Free Republic

Prominent Democratic donor and LGBTQ political activist Ed Buck was arrested Tuesday and charged with operating a drug house, with prosecutors calling him a violent sexual predator who preys on men struggling with addiction and homelessness. Buck was charged with one count each of battery causing serious injury, administering methamphetamine and maintaining a drug house, according to the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office. Buck is accused of injecting a 37-year-old man, who overdosed but survived, with methamphetamine on Sept. 11. That latest incident comes after two men were found dead in his Laurel Avenue apartment in Hollywood. In both...

Presidential hopeful Beto O’Rourke says a dearth of new gun control laws is no excuse for inaction by banks and credit card companies. The Democrat took to Twitter on Thursday to blast financial institutions for not acting in the absence of legislation passed by Congress and signed into law by President Trump. “Credit cards have enabled many of America’s mass shootings in the last decade — and with Washington unwilling to act, they need to cut off the sales of weapons of war today,” he began a series of tweets. “Banks and credit card companies must: 1. Refuse to take...

[Catholic Caucus] Vittorio Messori: “The Church does not belong to Bergoglio” Bruno Volpe La Fede Quotidiana September 17, 2019    “The Church doesn’t belong to Bergoglio but to Christ. Certainly, I’m worried” says the well-known Catholic journalist, Vittorio Messori, fine intellectual, author of a historic, John Paul II interview, at the time when interviewing a pope was not the done thing by newspapers.  “I have seen many people worried, even desperately. As a believer, nonetheless, I keep in mind that  the Church is not a business, a multinational or a state. In a word, it cannot fail. Certainly, there...

President Trump on Wednesday will conclude his two-day fundraising trip through California with a stop at the southern border to tour a section of the wall near Otay Mesa. The White House announced Tuesday night that Trump would visit Otay Mesa, which juts up against the U.S.-Mexico border, following two more fundraisers in southern California. The president will likely be briefed by border officials on the status of the project, which has been a cornerstone of his first-term agenda. Trump arrived in California on Tuesday. He held fundraisers at private residences near Mountain View and in Beverley Hills. He will...

Mercedes Stephenson from Global News has done some excellent follow-up coverage on the arrest of RCMP Intelligence Director Cameron Ortis. Mr. Ortis is facing seven serious charges of intelligence violations including obtaining information to pass to a “foreign entity.” The intelligence compromise is the biggest scandal in “a generation”. New evidence shows the arrest was a result of a 2018 international intelligence operation that targeted the encrypted communications service known as “Phantom Secure”. A man named Victor Ramos was the CEO of Phantom Secure, an enterprise that provided encrypted communication devices to criminal agents involved in drug smuggling, money laundering...

Westchester County (WABC) -- Police say a car crashed into the lobby of the Trump Plaza in New Rochelle Tuesday night. Authorities say it does not appear to have been intentional. There are no indications it was anything more than an accident. The driver was injured and was interviewed by police. Two pedestrians in the lobby were also injured, but no one was seriously hurt. Residents say the driver calmly exited his car after the crash, didn't say a word and just took a seat. "I just heard like a big boom," said resident Israel Galvan. "And everyone in there...

For most parents, daughters are a blessing. But in many parts of south and east Asia, where there exists a strong, culturally-rooted preference for sons, daughters are often unwanted and often selectively aborted prior to birth simply on account of their sex. In many Asian cultures, sons are strongly valued to carry on the family name, inherit property, or to provide parents with care and financial support in sickness and old age. Daughters, on the other hand, are often seen as a burden due to the practice of dowry in places like India, and due to the traditional custom that...

Scientists have proposed a method to connect the Earth and the moon with a cable that will allow us to travel between them, but the European Space Agency isn't convinced Two astronomers from the University of Cambridge and the University of Columbia have proposed a plan for a kind of elevator between the moon and the Earth. Have you ever thought about what it would be like if we could just hop in an elevator, press a button, and head up to the moon? According to the scientists' calculations, it would be possible to construct such a structure using existing...

Why are we even talking about schism? Who began this extraordinary conversation, and whose interests are served by it? Ross Douthat of the New York Times admits that he used the term "schism" long ago, as a theoretical possibility — which he now (rightly) regards as remote. But now Pope Francis speaks calmly about the prospect of schism, and even says that it does not frighten him — which, as I've pointed out, is frightening in itself. How did we come so far, so fast? How did we reach a point at which the nation's most prestigious secular newspaper raises...

