Free Republic

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent must be feeling chafed. Last month, amid rapidly rising interest rates on federal debt, he announced that his department would double its typical longer-term bond buybacks, from $2 billion to $4 billion. The idea was that, by boosting demand for Treasuries, yields might come down and the government would be able to borrow additional money at lower cost. And yields did come down a little bit — for about a day. Then they shot right back up to where they began.

A sculpture inspired by a desire to bring a contemporary "everywoman" to Trafalgar Square has been unveiled on London's Fourth Plinth. Lady In Blue by New York artist Tschabalala Self, which pays homage to a young, metropolitan woman, is the 16th artwork to feature on the plinth since 1998. The bronze and blue figure replaces Mil Veces un Instante (A Thousand Times in an Instant) by Teresa Margolles. The statue has been patinated with a pigment refined from Lapis Lazuli, a semi-precious stone that has been used by artists for millennia. Self said she had set out to put an...

Former President George W. Bush warned that Americans risk forgetting a critical lesson of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks if the United States turns inward and ignores threats developing overseas. "Our nation occasionally goes through isolationist periods, where the attitude is, 'Well, we've got too many problems at home. Therefore, who cares about what happens overseas?'" Bush said Wednesday, according to CBS News. "Which really means to me they just don't pay attention to the lessons of 9/11, because what happens overseas matters to our national security at home." Bush delivered the warning at his presidential library in Dallas...

The families of 9/11 victims opposed to Zohran Mamdani’s attendance at the 25th anniversary memorial have received celebrity support. Banging his gavel in the name of respect for the 2,977 lives lost on September 11, 2001, Adam Levy, son of world-renowned Judge Judith “Judy” Sheindlin, and star jurist of forthcoming CBS series “Adam’s Law,” is unabashedly backing the throng of protestors who’ve called for Mamdani’s exclusion from this year’s annual remembrance ceremony at Ground Zero, Friday, at 8:46 a.m. “Don’t show up at this memorial when you’ve supported radical Islam in the past,” Levy raged to The Post about Hizzoner....

Following the Hamas assault on Israel in October 2023, many American campuses erupted in turmoil—not due to the brutality of the attack, but in support of the Palestinian cause. In the minds of many American students, professors, and administrators, the Israelis are the aggressors and “had it coming.” Anyone who expressed support for Israel was apt to be harassed or even assaulted by pro-Hamas zealots. Jewish students were singled out for vituperation and taunts like “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free!” indicating a desire to see Israel wiped off the map. Encampments sprang up as activists...

Academic and author Gad Saad calls it “suicidal empathy.” Think of the term the next time some media hack lionizes New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a midwit influencer praises Hasan Piker, or another church is converted to a mosque that is a viper’s nest of anti-American Islamic fundamentalism if not also repository for weapons. Obviously we failed to learn the lesson that our enemies so savagely wrote on the World Trade Center towers, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania a quarter century ago. America’s response to Sept. 11, 2001, was first the proliferation of those asinine “Coexist”...

The Indiana Supreme Court has declared incumbent Senator Spencer Deery the winner of his primary race against Trump-backed Paula Copenhaver. When reached for comment, Deery said the court’s decision made him proud. “This was a lot bigger than me,” he said. “It says that Indiana is a place where if you do everything right as a voter: you vote, you check all the boxes, you show your ID, you register, your vote should count.” Paula Copenhaver did not respond to WFYI’s request for comment. The decision ends a months-long legal battle over who is the rightful winner in Indiana’s 23rd...

A male juror in the mistrial of Lindsay Clancy said the lone holdout on the 12-person panel wrapped one of the exercise bands the mom used to kill her children around a water bottle to mimic their strangulation in the deliberation room. Juror number 10 Nick Dargie said the holdout had every right to his opinion but that the reenactment using the same exercise bands left the room speechless. “I was so shocked. We’re not here to play detective – it’s not a game of Clue. This is serious,” Dargie, 25, the fifth juror to come forward in the macabre...

Illegal migrants excused from Sunday Mass obligation: Indiana archbishop Foreigners who are willfully breaking America’s immigration laws do not have to go to Mass on Sundays or Holy Days of Obligation this month, according to the Archdiocese of Indianapolis.Migrants who are in violation of the country’s laws are also now excused from attending Mass on Sundays and Holy Days of Obligation, according to a new directive from the Archdiocese of Indianapolis.Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents are currently working their way through Ohio and Indiana, arresting illegal immigrants. As a result, Archbishop Charles Thompson released a decree, written in Spanish, dispensing...

President Trump on Wednesday floated the idea of issuing every American adult a $5,000 “dividend” check if his party kept control of the House and Senate in November — an extraordinary offer that would cost more than $1 trillion and likely would require congressional approval. “It will be called the Trump dividend,” he said at the Republican midterm convention in Dallas. He added a caveat: The money must be spent in the United States, though he did not say how the government could track where private citizens used the funds. He offered few additional details about the idea. How could...

