Free Republic

"I don’t want this state that I love to become the country I left,” Steve Hilton tells the lunch meeting of South­ern California Republican Women. Knives and forks rattle on porcelain as the perfectly coiffured ladies down cutlery to clap. Remarkably, Hilton, director of strategy under former British prime minister David Cameron, has topped virtually every poll for governor of California since he launched his campaign in April last year. Hilton has leant into the West Coast aesthetic and spirit. Once the rebel of Downing Street in T-shirts and stockinged feet, today he sports a tech-bro beard, more bracelets and...

I should explain, for American readers, what a judicial review is in the UK. It is not quite the same as suing the government, though it has a similar effect. It is a procedure by which the courts in England and Wales can examine whether a public body—a minister, a local authority, a regulator—has acted unlawfully. If the judges agree that it has, they can quash the decision. Think of it as the British equivalent of challenging an executive action in the federal courts, except that our system doesn’t require you to invoke the Constitution. You simply have to show...

Not all types of alcohol are created equal — and a new study suggests that wine may carry lower health risks than beer or hard liquor. *** Using UK Biobank data, researchers analyzed participant questionnaires. The adults were placed into one of four groups based on their alcohol consumption levels. The study was observational — meaning the findings show an association but cannot prove cause and effect. *** Analyzing cardiovascular disease deaths, researchers discovered that moderate wine drinkers had a 21% lower risk of dying from the disease than people who never drank or occasionally drank — though, once again,...

A pedophile who murdered a 13-year-old girl after getting her pregnant has died in prison in an apparent suicide, officials said. Jarvis Butts, 43, was found dead in his cell at the Charles Egeler Reception and Guidance Center in Jackson, Michigan on Wednesday. He was just two weeks into a 35 to 60 year sentence for the murder of Na'Ziyah Harris. Prison staff said they 'provided life-saving measures which were unsuccessful' and noted that state police are investigating Butts's death as a suicide. He pleaded guilty to murdering Harris in January 2024 after impregnating her and prosecutors said he targeted...

The TSA showdown reveals a brutal truth about our politics America’s newest political battlefield runs through one of the most miserable places in the country: the airport.Democrats have held up funding for the Department of Homeland Security amid their ongoing war over ICE, and after a month without pay, TSA employees have started refusing to come to work. The result has been crippling delays at major airports, with waits stretching four hours or more and turning an already degraded flying experience into something closer to a public humiliation ritual.The GOP theoretically holds the levers of power, but in practice...

Austrian Catholic dioceses host pro-LGBT Stations of the Cross through lens of ‘queer refugees’Catholic churches in Vienna, Linz, and Graz staged the heterodox Stations of the Cross portraying ‘queer refugees’ in order to ‘live out (queer) diversity,’ according to a participant.Catholic dioceses in Austria have been hosting an LGBT-themed Way of the Cross that reinterprets the stations according to the supposed experiences of “queer” refugees.The ecumenical project “Fluchtweg” (Escape Route) tries to connect the Passion of Jesus and the Stations of the Cross with the contemporary experiences of “queer people” who had to flee their home countries, according to the...

Donald Trump today described Britain's aircraft carriers as 'toys compared to what we have' in his latest swipe at the UK's lack of support for his war against Iran. In yet another sign of the deep freeze consuming the transatlantic 'special relationship' the president lashed out at the Royal Navy's capabilities in a rant against US Nato allies. Speaking to reporters at the White House on Thursday, the US President said: 'The British said "we'll send our aircraft carriers" - which aren't the best aircraft carriers by the way, they are toys compared to what we have - "we'll send...

The village of Dolton, Illinois, has been an unfortunate laboratory for a specific brand of leftist governance for years. Under the leadership of Mayor Tiffany Henyard, the small suburb became synonymous with fiscal chaos, alleged self-dealing, and a flamboyant disregard for the standard rules of municipal conduct. But now, as the legal and political walls close in back home, Henyard is attempting the ultimate political Houdini act: moving to Georgia and rebranding herself as a “Republican.” The Dolton Disaster To understand why Georgians should be wary, one must first look at the wreckage left behind in Illinois. Henyard’s tenure in...

The Oklahoma State House on Tuesday passed a bipartisan bill that would make it legal to use the decomposed and ground-up remains of human corpses as soil fertilizer in the state. The legislation, HB 3660, seeks to include so-called “natural organic reduction” (NOR), a common euphemism for human composting, “as a form of cremation” under state law. Oklahoma’s lower chamber passed the bill 59-37, with both Republicans and Democrats voting in favor, prompting a harsh rebuke from one of the GOP lawmakers who opposes the legislation. “Today the House advanced HB3660, a bill to legalize the use of composted human...

A Portland jury on Wednesday acquitted Angella Lynn Davis of Vernonia, Ore., of charges of second-degree disorderly conduct and offensive physical contact stemming from an October confrontation with independent journalist Nick Sortor. Prosecutors said Davis, 47, chased and helped surround Sortor while brandishing a stick near an Antifa-affiliated encampment adjacent to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility, which has seen repeated protests and arrests, The Post Millennial reported. Sortor traveled from Washington, D.C. to document unrest tied to federal immigration enforcement policies. Senior Deputy District Attorney Kevin Demer told jurors during opening statements that Davis “aggressively pursued” Sortor after...

