Free Republic

BEIJING — Surging Covid infections across mainland China make it harder for the government to achieve zero-Covid without reverting to a harsh lockdown, Macquarie’s Chief China Economist Larry Hu said. In the last few days, the daily case count has climbed to around or more than 28,000 — near levels seen in April during a stringent lockdown in Shanghai, according to CNBC calculations of Wind Information data. The figures showed the last time mainland China saw only a handful of daily infections was in June, shortly after Shanghai eased its restrictions. The latest Covid wave has hit the southern city...

Chancellor Angela Merkel has warned British Prime Minister David Cameron he is approaching a “point of no return” with the European Union over his immigration proposals, according to a report on Sunday said. News weekly Der Spiegel writes in its latest edition that Merkel told Cameron on the sidelines of an EU summit last month that his moves to limit an influx of EU migrant workers undermined core principles of the bloc. If he continues, Germany would no longer fight to keep Britain in the EU. …

The Earth is reaching a "tipping point" in climate change that will lead to increasingly rapid and irreversible destruction of the global environment unless its forces are controlled by concerted international action, an international group of scientists warns. Unchecked population growth, the disappearance of critical plant and animal species, the over-exploitation of energy resources, and the rapidly warming climate are all combining to bring mounting pressure on the Earth's environmental health, they say. Scientists from five nations, led by UC Berkeley biologist Anthony Barnosky, report their analysis Thursday in the journal Nature. They likened the potential impact of the forces...

Across the electric wires, the hum is ceaseless: Give it up, loser. Don’t go down with the ship when it’s swept away by the Obama tsunami. According to newspaper reports, polls show that most people believe newspaper reports claiming that most people believe polls showing that most people have read newspaper reports agreeing that polls show he’s going to win. In the words of Publishers’ Clearing House, he may already have won! The battleground states have all turned blue, the reddest of red states are rapidly purpling. Don’t you know, little fool? You never can win. Use your mentality, wake...

Across the electric wires, the hum is ceaseless: Give it up, loser. Don’t go down with the ship when it’s swept away by the Obama tsunami. According to newspaper reports, polls show that most people believe newspaper reports claiming that most people believe polls showing that most people have read newspaper reports agreeing that polls show he’s going to win. In the words of Publishers’ Clearing House, he may already have won! The battleground states have all turned blue, the reddest of red states are rapidly purpling. Don’t you know, little fool? You never can win. Use your mentality, wake...

The question is: "Is Kerry sticking his bony, well-manicured, girly, index finger in the chest of the Marine pictured here?" The answer is "No." After optimizing the pic with Photoshop and Image Optimizer, what looks like Kerry's finger is actually the top piece of a wooden frame that holds a mirror and is attached to the window. There is another mirror just like it behind the Marine, to the right of his elbow.