Free Republic

They face a hostile environment much more often than their liberal peers do. With schools reopening for in-person instruction in a few weeks, many people are understandably fixated on the dangers COVID-19 poses to students’ safety and well-being. While the pandemic remains a real concern, another very worrisome issue will face our nation’s high-school students when they return to the classroom: whether conservative students will be treated fairly if their views and ideas do not comport with the overall zeitgeist of particular schools.... ...In the case of religious beliefs, barely 4 percent of respondents in the sample reported seeing uncivil...

The Biden administration on Monday challenged a federal judge’s decision in June to block the Interior Department’s pause on oil and gas leasing on public lands and waters – a critical piece of its climate change policy – but will proceed with leasing during the appeals process.

A fully vaccinated staff member from Gov. Gavin Newsom's office has tested positive for COVID-19, a spokesperson said Monday. The staffer had not interacted with Newsom or any staff who regularly come into contact with him, the spokesperson said. Once the office learned of the positive case this week, all staff were informed and the office underwent the state's COVID-19 protocols for state agencies.

Has anyone seen a formal resignation letter from Cuomo with a signature at the bottom? Surely such a formal document is legally necessary, given the nature of the powers Cuomo holds as chief executive of the state of New York. He must forswear his office as a matter of functional law so that it can be vacated before his successor, Kathy Hochul, is sworn in. His resignation is supposed to take effect in eight days. Where is the letter? Might it be that Cuomo has a scheme to stick around? Could this whole resignation business be a kind of trial...

The mood was sombre Monday in the corridors of the Pentagon, where US military personnel watched helplessly as chaos erupted at Kabul airport and privately criticized the slow pace of Joe Biden's administration in evacuating US-allied Afghans who fear Taliban retribution. Some criticized the State Department, which has sole authority to grant visas to former interpreters and other US military support staff and their families, for waiting more than two months to begin the process for Afghans in fear of their lives. .. ...Another Pentagon official interviewed by AFP said that diplomats had tried to speed up the visa process...

<p>Institutions are being absorbed not just by the woke apparat, but by an array of ideologies that seeks to destroy them.</p><p>The collective madness that ensued from the pandemic, the quarantine, the self-induced recession, the George Floyd killing and subsequent months of exempted riots, the election year, and the resurgence of variants of the Chinese-engineered coronavirus, all ignited the fuse of formerly inert socialist dynamite. And the ensuing explosion of revolutionary fervor in just a few months has made America almost unrecognizable.</p>

Jeb Bush RetweetedMike Pompeo met with Taliban Head of the Political Office Mullah Beradar on September 12, 2020.Beradar is now set to become the new President of Afghanistan.President Trump had Beradar released from a Pakistani prison in 2018.Press Release: https://t.co/64gZZuu05G pic.twitter.com/sFMPvUXz3r— Travis Akers (@travisakers) August 15, 2021

Arizona Senate President Karen Fann verified on Monday that auditors who conducted Maricopa County forensic audit of the 2020 election are preparing a report to present to state lawmakers. “Confirming audit companies are preparing the draft report to present to the senate team,” Sen. Fann tweeted on Monday in response to rumors that an audit report was underway. “Senate team will then review for accuracy and clarity for final report which will be released publicly.”

Novavax has enlisted a pair of industry heavyweights on the quest to push its recombinant COVID-19 vaccine hopeful across the finish line. The biotech’s new senior vice president of quality assurance, Nasir Egal, Ph.D., hails from Sanofi, while Jim Kelly, Novavax’s new chief financial officer and treasurer, joins from Supernus Pharmaceuticals. Novavax will channel the execs’ quality and commercial know-how toward its experimental COVID-19 vaccine NVX-CoV2373, which it plans to file for an emergency use authorization (EUA) in the U.S. in the fourth quarter. The news comes after Novavax reported series of vaccine manufacturing and supply issues this year, which...

Some 50% of the patients needed have been recruited to complete a Phase III trial of an American-developed drug that “might be a game changer” in the battle against COVID-19, says Hadassah University Medical Center’s Prof. Yosef Caraco. Caraco told The Jerusalem Post that his team recently completed its part of a successful Phase II trial of the orally available antiviral drug candidate Molnupiravir, developed by Merck Pharmaceuticals (legally known internationally as MSD), a drug meant to slow the progression of coronavirus from mild to severe disease. The professor presented the data from the study at the European Congress of...

