Free Republic

Until recently, Hamideh Soleimani Afshar and her daughter were green card holders living lavishly in the United States. Afshar is the niece of deceased Iranian Major General Qasem Soleimani. She is also an outspoken supporter of the Iranian regime who celebrated attacks on Americans and referred to our country as the "Great Satan." This week, I terminated both Afshar and her daughter's legal status and they are now in ICE custody, pending removal from the United States. The Trump Administration will not allow our country to become a home for foreign nationals who support anti-American terrorist regimes.

(At the link-click, the song hosting web page solely populated with audio-podcast control, lyrics and sheet-music.) Battle Hymn of the Republic Julia Ward Howe (1862) Anonymous, Traditional American (John Brown's Body) 1. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord; He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored; He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword; His truth is marching on. Refrain: Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! His truth is marching on. 2. I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling...

Bruce Springsteen, 76 years young, last week kicked off his new tour with a now-old ritual: histrionically denouncing President Donald Trump — the one thing all right-thinking people can agree on, right? “We are now, to many, America the reckless, unpredictable, predatory rogue nation. That is this administration’s and this president’s legacy,” lectured The Boss. Yet the Baby Boomer’s bluster brings up a crucial question for the entire left, from establishment Democrats to the wokest socialists: After Trump, what? For now, the prez is their entire raison d’etre. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s every media appearance centers on painting Trump...

Yes, the United States inherited the institution of chattel slavery from the British Empire, as it was already well-established in the British colonies of North America long before the American Revolution and independence in 1776–1783. Historical ContextThe first recorded arrival of Africans in the English colony of Virginia occurred in August 1619, when an English privateer ship (the White Lion) brought "20 and odd" Africans—seized from a Portuguese slave ship—to Point Comfort (near modern-day Hampton, Virginia). These individuals were initially treated as indentured servants rather than lifelong chattel slaves, but this event marked the beginning of African forced labor in...

Patrick Colbeck reposted@amuse@amuseDRIVE-BY MEDIA: Obama purged nearly 200 white military officers including dozens of flag officers. The media called it leadership. Trump removes 6 officers & they call it a coup. The drive-by media does not have standards. It has a team.April 3, 2026

Explanation: From pole to pole our fair planet is captured in this snapshot from space, an evocative image from a window of the Orion spacecraft Integrity. From the spacecraft's perspective the Sun is moving behind Earth's bright limb along the lower right. Africa and the Iberian peninsula are in view on the pale blue planet's surface, while aurorae crown Earth's south and north poles at top right and bottom left. Commander Reid Wiseman took the historic picture on Artemis II mission flight day 2 (April 2), after the completion of the planned translunar injection burn. That burn boosted the spacecraft...

On March 5, Politico economics correspondent Victoria Guida made it clear she's frustrated that President Trump isn't losing momentum. noted That March piece is dripping with frustration and irritation, starting with the headline: "Trump Keeps Gambling With the Economy — And Getting Away With It."Well it now appears that same bitterness on the part of Guida has carried over into April as reflected in title of her Friday story, "Job growth shatters expectations in March, in boost to Trump." And if you missed the bitterness in the title, the subtitle makes it quite clear, "That report gives the president some...

4 April 2026 Holy SaturdaySeville-Cathedral Readings at MassThere is no Mass on Holy Saturday itself. Here are the readings for the evening Easter Vigil.First readingGenesis 1:1-2:2God saw all that he had made, and indeed it was very goodIn the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was a formless void, there was darkness over the deep, and God’s spirit hovered over the water. God said, ‘Let there be light’, and there was light. God saw that light was good, and God divided light from darkness. God called light ‘day’, and darkness he called ‘night.’ Evening came...

President Donald Trump said Friday that VP J.D. Vance “is now in charge of ‘FRAUD’... In his Truth Social post, Trump claimed that fraud “is massive and pervasive” in the U.S. and said of Vance that “the job he will be doing, in conjunction with many great people within the Trump Administration....” “We will call him the ‘FRAUD CZAR,’” Trump continued, “ his focus will be ‘EVERYWHERE,’ ... in the unprecedented theft of Taxpayer Money. The numbers are so large that, if successful, we would literally be able to balance our American Budget.” The President did not offer evidence for...

A good hat trick.

