Free Republic

Whether you’re wrapping your Christmas tree in one strand of lights or adorning your home with a Griswold-like display, the type of lights you select can have a big impact on your electric bill. A strand of 300 white mini LED lights on the typical green wire is 21 watts, while the same style with incandescent bulbs is 72 watts. Using the formula above with the national average of 16 cents per kilowatt-hour and a display season of six hours a day for a month, using a strand of mini LED lights will cost you about 60 cents. A strand...

If you’ve ever had the misfortune to unwittingly sign up as a naïve adolescent for a sociology course at a mid-sized state university, waited too long to withdraw during the add/drop period, and so were forced to sit through a semester’s worth of frothing diatribes against the White Patriarchy delivered by a menopausal hippie divorcée with a neon-dyed bowl cut, as I have, these are the least surprising poll results in human history:“The US polling, which was conducted as part of the 2022 American Family Survey, found that liberals were about 18 percentage points less likely to be “completely satisfied”...

VIDEOMark Zuckerberg is very possessive about his hoodie because he seems to think it gives him a lot of comfort. Does that sound familiar? It should because that was the attitude of Leo Bloom of "The Producers" towards his blue towel. The big difference is that Bloom is a harmless fictional character while Zuckerberg is an all too real near human who not only violates our privacy but censors what we can see including banning President Trump from Facebook. All this power that we allow an over-the-top neurotic who, as you can see, looks as if he is about to...

The 27-year-old “Saturday Night Live” star is in the process of removing all of his ink, he reportedly revealed at a Q&A last week for his 2020 film, “The King of Staten Island.” Film critic Mike McGranaghan broke the news when he tweeted a screenshot from the event. “Just attended a virtual Q&A with the Judd Apatow and the cast of THE KING OF STATEN ISLAND,” he wrote. “And here’s a scoop: Pete Davidson is in the process of getting all his tattoos removed!” SNIP In a 2019 interview with Inked magazine, Davidson opened up about his reason for getting...

They are well loved for their immaculate fluffy coats and unique personalities but new research suggests cats do have a much darker side. A study carried out between the University of Edinburgh and Bronx Zoo compared our beloved domestic cat with its wilder relatives. Compared with the snow leopard, the Scottish wildcat and the African lion, researchers found these larger predators shared similar characteristics of aggression and neurotic behaviour to domestic cats.

November 1, 2014 11:55 AM "Pre-Traumatic Stress Disorder" By Andrew Stuttaford Just when you think that the misery that climate change is bringing in its wake can get no worse, there is this. Grist reports: …From depression to substance abuse to suicide and post-traumatic stress disorder, growing bodies of research in the relatively new field of psychology of global warming suggest that climate change will take a pretty heavy toll on the human psyche as storms become more destructive and droughts more prolonged. For your everyday environmentalist, the emotional stress suffered by a rapidly changing Earth can result in some...

A mother says her 5-year-old boy was threatened with suspension after he made a gun out of Legos during an after school program. Sheila Cruz received a written warning recently about her son from the after school staff at the Hyannis West Elementary School because he had been using toys inappropriately. “She (the principal) said, ‘it’s a threat to other children and other children could have been scared.’” School officials say little Joe made the toy gun, then ran around the classroom, pointing it at other kids, and making shooting sounds. Cruz says while she and her husband thought about...

If you want to score a meeting with Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.), know this: His scheduler/office manager, Elizabeth Becton, is to be addressed by her full name — not Liz or any other variant. An executive assistant at McBee Strategic recently learned this the hard way. A few weeks ago, the assistant e-mailed Becton seeking a meeting with McDermott and a client, JPMorgan Chase. Days later, the assistant checked back in and unfortunately began the e-mail with “Hi Liz.” Becton curtly replied, “Who is Liz?” When the assistant wrote back with an apology, Becton turned up the heat. “I do...

Who are you to judge? Who are you to say that the more than slightly creepy 39-year-old woman from Arkansas who just gave birth to her 16th child yes that's right 16 kids and try not to cringe in phantom vaginal pain when you say it, who are you to say Michelle Duggar is not more than a little unhinged and sad and lost? And furthermore, who are you to suggest that her equally troubling husband -- whose name is, of course, Jim Bob and he's hankerin' to be a Republican senator and try not to wince in sociopolitical pain...

Parasite that makes cat-lovers neurotic By Roger Highfield, Science Editor (Filed: 02/08/2006) Cat-lovers may be more neurotic than other people as a result of a feline parasite that could ultimately also be responsible for international cultural differences, according to a radical theory published today. More than a quarter of the world's population - ranging from about seven per cent of the UK population to almost 70 per cent in Brazil - is infected with Toxoplasma -gondii, a relative of the malaria bug, which also infects rats, giving them a suicidal attraction to cats. "Some of us have a parasite in...

What is your personal Linus-type security blanket? As you might know, Linus from "Peanuts" is constantly rubbing a blanket against his cheek as a form of neurotic security. However, in real life, many of us have our own form of security blanket. In my own case it is my leather fanny pack that I wear around my waist. I stick my money, cell phone, radio, sunglasses, dental floss, pens, and other stuff in there so it is very practical. However, I have developed an incredible NEUROTIC dependency on my leather fanny pack. This was brought home a couple of days...

WASHINGTON—The National Security Agency fired a high level intelligence official just days after he publicly urged Congress to pass stronger protections for federal whistleblowers facing retaliation.Russ Tice, 43, who was once nominated for an award by the agency for his intelligence work on Iraq, was informed Tuesday that his security clearances had been permanently revoked and that he could no longer work at the secretive intelligence agency known for its eavesdropping and code-breaking capabilities.Tice has been at the odds with the agency since he reported suspicions that a female co-worker at the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), was a spy for...

What's the deal with all the dead scientists?

Putin: Ally or Terrorist? by William F. Jasper Counting Vladimir Putin as an ally against terrorism ignores his career in the murderous KGB/FSB and his ongoing support for terrorist regimes and organizations. ‘‘Lena Goncharuk, aged 38, said that she was the only one to survive out of a group of six who were ordered out of the cellar where they had been hiding and shot at point blank range. Resting in her hospital bed, her voice barely rising above a whisper, she said she had survived only by pretending to be dead." So reported Paul Wood from the Chechen border...