The scenes out of Afghanistan are infuriating and tragically predictable. It shouldn’t really come as a surprise that President Biden and the geniuses surrounding him have made such an almighty hash of the withdrawal from that godforsaken country. Look at everything else he has messed up. His first act in office was to dismantle hard-won Trump-era border protection measures. The inevitable illegal migrant surge at the southern border has turned into an unchecked invasion, with national security and public health risks that will ricochet through history. At this stage, we can confidently say that Joe Biden has the reverse Midas...

A young Chinese woman says she was held for eight days at a Chinese-run secret detention facility in Dubai, along with at least two Uyghurs, in what may be the first evidence that China is operating a “black site” beyond its borders.Wu Huan, 26, was on the run to avoid extradition to China because her fiancé was considered a Chinese dissident. Wu told The Associated Press she was abducted from a hotel in Dubai and detained by Chinese officials at a villa, converted into a jail, where she saw or heard two other prisoners, both Uyghurs.She said she was questioned...

After fifteen years of constant war in Afghanistan, President Trump believed it was time to try our best to end it. He believed that the goal of extending our involvement beyond punishment for the 9-11 attacks into the concept of nation-building was wrong from the start, and we needed to wind down our presence and depart. He was in fact elected, in 2016, in large part, upon this philosophy - of maintaining a powerful military that is used sparingly (rather than a weaker military, stretched too thin through global meddling). Even so, President Trump did not take office in January...

The Biden administration has decided that most Americans should get a coronavirus booster vaccination eight months after they received their second shot, and could begin offering third shots as early as mid- to late September, according to administration officials familiar with the discussions. Officials are planning to announce the administration’s decision as early as this week. Their goal is to let Americans who received the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccines know now that they will need additional protection against the Delta variant that is causing caseloads to surge across the nation. The new policy will depend on the Food and Drug...

Former senior military and security figures say PM’s decision to depart was ‘dereliction of duty’ Boris Johnson’s departure on holiday on Saturday, despite public warnings the Taliban would be in Kabul within hours, has been criticised as a “dereliction of duty” by former senior military and security figures. It emerged on Monday that the prime minister and the foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, took their summer holidays at the same time before both taking the decision to return.... ...Major Gen Charlie Herbert, who undertook three tours of duty in Afghanistan between 2007-18, said: “It is almost impossible to believe that the...

Politifact is to be about as trusted as an anonymous Twitter user with no photo and five followers when it comes to claims about what is and isn’t factual in any given situation. It’s proven time and again that its out-of-control bias leans so far to the left that it sometimes falls over and embarrassed itself.It just did so again, but this time it tried to step into the ring with Texas Sen. Ted Cruz on Texas law. Highly unwise. Old women would have better luck in an actual ring with Ali in his prime.But Politifact knew that when it...

The Biden administration has decided that most Americans should get a coronavirus booster vaccination eight months after they received their second shot, and could begin offering third shots as early as mid- to late September, according to administration officials familiar with the discussions. The latest data from Israel, posted on the government’s website on Monday, shows what some experts describe as continued erosion of the efficacy of the Pfizer vaccine over time

According to the firm, the system termed as ‘Indrajaal’ can protect an area of 1000-2000 sq km against threats from UAV's, Incoming Weapons, Loitering Munitions and Low-RCS targets.In the backdrop of the Indian Air Force probing the use of drones in the recent Jammu airport explosion, Grene Robotics has developed India’s first indigenous drone defence dome system called ‘Indrajaal’.According to the firm, Indrajaal can protect an area of 1000-2000 sq. km per system against threats from UAV's, Incoming Weapons, Loitering Munitions and Low-RCS targets.VideoLink

America’s closest allies said Sunday that President Joe Biden’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan left them questioning the United States’ resolve and Biden’s leadership. The Washington Post reports that U.S. allies are complaining “that they were not fully consulted on a policy decision that potentially puts their own national security interests at risk — in contravention of President Biden’s promises to recommit to global engagement” and that “many around the world are wondering whether they could rely on the United States to fulfill long-standing security commitments stretching from Europe to East Asia.” Leaders in the United Kingdom, a close ally of...

Former Nevada Attorney General Adam Laxalt (R) filed paperwork on Sunday to challenge Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D) in Nevada, setting the scene for a competitive race as both parties look to secure control of the upper chamber in next year's midterm elections. Laxalt, an ally of former President Trump, served as Nevada's attorney general from 2015 until 2019. He launched a bid for the governorship in 2018 but ultimately lost to Gov. Steve Sisolak (D) by roughly 4 percentage points. He turned heads in 2014 when he became the country's youngest attorney general after being elected at age 35,...