Free Republic

Created by Elon Musk, xAI's Grok has introduced AI ‘companions’ — and one of them targeted toward children refers users to Planned Parenthood, likening abortion to simply “turning off a light.” According to a July 2025 article from Tom's Guide, Grok's companions are "AI chatbots that are assigned specific personalities for you to interact with...." Tom's reviewer Alex Hughes adds, with concern, that "[M]ost of the larger AI companies with strong reputations have stayed clear of this world, primarily because of the pretty expansive ethical problems that come attached with providing people with ‘AI relationships’." Grok's companions, Hughes writes, each...

Echoes of 1920s Europe in today’s United States.Some ninety years ago, Rose Wilder Lane penned “Give Me Liberty,” extolling the remarkable freedoms Americans had, especially in contrast to their European counterparts. Written in the 1930s, Lane’s piece is both a stirring defense of American freedoms and a damning portrait of European societies still writhing under the weight of bureaucratic statism. Written just as the state interventions of Roosevelt’s New Deal began to bite, her notes stand as a useful portal into a different era—challenging and checking our current assumptions about the trajectory of transatlantic liberty. In a nutshell, Europe has...

The Trump administration is accumulating a massive U.S. military presence in the Caribbean, deploying warships, surveillance planes and fighter aircraft as it continues to blow up alleged drug-trafficking boats in the waters around South America. The main target for the flurry of activity appears to be Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, whom the administration has called an “illegitimate leader.” The country’s attorney general said on over the weekend there is “no doubt” that Trump wants to topple Maduro’s regime.On Friday, the Defense Department (DOD) ordered the USS Gerald R. Ford and its escort ships to head to the U.S. Southern Command...

Flights departing for Los Angeles International Airport were halted briefly due to a staffing shortage at a Southern California air traffic facility, the Federal Aviation Administration said Sunday, when the agency also reported staffing-related delays in Chicago, Washington and Newark, New Jersey. The FAA issued a temporary ground stop at one of the world’s busiest airports soon after U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy predicted that travelers would see more flights delayed and canceled in the coming days as the nation’s air traffic controllers work without pay during the federal government shutdown. During an appearance on the Fox News program “Sunday...

Elbows Up Stengthens U.S. Tariff Resolve at Canada’s ExpenseThe disastrously misguided “Elbows Up” campaign championed by the Carney government rooted in the fantasy that a smug, arrogant Liberal elite wields leverage over the largest economy in human history, has suffered yet another devastating blow. The latest fallout: U.S.-based truck manufacturer Paccar Inc., maker of iconic heavyweights such as Kenworth and Peterbilt, is slashing Canadian production and laying off hundreds of workers in anticipation of a 25-per-cent U.S. import tariff set to take effect next month. Employees at Paccar’s Sainte-Thérèse, Quebec plant were informed Wednesday that the company will move production...

Archaeologists in Egypt have uncovered the remains of a massive 3,000-year-old fortress along an ancient route many believe was traveled during the biblical Exodus.The stronghold, recently unearthed in North Sinai, lies directly on the fabled Horus Military Road, the same route the Book of Exodus describes as the shorter path the Israelites avoided when Moses led them out of Egypt.Experts said the discovery provides tangible evidence that the road, long thought to be a key setting in the Exodus narrative, truly existed and was heavily fortified during the period traditionally associated with the Israelites' escape. The site's age, scale, and...

The Fifteenth Court of Appeals in Texas has ruled against Yelp, Inc., allowing a lawsuit by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton to proceed in which he is accusing the company of misleading consumers about pro-life pregnancy centers. The decision, hailed as a victory by pro-life advocates, reverses a lower court’s dismissal and holds Yelp accountable for allegedly targeting Texas users with deceptive disclaimers. The Texas Attorney General’s Office initiated the lawsuit, claiming Yelp placed false and misleading disclaimers on listings for pro-life pregnancy centers, which provide free counseling, medical services, and support for women seeking alternatives to abortion. According to...

The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley) offers an undergraduate course on immigration policy that characterizes American immigration policy as rooted in a theory of “racial superiority” and actively promotes the “Abolish ICE” movement.Campus Reform, a project of the Leadership Institute and a conservative watchdog group monitoring higher education, obtained the course syllabi for the Spring 2024 and 2025 semesters. The course is set to be offered again in Spring 2026.The syllabus reads: We often hear that America is a ‘nation of immigrants.’ But this representation of the United States does not explain why some are presumed to belong in...

WASHINGTON — Vladimir Putin is feeling the sting of President Trump’s new oil sanctions — so much so that he dispatched one of his top henchmen on a desperate charm offensive across the US. Kirill Dmitriev, the Kremlin-linked financier who once served as Moscow’s backchannel to Washington, spent the weekend trying to schmooze top Trump officials and going on a media blitz. But the move failed spectacularly, with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent bluntly blasting Dmitriev as a “Russian propagandist,” and NATO Amb. Matt Whitaker flatly rejected his overtures — saying the administration’s energy crackdown would continue. On one of the...

