Free Republic

The Washington Post reports that the current U.S. Senate is the oldest in American history. Dianne Feinstein turns 88 this month. Charles Grassley turns 88 in September. Richard Shelby is 87. James Inhofe is 86. Patrick Leahy is 81. Twenty-three senators are in their 70s. The average age of senators at the beginning of this year was 64.3 years. It may be that being 88 now is like being, say, 78 a few decades ago. So despite being the oldest, this might not be the most age-impaired Senate in our history. Robert Caro’s book about the Lyndon Johnson-dominated Senate makes...

Former Speaker of the House Paul Ryan was in the news recently. He gave a speech that was very critical of former President Trump. I would offer a counterpoint, but I already have. It happened in October of 2018, when I spent 10 minutes hollering at Speaker Ryan in a Maryland parking lot. It was right after I had become famous in the war over the nomination of Justice Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. My point in engaging Speaker Ryan was to try and convince him that we are living in a time of danger in America. A danger...

Have you ever seen fame and fortune turn so quickly against someone as it is right now against Il Fauci? The scandal of his emails ranks right up alongside the massive leak of the “climategate” emails back in 2009; they are the “Pentagon Papers” of the COVID fiasco. And does every media headline have to include “racism” in it right now? It seems like it from the ones we’ve assembled this week.

The world's richest countries signed a landmark global agreement Saturday to confront tax avoidance and make sure that giant tech companies pay their fair share, Britain's treasury chief said. "I'm delighted to announce that G-7 finance ministers today, after years of discussions, have reached a historic agreement to reform the global tax system to make it fit for the global digital age and crucially to make sure that it's fair, so that the right companies pay the right tax in the right places," Sunak said in a video message posted on Twitter. The meeting of finance ministers came ahead of...

GARDENA, Calif. — A man suspected of viciously attacking a woman at a gas station in Gardena was arrested in Long Beach Friday evening. Authorities were looking for a 300-to-350-pound shirtless man seen in a video attacking the woman at the gas station. The attack appears to be random and without provocation, and left the woman, a 25-year-old single mother, hospitalized with serious injuries. The suspect, who has not been immediately identified, was taken into custody around 7:30 p.m. after a family member turned him in. The family member expressed concern he would hurt someone else or himself. Investigators say...

Former President Barrack Obama suggested Friday that efforts by Republican legislatures to change voting laws amount to "rigging" the system. During a virtual discussion at the Economic Club of Chicago, Obama said Republicans have embraced "patently false" claims that the 2020 election was stolen, and excoriated them for instituting "voter suppression methods" through state legislatures. "That's the kind of dangerous behavior we are going to have to push back on," Obama said. “This really has to do with the basic rules well all have agreed to, to keep this diverse, multiracial democracy functioning. Are we going to stick to those...

LEE COUNTY, Fla – A robbery suspect picked the wrong delivery driver to target Wednesday night. Lee County deputies say 16-year old Hayden Celin tried robbing the Domino’s driver in a failed setup. The driver tried delivering a pizza to a home in Pine Manor, but the family inside said they never placed an order. When the driver returned to his car, he noticed his cell phone was missing. As the driver went to leave, Celin allegedly punched him in the face, and shot a water gun loaded with pepper spray into the man’s face. That’s when the driver pulled...

Pray For the Peace of Jerusalem Psalm 86Psalm 86 A prayer of David.. 1 Hear me, Lord, and answer me, for I am poor and needy. 2 Guard my life, for I am faithful to you; save your servant who trusts in you. You are my God; 3 have mercy on me, Lord, for I call to you all day long. 4 Bring joy to your servant, Lord, for I put my trust in you. 5 You, Lord, are forgiving and good, abounding in love to all who call to you. 6 Hear my prayer, Lord; listen to my cry...

NASA is now on the perplexing UFO case. NASA chief Bill Nelson, who assumed his post just last month, has asked agency researchers to look into the spate of UFO sightings that U.S. Navy pilots have reported over the past two decades, CNN reported. "Now that I'm here at NASA, I've turned to our scientists and I've said, 'Would you, looking at it from a scientific standpoint, see if you can determine [what these objects are], so that we can have a better idea?'" Nelson told CNN's Rachel Crane in an interview that the network posted online Friday (June 4)....

After months of calling for cuts in police budgets, activists in Albuquerque, New Mexico, were dismayed to hear about Mayor Tim Keller’s plan for the $56 million in Covid-19 relief on its way from Washington. In April, Keller proposed earmarking more than 15 percent of the funds for the Albuquerque Police Department: $3 million to expand a gunshot detection system, $5 million to refurbish station houses, $1 million for new cars and $450,000 to recruit more officers. A Keller spokesman said this week that the money was part of a plan “to make our community safer and healthier for everyone.”...

