Free Republic

President Trump’s senior policy team consistently went against conventional wisdom, because that conventional wisdom was wrong. This is an adapted excerpt from “Let My People Know: The Incredible Story of Middle East Peace—and What Lies Ahead“ (Encounter Books, July 12). Tomorrow, President Joe Biden will travel to Israel. I believe all Americans should root for his success. However, success will be more difficult to achieve because it hasn’t yet been defined by his administration. I had the honor of working for David Friedman, former U.S. ambassador to Israel, and Jared Kushner, former senior adviser to the president. With them, there...

It needs to be a rule for the Larry Hogan wing of the Republican Party that anytime they drone about it being time to “move on,” they’re required to say out loud exactly what it means to move on. Because when the Wall Street Journal or Mitt Romney repeats that condescending line with absolute disdain, they’re not just talking about zeroing out the political viability of a single man who offends their delicate sensibilities. They’re talking about a complete memory-holing of the GOP’s shift from country club to Costco and the abandonment of all the issues that brought hundreds of...

Breonna Taylor’s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, settled a pair of lawsuits Monday against the city of Louisville, according to his attorneys. The city said it will pay $2 million per the settlements filed in federal and state court, according to Walker attorney Steve Romines, CBS News reported Tuesday: Walker and Taylor were settled in bed for the night when they were roused by banging on her apartment door around midnight on March 13, 2020. Police were outside with a drug warrant, and they used a battering ram to knock down the door. Walker fired a single shot from a handgun, striking...

Thailand's Princess Bajrakitiyabha Narendira Debyavati, the oldest child of King Maha Vajiralongkorn, has been taken to hospital after suffering heart problems. A statement from the Royal Palace confirmed Princess Bajrakitiyabha, 44, lost consciousness on Wednesday at Pak Chong in the north-eastern province of Nakhon Ratchasima while training her dogs.She was taken to the local hospital before being flown by helicopter with a royal medical team to Bangkok once her condition had "stabilised to a certain extent".The palace statement said the princess was receiving treatment at King Chulalongkorn Memorial Hospital in the Thai capital.

The TSA says the change will 'advance civil rights' and improve the customer experience

In a CNN appearance this week, Rep Adam Schiff (D-Calif) contended that "hate speech is soaring since Musk took control of Twitter. Slurs against black people have tripled. Slurs against women are up 33%. Slurs against Jews are up 61%. Slurs against gay men are up 58%. These numbers are abysmal – and unacceptable." Musk countered, asserting that "hate speech posts are actually down by 1/3 for Twitter now compared to what they were prior to my acquisition of the company." Schiff scoffed at Musk's assertion. "My sources tell me that some of the former Twitter employees fired by Musk...

Meluhha: the Indus Civilization and Its Contacts with MesopotamiaMark Kenoyer, University of Wisconsin, MadisonThe Oriental Institute | 211,313 views | October 7, 2010

Giffords adviser Ryan Busse claims the Supreme Court of the United State’s Bruen (2022) decision is making it “much easier” for “a trouble 18-year-old to become a deadly mass shooter.” The Bruen decision was handed down June 23, 2022, and Breitbart News reported it struck down New York’s proper cause requirement for concealed carry permit issuance. Busse’s column, published in The Atlantic December 14, 2022, summarized a portion of Justice Clarence Thomas’s Bruen opinion: Thomas made clear that, henceforth, the Court’s conservative majority would judge all firearms regulations by a new originalist standard: If there is no historical proof of...

Paglia used charity funds to renovate apartment Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia diverted hundreds of thousands of euros allocated to support missionary and charitable works while he served as president of the Pontifical Council for the Family. Paglia used much of the money to finance building projects in Rome, including the renovation of his personal apartment, The Pillar has learned.According to multiple independent sources with knowledge of the events, Archbishop Paglia confirmed in a 2015 memo to Holy See financial officials that hundreds of thousands of euros had been paid to an Italian construction contractor instead of going to missionary and charitable...

Thirty-six-year-old Brandon Turner was shot and killed Sunday about 8:30 p.m. in Port John, Florida, after he allegedly attacked an armed driver in a McDonald’s parking lot. Turner allegedly walked up the driver, as he sat in his car eating, and began attacking him, FOX News reported. The driver managed to grab a gun he kept inside the vehicle and fire one round, striking Turner. Turner was transported to a local hospital and pronounced dead. WESH2 noted the conversation on police radio as law enforcement described the incident: “We got a caller on the line. Advises that they had shot...

