Free Republic

Officials have a plan to whittle down the institution’s projected deficit to $3 million through expense shaving and revenue increases. ... Dive Brief: University of Maine’s senior leadership outlined a plan that would slash the public institution’s expected fiscal 2028 nonacademic budget deficit from $9 million down to $3 million. The plan relies on expense cuts including an unspecified number of layoffs, along with some combination of shorter employee appointments and vacancy eliminations in several units — athletics, student life, strategic partnerships and the president’s office. Leaders are also looking at consolidating UMaine’s research centers. At the same time, they...

NASA Confirms SpaceX's Starship Refueling Estimate! | 17:21 Ellie in Space | 232K subscribers | 1,683 views | October 23, 2026

Zillow and Thumbtack found property taxes, maintenance and insurance now add $1,380 a month beyond mortgage payments ... The hidden costs of homeownership are rising and have increased by nearly one-third in the last five years as expenses like insurance, maintenance and property taxes take a bite out of homeowners' budgets. A new report by Zillow and Thumbtack found those costs amount to about $16,566 per year, which amounts to roughly $1,380 a month in addition to a mortgage payment. Within the $16,566 total cost, the typical U.S. homeowner faces about $11,171 in annual maintenance, $2,266 for homeowners insurance and...

A federal appeals court has struck down an Indiana law meant to protect pregnant teen girls and keep their parents involved, clearing the way for Planned Parenthood to take minors out of state for secret abortions without parental consent or a judicial waiver. The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in August that Indiana’s 2017 “aid-or-assist” statute violated the First Amendment. The law barred anyone from knowingly helping a teen girl obtain an abortion unless the state’s parental consent requirements were met or a court granted a bypass. Planned Parenthood sued before the measure could take effect, arguing it...

🚨 BOOM: The New York Times just had to pull 15 midterm polls after the "pollster" behind them ADMITTED almost all of it was FAKE. The firm is called Wedgewood Polls. It pumped out made-up numbers from June to October, and the Times put them right on its official poll tracking pages. The Times says it vetted them first. Wedgewood's own words on how easy it was to fool the media: "Far too easy." This is the same paper telling you which polls to trust. Trump has been saying it from day one. Now they're proving it for him.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky says 9.5 million Ukrainians out of its population of almost 40 million are abroad since the war started. "This war pushed them out of Ukraine, 9.5 million. Can you imagine?" he says. "If the population of your country is 40 million, can you imagine that 20% to 25% are abroad from the beginning of this full-scale invasion?" he adds.

PHILADELPHIA, PA — NBA officials believe they've finally found a way to get LeBron James to stand at attention during the national anthem and show some respect by giving him a Chinese flag to look at. James, in his first game for the 76ers, was seen practicing his golf swing during the national anthem at this year's season opener at Madison Square Garden. The NBA received hundreds of complaints as a result, forcing league officials to figure out the best way to get the veteran player to sit still like an adult. Then it hit them: China. A Chinese flag,...

Durban Father Takes on 3 Would-Be Hijackers and Saves the Day A father in Durban faces a terrifying hijacking attempt but turns the tables on three would-be hijackers, shooting and killing all three.

We don’t watch a lot of television in our home anymore. Especially Disney. And there’s a good reason. The entire entertainment industry has departed from its seemingly harmless mission of turning us into couch potatoes and making us laugh. It has now become our primary catechism for moral and spiritual formation. And Disney has become the high priest of this secular humanistic self-worship religion masquerading as innocent entertainment for children. “Coven Academy,” produced by Disney Kids & Family, opens October 1 and will reportedly follow teenage witches, warlocks, and a vampire at an elite magical boarding school. Disney’s “First Look”...

Rep. Ilhan Omar insisted she’ll keep voting in Minnesota as feds probe her immigration history, brushing off questions about whether the investigation could threaten her US citizenship. Omar spoke briefly after casting her ballot in Minnesota, where she’s up for reelection amid a federal immigration probe into whether she married her brother, lied about her birthday and has been living under an alias. Asked by reporters whether this would be her last time being able to vote, Omar defiantly shot back: “No, and I’ll continue to vote.” The congresswoman then hurried away from reporters and said federal officials haven’t told...

Disgraced Max Factor heir Andrew Luster has been banned for life from the California county where he carried out multiple rapes in the late 90s, the Daily Mail has exclusively learned. Pervert Luster, now 62, was sprung from prison last week and is living in a modest $700,000 bungalow in the small city of Glendora – 25 miles east of downtown Los Angeles. But while the serial predator has been cut loose, the Daily Mail has learned that his freedom has come with severe conditions, including three years on parole, a life ban from Ventura County and an ankle monitor...

