Free Republic

In response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by Insider, the General Services Administration has identified three more former White House aides who earned taxpayer-funded paychecks while working for former President Donald Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence in the months after they left office. The agency identified the post-White House transition-team staff members as the Trump aides Margo Martin and Madison Porter and the Pence aide Hannah MacInnis. Porter served as the communications director for former first lady Melania Trump, according to the agency's records, and Martin worked as a press assistant. MacInnis served as Pence's digital...

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Friday he trusts that President Joe Biden wants to help repel the Russian invasion — but warned that the leader of the free world can’t prove it without delivering desperately needed fighter jets and missiles. [cut] “Just give us missiles. Give us airplanes. You cannot give us F-18 or F-19 or whatever you have — give us the old Soviet planes. That’s all. Give them into my hands. Give me something to defend my country with.”

A new shows remission from type 2 diabetes is possible for people with lower BMIs. Results show a staggering 70% of participants with lower bodyweights went into type 2 remission through diet-induced weight loss, despite not living with obesity or overweight. The Counterpoint study first showed that shedding fat from inside the pancreas and liver was key to remission from type 2 in people living with obesity or overweight. To find out if losing excess fat could also help people with BMIs in the healthy range go into remission from type 2 diabetes, Professor Roy Taylor put people with the...

Sarah Palin, a former Alaska governor and the Republican nominee for vice president in 2008, said Friday that she was entering the race for Alaska’s lone congressional seat, marking her return to national politics after she helped revive the anti-establishment rhetoric that has come to define the Republican Party. She will be joining a crowded field of nearly 40 candidates to fill the House seat left vacant by Representative Don Young, whose unexpected death last month has spurred one of the largest political shifts in the state in 50 years. Ms. Palin said she planned to honor Mr. Young’s legacy,...

@ColumbiaBugle #BREAKING @SarahPalinUSA Running For Congressional Seat In Alaska.

,/A> A major bunker fuel contamination has been reported in Singapore, the world’s largest bunkering hub, with dozens of ships receiving tainted high sulfur fuel oil (HSFO) that has led to dangerous power blackouts, according to Bloomberg. Fuel testing firm Veritas Petroleum Services (VPS) reports 34 vessels were identified to have received HSFO from two unidentified Singapore suppliers between February and March. The marine fuel contained up to 2,000 parts per million (ppm) of chlorinated hydrocarbons. “These bunker fuel contaminations have affected 14 vessels so far and the impact has been failure of the fuel system to the auxiliary engine...

Given Russia's reliance on Ukraine for military components, UK defence sources say Russia's war effort is in serious trouble. Last night a source said: 'Serious amounts of components for Russian weapons systems were made there [Ukraine]. That won't be happening any more. 'Russia cannot manufacture this equipment itself or import it, so it won't be getting any of these materials any time soon. The hardware expended in Ukraine came from historic stockpiles, developed when there was greater cooperation between Russia and Ukraine. 'The integration of their industrial complexes meant a severing of relations would jeopardise Russia's ability to sustain military...

From the FB page of Mannheim Steamroller: Chip’s good friend Bill Fries passed away today. Bill and Chip teamed up to create the fictional CW McCall — voiced by Fries — for a series of award-winning commercials, including the #1 classic hit, “Convoy”. Chip just spoke about his friend, “Bill Fries, ‘Breaker Breaker 19’ is how that big song started— selling millions of copies worldwide. It made an impressive impact on millions of people. I had a great time writing with ‘Willy’. I’d go over to his house and we’d talk about the topic of a song while having a...

https://twitter.com/RepCawthorn/status/1510017162190241796?t=UdN3JKhAXAZ6c7skOSrhWw&s=19

Former President Trump endorsed Republican Sen. Mike Lee (Utah) ahead of the November midterm elections in a statement on Friday. “Senator Mike Lee has done an outstanding job for the wonderful people of Utah. There is no greater voice for our Military, our Vets, Law and Order, or our Second Amendment, which is under total siege,” Trump stated. “He loves his State, and is by far the superior Senator there—not even a contest!” he added. The race is rated “solidly Republican” in the Cook Political Report’s 2022 Senate race ratings. Lee, facing off against independent Evan McMullin, has easily won...

Will Smith resigned from the Academy of Motion Pictures Friday in the face of possible suspension or expulsion from the organization after he slapped Chris Rock during the Oscars last weekend. In a resignation statement, Smith said he would accept any consequences imposed by the Academy’s Board of Governors for his actions. “The list of those I have hurt is long and includes Chris, his family, many of my dear friends and loved ones, all those in attendance, and global audiences at home,” Smith said in the statement, obtained by Variety. “I betrayed the trust of the Academy. I deprived...

