Free Republic

DENVER, CO—Local Christian plumber Peter Howe has come under fire for refusing to join same-sex fittings. Howe is being labeled a "backward, hateful bigot" for his refusal to connect two male pipe threads or two female pipe threads, insisting on only the traditional, conservative practice of male-to-female connections. "Fittings are between a male pipe thread and a female pipe thread only," said Howe in a statement. "That's the way God designed plumbing, and it's my religious right to refuse anyone with a different plumbing lifestyle. I'm not saying they don't have the freedom to do what they want. I'm just...

Disgraced former Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) posted a Thanksgiving message with a picture showing his mother and three daughters on Thursday. The 63-year-old stepped down from office after investigators with New York Attorney General Letitia James wrote a report concluding he sexually harassed 11 women, according to the Daily Mail.

The US will restrict travel from South Africa and seven other nearby countries from next week as fears grow over the new COVID-19 Omicron variant, the White House said Friday. The travel ban, which doesn’t apply to American citizens or permanent residents, will come into effect from Monday. The new restrictions apply to South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique and Malawi.

Paris’s fire-ravaged Notre-Dame cathedral risks resembling a “politically correct Disneyland” under controversial plans for its renovation seen by The Telegraph. Critics have warned that the world-famous cathedral will be turned into an “experimental showroom” under plans to dramatically change the inside of the medieval building. Under the proposed changes, confessional boxes, altars and classical sculptures will be replaced with modern art murals, and new sound and light effects to create “emotional spaces”. There will be themed chapels on a “discovery trail”, with an emphasis on Africa and Asia, while quotes from the Bible will be projected onto chapel walls in...

The U.S. government has paid out at least $548 million to informants working for the FBI, Drug Enforcement Agency and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms in recent years, multiple federal audits found as they slammed the agencies for wasteful spending. Among the questionable payments made to the informants include a parcel worker who was paid $1.4 million, an Amtrak employee who was paid nearly a $1 million and an airline worker who received $655,000. All three received those amounts from the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). Those three unidentified informants were all given the huge sums of cash between 2011...

The World Health Organization on Friday assigned the Greek letter omicron to a newly identified Covid variant in South Africa. The U.N. health agency recognized the strain, previously referred to as lineage B.1.1.529, as a variant of concern. Health experts are deeply concerned about the transmissibility of the omicron variant given that it has an unusual constellation of mutations and a profile that is different from other variants of concern. “Omicron, B.1.1.529, is named as a variant of concern because it has some concerning properties,” Maria Van Kerkhove, the WHO’s technical lead on Covid-19, said in a video published on...

For the first session on Saturday, John Peterson, chief editor of Socialist Revolution magazine, spoke on the elections and how the working class was offered no real choice between Donald Trump and Joe Biden. Biden was Wall Street’s preferred candidate. Democrats have already begun an offensive against the left wing of the party, against AOC and “the Squad.” Trump will continue to have a strong hold on the Republican Party through his newly announced super PAC, and “Trumpism” is far from finished. His base includes millions of angry and distressed workers, because there’s no working class alternative to the big...

RUSSIA and China's "deadly" alliance would effectively end the United States' status as the world's leading superpower, an expert has claimed. On Tuesday, Moscow said it has ramped up its military "cooperation" with Beijing in light of alleged threats by Washington including US nuke bombers flying near their borders. Tensions between the West and Russia are at boiling point over the ongoing conflict in Ukraine and the migrant crisis in Belarus. Isabel Sawkins, a research fellow at the Henry Jackson Society specialising in Russia, told The Sun Online that Russia and China joining forces could "potentially could be catastrophic" for...

The new COVID-19 variant first detected in South Africa was given the name Omicron by the World Health Organization on Friday. An advisory panel classified Omicron as a highly transmissible virus of concern and gave it its name under its Greek-letter system. It marks the first time in months that WHO has classified a COVID-19 variant with such a name – and is only the fifth variant to be given the designation amid the pandemic.

The euthanasia association says that “assisted death” is only for those who are vaccinated against COVID-19. Oh, the irony… Anyone wishing to be euthanized (or killed with medical help) now has to first present proof of vaccination or recovery from Covid, as per the new guidelines issued by Germany’s euthanasia association, according to RT. The total irony of this is not lost. Aren’t the “vaccinated” taking the shots so they don’t die? Because their fear of dying from something with a survival rate of over 99.99% is overwhelming the reptilian part of their brain? And many of those who don’t...

