Free Republic

Explanation: It's back. The famous active region on the Sun that created auroras visible around the Earth earlier this month has survived its rotation around the far side of the Sun -- and returned. Yesterday, as it was beginning to reappear on the Earth-facing side, the region formerly labeled AR 3664 threw another major solar flare, again in the highest-energy X-class range. The featured video shows the emerging active region on the lower left, as it was captured by NASA's Earth-orbiting Solar Dynamics Observatory yesterday in ultraviolet light. The video is a time-lapse of the entire Sun rotating over 24...

From the elegant entryway, to the spectacular views, to the private beach, we’re exploring the special touches in the forever first family's gorgeous estate. When your previous homes are the White House and Camp David, there’s a lot of pressure on your next address. For their post-presidential vacation getaway, Barack and Michelle Obama chose a private, yet beautiful estate that would offer them all the luxury and security they’ve become accustomed to. According to Ebony, beginning with the Shearer Inn in 1912, the Oak Bluffs area has a long history of catering to Black vacationers. Over the years, it became...

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a new interview criticized her fellow Democrats for their response to the Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v. Wade, arguing they could have “done more.” “We didn’t take it seriously, and we didn’t understand the threat,” Clinton said in an interview with The New York Times, published Saturday. “Most Democrats, most Americans, did not realize we are in an existential struggle for the future of this country.” “We could have done more to fight,” she added. (snip) The former presidential nominee also slammed the conservative justices on the high court who handed down...

Fifty-six years ago in August 1968, Richard Nixon achieved what The New York Times called “the greatest reversal of fortune in American political history.” Times columnist James Reston went further, calling it “the greatest comeback since Lazarus.” This from a newspaper, along with The Washington Post, that hated Nixon, as they now hate Donald Trump. How did he do it and could presumptive Republican presidential nominee and former president Trump learn anything from Nixon’s seeming transformation? First, the parallels between Nixon and Trump are striking. Nixon, like Trump, believed America was in bad shape. In 1968, crime, the war in...

Israeli lawmakers on Monday advanced a government proposal to designate June 1 as a day to commemorate the Farhud, the 1941 pogrom in Iraq coordinated by Palestinian leader Haj Amin al-Hussein. The Commemoration Day for the Farhud Events Bill, sponsored by Likud Party lawmaker Ofir Katz, was approved for first reading and will be discussed by the Knesset Education, Culture and Sports Committee ahead of future votes. Katz’s bill calls for the pogrom to be commemorated in educational institutions across the Jewish state in order to preserve the memory of the events and the victims and pass it on to...

Former heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson suffered a medical emergency during a flight from Miami to Los Angeles on Sunday, according to reports. Just thirty minutes before landing, Tyson experienced nausea and dizziness, the Los Angeles Times reported. The 57-year-old boxer’s symptoms were due to an ulcer flare-up. Tryson received prompt assistance from the medical staff on board the flight. He is now reported to be stable and “doing great,” Los Angeles Times reported. “He became nauseous and dizzy due to an ulcer flare-up 30 minutes before landing,” his representatives told The New York Post. “He is appreciative to the...

Native American campaigners are raising questions about the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s first-ever curator of Native American art — claiming she does not belong to a federally recognized tribe in the US, The Post has learned. Patricia Marroquin Norby was hired with great fanfare in 2020, after what the museum said was “a long and competitive search,” as its “inaugural Associate Curator of Native American Art” in its American Wing. For years, Marroquin Norby, 53, described herself — including in legal filings — as “Apache,” “Eastern Apache” and “Nde” as well as “Purepacha/Tarascan,” an indigenous group from the northwestern part...

High purchase prices are a major barrier to the wider adoption of electric vehicles. A significant portion of this cost comes from expensive batteries. However, in recent years, automakers have been employing an advanced manufacturing technique known as gigacasting. This method helps offset the high cost of batteries, simplifies production, and reduces the weight of EVs. Nissan will follow Tesla, and several other carmakers like Toyota, Hyundai, and Ford, in adopting this technology. The brand aims to reduce the costs of EV parts by 10% and slash weight by 20%, Automotive News reported. Nissan's EVs using gigacasting are expected to...

As the migrant and refugee crisis unfolds at our border, I want to share a personal story about a formerly undocumented person: my dad. In the 1980s, my dad took a perilous 10-month journey to cross into the United States. He was arrested, detained and released multiple times and witnessed horrific incidents, including the tragic loss of human life. His successful means of entry was to jump over a fence into muddy waters. A member of his caravan had to toss a tire around him to drag him out. After crossing into the U.S., he remained undocumented and took on...

Detectives in Fontana, California, told Thomas Perez Jr. that his father was dead and that he killed him. Neither was true.The California town of Fontana will pay $900,000 to settle a federal civil rights lawsuit after police falsely accused a man of murdering his father, interrogated him for 17 hours, threatened to have his dog euthanized, and withheld medication from him, eventually leading the distraught man to give a false confession and try to commit suicide in the police station. His father was alive the whole time. The case, first reported by the San Bernardino Sun, is a particularly deranged...

