Free Republic

In the year since Florida enacted its red flag law, Kendra Parris has defended nearly 20 clients against risk protection orders that could remove their firearms. The Orlando-based lawyer has long represented people who might be subject to the state’s involuntary mental health treatment provision. But when this new law, meant to protect against people who might be a harm to themselves or others, passed in the aftermath of the February 2018 Parkland mass shooting, she saw yet another opportunity for the state to potentially deprive certain people of their civil liberties. “It’s almost like a shiny new toy for...

DENVER — After watching his mother die slowly when he stopped her medication, Neil Mahoney knew he wanted the option of ending his own life peacefully when a doctor told him in July that he had months to live after being diagnosed with cancer. A physician was willing to help him do that under Colorado’s medically assisted suicide law, but she was fired by Centura Health, a health system affiliated with the Catholic and Adventist churches, for violating its guidelines on the issue. The action launched a legal fight over whether the law violates the organization’s freedom of religion and...

Growing demand for donkey meat and skin in China is causing a sharp decline in the animals in Kenya. Animal rights campaigners warn that donkeys could soon disappear in the east African country, where they play a vital role as beasts of burden, especially in rural areas. Since 2014, four abattoirs have been set up in Kenya to meet demand. The meat is considered a delicacy in China and the skins are processed to create ejiao, a traditional remedy used to treat everything from anaemia to dizziness. However, according to a recent report by the African Network for Animal Welfare...

'It's been a tradition for us to fast on Fridays. However, this tradition somehow was abolished,' said Bishop Joseph Ha Chi-shing As widespread protests continue in Hong Kong, a local bishop is urging people to pray and fast for peace, while speaking up against injustice and corruption. The auxiliary bishop of Hong Kong, who has been a vocal supporter of the protests, told CNA that he hopes prayer will help transform the area into “a channel of God’s peace.” “We’re urging fellow parishioners to join our ‘Friday fasting’ movement,” Bishop Joseph Ha Chi-shing told CNA on August 30. “It’s been...

Polish legal expert says the fight is not overWARSAW, Poland (ChurchMilitant.com) - In the face of pushback, the city of Warsaw, Poland, has withheld implementation of an aggressive document that would introduce LGBT themes to young school children in city schools. Rafał Trzaskowski, mayor of Warsaw, signed the "Warsaw LGBT+ Declaration" Feb. 18, a document that grants many benefits to LGBT activists related to education, public activities, culture and sports. In the area of education, the declaration called for classes in Warsaw schools on homosexuality, bisexuality and transsexuality, implementing the World Health Organization's standards that include encouraging early childhood children...

The Chudov Monastery, named in honor of the miracle of the Archangel Michael at Conae, was built in 1358, and stood within the Kremlin walls until it was destroyed by the godless soviets in 1929. The 14th building of the Kremlin was built over the site of the Chudov and Ascension monasteries between the Spassky Gate and the Senate Palace from 1932 to 1934; the dismantling of the building began in the fall of 2015, revealing a number of archaeological treasures. Now those treasures will be on display in an underground archaeological museum, built on the foundations of the Chudov...

Autodromo Nazionale Monza First Grand Prix1950 Number of Laps53 Circuit Length5.793km Race Distance306.72 km Lap Record1:21.046 Rubens Barrichello (2004)

FR CANTEEN MISSION STATEMENT Showing support and boosting the morale of our military and our allied military and the family members of the above.Honoring those who have served before. FReeper Canteen Just Hangin' Cafe Come on in, we're open Need a place just to hang out? This is it. We serve coffee, tea,or maybe a tall brew? Topped off with great conversation and music. No worries in the FReeper Canteen Just Hangin' Cafe. Grab a glass and start a conversation. You never know who you might meet in the Cafe. Glad you could join us. Enjoy your stay. Our...

“Public Enemies List: Trump supporters face boycotts, bullying amid calls to be named and shamed” [Fox News headline] “They want to cost people their livelihoods just because you don’t agree with them politically,” Sam DeMarco, Allegheny County councilman and chairman of the county’s Republican Party, told the local CBS affiliate. “It’s not just absurd, but I believe it’s dangerous.” DeMarco continued, “People who they just don’t agree with, they want to take and punish. I absolutely believe this is a fascist behavior, and I totally reject it.” This is real. Anyone who’s a Trump supporter knows that opponents of the...

Former Vice President Joe Biden struggled to explain his plan to persuade China to lower its carbon footprint on Wednesday. Biden, who has fluctuated between downplaying China as an economic threat to warning they may soon outpace the U.S. in energy and infrastructure, was asked during CNN’s climate change town hall how he would pressure the communist power to address its carbon output—which is currently the largest in the world.