A new critical Internet security vulnerability has been announced, and it’s really, really bad. The PHP Foundation has revealed two serious vulnerabilities that could impact millions of websites. Security experts warn that failure to quickly patch the flaws could have dire consequences. Internet security and web administration teams around the world are scrambling to prevent widespread disaster. On Wednesday, the developers behind the much-used PHP programming language released emergency security updates designed to fix critical flaws that could be exploited to allow attackers to gain dangerous remote control of victim systems. The PHP Foundation detailed the two critical vulnerabilities—CVE-2026-109618 and...

Explanation: Looking toward the north from Mullion, New South Wales, Australia, the Andromeda Galaxy never gets more than a few degrees above the horizon. During the southern hemisphere spring, Andromeda is highest in the sky around midnight though. And in this telephoto scene from October 10/11, multiple exposures were used to reveal the spiral galaxy in tantalizing detail as it climbed above rolling Australian hills. Also known as M31, the Andromeda Galaxy is one of the brightest objects in the Messier catalog, but is only visible to the unaided eye as a small, faint, fuzzy patch. Digitally tracked and stacked...

(The Center Square) - Colorado voters will decide in less than two weeks whether to ban surgeries that change the genders of minors. If Proposition 135 passes on Nov. 3, doctors across the state will be prohibited from performing procedures to alter minors’ sex characteristics. Prop. 135’s description says a “Yes” vote would prohibit surgeries on minors that would “alter their biological sex characteristics as a treatment in response to a minor’s perception of sex or gender, and prohibits the use of government funds or health insurance to pay for the surgeries.” The bluebook ballot guide provided by the Colorado...

Congressman Keith Self (TX-03) introduced a bill to repeal the Diversity Immigrant Visa Lottery. The Diversity Immigrant Visa Lottery program offers permanent residence to up to 55,000 applicants annually from countries with historically lower levels of immigration to the US, many of them in Africa. A California judge ruled the U.S. State Department must reinstate the program after the Trump administration had suspended it last December after a Portuguese national who received a visa through the program was suspected of killing four people in two separate shootings in Rhode Island and Massachusetts. “We cannot allow activist judges to dictate our...

SENATOBIA, MS. (WMC) - The Senatobia police officer who shot and killed 1-year-old Kohen Wiley in a Walmart parking lot in June has resigned from the force, attorneys for the Wiley family told Action News 5. Officer Hunter Foster’s body camera footage, just released by the Mississippi Department of Pubic Safety, shows him running out of the store with other officers after a Walmart employee told him accused shoplifters were on the run. Within 13 seconds, Foster’s gun was aimed at the car with Wiley inside it. What the video shows Body camera audio captures officers shouting “Stop the car....

Lawsuit asks judge to delay finalization of vote if tossup election could have been swung by having two candidates named Dan Sullivan on the ballotWASHINGTON—President Trump said he asked the Justice Department to sue Alaska to prevent certification of the state’s Senate results if the Republican candidate loses, an extraordinary move by his administration to intervene legally in the 2026 midterm elections.The Justice Department filed the lawsuit in federal court in Alaska, citing the potential for voter confusion because the ballot there includes retiree Dan J. Sullivan Jr. in addition to the Republican incumbent Sen. Dan S. Sullivan, who is...

A major Democratic super PAC also pulled out of the race in the final weeks. Senate Majority PAC, which is aligned with Democratic leadership, announced a $42 million investment in the state earlier this year. A group tied to the super PAC spent $29 million before cutting its funds in mid-October. Saving America’s Future, a pro-Trump group run by former White House aide Taylor Budowich, last week gave $1 million to NC First, a super PAC that has been funding pro-Whatley television ads, according to campaign finance reports. The amount, however, is significantly less than what Republican-leaning groups have already...

What started with a Walmart driver’s tip about dozens of packages piling up at a Peoria home led investigators to a $1.2 million fraud scheme stretching from the Valley to Southeast Asia. The Walmart driver told police on Aug. 22 that he’d delivered 30 to 50 packages under different names to the same home in just a couple of days. Days later, a victim reported their Walmart account had been hacked and used to buy items. Those two reports sparked a two-month investigation that ended Thursday morning with six arrests, according to newly released court documents. Investigators say the group...

On Thursday's CNN This Morning, Mark McKinnon offered a snide suggestion about President Trump’s sexuality. Commenting on Trump’s habit of sizing up male physiques, McKinnon said: “Check Truth Social just to make sure he doesn’t have a Grindr account.”Get the rest of the story and view the video here.