Free Republic

Healthcare workers in Los Angeles just got a raise. Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti signed an ordinance Friday, July 8 that sets a $25-an-hour minimum wage for healthcare workers in the city. The law covers all private sector healthcare employees who work in hospitals, integrated health systems and dialysis clinics. The measure was approved last month by the Los Angeles City Council in a 10-0 vote after SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West collected the required amount of signatures to put the wage hike on the November ballot. Since the measure was initiated by a petition drive, the council could either adopt...

The economy is in a bad place, and it’s affecting people all over. When will President Joe Biden face it? I walked around a higher end shopping outlet last week deep on Long Island. It’s the kind of place that upper middle class people go to get a discount on their patio furniture. I kept passing conversations of people astonished at the prices. These are not people who have been astonished at prices before. They may not have noticed as the gas price ticked up a dollar a gallon and then three. Or when milk went up 20 percent. But...

On Friday, the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s Republican majority outlawed ballot drop boxes by a 4–3 vote, abolishing a reform that had made voting easier and more accessible in the state. The lead opinion—authored by the notorious fringe-right reactionary Justice Rebecca Grassl Bradley—contains alarming language casting doubt on the legitimacy of Joe Biden’s 2020 victory. It also grants credence to the GOP’s collapsing “investigation” to prove that illegal votes put Biden over the top in Wisconsin. Without a shred of evidence, the court has thrown its weight behind a dangerous conspiracy theory that helped to fuel the Jan. 6 insurrection.

SYRACUSE, N.Y. (AP) - Former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony before the Jan. 6 committee was a big hit with television viewers, easily reaching a larger live audience than any of the four other daytime hearings. Hutchinson’s riveting testimony about former President Donald Trump’s temper as plans to overturn the 2020 election fell apart was seen by 13.17 million people last week, the Nielsen company said. That’s a 28% jump from the 10.25 million who watched the committee’s previous daytime hearing, and 23% over the average from the four daytime hearings held thus far. The committee’s first hearing, the...

So Boris Johnson has gone kaput in the UK. Maybe he’s trying to be a role model for the U.S.? If Biden followed BoJo’s worthy example, he and BoJo could start their own chapter of the Hair Club for Men, since they share, in their own distinct ways, serious follicle frustrations. If I hadn’t retired permanently from the genre, I’d be tempted to do a Downfall-bunker scene “Biden Learns About BoJo’s Resignation” video.

Last Thursday, June 30, the Supreme Court issued its decision in West Virginia v. EPA, holding that, absent a further explicit statute from the Congress, the EPA did not have the authority to orchestrate its planned fundamental restructuring of the electric power generation sector of the economy. More generally, the Supreme Court stated that in cases involving “major questions,” including regulations that affect large portions of the economy, the government must demonstrate “clear congressional authorization” to support a sweeping effort to regulate. Do you think that such a Supreme Court decision might cause the various regulatory bureaucracies to slow down...

A left-wing interior minister in Germany has launched a plan to confiscate all firearms owned by members of the right-wing political party AfD. Interior minister of the German state of Thuringia, Georg Maier, wants to withdraw gun licenses from Alternative for Germany members, a political party that holds 81 seats in the German parliament and 9 seats in the European parliament. “Maier, who belongs to the Social Democrat Party (SPD), has tasked his employees with establishing a working group on “Weapons and Extremists” to move forward on the issue,” reports Remix News. “They plan to create the “AG WaffEx,” which...

IPray For The Peace of JerusalemGenesis 32Jacob Meets Esau 33 Jacob looked up and there was Esau, coming with his four hundred men; so he divided the children among Leah, Rachel and the two female servants. 2 He put the female servants and their children in front, Leah and her children next, and Rachel and Joseph in the rear. 3 He himself went on ahead and bowed down to the ground seven times as he approached his brother. 4 But Esau ran to meet Jacob and embraced him; he threw his arms around his neck and kissed him. And they...

Military recruitment in the United States is way down at the same time as the Biden Administration is driving out so-called “White supremacists” (anybody who voted for Trump or believes in the Constitution), those opposed to taking the COVID vaccine due to religious or health concerns or natural immunity, and people who refuse to use the preferred pronouns of gender activists. The result of all this is a neutered and divided military increasingly unable to fight and win wars. Recent polling by the University of Chicago found that two-thirds of Republican and Independent voters and 51 percent of self-described “very...

The Left continues to push a narrative that the SCOTUS is compromised by "conservatives" -- let's set the record straight. In the exposition of laws, and even of Constitutions, how many important errors may be produced by mere innovations in the use of words and phrases, if not controlled by a recurrence to the original and authentic meaning attached to them! - James Madison, fourth president of the United States, often called the “Father of the Constitution” (1826) Immediately after the recent SCOTUS rulings on abortion and the EPA, many voices from the Left immediately labeled the justices “extremist,” undemocratic,...

