Free Republic

The Senate GOP’s campaign committee swung at Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) on Thursday after news broke that his wife, Angela Paxton, had filed for divorce. “What Ken Paxton has put his family through is truly repulsive and disgusting,” National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) spokesperson Joanna Rodriguez said. “No one should have to endure what Angela Paxton has, and we pray for her as she chooses to stand up for herself and her family during this difficult time.” Ken Paxton is looking to topple Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), with one poll in June showing the incumbent trailing the state...

In what appears to be a first-of-its-kind lawsuit, big oil companies – including ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP and Shell – are facing a climate change wrongful death lawsuit from the family of a Seattle woman. Critics say the lawsuit is frivolous and part of a public relations campaign being waged against the industry nationwide. The lawsuit, filed in King County Superior Court on May 28, alleges the oil companies knowingly fueled climate change and misled the public about the risks and consequences that the suit claims contributed to the record-high temperatures that blanketed western Washington in the final week of June...

I have been looking into buying some assistance for my hearing loss. I got prices from a local Beltone rep and from a Miracle Ear rep, both in the multiple $1,000 range. ($3,995 to $6,500) And, of course, just looking anything up on the internet results in ads and suggestions for all sorts of alternatives, including "Amplifiers" for less than $1,000. (All of this out of pocket.) Any suggestions or recommendations from this group? Thanks

Superman has long stood as a symbol of kindness and friendship in my life, as he has for millions across the country.

President Donald Trump's proposed 50% tariff on Brazilian imports is bad news for coffee drinkers. Brazil, the largest U.S. supplier of green coffee beans, accounts for about a third of the country's total supply, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Coffee beans need to grow in a warm, tropical climate, making Hawaii and Puerto Rico the only suitable places in the United States to farm the crop. But, as the world's top consumer of coffee, the U.S. requires a massive supply to stay caffeinated. Mintel estimates that the U.S. coffee market reached $19.75 billion last year.

Unicorns appeared in Arthurian legend and are Scotland’s national animalA MYSTERIOUS “unicorn” skull has been unearthed near King Arthur’s castle. Tourist John Goodwin dug it up after spotting the long horn sticking out of moss on the edge of a Cornish cliff. When he pulled it free, he found a skull with a single tusk in the middle of its forehead — like the mythical creature. John, a plumber from Canada was near Tintagel — the supposed site of King Arthur’s Camelot castle — with wife Val and their daughter. He found the skull at St Nectan’s Glen, a spot...

Uranus has entered Gemini for the first time in 84 years, and astrologers and social media users are panicking about this transition, believing that it could herald turbulent times. The Context On July 7, 2025, Uranus entered Gemini. The planet will briefly retrograde into Taurus on November 7 and reenter Gemini in April of 2026, where it will stay until May 2033. What To Know So what does this mean and what (on earth) does it have to do with politics and world events? All the planets in the solar system will eventually return to a certain spot they were...

[Catholic Caucus] Bishop Strickland: Follow-up to my statement on Bishop-elect HennenMany faithful Catholics have expressed concern over my recent comments regarding Pope Leo XIV’s appointment of Fr. Thomas Hennen as Bishop-elect of Baker. I write now not to backtrack, but to clarify and deepen what must be said – for the sake of the flock and for the integrity of the Church.A bishop is a shepherd, yes – but also a watchman. And if the watchman sounds the alarm only once the wolves are already among the sheep, many souls will be devoured. The shepherd’s call must go out when...

Law enforcement conducted a bust at a home in Dallas while searching for a suspect involved in the July 4 ambush of an ICE facility. During the search, authorities found alleged members of Antifa and more than 40 firearms. The FBI is still on the lookout for Benjamin Song, a 32-year-old from Dallas, who allegedly took part in an “ambush” that wounded a police officer at an ICE detention center in Alvarado on July 4. Song was a member of the Antifa militant group Elm Form John Brown Gun Club, and had a radical past in the Dallas-Fort Worth area,...

A picture of what appears to be a MAGA-type hat behind the counter of a beloved San Francisco foodie spot that was a favorite of Anthony Bourdain has erupted into a major online flap. The hat in question, a red, white, and blue stars and stripes adorned cap with the numbers “45” and “47” on it was snapped behind the counter at Swan’s Oyster Depot by food influencer, Kat Ensign, known as @katfoodsf on Instagram. “Spotted at swan after waiting in a long a** line,” Ensign wrote on the photo. “Swan Oyster Depot -> absolutely not,” she added in a...

