Free Republic

House Freedom Caucus Chairman Bob Good is pleading with Speaker Mike Johnson for help in fending off a primary challenger backed by Good's colleagues. Wow. That's embarrassing. Virginia Republican Bob Good is a second-term Congressman who was elected Freedom Caucus chairman in January 2024. He's facing a very tough primary challenge from state Senator John McGuire of Goochland County. Some of Good's colleagues, miffed by his role in the defenestration of Kevin McCarthy, are campaigning in Good's district for his opponent.

Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. issued a statement on the January 6 prosecutions Friday, saying that while violent rioters deserved to be punished, many prosecutions of non-violent protesters were excessive. Kennedy’s statement undercuts the Democratic Party’s effort to portray the 2024 election as a “defense of democracy” and a referendum on the so-called “insurrection,” which Democrats blame on former President Donald Trump. Kennedy’s statement reads as follows: January 6 is one of the most polarizing topics on the political landscape. I am listening to people of diverse viewpoints on it in order to make sense of the event...

Hillary Clinton was branded a 'super predator' while husband Bill was called a 'piece of s**t' during an ambush by pro-Palestine protesters in New York City. The Clintons were accused of 'facilitating genocide' by the demonstrators who hurled abuse at the couple as they exited a Biden fundraiser on Wednesday. Hillary was leaving the Music Box Theater where she and her husband were watching a preview of the show 'Suffs' for which she is a producer. She and fellow host Hamilton writer Lin-Manuel Miranda used the occasion to stump for Biden. But the Clintons were met by a hostile crowd...

As Russia steps up airstrikes and once again advances on the battlefield in Ukraine more than two years into its bloody invasion, there is no end to the fighting in sight. And President Volodymyr Zelensky’s options for what to do next — much less how to win the war — range from bad to worse. Zelensky has said Ukraine will accept nothing less than the return of all its territory, including land that Russia has controlled since 2014. But with the battle lines changing little in the last year, militarily retaking the swaths of east and south Ukraine that Russia...

A serial fraudster who murdered her friend by lacing her water with eyedrops to steal everything she owned sobbed as she was jailed by a merciless judge. Jessy Kurczewski, 39, wept as she read a self-indulgent two-hour statement to the Waukesha County Circuit Court on Friday maintaining her innocence. Her tears failed to move Judge Jennifer Dorow, who deliberately tallied up the sentences so she would stay behind bars until she was at least 80. Kurczewski murdered Lynn Hernan, 62, by handing her a bottle of water with a fatal dose of six vials of tetrahydrozoline, the main ingredient in...

Key Statistics: • There have been 196 accidental deaths related to firearms so far in 2023. • Accidental shooting deaths have declined from 1,491 per year (1979-1998) to an average of 606 (1999-2023). • 728 accidental shootings (including injuries or death) occur on average yearly. • 1% of all firearm-related deaths in 2022 were unintentional. • Individuals aged 14-30 are consistently more likely to die of accidental shootings than any other age group.

A federal judge scolded the Justice Department on Friday for refusing to allow attorneys involved in the Hunter Biden investigation to comply with subpoenas issued by House Republicans. The House Judiciary Committee filed a lawsuit last month in the federal District Court in Washington seeking to force DOJ lawyers Mark Daly and Jack Morgan to provide testimony as part of the panel’s impeachment inquiry into President Biden. The GOP-led panel co-leading the impeachment probe related to the 81-year-old president’s alleged involvement in his family’s business dealings claims the DOJ has “thwarted” efforts by the committee to get depositions from the...

Waitstaff declined to serve Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert more drinks During the New York Young Republican Club’s annual gala in December, attendees have claimed. Three months after her theatre scandal, Boebert, 37, was seen repeatedly trying to take selfies with Trump at their shared table at the New York Young Republican Club’s annual gala in Manhattan, at Cipriani Wall Street. The alleged outbursts, multiple witnesses claimed, prompted Trump's security to intervene, requesting she desist. Still, the GOP frontrunner issued a glowing endorsement for the firebrand this past month - as a series of consecutive scandals threatens to upend her congressional...

The Social Security Administration (SSA) is capping clawbacks of benefit overpayments at 10% of benefits checks instead of 100% after being criticized for draconian repayment plans that left some beneficiaries destitute. Social Security Commissioner Martin O'Malley said in a statement that the agency would cease "the heavy-handed practice of intercepting 100% of an overpaid beneficiary's monthly Social Security benefit" if they failed to respond to a demand for repayment. Additionally, the Social Security Administration will extend repayment plans to 60 months, up from its limit of 36 months, giving recipients an additional two years to repay the money. The changes...

Japan appears to be transitioning from a homogenous society to embrace ‘diversity and inclusivity’ by ushering in “an era of mass foreign immigration.”It’s set to be a massive change for a country that was still up until recently 97.5% ethnic Japanese, according to the CIA World Factbook.A Bloomberg report details how rapidly declining native birth rates, an aging society and a chronic labor shortage is fueling the importation of millions of foreigners who “are changing the face of Japan.”The number of foreign workers in Japan has now exceeded 2 million, a 12.4% increase on 2022. The East Asian country needs...

