Free Republic

Ladies and gentlemen, may I introduce to you the President of the United States. The leader of the free world. The most powerful man on the planet. With Vice President Kamala Harris and Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra standing behind him, President Joe Biden stumbled and bumbled his way through remarks before signing an executive order on abortion on Friday. The occasional Biden gaffe has given way to at least one gaffe during every public appearance. His last performance was marked by several. Biden accidentally read aloud the teleprompter instructions during a speech Friday. That wasn’t...

Reporting from Washington — For decades, Republican doctrine has viewed Russia as a power to mistrust. But in Donald Trump’s GOP, Moscow’s sins seem to matter less. The platform written at the GOP convention in Cleveland this week eliminated references to arming Ukraine in its fight with Russia, which seized the Crimean Peninsula in 2014 and has supported separatists in eastern Ukraine.Those represent sharp departures from U.S. policy and recent GOP positions and sparked immediate concerns that Trump would abandon treaty commitments to allies. Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who is not attending the convention in his home state, was among...

Community health and LGBTQ rights leaders in California are demanding a much more aggressive response to monkeypox from government and health agencies, saying shortages of vaccines and limited public outreach are exacerbating the outbreaks. Confirmed and probable cases of monkeypox across California have climbed by 65% in the last week, from 85 to 141. There were 47 confirmed and probable cases of the virus in Los Angeles County as of Thursday — an almost 60% increase since last week — and in San Francisco, cases have more than doubled in a similar time frame, rising from 16 to 40. While...

HARRISON's BAR, JAMES RIVER, Saturday, July 5, 1862. The army is now comfortably settled in better and pleasanter quarters than any which they have occupied for several months. The rain which on Thursday drenched the camps and made almost impassable the roads, has not been repeated, but has been replaced by sunny skies and cooling breezes. In an astonishingly short space of time, the various corps have taken assigned positions and prepared the ground for a successful defence. The enemy, who yesterday appeared in some force on our right, and did a little in the way of artillery firing, have...

To the editor: As a woman of a certain age, I have two stories to tell — one of an illegal abortion, the other legal. Back in the 1960s, before birth control was easy to access, I became pregnant. The father was sent to Vietnam, and I was in college. I would rather have died than have the baby. If I could prove that I was insane, I could get an abortion. No luck. The psychiatrist said I was sane. My brother helped me find an illegal abortionist and got the $600 together. We met the middleman in a coffee...

A detailed list of the destroyed and captured vehicles and equipment of both sides can be seen below. This list is constantly updated as additional footage becomes available

“‘Everyone who hears these words of Mine and acts on them, may be compared to a wise man who built his house on the rock. . . . Everyone who hears these words of Mine and does not act on them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand’” (Matthew 7:24, 26). Differences between wise and foolish builders are more important than the similarities. The greatest differences are the types of foundations the builders choose. One selects a solid expanse of bedrock—stable and unmovable. The other selects sand—unstable and very movable. The house built on...

So you’re unhappy with the Supreme Court justices who turned back the clock on environmental protection, abortion, school prayer and guns? You’re angry because they’re ideologues with a reactionary agenda, flexing their muscles to eliminate rights, weaken government and endanger the planet? Me too. They’re reprehensible. But let’s be honest: The problem isn’t just with the justices. The problem, or at least a substantial portion of it, lies with the U.S. Constitution itself.

The Bible In Paintings 2 ENCOURAGEMENT FOR APPRECIATING AND APPLYING GOD'S MESSAGE KING HEZEKIAH'S ILLNESS AND FOLLY 2nd KINGS CHAPTER 20 In those days Hezekiah became ill and was at the point of death. The prophet Isaiah went to him and said, “This is what the LORD says: Put your house in order, because you are going to die; you will not recover.” Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the LORD, “Remember, O LORD, how I have walked before you faithfully and with wholehearted devotion and have done what is good in your eyes.” And...

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...