Free Republic

At today's Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) grilled Dale Ho, nominee to be United States District Judge for the Southern District of New York, over his past statements.

2nd covid case had "mild symptoms that have resolved"further evidence that Omicron is "extremely mild" and as Kolanovic said, could accelerate end of Pandemic

So the other day I talk with a buddy who I've not spoken with in over a year. He's married, his wife is pregnant and he has a three year old son. He's the only one in the family that's been vaccinated. Wife didn't want to get vaxxed while they were trying to get pregnant. Son is way to young. He got vaxxed because he travels and meets face to face with people around the country. Everyone in the family recently caught the China virus. The son had no symptoms. The wife had mild symptoms but was kept in the...

After the Chinese government and the International Olympic Committee announced that tennis player Peng Shuai is (allegedly) safe, the World Tennis Association has announced that it will suspend tournaments in China.Steve Simon, WTA chairman & CEO, issued a statement on Wednesday afternoon.He said, in part:When on November 2, 2021, Peng Shuai posted an allegation of sexual assault against a top Chinese government official, the Women’s Tennis Association recognized that Peng Shuai’s message had to be listened to and taken seriously. The players of the WTA, not to mention women around the world, deserve nothing less.From that moment forward, Peng Shuai...

It is “prudent” for fully vaccinated individuals to wear masks in congregate settings throughout the holiday season, Dr. Anthony Fauci said on Wednesday, ignoring that vaccines were originally pitched as a way for Americans to get back to a maskless state of pre-pandemic normalcy. A reporter asked Fauci on Wednesday if Americans should consider it safe to go to holiday gatherings, such as a cocktail party, without a mask on, even if they are fully vaccinated.

Biden Christmas impeachment song… Music here

For just under $15 per month, in perpetuity, the legality of your homeownership can be protected from identity thieves.Really?Here in California, and most likely elsewhere, in order for a vestee to convey a property title to another person or corporation, a notary has to confirm the vestee's identity. A signature alone is no longer sufficient. After the burst credit bubble of 2008, a thumb print also has to be provided. It's pretty hard to forge a thumb print.The scammers claim that the title thief can then re-mortgage the property, take the money, and stick you with the bill. Again, really?...

McConnell also reiterated his belief that the government wouldn't end up closing its doors. "We're not going to shut the government down," he said. "That makes no sense for anyone. Almost no one on either side thinks it's a good idea."

ROME — Pope Francis traveled to the island nation of Cyprus Thursday, where he told a gathering of priests and religious that there are “no walls in the Catholic Church.” The Church is catholic, “that is, universal, an open space in which all are welcomed and reached by the mercy of God and the invitation to love,” the pontiff asserted in the Maronite Cathedral of Our Lady of Grace in Nicosia.

More than $87 billion in unemployment benefits funded by the federal government was likely siphoned from the system during the Covid-19 pandemic, much of it due to fraud, according to a U.S. Department of Labor report. Congress authorized many new programs in the pandemic’s early days to support millions of workers who’d lost their jobs. Those programs, which ended on Labor Day this year, raised weekly benefits, extended the duration of aid and expanded the pool of jobless Americans eligible for payments. The federal government issued $872 billion in total benefits as of Sept. 30, according to an estimate from...

What if we could simply have advised everyone last March to supplement with vitamin D (and active forms of D for those with absorption issues)? An endless stream of academic research demonstrates that not only would such an approach have worked much better than the vaccines, but rather than coming with sundry known and unknown negative side effects, it would have induced immeasurable positive side effects in the population for an array of other health concerns. I recently changed doctors in search of a physician who actually follows science rather than political protocols from government and Big Pharma. My wife...

The Greek government will fine all unvaccinated people aged 60 and over €100 (£85/$113) every month after mandatory jabs are enforced from next month. The new policy came as part of an amendment to existing legislation on the mandatory vaccine policies introduced by the government earlier this week and will see anyone born prior to December 31st, 1961, unless they can prove they have recovered from the Wuhan virus in the last six months or have particular vulnerability to vaccine side-effects, newspaper Ekathimerini reports.

