Using Guns In Self-Defense Is Rare

When you buy a gun for self-defense, you are much more likely to be providing an offender with a weapon. A study by the Violence Policy Center had some interesting findings.

The study, released Wednesday by the Violence Policy Center, found there were 258 justifiable homicides involving civilians using firearms in 2012, compared with 8,342 murders by gun. Even if a criminal isn't shot down, the study found that civilians rarely use guns to protect themselves. "Intended victims of property crimes engaged in self-protective behavior with a firearm" only 0.1 percent of the times they were targeted by a crook.
 ...
“The NRA has staked its entire agenda on the claim that guns are necessary for self-defense, but this gun industry propaganda has no basis in fact,” the group's executive director, Josh Sugarmann, said in a statement. “Guns are far more likely to be used in a homicide than in a justifiable homicide by a private citizen. In fact, a gun is far more likely to be stolen than used in self-defense.”

Magic Bullet

A molecule that binds well to prostate cancer cells has been used to not only enhance the imaging of prostate metastases but also to deliver target radiation to tumor cells with great effect. It's capabilities greatly exceed those of similar methods used to date.

Clean Water On the Go

Fieldtrate Lite is a plastic bag in a backpack that can filter dirty river water into clean water as fast as the tap flows. It's already saving lives in disaster-stricken areas.

Fusion Energy Sooner and Cheaper

Incremental improvements to the technology associated with fusion reactors have brought the promise of controlled nuclear fusion energy closer.

PROTACs on the Horizon

This new type of drug can target ALL disease-causing proteins. Yes, all of them. Specific varieties of it It works by tagging a specific protein for removal. The cell destroys the protein and the drug molecule is released to tag another bad protein. Most drugs today just latch on to the protein and block its function. High doses are needed to flood all the target proteins. A much lower dose of a PROTAC drug can be used because the molecules simply "catalyse" the destruction of the proteins.

I think this could be a game-changer.

Constitutional Crisis in Kansas

Unless the Supreme Court of Kansas sues Governor Brownback for refusing to fund the Kansas judiciary, Kansas could become the first state to be run by a de facto dictator. If the court does not rule the way he wants, he will take away their money. This violates clause in the US Constitution that requires every state in the union to be governed by a republican form of government. James Madison made it clear in the Federalist Papers that a functioning judiciary was essential to that republican form.