Free Republic

The following is a news analysis. Slanted reporters and outlets, such as the New York Times’s Jeremy Peters and Carolyn Ryan; Vanity Fair, and Facebook have worked hard to controversialize and bully certain journalists and scientists reporting factually on coronavirus, and asking rational questions. It has made it difficult to get reasoned, factual information, at times. As far as some media outlets are concerned, only worst case scenario discussions are to be permitted, even if they are proving wildly wrong. Now, the far left host of HBO’s “Real Time,” Bill Maher, is calling much of the media coverage on the...

For many people, rats are unwanted guests in the house. But in China, they can be a delicacy on the dining table. Chinese bamboo rats, a possible coronavirus carrier, have been a sought-after food source in the country for centuries and hailed for their 'nutritional value'. Tens of thousands of farmers raised them, chefs cooked them in dozens of ways and web users celebrated '100 reasons to eat them' - until the pandemic brought the trade to a standstill.

To a new Senate website, Sen. Lindsey Graham’s staff uploaded the four Carter Page FISA applications, which were recently further declassified. Late last week, Sen. Lindsey Graham announced a webpage dedicated to the Senate Judiciary Committee’s probe into the Crossfire Hurricane illicit investigation into the Donald Trump campaign. Graham’s staff uploaded the four Carter Page Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) applications, which were recently further declassified. These declassifications reveal more devastating details in the SpyGate saga. Here are seven new revelations. 1. The FBI Always Intended to Spy on the Trump Campaign When news first broke that the Obama administration...

Our leaders are making decisions based on training, experience, intelligence, and wisdom, and they have our best interests in mind. But this does not mean they are always correct. I had a patient once with a liver lesion. At the community hospital where I worked, I reviewed her MRI with the radiologist carefully and we concluded it was a possible liver cancer. Unfortunately, I shared her care with a university hospital. In their opinion, the lesion was definitely cancer and they so informed her. She promptly drank herself to death. Of course, it could be argued that the university care...

Could liberal billionaire George Soros be more disgusting? He’s using his super PAC to exploit the coronavirus and attack President Donald Trump and using the issue of abortion to do it.Federal Election Commission data revealed that Soros’s Democracy PAC gave $1 million to the radical pro-abortion group NARAL Freedom Fund. "A new ad from the abortion rights group NARAL Freedom Fund features young women accusing the President and his allies of putting ‘ideology over science,'" National Public Radio (NPR) reported April 15. NPR also noted the ad accused Trump and his allies of “using the coronavirus pandemic as a pretext...

LANSING, Mich. — Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said social distancing is working but it is too early to detail a specific plan on when to reopen the economy.

Amid growing unrest in several states about the ongoing lockdown, Dr. Anthony Fauci is urging protesters not to demonstrate, and arguing that a premature reopening would “backfire.” Appearing on Good Morning America Monday, George Stephanopoulos asked the infectious disease expert what his message is for those who have been protesting. “I think the message is that, clearly, this is something that is hurting from the standpoint of economics, from the standpoint of things that have nothing to do with the virus,” Fauci said. “But unless we get the virus under control, the real recovery, economically, is not going to happen.”

The existential crisis in the Colorado beer world is palpable right now as an industry built on social gathering comes to realize that social distance is the new normal. As much as 15% of craft breweries expect to close by the end of the month if social distancing remains in place, according to a national survey from the Boulder-based Brewers Association, and more than 60% don’t expect to survive beyond June. If applied to Colorado — which now counts about 420 breweries — the projections suggest 250 would close by summer. That would represent a huge dent for an industry...

Meghan Markle gushed over elephants and how she 'understands them' in a never-before-seen interview that was taped last summer and aired on Good Morning America on Monday, a day after she and Prince Harry said they would no longer talk to four British newspapers. In the interview, Meghan said she was 'grateful' to have been involved in the Disney+ documentary Elephant which she hopes will teach people how similar humans are to elephants and how 'connected' we are. The film is her passion project and marks her return to showbiz after shunning royal life.

Congressional Republicans continue to face a significant fundraising disadvantage against their Democratic opponents, according to newly released first-quarter campaign finance reports. These money woes will only increase GOP panic over their prospects in hotly contested Senate and House races. The fundraising disparity is all-encompassing: Of the 10 most-competitive Senate races, Democratic candidates outraised their Republican rivals in eight of them—often by massive margins. Republican senators with built-in fundraising advantages were badly outmatched by lesser-known Democratic challengers. In the bellwether Maine and North Carolina races that will determine which party holds the Senate majority, Democrats raised more than twice the amount...

