Free Republic

Next week, the California Department of Education will vote on a new statewide ethnic studies curriculum that advocates for the “decolonization” of American society and elevates Aztec religious symbolism—all in the service of a left-wing political ideology. The new program, called the Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum, seeks to extend the Left’s cultural dominance of California’s public university system, 50 years in the making, to the state’s entire primary and secondary education system, which consists of 10,000 public schools serving a total of 6 million students. In theoretical terms, the new ethnic studies curriculum is based on the “pedagogy of the...

New York State, which has embraced some of the most stringent coronavirus restrictions in the country over the past year, has reported more cases both per capita and in overall number than Florida, which has faced backlash from establishment media outlets and pro-lockdown politicians for its coronavirus policies, allowing businesses to operate and abstaining from a statewide mask mandate.

CLAIM: More Americans have died of COVID-19 “than in World War I, World War II, the Vietnam war and 9/11 combined.” VERDICT: MOSTLY FALSE. The total number of deaths in those conflicts, including non-combat deaths, is higher.

Joshua James was arrested this week and is being charged in connection to the violent events of January 6th in Washington D.C.Joshua James is an Iraq War veteran. He was wounded in a bomb blast in Iraq. And Joshua is being held by the FBI without bail.Joshua is the breadwinner in his family. He has three young children including a 3-year-old.The FBI lured him out of his home in Alabama by pretending to be a customer needing a pressure washing.Then an Army armored vehicle with a turret on top, 2 FBI vans, 6 FBI vehicles, 3 local police and sheriff’s...

A female reporter has claimed New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, D., touched her inappropriately and made her feel uncomfortable in an attempt to impose his power on the young journalist, making her the seventh accuser to come forward with claims of sexual harassment against the governor. “I never thought the governor wanted to have sex with me. It wasn’t about sex. It was about power,” Jessica Bakeman wrote. “He uses touching and sexual innuendo to stoke fear in us. That is the textbook definition of sexual harassment.” The New York magazine piece written by Bakeman, titled, “Cuomo Never Let Me...

At present time, the United States' southern border is wide open. Unaccompanied alien children, single alien men and intact alien families are all pouring over en masse. Anecdotal horror stories abound: On Thursday, for instance, U.S. Customs and Border Protection tweeted: "Within 24 hours, Laredo North Station Border Patrol agents apprehended 111 individuals during 3 separate human smuggling attempts involving commercial trailers." This is a legitimate crisis, notwithstanding self-serving presidential obfuscation to the contrary. And it is a legitimate crisis entirely of the Democratic Party's own making. As this column has previously noted, CBP data evinced as early as last...

The Democrat-led House on Thursday passed HR8, a gun control bill that will expand background checks, with a 227-203 vote. Eight Republican lawmakers voted with the Democrats to pass the “Background Checks Act” that prohibits private firearms transfers without having a background check. It will require a gun registry to work. They also passed HR 1446 which allows tyrants to indefinitely hold back background checks. At the same time, these same Democrats blocked legislation that would require ICE to be contacted when illegal aliens apply to buy a gun... Steve Scalise announced on Twitter: House Democrats just REJECTED an amendment...

Democrat state senators in Oregon have introduced legislation to pay black Oregonians $123,000 in reparations. The bill would have the Department of Revenue establish a reparations payment program to residents “who can demonstrate heritage in slavery” and have identified as “African-American” for at least ten years. The Daily Wire reports that “according to a copy of the state Senate bill, the government will pay six figures to any person who can demonstrate that they are a descendant of American slaves and have “identified as African-American” on legal documents.” In order to qualify for the reparations, a person must live state...

Democrats and far lefties have been so desperate for a president that’s not Donald Trump that they were literally crying tears of joy during the first presidential address to the nation by a mushmouth, low-energy, septuagenarian dinosaur named Joe Biden. Biden might actually be driving the country into the ground. But his fans are talking him up as if he is an American messiah, rescuing us from a time of Trumpian darkness and incivility. The level of Biden butt-kissing done by Hollywood during the president’s speech was extremely high, so high that celebrities like Rob Reiner referred to the sluggish,...

