Free Republic

Amid the gloom, one trade looms so unusually pessimistic that it is hard to process because the world would likely need to end, or come close to it, for it to prove profitable. The trade is predicated on the Cboe Volatility Index, or VIX, hitting 150 by March, a level that has never before been realized. In recent sessions, an investor bought 50,000 VIX March $150 call options, paying about 19 cents per contract. The trade is so large, and so unusual, that it was almost certainly made by a wealthy investor worried about a massive stock market decline, perhaps...

Denmark’s new Synthetic Party has produced a conversational AI to serve as nominal leader of the party and run for Parliament in the election scheduled for next June. The Synthetic Party was founded by the artistic tach collective Computer Lars, and the campaign is more of a stunt than a serious candidate. The AI’s personality and policy platform are built on the proposals by Denmark’s hundreds of small parties going back 50 years. Synthetic Party Computer Lars announced the formation of the Synthetic party in May as a way of leveraging a political campaign and AI party leader to draw...

Kentucky is the latest state to face a religious freedom challenge to its pro-life laws. Recently, Jewish and Satanic groups also sued Idaho, Indiana and Florida, alleging that protecting unborn babies from abortion violates their religious beliefs. On Thursday, three Jewish women from Louisville filed a lawsuit that argues the Kentucky abortion ban, which is saving thousands of unborn babies, would prohibit them from exercising their religious beliefs, according to the Lexington Herald-Leader. “In Judaism, reproductive health of a mother is between the mother, her rabbi and her doctor — not the attorney general,” their attorney Aaron Kemper said. However,...

After more than 4 months under Russian control, large parts of the city have been destroyed ..."Are we in Donetsk Oblast already? Or still in Kharkiv Oblast?" "Donetsk Oblast," the guard laughed One of the soldiers in that SUV, identified only as Ivan, has been stationed about 100 kilometres north, in Kupiansk, and is using several days of leave to visit his home in Lyman for the first time since he enlisted on Feb. 24, the first day of the Russian invasion. Located in Ukraine's eastern Donetsk region, Lyman fell to Russian forces in late May and served as a...

“Even in laughter the heart is sorrowful; and the end of that mirth is heaviness” (Proverbs 14:13).

Donald Trump ordered a complete withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan and Somalia after he lost the 2020 election, the January 6 committee said at their Thursday hearing. The memo was written to the acting Secretary of Defense on November 11 to take effect on January 15, 2021 - just before President Joe Biden was meant to take office. The revelation was made by GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger, who is retiring from Congress at the end of this year after facing opposition from Trump over his re-election. Trump National Security Council Official Gen. Keith Kellogg said he warned the former...

The Connecticut man who gunned down three Bristol cops after luring them with a phony 911 call was a beer-drinking divorced dad of two, who stunned neighbors described as the “rowdy one” in his clan. Cop killer Nicholas Brutcher, 35, also liked guns — and is seen proudly displaying a handgun at a wedding in one Facebook post from 2016. “Nick was the big rowdy one,” a neighbor of his brother Nathaniel told The Post Thursday.

The overturning of Roe v. Wade is forcing more men to take responsibility for their actions. Those who are not ready to be fathers can no longer rely on their unborn babies being aborted, especially in the South and Midwest where many states now protect – or are fighting in court to protect – unborn babies’ lives. So, many are choosing to be sterilized instead. In a new Associated Press report, doctors across the country confirmed that they have seen a noticeable increase in men seeking vasectomies since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health in...

Taiwanese semiconductor manufacturing prowess might be one reason for China to invade the island and seize fabs belonging to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., United Microelectronics Corp., and Micron. One of the potential responses to such a plan could be evacuating personnel and destroying the fabs, suggested Parameters, a top U.S. army publication recently. But this might be unnecessary, according to Taiwan’s National Security Bureau. To build chips using leading-edge process technologies, TSMC needs leading-edge chip production equipment from companies like ASML, Applied Materials, and KLA. Even if China invades the island and seizes TSMC’s fabs without access to advanced equipment...

Twenty-two patients (18 in the case series and 4 via systematic review; aged 7–16 years; 19 males [86%]) were identified as having experienced suspected or proven ventricular arrhythmia during electronic gaming; 6 (27%) had experienced cardiac arrest, and 4 (18%) died suddenly. A proarrhythmic cardiac diagnosis was known in 7 (31%) patients before their gaming event and was established afterward in 12 (54%). Ten patients (45%) had catecholaminergic polymorphic ventricular tachycardia, 4 (18%) had long QT syndrome, 2 (9%) were post–congenital cardiac surgery, 2 (9%) had “idiopathic” ventricular fibrillation, and 1 (after Kawasaki disease) had coronary ischemia. In 3 patients...

Earlier this week, a poll released by NBC/Telemunmdo indicates that Latinos favor Democrat control of Congress by 54%. One may be tempted to ask, while yawning, what else is new, because for eons, Latinos have been staunch Democrat supporters.What is significant here is not the current level of support, which is substantial at 54%, but the direction of the trend. Similar polls have previously shown the Democrat preference at 67% in 2016 and 59% in 2020. That is a drop of 13 percentage points in four years, which is significant enough to cause concern among Democrat leaders.Whenever discussing the actions...

China's ultra-strict COVID-19 curbs are taking a toll on businesses and jobseekers as Beijing stresses again and again the need to maintain its zero-tolerance approach to the virus, to save lives, if not livelihoods. Since 2020, China has reported 5,226 COVID-19 fatalities among its population of 1.4 billion. In contrast, more than 1 million people have died of the disease in the United States. Keeping a lid on China's COVID-19 death toll has come at a cost to its economy.

“Traditionalism: Fidelity, Resistance, Work of the Church”: Jean-Pierre Maugendre On Saturday, September 24, 2022, a symposium on the future of the traditional Mass was held in Paris, bringing together nearly 500 participants. The great success of this event, co-organized in particular by the associations Oremus-Paix Liturgique and Renaissance Catholique, was due to the quality of the interventions and in particular that of Jean-Pierre Maugendre, President of Renaissance Catholique, a translation of which appears below.Everything began well:The Council that has just opened is like a resplendent dawn that is rising over the Church, and already the first rays of the...

“After these things there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now there is in Jerusalem by the sheep gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew Bethesda, having five porticoes. In these lay a multitude of those who were sick, blind, lame, and withered, waiting for the moving of the waters; for an angel of the Lord went down at certain seasons into the pool and stirred up the water; whoever then first, after the stirring up of the water, stepped in was made well from whatever disease with which he was afflicted. A...

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Secretary-General Antonio Guterres sent a letter to finance ministers and central bankers from the world’s 20 leading economies Thursday urging they change course and steer a global economic recovery that includes developing countries hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, the impact of the war in Ukraine and escalating climate emergencies. The U.N. chief said in the letter ahead of the Group of 20 summit in the Indonesian resort of Bali next month that these world events along with the rising cost of living, tightening financial conditions, and unsustainable debt burdens “are wreaking havoc on economies across...

In the worldy, economic sense, the U.S. dollar has often been referred to in recent times as "the cleanest dirty shirt": Fortune, July 2022: "Why is the dollar dominating? Because the U.S. is" the cleanest dirty shirt. " Asia Times, September 2022: "Analyst Louis-Vincent Gave at Gavekal Research observes that 'in a dangerous world, the reason for the US dollar' s super-charged performance over the last year has been investors' view that it is the 'cleanest dirty shirt' in a smelly pile of laundry.'" In the spiritual sense, who or what has the "cleanest dirty shirt" in the world? The...

For years the political left has made fools of themselves by sucking up to celebrities. Both in election season and out of it, always it’s the same story. Susan Sarandon, Matt Damon, Eva Longoria and the rest of them all come out to support the Democrat party. Want to weigh up the rights and wrongs of American foreign policy? Then make sure George Clooney is on your side. Want to address income inequality? Well make sure you’ve got Taylor Swift on board. Of course the whole thing is ridiculous. And conservatives have not been shy about pointing out that fact....

A 42-year-old-man was hunting Elk in Idaho when a mountain lion emerged from the wilderness and began stalking him. Jared Erickson - from Paradise, Utah, just south of the Gem state - was lucky to get away with his life after the encounter with the lion in which he was forced to fire his gun twice. After the second shot he was able to scare off the mountain lion, which then returned into the wilderness disappointed. Erickson pulled out his pistol and phone upon noticing the big cat. With his left hand he filmed the lion as it moved menacingly...

Oct 13, 2022 (twitter.com/natirom/status/1446432164099379201) Attorney, NGO Nati Rom: Hundreds of Muslim citizens of Israel are chanting in Jerusalem, our capital, 'Khaybar Khaybar ya Yahud, Jaish Muhammad Swafa Yeud', and in a free translation - 'Jews, remember Khaybar' (a Jewish settlement that signed a peace agreement between it and Muhammad's army - the agreement was broken and the Jews were slaughtered to the very last of them).

Interesting item from the Times of India:Coins are not only used as a mode of exchange but they also reflect heritage. Indian-Roman relations was one such area where coins played a major role in establishing and strengthening ties between two countries.At a special exhibition on Roman coins and other Roman antiquities found in South India, inaugurated by the Italian Embassy Cultural Centre director Angela Trezza at the Government Museum in Egmore on Tuesday, rare coins and antiquities were put on display for the public...Historically, trade between ancient Rome and India can be traced to the rule of Roman emperor Augustus...