Free Republic

U.S.—A new pair of Microaggression Goggles has been made available for people who want to find something offensive in any situation. The goggles are available on Kickstarter. The promotional video claims that the goggles are able to actively identify threats to political correctness and alert you when you're about to be dangerously oppressed. "Are you tired of having to search for something to be oppressed by?" a voiceover says in the ad. "With our patented microaggression-tracking technology, you won't have to search any longer. Now, you can instantly identify up to 100 things to be offended by in any conversation."...

This seems particularly unhinged. The media is constantly buzzing about how President Trump is unstable, but McCain’s behavior seems a bit…unusual. Presidential hopeful Senator Amy Klobuchar told a crowd on the campaign trail that the late John McCain muttered the names of dictators as he watched Donald Trump’s inauguration. “John McCain kept reciting to me names of dictators during that speech,” the Minnesota senator said, “because he knew more than any of what we were facing as a nation, he understood it.” She continued: “He knew because he knew this man more than any of us did.” Or it was...

SPRINGFEILD, Ill. (WLS) -- A controversial abortion bill has cleared a house committee in Springfield and has now been sent to the full Illinois House, where it is being debated Monday. The state's Human Services Committee passed the Reproductive Health Act bill in a rare late night Sunday meeting. The measure had been stalled for months. The bill would remove abortion restrictions in Illinois, repealing both the state's Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act and the Illinois Abortion Act of 1975. It also would expand insurance coverage for procedures and contraception. Proponents say the new bill modernizes Illinois' reproductive rights. "RHA...

President Trump has been labeled repeatedly as a Moscow agent by top Democrats and their intelligence officers, but in special counsel Robert Mueller’s report he comes up clean. An analysis by The Washington Times didn’t find one instance in which Mr. Mueller found that the businessman-candidate communicated with Russian government officials, was spying for Moscow or was being blackmailed. The lack of evidence is important. Attorney General William Barr has assigned U.S. Attorney John H. Durham to investigate how the FBI decided in July 2016 to open a counterintelligence probe into the Trump campaign — meaning in effect the president....

As you may know, our state lawmakers returned to the Capitol late Sunday afternoon to begin their last week of regular session, which is scheduled to end on Friday, May 31st. At 6:08 PM, SB 25 (House Amendment 1) was posted and then scheduled for a hearing at 7:08 PM. This proposal, sponsored by State Representative Kelly Cassidy (D-Chicago) is very similar to the extreme abortion expansion legislation filed by her earlier this year. It should be noted that this bill was posted and scheduled in the absolute minimum amount of time required to be considered in the Illinois General...

Intelligence warnings are growing that Russia will probably meddle in the 2020 elections, but Donald Trump and a powerful Senate ally are downplaying these concerns and not doing enough to thwart interfering, say Russia and cyber experts and key congressional Democrats. Despite fears that Moscow may seek to influence the 2020 elections by launching cyber attacks, social media disinformation, covert agent operations and other “active measures” as it did in the 2016 election, adequate funding and White House focus to counter any new Russian meddling are lagging, experts and officials say. Election security concerns that critics say require more resources...

By now, the public is well aware of the “Green New Deal” proposed by freshman Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. They have not responded well to calls for forced veganism and banning airplanes, let alone giving up the American way of life made possible by cheap energy. But while Ocasio-Cortez has taken the brunt of the media focus, environmental groups have developed a new strategy to get their way: pass a type of “Green New Deal” state by state. It’s a smart tactic. They get friendly, left-leaning state legislators and governors, most of whom they financially backed in the past election,...

BARCELONA, Spain — In what might be seen as a Memorial Day gift to President Trump, residents of a mountain range outside of El Paso today woke up to a new vista—a mile-long wall of metal slats constructed along the border with Mexico that just shot up over the weekend. The secret project, which started on Friday evening and was completed by Monday morning, was the work of We Build the Wall, a new group whose director is the former White House strategist Steve Bannon. The CEO is Air Force veteran Brian Kolfage, who had raised $20 million to build...

The economy invariably ranks among the top issues on the minds of voters in presidential elections. At the moment, it appears to offer President Trump a meaningful tailwind. But how big is that tailwind? Fortunately, economists have worked hard to develop models for predicting election outcomes, and according to one of the best of these, it should be quite large. One of the first — and perhaps still the best — of these models was created by Ray Fair, a professor at Yale. He found that the growth rates of gross domestic product and inflation have been the two most...

teven Rattner, "car czar" and counselor to the Treasury secretary in the Obama administration, cites three different modelers in his N.Y. Times commentary, "Trump’s Formidable 2020 Tailwind." The big picture: Trump wins all three modelers. Economists predict that the tailwind is large. Ray Fair, a professor at Yale, "found that the growth rates of gross domestic product and inflation have been the two most important economic predictors — but he also found that incumbency was also an important determinant of presidential election outcomes." "Mark Zandi, the chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, has looked at 12 models, and Mr. Trump wins...

