Free Republic

Tough luck, Zuck! Mark Zuckerberg tumbled from third to fifth place on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index after Meta’ stock plunged 11% on Thursday — wiping out $29.2 billion from his fortune in just one day. The 41-year-old CEO’s net worth fell to $235.2 billion, his lowest ranking in nearly two years, as investors recoiled from Meta’s plan to issue $30 billion in new debt to fund artificial intelligence spending, according to Bloomberg. The drop was the fourth-largest one-day market-driven loss ever recorded by Bloomberg’s wealth index. Zuckerberg reportedly refused to clap Wednesday after singer Billie Eilish said at the Wall...

Barack Obama used to be confident America would survive Donald Trump. He’s not so sure anymore. The 44th president can still draw a crowd of thousands or dial Gavin Newsom’s cell phone to strategize about the California governor’s redistricting push. But friends who talk to him say it’s become clear that eight years out of the White House, darkness and anxiety have crept in on Obama’s message of hope and change. After deliberately stepping back during the Biden years — while remaining the party’s biggest fundraiser even then — Obama and his aides are reworking his longstanding strategy of minimizing...

Cardinal Müller says ‘progressivism,’ not tradition, is ‘splitting’ the Catholic ChurchCardinal Gerhard Müller concluded that there is no theology behind Latin Mass restrictions because the Vatican has not and cannot explain what is wrong with the Traditional Mass.Cardinal Gerhard Müller said it is “progressivism,” not tradition, that is dividing the Catholic Church in light of a statement by Pope Leo XIV that the tension between “tradition and novelty” can be a “harmful polarization.”“Progressivism is the ideology that’s splitting the Church,” Müller, former prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), told EWTN’s Raymond Arroyo on a Thursday...

Republican Jack Ciattarelli and Democrat Mikie Sherrill are neck and neck in the latest polling, showing the two New Jersey governor hopefuls less than a percentage point apart, the closest yet as election day approaches. Ciattarelli is within less than a single point, which is in the margin of error, in a stunning new poll released Saturday as the two approach the final hours of their campaign in a virtual tie. Sherrill’s lead has dropped to 50.2% to 49.3% in a new Atlas Intel poll. It’s just the latest survey to show a nail-biter in the most-watched statewide election this...

Still photo The US Central Command (CENTCOM) released footage from an MQ-9 drone showing suspected Hamas operatives looting a humanitarian aid truck in northern Khan Yunis, Gaza. The truck was part of an international humanitarian convoy delivering essential aid to civilians during the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Twitter-linked video According to CENTCOM's statement, the suspects stopped the truck, assaulted the driver, and moved him to a central traffic island. They then boarded the truck and stole both its contents and the vehicle itself. The US-led Civil-Military Coordination Center (CMCC) was activated following the aerial footage to monitor and assess...

Surging early voting points to high turnout in the mayoral election. It’s a bad sign for the Democratic Socialist’s campaign Back in 2016, I suggested that Donald Trump was heading for victory, writing in the New York Post in June of that year: “As much as Trump might alienate and appal, his iconoclastic campaign aligns with what many across America are already thinking.” In The Telegraph nearly eight years later in December 2023, I correctly assessed that Kamala Harris, the vice-president at the time, was angling to oust her elderly boss, President Joe Biden.Now I have a new prediction....

An explosion rocked a Harvard Medical School building early Saturday morning, authorities said. The unknown device exploded on the fourth floor of the Goldenson building on the Harvard Longwood Campus’s main quad shortly before 3 a.m., The Harvard Crimson reported citing authorities. Two individuals were witnessed running out of the building at the time of the detonation, the outlet said, citing the Harvard University Police Department. An officer with the university failed in an attempt to stop them, before entering the building to check on the alarm, The Boston Globe reported. The Boston Fire Department determined the explosion was intentional...

Harvard's medical school was rocked by a huge explosion early Saturday morning. Law enforcement said the blast appeared to be deliberate and that two people were seen fleeing as they arrived. The explosion took place at about 2.48am in the fourth floor of the Goldenson building on the Longwood campus. No injuries were reported. 'Upon arrival at the building, the officer observed two unidentified individuals fleeing the building,' the Harvard University Police Department said.'The officer attempted to stop the individuals before proceeding to the floor where the alarm had been triggered.' Boston police checked the building for additional explosives and...

