Free Republic

With conservatives back in power, public media is getting back to what it really excels at. No, not objective, impartial reporting. If NPR and PBS focused on that, they wouldn’t need to be so good at their side hustle: desperately lobbying Congress not to defund them. Now that they’re good at. The lobbying efforts have worked every time conservatives have had power, going back to when President Lyndon Johnson created the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in the late 1960s. Every Republican president after Johnson has tried to defund, dissolve, or reform public broadcasting. Yet the CPB is still standing, and...

President-elect Donald Trump’s choice to “Make America Healthy Again” as the head of the Department of Health and Human Services — petitioned the government to stop use of all Covid-19 vaccines in the heart of the pandemic. Kennedy petitioned the Food and Drug Administration in May 2021, asking that the agency revoke authorization for Covid vaccines, The New York Times reported Friday. Kennedy has a long history of spreading vaccine conspiracy theories, and was a vocal opponent of preventative measures during the pandemic. In 2022, at a rally organized by his group Children’s Health Defense, he compared measures around Covid...

CBS is considering settling a $10 billion lawsuit brought by Trump over its deceptively edited ’60 Minutes’ interview with Kamala Harris. CBS executives are reportedly worried ongoing litigation with President Trump will interfere with a merger with Skydance. “Paramount, owner of CBS, its namesake studio and several cable channels, has a major piece of business in front of the new administration: its planned merger with Skydance Media,” The Wall Street Journal reported. “It’s become clear to executives at both companies that Trump’s dissatisfaction with CBS News will make the review tougher than they anticipated, and that they’ll likely need to...

Baroarbunga, one of the largest volcanoes in the whole of Iceland, has seen 130 earthquakes shatter its surrounding surfaces in just five hours, leading many to feel a full scale eruption will force flights to be severely disrupted. Iceland has been the unfortunate home of many severe volcanic eruptions, with the most famous in recent times coming in 2010, when Eyjafjallajokull erupted, causing some 20 countries to close their airspace completely to travellers, impacting 10 million passengers looking to fly through, and out of Europe, as 100,000 flights were called off, and 80 million dollars was lost due to airport...

A Gloucester County man admitted to skirting $3.4 million in taxes over a seven-year period by cashing checks at a check cashing location rather than depositing the money he collected for his business into bank accounts, officials with the U.S. Attorney’s Office said Tuesday. Jose Camilo Perez Jr., 54, of Sewell, pleaded guilty to one count of tax evasion in Camden Federal Court and is scheduled to be sentenced on May 20. From 2016 to 2023, Perez collected over $8 million from clients that included hospitals and other healthcare entities to digitize medical records, authorities said. Instead of depositing the...

CNN host Fareed Zakaria tried to claim (a) Bidenomics was mind-boggling genius, and also (b) white working-class voters hated it and rejected it in November. So forget those unwashed, uneducated white voters. Democrats should stop trying for those voters and stick to college-educated women and minorities. The host of CNN's Fareed Zakaria GPS bellowed in a January 17 op-ed for The Washington Post that Biden’s spendthrift economic catastrophe was actually “a resounding success.” But, alas, as Zakaria lectured in his ridiculous headline, “Biden failed to win the working class. Democrats might want to stop trying.” Of course, Zakaria’s idea of...

On today's Morning Joe, Jonathan Lemire said there's skepticism the hostage deal will hold because Netanyahu -- not Hamas! -- might "submarine" it. Yes, you can always trust the sterling citizens of Hamas to be good to their word. But Bibi? Not so much--you know those tricky Israelis! Lemire also got in an unintentional laugh line, saying: '"Biden privately blames Netanyahu for prolonging the war, which he believes hurt his re-election chances." As I posted at X: "Yes, if only Bibi had been more malleable, Biden wouldn't have said 'we finally beat Medicare' during the debate." Get the rest of...

Number one: Our elections are being stolen. Every time we try to protect our elections, Democrats cry “racism.” So why not adopt the exact Voter ID law of Mexico? That kills the Democrat’s argument. How can it be racist to implement the same voter fraud protections as Mexico. If it’s good enough for Mexico, if it isn’t racist in Mexico, why would it be “racist” in America? What does Mexico do to keep their elections honest? It’s simple. They require government-issued photo

GOP senators railed against a host of Alejandro Mayorkas’ failures in Friday’s confirmation hearing for Kristi Noem, President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The hearing at times seemed like a Republican therapy session for lawmakers who needed to express their disgust with current DHS Secretary Mayorkas, whom Republican Sen. Bernie Moreno of Ohio described as “the worst cabinet member ever in the history of the United States of America.” Senator Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican, recounted how Mayorkas established the Disinformation Governance Board “using taxpayer resources to police speech on the internet and elsewhere,...

