Free Republic

Days before a critical Indiana primary that could sew up the presidential nomination for the “presumptive” Republican party nominee, the candidate’s eldest son, who is also his current campaign surrogate and Executive Vice President of the Trump Organization, isn’t interested in talking politics at all..... If all of these Trump business traits—passion, hard work, getting your hands dirty—sound distinctly similar to many of the themes Donald Sr. is hammering home on the Republican campaign trail it’s because they’ve run in the family for decades—and Don Jr. isn’t shy about telling voters as much. Presidential campaigns have a habit of throwing...

Digital Traffic Sign Reads 'Trump16' in Walnut Creek During AM Commute Commuters were subject to electioneering from a programmable traffic sign in Walnut Creek on Thursday morning, less than 36 hours after Donald Trump lined up enough electoral votes to run for president on the Republic ticket. The sign on westbound Ygnacio Valley Road near Lime Ridge read, "Rigged Election #Trump16" at about 7:30 a.m. Thursday. Robert Lew was rolling video as he cruised by on his daily drive from Concord to Danvile, and posted a trio of photos to Twitter. "I was more annoyed that someone would mess...

Cross-continental journey first-ever and longest-ever real world ride for the Batmobile The world-famous, iconic Batmobile was recently spotted in Istanbul, travelling cross-continental for the first time via the newest Bosphorus Bridge. The feat was backed by Turkish Airlines, which brought the Batmobile to its base country to celebrate the release of Warner Bros. PicturesÂ’ highly anticipated action adventure movie, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. The Batmobile travelled from Europe to Asia by crossing the Bosphorus Strait via the new Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge which officially opens to the public this summer. This marked the longest-ever ride for the...

“Nobody has ever done a global startup before, have they?” muses Martin Leach, co-president of NextEV, an EV startup that intends to launch an electric supercar later this year and a mainstream vehicle in 2017. Founded in late 2014, NextEV has its design headquarters in Munich, a software hub in San Jose, and most of its engineers in Shanghai. “This time last year we were less than 10 people,” said Leach in an exclusive interview with IEEE Spectrum. “Now we’re over 1000, and by the end of this year, we’ll be over 2500. Probably by the end of 2017, we’ll...

Reportedly celebrated his new car with a bottle of champagneA newly minted McLaren owner in England became a little over-excited following the delivery of his brand-new supercar. Telegraph reports that the owner of a McLaren 650S stuffed the coupe into a tree just 10 minutes after the car arrived at his house for the first time. The report states that neighbors spotted the owner celebrating supercar ownership with a bottle of champagne right after the car arrived at his doorstep. Not 10 minutes later, the owner introduced the front end of his $265,000 supercar to the ever-sturdy trunk of an...

Four men have been rescued after spending nearly a month adrift in the Pacific surviving on fish after their boat was blown off course by a storm. The men, given a clean bill of health on arrival in the Marshall Islands, were dropped off in the capital Majuro by a fishing trawler which found their small wooden boat several hundred kilometres (miles) south of the city. Tatika Ukenio, Boiti Tetinauiko, Bonibai Akau and Moamoa Kamwea told officials they left their home in Kiribati, an island nation more than 650 kilometres (400 miles) from the Marshalls, on March 23.

In one of the most arid regions in the world a series of carefully constructed, spiralling holes form lines across the landscape. Known as puquios, their origin has been a puzzle -- one that could only be solved from space. The holes are from the Nasca region of Peru -- an area famous for the Nasca lines, several enormous geometric images carved into the landscape; immaculate archaeological evidence of ceremonial burials; and the rapid decline of this once flourishing society. What adds to the intrigue in the native ancient people of Nasca is how they were able to survive in...

Offending video featured three young players engaging in explicit actsIt was billed as a goodwill trip and a chance to unwind after a heroic relegation escape, instead Leicester City's close-season Thai tour became the turning point in their improbable title charge - all thanks to a racist sex tape. The offending video featured three young players including James Pearson, son of then manager Nigel Pearson, engaging in explicit acts with a group of Thai women in a Bangkok hotel. Filmed by the players in May 2016, the footage of the sniggering men soon ended up in the British tabloid...

If you've felt your blood pressure rise after seeing passengers being served champagne on the tarmac while you're fighting for overhead space in coach, you are not alone. A new study finds that class division in the skies can have a real and occasionally dangerous effect on passengers in both sections of a plane. And when economy-class passengers are forced to pass through the luxurious first-class area on their way to the cramped economy seats, the rate of air rage incidents is more than seven times higher than if there were no first-class seats at all. Researchers report that the...

. . . The world’s failure to effectively fight poverty can be significantly attributed to corruption, as most heads of state are more concerned with pleasing their wealthy financiers and retaining power. In addition, global thought leaders use inequality as a quest for global fame and padding their bank accounts. Sadly, the majority of influential global leaders lack sincere passion for the poor and compete for awards or reelection, instead of working together to find legitimate solutions, such as enhancing global education. . . . when implementing new education programs, we must avoid a common mistake made in past poverty...

