Free Republic

...This sounds like a shakedown. Many of Biden’s positions have already moved to the left in a big way. If he caves-in to these demands, there wouldn’t really be much of a difference between a Biden or a Sanders candidacy, except that Sanders can navigate his way around a salad bar. (Tucker Carlson was joking on his show. He asked if Biden could find his car in a three-tiered parking lot? Can he navigate a salad bar?) Strassel reminds us that, normally when a candidate captures the nomination, they begin shifting back to the center. But Team Bernie is effectively...

Because of the coronavirus outbreak, Poland's ruling conservative government has held scaled-back commemorations marking the 10th anniversary of a plane crash in Russia that killed then-Polish President Lech Kaczynski and other high-ranking officials. Only a small group of senior officials, including Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the twin brother of the late president and head of the conservative Law and Justice Party (PiS), and Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, attended the wreath-laying ceremony at the Warsaw monument at the exact moment that the plane crashed on April 10, 2010, in the western Russian city of Smolensk.

The Trump campaign released an online ad Thursday that portrays Joe Biden as being soft on China, hitting the former vice president for protecting “China’s feelings.” “During America’s crisis, Biden protected China’s feelings,” the ad states, showing a montage of Biden with President Xi Jinping and news reports about how he was against President Trump’s coronavirus travel restrictions. “Or perhaps China’s investment?” then flashes across the screen along with news segments about Hunter Biden’s dealings with China. A line is also used from a Peter Schweizer and Jacob McLeod story in the New York Post about how “Joe Biden met...

Maybe you’ve seen the eyebrow-raising claims on the Internet or elsewhere in the media: rather than celebrating Jesus’ resurrection from the dead and triumph over crucifixion, Easter is really derived from a pagan holiday. Proponents of this theory point to symbols of rebirth and fertility, like eggs and bunnies, that we see at Easter as proof. But the foundation of the claim that Easter is a pagan tradition is the similarity in names: Easter, they say, is the English translation of Eostre, a Germanic goddess of fertility. (Others claim Easter got its name from the Mesopotamian goddess Ishtar, or the...

If President Trump starts opening the economy on a roll-out basis, etc...Would state governments have to cooperate if their lockdown timelines extend beyond President's preliminary deadline of April 30th?

...While the cumulative totals of cases and deaths continue rising, the media are doing a lousy job of reporting the most important numbers: How many COVID-19 patients are currently hospitalized? How many new patients are admitted to the hospital each day, and how many patients are discharged? The reason for “social distancing” policies was to slow the spread of the disease, to “flatten the curve” of the pandemic and avoid overwhelming the hospital system. We have reason to believe that these policies are succeeding in that regard, and something else may explain why we may be averting the “apex” crisis:...

A California woman is accused of licking nearly $2,000 worth of grocery store items at a Safeway supermarket near Lake Tahoe. The Los Angeles Times reported that the South Lake Tahoe Police Department responded to a report Wednesday of a customer “licking groceries inside of the store.” Employees say the woman, Jennifer Walker, 53, of South Lake Tahoe, licked and then stole several pieces of jewelry and other goods. A Safeway employee told the police the $1,800 in goods were “unsellable due to the cross-contamination” due to the coronavirus pandemic. Police arrested Walker on one count of felony vandalism and...

With a few exceptions such as the Schöningen spears and the recent finds of wooden tools at Pogetti Vecchi, almost all of our knowledge about the Middle Paleolithic comes from durable materials (bones and stone tools). We know from observations of our own surroundings, ethnographic and ethnohistoric accounts that most of the material culture of humans (and Neanderthals) is comprised of perishable materials... Obviously, differential preservation of materials contributes to this bias. Previously, researchers have demonstrated that the microenvironment immediately surrounding a stone tool can preserve microscopic fragments of what is otherwise invisible archaeologically. This is also true for the...

A Kentucky court rejects the argument from Covington High School students that the comedian is subject to jurisdiction there because local people were asked to shame fellow citizens. On Thursday, comedian Kathy Griffin slipped one of the many lawsuits that followed for her minor role on Twitter, where she demanded names and shame upon the Covington High School students. U.S. District Court Judge William Bertelsman holds that Griffin's attempted doxing doesn't constitute acts committed in Kentucky and thus she's not subject to the jurisdiction of this federal court. In dismissing the suit, the judge adds that allowing Griffin to be...

Hunter Biden’s baby boy is a week old, but it may be months before his grandfather Joe Biden gets to meet him. Hunter’s wife, Melissa Cohen - who he wed last May, after knowing her for six days - gave birth to a “beautiful and healthy” son on March 28, according to her brother, Garyn Cohen. But presidential candidate, Joe, 77, is currently under a state-mandated lockdown at his home in Wilmington, Del., amid the coronavirus pandemic. **SNIP** Baby-boy Biden was born in Los Angeles, where the family is living in a $2.5 million home in the Hollywood Hills. He’s...