John Solomon @jsolomonReports 50K people expected to protest Trump inauguration in Washington this weekend From justthenews.com 4:02 PM · Jan 17, 2025

Updated: On Jan. 17, 2025, President Joseph Biden said in a statement that he believes the "Equal Rights Amendment has cleared all necessary hurdles to be formally added to the Constitution as the 28th Amendment." According to a report from NPR, the White House said Biden wil not order the Archivist of the United States to certify the proposed amendment. Original Story: In recent weeks, several groups have asked outgoing President Joe Biden to order the Archivist of the United States to certify the Equal Rights Amendment (or ERA) as the next amendment to the Constitution. Although the ERA’s ratification...

The reason they will not help is unclear, but it may stem from internal disputes over Metro PD's use-of-force policy. DC police agreed in a lawsuit settlement to restrict the use of sting balls or explosive devices on protestors and rioters. More from NBC Washington:

A new rule by the FDA could change smoking as we know it.No drug is quite like nicotine. When it hits your bloodstream, you’re sent on a ride of double euphoria: an immediate jolt of adrenaline, like a strong cup of coffee injected directly into your brain, along with the calming effect of a beer. Nicotine is what gets people hooked on cigarettes, despite their health risks and putrid smell. It is, in essence, what cigarette companies are selling, and what they’ve always been selling. Without nicotine, a cigarette is just smoldering leaves wrapped in some fancy paper. But if...

As protesters gather in Washington DC on Saturday for this year's Women's March, Vanessa Wruble, one of its founders, will be 2,500 miles away, at her farm in the Californian desert. "I didn't even know it was still a thing," she told the BBC from her five-acre animal sanctuary near Joshua Tree, which features a zebra, mini cows and horses, peacocks and chickens. Eight years ago, on the eve of the first Women's March, Wruble had been consumed by it. In the aftermath of Donald Trump's surprise 2016 victory over Hillary Clinton, Wruble, along with a handful of other female...

What you need to know: Governor Newsom has suspended penalties and interest on late property tax payments for a year, effectively extending the state property tax deadline, for those living in communities impacted by the Los Angeles firestorms.

Federalist CEO Sean Davis blasted the FBI for stonewalling Congress’s investigation into the first assassination attempt against President-elect Donald Trump. The moment came during a Friday interview, in which Davis was asked by conservative commentator Tucker Carlson what information is publicly available about Thomas Crooks, the would-be assassin who tried to kill Trump at a July rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. The 20-year-old was killed by law enforcement shortly after the attempt on the incoming president’s life and information about his activities leading up to the shooting has remained scarce.Davis noted despite the near assassination having occurred months ago, Americans “still...

COLORADO: Rocky Mountain Oysters Rocky mountain oysters aren't a type of seafood—they're actually fried bull testicles. Whether or not that sounds appetizing, these are a delicacy in Colorado.

President-elect Trump will be sworn in Monday inside the Capitol Rotunda, and D.C. will be packed with events surrounding the inauguration. Why it matters: Hundreds of thousands of people will gather in D.C. for the event, sparking road and Metro closures plus a massive security operation. Here's everything you need to know: Schedule Saturday, Jan. 18 Trump will kick off the weekend with a reception and fireworks at Trump National Golf Club in Sterling. There will be a cabinet reception and the vice president's dinner, as well. Sunday, Jan. 19 The "Make America Great Again Victory Rally" will begin at...

CNN is set to banish longtime anchor and former White House correspondent Jim Acosta to the “Siberia of television news,” according to a report from a former colleague.Acosta, known to conservatives as an annoyance to President-elect Donald Trump, will see his program CNN Newsroom with Jim Acosta moved from 10 a.m. to midnight, ex-CNN senior media reporter Oliver Darcy said.“The move would effectively exile Acosta to the Siberia of television news,” according to a Status News update from Darcy.

President Joe Biden released a statement Friday declaring that the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) “has become part of our Constitution.” Biden asserted that as of 2020, 38 states have ratified the amendment and stated it should now be recognized as “the law of the land,” according to a White House press release. The amendment is meant to ensure equal rights for men and women in the U.S., but some interpretations of the text have implied it would erase gender distinctions and grant abortion protections. “The American Bar Association (ABA) has recognized that the Equal Rights Amendment has cleared all necessary...