Free Republic

The gun legislation also included a bill to micro-stamp every bullet shot out of newly purchased guns, assisting law enforcement in ballistics investigations. “New York cannot stand idly by. And that’s why we are here. We are taking action. We are once again leading the nation on smart and common sense gun laws. State legislatures have to act,” said Stewart-Cousins. The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to issue a ruling this month on whether to overturn New York’s concealed carry law. State lawmakers say if that happens, they may have to go back to Albany for a special session to...

Lumber prices have been halved since the Federal Reserve embarked on its most aggressive interest rate tightening campaign in decades as the pandemic boom in housing slows. Lumber contracts trading on the CME crashed to $653 per thousand board feet, down 51% from a high in late February of $1,336. The decline in wood prices occurred about two weeks before the Fed began hiking interest rates in mid-March. The Fed is expected to continue raising rates this summer. Interest rate probabilities show the Fed could hike by 50bps at three of the next FOMC meetings to suppress consumption and get...

Russia's war chief in Ukraine hasn't been seen for weeks, NYT reported, citing US officials. Some officials speculate he may have been removed from his post as top commander. Gen. Alexander Dvornikov was dubbed "The Butcher of Syria," and was assigned to Ukraine in April. ...Dvornikov effort have yet to provide significant victories. Russia had lost an estimated 1,000 tanks, a substantial number of troops, combat assets, and aircraft since the war began on February 24. While Russian forces took the port city of Mariupol after a lengthy siege, they lost Ukraine's second-largest city of Kharkiv in mid-May. Meanwhile, some...

Gas prices have surged to nearly $10 a gallon in parts of California as costs continue to climb amid unprecedented inflation. Overnight Friday, gas prices hit a national average of $4.76, according to AAA - an increase of nearly 20 cents in the span of a week. Along the US West Coast, the pain at the pump is even worse, with Californians now seeing an also previously unseen average of $6.24 cents. The state saw gas costs surpass the $6 mark for the first time in history over the weekend. With that said, some parts of the Golden State have...

Analysts consulted by Argentina's central bank raised their inflation estimate for the South American country for 2022 to 72.6%, 7.5 percentage points above the previous month's forecast, according to a monthly survey published Friday. Meanwhile, inflation for the month of May was expected to have been at 5.2%, according to the central bank's monthly Market Expectations Survey (REM). The poll surveyed 41 analysts over several days. The economists consulted also slightly cut their economic growth projection for Argentina in 2022 to 3.3%, a contraction of 0.2 percentage points. Latin America's third largest economy has been suffering from extreme inflation for...

In Pennsylvania, the GOP primary contest to replace retiring Senator Pat Toomey remains an uncertainty as frontrunners Mehmet Oz and David McCormick jockey to gain any advantage possible in their currently unfolding recount, but the Democrats aren't necessarily in any better shape with just more than five months until November's general election. Their nominee, current Pennsylvania Lt. Governor John Fetterman, swept every county in the commonwealth on primary night in May — despite the fact that their nominee was in the hospital after suffering a stroke and having emergency surgery to implant a pacemaker to regulate his heart rate. At...

From the Handyman channel on youtube. 2 years old but a good one. First 5 minutes, he "installs" a smoke detector and makes $125. Hard work right? ;) 2nd "work" he has to swipe a sink garbage disposal. According to a handyman dude I know of, Handyman is correct..there mostly is a rat or disgusting underneath there LOL

Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming in a new interview took aim at her fellow Republicans who she says have pledged loyalty to former President Donald Trump rather than their oath of office. "We have too many people now, in the Republican Party, who are not taking their responsibility seriously, and who have pledged their allegiance and loyalty to Donald Trump," the Republican lawmaker told CBS' Robert Costa in a clip of their interview that will air in full on Sunday. "It is fundamentally antithetical, it is contrary to everything conservatives believe to embrace a personality cult," Cheney continued. "And yet,...

A US Navy fighter jet crashed in Southern California... The leader of a megachurch based in Mexico pled guilty today to California state charges of sexually abusing three children... The Michigan Supreme Court in a 6-1 vote rejecting an appeal from three Republican candidates for governor knocked off the ballot... A Republican congressman in upstate New York ending his bid for re-election after he came out in support of gun control legislation... Former hedge fund manager David McCormick has conceded the Pennsylvania Republican US Senate race to Dr. Mehmet Oz... A new disclosure regarding the medical condition of Pennsylvania Democrat...

