Free Republic

President Biden recently signed the Inflation Reduction Act, a sweeping energy, tax, and healthcare law that is partly designed to reduce the deficit. The legislation includes $80 billion in increased IRS funding over ten years. The idea is that the funds could help improve tax compliance, which in turn, could bring in an estimated $203 billion in increased revenue. It’s too early to know what the impacts will be. But you may have heard some lawmakers say that because of the new law, an “army” of 87,000 new IRS agents will be coming to audit ordinary taxpayers. As is often...

If half of the firms in the entire country really do cut jobs over the next year, what will our economy look like afterwards? All over America, companies are anticipating that a major economic downturn is coming in 2023, and a lot of them are already planning to shed workers in order to cut costs. Of course this sounds so much like what we went through back in 2008 and 2009. Millions of Americans lost their jobs during the “Great Recession”, and it was truly a very dark time in our history. So are we right on the verge of...

California on Thursday is expected to put into effect its sweeping plan to prohibit the sale of new gasoline-powered cars by 2035, a groundbreaking move that could have major effects on the effort to fight climate change and accelerate a global transition toward electric vehicles. “This is huge,” said Margo Oge, an electric vehicles expert who headed the Environmental Protection Agency’s transportation emissions program under Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama. “California will now be the only government in the world that mandates zero-emission vehicles. It is unique.” The rule, issued by the California Air Resources Board,...

Former President Donald Trump’s social media outfit, Truth Social, is locked in a bitter battle with one of its vendors claiming that the platform is stiffing the company out of more than $1 million in contractually obligated payments, FOX Business has learned. If the allegations are true, they would suggest that Truth Social’s finances are in significant disarray, people with direct knowledge of the matter say. Internet infrastructure company RightForge is said to be among Truth Social’s largest vendors and creditors, these people say. In October, RightForge announced it entered into an agreement to host Truth Social, which Trump helped...

In an August 19th letter to Congressman James Comer, The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) announced the suspension of the sub-grants awarded to EcoHealth Alliance to study bat coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. The funding was originally to determine which of the bat-borne coronaviruses were likely to make the jump from animal to humans and the likelihood that those viruses could mutate into deadly potential pandemic pathogens. During the 2018-2019 grant period, EcoHealth Alliance failed to report the creation of a deadly, more virulent virus that infected humanized cells with ACE2 receptors in laboratory mice,...

According to the report, the purpose of the operation - conducted with the US - was to simulate an aerial and maritime strike on Iran in the Red Sea. Israeli Air Force F-35 advanced fifth-generation fighter jets penetrated Iranian airspace multiple times over the last two months, according to the Saudi media outlet Elaph. Both Iranian and Russian radars failed to locate them, according to the report. According to the news site, Israel and the US have conducted large-scale exercises over the Red Sea in order to simulate an aerial and maritime strike on Iran and the seizure of Iranian...

Three journalists from Finland's largest daily went on trial on Thursday charged with publishing classified defence intelligence, with the prosecutor demanding at least 18-month suspended sentences if found guilty. The report, entitled "Finland's most secret place", revealed the rough location and tasks of an intelligence unit of the defence forces at a time when parliament was debating whether to expand its powers to monitor private data in digital networks.According to the prosecutor, the article contained harmful information the publication of which was against the law.

For the first time in nearly 50 years, Great Britain’s inflation rate is expected spike beyond 18 percent, according to a dire new report from Citi. Benjamin Nabarro, the chief UK economist at Citi, told clients at the start of the week that the bank expects CPI inflation to reach 18.6 percent by January, in part due to soaring electricity and natural gas costs. (Related: The UK’s hyperinflationary track started to really become noticeable last year.) “Our latest estimate, updated for the further 25 percent and 7 percent rally in UK gas and electricity prices last week, points to a...

Although Oregon has long been a blue stronghold, political analysts say the state’s gubernatorial race is no sure thing, the Baker City Herald reported Tuesday. Most recently, the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics changed the race from “Leans Democratic” to “Toss-up,” pointing to the volatile nature of potentially splitting a governor’s race between three candidates.

Appearing on "The Joe Rogan Experience" podcast on Thursday, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg alleged that the FBI warned the company of a "Russian propaganda dump" prior to the New York Post publishing a story that included damaging information on then-candidate Joe Biden from his son Hunter Biden's laptop.

