Free Republic

Don McLean celebrates 50 years of "American Pie" with his new children's book, inspired by his hit song

Join with fellow FREEPERS to pray for AMERICA: For those in Authority in Government, Family, Military, Business, Healthcare, Education, Churches, and the Media. I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession, and thanksgiving be made for everyone: for kings and all those in authority that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. ~ 1 Timothy 2:1-2 Religion Forum threads labeled [Prayer] are closed to debate of any kind. Churchill: The Man Who Saved the Free World Then the LORD raised up judges, who saved them out of the hands of these raiders....

I normally wouldn't think much about a politician saying this, but the look on his face gave me pause. Not that my opinion matters, but personally I am not usually an apocalyptic thinker, I think we must focus on repenting and confronting our sins for salvation regardless of world events. (click link for video)

Kuwait has summoned a top US diplomat in protest over tweets from the American embassy supporting LGBT rights, its foreign ministry says. US officials there had posted a rainbow flag and message of solidarity from President Joe Biden for Pride month. But Kuwait officials criticised the embassy for "supporting homosexuality" and demanded it didn't happen again. Rights for LGBT people are severely restricted in Kuwait and it is illegal there for men to be gay. In a pair of tweets published in English and Arabic on Thursday, the US Embassy in Kuwait quoted President Biden as saying all humans "should...

Britain pledged Thursday to send sophisticated medium-range rocket systems to Ukraine, joining the United States and Germany in equipping the embattled nation with advanced weapons for shooting down aircraft and knocking out artillery.Western arms have been critical to Ukraine’s success in stymieing Russia’s much larger and better-equipped military during a war now in its 99th day. But as Russian forces closed in on a key city in recent days, the Ukrainian government said its fighters needed better rocket launchers to prevail.A Kremlin spokesman again warned of “absolutely undesirable and rather unpleasant scenarios” if the latest Western-supplied weapons were fired into...

More than 4,000 Salesforce employees have urged their company's leadership to drop the National Rifle Association (NRA) as a customer. The employees made their request in an open letter addressed to company leaders including co-CEOs Marc Benioff and Bret Taylor, SFGate first reported, citing a copy of the letter it viewed. The employees delivered the letter a day after a teenager went on a shooting rampage in Uvalde, Texas, on May 24, killing at least 19 students and two adults. "It's not in our power to get background checks or other gun control measures passed by Congress — but we...

<p>SUMTER COUNTY, Fla. - An argument between two men on the green at The Villages over golf etiquette led to one of them facing a battery charge, according to Sumter County deputies.</p><p>Richard Randell, 77, entered a not guilty plea for his alleged crime against his 84-year-old friend, court documents filed in late May confirmed.</p>

he Carolina Panthers' proposed $800 million practice facility project in Rock Hill, South Carolina, is officially dead after team owner David Tepper’s real estate company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in Delaware on Wednesday night. Tepper, who made billions in hedge funds, is the NFL’s wealthiest owner. The filing will not affect the NFL’s Panthers or Major League Soccer’s Charlotte FC in any way. It’s unclear at this point what will happen to the half-built practice facility. Tepper has invested more than $175 million into the facility, which is located 25 miles south of the team’s current downtown stadium...

The irony of life

[Catholic Caucus] Vatican Blocks Ordinations in Best French DioceseFréjus-Toulon Bishop Dominique Rey, France, has informed the priests of his diocese via a June 2 email that Rome has “requested that the diaconal and priestly ordinations planned for the end of June be postponed.”His email (below) was published by Diane Montagna on Twitter.com. The decision was taken after the anti-Catholic Neo-Cardinal Jean-Marc Aveline of Marseille has led a visitation to the diocese.Rey is one of the few Catholic bishops in France. He has a relaxed approach to the Roman Mass and attracts many seminarians from all over France.

The groomers are everywhere these days, but nowhere are they more visible than at LGBTQ “Pride” parades, where every kind of debauchery imaginable is on full display in neighborhoods and on city streets around the world. A website called Fatherly warns in its Parenting section that pride parades are “filled with sights that may be new to kids, like public nudity and kink. Not to mention that Pride parades aren’t the most sober of places.”Pride Parades and the Pride festivals that follow are noisy and crowded. They’re filled with sights that may be new to kids, like public nudity and...

