Free Republic

Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. John Fetterman (D), running against Mehmet Oz for the state’s open U.S. Senate seat, continues to receive many questions about his health as he dodges debates with his opponent. Following Fetterman’s semi-recent stroke and the lieutenant governor keeping an extremely low profile on the campaign trail, he has not accepted any proposal to debate Oz for the U.S. Senate seat. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported on Tuesday that KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh has wanted to hold a televised debate, but only Oz agreed to participate. This all comes as state Sen. Dave Argall (R), the chairman of the Pennsylvania Senate...

It’s unlikely mass adoption of Battery Electric Vehicles will develop as fast as environmentalists, the U.S. government, and most of the U.S. auto industry seem to expect. That’s because, fundamentally, consumer demand just isn’t sufficient, says Jack Hollis, executive vice president of sales at Toyota Motor North America. In turn, consumer demand isn’t sufficient because on average, BEVs cost too much, and because the infrastructure isn’t ready, like for recharging batteries away from home, Hollis said, in a recent webinar hosted by the Detroit-based Automotive Press Association. “I don’t think the market is ready. I don’t think the infrastructure is...

Bad News from London for the Pope. The Trial Puts the Screws on HimThere were two practical tasks that the cardinals entrusted to Jorge Mario Bergoglio when they elected him pope in 2013: the reform of the curia and the reorganization of Vatican finances.On the first point of the program, what holds sway is the apostolic constitution “Praedicate Evangelium,” issued on August 19 of 2022. On the second point, the publication of the Vatican balance sheets of 2021, at the beginning of this month of August.The reform of the curia will be evaluated by the consistory Pope Francis has convened...

After years of revelations about strange lights in the sky, first hand reports from Navy pilots about UFOs, and governmental investigations, Congress seems to have admitted something startling in print: it doesn’t believe all UFOs are “man-made.” Buried deep in a report that’s an addendum to the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2023, a budget that governs America’s clandestine services, Congress made two startling claims. The first is that “cross-domain transmedium threats to the United States national security are expanding exponentially.” The second is that it wants to distinguish between UFOs that are human in origin and those that...

A bizarre spectacle greeted the folk of Shawinigan, Québec over the weekend. A shepherd could be seen leading a flock of creatures with farmyard bells swinging from their neck, filling the air with the sound of baaaaa and chewing on greens when they arrived at their pen. But it wasn't a flock of sheep that had come grazing around the streets of Québec, but a Toronto-based group performing an immersive art project called 'Les Moutons'. In the performance, actors dressed as sheep are led around the city by their shepherd, who takes them to a pen before 'shearing' them. There,...

Ankara supports Ukraine's territorial integrity and rejects the illegal annexation of Crimea, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Tuesday. "The return of Crimea to Ukraine, of which it is an inseparable part, is essentially a requirement of international law," Erdogan said in a video message to the Second Crimea Platform Summit. The Crimea Platform is an international coordination mechanism of Ukraine to draw more global attention to Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014. Erdogan said Ankara will continue to support the Crimean Platform that was established to resolve the Crimean issue through peaceful means. "Türkiye does not recognize...

The federal agency created after 9/11 to keep America safe is spending more than half a billion dollars on security enhancements for nonprofits “at high risk of terrorist attack,” and recipients include dozens of Islamic centers, a leftist La Raza group and a country music museum, according to records obtained by Judicial Watch. An LGBTQ rights organization and the nation’s leading abortion rights advocacy group have also received generous security enhancement funds from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and so has an old west museum, a congregationalist seminary in American Samoa and an American Indian museum.

The popular Palisade and Telluride may catch fire with a hitch harness installed "Owners are advised to park outside and away from structures until the recall repair is complete," Hyundai said in its defect notice to NHTSA. "As an interim repair, dealers will inspect the tow hitch module and remove the fuse, as necessary, free of charge. The final remedy is currently under development." Palisade and Telluride owners should expect to be notified of a permanent fix by the time it distributes formal notices to owners in October.

China's Catholic leaders vow to accelerate sinicization 10th National Congress of Catholicism in China elects new leaders who vow to toe Communist Party lineTwo state-sponsored Church bodies in China have elected new leaders during a five-yearly national conference who promised to invigorate the Catholic faithful pastorally in line with the socialist principles of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).The three-day 10th National Congress of Catholicism in China ended in Wuhan, the capital of Hebei province in central China, on Aug. 20. Senior officials from the CCP also attended the gathering and delivered speeches.The meeting attended by some 345 Catholic bishops, clergy,...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Joe Biden's public approval rating rose this week to its highest level since early June, following a series of legislative wins for his Democratic Party, according to a Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll completed on Tuesday. The two-day national poll found that 41% of Americans approve of Biden's job performance. It was his first time above 40% since early June.

