Free Republic

“The Bundeswehr, the army that I am allowed to lead, is more or less depleted,” wrote General Alfons Mais, chief of the German army, on the day Russia attacked Ukraine, in an emotional post on social media. “We all saw it coming and were not able to get through with our arguments, and draw and implement conclusions from the annexation of Crimea. It doesn’t feel good! I am fed up!”Almost a year after the general’s much-noted post, Germany’s armed forces are more depleted than ever, owing to the kit they are sending to Ukraine. Their stockpile of ammunition would last...

Fox News has been flying high in the ratings for some time. With the most popular shows and hosts, the network seems to be doing everything right. But one host has had some bad luck outside her job. Laura Ingraham, host of The Ingraham Angle on Fox News Channel since 2017, is also the editor-in-chief of LifeZette. She joined the network in 2007 and has soared as a host since.It seems Ingraham was on a skiing holiday with her family in Colorado when an old injury reared its head, putting her physically out of commission. The popular Fox News host...

Transgender figure skater can’t skate CLICK ABOVE ARTICLE LINK FOR THE WEIRD VIDEO A 59 year-old male Finnish farmer took up skating at age 50, declared himself transgender, and performed yesterday under the female name Minna-Maaria at the opening of the European Figure Skating Championship. Finland was proud to announce that they would be including the world’s “first trans figure skater” at the proceedings, only to discover Markku could not skate.

On January 10, the French government announced plans to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64.The change would mean that after 2027, workers in France would have to work 43 years to qualify for a government pension, instead of 42 years. French workers promptly took to the street in protest decrying even this very small reduction government welfare.Like many countries in Western Europe and North America, France faces a major demographic problem in that its population is aging and demanding ever larger amounts of public pension funds.Meanwhile, the younger working-age population is shrinking as birth rates continue to fall....

The election for the Republican National chair grew nasty towards its final weeks. Incumbent RNC chair Ronna McDaniel was elected to an unprecedented fourth term yesterday. However, these contests, which aren’t often exciting, became a focus of national attention after attorney Harmeet Dhillon decided to toss her hat in the ring to bring much-needed change to the organization after three consecutive election losses. The abysmal election performance of the GOP in the 2022 midterms, which was supposed to be a red tsunami, was the tipping point for many in the grassroots. Besides having a prime environment to clinch significant majorities...

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif) said that he plans to meet with President Joe Biden on Wednesday to discuss raising the federal debt limit while controlling government spending. During an interview with CBS’s “Face the Nation,” McCarthy brushed off the idea that the U.S. would default on its debt. “We’re not going to default,” McCarthy said, adding “this won’t come to fruition until sometime in June.” He aimed his target at Democrats calling them out for wanting to raise the debt ceiling. “There will not be a default,” McCarthy continued. “But what is really irresponsible is what the Democrats are...

The Church of England’s Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell, responded to pressure to answer whether homosexuality and same-sex marriage are sinful by saying the CofE's new stance on the issue is that it's OK, as long as couples are in "committed, stable, faithful relationships," adding that same-sex married couples will be "welcomed fully into the life of the Church, on their terms."This comes on the heels of the denomination’s recent decision not to officiate same-sex marriages but to offer blessings for same-sex couples in civil partnerships within its churches.BBC Radio Four’s William Crawley asked the archbishop whether the CofE’s recent...

Long hours elapsed with no official response from Pfizer following Project Veritas releasing the fruits of an investigation into its Director of Research, Jordon Trishton Walker. Project Veritas captured Walker on video, confiding to a Grindr date that Pfizer has been engineering new COVID-19 strains in order to have vaccines ready for rollout after they appear in the population.Original PJ Media report: Project Veritas: Pfizer Exec Admits Plans to Possibly Mutate COVID for More $$$$Presumably, Pfizer’s PR team was scrambling in the interim to strategize a response — a tall task given that the video clearly shows Walker, who is...

A recently released Gallup poll on healthcare was simultaneously right and wrong. It got statistically correct answers but asked the wrong questions.Fifty-seven percent of the 1,020 adults polled responded that "the federal government should ensure all Americans have healthcare coverage," presumably insurance. Despite assigning healthcare responsibility to Washington, 53 percent wanted private insurance rather than government-supplied. The article shied away from stating an inconvenient truth: what Americans say they want will not achieve what they really want and need. Most Americans do not distinguish healthcare from health care. As one word, healthcare refers to a massive system that consumes 18...

by Jim Clairborne | RNNThe new General Motors Hummer electrical vehicle, priced at $115,000, has presented owners with many problems. Roman Mica, the publisher of the website The Fast Lane Truck, posted a video of a brand new Hummer with multiple problems. Mica was unable to move the vehicle because the shifter wouldn’t move and the trunk would not open. He finally got it in gear and drove it back to the dealer. WATCH: Reports have been published that point out an “offroad” Hummer malfunctions if a car wash goes awry, and issues with the software have caused faulty tail...

