Free Republic

It’s now clear that COVID-19 is a deadly serious global pandemic, and all necessary precautions should be taken. Still, C. S. Lewis’s words—written 72 years ago—ring with some relevance for us. Just replace “atomic bomb” with “coronavirus.” In one way we think a great deal too much of the atomic bomb. “How are we to live in an atomic age?” I am tempted to reply: “Why, as you would have lived in the sixteenth century when the plague visited London almost every year, or as you would have lived in a Viking age when raiders from Scandinavia might land and...

ran’s President Hassan Rouhani has met with key advisers and officials to coordinate the suppression of media reports on the coronavirus pandemic in Iran. As numerous Iraqis returning from Iran have been saying, as a massive disaster is unfolding in Iran, the regime in Tehran wants to stop what it calls “gossip.” Iran’s Tasnim reports that the president’s office will “track” media reports. They want to push a campaign to highlight the regime’s response to the coronavirus. Under the guise of “accurate, clear and transparent information on countering coronavirus,” it appears the main goal is to try to get the...

Reports that Israel may soon produce a vaccine for the coronavirus prompted Iran’s Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi to say “it’s okay for Muslims to accept it.” The revered cleric cited an instance in the Prophet Muhammad’s life to support his ruling. “Mohammed was the first man to receive Allah’s command to exterminate the Jews,” he pointed out. “Yet, there came a moment when he agreed to a truce with these vermin that both sides should lay down their arms. When the Jewish army complied with this agreement the Prophet ordered them seized and beheaded.” “If Muslims are to obey...

At his daily briefing on the coronavirus emergency on Friday, Luca Zaia, the governor of Italy’s Veneto region, one of Europe’s worst-hit, told reporters that Europe’s borderless zone was “disappearing as we speak”. “Schengen no longer exists, it will be remembered only in the history books,” Zaia said, pointing to the long lines of traffic stuck at Italy’s northeastern border, where Austrian officials have reintroduced stringent controls. With Italy reporting the most virus cases and deaths anywhere in the world except China, the pandemic is increasingly wearing on the EU's cherished core principle, which envisions a border-free Europe where citizens...

Gov. Andy Beshear announced there are 16 positive cases of COVID-19 in Kentucky in his Saturday press conference. In addition to Harrison County, Jefferson County and Fayette County, cases have been confirmed in Bourbon County, Montgomery County and Nelson County/Meade County (one case has connection to both counties). Gov. Beshear said the first instance of an individual who tested positive and refused to self quarantine has now happened as well. The Nelson County resident was forced into isolation after the person refused, according to Gov. Beshear. Gov. Beshear also said that one person who tested positive is in "bad shape"...

During a press conference on Friday, Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) criticized the federal government’s response to the coronavirus and the “inconsistent” messaging from the federal government. She called on President Trump “to step back and appoint one of our public health officials to be the spokesman” and suggested Dr. Anthony Fauci serve as the spokesperson and give daily briefings on the virus. Collins said, “We are making progress at the federal level, but I am not satisfied with the response. I think that the messaging at the federal level has been inconsistent. And when you’re dealing with a novel virus...

Dr. Anthony Fauci has become a rare source of frank honesty from within the White House coronavirus task force in recent weeks, holding firm with an at times overly optimistic President and gently recommending steps forward in the face of crisis. The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases -- and a doctor for the National Institutes of Health for more than 50 years -- has even won public praise from President Donald Trump. Trump went so far as to say Fauci was doing a "tremendous job" and "working long, long hours" during a Rose Garden news...

---SNIP--- you can stop yourself from getting the virus and so can your relatives and friends, by following the same simple rules that Bruce Aylward and his team used. This international team of experts toured the worst virus hotspots in China. They came away again confident that they are not contacts for the virus and didn’t need to be quarantined before talking directly to the press. You can keep yourself safe from this virus in the same way, with the right hygiene. If most of us did this it would soon go extinct in the wild. All of us who...

Taiwan, a nation of 23 million, lies only 81 miles off the coast of China. About 2.71 million visitors fly from the mainland to the island each year. But while China’s coronavirus death toll stands at more than 3,100, Taiwan has had only 49 confirmed cases and just one death as of Friday. That’s despite early predictions that it would have the second-highest "importation risk" of any country. Taiwan's Central Epidemic Command Center was activated on Jan. 20, and between then and Feb. 24, it took 124 actions based on assessments gathered from the country’s integration of big data and...

