Free Republic

Obama Final Travel Tally: Nearly $100 Million JW Sues for FBI Records –and Payments – Relating to ‘Trump Dossier’ Government Yanks Report Blasting DHS for Catching Less than 1% of Visa Overstays We Probe Obama White House Influence Over FCC Attempt to Regulate Internet Obama Final Travel Tally: Nearly $100 Million There may be no better way to keep on eye on our leaders’ penchant for pretending to royalty than to tally the cost of their travel and accommodations. Our nation has granted its presidents exquisite transport because we need for our leaders to be efficient and safe. However,...

U.S. airlines have received some well-deserved criticism lately for their routine mistreatment of customers. But maybe it’s time air travelers also look in the mirror to see why so many jetliners have become venues for Mile High cage fights. Those folks might see a reflection of the Ugly American. The whiny American. The entitled American. Just this week, we’ve been treated to a fight night on a plane at Burbank Bob Hope Airport in California that ended with a Southwest Airlines flight attendant buried somewhere in the scrum. At Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport in Florida, passengers started duking it out...

Incentive Trap 2: Minimizing the Wait Time by Paul Gilster on May 9, 2017 When to launch a starship, given that improvements in technology could lead to a much faster ship passing yours enroute? As we saw yesterday, the problem has been attacked anew by René Heller (Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research), who re-examined a 2006 paper from Andrew Kennedy on the matter. Heller defines what he calls ‘the incentive trap’ this way: The time to reach interstellar targets is potentially larger than a human lifetime, and so the question arises of whether it is currently reasonable to...

On Monday, in a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) exposed former Acting Attorney General Sally Yates’s ignorance of the law, and the partisan nature of her decision to refuse to enforce President Donald Trump’s executive order suspending travel from several terror-prone countries. One would not know that from the liberal media, which thinks Yates won the exchange, but Cruz proved his case decisively. Here’s why — in short: Cruz brought up the law that authorized the executive order, and Yates did not recognize it. She then answered by referring to another law, which does not...

<p>NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — United Airlines has apologized to a French woman after she wound up on a plane to San Francisco instead of Paris from a New Jersey airport.</p> <p>Lucie Bahetoukilae was scheduled to fly from Newark to Paris last month. Bahetoukilae, who only speaks French, ended up in San Francisco after boarding a plane at the gate that corresponded with her ticket.</p>

LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- A Southern California family says they were kicked off an overbooked Delta airplane because they refused to yield a seat held by their young son. The Schear family of Huntington Beach says they were flying from Hawaii to Los Angeles last week when airline staff asked them to give up a seat occupied by their 2-year-old son and carry him on their laps for the duration of the flight. They tried to refuse and argued with airline staff, but say they were threatened with being sent to jail. "You have to give up the seat or...

Romance is in the air — and sometimes in the airport, according to an online flight-shopping service. About 1 in 10 American air travelers reports having had sex of some kind at an airport, compared with about 8 percent who are members of the Mile High Club, according to an important new survey conducted by a flight-shopping website.

NOTE: The link is to the public statement on the Dr. Dao incident by United. Complementing that public statement, United Airlines CEO Oscar Munoz emailed United MileagePlus members about that incident and what United intends to do in the future. It is posted for general information and comment. Dear Mr. XXXX, Each flight you take with us represents an important promise we make to you, our customer. It's not simply that we make sure you reach your destination safely and on time, but also that you will be treated with the highest level of service and the deepest sense of...

Attorney General Xavier Becerra won’t lift a ban on publicly funded travel to North Carolina even though the Southern state repealed the law that California Democrats condemned as discriminatory against gay and transgender people. North Carolina’s repeal of its House Bill 2, the so-called “bathroom bill,” late last month persuaded the NCAA to lift its own ban on sponsoring championship collegiate sporting events there. Becerra found the repeal inadequate, noting that North Carolina’s new law bans local governments and universities from passing their own anti-discrimination laws. A number of civil rights organizations, such as Equality California, denounced North Carolina’s repeal...

