Free Republic

Teen athletes have traditionally been classified as "boys" or "girls" so that girls can participate in sports without having to compete against boys who are usually stronger and faster than girls. This system worked as long as everyone agreed on which athletes were girls and which athletes were boys. Today some disagree about who qualifies as girls and who qualifies as boys. One thing hasn't changed. There are two different genetic types of athletes. One type has two "X" chromosomes. The other has an "XY" combination of chromosomes. Athletes who have an "XY" combination of chromosomes are usually stronger and...

Four people in Oregon have tested positive for the coronavirus after receiving both doses of the Covid-19 vaccine, health officials said. There are two cases each in Yamhill and Lane counties, the state's Health Authority said in a series of tweets on Friday. The cases are either mild or asymptomatic. "We are working with our local and federal public health partners to investigate and determine case origin," the agency said. "Genome sequencing is underway, and we expect results next week." The agency referred to the individuals who tested positive as "breakthrough cases," meaning that they got sick with the virus...

You know them and I know them. The laundry list of technical jargon 99.9% of people scrolls or skip through to use whatever technical device they need or want. They usually come with your “optional” software updates. They come with most apps. They come with loans and appliances you buy. The User Agreement/Terms and Conditions/End User License Agreement (EULA)/etc. are the stock and trade of corporations seeking to cover their own hindquarters. The rub is that it’s only truly optional if you agree to their terms and conditions. Then you can use their product. If you don’t, well, tough luck....

Men opted to be flogged in public in Aceh province to avoid a prison sentenceThree Christians were flogged in public in Indonesia’s Aceh province on Feb. 8 after being caught drinking alcohol at a small shop in the provincial capital Banda Aceh, according to a local government official. Heru Triwijanarko, acting head of the Banda Aceh public order agency and Sharia police, said the three unnamed men received 40 strokes of the cane for violating bylaws prohibiting alcohol. It was not clear whether any of the men were Catholic. “They were all given the choice of a prison sentence or...

A newspaper editor once described journalists as people who have the bad taste to learn in public. Ezra Klein, a rhetorician who poses as a policy analyst, is doing some learning in public, and learning the hard way. But what would we do without him? Who but Ezra Klein could survey the wreck left-wing Democrats have made of California and conclude that the state’s problem is its excessive conservatism? The Golden State is in such deep trouble that even Klein can dimly recognize the crisis. But he can't or won't recognize its causes. “Conservative” is, of course, an ambiguous word....

President Joe Biden on Feb. 14 urged Congress to strengthen existing laws concerning gun ownership on the third anniversary of the mass shooting at a high school in Parkland, Florida. “The Parkland students and so many other young people across the country who have experienced gun violence are carrying forward the history of the American journey. It is a history written by young people in each generation who challenged prevailing dogma to demand a simple truth: we can do better. And we will,” Biden said in a statement. “This Administration will not wait for the next mass shooting to heed...

State lawmakers want to square conflicting health care values between public University of California hospitals and Catholic hospitals that collaborate on patient care, under a new bill introduced Wednesday by state Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco. Under longstanding agreements between UC Health and Catholic hospital systems like Dignity Health or St. Joseph Health, UC doctors and medical students who provide care inside Catholic hospitals must abide by Catholic Church directives that prohibit abortions, sterilizations, contraception, some end-of-life options and gender affirmation surgery. Wiener says this makes the public university system complicit in discriminating against women and transgender patients. “The fact...

NEW YORK — Two Catholic organizations in southern Texas are prepared to provide humanitarian relief to a combined 400 migrants a day, with the expectation that U.S. Customs and Border Protection will release more migrants as soon as next week. “Having participated in a few meetings with other non-profit organizations as well as the government agencies, they are letting us know and they are also getting us ready that families are going to be released,” Rebecca Solloa, the executive director at Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Laredo told The Tablet. Solloa didn’t have an exact date when the government...

In the New Year, systemic racism has continued to force inequity in home ownership rates across the Bay Area, and Black families who are in a position to purchase a home often face discrimination. It is no secret that home ownership is a proven pathway to building wealth in the United States. But in a competitive housing market with some of the most expensive homes in the country, it is tough for Black Bay Area residents to buy a home to start the process.

China's Xinhua news agency and the Global Times state newspaper both praised Mr. Biden's "amazing show of respect for China and President Xi Jinping. Even when Xi was eating his lunch Joe was appropriately respectful, though he did mysteriously mumble 'if Oliver Twist can have pudding, then the God Damned President of the United States ought to have pudding.' Xi was puzzled and wanted to know who this privileged Mr. Twist is. This aside, the communication between the two leaders was a dramatic contrast to the disrespect shown to China by Mr. Trump. Trump was repeatedly and inharmoniously pushing his...