Group of friends had enjoyed early morning meal in Istanbul restaurant Ä°dris AlakuÅŸ intended to pay and became angry when Hasan Erdemir did AlakuÅŸ stormed out before returning with a gun, shooting Erdemir dead This is the moment when a Turkish man shot his friend dead after the latter had paid their restaurant bill in Istanbul. Ä°dris AlakuÅŸ shot and killed Hasan Erdemir after an alleged argument over who was to pay for their soup in the capital's Bakirkoy district in the early hours of Sunday. CCTV shows Mr Erdemir paying for the bill, before Mr AlakuÅŸ appears in the...

Dogs and other animals now have a bathroom of their own at New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport. A new pet relief facility has opened in JFK’s Terminal 4, WCBS 880’s Stephanie Colombini reported. It allows service and guide dogs, emotional support animals and pets traveling with their owners to go to the bathroom without having to exit the terminal and go through security again. The tiny room is marked with a paw print on the door. It’s outfitted with a red fire hydrant and a patch of artificial turf, 1010 WINS’ Carol D’Auria reported. A federal regulation says all...

A boisterous welcome greeted the first American visitors to walk out the Sierra Maestra cruise terminal. Several hundred Cubans gathered in Plaza de San Francisco to witness the historic arrival. "I am here just to see it," said Mayalin Suarez Rubio, 41, a Cuban whose daughter lives in Hialeah. "We say welcome."

Researchers captured images of the short-eared dog in Puno's jungle regions. For the first time in Peru's history, researchers in the jungles of Puno captured images of an animal that they had long thought to be extinct: the short-eared dog. Also known as the small-eared fox, or Atelocynus microtis, the animal was photographed by camera traps in the Bahuaja Sonene National Park in the Puno jungle, Southern Peru, reports El Comercio. The animal's presence had not been detected in the Peruvian Amazon since 1987 and has been on the red list of threatened species of the International Union of Conservation...

Half of Western European men are descended from one Bronze Age 'king' who sired a dynasty of elite nobles which spread throughout Europe, a new study has shown. The monarch, who lived around 4,000 years ago, is likely to have been one of the earliest chieftains to take power in the continent... It is likely his power stemmed from advances in technology such as metal working and wheeled transport which enabled organised warfare for the first time. Although it is not known who he was, or where he lived, scientists say he must have existed because of genetic variation in...

A desperate mom was filmed as she dropped to her knees when a cruise ship left her and her husband behind while their three children were on board. The incident, which occurred on April 21, was caught on camera by passengers on board the Norwegian Breakaway cruise ship in the Bahamas. The 4,000-passenger ship was dockside preparing to depart for New York when the woman’s husband noticed she was missing. He was driven away in a buggy to look for her, leaving their three children on board. Minutes later, the ship’s horn blew as it sailed off. The couple tried...

Germany plans to subsidize electric cars in a bid to help the country’s auto industry compete in the global market for the growingly-popular and environmentally friendly vehicles. Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble says starting May buyers will get €4,000 ($4,514.80) to buy an all-electric vehicle. Plug-in hybrids will receive a subsidy of up to €3,000. The cost will be shared equally by the government and industry. …

The largest ever study of global genetic variation in the human Y chromosome has uncovered the hidden history of men. Research published today (25 April) in Nature Genetics reveals explosions in male population numbers in five continents, occurring at times between 55 thousand and four thousand years ago... analysed sequence differences between the Y chromosomes of more than 1200 men from 26 populations around the world using data generated by the 1000 Genomes Project... involved 42 scientists from four continents... Analysing the Y chromosomes of modern men can tell us about the lives of our ancestors. The Y chromosome is...

Dairy fats on Iron Age pottery sherds, evidence of pre-historic origin for dairying. The discovery of dairy fats on ancient pottery may indicate dairying high in the Alps occurred as early as the Iron Age over 3000 years ago, according to a study published April 21, 2016 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Francesco Carrer from the University of York, UK, and colleagues. Dairy farming has long been an important economic and cultural tradition in the European high Alps, but little is known about when and how the practice originated. Using organic residue analysis, the authors of the present...

About an hour into a red-eye American Airlines flight from San Francisco to Charlotte on Saturday, a passenger pulled his pants down, arched his back, and urinated on the floor of the airplane, according to an affidavit filed by the FBI Sunday. Jordan Gardner, of Ludlow, Ky., was met by Charlotte-Mecklenburg police after the plane landed at 7:45 a.m. Sunday. He is being detained at Mecklenburg County Jail pending a hearing Thursday. He faces a criminal complaint of destruction of aircraft, according to court documents. The passenger sitting next to Gardner summoned a flight attendant, who saw Gardner pulling up...