A Chicago alderman and mayoral candidate tore into fellow Democrat Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Thursday, accusing her of emboldening criminals with her soft-on-crime policies, which he blames for the city's deadly crime wave. Alderman Raymond Lopez, who is running to unseat the mayor in the fall elections, told "Jesse Watters Primetime" on Thursday that deadly shootings over Memorial Day weekend and other incidents offer a glimpse into the city's dangerous conditions under Lightfoot's leadership. "Chicago is in a state of lawlessness right now thanks to the policies of Lori Lightfoot, who has enabled and emboldened criminals to feel that they...

A spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety tells KBTX that five people were found murdered in Leon County near the area where escaped inmate Gonzalo Lopez was last seen in May. A large law enforcement presence is in the area including a helicopter. The Texas Department of Criminal Justice says law enforcement received a call from an individual who was concerned after not hearing from an elderly relative. Officers arrived at the residence and discovered the bodies of two adults and three children.

man who threw a cup of hot coffee over a 76-year-old man making him wait to pay in a store is facing assault charges after punching the older man, sending him to the ground, police say. Security camera footage of the attack in a Shell gas station in Palm Coast, Florida, shows the grey-haired victim at the checkout, with the suspect, later identified as Sean Ruel, 39, standing in line behind him. Ruel can be seen waiting to be served while the 76-year-old man is being seen to by the cashier. After a few seconds, the suspect can be seen...

One of the myriad issues with hydrogen as a clean energy source is infrastructure, as it's very expensive to move around and store an extremely explosive gas. Toyota and its subsidiary Woven Planet believe they may have a solution with a new portable hydrogen cartridge prototype. The idea is that they can be filled up at a dedicated facility, transported where needed, then returned when you receive your next shipment. The cartridges would be relatively small at 16 inches long, 7 inches in diameter and about 11 pounds in weight. Toyota calls them "portable, affordable, and convenient energy that makes...

Attorneys for Gibson's Bakery in Oberlin have asked a Lorain County judge to order their clients be paid a $36 million-plus judgment they're owed by Oberlin College after the college failed to file an appropriate motion with a state appeals court. Oberlin College didn't ask for a stay of a 9th District Court of Appeals ruling in March that rejected its appeal, attorneys for the Gibsons argued in a court document filed Friday. As a result, the college should pay what a jury and court determined was owed the family bakery and its owners from a 2019 civil trial —...

The judge described the state's practice of rejecting ballots that arrived without a required handwritten date on the outer envelope unfair restriction of the right to vote. A state appellate court on Thursday agreed with Pennsylvania GOP Senate candidate David McCormick and ordered Pennsylvania counties to tally more than 800 undated mail ballots and include them in vote totals they report for the neck-and-neck Republican primary race between McCormick and Mehmet Oz....

Lakers star LeBron James has officially become the first active NBA player to obtain a net worth of $1 billion, according to Forbes. Legendary NBA superstar Michael Jordan has also reached the lofty billion-dollar mark, but he didn’t accomplish that feat until 2014, long after he retired from the league. Only $41 million worth of James’ considerable financial fortune comes from the Los Angeles Lakers team he plays for. The rest comes from shoe, movie, and clothing deals, the lion’s share of which is connected to Nike, which is among one of the dozens of international corporations linked to slave...

A new analysis of IRS data shows the financial consequences of gaining or losing population can be either extremely rewarding or devastating to individual states. In 2020, blue states repelled the highest earners while red states attracted them, resulting in massive economic losses and gains. Wirepoints, an Illinois-based research organization, took a look at the latest migration data released by the IRS and drew some conclusions that should leave Democrat-run states in a cold sweat, wondering how they’ll ever be able to maintain their profligacy. In the competition for America’s best and brightest residents, the most populous blue states are...

When asked whether they believe their country is democratic, those in China topped the list, with some 83% saying the communist-led People's Republic was a democracy. A resounding 91% said that democracy is important to them. But in the U.S., which touts itself as a global beacon of democracy, only 49% of those asked said their country was a democracy. And just over three-quarters of respondents, 76%, said democracy was important. A note accompanying the poll results offers a disclaimer, stating that "in authoritarian countries, positive perceptions might result from different conceptions of democracy, high levels of government satisfaction, or...