On the 140th anniversary of the death of the great Russian writer Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky, on February 9, 2021, commemorative events were held at his grave at the Tikhvin cemetery of the Holy Trinity Alexander Nevsky Lavra in St. Petersburg. The requiem for the writer was performed by the clerics of the Cathedral of the Vladimir Icon of the Mother of God in St. Petersburg (FM Dostoevsky was once a parishioner of this cathedral) Priest Alexander Prokofiev and Deacon Andrei Reimers. “We often remember both the personality and the work of the great Russian writer, the genius of Russian literature...

Remember when New York Governor Andrew Cuomo was almost universally hailed by the left over his many coronavirus briefings to the extent that he even won an Emmy in November for them? Of course, the Emmy Founders Award was given to Cuomo in November not so much for what he said but more for the fact that was considered the favored counterpoint to President Donald Trump's coronavirus briefings which they hated because he was, well, Trump.A big part of the Emmy ceremony was the top gushing over Cuomo by celebrities which in retrospect, due to the revelations about Cuomo's office...

Late News: Syrian government media reporting air defenses in operation tonight... White House Deputy Press Secretary T.J. Ducklo resigning this weekend. The resignation one day after he received a one week suspension for threatening a reporter... Responding to his acquittal at the second impeachment trial, President Trump said: "Our movement has only just begun"... ..Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said Trump was: "practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day" regarding the incident at the US Capitol... President Joe Biden said in a statement: "the substance of the charge is not in dispute"... From Ogden, Utah the...

Places with highest daily reported cases per capita Seven-day average of daily new reported cases per 100,000 residents

In a quiet but stunning correction, the New York Times backed away from its original report that Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick was killed by a Trump supporter wielding a fire extinguisher during the January 6 melee at the Capitol building. Shortly after American Greatness published my column Friday that showed how the Times gradually was backpedaling on its January 8 bombshell, the paper posted this caveat:UPDATE: New information has emerged regarding the death of the Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick that questions the initial cause of his death provided by officials close to the Capitol Police.The paper continued to...

A video posted to Instagram on Saturday evening by user 'standwithseattlepd' shows a snow barrier built by protesters outside of the Seattle Police Department's East Precinct. In the video, a police vehicle is seen rolling backwards after attempting to drive over the barrier. "Antifa goons blocked the exit of the East Precinct with a pile of snow tonight, in an effort to stop vehicles from responding to emergency calls," the user claimed in the caption on a separate video showing a crowd of officers later standing around the barrier. Another video of the incident posted by journalist Andy Ngo shows...

Former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne was deeply involved in the analysis of the 2020 U.S. general election, leading a team of ‘white hat’ hackers to delve into exactly what happened. Now he has preliminary results of where the foreign interference (cyber attacks, acts of war) came from. His preliminary data is below…you be the judge.

Electric-vehicle drivers put about half as many miles on their cars as the average driver. At least, that's what a new study, conducted by researchers working for the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), is estimating. Those results are based on calculations that look at the increase in home energy usage for homes with EVs in California. The study authors did not ask the EV drivers themselves. Nor did they check odometer readings through service records or using other methods. They do admit that getting that kind of information would be best but that these numbers are "within the vehicles...

Texas Governor Greg Abbott is trying to prevent Democrats from treading on Texans’ gun rights, calling on his state to become a “sanctuary” for the Second Amendment. In his State of the State address last week, Abbott said, “Texas must be a Second Amendment sanctuary state.” “Politicians from the federal level to the local level have shouted: ‘Heck yes, the government is coming to get your guns,'” he said. “We won’t let that happen in Texas.” Abbott’s comments are a direct reference to Beto O’Rourke, the Texas Democrat who has hinted he might challenge for the governorship in 2022.

In April 2011, an Assistant Secretary in the Obama administration’s Office for Civil Rights named Russlyn Ali sent a letter to college and university deans. The purpose of the letter, which began with the ostensibly courteous greeting, “Dear Colleague,” was to inform schools of the agency’s displeasure with the campus response to what it saw as a troubling “epidemic” of sexual violence and to give “guidance” about the procedures that institutions should follow to better protect students. Missives clarifying agency regulations are a fairly common, if tedious, form of bureaucratic communication in D.C., of interest to few people other than...