Free Republic

Dan Cox, the Republican candidate for governor of Maryland, promised to empower the state police and Maryland Guard to “stand against all rogue actions of this out of control tyrannical Biden administration” if elected. [SNIP] “As governor, I will use the 9th and 10th amendments, the Maryland Constitution and Declaration of Rights, the MSP and Maryland Guard to stand against all rogue actions of this out of control tyrannical Biden administration with fierce tenacity,” the email read. “Our children, families and loved ones and the freedom we cherish and is our birthright as Americans demand we oppose these criminal acts...

The previous head of the Chemnitz Clinic Dr. Thomas Jendges is dead. He fell from the roof of the clinic to his death. In his farewell letter, he is said to have justified his step by saying, among other things, that he could no longer stand the “constant lies and cheating about supposedly harmless vaccinations” associated with Covid. In his lengthy farewell letter that Dr. Thomas Jendges wrote before his suicide and demanded its publication, he is said to have sharply criticized the governments' information policy in dealing with the danger of the Covid vaccinations. He could no longer stand...

The Central Intelligence Agency on Monday evening slammed what it called CNN's "misguided" and "simply false" reporting, after the cable channel's chief national security correspondent authored a hole-filled piece claiming that the CIA had pulled a high-level spy out of Russia because President Trump had "repeatedly mishandled classified intelligence and could contribute to exposing the covert source as a spy." The extraordinary CIA rebuke came as The New York Times published a bombshell piece late in the evening, which largely contradicted CNN's reporting. According to the Times, CIA officials "made the arduous decision in late 2016 to offer to extract...

President Trump on Friday mocked former Vice President Joe Biden after the Democratic presidential candidate committed a gaffe by telling supporters that “poor kids” are “just as talented as white kids” before correcting himself to say “wealthy kids." "Joe is not playing with a full deck. He made that comment, I said 'woah,' " Trump told reporters as he left the White House for a fundraiser in the Hamptons. "This is not somebody you can have as your president, but if he got the nomination I’d be thrilled," he added.

<p>7 a.m.</p> <p>A Virginia lawmaker is now suggesting he won’t move forward Monday with plans to introduce an impeachment bill seeking the ouster of Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax.</p> <p>Democratic Del. Patrick Hope had said he wanted to introduce articles of impeachment Monday against Fairfax after two women recently accused the Democrat of sexual assault in the 2000s. Fairfax has vehemently denied the claims and called for authorities, including the FBI, to investigate.</p>

WASHINGTON (AP) — Thousands of requests by men to bring in child and adolescent brides to live in the United States were approved over the past decade, according to government data obtained by The Associated Press. In one case, a 49-year-old man applied for admission for a 15-year-old girl. The approvals are legal: The Immigration and Nationality Act does not set minimum age requirements. And in weighing petitions for spouses or fiancees, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services goes by whether the marriage is legal in the home country and then whether the marriage would be legal in the state where...

Vice President Pence and Republican leaders speak to reporters after talks to break the impasse over border security and end the 19-day-old government shutdown falter when President Trump walks out calling them a “total waste of time.”

The feud over who will be the next speaker of the House is heating up, as allies of the longtime Democratic leader, Nancy Pelosi, take on a rowdy band of rebels pushing for regime change. Pro-Pelosi forces launched a snarky Twitter assault against a handful of the men leading the rebellion. As the progressive pundit Joan Walsh tweeted, “So #fivewhiteguys are following the tactics of the right wing white guy Freedom Caucus to block a woman speaker after an election in which women saved the Democrats. Got it.”

TALLAHASSEE — Amid a dizzying whir of legal action, questions over uncounted ballots and the failure of two South Florida counties to meet the deadline, a machine recount produced little change in the overall results to three statewide races Thursday. Even so, the U.S. Senate and agriculture commissioner races are headed to manual recounts, results of which are due to the state by noon on Sunday. Certification of the official election results is scheduled for 9 a.m. Tuesday. In the governor’s race, the recount showed that Democrat Andrew Gillum trailed Republican Ron DeSantis by 33,683 votes, a net gain of...

Residents of the Florida Panhandle began taking in scenes of destruction Wednesday night, hours after Hurricane Michael slammed into the coast with a fury that ranked it among the most powerful storms ever to hit the United States. “It’s all gone,” Deep Patel, 24, said as he stared at the remains of his duplex bedroom in Panama City, near where Michael made landfall as a Category 4 storm in the afternoon, packing winds of 155 mph. Most of the wooden rafters had been ripped off, exposing an upturned mattress. A bathtub landed a few houses away in a neighbor’s yard....