An Ohio real-estate investor is planning to take a two-person submersible down to Titanic-level depths to prove that the journey can be carried out safely following the Titan sub's implosion last year. The investor, Larry Connor, told The Wall Street Journal: "I want to show people worldwide that while the ocean is extremely powerful, it can be wonderful and enjoyable and really kind of life-changing if you go about it the right way." He's working with Patrick Lahey, a cofounder and the CEO of the submersible manufacturer Triton Submarines. They aim to show that such an expedition can be carried...

Poland’s Minister of National Defense, Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz, has signed a contract with the United States for the acquisition of several hundred AGM-158 JASSM-ER air-to-ground missiles. This agreement on Tuesday marks another major procurement by the Ministry of National Defense. Just last week, Minister Kosiniak-Kamysz signed a $960 million contract for the delivery of four reconnaissance aerostats, equipped with advanced radar systems, under the “Barbara” program. “A $735 million contract is being signed today. Another multi-million-dollar contract for the purchase of JASSM-ER air-to-ground missiles, which will be in the equipment of the Polish army,” said the Minister of National Defense. “We...

Former President Donald Trump’s lawyer told jurors Tuesday they “should want and expect more” from prosecutors who claim the presumptive GOP nominee engaged in business fraud to boost his first run for the White House. Defense attorney Todd Blanche, in his closing argument, said the state’s evidence showed little more than standard business practices. “President Trump is innocent. He did not commit any crimes, and the district attorney has not met their burden of proof, period,” Mr. Blanche said as Mr. Trump’s hush money trial neared its conclusion.

Defense attorney Randy Zelin said Tuesday on CNN’s “News Central” that the prosecution in former President Donald Trump’s business record trial “fell way short” of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Host Kate Bolduan said, “The burden of proof is an important one to remind everyone: It’s on the prosecution, right? They need to prove beyond reasonable doubt that he commit, that Donald Trump broke the law. And you think after listening to all of this, you think they fell short. How?” Zelin said, “They fell way short, because let’s start with reasonable doubt. What is reasonable doubt? And it’s...

A possibly disturbing development has unfolded, leading many to believe the fix is already in for a Trump conviction or imprisonment. .... Snip.... The prosecution has not proven Trump committed any of these crimes or even had an affair; he will likely be found guilty anyway, given the rigged jury. Now, we learn that Secret Service officials have met with jailhouse officials to prepare for President Trump to go to prison. What is possibly even more alarming is that corrections officers will be responsible for protecting agents assigned to Trump. Recall what that Jeffrey Epstein died under suspicious circumstances after...

Exciting new AI tools are still being shaped by human beings.In February, freakouts over artificial intelligence took a fun twist. This time, it wasn't concern that humans are ushering in our robot overlords, panic about AI's potential to create realistic fakes, or any of the usual fare. It wasn't really about AI at all, but the humans who create it: woke humans. The controversy started when @EndWokeness, a popular account on X (formerly Twitter), posted pictures generated by Google's AI tool, Gemini, for the prompts "America's Founding Fathers," "Vikings," and "the Pope." The results were all over the people-of-color spectrum,...

Mike Davis, legal adviser to Donald Trump, will send a letter Tuesday to every House Republican calling on them to do everything they can to fight back against President Joe Biden’s “lawfare” against the former president, according to a letter and memo first obtained by the Daily Caller. In the letter, Davis, founder and president of the Article III Project, mentions six bullet points he believes House Republicans need to utilize in order to properly defend Trump against the ongoing “lawfare” brought forward by Biden’s Department of Justice (DOJ), and Democrat state and local prosecutors. He argues these steps are...

A government scientist is the latest official whose attempts to evade the Freedom of Information Act have landed him in hot water.The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is based on an important principle: any document that the public pays for belongs to the public. Whenever a government official writes or records something as part of their taxpayer-funded duties, ordinary citizens have a right to request a copy, with some exemptions for privacy and security. Politicians, of course, hate that kind of accountability. And every so often, they get caught hiding their official correspondence from FOIA requesters. Hillary Clinton's attempts to...

Judge Merchan made sure to let the jurors know who is in charge of the sham trial. Per Paul Ingrassia: Judge Merchan tells the jurors that “nothing the lawyers said is evidence” and “nothing said during the summations is evidence.” Merchan: You and you alone are the judges of the facts of this case. Merchan: I AM RESPONSIBLE FOR EXPLAINING THE LAW, NOT THE LAWYERS. YOUR SWORN DUTY AS JURORS IS TO FOLLOW MY INSTRUCTIONS ON THE LAW, AS YOU PROMISED ME THAT YOU WOULD. Alvin Bragg’s prosecutors fumed after Trump’s lawyer Todd Blanche said Trump shouldn’t be sent to...

Dozens of foreign workers protesting changes to P.E.I.'s immigration strategy are on their fourth day of a hunger strike in downtown Charlottetown. The provincial government is cutting back on the number of workers it is nominating for permanent residency this year, from about 2,100 to about 1,600 — with a big drop in the number of hospitality workers in particular. More than 800 were nominated last year, and the plan is to nominate just 200 this year. Jaspreet Singh Sivia, one of the people who have been speaking for the protesters, accuses the government of changing the rules for people...