Free Republic

U.S. — According to sources, wives across the nation have begun their yearly autumn ritual in which they carefully select pots of autumn-colored mums they wish to take home and immediately kill. "Fall is here! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" said a spokeswife for the American Wives Union in an official statement. "Soon our front porches will be decked out with pots of red, yellow, and orange-colored mums we bought at the grocery store, which will live 12 hours and immediately wither and die before our very eyes, forcing us to go back to the store to buy more, again and again, until Christmas!...

Mums help chicks if dad was ugly 29 September 2006 From New Scientist Print Edition. Evolution holds hope for ugly males. Females appear to invest extra energy in getting their poorer-quality offspring off to a good start, at least among house finches (Carpodacus mexicanus). Female birds can deposit different amounts of health-promoting compounds in their eggs, depending on social and environmental conditions. Previous studies on zebra finches showed that females were more likely to invest in eggs fertilised by high-quality males. Kristen Navara, now at Ohio State University in Columbus, expected to see the same pattern with house finches, in...

Congressmen who visit the U.S.-Mexico border unannounced are being monitored by the Department of Homeland Security, and at least one U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent has been suspended for speaking to a congressman without first getting supervisory clearance, according to documents obtained by the Daily Bulletin. Congressional representatives interviewed by the Daily Bulletin said they were unaware until recently that Border Patrol agents were required to file Significant Incident Reports -- normally used for shootings and other serious border incidents -- when congressional representatives made unannounced visits this summer along the U.S.-Mexico border. A second document obtained by the...