The University of California is dumping fossil fuel investments from its nearly $84 billion pension and endowment funds, calling them a financial risk. An opinion article in Tuesday’s Los Angeles Times says UC will make its endowment fund “fossil free” by month’s end and its pension fund will soon follow. The pension fund covers 320,000 people. …

Rite Aid” … wrong store! Joe Biden’s latest campaign-trail gaffe is an inspiring tale about a Boston strike — it just didn’t happen quite like Joe said. The presidential front-runner was speaking at an AFL-CIO event in Philadelphia Tuesday when he recounted visiting Boston last April to address the Stop & Shop workers’ strike — except he called it the “Rite Aid strike.” “When I went up to the — there was the Rite Aid strike. I looked out in that parking lot when I was talking with the folks and I was walking a picket line up in Boston,”...

On his nationally syndicated radio talk show “The Mark Levin Show” on Monday, host Mark Levin warned that if something serious isn’t done, Iran will take this attack as a first step. “I will say this, if something isn’t done, something serious and significant isn’t done respecting Iran, they’re going to take this as a first step,” stated Mark Levin. “I’m just telling you. They’re going to take this as a first step. So, we’ll see what happens.” Mark Levin’s comments came after a Saudi Arabian oil facility was attacked by “cruise missiles and drones,” FOX News reported, that “were...

One doesn't have to squint too hard to see Monday night as a possible preview of a presidential general election campaign that will be at a frenzied pitch in just a year's time. Standing in New York City's Washington Square Park before a crowd of more than 20,000, Democratic presidential hopeful Elizabeth Warren gave an extended address where she pledged to fight Washington corruption and the vested corporate power that feeds it. A few hours later, near Albuquerque, New Mexico, Donald Trump gave another one of his trademark campaign rallies in an arena filled with roughly 9,000 supporters (and more...

Former Trump 2016 campaign manager Corey Lewandowski testified in front of the House Judiciary Committee for an impeachment inquiry on Tuesday and got into a heated exchange with Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif.

Cities in red states such as Texas, Georgia, and Arizona are becoming increasingly deep blue as a wave of millennials and white liberals move from blue state cities, coupled with a booming foreign-born population. As the 2020 presidential election nears, red-state cities are seeing not only the impact of immigration to the U.S. — with a national foreign-born population of 44.5 million — but of domestic migration as young people and white liberals flee hard-left states like New York, Illinois, and California. Analysis by The Atlantic finds New York City, for instance, is decreasing by about 277 residents every day...

A California bank robber could get extra time in prison because social justice warriors said his mask was offensive In Santa Monica, California, a bank robber could get extra time in prison because social justice warriors said his mask was offensive.Here’s a still from the security footage which shows the mask in question: (Source)I support the maximum prison time for anyone who robs a bank.But I don’t think anyone should ever go to prison for doing something that some people consider to be offensive.In this case, the proposed extra time for the robber is because the mask that he wore was...

Oil prices dropped sharply Tuesday, following Monday's surge that sent shock waves around the world. US oil futures settled down 5.7% at $59.24 a barrel. It was the worst one-day drop for US oil since August 1, according to Refinitiv. Oil prices initially fell after Reuters reported Saudi Arabian oil production would return to normal within two to three weeks. Tuesday afternoon, Saudi Energy Minister Abdulaziz bin Salman said the country's oil exports would not fall in September, as the kingdom will rely on reserves to keep exports stable. Investors took that as a positive sign about the impact of...

Unrecorded archaeological sites within Arizona’s Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument could be destroyed by President Trump's border wall construction, according to a newly public National Park Service report obtained by the Washington Post. The big picture: Customs and Border Patrol plans to finish construction through the Arizona International Biosphere Reserve by January, according to the report. Construction began on Aug. 29. The Trump administration told Axios in August it expects to build 450 miles of wall by the end of 2020 — but was unable to say when it would add its 1st mile of new wall to a border area without pre-existing barriers. Details: The Trump administration aims to replace...

LOVE DOES NOT PUT BABIES IN BINS "Christ's love says: 'I will die for you' and abortion is the evil reverse image of that which says 'you will die for me'." Martyn Iles There is a better way: Love Them Both. Raise your voice for the ones who have no voice. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=suNL2V4ketY (will youtube delete this Pro-Life speech?)

A heckler is commonly defined as someone who “interrupts a performer or public speaker with derisive or aggressive comments or abuse.” It's been six months since the heckling stopped. Six months since the last White House press briefing. Six months devoid of noxious nonsense.