Opponents of the shutdown have said they will drive around the now empty Capitol in Harrisburg honking their horns to call for a resumption of economic life.

Today's AM Joy show on MSNBC provided a virtual parody of liberal-elite condescension to Trump supporters. Joy Reid kicked things off by finding it "confusing" that Trump's populist base supports him despite supposedly not "getting anything economically out of this plutocracy." It's a recycling of the old liberal complaint of "What's the Matter with Kansas?": those poor, benighted cultural conservatives allegedly voting against their own interests (against redistributing all the wealth). Ultraliberal writer Jane Mayer of The New Yorker [infamous for co-authoring a book trashing Justice Clarence Thomas with Jill Abramson while they were reporters at The Wall Street Journal]...

Following other prominent left-wing lawmakers, Biden had quite the slip of the tongue recently when he told virtual CNN town hall audiences there’s an “opportunity” to exploit the coronavirus pandemic to “fundamentally change the science relating to global warming.” Biden seemed to suggest that the global pandemic presented the perfect opportunity for Democrats and progressives to expand the scope of federal economic and environmental policy. “It’s like the New Deal. Think of every great act, every great change that’s taken place. It’s come out of a crisis. … What we did, we expanded opportunity. And I think we have an...

The Supreme Court on Monday ruled that defendants in criminal trials can only be convicted by a unanimous jury, striking down a scheme that has been rejected by every state except one. The court said in a divided opinion that the Constitution requires agreement among all members of a jury in order to impose a guilty verdict. "Wherever we might look to determine what the term 'trial by an impartial jury trial' meant at the time of the Sixth Amendment’s adoption—whether it’s the common law, state practices in the founding era, or opinions and treatises written soon afterward—the answer is...

With virtually everything and every business in New Jersey shut down, why are liquor stores deemed essential business and allowed to remain open and operational? For as long as this pandemic has gone on, the left has shouted incessantly that we must “believe in the science and the scientists” and the experts and anyone else who cements the idea of shutting down an entire economy. Okay. Let’s trust the science and the experts and follow their advice to shut it all down. Would that satisfy the left? Of course not. Because it’s never enough. Once you give in to one...

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Thermometers in many stores have been selling off shelves faster than they can be replenished amid the COVID-19 pandemic. A pharmacist at a Jacksonville Walgreens said they’ve sold out of thermometers. It’s unclear when the next shipment was coming in for that store. News4Jax was able to obtain one thermometer on Friday after searching throughout the day. It was at a CVS Pharmacy at the corner of University Boulevard and St. Augustine Road. The store is only permitted to sell one at a time from a crate. Dr. William Nimo, the owner of Omni Care Pharmacy in...

Is meritocracy just? Just a short time ago, it was commonly accepted that it is the fairest way to determine who wins and who loses in the competition of college admissions. Now, it is one of the most hotly debated questions in higher education. Some believe it is just, as it encapsulates the American dream of “work hard and achieve your educational goals.” Others, however, believe meritocracy is inherently unjust and view it as a cut-throat system rigged against the lower and middle classes. So, how much should innate intelligence and academic performance factor into who gains admittance into college?...

President Trump on Monday tweeted a satirical video that shows former President Barack Obama – or rather, his head doctored onto someone else's body – shrugging off awkward comments by presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden before cutting to a Trump-Pence 2020 campaign logo. The video – which was not produced by the campaign – parodies an Allstate commercial showing the insurance company's spokesman Dennis Haysbert watching a basketball game with his friends before a commercial of Haysbert advertising Allstate appears on the screen. In the original ad, Haysbert's friends implore him to change the channel, which he does, only to...

Posted on April 19, 2020 by Msgr. Charles Pope Perfect and Astonishing Divine Mercy In the afterglow of Divine Mercy Sunday it seems opportune to make a few observations about the glorious mercy of our Lord. As a prelude we ought to set aside some mistaken notions of mercy.We live in times in which mercy, like so many other things, has become a detached concept in people’s minds,separated from the things that really help us to understand it. For indeed, mercy makes sense and is necessary because we are sinners in desperate shape. Yet many today think it unkind...

The U.N. Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights has warned significant portions of America face destitution unless Congress takes “far-reaching” actions to stem the financial damage driven by the Chinese coronavirus epidemic. “Low-income and poor people face far higher risks from the coronavirus due to chronic neglect and discrimination, and a muddled, corporate-driven, federal response [that] has failed them”, said Philip Alston, who made a fact-finding visit to the U.S. in 2017 and in 2018 delivered a scathing report into income inequality in America, as Breitbart News reported. This time he painted a picture of record layoffs, a...