, and put it up for sale. Then tell me where to bid. ##########UPDATE########## It turns out, I'll have to...

Today seems to be a day where Jay Sekulow is hitting the news. And his story is getting air at NBC, where Lisa Meyers says "two IRS employees in the Cincinnati office made statements to NBC News that call into question parts of the official explanation Americans have heard from the IRS so far." Progress comes sometimes quickly and sometimes slowly. NBC is still running off the template that conflict sells news. Be that as it is, the interesting part here is that this story has found a way back into the main stream news cycle, seemingly without an...

In his speech a few minutes ago, our President said You look out over the horizon, you can count on the fact that you won’t be alone. The President did not look 5 blocks to the south. There, just past the Casino, lies Ocean Grove, with a still shattered boardwalk. FEMA will not provide funds to restore it, unlike for every town with a boardwalk to the north and south, will not fix. Why? Because the religious Camp Meeting Association owns all of the land within Ocean Grove. You can own your house, with a 99 year lease of...

Here is a little food for thought for those who think collections of data in the hands of public officials is a benign matter. Here is a "hate map," which shows the point of origin of tweets that contain "hate speech." I have zoomed in to a few locations, and I am please to report that people in NJ are not very hateful. Where I live it's not hateful at all. What a relief! This map is a project is the work of Monica Stephens, assistant professor of geography at Humboldt State University in Arcata, Calif. She had the...

In the Google Purge Pt. 3, I wondered whether a search algorithm uncovered emails that led to the downfall of Kip Ward. The story of his demotion hit the news in November of 2012. This followed when we learned about 20,000 emails between Jill Kelley and Marine Gen. John R. Allen. Before that David Patraeus was taken down in what I argued was a purge of the administration moderates. I didn't have any idea why this was happening, but I could see that something was happening. So I just called attention to the role Google may have played in...

Sometimes I look at what I have written and worry a little bit. I look at all of this stuff I posted about the Google Purge of David Petraeus and Kip Ward, and how the use of information stifled voices of dissent. Sometimes I think I might come off as pretty paranoid. Then I see a little something like this:The real threat is that Google, or perhaps just a few people within the leadership of Google, may be quietly operating as a private intelligence agency for the left. The information analysts and behavioral scientists are busy looking for better ways...

Now, let’s fast forward to the present. As a society, we expect rapid and massive technical innovation in the creation of physical objects. We measure the speed of directional changes in the allocation of resources for such innovations in milliseconds, rather than years. Our “Sharpes” Shooters no longer have a range of 200 yards. A trigger pulled in Washington can hit a target in Islamabad. I keep coming back to the idea that we, as a society have reached a tipping point, but I feel at a total loss as I try to imagine where it may lead. With...

Economic history, my collegiate academic fascination, focuses upon the adaptation of societal institutions to technical innovations. The American legal history of the right to keep and bear arms can be traced back to the deposition of King James II, who prevented Protestants from owning firearms. The English constitutional right that “Protestants may have Arms for their Defence suitable to their Conditions and as allowed by Law” then served as the model for the American Bill of Rights. Here in the States, however, firearms were not stored in a castle “keep” with villiens, as part of their required service, bearing...

I love the intro to these "news" reports - "after leading the agency’s efforts to clamp down on public corruption and financial fraud at the nation’s largest banks, according to several people familiar with the matter." Those big banks are just too big and too much for a dedicated public servant who is tough on crime. A couple of posts here last summer asked about executive privilege once the Obama administration asserted it in Fast & Furious. It seemed clear to me then that the administration strategy would be to use the litigation process to delay, so that Fast...

In the debate around gun rights, how much can you say about your intentions without violating the law with your speech? As I've said almost continually for years... "Liberals are cowards." They will happily knuckle under to anyone who threatens to use force to support their political position. That's why they've maintained a policy of preemptive surrender in all international conflict, and will happily bully non violent Christians domestically while they cower in fear of violence from a tiny Muslim minority. Which is what makes this piece from Charles Blow so interesting. He's basically talking about the 'extreme language' of...

We have a lot of stupid people the United States governments. ItÂ’s not their fault. The creators of our Constitution designed a system that should rarely entangle itself in highly profitable transactions that involve innovative products or strategies. As a result, our economy historically bids the most driven and intelligent away from government jobs. Government, then, finds a governing formula that works, and sticks to it, often no matter what. China, as every American senses, differs. There, the government bears no shame in announcing that it is the sole source of all beneficial economic activity. In this way, the...

All you need to know as an American politician or bureaucrat is that Thorium is bad, because it is radioactive. Thorium was discovered in 1828 by the Norwegians who named it after the God of Thunder. At one time, annual U.S production of brightly glowing thorium mantles in gas lamps stood at 40 million units. But as we in the U.S. matured from a manufacturing powerhouse, we learned that nearly all naturally occurring thorium exists as thorium-232, which undergoes alpha decay with a half-life of about 14.05 billion years. Alpha decay consists of two neutrons and two protons, basically...

The Oak Ridge National Laboratory ran a Molten Salt Reactor for over 22,000 hours in the late 60's and early 70's. It used molten thorium fluoride salts as fuel, which in its liquid state is a clear liquid. Thorium is fertile, not fissile, so the Oak Ridge reactor achieved criticality with the introduction of U-239 and later U-233 as a source of neutron radiation. A Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor (LFTR) operates at atmospheric pressure, maintaining a peak temperature of 1,300 degrees F. A LFTR will not go kerpow like Fukushima Daiichi because you do not need power to cool...