Free Republic

The world’s richest person has quietly become by far the biggest known midterm donor, trying to save Republicans’ Senate majority with some of the largest donations in American political history.Elon Musk has quietly funneled more than $276 million into Republican groups and his super PAC since the start of July, building a huge turnout operation to help the party battle headwinds in the midterm elections.The staggering amount of money makes Mr. Musk, the richest person in the world, by far the largest known donor in the midterms. Representatives for Mr. Musk supplied the previously unreported figures on his political giving...

Explanation: How many moons can you see? The best answer is five: four orbiting Jupiter and Luna orbiting Earth. This multi-moon picture was possible because Earth's Moon moved directly in front of Jupiter last week. The featured image is a series of exposures near alignment taken from Westchester, New York, USA. The sunlit crescent of Earth's Moon, on the lower left, is overexposed, while the Moon's night side, on the upper right, is faintly illuminated by Earthshine. Lined up nearly vertically above our Moon, listed from bottom to top, are Jupiter's bright Galilean satellites: Ganymede, Io, Callisto, and Europa. Callisto,...

It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s a… yep, it’s a plane. Fleet Week took over San Francisco over the past few days, with the Blue Angels scorching through the skies, bringing San Franciscans to their rooftops to take in the spectacle and causing pets to cover in fear. And of course, it brought swarms of sailors out to the Marina, North Beach and other shore-adjacent neighborhoods.

ERIE, Pa. — Matthew S. Stone, also known as Matt Stone, has reportedly been identified as the suspected gunman in a deadly mass shooting at a residence on Perry Street in Erie, Pennsylvania, on Friday, October 9, 2026. The shooting reportedly claimed nine lives, including those of his daughter, Angelina Stone, and her two young children, according to information shared by family members and other reports. Authorities responded to a residence at 722 Perry Street at approximately 5 p.m. after receiving emergency calls reporting gunfire. The incident developed into an hours-long standoff before officers entered the home and found multiple...

When President Trump’s former personal lawyer, Alina Habba, married a Turkish businessman last month, the lavish ceremony cemented their status as a power couple. Ms. Habba, 42, a longtime Trump loyalist, and Turhan Mildon, 29, an investor, hosted some of Washington’s most powerful people, including Attorney General Todd Blanche, the F.B.I. director, Kash Patel, and Will Scharf, the White House counsel. At that point, his patrons could no longer protect him. Mr. Maduro was not only out of power, but sitting in an American jail. Mr. Saab, Mr. Mildon’s most powerful ally in Venezuela, was arrested and extradited to the...

The disgraced musician returned to the low-security federal prison in New Jersey before sunrise, conscious and talking, according to TMZ. Sources at the prison told TMZ the injury was not life-threatening. It is not clear how he was injured. A Combs representative told Page Six, “We are aware of the reports concerning Sean Combs and are working to confirm the circumstances.” Combs has been in custody since September 2024. He was convicted last year of two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution and acquitted of the more serious sex-trafficking and racketeering charges. In October 2025, a judge sentenced him...

One of the latest narratives disseminated widely by abortion advocates is the claim that induced abortion (intentionally killing human beings in the womb) is central to the idea of reproductive and economic 'justice' for women. But killing humans should never be offered as a sort of 'solution' to financial hardship. Key Takeaways: * The Center for Reproductive Rights recently released a flawed, non-peer-reviewed study promoting the message that women need abortion because having children is too expensive. * Abortion advocate Jessica Valenti appeared on Vox Media's "America, Actually" podcast to discuss abortion, which she claims is an "affordability" issue. *...

WASHINGTON, D.C. — As public debate continued over the scheduled live-streaming of terrorist Nidal Hasan's death by firing squad, President Donald Trump told liberals who are uncomfortable with public executions to just imagine that it's a healthcare CEO. Trump's suggestion came on the heels of public outcry that live-streaming Hasan's execution is barbaric. The trick, Trump said, is for the liberals to view the man who went on a murderous rampage at Fort Hood and killed 14 people with the same level of disdain as an executive of a healthcare corporation. "If they picture him that way, they'll cheer for...

Former Planned Parenthood director, Abby Johnson, joins Nicholas Bowling to explain why she left the abortion industry after witnessing an ultrasound-guided abortion. Abby and Nicholas discuss abortion procedures, the dark realities of the abortion industry, and how to respond to the issue to help END abortion. Chapters: 0:00 Introduction 2:24 From Planned Parenthood to Pro-Life 8:50 The Abortion That Changed Everything 16:49 Surgical Abortion vs. Chemical Abortion 20:23 Is it Just a “Clump of Cells”? 24:58 What Really Happens Inside an Abortion Clinic? 29:59 Why People Work in the Abortion Industry 33:38 LGBT in the Industry & Abortion Funding 37:59...

Nidal Hasan is a savage Islamic terrorist who killed 13 innocent US service members at Fort Hood in 2009. He deserves the death penalty, nothing less. But the idea of broadcasting his execution publicly — livestreaming it — is beyond grotesque. America is supposed to be a model nation, with the highest values, a shining light that leads the world into a civilized future. The spectacle of a publicized, glamorized execution sends us in the opposite direction. It signals a type of gloating and bravado unbecoming a proud, moral country. America is not a medieval caliphate. Our leaders aren’t supposed...

