Free Republic

ROME — The head of the Russian Orthodox Church has canceled his planned attendance at an interfaith meeting in Kazakhstan next month where he was expected to meet with Pope Francis, a top Orthodox official said, in a sign of further deterioration in relations over Russia’s war in Ukraine. Metropolitan Anthony of Volokolamsk, head of foreign relations for the Moscow Patriarchate, was quoted by the Ria Novosti news agency as saying that Patriarch Kirill would not be attending the Sept. 13-15 meeting and that therefore any meeting with Francis was off. Kirill has justified the invasion of Ukraine on spiritual...

An unredacted, internal Department of Justice memo shows the rationale of its leadership in deciding not to prosecute then-President Donald Trump on obstruction of justice charges following the Mueller report's publication. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) secured the memo's release following a ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit that the DOJ improperly withheld the memo from the watchdog group, which had sued to obtain it. “Because the department did not tie the memorandum to deliberations about the relevant decision, the department failed to justify its reliance on the deliberative-process privilege,”...

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed Thursday on “The Joe Rogan Experience” that the FBI approached the social media company during the 2020 presidential election and pushed them to crack down on alleged “Russian propaganda” before the Hunter Biden laptop story was published by the New York Post. Zuckerberg made the remarks when asked by host Joe Rogan how Facebook handled big news items that were controversial, like the Hunter Biden laptop story. “I mean, basically, the background here is the FBI, I think, basically came to us, some folks on our team, and was like, ‘Hey, just so you know,...

CHICAGO - A man suspected of pushing a person off a CTA platform on the Near West Side in early August has been arrested. James Stamps, 28, of Joliet, was taken into custody Monday in the 2600 block of South California Avenue in Little Village, according to Chicago police. On the morning of Aug. 7, police said Stamps approached a person at the Illinois Medical District Blue Line platform in the 400 block of South Damen Avenue and pushed them onto the tracks. Chicago police have not released details about the victim's condition. Stamps was charged with a felony count...

[H/T Melian]Have you seen President Trump's powerful 4 minute video message? Don't miss it!A NATION IN DECLINE Q is the result of the sacrifices and commitment of countless patriots to win back our captured country from the Deep State and achieve the transformation President Trump promised in this campaign video. President Trump has said the awakening of the public is key to this transformation.Q describes this awakening as follows: "The Great Awakening ('Freedom of Thought’), was designed and created not only as a backchannel to the public (away from the longstanding 'mind’ control of the corrupt & heavily biased media)...

According to the Center of the American Experiment, the changes will impact teacher licensure programs and “require aspiring educators to ‘demonstrate’ ideologically driven content in their coursework to obtain their teaching license.” This goes for educators who end up teaching at private schools, too. -snip- In another section on “planning for instruction,” the draft standards say a teacher should “create opportunities for students to learn about power, privilege, intersectionality, and systemic oppression in the context of various communities and empower learners to be agents of social change to promote equity.”

A controversial cartoon published in New Brunswick's largest French-language newspaper is prompting pushback over how it portrays Muslims. The cartoon, published in the Aug. 17 edition of l'Acadie Nouvelle, shows a caveman dragging a woman by her hair. Below is an illustration of a man wearing a turban and carrying a gun, using a leash to drag a woman wearing a burqa. "Evolution?..." is written above the cartoon. The National Council of Canadian Muslims issued a statement calling the cartoon Islamophobic and said it spreads stereotypes that "fuel widespread hatred." Lina El Bakir, the organization's Quebec and francophone community advocacy...

Someone mentioned this in the comments section and I'd never heard of it. The Curley Effect named after a Boston, MA politician. Defined: Curley's strategy of driving opponents outside of the city, described by Harvard economists Andrei Shleifer and Edward Glaeser in "The Curley Effect: The Economics of Shaping the Electorate," increased his political base by using distortionary economic policies, leading to long-term economic stagnation. Thought this would be a subject for further research or the journalists on here because we seem to see this being used in NYC and other major cities and - with our open border -...

Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a major buildup of his country’s military forces Thursday in an apparent effort to replenish troops that have suffered heavy losses in six months of bloody warfare and prepare for a long, grinding fight ahead in Ukraine. The move to increase the number of troops by 137,000, or 13%, to 1.15 million by the end of the year came amid chilling developments on the ground in Ukraine. (snip) Putin’s decree did not specify whether the expansion would be accomplished by widening the draft, recruiting more volunteers, or both. But some Russian military analysts predicted heavier...

