Free Republic

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) — Just days ago, the nearly 1,300-pound, powerful jumping horse with a shiny chestnut coat named Phedras de Blondel arrived at his new home in the U.S., a farm owned by a champion rider in Florida. On Sunday morning, his owner discovered a horrific scene near his stall: the 12-year-old gelding had been slaughtered and butchered, most likely for his meat. Only his head and neck were left intact. Now, detectives are trying to find the perpetrators. “What they did to this horse had nothing to do with his value,” Debbie Stephens, who owns the 27-acre...

Between 2010 and 2014, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) awarded $4.6 billion in Obamacare start-up grants to 16 Democrat-controlled states and the District of Columbia. $1.4 billion of this taxpayer largesse was spent on exchanges, many of which imploded upon launch or operated so inefficiently that enrollees have been left to the tender mercies of Obamacare.gov. The rest of these states also appear likely to abandon their exchanges in favor of federal “marketplaces.” Yet, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), they have kept all but $1 million of the grants. Where’s the rest of our money?...

Proposal, likely to pass due to Muslim majority, would have Kotel renamed Buraq Plaza and made part of Al-Aqsa Mosque. In an attempt to gain international legitimacy for its rewriting of history, the Palestinian Authority (PA) will submit a resolution to UNESCO (UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) next week claiming the Kotel (Western Wall) as its own. The proposal calls to have the Kotel in Jerusalem - which is an outer wall of the Temple Mount that is the holiest site in Judaism - recognized as part of Al-Aqsa Mosque located on the Mount, reports Yedioth Aharonoth on Friday.

If I post incorrectly, please forgive me. I think it is the first one.... A new Go Pro showed up that wasn't ordered from a reputable outfit today. It was addressed to my wife so I didn't open it on arrival. I don't go through other people's mail. Figured it was a typical purchase even though it wasn't from an outfit I would expect. It was a technology dealer and I do that buying. A little while ago she brings in a box with a new Go Pro. She checked her CC and there was a charge from a couple...

Strapped to wooden chairs and burnt alive: Two men are fatally punished by furious Mexican villagers after alleged car theft Angry villagers beat and then burnt two men to death on the streets of Mexico after accusing them of trying to steal a car. The men were grabbed by the 200-strong mob in the town of San Juan Chamula on Monday, according to a civil defense official, and strapped to wooden chairs before they were lynched. The official, who was not authorized to be quoted by name, said the men had been turned over to police in the southern state...

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — The postmaster in Pittsburgh has been arrested on charges of opening mail packages allegedly looking for drugs and threatening employees if they told authorities about it. Officials say Dan Davis is accused of illegally opening express mail packages. According to the criminal complaint, Davis would run Google searches on the addresses on packages. If an address came back invalid, he would open the package. The criminal complaint reports that he claimed he was searching for drugs and money.

 Google webcam privacy risk - this is a real issue.  Your laptop webcam can be hacked.  If you have to make videos, get yourself a cheap outboard web-camera that YOU control by unplugging it. Put tape over the built-in web-camera, find where the microphone is and tape it over too (find your laptop's manual online, look at the parts/features diagram.) I got a cheap web cam to use on my desktop computer. I downloaded Skype. My daughter is too busy to Skype to help me test it. The first thing that happened, "Esther" from Ghana wanted to Skype with me....

A man in Ohio has been arrested for what they are calling a ‘hate crime’ for burning a flag. It wasn't a U.S. flag! It was a GAY PRIDE FLAG! We have Blacks, Mexicans, Muslims and liberal Whites burning and stomping on our country’s flag and it’s not a problem. But if you burn a gay pride flag it’s a hate crime? What about the hate crimes committed against Whites in the so called ‘knock-out game’ where Blacks target Whites and savagely assault and beat the hell out of them? Those aren’t labeled hate crimes because it would be racist....

**SNIP** Overall, only 37 percent of people who called the IRS seeking to talk to a person reached one, the report said. That's the lowest rate over the past decade, by far. For those who got through, the average time on hold was 23 minutes. About 50 million callers reached out to the IRS for help during the tax season. Help lines were so overloaded that the system hung up on 8.8 million callers, the report said. That's a huge jump from last year, when the IRS hung up on 544,000 callers. The IRS calls the hang-ups "courtesy disconnects," because...

Surveillance video, obtained by Channel 9 shows more than a dozen people stealing weapons from a gun show at the Central Florida Fairgrounds in Orange County over the Fourth of July weekend. According to Orlando police, nearly 20 guns were taken from one of the gun show booths after the show closed for the day on July 6. Police said the weapons include handguns and rifles, and those guns are still on the streets. Channel 9's Kathi Belich learned the group of burglars got into the building through a door on the east end of the main building by smashing...

