No policy issue has defined the last four years more than immigration. 

The New World screwworm appeared in a single cow in Chiapas state

A viral video shared on X purports to show a plane helping fight the recent fires in California catch fire, then crash. ? The fire plane also caught fire ! A plane that was supposed to help fight a fire in Los Angeles, USA, has crashed. pic.twitter.com/8gM33HPUoE — Warzone Observer (@WarzoneObserver) January 11, 2025 Verdict: […]

'He supported Bill Clinton'

'You just said a TV host is his main qualification!'

Grade school kids could have created a better photograph

A curious Viking age graveyard has been uncovered in southwest Norway containing jewelry and evidence of continental connections. Three high-status women, though perhaps not Scandinavians themselves, were, or perhaps were not, interred there, and these uncertainties have raised interesting hypotheses. Located near the coast in a Norwegian town called Fitjar at a farm called Skumsnes, […] The post Metal Detectorist Stumbles Upon 1,200-Year-old Graves of Impressive Viking Women appeared first on Good News Network.

Books short fiction Five Beguiling SFF Stories About Merchants and Shopkeepers Exploring the delights and dangers of speculative shopping… By Ratika Deshpande | Published on January 15, 2025 Photo by Mike Petrucci [via Unsplash] Comment 0 Share New Share Photo by Mike Petrucci [via Unsplash] Of all the physical locations and settings that authors conjure up in their stories, shops tend to be my favourite. In real life, commerce tends to be rather straightforward; we are always limited in what we can buy, both in terms of expense and because the only thing to trade is money. In stories like those below, one need not be rich to make a purchase or sell goods. There’s so much that goes on with the characters behind both sides of the checkout counter; both the seller and the receiver are much more complex than the economic roles they’re playing, and when you add in speculative elements, the exchange can take on a much deeper meaning. Here are some stories that dig into that complexity and spin the results into reflections on love, wisdom, loss, and more… “So You Want to Kiss Your Nemesis” by John Wiswell Robin runs the Intimate Blade, where “We find the edge for that special someone in your life” —be it a lover, or in the case of this new customer, Zsofia, a nemesis. The store carries everything from rapiers and scimitars to daggers and axes, and Zsofia is in search of the perfect tool she can use to propose to her foe—propose a duel, that is. Obviously.  A charming story, and perhaps my favorite take on the enemies-to-lovers trope. “Big Box” by Greg van Eekhout  A store appears in a place where it wasn’t until yesterday, suddenly taking up space where there wasn’t any. You step in, and find yourself considering if you’d take some magical monkey paws (price: the animals’ extinction), a love potion (price: “the memory of your first kiss”), or pillows that help you sleep (price: no dreaming). There are so many good deals in here, so hard to resist! Maybe it’s too early to go to the checkout counter… “The Potion Seller Will See You Now” by Dianne M. Williams When a 12-year-old shows up at the potion seller’s mostly ignored shop, she knows he’s too young to be fighting, too brash and foolhardy. But the shop isn’t doing well, so she’ll take whatever coin she can get; she can’t afford to care about all the young boys going to war. But then the boy shows up again, having grown a little, still fighting. When he returns over and over, having become a new man each time because of the war and the things he’s seen, the potion seller starts worrying—not for herself, with no business thanks to the war, but for boys like him. How will they survive?   “The Merchant With No Coin” by M.A. Carrick Thanks to a detailed reading of The Merchant of Venice in Grade 10, in my mind the word “merchant” is always accompanied by the sense of someone who’s skilled at dealing with people and money shrewdly, and more importantly, someone who’s wealthy (like Antonio, the play’s titular character). But as I’ve often heard from people older than me, you can’t truly hold on to wealth, and you can’t take it with you. What ought a merchant to do when such is his fate? A visit to the szorsa tells him he’s fated for poverty, yet he still asks for all the money he can get. Where will such a wish lead him?  “How to Find a Folded Bookstore” by Devin Miller Blue Heron Books folded in the 1990s, but when the right person comes along, it shows itself and lets them in. Europa, who runs the bookstore, is attuned to the bookstore’s whims. It makes people  want to stay, guides them to comforting chairs, relocates shelves to get them what they need—or what it thinks they need. Today, the bookstore is determined to find Europa a date, and no amount of requesting is going to change its mind. Perhaps it’s time Europa accepted that help? [end-mark] The post Five Beguiling SFF Stories About Merchants and Shopkeepers appeared first on Reactor.