And now for something a bit more cheerful, Percy Faith and his orchestra playing Delicado. [This post is certified COVID-19 free.]

“I know that many of you were hoping we would get to the end of April and we’d be able to lift many of these restrictions, Ferrer said. “I am sad as you are to note that this is not the time to lift.” As part of the extended order, all indoor and outdoor private gatherings and events should not occur, beaches and trailheads as well as all nonessential businesses, remain closed. New measures taking effect next at midnight April 15: All essential businesses must provide all employees who are required to be around others a cloth face covering to...

A small Iowa town received a big surprise last week from an anonymous donor who shipped every household in town $150 worth of gift cards good at local small businesses. All 549 households in the town of 1,400 people received three $50 gift cards, according to the Des Moines Register, one each for West Side Bar and Grille, Hometown Market and Trostel’s Broken Branch. Collectively, the cards added up to $82,350, or $27,450 to each locally owned business. Mayor Jeff Lillie was in on the secret. On March 26, he was called by a man who said he was the...

When California seceded, Washington, Oregon, and New York quickly followed declaring that their new union to be called the Peoples’ Republic of America. The New England states, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois, and Pennsylvania followed suit to join the PRA, as did Maryland, New Jersey, Delaware, Hawaii, New Mexico, and Colorado. Parts of California split, denounced the secession; forming a new state called Jefferson and applied for statehood in the old USA. Eastern Washington and most of Oregon also left the PRA. The rural parts of Minnesota, Illinois, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania divorced themselves from the left wing lunacy of Minneapolis,...

Whoops! CNN "fell asleep at the switch" during a coronavirus town hall on Thursday when a viewer's question about Trump Derangement Syndrome made it onto live television. As Anderson Cooper, Dr. Sanjay Gupta and CDC Director Robert Redfield answered questions from viewers, CNN’s on-screen graphics at one point included the question, “Is Stage 4 TDS considered an underlying morbidity?”

President Trump on Friday teased an announcement on the World Health Organization (WHO) “sometime next week” after suggesting his administration might cut U.S. funding to the WHO over frustration with the organization throughout the coronavirus pandemic. "We are going to have an announcement on the World Health Organization sometime next week," Trump said at the White House Coronavirus Task Force briefing on Friday afternoon. "As you know, we have given them approximately $500 million a year, and we are going to be talking about that subject next week. We'll have a lot to say about it.” Later during the briefing,...

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff and Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris announced legislation Friday that would create a bipartisan 9/11-style commission to probe the federal government's response to the coronavirus pandemic in the U.S. Schiff, D-Calif., formally introduced legislation in the House that would establish the bipartisan commission, while Feinstein, D-Calif., and Harris, D-Calif., said they planned to introduce companion legislation in the Senate. The commission, according to the three Democrats, will “examine U.S. government preparedness in advance of this pandemic, the Federal government’s response to it, and provide recommendations to improve our ability to respond to and...

Comrades, the ministry of coronavirus compliance is making it easy to be a good state citizen. If you spot a non-compliant citizen participating in life without adhering to the dictates of the state, there’s now mobile APP’s for quick snitching. Comrade citizens are now able to take a picture of the non-compliant behavior (citizen spotted outdoors, not wearing a mask, unauthorized gatherings etc), upload the picture to the state ministry, and the state compliance division will dispatch local enforcement teams to correct the non-compliant behavior, or remove the citizen. DESSERT SUN – Residents looking to report nonessential businesses, neighbors, unauthorized...

...Last night, Laura Ingraham broadcast the second part [i] of an interview with Attorney General Barr in which he made some significant points about what is ahead for that cabal, in very general terms, of course. Sometimes, he is so economical and subtle that the significance of his remarks is not immediately obvious to all... Fortunately, two knowledgeable observers have offered exegeses today that are worth reading. Sundance of Conservative Treehouse picks out the biggest reveals and cues them on the video embedded below, while retired FBI special agent (and AT contributor) Mark Wauck of Meaning in History puts together...

Several emails have come in asking advice on cultivating an authentic, genuine “personal relationship” with Christ. The answer is simple, and it comes from Our Lord Himself who has told many mystic saints and doctors of the Church the same thing: THINK AND PRAY ABOUT MY PASSION AND DEATH. Why? Because thinking about Our Lord’s torture, agony and excruciating death forces us to confront Him as a Person, True God AND True Man. Legal systems don’t sob until their capillaries burst. Philosophies don’t suffer the agony of unrequited love. Imaginary friends don’t lay down their lives. Bureaucracies don’t fight asphyxiation...