"Arctic Frost was the vehicle by which partisan FBI agents & DOJ prosecutors could improperly investigate the entire Republican political apparatus." Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) gave a press conference on Wednesday in conjunction with a massive document dump relating to a probe — undertaken by former President Joe Biden’s Justice Department — code-named Arctic Frost.Arctic Frost, which would ultimately grow into Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into the 2020 presidential election, included nearly 200 subpoenas aimed at Republicans in Congress and Trump allies outside of Capitol Hill — from high-dollar donors and super-PACs to Mike Lindell’s MyPillow....

U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales has filed legislation to support domestic filmmaking, days after President Donald Trump threatened to impose a 100% tariff on foreign-made films. Gonzales has dubbed his proposed legislation “Texas is the New Hollywood Act.” A news release from Gonzales on Tuesday afternoon said the bill would create more filmmaking opportunities “here at home and allow Texas to build on its momentum to be at the forefront of the American film industry.” “This legislation is key to creating new jobs in our communities. It also goes hand-in-hand with efforts underway in the Lone Star State to give film...

You’re paying for them, in the name of climate aid. A £52m road through the Amazon jungle is being built using British aid that is intended to help the climate, The Telegraph can reveal. The road in Guyana goes nowhere other than a tiny village and has long been criticised by environmentalists, though it is celebrated by the oil industry. It is just one among hundreds of schemes funded by taxpayers through the International Climate Finance initiative (ICF). Few will have heard of the ICF outside Westminster circles. It is the result of the Government’s determination to push a green...

There are no effective replacements for capitalism. The question is: what is the Christian responsibility for the proper functioning of it, and to what extent can we steer the whole of capitalist production to serve genuinely human ends as they are articulated by the Christian faith? Now that will be my question. One of the things about capitalism, about economic opportunity is it provides a person a really fundamental, almost elemental— element of hope in their lives so I can improve my lot in life; I can do better; I can provide for a family; I can be elevated and...

Can the nation’s greatest city survive full-on socialism?It is still technically possible that self-declared democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani will not become the next mayor of the nation’s largest city and financial capital of the world. But those chances might best be described as a wing and a prayer. One would have thought that New Yorkers who voted for Mamdani in the Democratic primary months ago without knowing much about him would reconsider their support once they learned the details of his plan to turn the city into a socialist utopia. But the smooth-as-silk 34-year-old native of Uganda continues to hold...

The Trump administration plans to claw back more than $1 billion in federal funds being spent on Medicaid for illegal immigrants in blue states. A preliminary audit from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) found that California, Washington, D.C., Colorado, Washington, Illinois and Oregon had misused $1,351,204,127 on healthcare for illegal aliens during the past few years. While using federal Medicaid dollars for this purpose is prohibited, Democrat leaders are using loopholes in federal laws to use funds for emergency treatment of patients regardless of their immigration status. According to the CMS, California was responsible for a sizable...

What became of Freeper Archy? I enjoyed reading his posts. He was knowledgeable and intelligent.

Crank up the sound for some fun! COMMIETOWN NEW YORK CITY 2025 COMING SOON. This is a great video from Greg Abbott.

Explanation: What created this large mountain on asteroid Ceres? No one is yet sure. As if in anticipation of today being Asteroid Day on Earth, the robotic spacecraft Dawn in orbit around Ceres took the best yet image of an unusually tall mountain on the Asteroid Belt's largest asteroid. Visible at the top of the featured image, the exceptional mountain rises about five kilometers up from an area that otherwise appears pretty level. The image was taken about two weeks ago from about 4,400 kilometers away. Although origin hypotheses for the mountain include volcanism, impacts, and plate tectonics, clear evidence...

Michelle Obama really wants you to know she's a victim. That's been the theme for her over the last several years, whether it be during interviews or on her incredibly grating podcast. Most recently, speaking to ABC News "journalist" Gayle King, who is always chosen for these softball sessions for a reason, the former First Lady decried her time in the White House, claiming she and her family were given a "lack of grace" that other presidential families received. KING: "We were all too aware that as the first black couple, we couldn't afford any mistakes." And you also say...

Let's hope more arrests of these creeps take place and they end up in jail.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said the defence of Pokrovsk is a "priority", as elite special forces were deployed to the embattled town on the eastern front line. Ukrainian army sources told the BBC that special forces from military intelligence and assault groups were being used as regular infantry to protect supply lines to troops holding the town in the Donbas region. There have been growing reports of Russian advances around the strategic town to the west of Donetsk. Ukraine has denied claims their forces were surrounded. Moscow wants Kyiv to cede the entire Donbas region as part of a...