Free Republic

Republican businessman Kevin Rinke has more money to spend on his 2022 gubernatorial campaign than his GOP rivals, but James Craig collected more donations from supporters. Campaign finance statements filed Monday show Rinke gave his own campaign $2 million, technically making him the top fundraiser between Oct. 21 and Dec. 31, 2021. However, Rinke only raised $4,938 from other donors. Craig led the Republican field with $607,830 in donations from supporters. Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer reported raising $2.53 million for her re-election campaign in the last months of 2021. She had $9.9 million total to spend at the end of...

ATLANTA — The district attorney in Fulton County, Ga., who is conducting a criminal investigation of former President Donald J. Trump has asked for an F.B.I. risk assessment of the county courthouse in downtown Atlanta, citing “alarming” rhetoric used by Mr. Trump at a rally in Texas over the weekend.

The city of Denver will lift many of its indoor mask and COVID-19 vaccine mandates later this week. “Beginning Friday, people will no longer be required, under a public health order, to wear a mask or show proof of vaccination for entry into a business" in the city, Denver Mayor Michael Hancock (D) wrote in a tweet.

As the world began watching Royal Canadian Mounted Police descend upon truckers protesting the Canadian government’s COVID-19 vaccine requirement on its southern border, protesters were stationed inside a nearby building voting on whether or not to give in to police pressure trying to break up their convoy demanding vaccine freedom. After a voice vote in favor of staying put — continuing to block the entryway between the U.S and Canada — the group can be seen bowing their heads praying the “Our Father.” Over the past week, a “Freedom Convoy” of more than 50,000 truckers formed in Canada, protesting the...

SACRAMENTO -- California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who three years ago placed a moratorium on executions, now is moving to dismantle the nation's largest death row by moving all condemned inmates to other prisons within two years. The goal is to turn the section at San Quentin State Prison into a "positive, healing environment." "We are starting the process of closing death row to repurpose and transform the current housing units into something innovative and anchored in rehabilitation," corrections department spokeswoman Vicky Waters told The Associated Press.

A Chinese Satellite Just Grappled Another And Pulled It Out Of Orbit The maneuver raises concerns about the potential militarization of satellites designed to inspect, manipulate, or relocate other satellites. ===== A Chinese satellite was observed grabbing another satellite and pulling it out of its normal geosynchronous orbit and into a “super-graveyard drift orbit.” The maneuver raises questions about the potential applications of these types of satellites designed to maneuver close to other satellites for inspection or manipulation and adds to growing concerns about China's space program overall. On January 22, China’s Shijian-21 satellite, or SJ-21, disappeared from its regular...

Jason Wilson has had kidney failure since he was 10 years oldA South Carolina man has been declared inactive on a kidney transplant list after he said he has no plans to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. Jason Wilson has had kidney failure since he was 10 years old. Advertisement For a while, his condition improved, he said. But about two years ago, he began dialysis and was placed on Medical University of South Carolina Health's list for a kidney transplant. It was on Nov. 1 that he got a letter from the health system that said he would be moved...

CNN anchor Jake Tapper said Monday on his show “The Lead” that it was “a little bit frustrating” people were demanding schools be open without making sure all the kids, teachers, faculty, and staff are vaccinated. CNN medical analyst Dr. Jonathan Reiner said, “Right now, there are 500,000 cases per day in the United States. And we’re seeing more cases now than we did last winter, which was our largest spike to date. So there’s still a lot of COVID in the United States. While we all want to look ahead, we need to have — we need to be...

The mayor of Terry Fox’s British Columbia hometown and the leader of the federal opposition are among those speaking out Saturday, after a statue of Canadian icon Terry Fox was covered in political statements at an Ottawa rally opposing COVID-19 measures. “To have someone try and appropriate his legacy and his image for a political cause, whatever the cause, is just sickening,” Port Coquitlam Mayor Brad West told Global News. “It’s just so wrong.”Photos from the rally showed the statue holding an upside-down Canadian flag, along with a sign that reads “mandate freedom.” Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson said he had...

Preserve the Latin MassWe are a growing movement of Catholics and non-Catholics alike who recognize that the Traditional Latin Mass, which has nurtured countless souls and enriched the Catholic Church and the world for centuries, must surely be preserved. About Preserve the Latin MassWe wish to share our experience of the traditional liturgy, which has nourished many saints throughout the centuries and continues to edify a growing number of souls throughout the Catholic Church today. We will share why Catholics of all backgrounds value and treasure this Mass and why so many non-Catholics are inspired by its beauty and majesty....