Enigma, a popular UFO reporting app, monitors unusual aerial activity. However, they also receive reports of objects emerging from bodies of water or traveling underwater. Enigma has recently released a collection that serves as a repository for these reports and includes a history of anomalous underwater reports and statistics on the reports they have received. Unidentified Submersible Objects (USOs) refer to any object or phenomenon detected underwater that cannot be immediately identified or explained. The term is similar to UFO/UAP but applies specifically to subsurface or underwater contexts. From medieval chronicles to present-day Navy radar logs, witnesses have reported observations...

Trump danced with cheering Malaysians to the ‘Hawaii Five-0’ theme song. No recent Hollywood production could have resonated like that.For the past couple of weeks, the hilarious yet insightful Daily Wire podcast host Matt Walsh has challenged his audience to answer one question. What caused the radical decline of American culture post 2008? That the culture nosedived is undeniable to everyone except Democrats. It inspired my first article here an astonishing seven years ago, positing why a solid action thriller like Taken (2008) was beyond the capability of Hollywood just 10 years later. Walsh gives two correct reasons for...

The Mexican Senate is considering a bill to increase the tobacco tax, arguing that it would improve health by discouraging use and increase the government’s bank account.It could also fill the accounts of some of Mexico’s major cartels. Experts say the cartels have a significant hand in Mexico’s black market for cigarettes and stand to gain an even bigger share from the tax.President Claudia Sheinbaum has called for raising Mexico’s ad valorem tobacco tax from 160% to 200%. The per-cigarette quota tax would nearly double by 2030.The inevitable result would be a bigger black market for cartels to exploit, said...

A star chef from the show "Top Chef" tried to raise outrage over the demolition for President Donald Trump's White House ballroom renovation, but he was mocked and ridiculed instead. Tom Colicchio posted a photograph he said was from the East Room of the White House, which is being renovated to make way for a large ballroom. "My wife and I in the East Wing. I can’t believe it is gone," he posted on his official social media account. However, as many quickly noted, the photograph was not from the East Room at all, but actually from the Diplomatic Reception...

Javier Milei’s painful but necessary reform project gets needed momentum after midterm elections.For decades, Argentina’s political leadership has rotated between spendthrift socialists snuffing out economic growth – and would be free-marketeer reformers undermined by their own timidity. Over the past two years, Argentine President Javier Milei has come closer than anyone to changing the narrative, and voters just gave him permission to keep going.“Today we pass the turning point,” Milei told supporters late Sunday, as his La Libertad Avanza party won 41 percent of the national vote in midterm elections. That first-place finish can fairly be called a landslide in...

“The dollar always talks in the end,” Donald Trump wrote in his 1987 bestseller The Art of the Deal. Javier Milei’s surprise triumph in Argentina’s midterm elections – after Trump bailed him out with 40bn of them – suggests there may be some truth to that assertion. The US president had vowed to jettison his South American ally if, as widely predicted, the radical libertarian fared badly in Sunday’s make-or-break legislative vote. “If he doesn’t win, we’re gone,” Trump declared when Argentina’s shaggy-haired president visited him in Washington earlier this month to plead for economic help. Milei’s political woes have...

Zohran Mamdani’s aunt neither wears a hijab nor lived in NYC before, during, or after 9/11. In fact, she lived in Tanzania from January 2000 to December 2003. 🤔 pic.twitter.com/BTug7BohKT — The Persian Jewess (@persianjewess) October 26, 2025

China’s far-reaching rules already affect manufacturers of semiconductors, cars and many other products. They will soon become much broader.Starting over a year ago, China has created an elaborate set of rules to cast a net over its exports of minerals the rest of the world can’t live without. These minerals with obscure names, mostly so-called rare earth metals, are vital for making a vast array of military and civilian goods, from fighter jets to semiconductors to cars.The export controls have given Beijing enormous leverage because China is the dominant supplier. China is the sole producer, for example, of samarium, a...

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — The 22-year-old Utah man charged with killing Charlie Kirk can appear in court wearing street clothes but must be physically restrained due to security concerns, a judge ruled Monday.Attorneys for Tyler Robinson argued images of him shackled and in jail clothing would spread widely in a case with extensive press coverage and public interest, which they said could prejudice future jurors.Judge Tony Graf agreed to make some allowances to protect Robinson’s presumption of innocence before a trial, agreeing that the case has drawn “extraordinary” public and media attention.“Mr. Robinson shall be dressed as one who...

The Trump administration says a TikTok deal with China is set to be finalized on Thursday when President Trump meets with his Chinese counterpart. (Scripps News) Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent says a deal to keep TikTok operating in the U.S is set to be finalized on Thursday when President Donald Trump is scheduled to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping.Speaking Sunday on CBS News' "Face the Nation," Bessent said the two sides came to an agreement during a recent meeting in Madrid. "I believe that as of today, all the details are ironed out, and that will be for the...

Summary Job cuts may affect HR, devices, services, operations CEO Jassy aims to reduce bureaucracy, increase AI use Amazon shares rise 1.2% AMZN.O is planning to cut as many as 30,000 corporate jobs beginning on Tuesday, as the company pares expenses and compensates for overhiring during the peak demand of the pandemic, according to three people familiar with the matter. The figure represents a small percentage of Amazon's 1.55 million total employees, but nearly 10% of its roughly 350,000 corporate employees. This would mark Amazon's largest job cut since late 2022, when it started to eliminate around 27,000 positions. An...