Washington is putting all options on the table in determining its response to Russia’s continued military build-up near Ukraine, a senior US official said on Friday. US Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Karen Donfried said the US is consulting with its European allies on the next moves in responding to Russia’s military escalation. “All options are on the table. And there's a toolkit that includes a whole range of options,” Ms Donfried said in a call with reporters. “What we're doing now is monitoring the region closely, consulting with our allies and partners on how do we deter...

Our civilization is crumbling right in front of our eyes. We have become accustomed to soaring murder rates, mass shootings, extreme degeneracy throughout the entire entertainment industry, violent rioting in our streets, and severe corruption on all levels of government. To a certain extent, a lot of these things seem “normal” to many of us at this point. But the truth is that what we are experiencing is not even close to “normal”. We are literally watching our entire society slowly but surely go down the tubes, and it is heartbreaking to watch. If you think that I am being...

A group of four young men are wanted for robbing $20,000 worth of merchandise from an Apple Store, all caught on security cameras in broad daylight - the latest in a series of lootings across California.

Wisconsin's largest children's hospital has been struggling to care for patients in the wake of the Waukesha Christmas Parade attack in large part because of staffing issues stemming from its COVID-19 vaccine mandate, multiple sources tell “The Dan O’Donnell Show.” 18 children were brought to the Children’s Wisconsin Milwaukee Hospital with injuries suffered when a driver plowed into parade-goers Sunday afternoon. One of those children was among the six people killed when he succumbed to his injuries Tuesday afternoon. Several of the young victims remain in critical or serious condition, and sources say the hospital simply did not have enough...

The Kiribati islands, Cambodia, Denmark, Tanzania, the Seychelles and the UAE. One might be forgiven for thinking that little connects these distant, often far-flung, corners of the globe. For the most part, little does. All except for one thing. Each of these countries has been on China’s wish list for the establishment of military bases as the East Asian giant attempts to expand its global footprint. Most recently, headlines were awash with rumours that the UAE, a key US partner in the Middle East, had begun building a military installation for China. After a swift US intervention in the matter,...

When reporters Will Fitzgibbon and Debbie Cenziper began digging into the Pandora Papers — nearly 12 million confidential files leaked to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists whose contents would go on to reverberate across the world — they noticed something curious. In the trove of documents, which expose a secretive financial system that shields the deals and assets of some of the world’s richest and most powerful people, one U.S. state, South Dakota, stood out. “We early on found a document in the leaked records that showed that there were a number of trusts established in South Dakota, and...

Earlier this year, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) found COVID-19 antibodies in white-tailed deer tested in four states: Illinois, Michigan, New York and Pennsylvania. Now, some health officials suggest hunters wear a mask while handling and cleaning carcasses. That has prompted some questions about whether hunting deer and eating their meat is safe. Multiple studies have found COVID-19 antibodies in deer. A study by the USDA found that COVID-19 antibodies were detected in 33% of 481 samples taken from white-tailed deer between January 2020 and March 2021 in Illinois, Michigan, New York and Pennsylvania. However, researchers were unable to...

The US section of the International Marxist Tendency held its largest-ever National Congress on the weekend of October 9 and 10. As the morning sun lit up the bright fall-colored foliage around the Pittsburgh Congress venue, 170 delegates and comrades filed into the meeting hall to take their seats........... ..With comrades in attendance from over 50 cities and 29 states, the event provided a glimpse of the truly national scope of the organization, which has begun to sink roots in every corner of the country.....Ultimately, the historical impasse of the capitalist system—and of American capitalism in particular—is the driving force...

A special form of radiation known as millimeter waves can kill 99% of corona and polioviruses from surfaces within two seconds, new research from scientists at Ariel University has shown. The results can have important implications on how to disinfect environments and equipment in a fast and efficient way. “Our laboratory focuses on electromagnetic radiation sources,” said Prof. Moshe Einat from the Department of Electrical Engineering, and a co-author of the study recently published in the journal Environmental Chemistry Letters. “This type of radiation operates in the millimeter-wave regime, which means that they have a wavelength of about three millimeters....