The spectre of future energy blackouts is once again looming in Germany, with the country’s plan to cut consumption falling significantly short amid cold winter weather. A cold snap that has hit the north of Europe is now seriously threatening Germany’s energy security, with the country now reportedly falling far short of hitting gas savings targets of 20 per cent needed to avoid rolling blackouts. While many officials across the country had warned that there is a very real threat that Germany could be facing serious energy shortages over the next few months, bigwigs close to the government have repeatedly...

Flight cabin disruptions over masks .. are much less likely now. With a Biden administration mandate overturned, incidents are down 74%. ... The friendly skies too often resembled “season’s beatings” shopping brawls during the pandemic, as the number of arguments and even fistfights surged on-board. Viral videos of the flight-and-fight mayhem frequently had a common denominator – the federal government’s mask requirement. So it may come as little surprise that disruptions on commercial domestic flights have plummeted by 74% since the Biden administration’s mask mandate was overturned by a federal judge in April. The current rate is 1.7 unruly passengers...

After initial skepticism, first lady Jill Biden is “all in” on her husband seeking another four-year term of office, according to a new report Thursday. As recently as early fall, Jill Biden, 71, was described as “not a proponent” of 80-year-old President Biden running again, but shifted her outlook after last month’s midterm elections, when Democrats kept control of the Senate and only narrowly lost their majority in the House, CNN reported, citing seven people familiar with the first lady’s thinking. Jill Biden is now fully on board with a possible 2024 campaign, despite one source describing her as “exhausted”...

Reality television stars Todd and Julie Chrisley, who last month were sentenced to prison for fraud and tax crimes, will be heading to Florida to serve their time, according to documents from the US Marshals Service that were recently filed with the court. The couple have been ordered to report to two different federal prisons on January 17, according to the documents. Todd and Julie Chrisley, best known for their reality series “Chrisley Knows Best,” were found guilty in June of conspiracy to defraud banks out of more than $30 million in fraudulent loans. In addition, they were found guilty...

Sam Bankman-Fried appeared Tuesday at a hearing in the Bahamas with his parents in attendance, according to multiple reports, including from The New York Times and the cryptocurrency site CoinDesk. At the hearing, which largely focused on whether Bankman-Fried would be released on bail, the former FTX CEO indicated that he was not waiving his right to challenge his extradition to the US, the CoinDesk report said. The site, which was reporting live from Nassau in the Bahamas, broke the news in November of the financial links between FTX and Bankman-Fried's trading firm, Alameda Research. During the proceedings, Bankman-Fried's mother,...

Afshin Esmaeil Ghaderzadeh was named the shortest man living by Guinness World Records. Photo courtesy of Guinness World Records Dec. 15 (UPI) -- A 20-year-old Iranian man has been dubbed the shortest man living by Guinness World Records after his height was confirmed as 2 feet and 1.6 inches. Afshin Esmaeil Ghaderzadeh, from a village in Bukan County, West Azerbaijan Province, was found to be 2.7 inches shorter than the previous shortest man living, 36-year-old Colombia man Edward "Niño" Hernandez. Ghaderzadeh's parents said he was born at a weight of 1.5 pounds, and he now weighs in at 14.3 pounds....

Members of Oregon’s LGBTQ community are worried they may not be able to acquire guns, and will therefore be vulnerable, if the gun controls in Ballot Measure 114 (BM 114) are allowed to take effect. The controls in BM 114 are currently on hold via a temporary restraining order, but further hearings on the specific distinct controls in the measure could result in a partial or complete enactment. NPR reports that “some of Oregon’s trans and queer gun supporters are worried that a new state law will prevent them from buying firearms.”

I'll be in Memphis soon and I was looking forward to getting some of the OTC Ivermectin that is supposedly available to all persons without prescription. Well, guess what! I just got off the phone with Lucy at the Tennessee Board of Pharmacy and she was ZERO help. Said that the new "law" does not require them to assist in providing any information whatsoever about what pharmacies have Ivermectin. I also called a CVS and...you guessed it...the pharmacist there might just as well have told me to go pound sand. Is there anyone here that's had any success at all...

Russia was "ill prepared" for the economic response to the invasion. Western countries have slapped crippling economic sanctions on Russia, and in November, Russia's economy entered a recession. Putin planned for a quick war, but "Russian guns have now been firing for almost 300 days" and "the cupboard is bare," Radakin went on to say, echoing US officials who have pointed out that Russia is running through its munitions faster than it can replenish them. Russia has lost much of the territory it managed to occupy in the early days of the invasion. A Ukrainian counteroffensive that began in recent...

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