Free Republic

Democrats in San Francisco have made theft under $950 a misdemeanor & cops won't even arrest you for the crime. Not surprisingly, this has had very predictable results. It turns out if you tell people they won't get arrested for stealing, it's like a free pass to go shopping.

Global health authorities have advised people to use contactless payments instead of banknotes where possible in order to stop spreading the new coronavirus. Health experts have previously warned that the virus can survive on inert surfaces long enough to infect new hosts, although the risk is believed to be lower than human-to-human contact. But a spokesperson for the World Health Organisation (WHO) told the Telegraph on Monday that the virus can remain infectious on banknotes for several days. The Bank of England has also acknowledged that banknotes ‘can carry bacteria or viruses’ and encourages shoppers to wash their hands after...

locks of hundreds of cockatoos are ravaging the fields of farmers who grow the plants that produce that bagel and kaiser roll mainstay — poppy seeds — on the Australian island, but experts caution it’s likely not due to an addiction to the opioid-producing plants. “The crop is about [11.8 acres] and the best estimation is that at least a third of the crop had been severely damaged by cockies,” Keith Rice, of Poppy Growers Tasmania, told Australia’s ABC. Some farmers down under have accused the cockatoos of just looking to get loopy on the alkaloid found in the poppies’...

Former Vice President Joe Biden will win the Massachusetts Democratic primary, according to an NBC News projection. The result is a crushing blow to rival Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who represents the state. Biden will win at least 28 of the state’s 91 delegates, according to NBC News, and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., will score at least 13. Warren will chalk up at least seven delegates, according to NBC. “I’m here to report we are very much alive,” an energized Biden said at a rally shortly before NBC shared its projection.

Former Vice President Joe Biden is projected to win more than half of the 14 states holding contests on Super Tuesday, exceeding expectations for a campaign that was in serious trouble just weeks ago. Biden’s eight victories included upsets in Minnesota, Oklahoma and Massachusetts, where he defeated Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and home-state Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D). He was also competing hard with Sanders for Maine, another state where he had been seen as a big underdog. Biden won blowout victories in Alabama and the swing state of Virginia, and was building big leads in North Carolina, Tennessee and Arkansas,...

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders has captured the biggest prize of the Super Tuesday primaries with a first-place finish in California, the Associated Press projects. Sanders’ west coast win comes as a big relief to the New England senator who lost a majority of the Super Tuesday contest states to former Vice President Joe Biden, who swept the southern primaries with big wins in Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, Arkansas, and Oklahoma. Biden has also been declared the winner in Minnesota and Massachusetts, two states where Biden had no presence, while Sanders has only been projected to win Utah, Colorado, and...

The Manhattan lawyer hospitalized with coronavirus is in “severe condition,” the city Health Department said Tuesday evening. The lawyer, identified by sources as Lawrence Garbuz, 50, runs a boutique law firm with his wife that also employs one of their four kids as a paralegal, according to information posted online. The seven-lawyer practice, Lewis & Garbuz, is located across the street from Grand Central Terminal and specializes in matters including personal planning and wealth management, estate litigation, guardianships and elder law, its website says. Garbuz and his wife, also 50, both graduated from New York University and earned law degrees...

With their famous reputation for "tolerance" all out there, leftists, including the presumably vote-seeking Bernie Sanders, are mocking Vice President Mike Pence for beginning his coronavirus task force, a serious group of working government leaders tasked with keeping the infectious disease from spreading through the U.S., with a prayer. Here's an excellent description of just how this picture looks: I don't know anything about Mr. Williams, but this photograph and his comment perfectly illustrate the profound division in our culture. It's "obvious" to some of us that one of the things you do in a crisis is pray. It's "obvious" to others that praying...

President Trump has rightly won praise from medical professionals and public health officials for taking tough action, even against leftist criticism, for effectively protecting the U.S. from the ravages of the coronavirus. Nations that didn't do that, such as China itself — which hid the crisis, enabling its spread; South Korea — which kowtowed to China; and possibly Japan and Italy, are now reaping severe consequences.  Thomas Lifson wrote about the left's criticism here, and I wrote about Trump's sharp recognition of a threat when he sees one here. As the left continues to heap criticism on Trump, with various claims of "chaos," along with howls about a prayer before...