The Weekly Gardening Thread is a weekly gathering of folks that love soil, seeds and plants of all kinds. From complete newbies that are looking to start that first potted plant, to gardeners with some acreage, to Master Gardener level and beyond, we would love to hear from you. If you have specific question about a plant/problem you are having, please remember to state the Growing Zone where you are located. This thread is a non-political respite. No matter what, you won’t be flamed, and the only dumb question is the one that isn’t asked. It is impossible to hijack...

U.S.A. –-(AmmoLand.com)- HB 1636, removing the antiquated ban on carrying loaded pistols on Off-Highway Recreational Vehicles (OHRV) and snowmobiles, has become law in New Hampshire. Governor Sununu signed the bill on Friday, 17 June 2022.House Bill 1636 is a simple stand-alone bill that removes the current ban. From HB 1636:1 Off Highway Recreational Vehicles; Loaded Firearms Prohibited. Amend RSA 215-A:20 to read as follows: 215-A:20 Loaded Firearms Forbidden. No person shall carry on an OHRV, or a trailer towed by same, any firearms unless said firearm is unloaded. This section shall not apply to law enforcement officers carrying firearms in...

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Embattled New York ex-Governor Andrew Cuomo reportedly received advice from former President Bill Clinton as he fought for his political life amid multiple charges of sexual misconduct. **SNIP** Clinton provided Cuomo advice during the harassment investigation, suggesting that the governor hold a public press conference to address New Yorkers directly in an attempt to stave off his resignation, according to an excerpt of a book, "Any Given Tuesday," by Democratic strategist Lis Smith about events that transpired near the end of Cuomo's time in power. An excerpt was published in Politico. Following the release of James' report, Smith details one...

Pro-life activist assaulted for urging Louisiana facility to stop committing abortions A Louisiana pro-life activist has been assaulted after attempting to warn staff at an abortion facility that, following the reversal of Roe v. Wade, their involvement with abortion could see them criminally prosecuted.

This transgender madness can't last forever. People are catching on. Admiral (not a Navy admiral) "Rachel" Levine is a so-called transgender woman, a pediatrician, and now a U.S. asst. secretary for health. Levine has joined President Biden and many others in the LGBT campaign to promote "gender-affirming care" for youths. "There is no argument among medical professionals — pediatricians, pediatric endocrinologists, adolescent medicine physicians, adolescent psychiatrists, psychologists, etc. — about the value and the importance of gender-affirming care[.]" Levine's "no argument" assertions are hogwash for many obvious reasons. Here are three. First, the 2012 Report of the American Psychiatric Association...

British former finance minister Rishi Sunak has announced he is running to replace Boris Johnson, three days after helping to launch the cascade of resignations that brought the prime minister down. Johnson announced on Thursday that he would stand down as prime minister after a mass rebellion in his Conservative Party, triggered by the latest in a series of scandals that had fatally undermined public trust. "Someone has to grip this moment and make the right decisions. That’s why I’m standing to be the next leader of the Conservative Party and your prime minister,” Sunak said in a video posted...

Mark this down as the year's most grotesquely insensitive metaphor. On Friday's Morning Joe—hours after the news broke that former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe had been assassinated with shots to the back—Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson, in a scathing statement about Boris Johnson, said: "He sort of failed up, upward through his career until he became Prime Minister after knifing Theresa May in the back." Get the rest of the story and view the video here.

Former New York Gov. David Paterson dismissed US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s influence as a “phantom of the media” after left-wing candidates endorsed by the socialist firebrand suffered brutal losses in last week’s primaries. “AOC are just three letters in the alphabet,” the 68-year-old Democrat said in an interview on WABC radio’s “The Cats Roundtable” aired Sunday. Paterson was asked by host John Catsimatidis about the Tuesday primary results in which the majority of left-wing state Assembly contenders were unsuccessful in their efforts to expand their presence in Albany by ousting more moderate Democrats. Asked if the losses represented “the rise...

TOKYO -- The assassination of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will drastically transform Japan's policy priorities on both the domestic and foreign fronts as the country lost a giant who was able to shift the political landscape from behind the scenes. Japan's longest-serving prime minister left an indelible mark on the country's political agenda over the past 10 years. After Abe and his Liberal Democratic Party won back control of government in 2012, he immediately set out to reshape Japan's economic policy. He entered into an accord with the Bank of Japan in 2013, setting a 2% inflation target. There...