Free Republic

Walk the streets of any major metropolitan area and pay attention to what is communicated in the public sphere. Look especially at advertising, signage, and other messages that bombard you in public spaces. You can learn a good deal about the mindset of the people who run that society by observing such things. More specifically, a culture that is insane, or in the process of going insane, will give it away in what it features in privileged public spaces. These are its most essential values. On a recent visit to New York City, I did a little research in this...

William Holmes McGuffey (September 23, 1800 – May 4, 1873) was an American professor and college president who is best known for writing the McGuffey Readers, one of the nation's first and most widely used series of textbooks. It is estimated that at least 122 million copies of McGuffey Readers were sold between 1836 and 1960, placing its sales in a category with the Bible and Webster's Dictionary.

Elon Musk on Sunday offered to pay the legal fees of any Epstein survivor sued for speaking the “truth” in regards to naming who was responsible for their abuse. “I will pay for the defense of anyone who speaks the truth about this and is sued for doing so,” Musk wrote in a post on the social platform X, which he owns.

California’s already sky-high gas prices are expected to surge after Valero abruptly shuttered its Benicia refinery amid a spiraling “oil crisis,” a new report claims. The Benicia refinery began shutting down on Saturday, four months earlier than planned, a former Valero manager told the California Globe Tuesday. US gas prices: national average of $2.883 with California's average at $4.368, and a legend for retail prices ranging from $2.370 to $4.404. The closure will cause the state’s already sky-high gas prices to soar, a new report said. Thermal imaging showed the facility went cold as the Crimson Pipeline – which transports...

Wikimedia CommonsPresident Trump’s opponents, most of whom have never seen a local problem they didn’t think a national effort could solve, are suddenly proclaiming their devotion to the cause of federalism. This is in response to Trump’s recent suggestions that he would like to “nationalize the voting” in future elections, which prompted the usual tiresome comparisons of Trump to a banana republic dictator dedicated to stealing elections.The president has brought attention to an important issue: the need for voter ID. The fact thathis Democratic critics are so vociferously against it is telling. As the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act...

A 30-second ad from Ring stood out among Sunday’s glut of Super Bowl commercials shilling myriad forms of artificial intelligence, serving as a frightening reminder of how ubiquitous surveillance cameras have become amid our diminishing privacy. After all, if the “Search Party” function built into the doorbell camera’s app can be used to find a lost dog, as Sunday night’s ad emphasized, there’s little to stop it from being used to track people. The doorbell camera’s feature is especially worrisome now as the government encroaches on our civil liberties. Pointing out the potential of the Amazon-owned Ring being used to...

It's astonishing to witness the improvement in public education--reading, math, attendance, grad rates--in Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi. But we're busy fighting culture wars rather than scaling up what these three states have done. Please do read: https://nytimes.com/2026/02/09/opinion/red-states-good-schools.html?unlocked_article_code=1.K1A.hGAi.QpbdtKzj51Ke&smid=url-share

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer is fighting for his political life, and speculation about his replacement has centered on an unlikely figure: Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, who would become Britain’s first Muslim prime minister if elevated to the role. Starmer’s troubles stem from his December 2024 decision to appoint Peter Mandelson, a veteran Labour grandee, as Britain’s ambassador to Washington — despite allegedly knowing about Mandelson’s friendship with Jeffrey Epstein. Newly released Epstein documents revealed Mandelson maintained contact with the convicted sex offender after his 2008 guilty plea, allegedly shared sensitive government information with him, and received $75,000 in payments,...

DENIM AND DIVIDENDS: Actress Sydney Sweeney joined American Eagle Outfitters Chairman and CEO Jay Schottenstein at the NYSE to ring the opening bell. The appearance celebrates the American Eagle brand and follows the viral success of the “Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans” campaign.

A post on about a voter in Nebraska who said she received a ballot application in a pink envelope, while her husband received his in a blue one, has sparked backlash on social media. The Threads post, shared by @ellen_mint_author, has garnered over 330,000 views since it was published on February 6. The post features an image of two envelopes, one pink and one blue, that each bear a label saying an early vote ballot application for the statewide primary election on May 12, 2026 is enclosed. The caption of the post says: “What the ****, Nebraska? Why is my...

Former Democratic state Rep. Bakari Sellers of South Carolina said Friday that “a more aggressive approach” was needed to “remove” President Donald Trump and his supporters. Trump came under fire over a deleted video restating his claims about the 2020 election that included two seconds of a derogatory meme aimed at former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama. Sellers told former CNN host Don Lemon during an episode of “The Don Lemon Show” that a president willing to take “corrective action” against the “MAGA movement” would be needed. “Like this is a little bit controversial with my...

