Free Republic

PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — Former Silverton Mayor Stu Rasmussen, who was the nation’s first openly transgender mayor, passed away around 11 a.m. Wednesday from metastatic prostate cancer after spending several weeks in home hospice.

If we were standing here a year ago in Daytona, you could get a gallon of a gas — now it’s $3.34. It’s $1.31 more than it was a year ago today just right here, and that’s really true throughout the rest of the country,” he said, noting that the supply chain crisis is only exacerbating the issue. Because of that, the next legislative session will pursue providing over a billion dollars in gas tax relief for Florida families, “and that’s going to make a big, big, difference,” he announced. According to the Republican governor, the average family could save...

One of the great frustrations with Joe Biden’s vaccination mandate that has led to protests and lawsuits is the provision that puts private-sector workers out of their jobs if they remain unvaccinated. It’s already started happening in some places, but perhaps unsurprisingly, the news hasn’t been all bad for everyone. As most of you know by now, the United States has been caught up in a significant labor shortage this year as businesses around the nation have struggled to reopen. This has led some companies, including job recruiters to take note of a particular provision in the mandate and seek...

Maurice Timothy Jones, 35, was charged last month with fatally shooting 31-year-old Seth Tunstall on Sept. 7 outside of a convenience store in Cherry Hill. Surveillance video showed the two had engaged in a fist fight; Jones left the store, and was pursued by Tunstall, who emerged pointing a gun at him. When Jones drew his own weapon, Tunstall attempted to flee and was shot in the back.

There is no way to post 35 pages of documents here, but I've linked the PDF file. Long and short, it looks like the lawsuit/temporary restraining order has failed. Check out the PDF, let me know what you think.

There’s a lesson here not only about Illinois pensions but about how easily the press will let Gov. J.B. Pritzker thumb his nose at a crisis.We reported Wednesday that the total unfunded liability for Illinois state and local pensions passed the $500 billion mark. That includes pensioner healthcare liabilities, which are constitutionally guarantied just like pensions. It is based on numbers from Moody’s Investor Services which uses assumptions comparable to those used in the private sector and are less optimistic than those the state uses. Read Wirepoints Special Report: Illinois pension shortfall surpasses $500 billion, average debt burden now $110,000...

President Joe Biden broke his silence Monday about the deadly incident at a Christmas parade in Waukesha, Wisconsin on Monday. Five people were killed and 40 wounded after an SUV plowed into a crowd of people celebrating at the parade. The president commented on the tragedy at a White House event announcing his choices to the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve. “An entire community is struggling, struggling to cope with the horrific act of violence,” Biden said about the Waukesha community. Biden referred to the 59th Annual Waukesha Christmas Parade as “the holiday parade in Wisconsin” and lamented...

I hadn’t heard of Winsome Sears until she appeared to acknowledge victory in her race for Virginia lieutenant governor on the evening of November 2. My immediate reaction was that a star is born. Of the politicians who spoke that night, she said what I most wanted to hear. Yesterday she appeared for a segment on CNN’s State of the Union with Dana Bash. Bash went in search of a cudgel with which to bash Sears and somehow landed on vaccines (see CNN story here). Neither our nor CNN’s State of the Union is good. However, I stand by my...

ABC legal analyst Sunny Hostin said Monday on ABC’s “The View” that she believes if Kyle Rittenhouse were black, he would not be alive, much less acquitted of murder and other charges after he shot and killed two men and injured a third during a Black Lives Matter protest last year in Kenosha, WI. Co-host Joy Behar asked, “Sunny, if he were black would he be free now?”

With President Biden reportedly reappointing Jerome Powell to a second term as Federal Reserve chair and make Lael Brainard as vice chair, he will have an opportunity to meet with them privately. So why am I suggesting Biden should do what no other U.S. president has done and indicate that he wants the Fed to raise rates in an election year? To be sure, throughout the Fed’s history, the opposite tack has been more common: Presidents Johnson, Nixon and, most recently, Trump all jawboned the Fed to keep interest rates low to support the economy and their reelection prospects. The...

