Free Republic

Halloween is going to be an extra scary day for the logistics world. A total of 60,000 containers have been marked as beyond the dwell time and need to be moved out of the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach by the carriers or the penalties will start racking up. A total of 33,000 containers need to be rolled out of the Port of Los Angeles and 27,000 loaded containers for the Port of Long Beach — a whopping $2,633,940,000 value in trade.Carriers were put on notice this week when the ports announced that, starting next Monday, a daily...

[P]ushed about whether the United States would defend Taiwan from a Chinese attack, Biden added: "Yes. Yes, we have a commitment to do that." The remark quickly made headlines, as the U.S. policy for decades has been one of "strategic ambiguity" toward how it would respond to such an attack. The 1979 Taiwan Relations Act commits the U.S. to support Taiwan, including providing it defensive capabilities, but not necessarily to engage in a military conflict. After Biden’s remarks, the White House soon clarified the comment, and said the President was not abandoning strategic ambiguity. A White House spokesperson told Fox...

Prince Andrew is seeking to have a judge drop a lawsuit filed against him by Jeffrey Epstein accuser Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who claims she was forced to have sex with the Duke of York when she was under 18 years old. “Virginia Giuffre may well be a victim of sexual abuse at the hands of Jeffrey Epstein, and nothing can excuse, nor fully capture, the abhorrence and gravity of Epstein’s monstrous behavior against Giuffre, if so,” according to court documents filed by Andrew’s lawyers on Friday. “However, and without diminishing the harm suffered as a results of Epstein’s alleged misconduct,...

Hilaria Baldwin bundled her six children in her car and set off without a destination in mind, once she heard her husband Alec had accidentally shot and killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the movie “Rust.” “I didn’t know where I was going, I just drove,” Baldwin told The Post Saturday during an exclusive interview in Vermont. “I just drove around and around and around with my kids.” The family was seen leaving their Greenwich Village home Oct. 22, a day after the tragic shooting. Hilaria tells said she drove for an entire day in search of somewhere...

The US Navy successfully tested a booster rocket motor to launch a hypersonic vehicle on Thursday. The test comes a week after China stunned the world with the launch of its hypersonic missile.A "static firing" of the hypersonic rocket booster motor was conducted in Promontory, Utah, according to a Navy statement.The US Navy "successfully conducted a second test of the First Stage Solid Rocket Motor (SRM) on October 28, 2021, in Promontory, Utah, as part of the development of the Navy's Conventional Prompt Strike (CPS) offensive hypersonic strike capability and the Army's Long Range Hypersonic Weapon (LRHW).""Today's successful test brings...

Ukraine's use of Turkish strike drones in the conflict in the eastern Donbass region is defensive and does not violate any agreements, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Friday. Russia accused Ukraine of destabilising the situation after government forces used a Turkish-made Bayraktar TB2 drone to strike a position controlled by Russian-backed separatists this week. read more The General Staff of Ukraine's Armed Forces said it had deployed the drone to force pro-Russian separatists to cease fire and the drone had destroyed an artillery unit belonging to the separatists using a guided bomb. "When the Ukrainian army feels the need to...

on’t worry if you hear an explosion,” our Armenian guide tells us as we creep along the bombed-out streets of Martuni. “By the time you hear it, it has already missed you. You should only really worry if you hear the hum of a drone. Which you will,” he adds with a dry grin. This small town is less than two miles from the front line of a bloody battle between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the long-disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh—an area about the size of Delaware that’s entirely within Azerbaijan and largely inhabited by ethnic Armenians. The conflict dates back...

The Biden administration has failed to enforce the U.S.-China phase one trade agreement. There are serious concerns about the enforcement mechanism of the deal as China's purchases fall behind targets. In the trade deal signed in January 2020, Beijing promised to purchase about $200 billion of US goods and services over 2020, 2021 compared with 2017 levels. We've noted on multiple occasions how China was never going to live up to the deal, and nearly two years later, it still hasn't. Top Biden officials have tried to reassure that the deal is still intact and said the administration would hold...

“Faith, academic excellence, service, and community.” These are the “four pillars” that support Rice Memorial High School, one of the best high schools in the state of Vermont. These pillars anchor the topflight academics and athletics that make Rice a great option for Burlington-area families. But the state has turned one of those pillars into a stumbling block for several families who hope to send their kids to Rice. Care to guess which one? Vermont maintains a Town Tuition Program, which provides a tuition benefit for students who live in towns without public schools. Towns that provide tuition for their...

ATLANTA — Months after calling for a boycott of Major League Baseball, former President Donald Trump did the tomahawk chop with Atlanta Braves fans at Game 4 of the World Series on Saturday night. Trump stood beside his wife, Melania, as he chopped away with fans before the game between the Atlanta Braves and Houston Astros from a private suite.

