Free Republic

We are about to see a dramatic shift away from heavy reliance on vaccines and toward ever greater reliance on antivirals to treat COVID. Within the coming year, antivirals may well replace vaccine boosters as the primary means for combatting COVID-19 and its variants. Several factors make this shift an inevitable course. The shift will make an already insurmountable set of legal obstacles to Biden’s mandates even more formidable. The shift will eventually cause all of America to emulate Florida. Governor Ron DeSantis’ early appreciation for the need to make available effective treatments, in addition to the vaccines, throughout Florida...

While the omicron variant appears to be inconsequential, the Democrats have big plans for it. (Hint: Think of Australia.) Tucker Carlson is always enjoyable but sometimes he goes beyond being interesting and entertaining and makes points so profound they deserve to be widely shared. That’s why I’m using this post to share with you Tucker’s Wednesday night monologue regarding the way the Biden administration is using the appearance of the omicron variant—which seems to be mild, at most—to continue its crackdown on American liberties. Although the monologue starts off lightheartedly with a little riff about the Biden administration canceling Mozambique,...

The nonsensical coverage of the debate over paid leave continues. Apparently, opposing a federal paid-leave program is the equivalent of being anti-family or pro-suffering, or so we're told. We rarely get information about the full consequences of such a policy. What kinds of employment leave options do workers use the most? Who exactly doesn't have paid leave currently? Are there legitimate reasons for an employer not to provide it? Or, would a government program target only those workers who do not currently have employer-provided paid leave? These are some of the questions that are rarely asked by those who insist...

The Democrats are doing everything they can to get Americans into electric cars. However, those cars come with the risk of a serious loss of power—not just for the car but for those who buy those cars. We have to begin with asking why is the governing pushing electric vehicles? And it’s not just cars, it’s also trucks. Why are they ignoring hybrid vehicles? If something happens to the electric guts of a properly designed hybrid car, the vehicle can limp along with its smaller gas engine until it reaches safety. What happens to a fully electric vehicle if its...

It is by now a familiar pattern: Russian troops mass near the Ukrainian border, triggering ratcheting rhetoric and jitters across Europe and the United States that war might be imminent, before a flurry of diplomacy calms nerves. Officials and experts say that this time is different — and there are several clues giving them genuine concern that the current gambit by Russian President Vladimir Putin might be for real, and the start of a conflict that could drag in Europe and even the U.S. itself. Putin has deployed more than 90,000 troops along Russia’s border with Ukraine, matching the force...

Whew, I got my column accepted last week at the Washington Times with no intrusion from the censors. In fact, with no censors! At the Good Times, there are no censors at work. I used to write this column on a weekly basis for The Washington Post, and it could be a harrowing experience. Every week, I had to be certain that I had crossed no barriers with the potentates that be. Certain things could not be said. One editor told me that readers around the world thought that The Washington Post was the official voice of our government and...

The federal government spies on every email, text, and call you make. It uses your phone's location services to pinpoint where you are at all times. It knows which I.P. addresses are associated with online comments that have been deemed "politically incorrect." Its partnerships with Amazon and Walmart let it know what you're reading and buying. Its partnerships with Google and Facebook let it know what you're thinking. Its partnerships with Twitter and Hollywood allow it to censor unapproved messages before too many brains have the opportunity to consider new thoughts. Its alliance with credit card companies allows it to...

A USA Today-Suffolk University poll placed Vice resident Kamala Harris' approval ratings at 28%, 10 points below that of resident Joe Biden. The U.K. Telegraph tweeted: "With Kamala Harris looking unelectable, the Democrats are considering the nuclear option. Whispers in Washington suggest Joe Biden's camp has a plan to find a more popular replacement ahead of the 2024 battle." When Harris ran for president, she dropped out before the Iowa caucus, the first contest in the primary. She garnered little support from her home state, California. Harris got called out for hypocrisy during a debate by rival Rep. Tulsi Gabbard,...

Fool's Ball Week 13 Your home for all things Fool's Ball! In Memoriam Danny Lee (BENDER2)

In a recent online exchange, YouTuber Casey Neistat posted his fury after his car was broken into and the contents stolen. Los Angeles, he railed, was turning into a "3rd-world s-hole of a city." The multimillionaire actor Seth Rogen chastised Neistat for his anger. Rogen claimed that a car's contents were minor things to lose. He added that while living in West Hollywood he had his own car broken into 15 times, but thought little of it. Online bloggers ridiculed Rogen. No wonder - the actor lives in multimillion-dollar homes in the Los Angeles area, guarded by sophisticated security systems...

