Free Republic

At least 60 people within Joe Biden's White House have ties to a liberal Washington DC think tank which does not disclose its funding, according to reports - leading to questions about the power of progressive 'dark money'. The Center for American Progress was founded in 2003 by John Podesta, Bill Clinton's chief of staff and a counselor to Barack Obama. It is one of a number of lobbying groups and policy organizations which do not disclose how they are funded, leading to concern about who is behind their significant power and influence.

Melinda Gates warned her husband Bill against any further contact with Jeffrey Epstein after the couple had an uncomfortable meeting with the convicted sex offender, according to a new report. Melinda was 'furious' at Bill's relationship with Epstein after the couple visited the predator's Upper East Side townhouse in September 2013, people familiar with the matter told the Daily Beast. The meeting proved a turning point in Bill's relationship with Epstein, after Melinda expressed how uncomfortable she was with the sex offender and said she wanted nothing to do with him, the sources said.

In a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers from the Maryland-based biotech firm Novavax report that the company’s COVID-19 vaccine is 51% efficacious in protecting people from disease. The results come from a Phase 2 study of the two-dose vaccine, which uses a different technology than the three COVID-19 shots currently authorized by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Currently authorized shots from Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna both use an mRNA-based technology, while Johnson & Johnson-Janssen relies on an adenovirus to deliver SARS-CoV-2 genes to the body—both approaches work by training the body’s immune cells to make...

A senior U.N. environmental official says entire nations could be wiped off the face of the Earth by rising sea levels if the global warming trend is not reversed by the year 2000. Coastal flooding and crop failures would create an exodus of ″eco- refugees,′ ′ threatening political chaos, said Noel Brown, director of the New York office of the U.N. Environment Program, or UNEP. He said governments have a 10-year window of opportunity to solve the greenhouse effect before it goes beyond human control. As the warming melts polar icecaps, ocean levels will rise by up to three feet,...

As the epidemiological situation begins to stabilize through mass vaccination and building herd immunity, the 24th St. Petersburg International Economic Forum is finally set to take place on June 2-5, 2021. This unique Russian forum is expected to bring together politicians, corporate business directors and investors from different parts of the world. In this interview by Kester Kenn Klomegah especially for potential African participants, chief executive officer of the Roscongress Foundation and head of the coordinating council under the secretariat of the Russia–Africa Partnership Forum (RAPF) Alexander Stuglev describes it as a unique platform for networking and getting acquainted with...

Critical race theory is fast becoming America’s new institutional orthodoxy. Yet most Americans have never heard of it — and of those who have, many don’t understand it. This must change. We need to know what it is so we can know how to fight it. SNIP Critical race theory is an academic discipline, formulated in the 1990s and built on the intellectual framework of identity-based Marxism. Relegated for many years to universities and obscure academic journals, it has increasingly become the default ideology in our public institutions over the past decade. It has been injected into government agencies, public...

In April, South Korea held by-elections in the country's two largest cities, with the Democratic Party losing both in landslides. Poll data showed that young people, in particular young men, voted for the right-wing opposition in uncommonly large numbers. As left-leaning President Moon Jae-in enters his fifth and final year in office, he and his party are grappling with souring public sentiment related to the widespread perception that Moon has not delivered on promises to revive the flagging economy. At the same time, a number of high-ranking officials in his administration have had to step down after being implicated in...

Palestinian journalist Rewaa Mershid works at the studio of ZMN FM radio station in Gaza City, Thursday, May 6, 2021. Mershid, a 26-year-old reporter for a local radio station, was with colleagues filming at a privately owned farm near the heavily guarded Gaza frontier on April 25 when two members of a Hamas-run border patrol approached and asked them to identify themselves. (AP Photo/Adel Hana) GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) — A female Palestinian reporter said Thursday that a member of the Hamas-run border patrol in Gaza beat her with a tree branch for not wearing an Islamic headscarf last...

At least 25 people including a police officer have been killed in a shoot-out in Rio de Janeiro, according to local media. The shoot-out took place during a police operation in a favela in the Jacarezinho area of the city. Police launched the operation after receiving reports that drug traffickers were recruiting children for their gang. Two passengers on a metro train were hit by bullets but survived. Police in the Brazilian city confirmed the death of one of their officers, Inspector Andre Leonardo de Mello Frias. A statement on Facebook said "he honoured the profession he loved and will...

Join with fellow FREEPERS to pray for AMERICA: For those in Authority in Government, Family, Military, Business, Healthcare, Education, Churches, and the Media.I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone: for kings and all those in authority that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. ~ 1 Timothy 2:1-2Religion Forum threads labeled [Prayer] are closed to debate of any kind.Ronald Reagan - Man of faith Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: “All nations will be...