Americans across the country are stocking up on hand sanitizer, cleaning wipes, toilet paper and other products to prepare for the spread of coronavirus. Long lines at stores and panic buying on cleaning products throughout the country are stretching American retailers' ability to keep up with demand. Shoppers are posting pictures on social media of lines snaking around Costco and empty shelves of sanitizers at CVS, Walgreens and other drug stores. "Very, very busy!" Costco chief financial officer Richard Galanti said in an email Saturday. Costco was the top stock on the S&P 500 Monday. Walmart, Walgreens and other retail...

Re Against Zen. Divided By a Wall of China Dialogue between the two cardinals on the Sino-Vatican Agreement is urgently needed by Bernardo CervelleraIt is with great pain that I write these words having watched two cardinals whom I have the honor of knowing, two witnesses of the faith and coworkers of the pontiff in the mission of the Church, have a very public discussion without perhaps ever having spoken directly to each other (see letters of Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re and Cardinal Joseph Zen Zekiun). It leaves me with the impression that in the Vatican, as in the rest...

A research facility in Shanghai was shut down a day after it released information about the virus ahead of authorities. The Shanghai laboratory where researchers published the world’s first genome sequence of the new coronavirus has been shut down. The laboratory at the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center was ordered to close for “rectification” on January 12, a day after it publicized the genetic makeup of a new virus that would go on to sicken more than 89,000 people globally. “The center was not given any specific reasons why the laboratory was closed for rectification,” a source with the center...

The Manhattan lawyer hospitalized with coronavirus commuted regularly from his home in New Rochelle on the Metro-North Railroad, according to a report Tuesday. But it’s unlikely that he used the city’s subway system because his office is within walking distance of Grand Central Terminal, ABC News said, citing a source familiar with the case. During a news conference Tuesday, MTA Chairman Pat Foye said transit officials “don’t know whether that patient traveled to New York City using public transportation or not.” Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s office said the man’s movements were “still being looked at.” But Mayor Bill de Blasio wouldn’t...

According to NBC News and The Associated Press, Bloomberg campaign officials will deliberate over whether he should stay in the race after the disappointing results in multiple states before deciding whether to continue on Wednesday.

The brazen acts of petty theft and shoplifting are a dangerous and all-too-common consequence of Proposition 47, a referendum passed five years ago that critics say effectively gives shoplifters and addicts the green light to commit crimes as long as the merchandise they steal or the drugs they take are less than $950 in value. The decision to downgrade theft of property valued below the arbitrary figure from a felony to a misdemeanor, together with selective enforcement that focuses on more “serious” crimes, has resulted in thieves knowing they can brazenly shoplift and merchants knowing the police will not respond...

The first coronavirus patient in New Hampshire — an employee of Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center — defied instructions from public health officials to stay away from other people. In a statement, the state Department of Health and Human Services said the patient attended an invitation-only private event Friday "despite having been directed to self-isolate."

Joe Biden opened his speech calling his wife his sister and his sister his wife.

When disaster strikes, some people lose their heads, some people become cool and effective, but by far most people act as if they've suddenly forgotten the disaster. They behave in surprisingly mundane ways, right up until it's too late. Around the world, researchers are wondering how to combat normalcy bias. If you spend the beginning of your flights staring in disbelief at the cabin crew gesturing towards the emergency exits and asking you to look at them and think about walking to them in an emergency, you may be surprised that doing exactly that has saved one person. When two...

An Amazon employee in Seattle tested positive for COVID-19, the illness caused by the novel coronavirus, according to a message sent to Amazon employees Tuesday in Seattle and Bellevue. The message, viewed by The Seattle Times, said the employee worked out of the company’s Brazil office building, at Ninth Avenue and Republican Street in South Lake Union. “We’re supporting the affected employee who is in quarantine,” the company said in a statement. The employee went home feeling unwell on Tuesday, Feb. 25, and has not returned to work since, the message said. The message said Amazon received word Tuesday that...

Amazon.com Inc. notified employees Tuesday of the first confirmed case of coronavirus among its U.S. workforce. The online retailer told workers about the infected employee via email.