Free Republic

Rep. Bob Good (R-VA) introduced legislation Tuesday designed to end the FBI and ATF coordinating with local enforcement to carry out “no knock raids” on gun owners. A press release, which Breitbart News possesses, made clear that Good is concerned that the ATF’s recent AR pistol stabilizer brace rule could “open the door for increased coordination between the ATF and local agents to perform no-knock warrants on law-abiding gun owners.” The Federal Agent Responsibility Act is intended to prevent such raids. Good said, “The Biden Administration continues to weaponize every part of the executive branch to infringe on the rights...

Japan's factory activity shrank in February at the fastest pace in over two years, a private survey showed, highlighting companies' struggles amid a global economic slowdown, raw material inflation and policymakers' calls for higher wages. The final au Jibun Bank Japan Manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index released on Wednesday fell to 47.7 in February from January's 48.9. Although higher than the flash reading, it marked the fastest decline since September 2020. "Both new orders and production levels, which make up 55 per cent of the headline PMI figure, fell at the fastest pace since July 2020 as weak domestic demand and...

UPDATE: Chicago Mayoral Election: Paul Vallas: 134,844 Brandon Johnson: 74,992 Lori Lightfoot: 58,807 73 % in.

NFL Films, the official production arm of the National Football League, was flagged for keeping an extensive database of raunchy footage that lingered on cheerleaders’ breasts and buttocks, according to a bombshell lawsuit. Victoria Russell, a human resources employee fired by NFL Films last year, revealed the “sexualized and offensive descriptions of women” in a discrimination lawsuit against the NFL in New Jersey in January, The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.

BERLIN — Nearly a month after Berlin gave European allies permission to send German-made tanks to Ukraine, the flow of tanks so many leaders vowed would follow seems more like a trickle.Some nations have discovered that the tanks in their armory don’t actually work or lack spare parts. Political leaders have encountered unanticipated resistance within their own coalitions, and even from their defense ministries. And some armies had to pull trainers out of retirement to teach Ukrainian soldiers how to use old-model tanks.The struggle to provide Leopard tanks to an embattled Ukraine is just the most glaring manifestation of a...

The Biden administration is reportedly worried a 2008 spy law permitting warrantless wiretaps will not be renewed by Congress, as lawmakers on both the left and right have expressed privacy concerns. With the law set to expire at the end of 2023, the administration “is so worried” about renewing the legislation that “it has begun the push to lobby for reauthorization 10 months before the law sunsets,” the Washington Post reported. “Its value cannot be overstated,” Assistant Attorney General Matthew Olsen said Tuesday at the Brookings Institution. “Without 702, we will lose indispensable intelligence for our decision-makers and warfighters, as...

FBI Director Christopher Wray joined "Special Report" for a wide-ranging interview as the bureau continues to receive a bevy of criticism over its handling of several situations – including the Hunter Biden laptop investigation, classification of issues at school board meetings and the raid on Mar-a-Lago. Wray defended the agency and the way its agents conduct investigations in an "independent" manner. Anchor Bret Baier asked Wray about the FBI's reputation being at a record low, to which the director said the bureau's successful recruiting should help disprove any perceived shortcomings. "There are all sorts of opinions out there about the...

Question: What's the connection between the Muslim call to prayer and Fred Astaire? Answer: Night and Day You are the one Only you beneath the moon and under the sun... Well, that's the way Cole Porter told it, some of the time: His biggest hit was supposedly inspired by hearing the muezzin summon the faithful in Morocco during one of Cole's Mediterranean wanderings. If so, it must rank as Islam's greatest contribution to American popular music (along with "What Is This Thing Called Love?"). Morocco-wise, it seems more attuned to the country's nocturnal near namesake in Manhattan: "The crowds at...

Giants legend Buster Posey’s tired shtick about politics dates back years. In 2017, as Donald Trump’s racist comments and policies roiled the sports world, Posey said that the real problem was partisanship: “When you disagree to the point it becomes irrational on both sides, that’s when you get stuck.”

The Japanese government plans to criminalize sex with children under age 16 by raising the legal age of consent from 13, part of the country's Penal Code reforms, which critics say are long overdue and urgently needed to protect vulnerable minors from sexual offenses. The recommendations the Justice Ministry's Legislative Council submitted to Justice Minister Ken Saito on Friday include making the secret filming of someone's genitals or underwear and sharing such images an offense punishable under the Penal Code. Makoto Ida (R), chairman of the Legislative Council, submits proposed revisions to the Penal Code to Justice Minister Ken Saito...