Pro-choice activists are celebrating an amendment to Portland’s bereavement leave policy that has made it the first local government in the United States to give paid time off to public employees after an abortion. One pro-life group is calling it an unwitting acknowledgment of the loss of life. The new policy allows public employees to take up to three days of bereavement leave for an abortion or a miscarriage, stillbirth or any other type of pregnancy loss, “irrespective of whether deemed medically necessary,” Oregon Public Broadcasting reported. The city council approved the changes unanimously. Laura Narefsky, an attorney on the...

Rep. Adam Kinzinger's (R-Ill.) announcement that he will retire after his current term marks the latest victory in former President Trump’s quest to purge his internal critics from the GOP and mold the Republican Party even more in his own image. Kinzinger's Friday announcement, along with stiff primary challenges facing other Republicans who voted for Trump’s impeachment earlier this year, underscores the headwinds critics of the former president face in their reelection bids — and just how Trumpian the House GOP conference is expected to be starting in 2023 in the likely absence of at least some of his detractors....

The Four Known Scientific Ways CO2 Cools Earth’s Climate Published on October 30, 2021 Written by Dr Pierre Latour PEAs Glasgow, Scotland hosts the UN’s COP 26 Climate Conference we thought we’d give a timely reminder of four key ways carbon dioxide (CO2) COOLS the atmosphere. The life-giving gas is so crucial we need MORE not less of it. As with the fake pandemic, inconvenient science facts destroy a doomsayer political narrative. Dr Pierre R Latour, a renowned American Chemical Engineer, first published in 2014 with Principia Scientific International how four known mechanisms and three laws of nature prove why...

...At a retail business based in New York, managers were distressed to encounter young employees who wanted paid time off when coping with anxiety or period cramps. At a supplement company, a Gen Z worker questioned why she would be expected to clock in for a standard eight-hour day when she might get through her to-do list by the afternoon. At a biotech venture, entry-level staff members delegated tasks to the founder.... ...Gabe Kennedy, 30, founder of the herbal supplement brand Plant People, noticed as he recruited Gen Z employees that some had no interest in the rigid work habits...

There will be no Ice in Hell. Entertainer Ice Cube left the cast of pending Sony comedy “Oh Hell No” — and walked away from a $9 million payday — after refusing the COVID-19 vaccine shot, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Ice Cube was slated to co-star with Jack Black, with whom he partnered on the project in June. Filmmaker Kitao Sakurai planned to shoot the flick this winter in Hawaii, and producers asked the cast to get the jab. Sony, Ice Cube’s agency and his personal representative, as well as co-producers Black and Matt Tolmach, all refused to comment...

Taliban government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said on Saturday that two of the three attackers had been arrested, and denied they were acting on behalf of the Islamist movement. Qazi Mullah Adel, spokesperson for the Taliban governor in Nangarhar province, confirmed the incident but did not provide details. A relative of the victims said the Taliban fighters had opened fire while music was being played. Music was banned the last time the Taliban ruled Afghanistan and, while the new government has not yet issued such a decree, its leadership still frowns on its use in entertainment and sees it as a...

CONFLICTING LOYALTIES An interviewer once asked the late Senator Sam Ervin, Jr. how he had developed such insight into human behavior. "I had a good teacher, Henry Horace Williams," replied Ervin. "He said the things that try people's souls do not consist of choosing between good and evil. The thing that tries a person's soul is having to choose between conflicting loyalties." Ervin went on to say that understanding that concept had not only helped him make better decisions, but to judge other people more fairly as well. Sometimes unwise choices were simply the result of misplaced loyalty. "A...

The only one with his back to the camera. You know everyone thinks hes a brain addled old fool. Seems like no one really wants to talk to him.

Pray For The Peace of JerusalemHabakkuk 3Habakkuk’s Prayer 3 A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet. On shigionoth.[a] 2 Lord, I have heard of your fame; I stand in awe of your deeds, Lord. Repeat them in our day, in our time make them known; in wrath remember mercy. 3 God came from Teman, the Holy One from Mount Paran.[b] His glory covered the heavens and his praise filled the earth. 4 His splendor was like the sunrise; rays flashed from his hand, where his power was hidden. 5 Plague went before him; pestilence followed his steps. 6 He stood, and...

Biden and Francis at TanagraIn case you didn’t see it (I didn’t have time to read it immediately) Card. Burke published a letter about Catholic Politicians and Non-Admittance to Holy Communion. HERE in six languages.I think you can imagine his position, which is impeccably argued according to the Church’s law, suggesting also a sound pastoral praxis. It also provides a brief review of the slide into indifference about Communion for manifest and obstinent grave sinners in the political sphere, going back to the infamous Hyannisport Conclave of 1964.In contrast to this, I read today in Italian at Nuova Bussola that...