Two decades after President Robert Mugabe wrecked Zimbabwe’s economy by urging black subsistence farmers to violently force white commercial farmers and their workers off their land, his successor has thrown in the towel.

In a tortured attempt to avoid insulting Mexico, Vice President Joe Biden today burnished his image as one of the nation's great verbal bumblers. "I wouldn't go anywhere in confined places now," Biden told Matt Lauer during an interview on "Today" when asked whether he would advise family members to use public transportation. "It's not that it's going to Mexico, it's you're in a confined aircraft when one person sneezes it goes all the way through the aircraft. That's me. I would not be, at this point, if they had another way of transportation suggesting they ride the subway. "...

Every woman cringed at having been talked down to before in their lives. https://t.co/hUqMyG86vl— Gretchen Carlson (@GretchenCarlson) March 14, 2020 ------------- Every woman understands Kelly O’Donnell’s facial expression when Donald Trump says, “Just take it nice and easy. Just relax.” God grant me the confidence of an inept man who takes time out of failing miserably to reprimand a woman doing her job well. pic.twitter.com/2QXh1uNOpZ— Shannon Watts (@shannonrwatts) March 14, 2020

When mushers arrive in Ruby, it marks the beginning of the journey on the Yukon River. The first musher to reach that milestone is treated to a five-course meal and other prizes. Jessie Royer won that award and shared her meal with other front-runners.

Things change fast in the time of coronavirus. But as public spaces closed down this week across the country over fears of the viral pandemic, moviegoers were still buying tickets to see the latest new releases, albeit at softer numbers than expected. Going into the Friday the 13th weekend, audiences will keep last week's box office winner "Onward" at #1 as three new wide-release challengers enter a precarious frame. The well-reviewed animated adventure will handily win the top slot in its second week according to early industry projections following Friday matinees. Still, the Disney and Pixar title is estimated to...

Believing that cow urine can ward off coronavirus, a Hindu group in India reportedly hosted a cow urine drinking party Saturday to test their belief. The cow is sacred to many Hindus and some drink cow urine believing it has medicinal purposes. But experts have repeatedly asserted that cow urine does not cure illnesses like cancer and there is no evidence that it can prevent coronavirus, according to Reuters.

CRIPPLE — As the world grapples with whatever new reality the coronavirus is bringing, a few dozen people racing through Alaska’s Interior find themselves insulated from the chaos. They’re the mushers competing in the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race. As they mushed along, watching for moose and changing out dog booties, professional sports leagues suspended seasons, gatherings of even a few hundred people were banned in some of the country’s most populated cities. The stock market took a historic dive. Yet, on the Iditarod Trail, you’d have no idea. In Takotna on Wednesday night, people weren’t huddled around a TV...

Much has been said by other conservative bloggers about the recent 1619 Project's correction, but missing from all of those articles is any mention the weakness left behind. A few days ago, this was posted online. Everybody focused on the two word change at the core of the correction. That's important, but that's not as important as this: Versions of this interpretation can be found in much of the scholarship into the origins and character of the Revolution that has marked the past 40 years or so of early American historiography — in part because historians of the past few...

Hard-core socialists aren't letting a national emergency go to waste. They want to exploit it to realize their ultimate dream: government ownership of the means of production--the very definition of socialism. On Joy Reid's MSNBC show this morning, Bill de Blasio, the extreme-left mayor of New York City, actually proposed the: "nationalization, literally a nationalization, of crucial factories and industries that can produce the medical supplies that can prepare this country for what we need." Get the rest of the story and view the video here.

April 30, 2009— -- Democrats hustled to temper Vice President Joe Biden's comments today that he would advise his family to avoid flying or being in confined spaces because of concerns about swine flu, a comment that drew criticism from the travel industry. At a news conference Wednesday evening, President Obama said Americans who may be sick should avoid airplanes and "any system of public transportation where you're confined," but the vice president today took it one step further. "I would tell members of my family -- and I have -- I wouldn't go anywhere in confined places now. It's...

NIKOLAI — Most mushers plan for a year, at least, to run the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race. John Schandelmeier had an hour. Schandelmeier said Wednesday morning in the frigid cold at the Nikolai checkpoint that he no longer has the burning desire to race sled dogs. To him, there would be no difference in finishing or winning the Red Lantern, the prize for the last musher to cross the finish line in Nome. Schandelmeier was a last-minute substitute for his wife, Zoya DeNure, who withdrew from the race just before the restart in Willow because of a heart condition....