Free Republic

June 20, 2002 A Scholar Recants on His 'Shakespeare' Discovery By WILLIAM S. NIEDERKORN n 1995 Donald Foster, a professor of English at Vassar College, made a startling case for Shakespeare's being the author of an obscure 578-line poem called "A Funeral Elegy." After a front-page article about his methods of computer analysis in The New York Times — and after his reputation was further burnished by unmasking Joe Klein as the author of "Primary Colors" — the poem was added to three major editions of Shakespeare's works. Now, in a stunning development that has set the world of Shakespeare...

I'm feeling bad for Jeb Bush. I've never been a supporter of a third Bush presidency-having endured the highs and lows of the second up close-but I can't help but think about this coming Easter or Thanksgiving, or the next event when the whole Bush family is gathered around in one place. The Bushes may come across as kindly, low-key aristocrats. But have no doubt: They are ruthless competitors. When I worked for President George W. Bush, he was racing Karl Rove to see who could read the most books in a calendar year. His father used to challenge people...

Tom Cruise has never been shy about expressing his beliefs, and in a recent deposition, the actor said he believed acting was as hard as fighting a war. Cruise sat with lawyers to be deposed for his case against Bauer Publishing for stories two of its publications printed following his divorce from Katie Holmes, articles that stated he had "abandoned" his daughter Suri. During the deposition, a lawyer questioned Cruise about remarks his camp had made equating his work and inability to see daughter Suri to fighting in Afghanistan. "That's what it feels like. And certainly on this last movie,...

This is in some respects a political show, and we are in the throes of hands-down the most insane presidential race in history. What do you make of it, and more specifically, of the rise of Donald Trump? It seems to me that, given the relentless 24-hour news cycle, it was only a matter of time before we had a media-savvy reality star ascend to this perch. Man, I don't know! Trump leaves me speechless. When he came down that escalator to announce that he was going to run for president, I thought to myself that it was a smart...

"This is football, not Hollywood, and I thought it was really outrageous that she used it as a platform to attack police officers who are the people who protect her and protect us, and keep us alive," he said. "And what we should be doing in the African-American community, and all communities, is build up respect for police officers. And focus on the fact that when something does go wrong, okay. We'll work on that. But the vast majority of police officers risk their lives to keep us safe."

And why she should listen to Killer Mike. At the the Iowa Democratic forum on Monday night, Hillary Clinton took one of the easiest questions lobbed her way -- Who is your favorite president? -- and blasted it right into the back of her own goal. She did fine with the first part, naming Abraham Lincoln, but then dipped into the history of Reconstruction, bemoaning the vengeful way in which the North targeted the South after Lincoln's assassination. You know, he was willing to reconcile and forgive. And I don't know what our country might have been like had he...

If a liberal farmer deliberately puts a fox in his hen house in order to enforce farmyard diversity and bring about a multinatural utopia, who is guilty of killing the hens, the farmer or the fox? In the wake of the Islamic murders in Paris should we not be asking the question of just who are the murderers here, the Muslims for carrying out the commands of their prophet or the Western politicians who invited these medieval barbarians into our liberal democracies?

To Pay For Years Of ‘Institutional Racism’ An Asian woman believes that she has suffered from “institutional racism” and as such, she feels that she shouldn’t bear the financial burden of therapy, but that white people should pay for it. An Asian woman has asked white people to pay for her therapy because she claims living with them makes her ill. Rinna Rem, from Portland, Oregon, says the stress of being Thai-Cambodian in a predominantly white city means she has to spend $100 a month on treatment. After suffering ‘institutional racism’ for most of her life, she decided to launch...

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2 It seems Jennifer Lawrence’s thoughts on Donald Trump echo Katniss Everdeen’s feelings toward President Snow. For the uninitiated, that means she’s not a fan. During a lively conversation with the three leads of the final installment of The Hunger Games franchise, Mockingjay — Part 2, the Republican presidential candidate became the topic of conversation. “If Donald Trump becomes president, that will be the end of the world,” says Lawrence. Her co-star Liam Hemsworth feels the same: “I’ll back you up on that,” he adds. Josh Hutcherson, the third lead in the massive franchise,...

