Free Republic

Following the first direct talks between Russia and Ukraine after a nine-month pause, negotiators agreed to a large-scale prisoner exchange — as they have after nearly every round of talks — but little else to bridge the gap on the major issues dividing them, including a plan for postwar security in the region. There has also been no indication that Moscow has stepped back from its maximalist demands aimed at crushing Ukraine, as the country braces for what is likely to be its toughest winter yet because of relentless Russian strikes. The two-day talks in Abu Dhabi exposed a deepening...

“We will not rest until all of America’s great veterans can receive the care they so richly deserve,” President Trump said — a sentiment echoed by presidents of both parties going back decades. But for many veterans who come home seeking help with chronic pain, blast-wave brain injury, PTSD, depression, toxic burn pit exposure or moral injury, the reality can be a maze of bureaucratic indifference resulting in delayed or disjointed care. Veteran advocates dub it “institutional betrayal,” a term describing a rupture of trust when the institutions charged with caring for veterans leave them feeling dismissed or abandoned… And...

Though it’s been decades since I purchased this 78, it still never fails to move me. The electrically recorded voices of Henry Burr and Billy Murray, two giants of early 20th Century popular music, are heard together in this Al Dubin-Jimmy McHugh tribute to the fighting servicemen of The Great War. Though artist billed as the Peerless Quartet, the label also indicates vocal by a male quintet. Aside from the Murray narrative, the five singers at this session (according to the Victor ledgers) were Burr, Monroe Silver, Carl Mathieu, James Stanley, and Stanley Baughman. Transferred from 78rpm Victor 20098 -...

The agency has already had to increase security after six vandalism incidents in three months. Video and photos from the scene show individuals in tactical gear and fatigues marked “NOT A COP” standing with long guns and “Abolish ICE” banners near the building. Amid unverified reports of an increased ICE presence in Scarborough, several protesters have posted up outside the ICE facility with ARs. Chellie Pingree reacted to the reports of increased ICE presence: "This cruel, chaotic, and out-of-control agency needs to be abolished. And we need ICE out of Maine. Period." The protester pictured below has been stationed outside...

When Michel Houellebecq published Submission a decade ago, while Muslim terrorists were butchering cartoonists, the book’s calm unimpassioned description of France falling under the sway of a Muslim Brotherhood party with the gradual acceptance of the protagonist, a dilettante academic intellectual, who ends the novel by ‘submitting’ and converting to Islam, and the rest of society, French literary circles saw it as both fantastic and unrealistic. It’s a lot less fantastic now as Houellebecq faces a year in prison. During the 2022 interview, Houellebecq quipped that “what the native French population, as they say, wants is not for Muslims to...

Chilling photos reveal disturbing tattoos on the psycho ex-cop charged with fatally stabbing a Brooklyn jogger — but when colleagues at the school where he worked complained to higher-ups, they were told they were being “racist’’ and to simply stop looking at social media. At least 10 people filed complaints with officials at PS 200 in Brooklyn about suspected killer paraprofessional Sayed Mohassib just since September, including over his online tattoo snaps, troubling “blank stare’’ demeanor and him displaying his gun necklace to young students, sources told The Post. But the suspect’s worried colleagues were rebuffed by school administrators and...

NEW YORK — Big Tech is bowing to a bruising midterms that saw Democrats successfully use Silicon Valley as a foil. Nowhere is that hard pivot more on display than with Alex Karp, the CEO and co-founder of secretive tech giant Palantir, which bet massively on Trump 2.0 and became an administration darling in the process.Inside Palantir’s Manhattan lair, in an exclusive sitdown with Playbook, Karp — who once criticized the Democratic Party as “totally irresponsible” — deployed the word “progressive” eight times to describe his philosophy while acknowledging Democrats “absolutely” corrected in 2026 enough to win back his support...

ATLANTA - Georgia's next Secretary of State is turning her attention from the campaign trail to the work ahead. Judge Penny Brown Reynolds met with outgoing Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger at the State Capitol Tuesday as she prepares to take over the office in January. What they're saying In an interview with FOX 5's Deidra Dukes, Reynolds outlined her plans for the transition, her priorities for the office and the challenges of implementing a new voting system ahead of the 2028 presidential election. Reynolds says she plans to announce her transition team next week. She wants the group to...

There are reports of AI traffic cameras watching you and your car, but now even cars are being used to track how you drive. From when and how hard you brake and accelerate to showing your geolocation data, car companies have been found to track, collect, and also sell that data. All of which has led to increases in insurance bills and a lot of angry drivers. General Motors was found out to be secretly tracking, collecting, and selling details about driving patterns, behavior, and location. This was all done through the OnStar platform, a service that provides 24/7 support,...

(AP) - Stacy Keach, one of America’s finest stage actors who became best known for playing scruffy private eye Mike Hammer on TV and whose career was nearly derailed after he was imprisoned in 1984 for trying to smuggle cocaine into Britain, died Tuesday. He was 85. Keach died at home in Magdalenka, Poland, “after a long and difficult battle with a serious heart condition and heart failure,” his wife, Malgosia Tomassi Keach, said in a statement. Keach had previously suffered a heart attack onstage in Chicago in June 2017. Though he was considered a preeminent interpreter of Shakespeare and...