Little can surprise me in terms of the TSA’s waste, incompetence and sheer indignity, but this story may mark a new low. It’s about Evelyn Harris, a 65-year-old retiree who was flying out of Washington, D.C., this past January when she committed the terrible terrorism crime known as wearing a pantyliner. Harris went through the body scanner and thought she was free to proceed to her flight. A TSA agent thought otherwise. “I started to ask if I had done something wrong or if this was ‘random,’ but before I could get a second word out, the TSA agent yelled...

The European Parliament has taken the first step in potentially revoking visa-free travel of Americans to the European Union. The parliament’s civil liberties committee voted to end Americans’ visa-free travel to European Union countries, forcing the European Commission to reintroduce visa requirements on in-coming American travellers. The vote gives the Commission two months to adopt the needed legal measures revoking a reciprocity agreement the European Union had with the United States on travel. As long as neither the EU Parliament nor the Council of the European Union object, American travellers will be forced to apply for entry into the EU...

Poverty, sickness and pure survival - just a few reasons why genuinely needy people beg on the streets for money. But as these images show, the poor in southeast Asia are increasingly being joined by wealthy Western backpackers who are begging simply to fund their trips. The trend has caused outrage among locals, who say the tourists are taking money from the truly needy in order to finance lifestyle choices many consider a luxury.

As I retire, I want to devote my last column to travelers who wrote in to discuss their tips and travails. Some wanted to get something fixed. Some just wanted to vent. All were welcome. Dear Dr. Gridlock: I’m not a commuter, but I have a real gridlock problem. When people in a left lane don’t pull up to the vehicle in front of them, they block the ability of people trying to turn left from accessing the left-turn lane. I can’t even count how many times I’ve missed the left green arrow because of this. It seems that if...

There are many travel jobs that allow you to travel for an extended period of time. Be my guest, Google it. You’ll find lists upon lists, from Au Pairs, Wwoofing and volunteering to work as a bartender, waiter, and scuba instructor. Whilst these are all great ways to make money as you travel the world, they require you to be in a specific location for a length of time. Sure, many travelers enjoy this as they’re able to soak up the culture. Others prefer being on the move and not having to worry about finding a job because they have...

You are more than just just a tongue of men and angels , Yeah more than this, for your purpose and life is mine for I hold you in My Hand as a songbird singing out My Love for My Children. So do not cage My Love but set it completely free for only through this freedom shall they receive My unconditional Love " Through Grace " carved out in My Word for truly the words I desire for you to form from their mouths upon their tongues are Eternal Life all from the fruit from The Tree of Life....

A leaked DHS document is at the center of Trump’s travel ban controversy. Evidence that has been central to the two Federal judges instrumental in the March 15th revocation of President Trump’s travel ban was recently found to be false. The leaked Department of Homeland Security document first came to light via the Associated Press, where it was detailed in a February 24th article and has been cited as integral to the decision making process for the judges. The most important thing to note regarding this new information is that the judges based their ruling on false information about the...

The Trump administration Friday afternoon filed for an appeal of a Maryland federal judge’s ruling that the revised ban violates the First Amendment by disfavoring a particular religion. The case goes to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit in Richmond, Virginia. But a federal judge in Boston approved the original order, noted attorney Robert Barnes in an interview with XM Sirius radio’s Breitbart Daily News

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The Washington attorney general whose legal challenge has blocked implementation of the Trump administration’s January executive order on travel and refugees is asking a federal judge to extend the injunction to prevent portions of the revised order from taking effect next week. Attorney General Bob Ferguson will be joined by three other states — Minnesota, New York and Oregon — in the effort to prevent President Trump’s new travel ban from taking effect on March 16. “In our view, this new executive order contains many of the same legal weaknesses as the first and reinstates some of the identical policies...

Trump's new travel ban executive order The Trump administration plans to roll out its revised travel ban Monday, White House Counselor Kellyanne Conway said in an interview  It will go into effect on Mar. 16, 10 days from signing, as opposed to immediately; This travel ban will not apply to Iraq, based on its enhanced screening and reporting measures, Conway said. That would leave six countries from which individuals will be banned for 90 days, if there are no other changes to the countries listed: Iran, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. Syrian refugees will be treated the same way...