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer found broad support among lawmakers Monday, easing speculation that he will be toppled by revelations about his former ambassador’s ties to late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. In an attempt to rebuild some of his badly weakened authority, Starmer addressed Labour lawmakers in a 75-minute closed-door session, the same day his office said he does not plan to step down. All of Starmer’s Cabinet members extended public support to him in the hours before the session, and legislators gave him a round of applause when it concluded. The prime minister is facing heavy criticism for...

Oh, gosh. How they don't work an angle so hard to spin and bury an inconvenient story in Sir Keir Starmer's United Kingdom. Astonishing the levers a police state can pull. You'll all remember this horrifying scene this past August. (Watch video at link) David and I both wrote about it when it first happened, because the video was so shocking and so sad... "...What reportedly happened was that a fourteen-year-old and her younger sister were walking home. They were followed and harassed by one of the 'migrants' at the heart of all these complaints and clashes, which the government...

We knew this case against Planned Parenthood would be vital for babies and women. That’s why we labeled it as the “Trial of the Century” against the abortion giant. In open court, the mask came off. Planned Parenthood experts who claimed that one-year-olds likely can’t feel pain. Stories of moldy equipment. Shame, depression, suicidal thoughts, perforated uteruses, and rotting fetal tissue – These were the horrors that permeated the courtroom. This testimony didn’t just shock the courtroom – it revealed the extreme, dehumanizing logic required to justify the indefensible. Last week, the “Trial of the Century” wrapped up in a...

About three weeks ago I had what seemed to me to be a serious stroke. I considered it quite likely I was not long for this world. But medical technology has come ahead in leaps and bounds and I'm considered close to recovered at this point. If you're having concerns about your health, see your Doctor. I didn't. If I had, I might have not needed to go through what I did.

For those unaware, SpaceX has already shifted focus to building a self-growing city on the Moon, as we can potentially achieve that in less than 10 years, whereas Mars would take 20+ years. The mission of SpaceX remains the same: extend consciousness and life as we know it to the stars. It is only possible to travel to Mars when the planets align every 26 months (six month trip time), whereas we can launch to the Moon every 10 days (2 day trip time). This means we can iterate much faster to complete a Moon city than a Mars city....

Explanation: What is Miranda really like? Visually, old images from NASA's Voyager 2 have been recently combined and remastered to result in the featured image of Uranus's 500-kilometer-wide moon. In the late 1980s, Voyager 2 flew by Uranus, coming close to the cratered, fractured, and unusually grooved moon -- named after a character from Shakespeare’s The Tempest. Scientifically, planetary scientists are using old data and clear images to theorize anew about what shaped Miranda's severe surface features. A leading hypothesis is that Miranda, beneath its icy surface, may have once hosted an expansive liquid water ocean which may be slowly...

Less than 14% of nearly 400,000 immigrants arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in President Trump's first year back in the White House had charges or convictions for violent criminal offenses, according to an internal Department of Homeland Security document obtained by CBS News. The official statistics contained in the DHS document, which had not been previously reported publicly, provide the most detailed look yet into who ICE has arrested during the Trump administration's far-reaching deportation operations across the U.S. The internal DHS figures undermine frequent assertions by the Trump administration that its crackdown on illegal immigration is primarily targeting...

King Charles has made his first intervention in the Epstein scandal, saying Buckingham Palace is ready to support the police as they consider allegations against his brother Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor."The King has made clear, in words and through unprecedented actions, his profound concern at allegations which continue to come to light in respect of Mr Mountbatten-Windsor's conduct," a Palace spokesman said."While the specific claims in question are for Mr Mountbatten-Windsor to address, if we are approached by Thames Valley Police we stand ready to support them as you would expect," he said.Thames Valley Police confirmed it is assessing whether there are...

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — In some ways, 10-year-old Giancarlo is one of the lucky ones. He still goes to school.Each morning, he and his family bundle up and leave their Minneapolis apartment to wait for his bus. His little brother hefts on his backpack, even though he stopped going to day care weeks ago because his mom is too afraid to take him.As they wait behind a wrought-iron fence, Giancarlo’s mother pulls the boys into the shadow of a tree to pray. It’s the only time she stops scanning the street for immigration agents.“God, please protect my son when he’s not...