Former Attorney General William Barr said that former President Donald Trump was resorting to “extortion” to continue to exert influence over the Republican Party, and said he still hasn’t decided what to make of the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago and the government’s recovery of hundreds of pages of classified documents. In a lengthy interview published Thursday, former New York Times editor Bari Weiss asked Barr why more Republicans did not simply come out and say that Trump’s claims that election fraud had prevented him from winning the 2020 election were, to use Barr's previous word, “bullshit.” “The tactic that Trump...

“He that hateth dissembleth with his lips, and layeth up deceit within him; When he speaketh fair, believe him not: for there are seven abominations in his heart. Whose hatred is covered by deceit, his wickedness shall be shewed before the whole congregation” (Proverbs 26:24-26).

When the laws in Texas, Idaho and Tennessee go into effect, a dozen states in total will have banned abortion.“Trigger laws” banning most abortions with limited exceptions are set to take effect in three states — Texas, Idaho, and Tennessee — on Thursday, Aug. 25. When these laws go into effect, a dozen states in total will have banned abortion, most through “trigger laws” passed before the overturning of Roe v. Wade on June 24. According to SBA Pro-life America, the laws going into effect could prevent as many as 69,000 abortions each year across the three states. Katie Glenn,...

The Justice Department has released a 2019 memo that put to rest any prosecution of former President Donald Trump over allegations contained in the Mueller report. Special counsel Robert Mueller, whose investigation was criticized by Trump, was hired to probe allegations of collusion between the 2016 Trump campaign and Russia. He found no such connections. However, Mueller’s report cited 10 instances in which he believed there could have been possible obstruction of justice, without saying if they merited prosecution, according to NBC News. That prompted a DOJ review, which culminated in the nine-page memo released Wednesday. The memo said there...

Rome Newsroom, Aug 24, 2022 / 07:37 am In a message Wednesday, Pope Francis warned against letting ideology influence the Church’s ordained and lay ministries, and said he plans to initiate a dialogue with bishops on the topic. Francis’ reflection was published on Aug. 24 for the 50th anniversary of Saint Pope Paul VI’s motu proprio Ministeria quaedam, which updated norms for lectors and acolytes following the Second Vatican Council. An instituted ministry is a type of formal, vocational service within the Catholic Church. It can be either lay, such as lector, acolyte, or catechist (added by Pope Francis in...

Sheriff's deputies in the Florida Keys seized 70 pounds of suspected cocaine that was discovered floating in the ocean on Tuesday, just days after another bale of narcotics was found offshore. The Coast Guard originally spotted the drugs Tuesday around 2:30 p.m. and called the Monroe County Sheriff's Office. Deputies located nearly two dozen smaller packages with a green "100%" marking and turned them over to the U.S. Border Patrol.

On Thursday’s broadcast of NBC’s “MTP Now,” Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-MI) defended President Joe Biden’s student loan program and said she’s “really tired of these armchair economists who love to take the shots and get attention, but aren’t really working hard to try to solve some of our nation’s problems.” Host Kristen Welker asked, “I would be remiss if I didn’t ask you about the other big news today, which is the President’s announcement on student loans. He’s extending the pause. He’s giving relief of $10,000 to those who make less than $125,000. Some economists, though, are warning that it...

The New Jersey branch of the National Education Association is running an advertisement condemning concerned mothers and fathers as 'extremists.'(LifeSiteNews) — One of the strange and unintended effects of the Covid lockdowns was that for the first time many parents were exposed to what educators were teaching their kids. Many were shocked, and the resulting backlash torqued an already-growing parental rights movement rooted in opposition to LGBT indoctrination and Critical Race Theory (CRT). At first, progressives insisted that parents, if not lying, were simply following for the fevered conspiracy theories of raving right-wing pundits. Then along came activists like Christopher...

An obelisk with Soviet stars at the top that was the centrepiece of a monument commemorating the Red Army's victory over Nazi Germany has been toppled in the Latvian capital. (Aug. 25)

"A valuable present for Ukraine on the occasion of its Independence Day! U.S. President Joe Biden announced the allocation of nearly $3 billion in military aid to our state. The package includes air defense systems, unmanned aerial vehicles, artillery systems, and radars," Ukrainian media outlets quoted Shmyhal as saying on social media. In addition, the Ukrainian state budget on Wednesday received another $3 billion as a non-refundable grant from the U.S. via the World Bank mechanism, the prime minister said. "This is the first tranche from the additional $4.5 billion of direct budget aid," he said.