Free Republic

For seven years, a handful of homebuilders offered solar as an optional item to buyers willing to pay extra to go green. Now, California is on the verge of making solar standard on virtually every new home built in the Golden State.

House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce will not run for reelection, he announced Monday. Royce, a Republican from Fullerton who was first elected to Congress in 1992, is chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and is known as a hawk and a free trade advocate. He is the first California Republican to announce a retirement in what’s expected to be a tough year for the GOP at the ballot box. “In this final year of my Foreign Affairs Committee chairmanship, I want to focus fully on the urgent threats facing our nation, including: the brutal, corrupt and dangerous...

Watch as a student has his MAGA hat stolen and is violently berated at UC Riverside. Video at link.

After the men’s lifestyle magazine stopped featuring nude pictorials in 2015, the nude shots are making a comeback with Playboy's March/April 2017 issue featuring topless Playmate Elizabeth Elam as Miss March 2017, along with the headline “Naked is normal.”“I’ll be the first to admit that the way in which the magazine portrayed nudity was dated, but nudity was never the problem because nudity isn’t a problem,” Playboy’s Chief Creative Officer Cooper Hefner said in a statement. "Today we're taking our identity back and reclaiming who we are."

Donald Trump is known for his frequent use of Twitter, but on Monday profane terms typed into Twitter’s search function produced a result that would likely not please President Trump. When the terms “a--hole” or “a--holes” were typed into Twitter’s search, Trump’s personal Twitter profile @realDonaldTrump came up under the “People” category. Below Trump’s profile the search queries returned instances of people using those terms in their tweets in a variety of contexts.

White House claims Alisa Shevchenko was involved in hacking the US election but in an interview she says authorities misinterpreted facts or were fooled. Alisa Shevchenko is a talented young Russian hacker, known for working with companies to find vulnerabilities in their systems. She spends her winters in Asia, meditating and training in Thai kickboxing. She is also, the White House claims, guilty of helping Vladimir Putin interfere in the US election.

Two men dressed as Oompa Loompas from the film Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory are being sought by police in connection with an assault in Norwich. A 28-year-old man was attacked by three men and a woman as he left a kebab house on Prince of Wales Road in the city on Thursday.

The prosecutor at the center of the national firestorm over whether the man who killed Trayvon Martin should be charged in his death says she’s not likely to need a grand jury to make the decision for her. More probable, she said, is that she’ll be the one to decide. “I always lean towards moving forward without needing the grand jury in a case like this,” Angela Corey, the state attorney assigned to the case by Gov. Rick Scott, told The Herald/Times. “I foresee us being able to make a decision, and move on it on our own.” Read more...

A JetBlue plane was forced to make an emergency landing in Amarillo, Texas, Tuesday after a pilot reportedly had a medical emergency on board the plane. JetBlue 191, which was headed from New York’s Kennedy Airport to Las Vegas, was forced to make the emergency landing after the pilot reportedly ran up and down the aisles screaming after being locked out of the cockpit.  He apparently began banging on the cockpit door screaming “let me in,” but was not allowed to reenter, CBSDFW.com reported. One of the flight attendants got on the intercom and asked passengers to restrain the man....

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- Yosemite National Park officials are trying to determine why a man fell to his death while climbing Half Dome Monday evening. Park officials tell Action News, search and rescue crews recovered the body of an unidentified man Tuesday morning at the base of the popular dome.

What could be better than beer and beards?As a guy who recently, and reluctantly, shaved off my beard in preparation for an upcoming wedding, news that St. Louis brewer Anheuser-Busch was endorsing a full-blown beard-growing campaign was music to my ears.Budweiser, A-B’s flagship beer and one of its best-selling brands, recently announced its “Grow One. Save a Million” campaign to promote water conservation ahead of World Environment Day on June 5.The brewer will also donate $150,000 to River Network to help support the organization’s watershed conservation projects in each of A-B’s 12 brewery cities in the U.S., including St. Louis.Here’s...