I spent thirty-eight minutes last week debunking September 11 conspiracy theories one by one with Shabbos Kestenbaum on PragerU’s The Brief. Many of you are familiar with the most popular ones: Jet fuel cannot melt steel; WTC 7 was brought down by explosive charges; a missile struck the Pentagon; dancing Israelis are evidence the Mossad was behind the terror attack. I have had some variation of that conversation since 2003, when McGraw-Hill published my New York Times bestseller, Why America Slept. That book raised serious and some still unanswered critical questions about whether some senior Saudi royals and Pakistan’s air...

Progressive Church To Allow Mail-In Attendance Church Sep 3, 2026 · BabylonBee.com PORTLAND, ME — Progressive local church First United Methodist of Portland announced that it would now be offering a mail-in attendance option for its parishioners. In an effort to avoid discriminating against attendees who may not be willing or able to actually appear for service in person, the church decided to give congregants the option to record their attendance by mail. "Mail-in attendance is no different than attending church in person. It counts exactly the same," explained Pastor Damien Wagner. "Simply request an attendance card from the church,...

President Trump’s pledge to distribute $5,000 to every U.S. adult if Republicans win the midterms is drawing backlash from Republicans and Democrats as the president’s allies are forced to explain and defend the proposition. Fiscal hawks, including Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), openly questioned how the government would be able to afford to pay 270 million Americans that much money, while others have likened Trump’s proposal to bribery. “Maybe some of us think dependency is evil & soul-sucking in all its forms,” Roy wrote in a post on the social platform X, referring to Trump’s idea. Former Rep. Bob Good (R-Va.),...

Explanation: What does this image look like to you? Many see a giraffe facing right, with neck stretched high and long legs mid-stride (but some may see a squirrel instead). The featured image shows LDN 1295, also called the Giraffe Nebula, in the constellation of the mythical queen of Aethiopia (Cassiopeia). It is an object in the Lynds Catalogue of Dark Nebulas, compiled in 1962 by American astronomer Beverly Lynds, a pioneer for women in astronomy and astrophysics. Dark nebulas are interstellar clouds of dust and gas that block the visible light of the stars behind them. These nebulas are...

Grindr, the world's largest LGBTQ+ dating app, reportedly went down as the Republican National Convention's midterm event began on Wednesday. According to Downdetector, the app reported several outages just as the conservative event kicked off at the American Airlines Center in Dallas, Texas ahead of the speech of Donald Trump The highest number of reported outages appeared to occur in and around the Dallas area. "Man, I should become a Republican," joked one person on X. "Well, they say it's a big tent," posted another person. It comes after Trump's furious 5-word outburst at his pilot before storming off was...

WILMINGTON, DE (September 10, 2026) — Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) announced today a major Second Amendment victory in its Rigby v. Jennings lawsuit, with the United States District Court for the District of Delaware holding that the State’s bans on possessing and self-manufacturing so-called “ghost guns” are unconstitutional. The decision comes nearly four years after FPC first secured a preliminary injunction against Delaware’s possession and home-manufacturing bans. In its new merits decision, the Court granted FPC’s motion for summary judgment in part and rejected Delaware’s effort to defend its prohibitions under the Supreme Court’s Second Amendment framework. “Delaware tried to...

It starts with the generals and goes straight through political waste and fraud in his ballooned-up budget and ends with a demoralized force of soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines. That will be Pete Hegseth’s legacy when he’s gone, and it will take at least a decade and probably more to repair the damage he has done to our nation’s security. The New York Times reported last week that Hegseth “has fired or blocked the promotions of more than 80 generals and admirals.” The Times called it a “purge,” and that’s what it is. Ten percent of the military’s high-ranking leadership...

The UK’s agreement with France to return small boat migrants is facing renewed uncertainty, with Andy Burnham appealing directly to President Emmanuel Macron to preserve a deal that officials fear Paris could abandon. The arrangement, which is due to expire at the end of the month, allows Britain to return people who have crossed the English Channel illegally in exchange for France accepting an equivalent number of asylum seekers for transfer to the UK. A UK government source said France was “on the verge of pulling out” of negotiations, as the two governments have yet to agree terms for extending...

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Behold, what the world needs more of: An obese black woman in cartoon form! From the BBC: Lady In Blue by New York artist Tschabalala Self, which pays homage to a young, metropolitan woman, is the 16th artwork to feature on the plinth since 1998. ... Self said she had set out to put an ordinary contemporary Londoner on a site more usually associated with statues of monarchs and military commanders. 'My work Lady In Blue will bring to Trafalgar Square a woman that many can relate to,' the artist said. Question: Trafalgar Square is a monument to the great...