<p>The Department of Justice has informed the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, insurrection that it will not indict two former Trump White House officials found in contempt by the committee.</p><p>The New York Times first reported the news that Mark Meadows, former chief of staff to then-President Donald Trump, and Dan Scavino, former deputy chief of staff to Trump, won’t be prosecuted.</p>

I hear this commercial endlessly. This commercial annoys me on so many levels. 1. You are the post office, you should be everywhere. 2. You should be everywhere on time but you’re not. 3. Why are you wasting my tax money to tell me you’ve been everywhere? That’s your mission! In 2021 the USPS reported a $4.9 billion dollar loss. How much of this loss was attributed to you telling us you have been everywhere? USPS reports $4.9 billion loss in 2021 4. If the Washington post says you’re not obsolete that means you are obsolete so stop wasting our...

The governing body of the largest Mennonite denomination in the United States passed a resolution on Sunday (May 29) confessing to “committing violence against LGBTQ people” and committing to LGBTQ inclusion. In a separate vote, Mennonite Church USA also repealed instructions to pastors not to officiate at marriages between people of the same sex. The denomination’s official confession, which views marriage as between a man and a woman, remains unchanged. Nearly 83% of the delegates meeting at a special assembly in Kansas City, Missouri, voted in favor of repealing the guidelines barring marriage for same-sex couples, while the resolution for...

<p>MEMPHIS, Tenn. — A mother is accused of firing shots at six children, injuring a 12-year-old boy at a house in North Memphis.</p><p>Latorya Lemons, 35, is being held on a half-million-dollar bond on six charges of aggravated assault, six counts of felony reckless endangerment and two counts of violating bail conditions.</p>

Kentucky Democratic Senate candidate Charles Booker released a campaign video Wednesday which features him wearing a noose, in an attempt to highlight Senator Rand Paul's opposition to a 2020 bill that would have made lynching a federal hate crime. The video, which starts with a graphic warning, opens with a shot of a noose hanging from a tree. "The pain of our past persists to this day," Booker, who is Black, says in the opening lines. "In Kentucky, like many states throughout the South, lynching was a tool for terror. It was used to kill hopes for freedom."

A spokesperson for the Washington Post issued an apology after a writer retweeted a sexist joke and other writers at the news outlet objected vocally on Twitter. Dave Weigel retweeted a joke about women on Friday and immediately regretted it after he was criticized heavily for joking on Twitter. Weigel deleted the tweet, but it was saved for posterity by random people on Twitter and other writers at the outlet, like Felicia Sonmez, who objected to the sexist message. \u201cFantastic to work at a news outlet where retweets like this are allowed!\u201d

[Catholic Caucus] Pope Francis, Bishop McElroy, and Amoris LaetitiaBy now it is part of an old news cycle that Bishop McElroy is to be made a Cardinal. And the reactions to the news, as might be expected, reflect antecedent theological commitments. In short, theological liberals are cheering and the conservatives are jeering. Over at The National Catholic Reporter Michael Sean Winters is gushing like a fifteen year old adolescent over this appointment, which makes me suspicious. But I have long since gotten beyond judging folks based on who likes or dislikes them. (Because, you know, blind squirrels and acorns and...

On Friday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” White House Council of Economic Advisers member Heather Boushey stated that “the reason that we see inflation today is because we’re recovering from this historic global pandemic.” Boushey said, “Well, let me be very clear, you know, the reason that we see inflation today is because we’re recovering from this historic global pandemic. So, the president has outlined a number of steps that he is taking to make sure that we contain inflation. One of them is letting the Federal Reserve do their job. But another set of them is making sure that...

SANTA CRUZ – Much was discussed but no decision was made on Thursday by Santa Cruz Superior Court Judge Syda Cogliati regarding restitution for the vandalized Black Lives Matter mural in downtown Santa Cruz. Members of the public were hard-pressed to find an open seat in the courtroom where attorney arguments continued for the two men accused of defacing the Center Street mural last summer. Brandon Bochat, 21, and Hagan Warner, 20, were arrested last July on suspicion of felony vandalism and were later charged with an additional hate crime enhancement and misdemeanor reckless driving.

In the wake of the devastating nuclear meltdown at Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant in 2011, officials have been hunting for new sources of green energy — and they're leaving no stone unturned. A heavy machinery maker in Japan called IHI Corp has successfully tested a prototype of a massive, airplane-sized turbine that can generate electricity from powerful deep sea ocean currents, Bloomberg reports, laying the groundwork for a promising new source of renewable energy that doesn't rely on sunny days or strong winds. The company's latest prototype is called Kairyu and weighs in at 330 tons. Two counter-rotating turbine fans...