Free Republic

Taxpayer-funded National Public Radio (NPR) on Wednesday announced the decision to quit Twitter after being transparently labeled “state-affiliated media.” NPR, whose budget is subsidized nearly 11 percent by taxpayer funds, declared it will step away from the social media platform to protect journalism. NPR’s media personalities will (so far) remain with personal accounts. “We are not putting our journalism on platforms that have demonstrated an interest in undermining our credibility and the public’s understanding of our editorial independence,” NPR’s CEO John Lansing said in a statement. When questioned if NPR would ever return to the platform, Lansing cast doubt on...

The mother of a teen who died of a suspected fentanyl overdose at a Hollywood high school will speak in Sacramento this week in support of a bill named after her daughter that aims to help prevent overdoses on campuses. Melanie Ramos, 15, died last September of a suspected fentanyl overdose at Bernstein High School.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s urgent request to enter a restraining order against Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) was rejected on April 11, the same day it was filed. U.S. District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil, a Trump appointee, turned down Bragg’s emergency request for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction against Jordan. “The Court declines to enter the proposed Temporary Restraining Order and Order to Show Cause,” Vyskocil said, noting that she had not yet received several documents that were referenced in Bragg’s filings. She ordered Jordan and other defendants in the case to respond to the lawsuit and scheduled...

A large explosion and fire broke out at South Fork Dairy in Dimmitt, Texas on Monday night. The cause is still unknown. Reports say the explosion engulfed multiple structures. The smoke from the explosion could be seen from as much as 80 miles away. According to Texas authorities, more than 18,000 cattle died during the explosion. “There’s some that survived, there’s some that are probably injured to the point where they’ll have to be destroyed,” according to Castro County Sheriff Sal Rivera.

Joe Biden’s cousin Joe Blewitt from Mayo said the family is “thrilled” that the US President has finally confirmed he will be coming “home” to Mayo next week. Mr Blewitt said that even the weather seems to have improved since the news broke as the rain went away on Wednesday morning. Mr Blewitt is just back from the White House where he celebrated St Patrick’s Day with the President and spent a week in Washington. He said that “the whole place is buzzing” in Ballina, where President Biden is expected to visit and make a public address next Friday. Speaking...

The number of dairy cows killed Monday by smoke and fire has not yet been confirmed by officials, but early estimates number in the thousands One person is in critical condition and thousands of cows are believed to have been killed in an explosion and fire at a dairy farm in the Texas Panhandle Monday night. The explosion happened at the Southfork Dairy Farm in Dimmitt at about 7:30 p.m. According to KCBD-TV in Lubbock, a worker was trapped inside the milking facility and was hospitalized in critical condition after being rescued by first responders. No other injuries to employees...

[Catholic Caucus] Pope Cancels Latin Mass as 80% of US Catholics Skip New Mass EVERY SundayPope Francis is not telling the truth. He claims that he must cancel the Latin Mass to preserve unity in the Church. Trouble is, eighty percent of US Catholics don't go to Mass at all anymore. In Europe, the percentage is even higher. In forcing us to "unite" with defecting mainstream Catholics, is he hoping we'll stop going to Mass, too? Plus, what about all the other 23 rites in the Church? Is Francis going to cancel them, too? What's really going on here? Why...

I have been getting a lot of questions around the US dollar in recent weeks. De-dollarization seems to be a thing, as do central bank digital currencies, along with the latest round of worries about what the government is going to do to our savings. There is much to talk about, but the root of most of these questions is this: the notion that sometime soon the value of the dollar will collapse, making our savings valueless. Simply put, that collapse can’t happen in the short to medium term, for reasons we will discuss. Once we realize that, it will...

Former President Donald Trump’s national lead over his nearest rival has surged from an impressive 11 points in January to a gargantuan 33 points despite a wave of bad news for him and President Joe Biden’s stepped-up attacks on the MAGA base. The latest Morning Consult survey has Republican primary voter support at 56%, up from 52% last month and 45% in January when the widely respected pollster first started testing the 2024 campaign and potential candidacy of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. The popular governor, meanwhile, has seen his support shrink from 34% to 23%, though he remains the only...

There’s no sugarcoating the fact last week’s Wisconsin Supreme Court election was a complete disaster for Republicans. In one of the nation’s most hotly-contested battleground states, Republican Daniel Kelly lost to Democrat Janet Protasiewicz by 11 points, meaning Democrats will now control the state’s highest court for the first time in 15 years. With cases regarding abortion, election integrity, and governmental overreach likely to be heard before the court in the coming years, Protasiewicz’s win is devastating for conservatives in the Badger State. Given the high-stakes nature of the election, one would expect prominent conservatives to be raising the alarm...

