Free Republic

One of the 229 people diagnosed with mpox in Ireland during the recent outbreak had 75 different sexual partners in the 21 days before they developed symptoms of the disease, a new study has revealed. The review of cases also found that 96.5 per cent of confirmed infections had been sexually transmitted. All but three of the infected patients were men, and 98.6 per cent identified as gay, bisexual or men who have sex with men (gbMSM). The youngest patient was 16 and the oldest was 68, and more than one in four (28.3 per cent) were HIV positive, according...

Democrats at a raucous Atlanta watch party weren't just unphased by President Joe Biden's rocky performance - they loved it. The party boasted an open bar - a food spread with tacos, chicken tenders and pie - and an energetic deejay, who blasted top tunes from a table adorned with a giant pair of aviator sunglasses, after the 90-minute showdown wrapped. Attendees cheered for Biden and booed former President Donald Trump during the concluding minutes of the face-off and then gleefully joined first lady Jill Biden in calling the Republican a liar. 'What did Trump do?' she asked, 'Lied!' the...

Riffing on what he sees for the future of AI, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in an interview published Thursday that he deeply believes that there will not be “just one AI.” Touting the value of open source to put AI tools into many people’s hands, Zuckerberg took a moment to disparage the efforts of unnamed competitors who he sees as less than open, adding that they seem to think they’re “creating God.” “I don’t think that AI technology is a thing that should be kind of hoarded and … that one company gets to use it to build whatever...

A single Reddit post exposed a student at an elite college as a fraud who lied his way into the school - and had major legal consequences. Aryan Anand, 19, was exposed as a total fraud after a Reddit post revealed his web of lies. Anand pleaded guilty to forgery in Northampton County following revelations that his entire application to the university was fabricated. The international student was caught after investigators found a post written by an anonymous user they believed to be Anand on the Reddit forum titled, 'I have built my life and career on lies.' The post...

A group of 16 Nobel prize-winning economists have issued a stark warning that inflation would be worse under Donald Trump. The former president would reignite inflation and cause lasting harm to the US economy, the Nobel laureates said in a letter first obtained by Axios. 'While each of us has different views on the particulars of various economic policies, we all agree that Joe Biden's economic agenda is vastly superior to Donald Trump,' the letter read. The warning was spearheaded by American economist Joseph Stiglitz, who won the prestigious honor for economics in 2001. Inflation remains a hot topic for...

A basketball tournament set to feature scantily-clad women at a NJ high school has reportedly been scrapped by officials after backlash to an inappropriate promo video. The 'Nuttin But Azz' tournament was scheduled to go ahead at West Side High School in Newark, NJ on July 21, according to an events page. However, according to NJ.com, the event is not going ahead after an advertisement video emerged of women dancing in thongs on the court. School board communications director Nancy J. Deering told the site that 'No school or district official was aware of the video until it was posted...

Joe Biden is being encouraged to replace Kamala Harris with a blast from the past to aid his floundering chances at re-election. Biden, who has struggled in the polls nationally and in key swing states, has left Democrats wondering if major change is needed to beat Donald Trump Questions and doubts exist over the health and ability to perform the job of Biden, at 81 Harris - the first female and first black vice president in American history - has also struggled, with poll numbers saying a majority of Americans don't think she would be a good president. Pulitzer Prize-winning...

The Government is to use charter flights to deport groups of people no longer permitted to remain in the State. On Monday, Minister for Justice Helen McEntee said the launch of a procurement process for the flights would ultimately give gardaí (police) more options in executing deportations. “The capacity of deportation and return processes are essential elements of any immigration system,” she said. […] The move comes at a time of mounting pressure on Government to deal with the issue of immigration, alongside an inability to provide sufficient accommodation. …

Donald Trump has opened up on the potential existence of aliens, and revealed discussions he has had with 'serious' fighter jet pilots who claim to have seen UFOs in America. The former President appeared as a guest on YouTuber-turned-WWE star Logan Paul's podcast on Thursday, and no subject was off the table as they discussed the war in Gaza, Joe Biden, America's drug crisis and deepfakes. Trump was even quizzed on extra-terrestrials and asked whether he believes in the existence of aliens, UFOs or UAPs. 'It's such an interesting question,' Trump began. 'I've met with pilots that look just like...

Diversity bosses in Washington state accused a student council of promoting white supremacy for suggesting a mural of hammer-wielding Norse god Thor could represent their school team. Students at Mountain View High School in Vancouver offered a mural of the god - whose name translates as 'thunder' - to decorate a wall in a newly renovated building as their senior gift. Its team is nicknamed 'The Thunders' and there is already a Thor statue in the school's main entrance. But the AI image they came up with horrified the district's equity office which demanded the god be removed or accompanied...

