Free Republic

The city of Miami received mockery on Thursday after Mayor Francis Suarez unveiled a new police cruiser decorated with Africa-themed imagery to celebrate Black History Month. “This is a beautiful collaboration to commemorate Black history and Black History Month and the history of African Americans and our police department and our city,” Suarez said. “This is Black history.” Miami Police Chief Manuel Morales was also in attendance for the unveiling. Florida-based reporter Joshua Caballos claimed that the mayor’s office was not involved with the cruiser’s design. “I just spoke to Black police union (@mcpba1946) president Stanley Jean-Poix. He said Mayor...

Strange days indeed! Today’s jobs report from the Bureau of Labor Statists (BLS) was stunning. 517k jobs added! Very strange since the ADP jobs added report on Febuary 1st was only 106k. THAT is a huge discrepancy (probably a seasonal adjustment in the BLS reporting). Average hourly earnings rose to 4.4% YoY. Too bad headline inflation is still roaring at 6.5%. So, the inflation tax is still overwhelming wage growth. The spread between the January jobs report (BLS) and the ADP jobs added report (ADP) is similar to the infamous jobs report that the Philly Fed “corrected” (orange circle). Here...

NEW DELHI (AP) — Utkarsh Saxena and Ananya Kotia’s love story began just like any other college romance. Except no one else knew about the gay couple’s relationship. It was 2008. Homosexuality was yet to gain a degree of acceptance in deeply conservative India, with many gay couples facing stigma and isolation. So Saxena and Kotia took their time, watching from a distance how people’s acceptance of homosexuality was changing. “We were actually quite scared about the consequences,” said Saxena, a public policy scholar at the University of Oxford. “We were very fragile and vulnerable, a young couple figuring out...

America may soon face one of two kinds of left-wing authoritarianism. One is the soft despotism of liberal technocracy. This authoritarianism wouldn’t overthrow the present structures of our society or upend the economy. In fact, it would have the support of the regime’s major institutions. It would seriously curb civil liberties, such as free speech and gun rights, and feel much less democratic. More people would be arrested over memes, but much would remain the same. Political life in America would look more like contemporary Western Europe. The other is a radical populism in the mold of Hugo Chavez, the...

Duke coach Kara Lawson said the teams played with a men's basketball for the first half of a loss to Florida State on Sunday. The 16th-ranked Blue Devils lost to the Seminoles 70-57 in Tallahassee, Florida -- the team's second Atlantic Coast Conference loss of the season. After her team beat Pittsburgh 53-44 on Thursday, Lawson ended her news conference by speaking animatedly about Sunday's game. "This would never happen in a men's game. This would never happen," she said. "It's embarrassing for our sport."

On Thursday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “America’s Newsroom,” Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) stated that House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s approach to the debt ceiling is “most reasonable” and argued that spending reductions of 5-10% across the board should be explored. Manchin stated, [relevant remarks begin around 3:45] “Kevin and I had a nice conversation a couple of weeks ago. And I think he’s most reasonable taking the approach, can’t we at least recognize 31.5 trillion is unmanageable and we shouldn’t be passing on to our children and grandchildren, we’re writing checks they can’t cash. And I know the president’s...

MIAMI - Disturbing and alarming cell phone video captures the moment a 9-year-old girl is beaten by several older boys while riding on a bus from Coconut Palm K-8 Academy in Homestead. "Emotionally, I couldn't even last two minutes. I couldn't look at the video. Like any mother, I am destroyed. I fell to my knees and at that moment I said I have to do something," said Jenni, who is the mother of the young girl who was attacked. Jenni says her daughter was attacked while riding on the school bus Wednesday afternoon. Her 10-year-old son was also pummeled...

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis may be months away from publicly declaring his presidential intentions, but his potential rivals aren’t holding back. No fewer than a half dozen Republicans eyeing the White House have begun actively courting top political operatives in states like New Hampshire and Iowa, which traditionally host the opening presidential primary contests. At the same time, former President Donald Trump, the only announced candidate in the race, is launching regular attacks against DeSantis — and others — while locking down key staff and endorsements in early voting South Carolina. For now, DeSantis is...

The People's Republic of China confirmed Friday that the balloon craft floating over the northern United States is Chinese. "The airship is from China. It is a civilian airship used for research, mainly meteorological, purposes," a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson confirmed Friday. "Affected by the Westerlies and with limited self-steering capability, the airship deviated far from its planned course." The spokesperson said China regrets the incident. The statement continued, "The Chinese side regrets the unintended entry of the airship into US airspace due to force majeure. The Chinese side will continue communicating with the US side and properly handle this...