Twitter owner Elon Musk took the leftist U.K.-based BBC to the woodshed when the latter accused the platform of being plagued by a rise of so-called “hate speech.” BBC North America technology reporter James Clayton bemoaned how there’s “not enough people to police” the left’s hate speech bogeyman through censorship on Twitter during an Apr. 11 Twitter Spaces interview with Musk. Musk wasn’t having any of Clayton’s virtue-signaling about the vague “hate speech” concept and pressed him to be more specific. “What hate speech are you talking about,” Musk asked. “Do you see a rise in hate speech,” Musk continued....

Donald Trump Jr. warned during an appearance on the Full Send podcast that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) could face the same weaponization as former President Donald Trump down the road, contending that it is easy to disassociate yourself from that reality when big donors are using you to take down Trump.Donald Trump Jr. first noted DeSantis’s “flip flop” on Ukraine as a demonstration of the governor’s connections to big donors and the influence they may wield.“He tried sort of taking the Trump approach, like, maybe war bad and then, like, the donors — that’s a difference,” he said, explaining...

The Democratic National Committee on Tuesday announced that the party has decided to hold its 2024 national political convention in a city that has been ravaged by decades of one-party Democratic rule: Chicago. The Windy City has been run by Democratic mayors for 93 consecutive years. The 50-member City Council currently includes zero Republicans. The Cook County Board of Commissioners has 17 seats; 16 are filled by Democrats. So totalizing is the city's unipartisan political culture that recently vanquished mayoral finalist Paul Vallas, a lifelong Democrat, could not overcome the campaign criticism that he was a "Republican in disguise." So...

This list only includes destroyed vehicles and equipment of which photo or videographic evidence is available. Therefore, the amount of equipment destroyed is significantly higher than recorded here. Small arms, ATGMs, MANPADS, loitering munitions, drones used as unmanned bait, civilian vehicles, trailers and derelict equipment are not included in this list. All possible effort has gone into avoiding duplicate entries and discerning the status of equipment between captured or abandoned. Many of the entries listed as 'abandoned' will likely end up captured or destroyed. Similarly, some of the captured equipment might be destroyed if it can't be recovered. When the...

New mascot, Archie, replaces white sword yielding man, Highlander.

A Whole Foods Market, one of the largest supermarkets in downtown San Francisco closed at the end of business Monday, just over a year after the store opened, according to a new report Company officials told The Standard in a statement, “We are closing our Trinity location only for the time being. If we feel we can ensure the safety of our team members in the store, we will evaluate a reopening of our Trinity location.” A source at City Hall said that the outlet’s “flagship location” cited drug use and crime near the 64,737 square feet location as reasons...

A federal judge in Texas recently agreed with a federal judge in Oklahoma that the national ban on gun possession by cannabis consumers violates the Second Amendment. Kathleen Cardone, a judge on the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas, also concluded that the federal ban on transferring firearms to an "unlawful user" of a "controlled substance," first imposed by the Gun Control Act of 1968, is unconstitutional. The case involves Paola Connelly, who was charged with illegal possession of firearms under 18 USC 922(g)(3) after El Paso police found marijuana and guns in her home while responding...

Former President Donald Trump said Tuesday on FNC’s “Tucker Carlson Tonight” that he will not drop out of the 2024 race even if he is convicted in a New York case involving alleged hush-money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels.Host Tucker Carlson asked, “So they’re trying to prevent you from making to it the general election.”Trump said, “Yes.”Carlson continued, “By tying you up in lawsuits charging you with crimes.”Trump said, “The old Soviet process.”Carlson said, “The old Soviet process. You’ve described it as all legitimate If this goes to trial and you get convicted in the middle of a...

Another document was leaked on Tuesday from the Department of Defense. This latest release lists the number of NATO forces currently inside Ukraine including US special forces. https://sonar21.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-27.png This document, based on what you see, appears to be Unclassified. If there is a classification marking in the upper right hand corner, it is obscured. As you can see, it primarily provides a summary of the Composition & Disposition of the U.S. forces — air, maritime and soldiers — in the European theater. There are 92,000 U.S. military personnel in the European AOR (i.e., Aera of Operations), but they are not...

The U.S. Congressional Budget Office said Monday the federal government has accumulated more than a trillion dollars in debt only six months into the fiscal year. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget released a report pointing out that those figures amount to an average of $6 billion per day so far in fiscal year 2023. “Our fiscal challenges will only become more difficult the longer we wait to do anything,” said Maya MacGuineas, president of the CRFB. “In just five years, the national debt will surpass its record as a share of the economy – set just after World...