On this date in 1547, the Duke of Norfolk was to have been beheaded. But thanks to the previous day’s death of the corpulent 55-year-old King Henry VIII, the duke’s death warrant was never signed, and the condemned noble died in bed … seven years later. A force in the gore-soaked arena of English politics for two generations, Thomas Howard had steered two nieces into the monarch’s bed. Both girls had gone to the scaffold,* and the disgrace of the second, Catherine Howard, brought a collapse in the whole family’s fortunes. Thomas Howard’s son Henry was not as lucky as...

A dramatic scene played out at Camp Pendleton Friday evening when a driver attempted to crash through the main gate at the Marine base just north of San Diego, military officials said. The incident occurred around 6:30 p.m. when a driver attempted “to gain unauthorized access to the installation,” Camp Pendleton tweeted. Guards deployed “final denial barriers” which stopped the car in its tracks. Video captured by a passing driver shows the vehicle then burst into flames. The occupants of the car were taken to Palomar Hospital, according to KTLA sister station KSWB in San Diego. Their conditions were not...

ABSTRACT Viruses have brought humanity many challenges: respiratory infection, cancer, neurological impairment and immunosuppression to name a few. Virology research over the last 60+ years has responded to reduce this disease burden with vaccines and antivirals. Despite this long history, the COVID-19 pandemic has brought unprecedented attention to the field of virology. Some of this attention is focused on concern about the safe conduct of research with human pathogens. A small but vocal group of individuals has seized upon these concerns – conflating legitimate questions about safely conducting virus-related research with uncertainties over the origins of SARS-CoV-2. The result has...

Early Monday Morning Chinese ships and aircraft again approaching Taiwan in actions that are happening daily... French Prime Minister Elisabeth Bornr says that the "pension reform" plan that would raise France's retirement age is non-negotiable... Syrian opposition and Gulf Arab media outlets report airstrikes tonight destroying six trucks in a 25-truck convoy near the Syria-Iraq border... The Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says his country could accept Finland separately into NATO... Azerbaijan has withdrawn its diplomats from Iran following a Friday attack on its embassy... UK politics the firing of Conservative Party Chairman Nadhim Zahawi... During the COVID lockdowns in...

We will continue to be your single source of truth. . . . Unless you hear it from us, it is not the truth. —Jacinda Ardern On February 19, 2023, New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced her resignation, saying she “no longer has enough in the tank” to stay in the role until the coming October election.1 Many New Zealanders, who lived through some of the harshest lockdowns in the world under Ardern’s leadership, are rejoicing. But media and politicians alike have piled praise on Ardern’s premiership while dismissing her critics as an extreme fringe. Guardian journalist Jess Philips...

Cardinal ScrewtapePope Francis appointee Robert McElroy's jaw-dropping call to revolutionize -- and queer -- the Catholic ChurchThis essay in the Jesuit magazine America, by Cardinal Robert McElroy of San Diego (above, being made a cardinal by Pope Francis), brings the dubious insights of Critical Theory to the life of the Roman Catholic Church. It is an astonishing document that lays bare the agenda of Pope Francis -- who made McElroy a cardinal -- and his supporters to radicalize Catholicism. This is something we all should pay attention to, even non-Catholics. The woke are storming the citadel of Western religion. The...

Policymakers have long grappled with how to handle experiments that might generate potentially dangerous viruses. Now, officials are considering whether oversight needs to be expanded. Over 150 virologists have signed on to a commentary that says all the evidence to date indicates that the coronavirus pandemic started naturally, and it wasn't the result of some kind of lab accident or malicious attack. They worry that continued speculation about a lab in China is fueling calls for more regulation of experiments with pathogens, and that this will stifle the basic research needed to prepare for future pandemics. The virologists issued their...

Mark Houck was arrested by the FBI at his rural Pennsylvania home for allegedly violating the FACE Act Deadlocked jurors are set to reconvene Monday in the case against a Pennsylvania pro-life activist who faces up to 11 years in prison for allegedly pushing a Planned Parenthood escort during a clash outside an abortion clinic. Mark Houck, 48, was arrested by the FBI last September in front of his family at his home in rural Kintnersville, Pennsylvania, on charges that he violated the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act during an altercation he had with the escort in Philadelphia...

Nevertheless, the Holy Father Invites Heads of Dicasteries to Live in a Personal Way the Annual Period of Retreat.(ZENIT News / Vatican City, 23.01.2023).- The Holy See Press Office announced that this year the Pope will not take part in the Spiritual Exercises with the Roman Curia in a Retreat House on the outskirts of the Italian capital. Nevertheless, Pope Francis invited the Cardinals residing in Rome, the Heads of Dicasteries and Superiors of the Roman Curia to live in a personal way the period of Spiritual Exercises, suspending their work commitments and recollecting themselves in prayer from the afternoon...

Pope Francis sends a message to the General Chapter of the Order of Malta, called to live in fidelity to the new Constitutional Charter.The Sovereign Military Order of Malta is holding an extraordinary Chapter General with 111 members called to elect - under the chairmanship of the Lieutenant Grand Master Fra' John Dunlap and Cardinal Silvano Maria Tomasi, the Pope's special delegate - the Grand Commander, the Grand Chancellor and the other top positions, on the basis of the new Constitutional Charter and the new Codex Melitense. Challenge to the worldly mentalityMarking the event, Pope Francis sent a message to...