Someone needs to smack the writers of And Just Like That, the Sex and the City reboot, with a dose of reality. The entire Internet hates what they’ve done to longtime couple Miranda Hobbes and Steve Brady. (We also hate everything else about this show but there’s too much to mention here. You can read my other reviews here and here.) For some reason, the writers thought that breaking up this couple who made it through an unplanned pregnancy, infidelity, and more would be exciting for the viewers. But turning Miranda, a clearly heterosexual woman, into a non-binary attracted lesbian...

Michigan state Rep. Steve Carra, a Republican congressional candidate endorsed by former President Donald Trump, announced he will run in Michigan’s new 4th Congressional District, home to both Republican Reps. Fred Upton and Bill Huizenga, and called on Upton to drop out of the race. "Southwest Michigan is home to me. I have lived here my whole life. I graduated from Portage Northern High School and Western Michigan University. With the newly announced Congressional districts, I am now running in the 4th district to represent my hometown in Congress,” Carra said in a statement first shared with the Washington Examiner....

[Catholic Caucus] The Church's Troubling View of the Laity Throughout his pontificate, Pope Francis has frequently spoken out against "clericalism", which he views as one of the preeminent problems in the Church today. The irony is that the Franciscan pontificate evidences a profoundly clericalist mindset, especially in how the pope has dealt with the traditional Catholic movement.For example, in the letter that accompanied Traditiones Custodes, Pope Francis directed bishops "to discontinue the erection of new personal parishes tied more to the desire and wishes of individual priests than to the real need of the 'holy People of God.'" I...

In one five-year period, teens and preteens in the US may have lost about 200,000 years of life to unintentional drug overdoses, according to a new study. The study, published Monday in JAMA Pediatrics, may be one of the first to calculate lives lost to unintentional drug overdoses among young people. Researchers looked at overdose data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention between 2015 and 2019 to calculate the total number of years of life lost for 10- to 19-year-olds who died during that time. If the data is expanded to include people up to 24 years...

The Latest News At The Bottom Of The Post "an insult to memory and truth" Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau Characterizes Ottawa COVID policy protest-1/31/2022 Canadian Prime Minister appeared today continuing the steady stream of government and media disparagement of the trucker led protest that has engulfed Canada's capital city and led to a blockade at a US border crossing in Alberta. Trudeau wanted to put the message out... The Protests In Germany Continue On Monday Night Tens Of Thousands Involved... News Alert: Second Day Of Protest In Canberra, Australia Its 1115 am in Canberra Tuesday morning, 715 pm Monday...

Kyle Kemper — son of Fried Kemper and Margaret Trudeau and half-brother to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau — describes himself as a visionary strategist, technologist, artist, and family man. https://youtu.be/hzuDTmBe6YQ

The media cannot stand the fact that the narrative about the Canadian trucker convoy protest has gotten away from them and you can see how they feel about it by taking a look at how MSNBC is reacting. The trucker convoy protest has been making its way through Canada’s capital city of Ottawa and has become the largest in history spanning an astounding 45 miles. At the center of the protest is the message that Canadians are rejecting the government vaccine, mask, and lockdown mandates, and the desire to be treated as free westerners, not subjects of a single man...

ERLANGEN, Germany — A German school not registered with the government, where children were being taught in a mask-free environment, was closed following a raid by heavily armed police on January 20. The school had been set up by parents in an effort to protect their children from some of the most traumatic and long-term damaging effects of COVID restrictions such as mask mandates currently imposed on school children in Germany. According to local reports, the raid took place after the police was tipped that school-aged children were being taught at a private property in a small town near Erlangen...

I’ve watched this three times and have no idea what she’s getting at. But I bet the Nazis would be surprised to hear that the Jews whom they tried to exterminate were part of the same racial group as the Nazis themselves. The panel was discussing the decision made by one Tennessee school district to remove Art Spiegelman’s “Maus” from the eighth-grade curriculum due to, of all things, language and nudity. Evidently a story about people (represented in the novel by mice) being sent to Auschwitz wasn’t too mature for 13-year-olds to handle but a drawing of a nude anthropomorphic...

Ottawa’s police chief says “all options are on the table” to bring the ongoing truckers’ protest in downtown Ottawa to an end. Chief Peter Sloly said Monday that police have seen a significant decrease in the number of truckers and protesters downtown, but the protests have been “fluid, ever-changing and increasingly more difficult to manage.” The ‘Freedom Convoy’ protests against COVID-19 vaccination mandates and other public health measures have caused gridlock downtown and major headaches for area residents and business owners.