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NATO allies share an "unwavering commitment" to Ukraine's sovereignty, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Thursday, hours before he meets Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov amid escalating East-West tensions over Ukraine. Blinken, speaking at the start of talks with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, reiterated Washington's concerns over a build-up of Russian troops on the border that has triggered threats of fresh Western sanctions against Moscow. Kuleba tweeted that Ukraine, which is not a NATO member but seeks closer ties with the Atlantic alliance, was working with Western countries on a "comprehensive deterrence package including severe economic sanctions"...

The news of the emerging Omicron variant was greeted with a giant shrug by most of America, and it’s no surprise why. The total failure of our establishment to earn our trust over the last two years of this pandemic made it inevitable that a huge number of people, at best, don’t care, and at worst think it’s a calculated lie designed to prolong this nonsense. The COVIDians are positively turgid over the idea of more mandates, more lockdowns, more masks, and more viro-fascism. So when the CEO of Moderna states that the vaccine might not be as effective against...

Major League Baseball team owners have locked out the players in a battle over the game’s future economic structure, initiating the sport’s first work stoppage since the strike that resulted in the cancelation of the 1994 World Series. [snip] A large point of contention is the competitive landscape, particularly the rise of “tanking”–a radical rebuilding strategy in which teams intentionally make their rosters worse to save money and acquire draft picks for the future. This approach, coupled with an increased reliance on data analytics, caused a squeeze on some veteran free agents, inspiring the players’ frustration. [snip] Management argues that...

If you haven’t heard anything about Border Patrol agents on horseback allegedly “whipping” migrants lately, it’s because the anti-borders Left and the corporate media just had another narrative blow up in its face. After a weeks-long moral panic about Customs and Border Patrol (CPB) agents allegedly mistreating migrants, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is no longer pursuing an investigation into those agents. The DHS’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) announced earlier this month that they will not pursue an investigation of the agents, who were photographed on horseback in front of Haitian migrants earlier this year. At the...

Self-enforcing life rules….. 1. Law of Mechanical Repair - After your hands become coated with grease, your nose will begin to itch and you'll have to pee. 2. Law of Gravity - Any tool, nut, bolt, screw, when dropped, will roll to the least accessible place in the universe. 3. Law of Probability - The probability of being watched is directly proportional to the stupidity of your act. 4. Law of Random Numbers - If you dial a wrong number, you never get a busy signal; someone always answers. 5. Variation Law - If you change lines (or traffic lanes),...

The Kyle Rittenhouse trial was one of, if not, the most highly publicized and politicized cases since the trial of O.J. Simpson, with the jury’s Nov. 19 verdict causing a storm of both approbation and disapprobation around the world. Such high profile cases are bound to elicit aggressive responses from all sides. Yet what changed this time was the difference in response from certain sections of the public; namely, the that some viewed the American justice system as defunct and obsolete, based on the fact that Kyle Rittenhouse was acquitted on all charges, and, therefore, needed to be reconstructed. I...

McAuliffe’s candor during a September 29 debate against Glenn Youngkin set parents on fire, and likely cost him the election. Referring to books with sexually explicit material, he vowed that he would not “let parents come into schools and take books off the shelves.” He doubled down a few seconds later with this indicative statement: “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach.” But his loss was not just a matter of some ill-advised comments. Disturbing as they were to many parents, McAuliffe’s actions while Virginia governor in 2016 revealed that, in his mind, parental consent...

Here’s a telling but disquieting new survey. Harvard University’s Institute of Politics surveyed 2,109 young Americans ages 18-29 on their political views and their perceptions of the U.S. as a nation. The results are not encouraging. “A majority of young Americans believe that our democracy is in trouble or failing,” the poll analysis said, noting, however, that “78% say it’s important that the U.S. is a democracy in the first place.” “Young Americans place the chances that they will see a second civil war in their lifetime at 35%; chances that at least one state secedes at 25%. Nearly half...

A state lawmaker who flouted mask requirements in the Maine State House and fought against pandemic restrictions has resigned from his seat because of his wife’s COVID-19 death. Republican Rep. Chris Johansen, of Monticello, told House Speaker Ryan Fecteau in a letter this month that he needs to tend to his family farm. His wife, he wrote, had been dedicated to the farm, freeing him to serve in the Legislature. He was one of seven lawmakers who was stripped of committee assignments for refusing to wear masks in the State House after leaders required them. Both he and his wife...