Free Republic

Like many residents who live within a few miles of Norfolk Southern Railway’s Feb. 3 train derailment, Jerry Corbin evacuated before the railroad decided to conduct a controlled burn of five freight cars containing the toxic vinyl chloride on Feb. 6. When he returned to his home in Darlington Township, Pennsylvania—around 1.4 miles from the crash site—Corbin discovered two surprises. Black debris that resemble ash was strewn all over his yard and on his roof, and an “undetonated blasting cap” landed in a pasture near his house. On the evening of Feb. 3, a Norfolk Southern train carrying 151 cars...

[Catholic Caucus] “I Must Disobey”: A Priest’s Letter to His BishopEditor’s Note: What follows could double as a form letter for those priests who will be forced to disobey an unjust order in the very near future. They will be ordered to stop offering the Traditional Latin Mass, and many of them will disobey. But this need not be an act of defiance against their bishops. The villain here is Pope Francis. He is the one who has issued orders that put the bishops in a difficult spot. And neither should this disobedience be seen as permanent. The situation under...

NPR's chief executive announced the network would lay off roughly 10% of its current workforce – at least 100 people – and eliminate most vacant positions. CEO John Lansing cited the erosion of advertising dollars, particularly for NPR podcasts, and the tough financial outlook for the media industry more generally. "When we say we are eliminating filled positions, we are talking about our colleagues - people whose skills, spirit and talents help make NPR what it is today," Lansing wrote in a memo to staff today. "This will be a major loss."

If a person is really a danger to himself or others, confiscating guns isn’t much of a solution. There are so many other ways for disturbed people to cause harm. But advocates of “red flag” laws want people to believe that simply taking away someone’s legally-owned guns means the problem is solved. Last week, the Biden administration announced it was using part of the $1.8 trillion massive spending bill passed after last year’s election to give $231 million to states that enact red-flag laws and push other gun-control policies. After last week’s mass public shooting at Michigan State University, gun-control...

A 57-year-old flying instructor died from a heart attack after joining a pilot on a flight in a 1978 Piper PA-28-161 plane in England. A flight instructor died after suffering a heart attack mid-flight over England last summer — but the pilot thought his colleague was just pretending to be asleep as a joke.. The unsuspecting aviator continued the flight in a 1978 Piper PA-28-161, with the instructor’s head slumped over his shoulder, and landed safely at Blackpool Airport in Lancashire on June 29. It was not until the pilot tried to get the instructor up that he realized the...

President Biden appeared to trip and fall Wednesday while he was climbing the steps to board Air Force One in Warsaw, Poland, according to video of the incident. The video shows Biden falling near the top of the staircase on the airport tarmac before catching himself, turning to wave and entering the aircraft. It remains unclear what might have caused Biden to trip on the steps.

Natalie Boyce was a “fit and healthy” student who dreamt of travelling the world and buying her own home. The 21-year-old from Rowville in Melbourne’s southeast — a competitive netball player and hardworking student in her fourth year of law and commerce at Deakin University — would have turned 22 on Monday. Nearly one year ago, on March 27, 2022 — her late grandmother’s birthday — Natalie died of heart failure at The Alfred Hospital, six weeks after receiving a booster dose of the Moderna vaccine. “You’ll never be the same,” her mother Deborah Hamilton, 52, told news.com.au. “No parent...

Biden fell on the stairs when leaving Poland.

China's top diplomat has hailed his country's strong friendship with Russia as concerns remain over what role Beijing could play in the war in Ukraine. Wang Yi was on a visit to Russia when he said the countries will reach a “new consensus" on advancing their relationship. He said: “Today I am willing to further exchange views with you, my old friend, on the advancement of our mutual relationship, and I think we will definitely reach new consensus. “No matter how the international situation changes, China has been and remains willing to maintain the positive trend with Russia in building...

President Biden’s approval rating has hit its highest point in almost a year, according to a new NPR-PBS NewsHour-Marist poll, rising to 46 percent. Biden’s approval rating following his second State of the Union address is the highest it has been since March 2022, the poll released Wednesday found. He saw improvement among respondents across the political spectrum, with his approval among Democrats rising from 85 percent in January to 88 percent and his approval among independents rising from 32 percent to 36 percent. His approval rating among Republicans also ticked up from 13 percent last month to 15 percent...