CARACAS, May 18 (Reuters) - Venezuelan officials and soldiers inspected a warehouse of U.S. agribusiness giant Cargill Inc [CARGIL.UL] on Wednesday as part of a crackdown on alleged hoarding and price-gouging with foodstuffs. ... With Venezuelans complaining of oil, flour, meat and other shortages in recent days, Chavez over the weekend urged ministers to hunt speculators and said he would have no hesitation in expropriating any companies found guilty. Government officials, together with armed National Guard members, found 148 tonnes of food oil at the Cargill warehouse in Caracas during Wednesday’s operation. “We are checking how oil reaches black market...

Fox News

Investigators Also Say Cuomo Inappropriately Used Staffers To Work On His Book And Wasn't Fully Transparent Regarding Nursing Home Deaths ALBANY, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) — The New York State Assembly Judiciary Committee released the findings of its investigation into former Gov. Andrew Cuomo Monday. The investigation covered not only the sexual harassment case brought by Attorney General Letitia James, but also COVID-19 nursing home deaths, questions about whether Cuomo’s staff improperly worked on his book, and allegations he covered up safety concerns at the Gov. Mario M. Cuomo Bridge. “We conclude that there is overwhelming evidence that the former governor engaged...

Fox News commentators Jonah Goldberg and Stephen Hayes have quit the network, upset over a documentary about Jan. 6 that was produced by Tucker Carlson. “With the release of ‘Patriot Purge,’ we felt we could no longer ‘do right as we see it’ and remain at Fox News. So we resigned,” they wrote in a joint post at The Dispatch, where both work. “Patriot Purge” is a documentary series from Carlson about what took place on Jan. 6, when protesters and rioters breached the U.S. Capitol in Washington, interrupting a joint session of Congress that was certifying electoral votes. A...

ased in the United States, the Ian Fleming Foundation was formed nearly three decades ago when Doug Redenius, Dr. Michael L. VanBlaricum, and John Cork began acquiring an impressive collection of vehicles from the James Bond movies. And it all started with a submarine. The wet submersible Neptune from the Bond film For Your Eyes Only was up for sale in 1992. It had been donated to a museum in New York, which had it on display for some time. However, the museum didn’t specialize in movie or military history and the curator decided to get rid of it. Catching...

Looking for someone to blame for high and rising prices at the pump, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D–Mass.) has found a familiar villain: big corporations. During an appearance on MSNBC's The ReidOut on Thursday, Warren said price gouging is to blame for the pain that Americans are feeling at the gas pump these days. Amid rising inflation, the average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline sits at $3.40 nationally, up from about $2.11 at this same time last year and higher than at any time since 2014. This, Warren argued, is great news for oil companies and their shareholders....

Looters have targeted Bay Area businesses in California for the third consecutive day, this time robbing a jewelry store and Lululemon outlet. On Sunday, police in Hayward, Calif. responded to calls from stores at the Southland Mall. That same evening, a group of suspects robbed a Lululemon store in San Jose, according to a local CBS affiliate, KPIX. The calls about suspects at the mall came from multiple stores as thieves briefly took over a jewelry store and caused a large disturbance in the mall, KPIX reported.

I was in third grade. Happy to be a Friday and looking forward to drawing and coloring instead of catechism class after lunch.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — The American Civil Liberties Union on Monday sent a letter demanding a Kansas City, Missouri school district return two LGBTQ-themed books to library shelves. The North Kansas City School District pulled “All Boys Aren’t Blue” and “Fun House” from high schools this month in response to parent complaints. The district is reviewing the titles, and the books are expected to be discussed during a Monday school board meeting. In a letter to school officials, the ACLU of Missouri said removing the books violates students’ First Amendment rights by restricting their access to ideas. “Students must...

Press conference.