Free Republic

Smallpox: The Triumph over the Most Terrible of the Ministers of Death Smallpox has been one of humankind's greatest scourges since time immemorial. Even illnesses as terrible as the plague, cholera, and yellow fever have not had such a universal and persistent impact. Smallpox is believed to have appeared at the time of the first agricultural settlements in northeastern Africa, around 10 000 BC (2). It probably spread from Africa to India by means of Egyptian merchants in the last millennium BC (3). The earliest evidence of skin lesions resembling those of smallpox is found on the faces of mummies...

While anti-border wall activists see a coming eco-apocalypse, some border-wall proponents already see one caused by unchecked illegal immigration. The problems linked to illegal immigration have had much attention lately: the criminals and potential terrorists entering without permission, the young children needing care and workers taking jobs that Americans, in fact, would do. Then there’s the burden on taxpayers for all the social services as well as the possibility that lax state laws let them vote. Now a new one has begun getting attention: the millions of pounds of garbage left by those traveling through southwest America’s deserts illegally. “Perhaps...