Free Republic

https://babylonbee.com/news/al-qaeda-claims-responsibility-for-cracker-barrel-logo-changeKABUL — In a newly released video, the terrorist group Al-Qaeda has claimed responsibility for the changing of the Cracker Barrel logo. The group carried out the attack in the dead of night last week, posting the logo on sites across the world and sending Americans reeling. "America shall never recover from the devastation we have unleashed," said Saif al-Adel, commander of the Al-Qaeda. "We have hit the infidels where it hurts the most. Praise be to Allah, the Cracker Barrel guy is no more. There is nothing but a soulless void, thanks to our glorious freedom fighters. Take that,...

As Republicans in Texas and Democrats in California strong-arm their way toward redrawing congressional maps, it can be dizzying to keep up. One way to understand what’s happening is to ask a simple question: Which party will come out ahead? Republicans currently hold a 219-212 edge over Democrats in the House of Representatives, with four vacancies (three seats that had been held by Democrats who died and one by a Republican who resigned.) But with President Trump fretting that Democrats could gain control of the House after next year’s elections, Republican state legislators are frantically trying to gerrymander the maps...

An Obama judge issued an injunction on Thursday ordering Florida not only to halt the arrival of new detainees to Alligator Alcatraz but to begin dismantling the facility. The Sunshine State isn't rolling over, and Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis' office indicated that President Donald Trump's deportation campaign will continue as planned. Quick background After DeSantis tasked state leaders with identifying places for a new detention facility to temporarily house outbound criminal noncitizens, Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier made a public pitch in favor of "Alligator Alcatraz" — "an old, virtually abandoned airport facility" in the Everglades that could serve as...

The Rhode Island assistant attorney general, whose arrest went viral earlier this week after she seemingly tried to use her position to evade arrest, telling officers they'd "regret" putting her behind bars, will be placed on unpaid leave. Special Assistant Attorney General Devon Flanagan, who was arrested for trespassing, was placed on paid leave directly after the incident while the Rhode Island Attorney General's office reviewed the matter. But, starting Monday, Flanagan will go on unpaid leave, the office told Fox News Digital. It is unclear how long Flanagan will remain on unpaid leave until a final determination is made...

@RepThomasMassie Our government should not have ownership in private companies. There are so many specific problems with an arrangement like this, but fundamentally, this is not who we are as a country.

Public perceptions about slow vote-counting lend some credence to Trump’s mail-in ballot criticism.How did Donald Trump convince so many people that the 2020 presidential election was stolen? The question is relevant again as the president renews his campaign against mail-in ballots. “You can never have a real democracy with mail-in ballots,” he said Monday, and an executive order targeting the practice is supposedly in the works. Trump’s campaign against mail-in voting in 2020 foreshadowed his efforts to delegitimize Joe Biden’s election victory. But as two studies published last month illustrate, Trump might have been pushing on an open door. Insofar...

Public perceptions about slow vote-counting lend some credence to Trump’s mail-in ballot criticism.How did Donald Trump convince so many people that the 2020 presidential election was stolen? The question is relevant again as the president renews his campaign against mail-in ballots. “You can never have a real democracy with mail-in ballots,” he said Monday, and an executive order targeting the practice is supposedly in the works. Trump’s campaign against mail-in voting in 2020 foreshadowed his efforts to delegitimize Joe Biden’s election victory. But as two studies published last month illustrate, Trump might have been pushing on an open door. Insofar...

It’s not easy being from California, especially if you’re hoping to leave the Golden State’s fires and rising home costs behind and move to a more affordable red state. In Texas, some politicians have adopted “Don’t California my Texas” as both a rallying cry and a fundraising appeal. And now, in Oklahoma, education officials have entered the fray by requiring teachers from California and New York to take an exam aimed at guarding against “radical leftist ideology.” The test is being developed by leadership from the Oklahoma State Department of Education and PragerU, a nonprofit advocacy group that produces videos...

The embattled CEO of Cracker Barrel has been accused by workers of slashing working hours and reducing food quality, Daily Mail can exclusively reveal, as she faces calls for her resignation over a disastrous rebrand. The chain debuted a new logo for the first time in 48 years earlier this week, sparking outrage among customers and wiping millions off the company stock price, which shed almost $100 million in market value on Thursday. President and CEO Julie Masino, who earns $1 million a year, has become a target for those outraged over the change. Staff have vented over what they...

Activists who hung posters of hostages on fences in the city of Frankfurt, Germany, were attacked by pro-Palestinians, and one of the attackers sprayed them with red paint. Sacha Stawski (55), a member of the Jewish community and activist with Honestly Concerned, an organization fighting antisemitism, said that his group were pushed into a corner and insulted, but that the harassment did not stop them from putting up the posters. .....