The first task is to wipe off or cover up the Z, says Anatoly, 44, of the call sign infamously daubed on Russian hardware involved in the war in Ukraine. “We don’t want friendly fire later on.” Then the mechanics get to work. In a secret location in Ukraine, within a vast warehouse that could be mistaken for a tank graveyard, what was once Russian – Soviet, in many cases – is being turned Ukrainian. (snip) But for all the efforts of the Nato allies, it is Russia that is unwittingly, and yet by some margin, Ukraine’s biggest donor of...

(Daily readings from the USCCB)Herod feared John, knowing him to be a righteous and holy man, and kept him in custody. When he heard him speak he was very much perplexed, yet he liked to listen to him. Mark 6:20Ideally, when the Gospel is preached and received by another, the effect is that the receiver is filled with joy, consolation and a desire to change. The Gospel is transforming for those who truly listen and respond with generosity. But what about those who do not respond with generosity? What effect does the Gospel have upon them? Our Gospel today gives...

The FBI is expanding.The bureau is reportedly planning to build a new headquarters which will be twice the size of the Pentagon.This raises a few obvious questions. Why do they need such a massive building? Are they increasing the size of their ranks to fill it? Should the American people be concerned about this?

Rising American rock stars Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson are killed when their chartered Beechcraft Bonanza plane crashes in Iowa a few minutes after takeoff from Mason City on a flight headed for Moorhead, Minnesota. Investigators blamed the crash on bad weather and pilot error. Holly and his band, the Crickets, had just scored a No. 1 hit with “That’ll Be the Day.”

The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday said it hopes Beijing will stop imposing nontariff trade barriers under the pretext of food safety, after the Kinmen County Government announced that China lifted its import ban on kaoliang liquor. The Chinese General Administration of Customs issued a customs registration code for Kinmen Kaoliang Liquor Inc (KKL, 金門酒廠), enabling the company to export its products to China from Saturday, the county said. The company received the code after Kinmen County Commissioner Chen Fu-hai (陳福海) and county officials traveled to Xiamen, China, on Saturday to meet with Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) Director Sung Tao...

Federal financial aid depends on whether your college is accredited. That means an independent agency vouches for your college, assuring that it’s not a scam and that it fulfills its promises. Accreditors have a huge amount of power. Too often, they abuse it. Fortunately, there are solutions. One way that accreditors abuse power is to interfere with university governance. The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) is the most notorious. SACS recently intervened in the decisions of at least three universities in Florida. The accreditor infamously threatened the august University of Virginia when it didn’t like how UVA’s board...

Thank GOD there's a name for this disorder. Age-Activated Attention Deficit Disorder. This is how it manifests: I decide to water my garden. As I turn on the hose in the driveway, I look over at my car and decide it needs washing. As I start toward the garage, I notice mail on the porch table that I brought up from the mail box earlier. I decide to go through the mail before I wash the car. I lay my car keys on the table, Put the junk mail in the garbage can under the table, And notice that the...

This October 2022 photo provided by Kristin Stonehouse shows her son, Mason Stonehouse, 6, in Chesterfield, Mich. Mason Stonehouse used his father’s Grubhub account to order $1,000 worth of food delivered to his home on Saturday, Jan. 28, 2023. His father, Keith Stonehouse, was not aware his son was ordering the food and at first did nt understand why delivery people kept ringing his doorbell and leaving food. (Kristin Stonehouse via AP)AP CHESTERFIELD TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) — A Michigan man says he was left with a $1,000 bill after his 6-year-old son ordered a virtual smorgasbord of food from several...

FedEx pilots filmed UFO that followed their cargo plane for over half an hourA pulsating “teardrop-shaped” object circled the FedEx plane as it flew near Monterrey – although it never showed up on the plane’s radar.The pilots reported that at some point, a “shiny, yellow-white plasma-like object” quickly descended from the sky to the plane’s flight altitude, and then shot a beam of light towards them. The sphere flew alongside the plane for over half an hour before disappearing with a flash of pinkish-violet light.The video (see below) of the meeting was analyzed by experts from the National Aeronautical Anomaly...

URBANDALE, Iowa (KCCI) - A funeral home worker in Iowa got quite a shock when a woman who was thought to have died turned out to still be alive. According to a report from the Iowa Department of Inspections and Appeals, a resident at the Glen Oaks Alzheimer’s Special Care Center was placed in hospice care on Dec. 28, 2022, and was pronounced dead at 6 a.m. on Jan. 3 by a licensed practical nurse. The report says a funeral director picked up the woman, who was thought to be dead, at the facility just after 7:30 a.m. The director...

We are what we eat. It’s true. Jesus said his flesh is our meat [food]: “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you” (John 6:53 NKJV). People who relegate this eating of the Lord to the communion table alone do not understand what Jesus meant. The Lord’s Supper isn’t just symbolic. It is a reminder to us that he became our source of life through death. We are to come daily to eat and drink of him. When sheep are not fed,...