Free Republic

Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-NJ) insisted he has “credible” sources that drones in his state could be from Iran, calling the Pentagon’s handling of the situation “incredibly stupid.” Pentagon press secretary Sabrina Singh dismissed Van Drew’s claims Wednesday, saying there is not “any truth” to the New Jersey lawmaker’s claims on the drones or that they came from an Iranian ship off the coast. However, Van Drew pushed back against this dismissal. “They’ve been incredibly stupid and incredibly weak with this,” Van Drew said on Fox News’s America’s Newsroom. “Here’s the point: we know they’re not backyard drones that some...

Syrian Kurdish commanders seek Israel's help amid territorial losses to Turkish-backed Islamist forces. The assessment is that intervention would escalate tensions with Turkey. ===================================================================== The Israeli defense establishment is weighing requests for assistance from Syria's Kurdish minority, who are under attack from Turkish-backed Islamist groups. The appeals for help have reached Israeli officials in recent days following the advancement of these groups and their successful capture of Kurdish-held territories. Israel and the Kurdish forces have maintained an ongoing dialogue, which has strengthened significantly following the fall of the Assad regime. The Israeli dilemma stems partly from the potential impact such...

Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), former chair of the Jan. 6 committee, said in a Thursday interview that he would accept a preemptive pardon from President Biden if he offered one. CNN’s Jim Acosta asked Thompson whether he wanted Biden to extend the pardon offer — in light of recent reporting that Biden was considering using the pardon power to protect those he feared may be targeted in Trump’s second term. “The president, it’s his prerogative,” Thompson said about whether he wants Biden to preemptively pardon him. “If he offers it, to me or other members of the committee, I think...

The good news first: As RedState has been reporting, Christopher Wray is on his way out as director of the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI). President-elect Donald Trump called it a "great day for America as it will end the Weaponization of what has become known as the United States Department of Injustice" and promised his new administration "will now restore the rule of law for all Americans." Trump also signaled his support for Kash Patel, his nominee to succeed Wray as FBI director. "We want our FBI back, and that will now happen," Trump wrote, as he ended his...

Elon Musk, who is spearheading President-elect Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, is touting GLP-1 drugs to treat obesity. “Nothing would do more to improve the health, lifespan and quality of life for Americans than making GLP inhibitors [sic] super low cost to the public,” Musk wrote in a post on X Wednesday. “Nothing else is even close.” Musk’s comments come just two weeks after the Biden administration made an 11th-hour push to require Medicare and state Medicaid programs to cover obesity drugs. The administration is proposing to reinterpret a 2003 law banning Medicare from covering popular GLP-1s directly for...

The Iranian establishment — the officials and business leaders who exert the most influence — has reportedly had enough of the radicalism of the current regime and is looking to replace it with a less confrontational, albeit still Islamic, model. That is the analysis of an expert interviewed by the UK Telegraph, which notes that Iranian leaders are quietly taking stock of the regime’s defeats in the region and concluding that constant fights against the West are not a good idea.

Hamas has conceded on two key Israeli demands in the negotiations over a hostage release and ceasefire deal, The Wall Street Journal reported. Shortly thereafter, Axios said that Israel’s Mossad Director David Barnea had met with Qatar's prime minister in Doha on Wednesday, citing two officials who said that Hamas appeared to be open to implement the first stage of a potential deal. For the first time, Hamas told mediators from Egypt and Qatar that it would agree to a deal that didn’t demand the immediate withdrawal of Israeli troops, instead allowing them to stay in the Gaza Strip during...

"Nothing would do more" to bolster Americans’ health, he wrote in a post on X.Elon Musk, who is spearheading President-elect Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, is touting GLP-1 drugs to treat obesity. “Nothing would do more to improve the health, lifespan and quality of life for Americans than making GLP inhibitors [sic] super low cost to the public,” Musk wrote in a post on X Wednesday. “Nothing else is even close.” [Snip] It’s not clear how Musk would make GLP-1s “super low cost.” The drugs are expected to be eligible for Medicare price negotiation down the line, which could...

For a drone to fly, it needs some kind of energy source. It is possible that for these drones flying over New Jersey, this could be electrical. But that’s unlikely. Elon Musk’s Tesla brand’s claim to fame is the best proprietary battery in the world, but it weighs far more than the drones could carry into the sky. Which leaves some kind of liquid fuel. Here’s how that works. To illustrate this, in World War II, America had a world-exclusive monopoly on high-octane aviation gas. We helped the British with the Battle of Britain by supplying them with what was...