MADISON, Wis. -- At the very end of the Common Council meeting Tuesday night, District 10 Alder Yannette Figueora Cole took aim at the Police Civilian Oversight Board. Figueora Cole introduced a resolution, to be voted on at the council's next meeting on November 24, to suspend the PCOB. It came one day after the PCOB appointed the former alder for District 18, Rebecca Kemble, to replace the former interim independent police monitor, Aeiramique Glass. Glass was removed despite protest from the PCOB last month. She was provisionally appointed to the role at the end of 2025. That appointment was...

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier has subpoenaed the Democratic Socialists of America as part of an investigation into whether the group accepted donations or support from foreign countries such as Cuba and China. Uthmeier, a Republican, announced the move Tuesday in a video posted on X. “We are examining whether DSA accepted contributions or support from foreign sources of concern, including the regimes in Cuba and China,” he said, “and whether its fundraising from Florida donors has been fully transparent and lawful.” His office is looking into whether the DSA broke state law by accepting foreign money tied to its...

With an urgency commensurate with the stakes, temperate Americans of all political persuasions, but especially conservatives, should act together to implement this proposition: JD Vance’s ambitions must be stymied. He says Tucker Carlson (Putin fanboy, Hitler apologist, Churchill disparager, megaphone for Holocaust denial) is his friend, therefore Carlson belongs in the conservative movement. Vance said he will not throw Carlson “under the bus,” because a Vance virtue is acknowledgment of his debts: Carlson ardently lobbied Donald Trump to make Vance his running mate. A president’s character counts because the nation cannot count on the sufficiency of the Constitution’s Madisonian ingenuity....

A look at urban environmental hero, Taylor Frazier McCollum, billionaire Marxist Neville Roy Singham, and how 40 American data center projects were rejected by voters.Back in June, I reported on lawmakers’ warnings that China may be fueling opposition to American data centers, which is a serious concern worth keeping in mind as the backlash spreads. Now NPR offers a sympathetic profile of Taylor Frazier McCollum, whose organizing helped put a $5 billion Maryland data center project on hold, even as the surrounding county struggles with a budget deficit and the region is struggling economically. Frazier McCollum is one of a...

The Trump administration acted Tuesday to cut millions more Americans from the nation's largest food assistance program, even as enrollment continues to fall from other administration cuts. A proposed rule issued by the Department of Agriculture would limit automatic eligibility for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, also known as food stamps, for households receiving cash aid under the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Program. Currently, households receiving TANF benefits qualify for SNAP without needing to meet federal income thresholds. TANF eligibility varies by state but is generally 130% to 200% of the federal poverty level. SNAP eligibility is generally 130%...

Rabb, the far-left congressman-elect in Philadelphia, is refusing to comment on an ugly boycott of Jewish businesses in his district on the anniversary of KristallnachtDEMOCRATS Revealed: Chris Rabb Has Longtime Relationship With Organizers of Antisemitic Boycott He Won’t Condemn, Joined Them in Effort To Free Cop-Killer Mumia Abu-Jamal Rabb, the far-left congressman-elect in Philadelphia, is refusing to comment on an ugly boycott of Jewish businesses in his district on the anniversary of Kristallnacht Chris Rabb (Matthew Hatcher/Getty Images) Chuck Ross November 10, 2026 Socialist congressman-elect Chris Rabb—under fire for failing to speak out against a far-left "bicycle boycott ride" targeting...

The United States is at war. Whether you like that or not does not change it, and pretending otherwise only opens you to your adversaries. I am not talking about Iran. That is the war you can see on television, and it will end with a ceasefire. The war I mean is with China, it has no front and no end date, and it is the one that decides the next decade. A central thesis of my work is that we are running a wartime economy for exactly this reason. It is not a black and white war with declarations...

Austria's government on Wednesday launched plans to tighten the country's laws against spying, which at present explicitly ban espionage directed against Austria itself but not if it targets other countries or international organizations. Austria is a European Union member that has a policy of military neutrality dating back to the 1950s. Its capital, Vienna, is host to several U.N. agencies including the International Atomic Energy Agency. It is also the home of other international groups such as the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, or OPEC. "Espionage is a real threat...

The head of Iran's Supreme National Security Council Secretary vowed Wednesday that Tehran would not allow the removal of "even a single particle of enriched nuclear material" from the country, casting doubt on diplomatic efforts as the U.S. has long sought a peace deal that would see Iran give up its enriched uranium.President Trump has argued that he needed to launch the war with Iran to prevent the Islamic Republic from obtaining a nuclear weapon, which the regime has always denied any intention of doing. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters Tuesday that "crazy Islamists in Tehran will never ever...

There's no shortage of takeaways from last Tuesday's shellacking, but one of the most unfortunate is the door the GOP's drubbing opened for radical Islam. In Michigan, which is sounding more like an arm of the Tehran propaganda machine every day, two of the most powerful offices are laying an unnerving groundwork for the nation's next chapter. As Senator-elect Abdul El-Sayed openly warned in his victory speech, winning his seat was never the goal. "The goal is to use that seat to transform our politics." And that's what every American should be afraid of. El-Sayed's success, which seemed impossible in...