In Northern California’s Butte County, at least 130 houseboats were evacuated from Lake Oroville as water levels fell to dangerously low levels.The lake’s record low is 646 feet, and the state’s Department of Water Resources expects that level to be breached in August. If that happens, public boat ramps would be inaccessible for the first due to low water levels. According to Aaron Wright, public safety chief for the Northern Buttes District of California State Parks, who spoke with AP, the only boat access point to the lake would be an old dirt road constructed in the late 1960s. Eric...

President Trump, who dreamed of being a movie producer, seems to have written the ideal script for confronting the media's biased, knee-jerk responses to every move he made. In my new book and film, Citizen Trump: A One Man Show, I dig deeper than the shallow "Duhlemonized" nonsense and expose the rigid mainstream media's determined constant attack and equal lack of judgment. The media prides itself on being a watchdog, but instead, it had become Pavlov's Lapdog. Obama/Hillary could say anything, and the Snarling dog in Trump could say nothing. No matter what he did, he was attacked, dismissed, called...

...We would all have to agree, I think, that 2020–21 was a banner year for dangerous clowns and their quack brethren, starting with the lunatics whose successful gain-of-function genetic research succeeded in turning a harmless bat virus into Covid-19, the virus that causes a kind of human ’flu that shut down the world and killed off thousands of old folks. Then we should include all the political and medical quacks who made sure that effective treatments, well-known to all real, competent physicians for years, were unavailable, even forbidden, and who went on to cause incalculable social and psychological damage by...

CHICAGO -- At least 16 people were shot, four fatally, across Chicago so far this weekend, CPD said. One of the most recent shootings took place in Woodlawn. A woman was shot six times early Saturday in Woodlawn on the South Side. The 30-year-old was trying to park her car about 5:40 a.m. in the 6200-block of South Eberhardt Avenue when a car that had been following her pulled next to her and someone from inside fired shots, Chicago police said. She suffered two gunshot wounds to the side, three to the arm and one to the leg, police said....

The Weekly Gardening Thread is a weekly gathering of folks that love soil, seeds and plants of all kinds. From complete newbies that are looking to start that first potted plant, to gardeners with some acreage, to Master Gardener level and beyond, we would love to hear from you. If you have specific question about a plant/problem you are having, please remember to state the Growing Zone where you are located. This thread is a non-political respite. No matter what, you won’t be flamed, and the only dumb question is the one that isn’t asked. It is impossible to hijack...

“Abolish the filibuster,” tweeted Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) on June 2. AOC’s tweet was a direct response to President Biden’s tweet earlier the same day, “We’re witnessing an all-out assault on our democracy — and we need to act swiftly to protect the sacred right to vote. We need the For the People Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Act.” Biden’s hyperbolic tweet was in reference to the fact that a few states have passed election integrity laws since the chaotic 2020 election, which could threaten the left’s electoral strategy of mass mail-in ballots, no identification verification, no signature...

If it ain’t sweet, it ain’t a kolache. As I found during a recent quest to find out more about why we call savory kolaches the wrong thing, the klobasnek, the proper term, is widely believed to have been invented in the heart of the Texas-Czech Belt in West. But Village Bakery owner Wendel Montgomery’s klobasnek—originally created as a simple sausage wrapped in kolache dough—has come a long way from its humble beginnings. Here’s a roundup of some of the more unique klobasniky we found around the state.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg has said emphatically that a “clear direction” on infrastructure needs to be in place by the time Congress returns from its Memorial Day recess on June 7th. If that is true, infrastructure week may become a reality. Leading up to June 7th, the White House and congressional Republicans are trying to hammer out an agreement. However, given the lack of progress thus far, it seems clear that despite bi-partisan talks, such a deal isn’t imminent and infrastructure week may yet again just be a figment of the imagination of the President. This is a shame, as...

For nearly a year, Jefferson Square Park in downtown Louisville, often called Injustice Square, Breeway, or simply “the square,” has been a place where multiple rots started. The mainstream media however likes to call these riots peaceful protests. Protest in downtown Louisville led to 17 arrests, five cars towed, one confiscated gun, and a search for a driver who hit a protester with their car. Police provided video captured on Real-Time Crime Center cameras, which are on the Metro Corrections building by the corner of Sixth and Liberty streets, that showed an individual in a car appearing to be confronted...

WASHINGTON - The Biden administration says it is canceling or reviewing a host of actions by the Trump administration to roll back protections for endangered or threatened species, with a goal of strengthening a landmark law while addressing climate change. The reviews by the U.S Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service are aimed at five Endangered Species Act regulations finalized by the Trump administration, including critical habitat designations and rules defining the scope of federal actions on endangered species. Habitat designations for threatened or endangered species can result in limitations on energy development such as mining or...