Free Republic

The Stem Cell Cover-Up Posted May 24, 2004 By Michael Fumento Activists such as Christopher Reeve have it backward when they say that restrictions on funding for embryonic stem-cell research will prevent him from walking again. Stem-cell research constitutes one of the most exciting areas in medical science. It promises to prevent, ameliorate and cure diseases for which there are now few if any treatments. Far easier is listing what stem cells don't have the potential to do, but here are a few of the wonders in progress: More than 30 anticancer uses for stem cells have been tested on...

Why is HIV So Prevalent in Africa? By Michael Fumento Tech Central Station, April 15, 2005 Copyright 2005 Tech Central Station Massive airdrops of condoms won't stop African AIDS.   Ninety-nine percent of AIDS and HIV cases in Africa come from sexual transmission, and virtually all is heterosexual. So says the World Health Organization, with other agencies toeing the line. Some massive condom airdrops accompanied by a persuasive propaganda campaign would practically make the epidemic vanish overnight. Or would it? A determined renegade group of three scientists has fought for years – with little success – to get out...

Beginning of the End for Embryonic Stem Cell Research? By Michael Fumento Tech Central Station, February 11, 2005Copyright 2005 Tech Central Station Supporters of expanded federal funding for embryonic stem cell research were disappointed by President Bush's State of the Union Address, which indicated no softening of restrictions. Instead, he said he’d work to “ensure that human embryos are not created for experimentation.” But those who truly believe ESC research will bring medical breakthroughs have naught to fear. For there’s a far more promising approach, likelier to produce more benefits and much sooner.We're being flooded with exciting new developments from...

BRING BACK DDT  By Michelle Malkin   ·   January 08, 2005 11:02 AM  Bravo for New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof, who calls today for DDT to be sprayed in malaria-ravaged countries. Here's the intro: If the U.S. wants to help people in tsunami-hit countries like Sri Lanka and Indonesia - not to mention other poor countries in Africa - there's one step that would cost us nothing and would save hundreds of thousands of lives. It would be to allow DDT in malaria-ravaged countries.I'm thrilled that we're pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into the relief effort, but the...

Among the magazines even die-hard right-wingers should occasionally read are the neo-liberal publications The New Republic and The Washington Monthly. They often contain thoughtful articles with stimulating, fresh thinking (including material by decidedly non-neolib me). Alas, that makes it all the worse when they publish something moldier than a slab of Roquefort cheese — as they did with their combined attack on adult stem cells (ASCs). Unlike the official Democratic-party line (as expressed in Ron Reagan's convention speech and Kerry's non-response to a question in the second presidential debate), these magazines do not pretend that ASCs don't even exist....

In 1914, the U.S. Bureau of Mines predicted American oil reserves would last merely a decade. In both 1939 and 1951, the Interior Department estimated oil supply at only 13 years. "We could use up all of the proven reserves of oil in the entire world by the end of the next decade," declared Pres. Jimmy Carter gloomily in 1977. In fact, the earliest claim that we were running out of oil dates back to 1855 – four years before the first well was drilled! Still, with gasoline oil prices seemingly rocketing past the moon and towards Mars, and newly-published...

The Neolib Attack on Adult Stem Cells By Michael Fumento  November 11, 2004 The only beneficiaries of ESC therapy to date have been these guys, and precious few at that.   Among the magazines even die-hard right-wingers should sometimes read are the neo-liberal ones The New Republic and the Washington Monthly. They often contain thoughtful articles with stimulating fresh thinking. Alas that makes it all the worse when they publish something moldier than a slab of Roquefort cheese. So it is with their current combined attack on adult stem cell research, designed to support the alternative of embryonic stem cells....

October 06, 2003, 8:49 a.m.“Saddam We Love You!”What Germans are being told about the Iraq conflict. By Michael Fumento Anybody who's been to Iraq lately knows that the gloom and despair in our major newspapers concerning the conflict is low-grade liverwurst. Yet as I recently discovered when I picked up a copy of the Financial Times Deutschland on a trip, our papers look like Pentagon propaganda compared to what the Germans are reading. Such reporting may go a long way towards explaining European opposition to our Iraqi efforts.While the entire first page of the "Agenda" section was devoted to...

In their quest to "queer" America, radical homosexual activists in the media destroy lives, as they manipulate the principle of privacy, and make war on traditional masculinity, sports, and even the truth. In late April, Sen. Rick Santorum (R, Pa.) got a taste of what awaits anyone who opposes the gay agenda. After explaining to Associated Press reporter Lara Jakes Jordan (who is married to Sen. John Kerry’s (D, Ma.) campaign manager, Jim Jordan) his opposition to any pro-gay laws or court rulings that might weaken the family, gay activists demanded that Santorum resign. But the Santorum case was only...

It was 1997, and the tobacco companies were on the ropes. Facing a rash of lawsuits from state attorneys general seeking billions of dollars in reimbursement for what they claimed were the Medicaid costs of smoking-related diseases, the companies were about to agree to an unprecedented settlement with the states. Under that settlement, the major tobacco companies would pay the states more than $200 billion, accept sweeping restrictions on cigarette advertising and pay $1.5 billion for an antismoking campaign. While very few editorialists had much sympathy for the tobacco companies, many wondered what kind of precedents these lawsuits would...

Is this a great country or what? Bad things that happen to us or to those around us are never our fault. Moreover, repeatedly it turns out that the responsible party is a huge corporation with deep pockets for suing! Consider the sad and bizarre case of 15-year-old Charles Bishop, who in January swiped a small plane from St. Petersburg, Florida and smashed it into the 28th floor of a building across the bay in Tampa. Found on his body was a note pledging allegiance to Osama bin Laden and praising the September 11 attacks. That was newsworthy enough, but...