Contending that the purported "seasoned beef" or "seasoned ground beef" in a number of Taco Bell menu items isn't as meaty as it sounds, consumer law firms have filed a federal suit in California this week asking for a court determination on the issue.

On Monday, June 28, 2010, The Supreme Court reaffirmed the Second Amendment during the tria of McDonald vs. Chicago. The 5-4 ruling confirmed that neither a state nor city, acting under a grant of authority from the state, could deny a person the right to possess a firearm. This was seen as a victory for gun rights activists, but with the United Nations Small Arms and Light Weapons(SALW) treaty looming in the near future, this fight is far from over.

As many as 30 horrified onlookers saw a male hiker plunge hundreds of feet to his death Saturday as he was climbing Yosemite's world-famous Half Dome, park rangers said. The man, who was not identified pending notification of relatives, fell at 3:40 p.m. as he climbed the granite edifice in the midst of a hail storm. The hiker fell to a shoulder of the dome about 1,800 feet from the top.

Washington: If reports are to be believed, Hollywood actress Lindsay Lohan is planning to get married to on/off girlfriend Samantha Ronson. Lohan and Ronson had parted ways after a hotel bust up in March, however, sources claim that the couple is back together and Lohan has even proposed. The Mean Girls star is also said to be considering converting to Judaism to marry her lesbian lover. According to the National Enquirer, wedding talk angered Ronson's Jewish family - so Catholic Lohan has offered to convert. "Lindsay says Sam's promised she'll persuade her family to accept this, and they won't wait...

WEST HOLLYWOOD -- Firefighters are trying to determine the cause of a massive fire at a landmark strip club in West Hollywood. Firefighters were sent to "The Body Shop" strip club at 8250 Sunset Boulevard around 6:45 a.m. Thursday morning. Flames could be seen shooting through the roof. The fire was mainly confined to the attic, fire inspector Frank Garrido said. The fire was extinguished within an hour, but the building sustained about 70 percent damage. Sunset Blvd. was closed in both directions between La Cienega and Crescent Heights. People in nearby buildings were evacuated, but the fire was contained...

Famed chimp 'Moe' escapes into forest As of Monday, there was still no sign of Moe in the San Bernardino National Forest, but there were plenty of rumors about the missing chimp. Water was running and peanuts were missing at the Gem Ranch on Cajon Boulevard, and a dead chicken was found in the same area where Moe disappeared. Someone even called from Rancho Cucamonga saying there had been a possible Moe sighting in the caller's yard. Amidst the mayhem and the media circus at the scene, animal control officers and those close to Moe continued their search for the...

A Pinellas Park mother remained in jail Thursday afternoon on $5,000 bond after police said she held her 5-year-old son outside of an SUV because he was causing a disturbance.The incident began just before midnight Wednesday on 43rd Street North in Pinellas Park and ended with the arrest of 27-year-old Christina Adams. Witnesses said they watched in shock as Adams at some points forced the child to run beside the car to keep up."To hang a child out of a moving vehicle like that is absurd," witness Victor Concepcion said. "Just holding the baby out of the window and I...

Hollywood is now indulging in a different kind of rehab substitute. It's intense and round the clock sober companionship, aka "The Sober Buddy". Rather than spending the standard 60 to 90 days in a clinic like Promises or Betty Ford, the actor or actress or exec hires a sober companion to keep on track. Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, this coach by your side makes sure you stay clean. Such intense monitoring doesn't come cheap, as ABC News-- which claims Owen Wilson has a sober buddy -- found out from Douglas Caine, founder of Sober Champion with...

Last week, Deputy Gil Flores of the Twin Peaks Sheriff Department discovered 150 marijuana plants after he investigated a suspicious circumstances call in Cedarpines Park. Kurt Norlander placed the call after his chocolate Labrador, Maple, had eaten a large quantity of marijuana. “We had a new neighbor move in a couple of weeks ago,” explained Norlander. “He was unloading things at night and seemed kind of suspicious. Maple kind of befriended the guy and went over there sometimes. “We believe the man fed him, and Maple grabbed some marijuana off a table and ran off with it,” Norlander continued. “He...