Pierre Cote spent years languishing on public health waitlists trying to find a therapist to help him overcome his PTSD and depression. When he couldn’t, he did what few might consider: he built one himself.“It saved my life,” Cote says of DrEllis.ai, an AI-powered tool designed to support men facing addiction, trauma, and other mental health challenges. Cote, who runs a Quebec-based AI consultancy, tells Reuters that he built the tool in 2023 using publicly available large language models and equipped it with “a custom-built brain” based on thousands of pages of therapeutic and clinical materials.Like a human therapist, the...

A high school senior who claims she was banned from painting biblical messages on her student parking spot is fighting back. Sabrina Steffens, a senior at Grand Island High School near Buffalo, New York, told CBN News that seniors at her school are allowed to personalize their paid parking spots. But when she attempted to have verses and Christian art painted on hers, the school reportedly refused.

During a Q&A session in the Oval Office on Friday, President Donald Trump reignited the national conversation on gun rights by proposing a bold expansion of concealed-carry laws to include Washington, D.C. Trump argued that residents of the nation’s capital must have the ability to protect themselves amid a surge in violent crime.“People have to be able to protect themselves,” Trump said. “Especially in Washington, you walk down the street, a guy comes up and slugs you. He’s got a pistol in his hand. You can be tough, you can be powerful, or you can be a guy that weighs...

President Trump has embraced an array of far-right views and talking points in ways that have delighted many right-wing activists who have long supported those ideas.During President Trump’s first turn in the White House, right-wing extremists like the Proud Boys were on the streets, weekend after weekend, raising their voices — and oftentimes their fists — about issues such as immigration, the squelching of conservative speech and the removal of Confederate-era statues. But in the first seven months of Mr. Trump’s second term, there has been a conspicuous absence of far-right demonstrations. And that, some leaders of the movement say,...

Record heat waves, blazing wildfires and oppressive humidity are transforming the world’s tourism industry as holidaymakers struggle to deal with the havoc wrought by climate change. That’s seen a growing number look beyond traditional hotspots like Greece and Portugal in favour of ‘coolcations’ – visiting parts of the world that offer milder climes. Already, nearly half of Virtuoso’s luxury travel advisers say their clients are altering plans due to climate change. Heat waves in Europe saw tourist sites including the Acropolis in Athens and the Eiffel Tower in Paris shut this summer, and the region is tipped to see a...

Illinois started to provide standard driver's licenses to undocumented immigrants last year. Gov. JB Pritzker has now signed a bill into law to allow them to become driving instructors. In 2013, Illinois led the country as one of the first states to issue temporary visitor driver's licenses to help drivers who passed road tests regardless of immigration status. The 2024 law allowed undocumented immigrants to receive standard IDs without the large purple mark stating not valid for identification. House Bill 3125 will allow anyone with a TVDL for at least two years to teach driving courses. Sponsors said this change...

Explanation: How big is planet Earth's Moon? Compared to other moons of the Solar System, it's number 5 on the largest to smallest ranked list, following Jupiter's moon Ganymede, Saturn's moon Titan, and Jovian moons Callisto and Io. Continuing the list, the Moon comes before Jupiter's Europa and Neptune's Triton. It's also larger than dwarf planets Pluto and Eris. With a diameter of 3,475 kilometers the Moon is about 1/4 the size of Earth though, and that does make it the largest moon when compared to the size of its parent Solar System planet. Of course in this serene, twilight...

[Catholic Caucus] “Mass of ALL Ages”? Shiny New Lecture Series Rehashes 1970sWhenever a person writes, he always has to ask himself one question: Who is my audience? No matter his disposition or ideas, a writer writes to a certain group with their ideas (written and unwritten) and culture, which can often be very complex.I thought about this question today when I saw an ad promoting the latest work of Dr. Brant Pitre, a 32 hour, 130 dollar, 25 CD (or MP3) collection entitled Mass of All Ages which argues that actually, the Novus Ordo is the truly Traditional Mass!Now before...

The federal government is trying to force Kilmar Abrego Garcia to accept a guilty plea or face deportation to Uganda, his attorneys claimed in a filing on Saturday.The Salvadoran man, who was wrongly deported in March before being brought back to the United States to face human smuggling charges, was released from criminal custody in Tennessee and sent back to Maryland on Friday.After Abrego Garcia declined an offer to be deported to Costa Rica in exchange for remaining in jail and pleading guilty to the human smuggling charges, his attorneys say U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement informed them that he...

" ... the FDA will disclose adverse events publicly in real time."The Food and Drug Administration on Friday started to publicly report adverse events to drugs and some vaccines in real time, a change FDA Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary said promotes “radical transparency.” The FDA Adverse Event Reporting System, known as FAERS, is what the FDA uses as its primary database for collecting adverse event reports related to medication errors, prescription drugs, and some vaccines — though the main database for vaccine adverse event reports is known as VAERS. The reports are collected from health care professionals, manufacturers, and consumers....