MATTEO SALVINI's Lega Nord (League) Party has claimed a convincing European Parliament victory, in a shock result in Italy. The group has around 32 percent of the vote so far on the night, way ahead of the Democratic Party. Interior minister Matteo Salvini leads League, which came third in the 2018 general election. Following his victory, Mr Salvini said in Milan: “A new Europe is born. “I am proud that the League is participating in this new European renaissance.” He said previously: “As far as I'm concerned, if the League wins nothing changes in Italy, everything will change in Europe,...

The Ball Turret Gunner The near certainty the United States would be drawn into WW II prompted creation of an autonomous Army Air Force. Until the war in Europe began, standard doctrine gave an air corps had no mission beyond supporting the ground forces. Now air power advocates received the authority to prove the theory that bombers could win wars. The B-24 Liberator and B-17 Flying Fortress carried 10-13 .50cal machine guns for defense and the Norden bombsight for precision daylight attack. Under combat conditions, peacetime accuracy was never realized and bombers suffered horrendous losses until the P-51 Mustang could...

A cart attendant at a Walmart in Texas got quite the scare on Friday after discovering a large rat snake in a group of shopping carts. The Northeast Police Department said in a Facebook post that the reptile had worked its way into the group of carts at a return area of the Walmart in Cross Roads, located north of Dallas. "A loud scream across the parking lot at Walmart drew the attention of an NEPD Officer who was patrolling the area, at dusk this evening," the department said.

VIENNA, Austria: Austrian People’s Party leader Sebastian Kurz has been formally removed as Austrian Chancellor following a non-confidence vote passed by the Social Democrats and the populist Freedom Party. At just after 4 pm local time a vote of non-confidence in the government of Sebastian Kurz was carried in the Austrian parliament, which sees the downfall of both him as Austrian Chancellor and the rest of his ministers. The vote was initially proposed by Social Democrat (SPÖ) leader Pamela Rendi-Wagner who addressed Kurz saying, “You have said a lot, but have not yet said that your government has failed. You...

From the very first day an intelligence officer begins his training, he is primed on how to become the best salesperson in the world. Spies aren’t selling an ordinary product, however. The product they’re selling is treason. If an intelligence officer doesn’t close a deal, he might end up getting killed or spending the rest of his life inside a foreign prison. Treason, which is generally defined as betraying one’s country, is a pretty tough item to sell, particularly because the punishment for it is unforgiving. In the United States, when Ethel and Julius Rosenberg were convicted of conspiring to...

The perception deception continues. As the technological realm becomes more pervasive, whom can we trust? Each week, Liberty Nation brings new insight into the fraudulent use of personal data, breaches of privacy, and attempts to filter our perception. Three stories illustrate how the “perception deception” is in full swing, on the internet and on the streets. Controlled Spontaneity: Grassroots Action Just Government Propaganda? Over the past few weeks, we have looked at recent government responses to terrorism, from New Zealand’s Christchurch Call to Sri Lanka’s moratorium on all social media activity. While these countries – and those that chose to...

FULL TITLE: To be clear: The largest party in the entire European Union parliament is now led by @Nigel_Farage - Let that sink in

FULL TITLE: 96-year-old World War II veteran Pete DuPré played the national anthem on a harmonica before the @USWNT match

President Trump on Monday seized on a New York University professor’s false tweet as an example of journalistic malpractice while calling for the U.S. to modify its libel laws to hold news media accountable. In his early morning tweet while on an overseas trip to Japan, the president said a fake quote attributed to him by Ian Bremmer shows “what’s going on in the age of Fake News.” “People think they can say anything and get away with it,” Trump wrote. “Really, the libel laws should be changed to hold Fake News Media accountable!” Bremmer, who is the president and...

Pope Francis sounds racism alarm as EU nationalists win big VATICAN CITY (AFP) - Pope Francis warned on Monday (May 27) against a rise of intolerance and racism as far-right nationalists and eurosceptic parties made historic gains in European elections."The signs of meanness we see around us heighten our fear of 'the other', the unknown, the marginalised, the foreigner," he said in a message for the World Day of Migrants and Refugees."It is not just about them, but about all of us, and about the present and future of the human family.