A factory in China is developing hyper-realistic humanoid robots that can chillingly mimic human facial expressions and emotions in scientists' latest attempt to replace workers with machines. Ex-Robots, a robotics firm based in the northeastern coastal city of Dalian, is trying to create lifelike droids that engineers hope will soon be used in the healthcare and education industries. Terrifying footage from inside the Ex-Robots factory shows workers surrounded by piles of disembodied heads, neck-length silicone masks and spare limbs as they work to construct the most complex class of robotic products in the world. Drawings of robot designs are adorned...

A GP has shared his expertise on two common sexually transmitted infections - gonorrhoea and syphilis - as cases of the infections in the UK are at an all-time highUK Health Security Agency's latest figures have shown that cases of gonorrhoea and syphilis are at a record high across the UK. As summer approaches, a lack of education about these common STIs could lead to an even greater increase in cases, warns a doctor. Dr Donald Grant, a GP and senior clinical advisor at The Independent Pharmacy, has offered his expert advice on these two sexually transmitted infections, highlighting the...

Chinese officials have been forced to apologise after a hiker found a secret waterpipe supplying China's tallest waterfall. The video, posted to TikTok's sister app Douyin on Sunday, showed a large water main embedded at the top of Yuntai Mountain Waterfall, touted as China's tallest uninterrupted waterfall. Millions of tourists visit the 1024ft-tall waterfall every year, drawn in by the ancient geological formations that date back more than a billion years. Officials for Yuntai Mountain Geopark, a UNESCO-listed site, made a bizarre social media post, apologising for the additional pipe by speaking as the waterfall itself. 'I didn't expect to...

A YOUNG woman has spoken how embracing the alternative has empowered her. Today, Kitty Von Crypt is a celebrated alternative model, burlesque artist, and circus performer. She even breathes fire! She puts it down to embracing the alternative aesthetic, enabling the then awkward Colwyn Bay teenager to transform into the striking performer she is now. Kitty, of Colwyn Bay, said: I didn't have a lot of self confidence growing up and modelling in the alternative style gave me something to be proud of and made me feel comfortable in my own skin. "When I started doing the more raunchy stuff...

Doctors across the US are reporting an alarming health trend in the wake of the pandemic. Since about 2021, they are noticing rare and unusual cancers in patients who shouldn't fit the bill - many of them young and without family history of disease. Cancers that typically affect seniors in their 70s, and 80s are now striking people in their 40s, including bile duct and rare blood cancers. The pandemic forced people to isolate and put off preventative care measures that would screen for various types of cancers, out of fear of being infected. But doctors do not believe this...

Bilzerian is an American poker player, businessman, and social media influencer.Social media personality Dan Bilzerian has ignited a firestorm of controversy with a series of Memorial Day tweets, including one explicitly stating, "***k Israel" and harshly criticizing the US government's support for the country. In his initial tweet on Tuesday morning (Israel time), Bilzerian accused Israel of murdering US soldiers aboard the USS Liberty and claimed that US soldiers have died fighting Israel's wars. He further suggested that US congressmen are financially motivated to support Israel's activities. "To all the US soldiers on the USS Liberty who were murdered by...

A New York City couple got their hands on about $100,000 in cash from a safe they pulled up from a lake while 'magnet fishing' in Corona Park. To pull of this unique feat, James Kane and Barbie Agostini attached a neodymium magnet - which go for as little as $21.99 on Amazon - to a fishing rod and reeled the old safe out from the depths of the water. And at first, it was a mundane discovery because as Kane told NY1: 'We have found plenty of safes before, this is just what a magnet fisher does.' The couple...

There is never a dull moment when Sean Strickland has a microphone in his handIn yet another example of how CTE can damage your brain, UFC middleweight Sean Strickland came after Tom Brady this time with a homophobic tirade through at a press conference. Strickland is about to fight Paulo Costa in next Saturday's UFC 302 and someone asked him about the Tom Brady comedy roast and how he handled the jokes after the show. Needless to say, an attack like what follow is always expected of a man like Sean Strickland. There is never a dull moment when Sean...

man accused of running naked down the aisle of an Australian domestic flight, knocking down a flight attendant and forcing the plane to turn back, was arrested by police at the airport, officials said on Tuesday. The incident happened early in what was scheduled to be a 3 hour and 30 minute Virgin Australia flight on Monday night from the west coast city of Perth to Melbourne on the east coast. The plane made a U-turn about an hour into its flight, according to flight-tracking site, FlightAware. Flight VA696 returned to Perth Airport due to a "disruptive passenger," an airline...

A US police officer from the city of San Diego resigned after an ’embarrassing incident’ emerged last year, where he was forced to seek help from a fellow policeman after he became locked in the backseat of his police cruiser with a woman he had arrested for suspected car theft. The officer identified as Anthony Hair had been assisting in the arrest of individuals suspected of car theft on the night of August 15, 2023. One of the arrested individuals was a woman with an outstanding bench warrant, according to the KFMB San Diego outlet. According to the internal investigation,...