Free Republic

The Department of Justice is shelling out more than $6 billion to private companies to manage its asset forfeiture investigations, raising alarm from one nonprofit law firm that accuses police of "treating ordinary Americans like ATMs" and seizing their cash. "You've probably heard the adage, 'You've gotta spend money to make money.' Here, it's 'You've gotta spend money to take money,'" said Dan Alban, head of the Institute for Justice's National Initiative to End Forfeiture.

Update from Ukraine | Ruzzia runs out from Urozhayne | Ukraine broke their Defence https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=In_npgo8SZQ The summary of the situation of Russian re-invasion to Ukraine covering the last 48 hours, as of 9th August 2023 – 22:00 (Kyiv time). https://militaryland.net/news/invasion-day-532-summary/ *** Great interactive maps with viewer controlled Map magnification tool to use for each Front! https://militaryland.net/maps/

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., joins ‘Mornings with Maria’ to discuss the latest news emerging from the GOP’s probe into the Biden family’s suspicious business dealings. (He also discusses Covid misinformation, world banking, WEF, etc) "this is all pre-planned by an elite group of people .,snip.. for our loss of freedom"

A Catholic couple is suing Massachusetts state officials after allegedly being told they were unable to foster children due to their religious beliefs about marriage and sexuality, according to court documents. Mike and Catherine “Kitty” Burke went through the process to get certified to begin fostering children in 2022, but were reportedly deemed unfit by the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families (DCF) after a series of home visits, according to court documents. The couple filed a lawsuit Tuesday with the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, arguing that the state was deliberately discriminating against them because of their faith. “After...

A Texas school superintendent sent lewd photos to an undercover officer posing online as a 15-year-old girl he planned to meet with, authorities said. Michael Keith Stevens, 47, superintendent of the Itasca Independent School District, was arrested Thursday and accused of online solicitation of a minor, according to court records. Itasca Independent School District is about 55 miles south of Dallas. (snip) Stevens was one of seven people arrested after an undercover operation with more than a dozen local law enforcement agencies. Officers posed as teens ages 13, 14 and 15 and communicated online, Harris County Precinct 1 Constable...

CHICAGO (WLS) -- Teenagers used electric scooters to carry out two armed robberies on Chicago's Northwest Side, police said. Police said the robberies happened on Aug. 3 just before 5 p.m. and on Aug. 6 just before 8 p.m. in the city's Humboldt Park neighborhood. The alleged robbers, a boy and a girl, appeared to be between 12 and 17 years old and were armed with a handgun, police said. In each robbery, the pair rode on lime green and white Lime brand electric scooters to approach the victims. Police said the teens have taken a vehicle and work tools...

A woman videotaped savagely beating up a female taco vendor in Los Angeles — and then fleeing in a purple Lexus without paying for her food — has been arrested. Renee Hines, 36, from Bakersfield, was busted Wednesday and booked into the Los Angeles County jail on a charge of assault with a deadly weapon in connection with Sunday’s violent attack, the Los Angeles Police Department announced in a press release. On top of her legal troubles, Hines also was fired from her job as a temporary contractor after her employer learned of the viral video. Cops said Hines...

U.S. ARMED FORCES PLANNERS AT WAR WITH CHRISTIANITY AND THE CHRISTIAN FAMILY. EVERY YEAR Congress debates and passes a NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT. About every year since (I believe) 1994, a provision to require women to register for Selective Service (i.e., register of the military draft, as men are required to do) finds its way in as a provision of the bill. What you as an individual think about women being required to register for Selective Service, and what you think about women in general serving in the Armed Forces, has very much to do with what you believe about...

Recently some liberals became incensed at the actor Woody Harrelson. His offense was being photographed wearing a campaign hat for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. while posing with Kennedy's wife, actress Cheryl Hines. Left-wing Twitter soon became very angry, with one user declaring Harrelson "dead to me." An early comment on Hines's Instagram page explained the reason for the anger. "You might as well be wearing a MAGA hat," it said, "because that's who a Kennedy campaign will elect." In recent weeks, many Democrats have coalesced around the idea that support for Kennedy would equal support for former President Donald Trump,...

Is the state of emergency over yet? I mean, it’s been a couple of days now since the governor and lieutenant governor of Massachusetts asked their big-hearted Democrat constituents to step up and offer free room and board in their gated communities to the teeming hordes of Third World criminals yearning to live, er, breathe free. Surely the crisis has passed. Every trust-funder in the Bay State surely must be stepping up to the plate, because we’ve all seen the yard signs outside their $5 million mansions. “Hate Has No Home Here.” Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll may have put it...