Los Angeles County’s COVID-19 case numbers are no longer declining and there has been an increase in the circulation of the highly infectious BA.2 subvariant, the county’s health director said on Thursday. Up until recently, the county had been seeing falling daily case numbers as the region emerged from an omicron-fueled winter surge that overwhelmed testing sites and sent infection numbers skyrocketing. As COVID-19 loosened its grip on the county, officials eased COVID-19 restrictions. Masks became optional at many indoor locations and venues were no longer required to verify people’s vaccine status. Now, the county is no longer seeing those...

A New York judge has denied Ghislaine Maxwell's request for a retrial on sex trafficking charges, after it emerged that one of the jurors had been sexually abused - but failed to disclose it. Maxwell, 60, was convicted in December of grooming and trafficking underage girls for her ex-boyfriend, Jeffrey Epstein. Days after her conviction, Maxwell's attorneys requested a new trial because 'Juror 50', referred to as Scotty David, told newspapers that he had been sexually abused as a child, but had not disclosed the information during jury selection, as required. He also told reporters that he used his experience...

President Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden are the picture of scandal and corruption that the Democrats and corporate media tried to make former President Donald Trump and his family out to be — but instead of covering the bombshell stories, the press is turning a blind eye. Even before Trump won the election in 2016 after gaining popularity for calling out “fake news,” Democrats and the media were out to get him. Hillary Clinton’s campaign hired lawyers who hired a firm that hired Christopher Steele to dredge up fake news about Trump colluding with Russia. This fake information...

A Tennessee man, who prosecutors say was one of the first 15 people to breach the Capitol on January 6, 2021, was sentenced to three years of probation on Wednesday, including 60 days of house arrest for his role in the insurrection. Bruce Wayne Ivey, 28, pleaded guilty in June to one count of parading, demonstrating, or picketing in the Capitol. He initially faced four charges, including entering and remaining in a Capitol building and disorderly and disruptive conduct in a Capitol building. But as the government works to prosecute the 800 people arrested in connection to the attack, federal...

Among Washington elites, Thomas Massie is a gadfly whose strict adherence to libertarian ideology places him on a lonesome edge even within the Republican Party. To his primary challenger in Kentucky, he’s not conservative enough. “On Twitter I think that he has this persona that he’s very, very conservative and a lot of people believe it,” said Claire Wirth, the 33-year-old Prospect real estate agent running to oust Massie in May’s 4th Congressional District GOP primary. “But when it comes down to his voting record, he votes with AOC and Ilhan Omar more than any other Republican member of Congress.”...

There are two speeds of sound on Mars — one for high-pitched noises like the zap of a laser and another for lower frequencies like the whir of a helicopter rotor, scientists have revealed. The first audio recordings on the Red Planet were obtained by NASA's Perseverance rover after it landed in February last year and deployed its two microphones. Experts have now given their first analysis of five hours of sound picked up by the rover, which revealed a quiet planet with occasional gusts of wind where two different speeds of sound would have a strange delayed effect on...

Explanation: The natural filter of a hazy atmosphere offered this recognizable architecture and sunset telephoto view on March 27. Dark against the solar disk, large sunspots in solar active regions 2975 and 2976 are wedged between the Duomo of Pisa and its famous Leaning Tower. Only one day later, Sun-staring spacecraft watched active region 2975 unleash a frenzy of solar flares along with two coronal mass ejections. The largest impacted the magnetosphere on March 31 triggering a geomagnetic storm and aurorae in high-latitude night skies. On March 30, active region 2975 erupted again with a powerful X-class solar flare that...

PHOENIX (AP) — The Biden administration’s decision to end sweeping asylum limits at the border this May satisfied demands by prominent Democrats eagerly awaiting the end of a program created by Donald Trump in the name of public health. But it creates thorny political challenges for border-region Democrats who face the likely prospect of an increase in migrants who have for two years been denied the chance to seek asylum in the United States. In unusually harsh critiques of a president from their own party, some of the congressional Democrats with the toughest reelection prospects are warning that the administration...

A new forensic audit of more than $1 million in COVID-19 relief funds spent by the city of West Haven indicates approximately 80% of the expenditures should not have been allowed. That doesn’t include the hundreds of thousands of dollars a former state lawmaker and others are accused of stealing from the city. The problematic expenditures - nearly $900,000 of about $1.13 million reviewed by the auditors - were largely ineligible expenses or lacked sufficient justification and documentation. West Haven Mayor Nancy Rossi, a Democrat, said in a text message to The Associated Press that she had just received the...