It is litigation by leak where the government prevents others (including the target) from seeing key representations made to the court while releasing selective facts to its own advantage. It shows utter contempt for the court and the public.

Dr. Mehmet Oz has spent the past week defending himself from charges that he's hopelessly out of touch with most residents of Pennsylvania, where he is the Republican candidate for Senate. Last Monday John Fetterman, Oz's Democratic opponent, resurfaced a video Oz recorded in what he called a "Wegners" — a mishmash of the Redner's and Wegmans grocery store chains — shopping for "crudité" and complaining about inflation. Fetterman's comment: "in PA, we call this a veggie tray." In an exclusive statement as part of Insider's investigation into Oz, the doctor's campaign jabbed back. "If John Fetterman had ever eaten...

The irony was lost on Cross. In the opening minutes of her MSNBC show on Saturday, Tiffany Cross heaped personal insults on Donald Trump. She called him: "the Mangled Mussolini" [whatever that's supposed to mean], "the Velveeta Voldemort," and "a wounded animal, cornered."A bit later, Cross brought in Naureen Chowdhury Fink to discuss the risks of political polarization and incitement to violence. Although she predictably singled out right-wing extremism, her remarks were, in fact, of general applicability. In particular, Chowdhury Fink said: "One of the first steps to violence that we see is kind of dehumanizing or otherizing a group...

EMPORIA (KSNT) – An Emporia music teacher was let go from her job after authorities at the school learned she had organized a “Vote No” rally on the steps of the William Lyndsay White Civic Auditorium in July. Alexis Lowder, a music teacher at Sacred Heart of Jesus, Catholic Church & School, was told her, “…words and actions while organizing and participating in a ‘Vote No’ rally are inconsistent with the teachings of the Catholic Church.” With that, Lowder said the school terminated her employment.(snip) After moving to Emporia, Lowder learned Sacred Heart had been looking for a music teacher,...

asks are returning to the Skyline Drive. Citing high community transition rates of COVID-19 in and around the Shenandoah National Park, officials say they will follow National Park Service policy and CDC guidance by requiring face masks be worn in all Shenandoah National Park buildings. The ruling takes effect Monday, August 22, 2022. “We monitor local community levels and respond when transmission levels are high,” Park Superintendent Pat Kenney said. “The trigger to require masking is when the majority of the counties that the park resides in move into high transmission status.” The CDC community levels are released weekly and...

It was the first liftoff for Ingenuity in more than two months.NASA's Ingenuity helicopter now has 30 Martian flights under its belt.The 4-pound (1.8 kilograms) Ingenuity took to the skies on Saturday (Aug. 20) for the first time in more than two months, acing a short hop that was its 30th overall Red Planet sortie.Ingenuity had been grounded since June 11, through no fault of its own. It's winter at the helicopter's locale, the 28-mile-wide (45 kilometers) Jezero Crater, and the solar-powered Ingenuity isn't getting enough sunlight to keep its batteries charged both day and night, mission team members wrote...

HARRISBURG — State Rep. Dan Frankel has become the latest target of antisemitic threats on the same social media platform used by the man who is charged with the murder of 11 Jews in 2018 at the Tree of Life synagogue in Squirrel Hill — the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history. Mr. Frankel, D-Squirrel Hill, has become the subject of threats and derogatory comments on Gab. Gab is widely viewed as a platform used by white nationalists and other far-right extremists. The suspect in the 2018 Tree of Life attack used the site to post neo-Nazi propaganda and to...

Frisco Police arrested three people on Friday in connection to a shooting at a local Wendy’s restaurant. Frisco Police received multiple calls reporting gunfire at the Wendy’s restaurant at approximately 8 p.m. Aug. 17 in the 5500-block of Eldorado Parkway. Responding police officers learned a customer in the drive-thru was unhappy with their order, then entered the store and began arguing with staff. Following the dispute, the customer returned to his vehicle where he retrieved a pistol and fired into the front of the location before fleeing. No one was struck by the gunfire and damage was limited to...

A handout image obtained on August 23, 2022 courtesy of the Dinosaur Valley State Park shows dinosaur tracks from around 113 million years ago. A drought in Texas dried up a river flowing through Dinosaur Valley State Park, exposing tracks from giant reptiles that lived some 113 million years ago, an official said Tuesday. Photos posted on Facebook show three-toed footprints leading down a dry tree-lined riverbed in the southern US state. It is "one of the longest dinosaur trackways in the world," a caption accompanying the images says. Stephanie Salinas Garcia of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department...

Lt. Col. Richard Hecht on Twitter: "Another tragedy in the Gaza Strip today. Weapons stored unsafely in the house of a member of a Palestinian terrorist group exploded and killed a young child in the vicinity. These are the sad consequences of militarizing civilian areas for terrorist activity. https://t.co/9AUT2TwAhn" / Twitter