Free Republic

Did you think the Pentagon had a hard rule against using lethal autonomous weapons? It doesn’t. But it does have hoops to jump through before such a weapon might be deployed—and, as of Wednesday, a revised policy intended to clear up confusion. The biggest change in the Defense Department’s new version of its 2012 doctrine on lethal autonomous weapons is a clearer statement that it is possible to build and deploy them safely and ethically but not without a lot of oversight. That’s meant to clear up the popular perception that there’s some kind of a ban on such weapons....

“You Will Eat lab-grown ‘meat’ and bugs—and Be Happy. Or so the forces of the Great Food Reset believe. Bill Gates is gobbling up U.S. farmland (now the single largest owner) and the World Economic Forum pushes eating bugs, and the U.S. FDA and USDA edge closer to approving lab-grown ‘meat’—Bon appetite?!A food crisis and transformation are just the ticket for even more chaos that the WEF can exploit for their Reset agenda. The World Economic Forum is so eager to promote synthetic ‘meat’ that they are touting numerous ways to print up to 6 kilograms of the fake meat...

Explanation: The current darling of the northern night, Comet C/2022 E3 ZTF is captured in this telescopic image from a dark sky location at June Lake, California. Of course Comet ZTF has been growing brighter in recent days, headed for its closest approach to Earth on February 1. But this view was recorded on January 23, very close to the time planet Earth crossed the orbital plane of long-period Comet ZTF. The comet's broad, whitish dust tail is still curved and fanned out away from the Sun as Comet ZTF sweeps along its orbit. Due to perspective near the orbital...

Florida delivery driver robbed by convicted felons with dozens of charges caught on terrifying video Two career criminals are back behind bars after robbing a delivery driver at gunpoint earlier this month. On Wednesday, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office released terrifying dashcam video of two men robbing an Amazon driver at gunpoint in broad daylight on Jan. 13. In the video, one man is seen holding a gun to the worker’s neck before going into the back of the truck to steal packages. The other man is outside the truck for most of the video, but he pops inside the...

VALDOSTA, Ga. (WTGS) — Two Georgia children, an 11-year-old and a 15-year-old, were arrested on Wednesday after robbing a man at gunpoint in Valdosta. According to the Valdosta Police Department, officers responded on Jan. 15 to reports of a group of juveniles who had robbed a man of a PlayStation 5 he was trying to sell. Police said one of the children had pulled out a handgun and robbed him of the PlayStation. The victim told officers that he got in his car and began to leave when the two children began to chase him and shot at his vehicle,...

Booking photos of Colinford Mattis and Urooj Rahman taken on May 30, 2020. In a dramatic hearing on Thursday, a federal judge sentenced a corporate attorney who firebombed a police car during the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests to a year in jail, arguing that his prestigious education — boarding school, Princeton, a law degree from New York University — should have rendered him a peacekeeper, not an instigator. “You’re not one of the oppressed. You’re one of the privileged,” senior Eastern District of New York Judge Brian Cogan told Colinford Mattis, even as he expressed admiration for what the...

Actress, writer and activist Jane Fonda, whose protests have landed her in jail more than once, blamed the worst of climate change on racism during an interview to promote her new movie on “The Kelly Clarkson Show.” Fonda appeared with her “80 for Brady” co-stars Lily Tomlin, Rita Moreno and Sally Field. “Well, you know, you can take anything — sexism, racism, misogyny, homophobia, whatever, the war,” Fonda said. “And if you really get into it, and study it and learn about it and the history of it, everything’s connected. There’d be no climate crisis if it wasn’t for racism.”...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Flags are lowered, sorrowful statements are issued, pleas to lawmakers are made, again. In the wake of two mass shootings in California this week, President Joe Biden has followed a heartfelt and familiar script of outrage and grief over gun violence in America, coupled with a renewed call for Congress to pass legislation banning assault-style weapons. Such a ban has little chance of passing the Republican-controlled House of Representatives or the Senate, which is narrowly controlled by Democrats, political experts say. But Biden's stubborn strategy continues: make a ban the focus of public discourse whenever a mass...

Ukrainian forces battled Friday to repel waves of Russian soldiers trying to break through their defense lines in the east, as they pleaded for more weapons before the first Western battle tanks arrive. Ukrainian officials confirmed that brutal battles were underway, a day after at least 11 people were killed and as many people were injured in missile and armed-drone strikes across the country, including in the capital of Kyiv, which were widely viewed as retaliatory after the US and European countries pledged to send modern tanks. “Fierce fighting continues along the front lines,” said Oleh Synehubov, governor of the...

The recent advances in North Korea’s ballistic missile test program appear to be directed at developing capabilities to defeat or degrade the effectiveness of missile defenses deployed in the region: Patriot, Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD), and Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD). In addition, North Korea’s progress with submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBM) suggests an effort to counter land-based THAAD missile defenses by launching attacks from positions at sea outside the THAAD’s radar field of view, although local Aegis BMD systems could likely still track these projectiles. The Pukgugsong-3 SLBM was successfully tested beginning in late 2019. According to a...