BARNEGAT, N.J. – Teachers unions during the past decade have known their share of scandal. Add the case of Wayne Wedderman Jr. to the list. This Monday, June 29, Wedderman, treasurer of the Barnegat Education Association, pleaded guilty in Ocean County, New Jersey Superior Court to theft from the union. He had been arrested last November for stealing roughly a combined $23,000 from two union accounts in the wake of a county probe begun the previous month. A grand jury in February subsequently indicted Wedderman on two counts of thefts and one count of computer theft. Sentencing is scheduled for...

An abortion rights activist stole the signs of a pro-life group and then threw them over the highway overpass where the demonstration was held. Members of Protest ABQ were attacked on Wednesday, July 1, 2015 in Albuquerque, NM while conducting a peaceful overpass demonstration to educate the public about abortion. The group uses posters of the abortion victims to show what abortion does to the unborn child in the womb. “Protest ABQ conducts weekly overpass protests to peacefully expose the violence that abortion inflicts on pre-born children in the womb,” Bud Shaver, Executive Director of Protest ABQ told Life Dynamics....

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court says a program that lets the government take raisins away from farmers to help reduce supply and boost market prices is unconstitutional. The justice said Monday that forcing raisin growers to give up part of their annual crop without full payment is an illegal confiscation of private property.

Two men California were sort of shuffling around a supermarket without purchasing anything. One of the men was wearing very baggy pants, and store employees later told police that it was obvious something had been shoved inside his trousers. When the staff confronted him, his pants fell down, revealing ill-gotten hamburgers.

Lorenzo Ayala saved more than $16,000 to buy tractor parts while on a road trip to Montana to visit a woman he met online, but he ended up unwittingly contributing it to the state's first K-9 unit. Ayala forfeited his wad of cash after a state trooper became suspicious that the California farmer's generous amount of cologne, cluttered car and disputed criminal history were signs of drug trafficking. Ayala, of Palo Alto, was never charged with a crime — but Montana kept his money. This year, Montana became the fourth state to overhaul what activists call "policing for profit." Beginning...

Unclaimed Baggage Center in Scottboro, Alabama, sells lost stuff Buys bags en masse from travel companies if they can't be returned Discounts 20 to 80 per cent from items spanning dresses to iPads It's a paradise for bargain-hunters - filled to the rafters with electronics, clothes, musical instruments and jewelry, sold with as much as 80 per cent of the value lopped off. Inside, crowds of shoppers pore over the gear - some of it practically brand new - in the hope of giving the best finds a new home. In an earlier life, all the items were checked...

Eau Claire County (WQOW) - A new week brings disheartening news to the taxpayers of Eau Claire County. The former Eau Claire County Treasurer and his assistant have been accused of stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars. According to the criminal complaint, they took more than $625,000 from the county between 2011 and 2013. Larry Lokken and Kay Onarheim have both been charged with 11 counts of felony theft, as well as three counts each of misconduct in the office. They were arrested by the Eau Claire Police Department on Thursday and have been in jail since then. The two...

Anyone who steals an Apple Watch can -- in about 20 seconds -- simply reset it and make it their own. That's because the way Apple designed the Apple Watch makes it surprisingly easy to override your passcode and completely wipe it clean. You can set up a passcode on the Apple Watch. But -- get ready for this -- anyone can just hold down the "Power Off" button, then select and erase all the data on the Watch. By contrast, the iPhone has certain features that make it less desirable for criminals. If you set it up just right,...

A North Carolina store owner is fighting to recover more than $100,000 from the IRS. The feds reportedly seized Lyndon McLellan’s life savings under a banking law designed to stop drug dealers and money laundering. The IRS accused McLellan of structuring – repeatedly depositing money in increments just under $10,000. The IRS had said it would no longer target deposits unless the money was involved in a separate illegal activity. McLellan, who owns L&M Convenience Mart in Fairmont, hasn’t been charged with anything, yet he hasn’t gotten his money back. “It took 13 years to get it and less than...

Embattled Clinton Foundation and Clinton Health Access Initiative its major health-related offshoot received over $7 million from the US government in recent years, according to an analysis of public records conducted by the Washington Free Beacon. The Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI), chaired by Bill Clinton and run by the former president’s long-time associate Ira Magaziner, has received $6,010,898 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) since 2010. CHAI, the biggest arm of the Clinton family’s charitable efforts, accounting for 60 percent of all spending, received $3,193,500 in fiscal years 2010, 2011, and 2012, according to federal contracts,...