How the Homeland Became a Combat Zone Empathetic immigration policies put our country at great risk.During a dinner at the annual gathering of the Ciceronian Society on March 19, a glance at my phone profoundly changed the rest of the evening. It had been an intellectually stimulating day with fellow Christian thinkers, for which my wife and I were grateful to be part of. Something familiar caught my eye: the photo of a man I instantly recognized, Brandon Shah. We were part of the same staff group section within the larger U.S. Army Command and General Staff College class...

[Catholic Caucus] Irony Alert: Trads Follow Vatican II on the Liturgy Better Than the Novus Ordo World Follows ItIn the recent much-discussed letter from Cardinal Parolin to the French bishops, conveying the sentiments of Leo XIV, a certain phrase sticks out: “May the Holy Spirit suggest to you concrete solutions that would generously include those sincerely attached to the Vetus Ordo, while respecting the orientations set forth by the Second Vatican Council regarding the Liturgy.”Well, we might want to take another look at the Second Vatican Council’s Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, Sacrosanctum Concilium, promulgated December 4, 1963. Admitting that...

The government censorship machine took a huge hit Tuesday in a historic win for First Amendment rights. What is being billed as an “unprecedented” agreement will bar the three government agencies central to killing speech the Biden administration didn’t like from pressuring social media platforms from doing so in the future. “This case began with a suspicion, that blossomed into fact, that led to Congressional hearings and an Executive Order that government censorship of Americans’ social media posts should end,” said John Vecchione, Senior Litigation Counsel for the New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA), the nonprofit civil rights group that has...

A twisted Welsh teen obsessed with serial killers bludgeoned his mom to death with a sledgehammer after asking an AI bot, “What is a better weapon for murder?” Tristan Roberts, 18, deliberately waited until he was an adult before buying tools used to kill his mom, teaching assistant Angela Shellis, 45, blaming it on his “hatred for women” and a need for “revenge, justice and vengeance,” it emerged Wednesday as he was sentenced to at least 22 years in prison. He planned her killing for three weeks — spewing vile hatred online before turning to the Chinese AI bot Deepseek...

EVEN BY HIS chaotic standards, Donald Trump has just presided over an unusually wild week in his misguided war on Iran. The president had threatened imminent, punitive bombing of Iran’s civilian energy infrastructure. Though Iran didn’t quail, markets did. So a U-turn followed. Mr Trump said he had become aware of secret proposals for peace talks, and held off.

The GoFundMe for a Trussville man killed last week during Operation Epic Fury has reached over $1 million in donations. Maj. John A. "Alex" Klinner, 33, was one of six killed in an incident involving a KC-135 and another aircraft. Klinner's sister-in-law set up a GoFundMe to support Klinner's wife, Libby, and the couple's three children. Within hours, the fundraiser reached its $150,000 goal, and it was increased to $1.5 million after donations poured in, surpassing $1 million. Among donors was billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman, who gave $100,000. Two others killed in the incident were from the 99th...

Wellness influencer Dr. Casey Means' nomination to be U.S. surgeon general is stalled a month after senators of both major political parties grilled her on vaccines and other health topics during a tense confirmation hearing, deepening doubts about her ability to secure the votes she needs for the role. The nomination has languished despite ongoing efforts from the White House and Make America Healthy Again activists to convince lawmakers to carry it forward, revealing how intractable rifts over health policy can be even when Congress has shown deference to President Donald Trump's agenda. Means, a 38-year-old Stanford-educated physician who became...

A Democratic congresswoman accused of siphoning millions in federal disaster funds allegedly sought a presidential pardon from President Donald Trump at a White House Christmas party. Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (D-FL) was indicted in November on charges she stole $5 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Cherfilus-McCormick approached Trump last year seeking clemency, a source familiar with the exchange told The Hill, even as she publicly insisted she is the victim of persecution by his Justice Department. The allegations will be aired Thursday in the first public House Ethics Committee hearing. Cherfilus-McCormick has pleaded not guilty and criticised the...

Today, after ten years of fighting, I have reached a settlement agreement with the United States Government in my case regarding the Russian Hoax FBI lawfare against me.Nothing can fully compensate for the hell that my family and I have endured over these many years—the relentless attacks, the destruction of reputations, the financial ruin, and the profound personal toll inflicted upon us all. No amount of money or formal resolution can erase the pain caused by a prosecution that should never have been brought.This ordeal stemmed from partisan government officials in a coordinated effort to pursue an innocent man as...

The U.S. Postal Service on Wednesday said it is seeking to impose a temporary 8% fuel surcharge for package and express mail deliveries to deal with rising transportation costs, which include higher oil prices as a result of the Iran war. If approved by the Postal Regulatory Commission, the surcharge would take effect April 26 and remain in place until Jan. 17, 2027, the Postal Service said in a notice on its website. The 8% surcharge would apply to postage on Priority Mail Express, Priority Mail, USPS Ground Advantage, and Parcel Select products. First-class stamps and other mail services would...