[Catholic Caucus] Mad Hatter Francis "Liturgist" Andrea Grillo: The Bishops Were All Wrong, I'm Right -- plus a major assessment by Sandro Magister of the Lies on which Traditionis custodes were basedWeeks after mocking soon to be canonized Carlo Acutis for having faith in the Blessed Sacrament -- a public statement that was so shocking that his own university disowned him -- the Mad Hatter of the liturgical world, Andrea Grillo, is again showing his colors. He, who was the man behind Francis document Traditionis custodes, establishing a gradual extinction of the Traditional Latin Mass, now does not deny (as...

In 1992, the Jamaican duo recorded one of dancehall’s most enduring anthems with Sly & Robbie. This is the story of how it got made.Dancehall music has undergone multiple waves of popularity in the US since its birth in the late 70s; from the early 00s takeover with Sean Paul, Elephant Man, and Shaggy, to Rihanna, Drake, and Daddy Yankee putting their own spin on the genre in the 2010s. Back in the early 90s, however, roots-reggae traditionalists were still trying to wrap their head around the brash new sound. Artists like Shabba Ranks, Beenie Man, and Buju Banton...

Controversial Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson is being mocked for telling a light-hearted Q&A that she has sleepless nights worrying about “the state of our democracy.” The leading dissenter on the country’s high court was being asked quickfire questions at the end of an Indianapolis Bar Association event Thursday, with topics including favorite books and songs. “She’s functionally an activist, not a judge,” another jabbed. “Impartial judges committed to faithful application of the law don’t make incendiary comments like this in public.” “Some of her dissents this term have been pretty embarrassing,” said another user — adding that some...

Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino has told people he is considering resigning amid a major clash between the FBI and Justice Department over the continued fallout from the release of the Jeffrey Epstein memo, several sources familiar with the matter told CNN. This comes after a heated confrontation with Attorney General Pam Bondi over the handling of the case earlier this week. The infighting over the case came to a head during a Wednesday meeting, which included Bongino, Bondi, FBI Director Kash Patel and White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, sources said. Bongino and Patel were confronted about whether...

LA Mayor Karen Bass: The LA riots "never happened."

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass signed a new executive directive Friday aimed at strengthening city protections for immigrant communities in the wake of what she described as “unlawful and chaotic” federal immigration raids across the region. During a news conference, Bass called the directive necessary to help Los Angeles “understand how to protect itself from our federal government,” referencing a series of immigration enforcement actions that have occurred in the city over the past six weeks, including recent incidents in MacArthur Park and Ventura County. “We saw MacArthur Park earlier this week, which I think, now after all assessments, is...

Explanation: Transfusing sunlight as the sky grew darker, this exceptional display of noctilucent clouds was captured on July 10, reflected in the calm waters of Vallentuna Lake near Stockholm, Sweden. From the edge of space, about 80 kilometers above Earth's surface, the icy clouds themselves still reflect sunlight, even though the Sun is below the horizon as seen from the ground. Usually spotted at high latitudes in summer months, the night shining clouds have made a strong showing so far during the short northern summer nights. Also known as polar mesopheric clouds they are understood to form as water vapor...

FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino took a day off from work after a clash with Attorney General Pam Bondi over the handling of the Epstein files. .... Snip.... FBI deputy director Dan Bongino took a day off from work Friday after clashing at the White House with Attorney General Pam Bondi over their handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files, four sources familiar with the conflict told Axios. Why it matters: The dispute erupted Wednesday amid the fallout of the administration walking back its claims about Epstein by determining the convicted sex offender didn’t have a celebrity “client list,” and that...

The sequence of characters "9e112725- REMAINDER REDACTED BY ME "is an example of a Universally Unique Identifier (UUID), also known as a Globally Unique Identifier (GUID). UUIDs are 128-bit numbers represented as a 36-character alphanumeric string, including hyphens, designed to be unique across all systems and networks. They are widely used in computing for various purposes, including: Identifying data records: Like a database table might assign a unique UUID to each row, helping to distinguish one record from another, according to Cockroach Labs and PlanetScale. Tracking user behavior: In product and web analytics, UUIDs are used to track user activity...

When several countries endorsed the notion of some high-risk people taking the antibiotic doxycycline after unprotected sex to lower their chances of contracting a sexually transmitted disease, as the U.S. did last year, there was a theoretical concern the shift could drive antibiotic resistance in some bacterial infections. That risk no longer appears to be theoretical. In a newly published letter in the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers reported a steep rise in resistance to tetracycline — the antibiotic class to which doxycycline belongs — in gonorrhea isolates collected from across the country since results of the studies investigating...