Quotes and Facts on Iraq http://www.freedomagenda.com/iraq/wmd_quotes.html excerpt: “In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including Al Qaeda members... It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons. Should he succeed in that endeavor, he could alter the political and security landscape of the Middle...

CNN anchor Jake Tapper said Friday on “CNN News Central” that Republicans had “legitimate questions” about Attorney General Merrick Garland’s decision to appoint David and Weiss as special counsel to investigate Hunter Biden. Tapper said, “I think there are some legitimate questions about this whole situation. First of all, I do think it’s fair to question why would U.S. Attorney Weiss be appointed to special counsel. Usually, a special counsel comes– is an outside attorney. Now, it has happened before, Durham came from inside, and the attorney general has the right to do that, but it is odd.”

The problem is that conditions are worsening in Washington.

On Friday’s broadcast of CNN’s “Situation Room,” CNN Senior Political Analyst Gloria Borger said that while Republicans didn’t like the plea deal U.S. Attorney David Weiss attempted to reach with President Joe Biden’s son Hunter earlier in the year, “I don’t really understand what it is they’re complaining about” with Weiss being named as special counsel in the Hunter Biden case by Attorney General Merrick Garland earlier in the day, “since they’re getting what they want.” And they “just want to complain.”

These UNTRUTHs are epically at odds with the spirit of the candidate’s platform and cry out for correction. (LifeSiteNews) — The GOP presidential hopeful who kicked off his campaign with a declaration of 10 foundational TRUTHs beginning with “God is real” recently strayed from truth when he declared that homosexuality is “hardwired” at birth and that the burgeoning number of transgendered individuals are folks who are “really just gay.” The claims were made by candidate Vivek Ramaswamy during a recent “All-In Podcast.” “The gay rights movement was predicated on the idea, which I’m quite sympathetic to, that the sex of...

Who would you trust more in a high-stress, high-stakes military excursion? A trained human soldier with the limitations of hunger, thirst, lack of sleep, and emotion—or a soulless, autonomous artificial intelligence system acting according to its programming? That’s a question militaries around the world—including the US military—are already facing as AI quickly advances into every industry. But the big question is this: who gets to do the programming? So what exactly is autonomous AI when it comes to the military? Well, according to a Christian Post article, the Congressional Research Service states these are: a special class of weapon systems...

Kremlin propagandist Vladimir Solovyov has demanded that the Russian Central Bank explain why the ruble is crashing. Solovyov, one of the most well-known figures in Kremlin-backed media, made the remarks on his show that airs on Russia-1—an excerpt of which was shared on X, formerly Twitter, by Francis Scarr from BBC Monitoring. His heated comments came after the ruble slumped toward 100 per dollar on Wednesday, its weakest level in 16 months. The Bank of Russia later announced that it would halt purchases of foreign currency on the domestic market for the rest of the year. "The bloody Central Bank,...

John Zmirak: You’ve co-authored a meticulously researched, fact-packed book with Daniel Horowitz, Rise of the Fourth Reich, about the public health dictatorship that was foisted on the public across the world on the pretext of the COVID panic. Are you overheating the rhetoric a little by invoking the Nazi precedent? Not at all. As we thoroughly explain in the introduction, both of us are actually pretty hesitant to make Nazi comparisons historically. However, the parallels here are just too stark to ignore, right down to weaponizing public health under the guise of “science” for the purposes of establishing unprecedented government...

The Great Recession was largely the consequence of too much household debt. The next recession will probably be viewed as the offshoot of excessive US government indebtedness. It is not beyond the realm of a possibility that the nearly $1 trillion of US government borrowing expected for the current quarter may push Treasury bond yields up to heights that roil financial markets and curb private-sector spending. If the “crowding out effect” were to return, the political opposition to increased federal spending and more regulations will be mighty enough to force Washington into reversing course. Could it be that whoever is...

Though it may not seem that way at times, reporters are human beings and as human beings we can on occasion make a mistake. Typically, after a story has run, if there is a possible error a call or email arrives from the offended party saying “such and such is wrong – fix it now!” Sometimes, these requests are correct – on the minor side they involve typos or misspellings or mis-identifiers – writing “assistant director of the department of departments” instead of “deputy assistant director of the department of departments” – that sort of thing