A few days ago, on several internet news sites, a bone-chilling claim appeared: The U.S. is looking to the Ukraine war to shape its planning for the coming conflict with China over Taiwan. This is completely wrong because there is no connection between events in Ukraine and a possible Chinese assault on Taiwan. The comparison between current events in Ukraine and possible future events in Taiwan has been common practically since the Ukraine conflict began. On May 19, 2022, Politico wrote that “U.S. officials are pushing their Taiwanese counterparts with new urgency to look to Ukraine’s success in fending off...

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) will reportedly enjoy a taxpayer-funded safari with five Senate Democrats during a trip in Africa, which includes the nations of Zambia, South Africa, Botswana, and Morocco. The excursion appears to be under the guise of conducting “fact finding missions, focused on the fight against HIV/AIDS through site visits, meetings/briefings, and informal substantive meals designed to provide a frontline look at the impact of US Government investments in PEPFAR [U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief],” according to an itinerary obtained by Punchbowl News. Graham will be joined by five high-profile Democrat senators: Sens. Bob Menendez (D-NJ),...

The mainstream media coverage concerning President Biden’s remarks about Social Security during his State of the Union address and the Republican reaction has been remarkable in its ability to miss the point. Pundits sparred over whether the Republicans or Democrats won, when the real story is who lost in this sideshow. After all, it is the average, hard-working American who has paid into and therefore deserves Social Security. Unfortunately, everyday Americans who need to know whether or not they can rely on the trust fund received no worthy news coverage, and likely won’t for the next decade. During his speech,...

Former Vice President Mike Pence said Wednesday on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” that Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) had not acted as he would have a “conservative limited-government Republican.” Host Andrew Ross Sorkin said, “What do you think of DeSantis did with Disney in Florida? There’s two ways to look at it. One is to say Disney spoke out on a political or social issue, but then clearly, there was retribution political against them. I think it’s empirical what happened. He said as much when he did it. So people talk about cancel culture. Some people say, well, you know, they’re canceling...

KY KL BOLKBZ YE VE O HEQ ZKXPY YPOR YE BFSWOKR UPJ JEG VKVR’Y. —DOZYKR TOR QGZBR

The Washington Post provides another of those lame flattering portraits of the Ukrainian president Vladimir Zelinski:A year in the trenches has hardened Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky came into office thinking peace with Putin was possible. He now believes victory is the only answer.The piece is contradicting itself in certain manners but it also provides new evidence that the U.S. had set out to sabotage the Minsk agreement.The headline is of course wrong. Zelenski has not been in the trenches but continued his pampered life near a bunker in Kiev. It is not Zelenski's 'hardening' that prevents peace negotiations with Russia...

Before the midterms were over, former President Donald Trump had announced his bid for the Presidency in 2024 on the Republican ticket. As 2023 began, this month South Carolinian Nikki Haley announced that her hat is sailing into the ring. Speculation as to others who will soon announce intentions in the Republican primary includes another South Carolinian, Tim Scott, as well as Ron DeSantis, Mike Pence, Ted Cruz, Kristi Noem, Greg Abbott, and a host of others from around the nation. There is no shortage of eager Republican candidates in the primary, but former President Donald Trump and Nikki Haley...

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot (D) expressed disappointment that "the decision of homeless people to squat in the cozy confines of O'Hare Airport comes at an especially bad time for me. Unfortunately, the squatting is literal. Though the airport has plenty of restroom facilities a distressingly large portion of those camping inside the airport can't make the effort to hold it until they get to a restroom." A possible contributing factor for not using the restrooms is that in 55 Chicago schools not a single student is proficient in reading. Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, blamed the...

French newspaper Sud Ouest said the attacker entered the classroom while the teacher was giving a Spanish class and attacked her. The teacher was in her 50s and died of cardiac arrest after emergency services arrived at the school, local media reported. French TV station BFM said the attacker locked the classroom door and stabbed the teacher in her chest. Local media reported the student may have been suffering from mental health issues. They said at this stage of the investigation there was no suggestion the incident was terror-related. The school is a private, Catholic establishment near the centre of...

Alabama Representative Barry Moore, a staunch gun-rights supporter, is proposing that the AR-15 rifle should be the "National Gun of America." On Tuesday, Alabama Representative Barry Moore announced a bill that would make the AR-15 the "National Gun of America." "The #SecondAmendment is as American a right as freedom of speech, religion, & the press," Moore wrote on Twitter Tuesday evening. "Today I unveiled my bill to make the AR-15 the National Gun of America. We must send a message that we will meet every attack on any of our constitutional rights."