ST. LOUIS (KMOV.com) — With only a few months remaining on his contract with the team, the Los Angeles Angels have designated Albert Pujols for assignment, a move which precedes his release from the club. The team announced the move on Thursday. "The Angels Organization proudly signed Albert Pujols in 2011, and are honored that he has worn an Angels jersey for nearly half of his Hall-of-Fame Career," the Angels said in a tweet regarding the decision. Pujols, 41, has seen his skills diminish in recent years with Los Angeles. Though his five home runs are nothing to scoff at...

My latest song. Please don’t give it the bird.

A couple from Worcestershire have defied odds of “between one in 200 million to one in two million” and welcomed one of the most premature sets of identical triplets into the world. Lauren, 28, was rushed to Worcestershire Royal Hospital on 16 January this year where she gave birth by emergency cesarean section to her identical sons River, Beau, and Leo all within six minutes of each other. Lauren and her husband, Jack, were shocked to learn that she was carrying triplets at her 12- week scan but were soon overjoyed at the news. Lauren said: “They were sharing a...

In new interview, Abp. Viganò discusses Vatican II, decline of Marian devotion, and the Novus Ordo MassMay 6, 2021 (LifeSiteNews) – In a new interview, Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò has once more returned to the topic of the Second Vatican Council, the loss of Marian devotion followed by that Council, as well as the deficiencies of the Novus Ordo Mass.Speaking with the Italian website Radio Spada – this is the second installment of two parts of an interview (here part one) – the Italian prelate sees a satanic involvement in the decline of devotions to Our Lady after the Council...

SNIP The audit, which is unprecedented in US elections, is being watched with alarm around the country. Experts say it is a non-credible effort to fuel doubts about the 2020 race. And there’s some evidence similar efforts could pop up elsewhere. Maricopa county has already conducted multiple audits of the 2020 race and confirmed the results. The firm hired by the GOP-controlled Arizona senate has little experience in election audits, and experts are deeply concerned its methodology is unreliable and will only lead to more doubt about the results of the 2020 race in Arizona. The CEO of the firm,...

[Catholic Caucus] APPEAL by Cardinal Zen and more: Against the effort to destroy marriageby the german synodal pathThe German Synodal Path, initiated in 2019, has been, during the past two years, fertile ground for the planning and subsequent homogenization of ideas and theories that are blatantly contrary to the immutable and perennial Magisterium of the Holy Catholic Church, founded by the Divine Savior on the solid rock of the Apostles (Mt 16:18). The errors being spread include the declared attack on the Priesthood, both by means of the effort to abolish eccelsiastical celibacy as well as imposing the ordination of...

Goodbye, Calibri. It’s 2021 and it may not be the year for Times New Roman to make a comeback or Comic Sans to takeover, but the default font for Microsoft is definitely changing. Late on Wednesday, Microsoft announced that Calibri, which has been the default font for all things Microsoft since 2007, when it stepped in to replace Times New Roman across Microsoft Office is being removed. “It has served us all well, but we believe it’s time to evolve," wrote Microsoft on its blog. “To help us set a new direction, we’ve commissioned five original, custom fonts to eventually...

The man suspected of stabbing two Asian American women on a San Francisco sidewalk was reportedly released early from a 25-year prison sentence due to a left-wing criminal justice diversion program. Years before allegedly stabbing two elderly woman at a Tenderloin bus stop, Patrick Thompson, now 54, was charged with assault with a deadly weapon in 2017 and sent to a mental institution, according to the San Francisco Chronicle – but he was granted entry into a mental health diversion program in 2019, "successfully" completing it in August 2020. A spokesperson for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation deferred...

Black Lives Matter militants took to the streets of North Portland on Thursday, in a march for Patrick Kimmons, who was shot by police in 2018 after a gang shootout on the streets late at night. During Thursday’s event the protesters began marching in the streets, with a couple of support vehicles leading the way. At two separate points multiple participants pulled AR-15s, AK-47s, pistols, and possibly a shotgun and/or Keltec Sub 2000 on motorists who happened be driving along.

Margie Zacharias has broken her silence to defend her late husband, the apologist Ravi Zacharias, from sexual and spiritual abuse findings which caused Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM) to reorganise. "There is absolutely no way that Ravi is guilty as charged, convicted, cancelled and executed, some even going so far as to claim that he never knew the Lord," Margie wrote in an email to her friends. "It is not because I am in denial. It is because I knew him and because there is absolutely no evidence to support anything contrary," she continued. Earlier this year, the findings of...