The Caldwell Police Department said in a statement that detectives think graffiti was not "motivated by hate" but was carried out as "an act of intimidation." Report: Idaho High School’s ‘White Power’ Graffiti Revealed To Be Hate Hoax Scheme Carried Out By Hispanic Gang Idaho police officials believe that a Hispanic gang spray-painted the phrase “White Power” on a local high school in a hate hoax scheme. The Caldwell Police Department said in a statement that detectives think graffiti was not “motivated by hate” but was carried out as “an act of intimidation.” “At this time, detectives no longer believe...

The European Union is responsible for bug additives being put into food. One large German company had requested to put cricket powder in all food. The normalization of eating bugs is a goal of the World Economic Forum. It has been approved, but it’s not only crickets. Mealworms and grasshoppers are also approved. Since the globalists want the peasants to eat bugs, many believe this is a foot in the door for climate ideologues to impose their beliefs. They believe that we should not eat meat but rather bugs. Don’t believe these people when they say bugs are good for...

The Department of Energy on Thursday announced a grant of $118 million in funding for domestic production of biofuels, part of the Biden administration’s emission-reduction goals. Funding was divided between 17 projects, each of which received between $500,000 and $80 million, according to Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm. The projects are sited in nine states and the District of Columbia, according to the department. They are divided into four categories: emission reduction using ethanol and integrated biorefinery technology in the pre-pilot, pilot and demonstration stages. Biofuels are quickly produced fuels derived from organic material, distinct from fossil fuels both for their...

Two police officers are among the three people charged in connection with the beating of a homeless man in Florida last year. Both officers were removed from active duty before being fired from the department, police chief George Fuente said. According to an affidavit, Hialeah Police Department officers Lorenzo Orfila and Rafael Otano were working an afternoon patrol shift together on Dec. 17, 2022, when they were dispatched to Los Tres Conejitos Bakery in a Hialeah shopping plaza. The two officers "made contact" with Jose Ortega Gutierrez, who was then handcuffed and put in the backseat of Orfila's police vehicle....

The most comprehensive plans need a sprinkle of luck, even in space. VIDEO AT LINK In October 2022, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST or Webb) watched as Chariklo, a tiny ringed asteroid, eclipsed a star. This event, called an occultation, marked a first for Webb. At the month's end, Webb turned toward Chariklo again and notched another victory: For the first time, astronomers analyzing the telescope's data spotted clear signs of water ice, the presence of which was only hinted at until now. These observations will guide astronomers to better understand the nature and behavior of tiny bodies in...

Singer Azealia Banks offered Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis her ringing endorsement in a new interview, proclaiming that she feels “way safer” living in the Sunshine State under the Republican’s leadership than she ever did in liberal California. The “212” rapper, who relocated to Miami in 2021, weighed in on the potential 2024 GOP frontrunner as she recalled spending the pandemic in Los Angeles “isolated and scared,” surrounded by virtue-signaling wealthy liberals displaying “Black Lives Matter” signs at their homes and businesses. “Every which way I turn there’s a Black Lives Matter sign, and then we’re watching swathes of Latino people...

"I pray that ... you may know ... the surpassing greatness of [God's] power toward us who believe" (Eph. 1:18-19). The same divine power that created, sustains, and controls the universe secures your salvation. God’s power is awesome! David wrote, “Thine, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory and the majesty, indeed everything that is in the heavens and the earth; Thine is the dominion, O Lord, and Thou dost exalt Thyself as head over all. Both riches and honor come from Thee, and Thou dost rule over all, and in Thy hand...

Left-wing fascists in San Diego are preparing to tax residents by the mile to convince them to give up their cars. Keep voting Democrat, geniuses. Via Fox News: San Diego County’s Regional Transportation Agency’s (SANDAG) latest transportation plan is designed to make driving so expensive that you succumb to public transportation. In addition to the current gas tax and registration fees, SANDAG’s plan adds three new half-cent sales tax increases, over 800 miles of San Diego County freeway lanes converted to toll lanes, and a mileage tax for every mile driven to pay for their $165 billion public mass transit...

Since the cross, all spiritual giants have had one thing in common. They were in close communion with the Lord; they became lost in the glorious vastness of Christ, and they died lamenting they still knew so little of him. So it was with Paul and the disciples; with many early church fathers like Luther, Zwingli and the Puritans; with the pious English preachers; and with many godly leaders today. Every one of these giants shared the same ruling passion: an ever-increasing revelation of Jesus Christ. They cared nothing for success, ambition or worldly fame. They prayed not for things,...

And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness:..And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. (Genesis 1:26, 28) And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave...