Free Republic

They’re sea-sick of it. Frustrated cruise passengers are sounding the distress signal over a rising trend toward nickel-and-diming, as lines find new and creative ways to upsell their customers on everything from drinks to arcade games. A queasy traveler started an interesting conversation on the subject online, recently about which lines fleece their guests and which actually deliver on the all-inclusive promise. The high seas set-to kicked off over a woman detailing her poor experience on an MSC cruise, where she said she was upsold significantly on spa treatments. Her account, posted elsewhere on Reddit, inspired a slew of salty...

I used to think that teachers were so much smarter than the rest of us. I used to think that principals were even smarter than teachers. But I was wrong. I just got a look at the testimony of an Oregon elementary school principal before a local school board meeting, and it occurred to me that she must have missed most of her history and civics classes during more than 12 years of state school indoctrination. She lamented seeing Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol officers run operations and arrest people who are wanted on criminal warrants and illegally...

Norwegian Cruise Line is alerting guests on Hawaii cruises in 2026 and beyond of the new Transient Accommodations Tax that levies an additional 14% on their cruise fare. While the cruise line is part of the legal challenges to the new tax, it may be some time before any court cases are resolved and in the meantime the tax goes into effect from January 1, 2026. Booked guests are reporting additional taxes on their cruise fares from $50-500 and higher, depending on the overall cost of their cruise and how much time their itinerary spends in Hawaii. Norwegian Cruise Line...

EVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK, Fla.– A crocodile decided to show an alligator who is boss in the Florida Everglades on Monday as people watched in suspense. Video showed a crocodile walking up to an opening of some water in Everglades National Park. As the camera angle changed, it showed the crocodile wasn't just aiming to take a dip, but was actually boisterously approaching an alligator hanging out in the water. The two reptiles began hissing at each other as the crocodile entered the water and got closer to the gator. As the crocodile entered the alligator's personal space, the gator thrashed...

A trans-identifying man with an extensive arrest history was charged arson after setting fire to his own apartment during a standoff with police following a robbery, according to news reports. This gem, who was charged with setting fire to his mother’s apartment in 2022, while the woman was inside, also once asked on a Facebook post, “May I start burning Churches yet?” independent journalist Andy Ngo reported. Nathan Herbert Click — who now goes by the name Cassidy Mal Lyss (get it, “malice?”) — was arrested on the morning of Nov. 10 in Stillwater, Oklahoma, after a report of robbery,...

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Oh, spare me the pearl-clutching from the soy-sipping leftists. Trump's not losing a wink of sleep over some pint-sized, big-word-spouting socialist toddler like Zohran Mamdani hurling "fascist" around like it's his security blanket. This guy's the freshly minted NYC Mayor-elect—a democratic socialist hack who's probably still got Che Guevara's poster on his dorm room wall—waltzing into the Oval Office and lobbing playground insults at the man who just steamrolled the establishment to Make America Great Again. And Trump? He just chuckles it off like swatting a gnat. "It's okay," he says, before tossing in praise for the kid while batting...

Why Has the Deer Population Exploded? Understanding the Surge in Deer Numbers The dramatic increase in deer populations stems primarily from human-induced changes to their environment, including habitat alteration, predator removal, and supplemental feeding, leading to Why the population of deer increased so much? Introduction: The Unseen Rise of the White-Tailed Deer The rustling in the woods, the flash of a white tail – encounters with deer have become increasingly common. But what’s driving this proliferation of deer across vast swathes of North America and other regions? It’s a complex issue with deep roots in ecological changes, human intervention, and...

The 15 States Bustling With the Most Wild Turkeys Wild turkeys were almost wiped out over 120 years ago. But, thanks to unregulated hunting and habitat loss, they’ve made a huge comeback across the U.S. There are even some states absolutely bursting with flocks of turkeys. Thanks to conservation and smart habitat management, wild turkeys have returned to forests and farmyards. Let’s break down the 15 states where you’ll absolutely see turkeys in.

Leftist ideology is so patently sick and wrong that recruitment focuses on children too young to have developed a sense of moral revulsion. The idea is that attitudes implanted in defenseless minds at a very early age can lead to a lifetime of voting for Democrats. That’s why the liberal anti-sacrament of abortion is promoted via books aimed at children as young as 5 years: Amelia Bonow, the abortion activist most well-known for creating the “Shout Your Abortion” social media movement, has published a children’s book about abortion… The book is entitled Abortion Is Everything. Marketed toward children from ages...

An Ohio man allegedly ambushed his wife as she tried to move out, fatally shooting her two children and the father of the eldest before turning the gun on himself in a grisly apparent murder-suicide, cops said. Ryan Eagon, 42, went on the deadly rampage Wednesday night, killing the 7-month-old baby he shared with his wife, her 7-year-old son, and the child’s father after discovering his spouse was moving out of their Seneca County home amid ongoing domestic troubles, according to the Tiffin Police Department. “As a community, we are not accustomed to events of this horrific and heartbreaking nature...

Nov. 20 (UPI) -- An AI-powered talking teddy bear has been removed from sale by a Singapore-based company after researchers found it could discuss sex and other topics. The Public Interest Research Group said a group of researchers from the U.S. and Canada held test conversations with Kumma, a $99 teddy bear powered by OpenAI's GPT-4o chatbot. The bear is manufactured in China and marketed by Singapore-based FoloToy. The researchers said they found it easy to get Kumma to discuss sexually explicit topics, including spanking, roleplay and BDSM. "We were surprised to find how quickly Kumma would take a single...

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Sex trafficking on Meta platforms was both difficult to report and widely tolerated, according to a court filing unsealed Friday. In a plaintiffs’ brief filed as part of a major lawsuit against four social media companies, Instagram’s former head of safety and well-being Vaishnavi Jayakumar testified that when she joined Meta in 2020 she was shocked to learn that the company had a “17x” strike policy for accounts that reportedly engaged in the “trafficking of humans for sex.” “You could incur 16 violations for prostitution and sexual solicitation, and upon the 17th violation, your account would be suspended,” Jayakumar reportedly...

You can't hide hunger, as proven by a Florida woman who was in such a hurry to grab her pizza from the Little Caesars restaurant that she got nabbed for driving 107 miles per hour to get there. This all happened on Nov. 6, and police say Yazmin Victoria Erazo's excuse was that she was hungry and wanted to get her pizza before the establishment closed and they locked her pizza in the store for good. She got pulled over at exactly 11:54PM, and the store closed at midnight. She was so close to the pizza, but police put the...

A Missouri judge who wore an Elvis Presley wig in his courtroom and played the singer’s music from his phone during court proceedings has agreed to a deal that would cut his career on the bench short. Judge Matthew Thornhill in suburban St. Louis faces a six-month unpaid suspension under the deal he reached with a state board to avoid a disciplinary hearing. After the suspension, he would serve 18 more months on the bench before resigning from the St. Charles County Circuit Court.

Former Secretary of State and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton said that “abortion bans have killed another woman in Texas” in response to a ProPublica report published Wednesday. Clinton’s comments came in a Wednesday post on the social platform X, which included a link to ProPublica’s story. According to the outlet, a 37-year-old woman named Tierra Walker had been dealing with health issues during her pregnancy. She faced increasing blood pressure and diabetes and was aware she faced a raised chance of potentially fatal pregnancy complication, according to ProPublica. In mid-October of last year, Walker decided it was necessary to request...

In the same time period that the United States built the overdue and over-budget Plant Vogtle, China built 13 reactors of similar scale, and has 33 more on the way

November 22, 1963. Assassination of our then President Kennedy. I hated to let the day go by without mentioning it, though it's been many years. I still remember my mother's tears, the 3 days of the funeral, the sound of the drums. I was a kid. A different time. Worlds ago, now. It seems after that day it all turned a different page. Still RIP John Fitzgerald Kennedy. Btw, those drums, that funeral, briefly shown in the movie The Boston Strangler, with Tony Curtis, which I am grateful they put that in the movie, so it has been placed, I...

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) “collects, evaluates, and disseminates vital information on economic, military, political, scientific, and other developments abroad (emphasis added) to safeguard national security.” So why are they so involved in Obama’s life? Because he worked for them and shoveled money to the CIA when he was the president, like the $1 billion for Operation Timber Sycamore where U.S. Special Forces trained Islamic fundamentalists who carried out a reign of terror. Obama worked for Business International Corporation, a known CIA front, for a year in 1984. Besides Obama, the CIA also employed his grandparents, mother and stepfather, and...