Suddenly, space is getting interesting again. After decades of going boldly nowhere in low Earth orbit, Man, or rather his robotic emissaries, have made some startling discoveries in our Solar System. Cold, distant Pluto is – who would have thought it? – turning out to be one of the most interesting planets (yes, it is a planet) in the Solar System. Before the New Horizons probe turned up earlier this month, astronomers assumed it would be a dull, grey cratered rock. [SNIP] If we find life of any kind out there – whether it be Martian microbes (we have several...

From the Washington Post, presidential announcement speech, June 16, 2015: "When Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best. They're not sending you. They're not sending you. They're sending people that have lots of problems, and they're bringing those problems with us. They're bringing drugs, They're rapists. And some, I assume, are good people." One of the first things that I look for when perusing through comments is to look for any hard data or empirical evidence that can either scuttle or bolster the contention that was made and is now being analyzed. While the southern border of the...

".....Harf pronounced herself and her team “perplexed” at the concern. “There are some real issues, serious ones that we have to resolve in these talks,” Harf responded yesterday, “but this just isn’t one of them.”

As Secretary of State John Kerry and his P5+1 counterparts sought to finalize the political outlines of a comprehensive agreement on Iran’s nuclear program, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Sunday stood alongside the talks’ most vocal critic, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, and reiterated that Congress must approve any deal.

"I think a bright line rule that sort of spells out the principles that we believe in, I think the Bill of Rights is a good thing," said Tumblr founder and CEO David Karp.

It is only a couple of weeks into the new year but it looks like we already have a strong contender for the dopiest article of the year, emphasis on "dope" as we shall see. A bizarre solution to reducing campus rapes comes to us by way of Annie Lowery of New York magazine. Her solution is to raise taxes on beer while also encouraging people to smoke more marijuana. After acknowledging that the Rolling Stone story about a drunken fraternity rape case was just a fairy tale, Lowery takes a deep plunge into the world of utterly stupid:

A radio station that asked listeners to vote on whether two turkeys should be killed has been criticised by animal lovers - including Queen guitarist Dr Brian May. And the RSPCA has urged Jack FM to rethink the online vote on whether the turkeys should be cooked or kept alive. The RSPCA said it opposed any practice with the "potential to cause animals pain... in the name of entertainment". Currently, 62% of people have voted to save the turkeys, named Sage and Onion. The Oxfordshire station said if listeners voted to kill the pair in the "cook it or keep...

NASA's Stardust spacecraft returned new images of a comet showing a scar resulting from the 2005 Deep Impact mission. The images also showed the comet has a fragile and weak nucleus. The spacecraft made its closest approach to comet Tempel 1 on Monday, Feb. 14, at 8:40 p.m. PST (11:40 p.m. EST) at a distance of approximately 178 kilometers (111 miles). Stardust took 72 high-resolution images of the comet. It also accumulated 468 kilobytes of data about the dust in its coma, the cloud that is a comet's atmosphere. The craft is on its second mission of exploration called Stardust-NExT,...

LONDON - Brian May, rock star and astrophysicist, has been appointed chancellor of Liverpool John Moores University. May will be installed as the university's figurehead leader early next year, it was announced Monday. The 60-year-old Queen guitarist said the appointment was "a great honor and a great new challenge." He is an honorary fellow of Liverpool John Moores University, which has a well-known astrophysics research institute. "Brian May is an intensely talented individual who achieved global success with Queen," said the university's vice chancellor, Michael Brown, in a statement. "In this age of celebrity culture, it is rare to find...

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- Imagine last year's tsunami, last month's earthquake in Pakistan, and Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma all rolled into one -- and then some. If nations can't handle those calamities, what's going to happen when an asteroid collides with Earth? In 30 years, there is a 1-in-5,500 chance that a smallish asteroid will land a bull's eye on our planet. At 360 yards wide, it could take out New York City and much of the surrounding area. Fortunately, experts believe further observations of the asteroid, 99942 Apophis, will almost certainly rule out an impact in 2036. Nevertheless,...

**Fri 08 Jul 05** THE BOMBINGS IN LONDON Q: What is the definition of an idiot ? A: Someone who keeps on doing the same thing, and expects a different result. I sense there is a mood of quiet resolve among the people I speak to. We are feeling that we must not go any further down the road of escalation .... this is old stuff, but I personally feel that in the wake of 9/11 an opportunity was missed .... to seek understanding rather than revenge. The Nelson Mandela way. I do not subscribe to this "War on Terrorism"...