The Reagan Revolution didn't just usher in a wave of prosperity, but also wholesome patriotism. Every proper child of the 1980s has a wisp of nostalgia for the times. Reagan was an actor, and Hollywood wasn't so uptight about politics. Producers then shoveled cash into content that lionized the military, pleased the White House, and made America's blood pump. Veterans like Clint Eastwood and Chuck Norris practically reinvented the patriotic chic genre that died off after the 1960s, when Hollywood grew tired of making World War II movies and hunting commies. One of my early memories was soaking in this...

Judge P. Kevin Castel for the Southern District of New York ruled that "any ICE arrest of a person who enters the country without legal authorization that doesn't occur at the scene of the commission of the crime is arbitrary and capricious." Judge Castel rejected the government's "argument that an arrest policy, or absence of an arrest policy, is beyond judicial review because the place of an arrest is left entirely to the discretion of the agency." Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Markwayne Mullin called the ruling "absolutely bonkers. In essence, the Judge is saying that unless a criminal...

ChatGPT Article SummarySummary: Mexican Cartels Steal U.S. Rental CarsMexican drug cartels are increasingly stealing vehicles from U.S. rental agencies, transporting thousands across the border annually to supply cartel leaders with luxury cars and provide transportation for drug smuggling and armed operations. Popular targets include Cadillac Escalades, BMW SUVs, Ford Raptors, Jeep Wranglers and heavy-duty pickup trucks. Some trucks are modified with ballistic armor, gun mounts and firing ports.California is a major target, alongside Texas and Arizona. Cartel operatives use several methods, including recruiting Americans through social media to rent vehicles, exploiting rental-company procedures, and using stolen identities at rental kiosks....

Acouple of weeks ago, the winning entry of the annual Nikon Small World in Motion contest was embroiled in a controversy, with experts alleging the undisclosed use of AI in creating some parts of the video. At the time, the winner, Ning Xu, an optical engineer at Tsinghua University, and Nikon Instruments Inc. maintained that he only used AI for image enhancing, which fell within the competition policy. Nikon had also noted that “this particular use of AI—as a tool for enhancement of microscopy-generated source data, not for image generation from scratch—to be in compliance with the rules set forth...

The structure was concealed just beneath the forest floor in the foothills of the eastern Taunus Mountains, on the northern outskirts of Frankfurt, according to a September 25 announcement from the Hesse State Office for Monument Preservation. The temple is rectangular and measures about 16 feet long. Inside, it appears to have contained a smaller, square chamber with just three roughly 20-inch-thick walls, Thomas Kurella reports for Hessenschau... Archaeologists unearthed this temple during ongoing excavations of the Kapersburg fort -- a Roman military fortification thought to date back to the second century... likely constructed under the reign of Emperor Trajan...

A motorist who struck and killed a Pakistani international student who was praying in the middle of an Adelaide road has been given a suspended prison sentence and banned from driving for a decade. Samia Malik, 20, was seen by witnesses and caught on CCTV appearing to kneel in prayer for almost four minutes on North East Road in Hillcrest on the night of May 6, 2025, before she was hit by then-19-year-old Ashton Jacob Friend. Friend, who kept driving because he thought he had hit a kangaroo, pleaded guilty to causing death by careless use of a vehicle and...

NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University Beneath its pock-marked, craggy exterior, the Moon is thought to harbor a network of caves and tunnels from its volcanic past. Now, NASA has selected a mission to go investigate a promising window into our space rock’s subterranean secrets. Gaping up at outer space, as if mugging for the orbital satellite cameras, is the Marius Hill Pit, a hole on the lunar surface that’s thought to be up to 150 feet deep and up to 300 feet across. Scientists believe it’s an example of a skylight — the collapsed roof of an underground lava tube, which forms...

New York Attorney General Letitia James, the hyper-partisan Democrat who built her career targeting President Trump, is now facing a formal bar ethics complaint for publicly prejudging the “Cornell 7” sexual assault case just days before Governor Kathy Hochul appointed her special prosecutor. According to the New York Post, the National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC), a Washington, D.C.-based watchdog organization, filed a nine-page bar complaint against James with New York's Attorney Grievance Committee on Friday, October 9. The complaint accuses James of a clear, incurable conflict of interest and a “flagrant, obvious and therefore shocking” violation of the New...

In the last few days, the titles of YouTube videos about Europe have tended toward the exceedingly agitated: “They’re Destroying France” (October 6); “France Has Collapsed” (Rubin Report, October 8); “We’re Watching France’s End” (October 9); “France Is on Fire” (Triggernometry, October 9); “The Siege of London” (Bill O’Reilly, October 8); “Germany’s Crisis: Why Living Here Is Impossible Now” (October 3). What a fascinating moment it is in Western European history. Not a happy moment, not a promising moment, but certainly fascinating. Not so very long ago, Germany, France, and Britain were world powers; now all three of them are...

In 2019, Princeton University’s Program on Science and Global Security simulated a potential nuclear conflict between the United States and Russia. In one series of escalatory exchanges, the United States expended between 930 and 1,080 nuclear warheads.1 These simulated figures represent 65–76 percent of U.S. strategic warheads deployed on missiles and bombers as of March 2023.2 With limited remaining warheads and a degraded NC3 network, could the United States effectively deter China in the aftermath?In a 2024 report to Congress, DoD updated its estimate of China’s stockpile of nuclear weapons to more than 600 operational warheads.4 If this trajectory continues,...