The more often Americans attend virtually any Christian denomination, as well as Jewish services, the more likely they are to adopt conservative political views, according to a recent statistical analysis. “The more Democrats go to church, the more they look like Republicans,” states the study. “Being politically liberal and being highly religious are just not compatible,” wrote Ryan Burge, an associate professor of Political Science at Eastern Illinois University and research director for Faith Counts. “Among white people who never attend: 45% are liberal. Among weekly+ attenders: 11% are liberal. That same pattern is there for every single racial group.” Even attending church only once a year moves Americans further to the right of the political spectrum: More than one-third (36%) of annual church attendees are conservative, while one in four is liberal. More regular attendance makes believers more conservative. Only 4% of weekly churchgoers hold “very liberal” political views, while 23% are “very conservative” and another 29% are conservative. Regularly attending church services displaces social theories, such as critical race theory, with a belief that individuals bear the moral responsibility of their own actions, the analysis discovered. Both Republicans and Democrats who congregate more than once a week are roughly twice as likely as those who never attend to agree with the statement, “God is more concerned about individual morality than social inequalities.” Registered Independents experienced a greater change of heart yet.  “What is really stunning is the fact that even among Democrats, going to church more makes them more likely to believe that individual morality is more important to God than societal problems,” wrote Burge. “In other words, the more Democrats go to church, the more they look like Republicans.” The trend held true across most ethnic groups, as well as religious groups ranging from Roman Catholicism and the 20 largest Protestant denominations to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and Judaism. Not only do Baptists and Church of Christ attendees find themselves growing more conservative politically, but so do members of the liberal Presbyterian Church and the liberalizing United Methodist Church. Only two of the largest Protestant denominations defy the trend’s general contours: The more frequently people attend the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and The Episcopal Church, the more liberal their politics become. Burge noted that both churches put together have less than half the membership of the conservative Southern Baptist Convention. Burge’s previous research identified Episcopalians as the most politically active religious denomination. But overall, “atheists are the most politically engaged ‘religious’ category,” when compared to all Christians.  In his latest study, Burge learned that among Jews who never attend synagogue, “over half say that they are liberal (54%), it’s half that rate (27%) among Jews who are at synagogue multiple times a week.” He did not specify if that betrays a difference between such liberal branches of Judaism as Reconstruction and Reform and Orthodox Judaism. “I think it’s fair to say that there’s no real relationship between liberalism and frequency of attendance among Muslims, Buddhists, and Hindus,” stated Burge. The most recent analysis built on previous research from Burge himself, as well as other religious scholars. “While the study finds the most liberal politics among adherents of particular ‘liberal’ religious groups rather than among the unaffiliated, it largely fails to find forms of religion where exposure is associated with liberal politics. In fact, exposure to even ‘liberal’ religion is generally associated with more conservative politics,” concluded sociologist Landon Schnabel of Cornell University in a study published in November 2023 in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. “[E]ven liberal religion appears to conservatize the public.” Burge previously found that secularists vote for Democrats, while churchgoers vote Republican. “Democrats are making gains in areas where religion is fading,” wrote Burge, “and Republicans are increasing their vote share in places where houses of worship are gaining new members.” Polling data bear this out. Two-thirds of Democratic voters said they “never” attend religious services, according to CNN’s exit polls in the 2022 midterm elections. Exactly the same percentage of Republicans said they attend church “weekly or more” often. “While such a finding might have been surprising a few years ago, it is unsurprising in the cultural and political climate of 2025,” David Closson, the director of Family Research Council’s Center for Biblical Worldview, told The Washington Stand. “Today, many of the key political debates revolve around issues tied to creation order. Consider, for instance, the ongoing gender debate. Twenty years ago, the idea that society would question something as fundamental as the distinction between male and female would have seemed unimaginable. Equally shocking would have been the notion of debating the moral permissibility of medically altering children in the name of gender ideology.” “In essence, these debates now center on ontology—the very nature of being,” Closson continued. “Christianity offers clear and unambiguous teachings on these issues, including the nature of reality and gender. This clarity provides a framework for understanding and addressing such foundational matters.” “As a result, it is logical to observe a direct relationship between church attendance and conservative political positions. Regular exposure to clear biblical teaching about creation order naturally influences how individuals approach related political and moral questions,” Closson told The Washington Stand. “Consequently, those who are actively engaged in church life are more likely to adopt conservative perspectives in the public square.” The impact of these studies will impact future generations. The growth of “nones,” or the religiously unaffiliated, appears to have stopped, and America’s slipping church attendance stabilized. A total of “24.8% of folks reported weekly attendance in 2019. It was 24.5% of respondents in 2023,” +reported Burge. “That difference is not statistically (or substantively) significant.” Burge, too, seems to agree that (nearly) all religious faiths compel believers in revealed truth to align themselves with the American Right. “Maybe the idea that religion can push people toward left-leaning ideas is over for good,” concluded Burge. “[T]here’s plenty of evidence that American religion is now inextricably linked to one political viewpoint.” Originally published by The Washington Stand. The post The More Democrats Go to Church, the More They Look Like Republicans: Study appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The Top 10 Dumbest Things Said By Democrats...On Tuesday