The ultra-funky single by The Beatles and Rolling Stones alumnus entered the Billboard Hot 100 on March 31, 1973.The keyboard confidant of both The Beatles and the Rolling Stones was adding to his solo heritage on March 31, 1973. The late and much-missed Billy Preston, a cherished contributor to the work of both bands and many others, entered the Billboard Hot 100 that day with the ultra-funky “Will It Go Round In Circles.” It was strangely fitting that, just over three months later, this great solo track by the man who’d played on “Get Back” and with George Harrison...

Uh oh, a new crop of deadly airbags just dropped. In all seriousness, airbags are lifesaving devices that are an integral part of the safety systems in all new cars sold in the United States, so when they start killing people it's no laughing matter. Yesterday the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration released findings that "suggest substandard Chinese air bag inflators, likely illegally imported into the United States, are to blame for 10 fatalities and two serious injuries in a dozen crashes over the past three years. All 12 crashes involved Chinese frontal driver air bag inflators manufactured by Jilin...

A’ja Wilson’s close friend Michael McManus, widely known on social media as Deloris, reacted following the NCAA women’s Final Four matchup between the UConn Huskies and South Carolina Gamecocks on Friday, which concluded with Geno Auriemma involved in a heated confrontation with Dawn Staley, Wilson’s former coach. Auriemma, who coached the defending champion UConn in its 62-48 defeat to Staley’s South Carolina, approached the Gamecocks bench in the closing moments, leading to a In a post on X, Deloris labeled Auriemma “classless” and issued a strong accusation: “Geno is a classless piece s**t who has built his legacy on sabotaging...

The niece and grandniece of slain Iranian mastermind Gen. Qasem Soleimani were arrested by US officials, the State Department announced Saturday. Hamideh Soleimani Afshar and her daughter, who live a lavish lifestyle in Los Angeles, were nabbed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Friday as the US pushes to revoke green cards for foreign nationals with ties to Iran while locked in a war with the regime.

Matt calls Stephen A.’s criticism of LeBron “BS” because he also criticizes famous Black people on his show.Former NBA player Matt Barnes called out ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith for criticizing LeBron James for his comments about the Memphis Grizzlies. James was recently on the “Bob Does Sports” show with Robby “Bobby Fairways” Berger, and the Los Angeles Lakers star called Memphis and Milwaukee boring NBA cities while also declaring that the Grizzlies should just move to Nashville. Skip Bayless calls the Lakers the Dallas Cowboys of the NBA: "Everything they do gets ridiculously exaggerated"Skip Bayless calls the Lakers the Dallas...

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From my experience, one of the most difficult things to do in life is to cross a threshold. I would like to be able to claim that I do so bravely and boldly. Sadly, human frailty being what it is, that has often not been the case. Sometimes it has required tornado public transport to move me from Kansas to Oz. Sometimes I have crossed by accident while playing hide and seek with myself and my fears in the back of a wardrobe. The problem with thresholds is there is only one thing to expect ­­— the unexpected. Such is...

Removing the word “church” from our name has been proposed and the decision was made recently to weigh the extent of interest in replacing “church” with something else. Our group conducted a survey to gauge support and we received a total of 295 responses from members and friends of the UUCB. For the first question, respondents were asked to indicate their support ranging from “strongly disagree (1)” to “strongly agree (5). The table below indicates their level of support. The reasons given by those in agreement with the change (groups 4 & 5, 49.2%), fell under two general themes: Lack...

When you think of biblical epics in film, what comes to mind? Do you envision Charlton Heston hefting the Ten Commandments in, well, The Ten Commandments? Or maybe Charlton Heston locked in a life-or-death chariot race in Ben-Hur? Or Charlton Heston in … well, you get it. Charlton Heston was in a lot of those movies. But one biblical epic that Charlton Heston wasn’t in? The Prince of Egypt. The 1998 film wasn’t produced by Old Hollywood, but a different kind of studio: DreamWorks Animation. Though the inspiration for the film—wasn’t far off from Old Hollywood. DreamWorks co-founder and former...

A Chinese satellite equipped with a robotic "octopus arm" has passed a key refueling test in low Earth orbit (LEO), according to state-run media. The achievement highlights China's continued leadership with this particular technology, which NASA has not yet caught up with. The experimental spacecraft will eventually deploy a giant balloon in LEO, which could help solve another important issue surrounding satellite "megaconstellations" like SpaceX's Starlink network. The satellite, dubbed Hukeda-2 (also known as Yuxing-3 06 within China), launched March 16 aboard the Kuaizhou-11 rocket from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, according to the website of Jonathan McDowell, a now-retired astronomer...