Excellent 12 minute update. The bi-partisan effort to recall the most extreme governor in the US (looking to make her national mark on the necks of common people) looks to be on track. Among many executive abuses, Illegal Drivers Licenses were defeated by a 66% majority state-wide vote, which she overturned with an “emergency order”. People are both angry and energized. Trump can turn Oregon Red

No, no, no. Hell, no! That’s my response to the latest trial balloon floated by the White House to join with Silicon Valley on a creepy program monitoring Americans’ “neurobehavioral signs” to (purportedly) prevent gun violence. President Donald Trump’s old friend, former NBC head Bob Wright, has been pushing an Orwellian surveillance scheme called “Safe Home” — “Stopping Aberrant Fatal Events by Helping Overcome Mental Extremes” — that would cost taxpayers between $40 million and $60 million. The Washington Post, owned by Amazon billionaire founder Jeff Bezos, reports that the plan could incorporate “Apple Watches, Fitbits, Amazon Echo and Google...

1st NFL game of the season. What was that opening?

The change of power in Russia will be very similar to my arrest. On the night of Aug. 2, when the longest day of my life finally ended and I laid down on a hard bunk bed in an isolation cell of a detention center, the similarity of these two events suddenly became clear to me. And while my cellmates slept — one young and one middle-aged man who were facing prison terms for armed robbery — my tired and screaming brain continued to draw parallels…. However repressive the ruling regime is, however widespread lawlessness becomes, you never think that...

Adrian Dahood-Fritz was a marine conservation scientist for the state’s Ocean Protection Council and had been on board the 75-foot Conception for the dive trip along with her husband, Andrew Fritz. “Adrian led the state’s efforts to manage California’s network of marine protected areas, and she cared deeply about the ocean and biodiversity,” Newsom said. Crews are searching for the remains of the final victim yet to be found following the disaster off Santa Cruz Island early on Monday morning. Authorities have been using a DNA analysis here tool typically employed in war zones to identify the 33 badly burned...

After the surprise resignation of Secretary of Defense James Mattis last December, Democrats were quick to politicize the news, and have certainly been hoping ever since that Mattis would provide them with new information they could use to attack Donald Trump. He does have a memoir coming out, Call Sign Chaos: Learning to Lead, but it looks like it’s Barack Obama and Joe Biden who get the bulk of the criticism. Prior be being Secretary of Defense under Trump, Mattis served as commander of U.S. Central Command under Obama and Biden. Mattis had predicted that Iran would continue to provoke...

[Catholic Caucus] Below the Belt: Francis Ridicules Cardinal Müller In a conversation on the plane to Maputo, Mozambique (September 4), the German bootlicker-journalist Andreas English said to Pope Francis that “not all Germans believed the bad things said about him by the German Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller”. According to NyTimes.com, Francis asked back what Cardinal Müller had said about him. Englisch answered that Müller wanted to save Francis’ papacy from bad theology. Francis replied that Cardinal Müller “has good intentions and he is a good man, but he is like a child.” In the same conversation, Francis called his decision...

Congressman Devin Nunes, ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, has sued Fusion GPS, Glenn Simpson and left-wing front group Campaign for Accountability, Inc., in federal court in Virginia. It is in considerable part due to Nunes’s tenacity as Chairman of the Intelligence Committee that we know as much as we do about the biggest political scandal in American history, the Russia collusion hoax. His lawsuit alleges a campaign to smear him and to obstruct justice by the defendants. The lawsuit is pled as a RICO case. I am not an expert on RICO, but I am skeptical that it...

Here’s the deal, if you are looking to this president, or you were looking to the past president, or you are looking to a future president to make your life better you’re on a fool’s errand. It was the furthest thing from the minds of the Founders and Framers that any individual should have such power and sway. If you are looking to Congress — this Congress or a past Congress or a future Congress — to make your life better you’re on a fool’s errand. It was maybe the second furthest thing from the minds of the Founders and...

Cubans make up the largest number of migrants in Mexico trying to obtain asylum in the United States. But policy changes in the Obama and Trump administrations have made it harder for Cubans fleeing the island. Immigration officials deported 120 Cubans on a single flight last week — one of the “largest” Cuba repatriation missions in recent history. Last Friday’s U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement charter flight from New Orleans to Havana was one of many to come, two federal sources say, noting that officials have been quietly ramping up their efforts to detain and send undocumented Cubans back to...