Liberals are mounting a pressure campaign to force liberal Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor to retire from the bench so President Joe Biden, who faces a tough reelection fight in November, can appoint a younger liberal successor before the election.Democrats fear that the 6–3 conservative majority on the nation’s highest court could become a 7–2 conservative majority if President Donald Trump wins the election in November and she dies during his second term of office.They point out that President Trump was able to replace liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died of pancreatic cancer complications on Sept. 18, 2020, at...

American forces have been placed on "high alert" as of Friday, in anticipation of a possible attack by Iranian forces on either U.S. or Israeli assets in the Middle East. The attack, if it happens, is expected to come as soon as next week.Senior US officials currently believe that an attack by Iran is “inevitable” – a view shared by their Israeli counterparts, that official said. The two governments are furiously working to get in position ahead of what is to come, as they anticipate that Iran’s attack could unfold in a number of different ways – and that both...

MRI of the prostate, combined with a blood test, can help determine if a prostate lesion is clinically significant cancer, research suggests A new meta-analysis suggests doctors and patients can avoid unnecessary prostate biopsies by combining MRI of the prostate findings with prostate-specific antigen (PSA) density. To doctors, clinically significant prostate cancer (csPCa) is prostate cancer that has a high chance of threatening a patient's life. MRI of the prostate can provide some of this information. Still, a biopsy is traditionally needed to determine how aggressive the cancer cells look. This study tested a new approach: combining MRI-based prostate imaging...

An Indiana court has ruled that the state's abortion ban violates the religious freedom of several Jews and religiously unaffiliated people who might seek abortions as the law's supporters remain confident it will withstand scrutiny from the Indiana Supreme Court. Indiana Court of Appeals Judge Leanna Weismann published an opinion Thursday siding with five anonymous plaintiffs and the group Hoosier Jews for Choice. The plaintiffs asserted that the state's 2022 law prohibiting almost all abortions with exceptions in cases of a fetal anomaly or where the life or health of the mother is at risk violated the state's Religious Freedom...

Consistently exercising 2–3 times a week over the long term is linked to a lower current risk of insomnia as well as the ability to clock up the recommended 6–9 hours of shut-eye every night, suggests an international 10-year study. The researchers assessed the frequency, duration, and intensity of weekly physical activity and symptoms of insomnia, nightly sleep clocked up, and daytime sleepiness among middle-aged adults. The 4,399 study participants (2,085 men; 2,254 women) were drawn from the European Community Respiratory Health Survey. They had answered questions on the frequency and duration of physical activity at baseline (ECRHS II;1998–2002) and...

A century ago today, a Polish army major had 35 Jews executed in Pinsk. After the devastation of World War I, Poland and now-Soviet Russia fell into war in early 1919 over the oft-trod lands between them. In late March of that year — still the opening weeks of the conflict — the Polish 34th Infantry Regiment commanded by Major Aleksander Narbut-Luczynski captured the town of Pinsk which today lies just on the Belarus side of the Belarus-Ukraine border. This town had seen occupying armies cross it to and fro during the recent bloody years: Germany captured it from Russia...

For people living with serious mental illnesses like schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, standard treatment with antipsychotic medications can be a double-edged sword. Now, a pilot study has found that a ketogenic diet not only restores metabolic health in these patients as they continue their medications but it further improves their psychiatric conditions. Sethi remembers when she saw a patient with treatment-resistant schizophrenia whose auditory hallucinations quieted on a ketogenic diet. In the four-month pilot trial, Sethi's team followed 21 adult participants who were diagnosed with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, taking antipsychotic medications, and had a metabolic abnormality—such as weight gain,...

A drug used to treat diabetes slowed the progression of motor issues associated with Parkinson's disease, a study said. Researchers have been interested in exploring a class of drugs called GLP-1 receptor agonists—which mimic a gut hormone and are commonly used to treat diabetes and obesity—for their potential to protect neurons. In the new paper, 156 patients with early-stage Parkinson's were recruited across France and then randomly chosen to receive either lixisenatide, which is sold under the brand names Adlyxin and Lyxumia and made by Sanofi, or a placebo. After one year of follow up, the group on the treatment,...

When Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed that he had a “good” talk with President Joe Biden on Thursday, he was hiding a bombshell. It soon emerged that Biden’s words to Netanyahu were harsh and uncompromising. Biden demanded that Israel address the humanitarian situation in Gaza immediately, that it takes concrete steps to protect civilians and aid workers and that it reaches a ceasefire deal with Hamas. This was an ultimatum. Biden threatened to reassess American policy towards the war in Gaza if Netanyahu does not comply immediately. In other words, he refused to guarantee that the strong support he...

The Biden administration is bracing for a second Trump term by rolling out a rule that would complicate Donald Trump’s pledge to fire tens of thousands of federal workers if he wins in November. The new rule is also a huge gift to the public-sector unions that Joe Biden needs firmly in his corner.The latest edict, issued by the US Office of Personnel Management, is an almost direct response to Trump’s stated plans to purge the bureaucracy. That’s not how the OPM is framing it, of course; instead, OPM deputy director Rob Shriver said it “is about making sure the...