President-elect Donald Trump promised in a wide-ranging Time magazine interview published Thursday that he will not “abandon” Ukraine amid its nearly three-year-long war — but called the Biden administration’s decision to green-light launching long-range missiles into Russia “the most dangerous thing.” Trump, 78, has long sought peace between the nations but rarely discussed details on how he would negotiate an end to the conflict, before sitting down with Time as he was named the outlet’s “Person of the Year” for 2024. “I want to reach an agreement, and the only way you’re going to reach an agreement is not to...

[Catholic Caucus] Is Francis Pope? My Reply to Fr. Brian HarrisonI am grateful to Fr. Brian Harrison, OS for taking note of my contribution to the growing number of voices asking whether Francis is Pope. Fr. Harrison, however, thinks that’s one question we ought not to ask:How are the countless millions of ordinary lay Catholics in the pews to prudently decide this question, given that they don’t have the theological and canonical formation necessary to weigh and evaluate the respective arguments of Dr. Lamont and the scholars who disagree with him? … “Well, I see that Archbishop Viganò, John Lamont,...

Executive Grant of Clemency TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, GREETING: WHEREAS SHANLIN JIN, Reg. No. 27074-509, was convicted, in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, on an indictment (Docket No. 4:21 -CR-00048- ALM-CAN(1)) charging violations of Section 2252A, Title 18, United States Code, for which a total sentence of 97 months' imprisonment, five years' supervised release, restitution of $30,500, forfeiture of specific property, and a $100 special assessment was imposed on July 14 and 19, 2022;and WHEREAS the said SHANLIN JIN has been confined continuously since his arrest on January 24, 2021...

Hate crimes in Los Angeles County were reported 45% more in 2023 than in 2022, according to an annualized report from the L.A. County Commission on Human Relations. The 1,350 reported hate crimes in 2023 are the most in the history of the report, which has been commissioned since 1980, surpassing the 1,031 in 2001 that were reported in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Jack Poso 🇺🇸 @JackPosobiec 🚨🚨🚨 BREAKING: IG report found FBI had 26 undercover assets at Jan 6 11:42 AM · Dec 12, 2024

The NYPD and FBI offered a joint $60,000 reward during the manhunt for UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson’s killer — but it wasn’t immediately clear who, if anyone, would get the cash now that an arrest has been made. Luigi Mangione, 26, was captured in Altoona, Pennsylvania, on Monday after a McDonald’s employee spotted him eating at the fast food restaurant and called 911. According to FBI rules, a tipster can’t nominate themselves to collect the reward....

@ActivePatriotUK 🚨 You b*stards in power have got blood on your hands 65 year old homeless man John Finch has been found dead in his tent this morning in a carpark in Cleethorpes 😭

In an extraordinary and unprecedented move, Romania’s constitutional court announced last week the annulment of the results of the first round of the presidential elections held on Nov. 24, in which the independent populist candidate Călin Georgescu came out on top. The ruling, which restarted the entire electoral process, came just days before the scheduled runoff between Georgescu and the pro-EU candidate Elena Lasconi, which Georgescu was tipped to win by a large margin. It’s the first time a European court has overturned the result of an election, signaling a troubling escalation in the EU-NATO establishment’s increasingly open war on...

When you read about Eithan Haim, don’t think about Eithan Haim. Think about yourself, and the world around you, and how that world works. Think about what it means to you, and what it would be like to be caught in the same traps — because you committed the simple act of speaking truthfully. Haim is the Texas surgeon who, as a surgical resident, told Christopher Rufo that Texas Children’s Hospital (TCH) was lying when it publicly announced an end to transgender medical procedures on children. I started writing about the federal prosecution of Dr. Haim on Monday, and you...

Snakes rank among Americans’ top animal phobias, and are among the most disliked animals globally. A new study from North Carolina State University finds that the dislike of snakes is subconscious and, to some extent, learned. “Snakes are important,” said the study’s first author Audrey Vaughn, a former graduate student at NC State. “They serve as both important predators and sources of prey for other wildlife. They can also serve as important ecological indicators. This disdain that people have for them is something that impacts our ability to make sure they are well conserved. That in and of itself...

[Catholic Caucus] Polish Cardinal Now Open to Legal Protections for LGBTQ+ CouplesIn a move divergent from a history of intense LGBTQ-negative advocacy from Polish Catholic officials, Warsaw’s Cardinal Kazimierz Nycz has expressed openness to legal protections for same-gender couples in the country.In comments to Polsat News, Nycz stated that the church should show a “certain tolerance” for those seeking to enter same-gender partnerships through a civil contract, as long as these relationships were not equated with marriage.These comments come on the heels of a recent draft of a partnership law published by Polish Minister for Equality Katarzyna Kotula, which proposes...