Minnesota public health authorities confirmed Thursday what appears to be the second U.S. case of the omicron Covid variant in a resident who recently returned from New York City, the state’s department of health said. The man, who was fully vaccinated and has since recovered, traveled to New York City to attend the Anime NYC 2021 convention at the Javits Center from Nov. 19-21, the department said in a statement. The first omicron case was confirmed in California by U.S. officials Wednesday in a person who recently returned to San Francisco from a trip to South Africa. New York health...

Let's say you owned a catering business hired to set up an outdoor wedding. Rain is forecast, and you can cover only 70% of the seats with tents. If the rain came, would you expect to have more dry seats with the tents or without? You would say, "Obviously, you'd have 70% fewer wet seats if you used the tents." And in a pre-COVID world, you would be right. Yet 70% of the citizens in Germany have been fully vaccinated against COVID, and still they are reporting record or near-record high daily numbers of new COVID cases. When it wanes,...

(Looks like they took the pictures down) Police in Florida have arrested a man they described as a “homeless drifter” in the stabbing death of a 14-year-old boy whose body was found near an interstate overpass. Semmie Lee Williams, 39, was arrested Wednesday in Miami and charged with first degree murder in the death of Ryan Rogers. “He appears to be a homeless drifter spending most of his time in the streets of Miami,” Palm Beach Gardens Chief of Police Clinton Shannon said of Williams at a press conference Thursday. Ryan, a high school freshman, went missing on Nov. 15,...

If America’s journalists once spoke truth to power, today America’s journalists are the powerful, a tightly knit caste both highly educated and affluent. “Elite journalists resemble senators, billionaires, and World Economic Forum attendees in terms of educational attainment,” a recent study found. Politicians and journalists go to the same schools and live in the same neighborhoods — especially liberal journalists. Reporters didn’t used to be celebrities. But cable news and Twitter have changed the equation. Social media offer journalists a lower-grade but still-fulfilling form of attention, the ersatz celebrity of our age — internet fame — provided you can write...

In a 29-page order, U.S. district judge Gregory Van Tatenhove actually got it right on vaccine mandates — but not for reasons cited by either side of this contentious issue. The George W. Bush nominee wrote, "This is not a case about whether vaccines are effective. They are. Nor is this a case about whether the government, at some level and in some circumstances, can require citizens to obtain vaccines. It can." Judge Gregory Van Tatenhove further made his case, writing, "The question presented here is narrow. Can the president use congressionally delegated authority to manage the federal procurement of...

For Kamala Harris, she must be uttering the rich lady's lament right about now: you just can't get good staff anymore.This time, a big one has flown the coop, a veritable whale of a woman in significance, spokeswoman Symone Sanders. She's by far the highest-ranking Kamala official now to get the heck out of Dodge. Her exit follows a lot of other exits, which I wrote about here. And apparently, it's not going to be the last one. These guys plan to leave after Sanders leaves.Why would she do that? Two reasons stand out.One, working for Kamala Harris is hell.Back...

Harris County commissioners voted Tuesday to demolish and rebuild parts of the under-construction Beltway 8 bridge over the Houston Ship Channel after the original designs were found to have "significant" flaws. The setback will cost the county $291 million, including $50 million to demolish some sections that have already been built, according to the Houston Chronicle's Dug Begley. Work on the new Beltway 8 Bridge began in 2018, the same year another FIGG-constructed bridge collapsed near Florida International University in Miami, killing six people and putting the company's practices into question. COWI determined that there were 21 different "significant" design...

Fast-moving Amazon is pushing for slow-growing chickens that animal-rights groups say are more ethically raised — but they could end up costing consumers more. The US poultry industry will boost its production of the chickens, which are said to have fewer health issues, in a nod to a powerful animal-welfare organization that’s backed by Amazon-owned Whole Foods Market. The Global Animal Partnership unveiled a list of 11 breeds of chicken on Wednesday that meet its certification criteria. The latest list is down from 27 breeds. GAP says that top-tier companies like Chipotle and Popeyes Louisiana Chicken have signed on to...