On Thursday’s broadcast of CNN’s “New Day,” CNN Chief Business Correspondent and host Christine Romans stated that under President Joe Biden’s student loan cancellation, “the winners are the colleges that just keep raising tuition again and again and again.” And the plan doesn’t address the root cause of student loan debt, the massive cost of college.

On Thursday’s broadcast of Bloomberg TV’s “Bloomberg Markets,” Education Secretary Miguel Cardona responded to criticism of President Joe Biden’s student loan program that it’s not fair to people who paid back their loans by saying that “If something happened where my neighbor needs help to get back on their feet, me feeling that they shouldn’t get help, that’s un-American.” Bloomberg host and reporter David Westin asked, [relevant exchange begins around 9:45] “[D]o you have some sympathy for people who say, I paid back my loans and I didn’t get this kind of break. It’s not quite fair?”

Former HBO Max executives say the streaming service has been left with few people of color to oversee its diverse slate of programming as Warner Bros. Discovery continues its ongoing corporate reshuffling."What are they going to do with this disproportionate amount of people of color that were let go? They need to replace them in some capacity. Or do they not care? That’s what we’ve been told, that they just don’t care.”

According to Israel’s Channel 13, Lapid sought to speak with Biden in an attempt to prevent a return to the 2015 JCPOA nuclear pact but U.S. officials denied the request, informing Lapid Biden “is on vacation.” will eventually hold the call, the report said. In another instance of American rejection, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz was set to meet with U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Thursday but was informed that the latter was “out of Washington,” the report said. Sen. Ted Cruz: “A year ago, Joe Biden gave Afghanistan to the Taliban. Now he intends to give a nuclear...

President Joe Biden announced his belief Thursday that former President Donald Trump’s movement to Make America Great Again is basically fascism. “It’s not just Trump, it’s the entire philosophy that underpins the — I’m going to say something — it’s like semi-fascism,” Biden said, criticizing the “extreme MAGA philosophy” driving the Republican Party.

The University of Pennsylvania expanded a program that admitted minority and other underrepresented college applicants into its Perelman School of Medicine under special criteria, including waiving the Medical College Admission Test requirement. The program has “officially broadened” this year to include students from Howard University, Oakwood University, Xavier University of Louisiana, Morehouse College and Spelman College, according to a Perelman School of Medicine news release. The Penn Access Summer Scholars program selects a group of diverse college candidates to complete two eight-week summer mentorship sessions with medical professionals. Upon completion, students may be eligible for early admission into Penn’s Perelman...

I certainly sleep better at night knowing that Zuckerberg’s security team is making sure that what we see is carefully curated for our own good, including posts like this one from House Republicans that simply stated: “If you take out a loan, you pay it back. Period.” Those words were posted on the House Judiciary GOP page on Wednesday. Not only were people unable to share it, but Facebook censored the post stating: “Your post goes against our Community Standards so only you can see it.” At least one person claimed to have gone directly to FB jail for trying...

~Favorite Country Songs that have a color in it. ~ Josh Turner - Long Black Train *Video*https://www.all-about-vinylrecords.com/images/xElvisBlueXmasAMA251x250.jpg.pagespeed.ic.bq2FNY73la.jpg *Video*

Prosecutors say a three-time convicted felon robbed and shot a man while on bail for a pending Class X armed habitual criminal case in Chicago. Prez Bailey is the 29th person accused of killing or shooting — or attempting to kill or shoot — someone in Chicago while on bail for a felony this year. The alleged crimes involved at least 63 victims, 13 of whom died. Bailey met the 37-year-old victim for the first time on August 4 and stopped into the man’s Englewood apartment around 4:30 p.m., according to the allegations. Once inside, Bailey pulled out a gun,...

Shia LaBeouf converts to Catholicism after discovering traditional Latin Mass

As both shootings and gun sales in Philadelphia rose to unprecedented levels last year, a growing number of residents also turned their firearms over to the city’s Police Department, data show. In 2021, during 16 gun-buyback events — in which people are typically offered $50 to $200 gift cards for each weapon — 558 handguns and 188 long guns were turned in. That’s a 532% increase over 2019, when just five such events were held, according to police data. Yet of the more than 1,000 weapons turned in over the last three years, not a single one has been linked...