DEFENCE AND SECURITY, ECONOMY, MEDIA, POLITICS, WORLD Ukraine: Is it almost over? By Scott Burchill Mar 1, 2023 Joint press conference President Biden and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy December 21, 2022 Despite celebrating 12 months of surviving the Russian onslaught, promises of more money and military equipment (including tanks) from the West, and a chorus of support for the courage and resilience of the people, the war appears almost over for Ukraine. There are four reasons for thinking this. First, as the Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal explains, public rhetoric [about Ukraine’s heroic resistance] masks deepening private doubts among politicians in the...

FBI Director Christopher Wray said the COVID-19 pandemic was likely caused by a lab leak in Wuhan, China. "The FBI has for quite some time now assessed that the origins of the pandemic are most likely a potential lab incident in Wuhan," Wray told Fox News in an interview that aired Tuesday. "Here you are talking about a potential leak from a Chinese government-controlled lab." "I will just make the observation that the Chinese government, it seems to me, has been doing its best to try to thwart and obfuscate the work here, the work that we're doing, the work...

The family of a Saskatchewan man who suffered a stroke in Arizona says he racked up hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills after his insurance company denied coverage. According to his granddaughter Rebecca Fee, Louis Lamothe had a "massive stroke" on Feb. 3 in Yuma, Arizona where he spends winters with his wife. The stroke left him paralyzed on one side, and unable to speak and swallow. While Lamothe had taken out travel insurance, Fee said her family was devastated to learn he wouldn't be covered. "We had no words we just sat in the hallway and cried,"...

Snow drifting all the way to the top of the powerlines, haven't seen this since I was a kid.

The Chinese government — which has defied efforts by international inspectors to​ examine labs in the country or share detailed information about COVID-19 — still claimed on Tuesday that it has been “open and transparent” in the search to determine how the global pandemic originated. ​​ China had “shared the most data and research results on virus tracing and made important contributions to global virus tracing research,” Foreign Ministry spokes​woman Mao Ning Mao ​told reporters after the US Energy Department assessed the coronavirus leaked from a lab in the city of Wuhan. M​ao went on to demand the US answer...

Pro-LGBT Fr. James Martin calls for DeSantis to be denied Communion for supporting death penaltyThe dissident priest made his comments after a man convicted of murders in two separate incidents was put to death in Florida last week. Heretical pro-LGBT Jesuit priest Fr. James Martin has called for conservative Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is Catholic, to be denied Communion because he supports the death penalty.Last week, the Republican governor signed the death warrant for a convict on charges of a second murder committed after the man escaped from a life sentence imposed for his first murder.In response to the...

An engineer who designed a bridge that collapsed hours after opening in rural Saskatchewan in 2018 is prohibited from practicing for now. The Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Saskatchewan’s (APEGS) discipline committee panel sent Scott O. Gullacher an interim order outlining the stipulations on Jan. 24, 2023. Gullacher was found guilty on three counts of professional misconduct, with one count relating to a formal complaint on the Dyck Memorial Bridge in the R.M. of Clayton, Sask. which collapsed hours after opening on Sept. 14, 2018. He was found to not have practiced in a careful and diligent manner...

Is fasting the future?The concept of intermittent fasting may seem scary at first. Going many hours without food? Not even a snack to tide you over? Whether you refer to it as time-restricted eating or IF, the practice of going for a block of time without sustenance — and doing that on a consistent basis for at least a few weeks — has inspired numerous researchers to investigate one big question: Does it really improve your health? According to a number of studies, the answer seems to be yes. Although more research is needed to pin down all the physiological...

Adidas could be forced to burn Yeezy sneakers worth around half-a-billion dollars after rapper and fashion designer Kanye West's anti-Semitic outbursts. The sportswear brand is struggling over what to do with its massive stockpile of the shoes, which retail for between $200 and $600 Analysts now say Adidas, which has already said the debacle hit revenues by $1.3bn, could be forced to burn the stock - because it risks a PR nightmare if they are still sold at a discount. The company's decision to drop West capped the rapper's fall from grace after a pattern of increasingly erratic behavior and...

A very white outdoor culture... that white supremacy “obstructs access to nature.”