A white Georgetown Law professor was fired Thursday after getting caught on video belittling black students during a Zoom call with a colleague, saying they “usually” perform “just plain at the bottom” of her classes. Georgetown Law Dean Bill Treanor said he was “appalled” by the conversation between now-terminated adjunct professor Sandra Sellers and another faculty member, David Batson, who was placed on administrative leave pending an investigation. “I informed Professor Sellers that I was terminating her relationship with Georgetown Law effective immediately,” Treanor wrote in a statement released Thursday afternoon. “During our conversation, she told me that she had...

Imagine yourself a Democrat seeking elective office in a competitive district, the kind of place with a reassuring plenitude of Unitarian churches and vegan bistros, but just a few too many tax-weary entrepreneurs and stodgy evangelicals lurking about to let you breathe easy. You calm yourself by sitting back and rereading an old favorite poem, Bertolt Brecht’s “The Solution,” and you wonder if the author was onto something when he reckoned it could make sense “to dissolve the people and elect another.” (Brecht was being sarcastic, but you, being a Democrat, cannot sense this.) You desire some extra voters who...

Let's face it: Joe Biden is not totally in control of his mental faculties.You know it. I know it. Everyone knows it. The problem we are now faced with is not what should be done about it, because we know what should be done... the problem is: if we were to do what should be done, will we actually be much worse off?In other words, as frightening as it is to have a mentally debilitated Commander-in-Chief, is it still better than a competent and empowered President Kamala Harris?As #DementiaJoe trends on social media following President Biden's shaky performance Thursday night...

Once again, Pennsylvania lags behind other states, as we see more and more mask mandates lifted and indoor dining capacities increased. It is time for us to follow suit and begin to reopen our economy. It has been a year since the COVID pandemic brought things to a halt across the nation and the world. We have learned a lot throughout that year, but we have also seen a great deal of hardships imposed that have negatively impacted small businesses and in turn, individuals, families, and our overall economy. To quote Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, “We know what we need...

<p>When humans flooded their zoo in South Africa, after months of lockdown, the African penguins couldn't have cared less, according to a new study. Meanwhile, the bubbly meerkats at a zoo in the U.K. seemed uplifted by their bipedal visitors.</p>

As President Biden wrapped up his first primetime performance Thursday night, his pronouncements served their predictable and short-term political ends, of course. More interesting, they dually serve as rhetorical choices, choices that feed into the natural process of historicization as COVID-19 loses its monopoly on our attention. What are the elements he stressed in his framing, and what lessons can we take away from the pandemic as the end potentially draws near? President Biden makes several mistakes in his first primetime performance that allow us to explore what these lessons are. They are worthy of note not because this speech...

This is insane! The city of Minneapolis reached a $27 million settlement with George Floyd’s family on Friday. The City Council unanimously approved of the settlement on Friday as jury selection for officer Derek Chauvin’s trial continues. George Floyd died last spring after Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck for 8 minutes during an arrest.

The California Dept. of Fish and Wildlife said they used DNA analysis to link the attacks to the animal, which was euthanized and will be tested for rabies. The attacks began last summer in the town of Moraga, which borders Oakland. Five people, two children and three men, were bitten in a 2-mile area in Moraga and neighboring Lafayette. The searchers laid traps and used coyote urine to lure the aggressive animal. Several other coyotes were caught and euthanized before authorities trapped the target. The coyote approached and bit people without warning. Last month, it bit a 3-year-old girl as...

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed an executive order that will eliminate all fines issued by local government officials over the past year to people and businesses in the state who violated restrictions related to the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus. The order (pdf) was signed after the Board of Executive Clemency approved DeSantis’s proposal on March 10 to categorically remit all fines related to local government CCP virus restrictions. “I hereby remit any fines imposed between March 1, 2020, and March 10, 2021, by any political subdivision of Florida related to local government COVID-19 restrictions,” DeSantis confirmed in the order,...

Joshua James was arrested this week and is being charged in connection to the violent events of January 6th in Washington D.C. Joshua James is an Iraq War veteran. He was wounded in a bomb blast in Iraq. And Joshua is being held by the FBI without bail. Joshua is the breadwinner in his family. He has three young children including a 3-year-old. ....... Snip...... The FBI lured him out of his home in Alabama by pretending to be a customer needing a pressure washing. Then an Army armored vehicle with a turret on top, 2 FBI vans, 6 FBI...