It could be one of those Washington days that define a political era. When Supreme Court pick Brett Kavanaugh and his original accuser Christine Blasey Ford deliver dueling testimony on Thursday, they will conjure drama of an intensity unusual even in the Trump administration. Take it from the commander in chief himself, who said of a day steeped in political, legal and judicial consequences: "I think it's going to be a very, very, important day in the history of our country," President Donald Trump said in New York on Wednesday evening. In Room 226 in the Dirksen Senate Office building,...

LAKE MILLS — David Groe of Lake Mills initially thought Friday’s ceremony recognizing his service during the Vietnam War would be a low-key affair. Instead, he and his family walked into the Lake Mills High School gym to see a crowd of students, veterans and other community members on hand to witness the ceremony. An old friend and neighbor of Groe’s — Terry Branstad, U.S. Ambassador to China and the former governor of Iowa — gave the main address. “It was pretty overwhelming,” Groe said. “I didn’t expect all of that.” Like many Vietnam veterans, Groe never got his medals....

You're John McCain, a fallen hero who wanted to become president so desperately that you sold yourself to Charlie Keating, the wealthy con man who bears such an incredible resemblance to The Joker. Obviously, Keating thought you could make it to the White House, too. He poured $112,000 into your political campaigns. He became your friend. He threw fund raisers in your honor. He even made a sweet shopping-center investment deal for your wife, Cindy. Your father-in-law, Jim Hensley, was cut in on the deal, too. Nothing was too good for you. Why not? Keating saw you as a prime...

You’ve never heard Colin Powell talk like this. The former secretary of state and four-star Army general who has been in the national spotlight since he was Ronald Reagan’s national security advisor let loose on Hillary Clinton (“greedy, not transformational”), her husband Bill (still “dicking bimbos”), and Donald Trump (a “national disgrace”). The frank, biting version of Powell made public is thanks to private emails that appeared on dcleaks.com, a mysterious repository for hacked information suspected to be of Russian origin. Powell’s office confirmed to The New York Times that the emails were genuine.

The Virginia Bar Association hosts the first U.S. Senate debate Virginia's 2018 election. Sen. Tim Kaine (D) will face Corey Stewart (R) on July 21. [Full debate video at link]

Tesla’s Elon Musk has been tweeting as if he’s as high as one of his SpaceX rockets. Wall Street analysts, regulators and the media have all been recent victims of the eccentric billionaire. But his calling a member of the team rescuing the Thai soccer kids a “pedo” did more than raise eyebrows. The July 15 tweet prompted an open letter from Loup Ventures’ Gene Munster, who described Musk’s behavior as “fueling an unhelpful perception of your leadership — thin-skinned and short-tempered.”

Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer on Friday called on President Trump to cancel his summit with Russian President Vladi­mir Putin in the wake 12 Russian intelligence officers being charged with conspiring to hack Democrats during the 2016 presidential campaign. “Glad-handing with Vladimir Putin on the heels of these indictments would be an insult to our democracy,” Schumer (N.Y.) said in a statement less than an hour after Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein detailed the new charges at a midday news conference. Trump is scheduled to meet with Putin on Monday in Helsinki. During a joint news conference Friday...

John Batchelor interviews Lee Smith about his findings and reporting on Russiagate.

While generally cautious about criticizing Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s report on the Clinton-emails investigation, Trump supporters have taken aim at its chief logical flaw: Although key investigators harbored anti-Trump and pro-Clinton bias, and even made statements indicating an intention to act on that bias, the IG did not find that this bias was the proximate cause of any particular investigative decision. This conclusion is easy to rebut; I did so myself in a column last week. Yet, the Trump camp should also be embracing it. Why? Because if this is the Justice Department’s position, then Special Counsel Robert Mueller has...

Good news abounds lately for America. Jobs numbers continue to soar and, per a new CNN poll, Americans have grown more confident in the direction of the country than at any time in a decade. Not surprisingly, President Trump’s job approval ratings also are on the rise, particularly among independents. In spite of these successes – or perhaps because of them – the president’s critics continue to direct the most extreme possible language at him, invective that reached full-scale apoplexy regarding our country’s border policies. The lawful separation of children from illegal immigrants who cross our border without permission has...