Free Republic

A report in Israel’s Israel Hayom says that President Donald Trump is “disappointed” in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and has decided to make his next moves in the Middle East without him. The report, published in Hebrew and citing two sources close to Trump, would seem to corroborate the observation that Trump has cut Netanyahu out of his decision-making process on major policy steps. Last month, Trump surprised Netanyahu by announcing that the U.S. would begin “direct” talks with the Iranian regime over a new nuclear deal. And this week, he surprised Israel again by announcing that the U.S....

On Thursday’s broadcast of CNN’s “AC360,” New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) said that she would make sure education funds are spent properly, but “Heaven help the Republican states who might take that money and do something that’s not focused on feeding hungry kids, helping kids with disabilities, and everyone else that the Department of Education helps.” And declared, “Just leave everybody alone. Leave the parents alone, leave the kids alone.” Hochul said, “Right now we get $6 billion from them in New York state, 2 billion for Pell Grants to give people a pathway to higher education, $2 billion...

The alleged spree killer who fatally stabbed three people in Manhattan told cops in a chilling confession that he targeted his innocent victims because they were “alone” and “distracted,” law-enforcement sources revealed Tuesday. The revelation about the purported cold-blooded admission by Ramon Rivera, 51, came shortly before he shuffled into Manhattan Criminal Court for his arraignment on three counts of first-degree serial murder. The bearded, raggedy Rivera sat stone-faced as Assistant District Attorney Megan Joy recounted how he allegedly attacked three times — and “with no provocation” — in an hours-long frenzy Monday morning that stretched from the West Side...

A 93-year-old Florida man allegedly confessed to twice trying to kill his wife of 60 years — because he “did not want to leave her alone” when he died, according to cops. Helmut Lockner was arrested on Saturday after his wife said he crept up on her watching TV and tried to strangle her with some rope — weeks after he tried to smother her with a pillow, according to the Marion County Sheriff’s Office. Lockner allegedly told detectives he planned to kill himself with the same rope, telling them that he “is dying and did not want to leave...

A member of the U.S. Secret Service was robbed at gunpoint Saturday night in California during President Joe Biden's high-profile fundraising swing. Scripps News reported Monday that officers from the Tustin Police Department responded to a call and found that the victim was a member of the Secret Service who had fired off his own gun during the robbery. It is unclear if the perpetrator was injured and by Monday afternoon the Tustin, California Police Department said it was still investigating the incident. Secret Service spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi confirmed to Scripps that a member of the U.S. Secret Service was...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Friday after meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken that there was no alternative to an attack in Rafah, and that Israel was prepared to do so without U.S. support. While thanking Blinken for American help thus far, and while sharing his concern for civilians in Gaza, Netanyahu said that “we have no way to defeat Hamas without going into Rafah and eliminating the rest of the battalions there. And I told him that I hope we will do it with the support of the U.S., but if we need to, we will...

Nearly 30 percent of American households comprise a single person, a record high...Solitaries make up 39 percent of households in Denmark, 45 percent in Finland, 42 percent in Germany, 38 percent in the Netherlands, 39 percent in Norway and 40 percent in Sweden.

Philadelphia this week became the first major U.S. city to bring back its mask mandate in response to rising cases of the BA.2 coronavirus strain, which could test the limits of a pandemic-weary public. Beginning Monday, residents of the City of Brotherly Love will be required to wear masks while in public indoor spaces and businesses will be required to report on each other regarding noncompliance.

Italian police have discovered the mummified remains of a 70-year-old woman sitting at a table more than two years after she died, prompting calls for better care for older people in the country. Marinella Beretta, who had no living relatives, was found in her house in Prestino near Lake Como in northern Italy. Police stumbled upon her remains when they made a house call during high winds in Lombardy, which risked uprooting neglected trees in her garden. She had not been seen by neighbours for at least two and a half years, according to Italian media reports. Her neighbours, who...

Merry Christmas! I hope everyone is having a good evening. This is, I think, the tenth edition of the annual thread dedicated to those among us who, for whatever reason, find ourselves solo on the night before Christmas. Here in my cozy habitat, it's just me, my faithful hound and, a little later, Ralphie Parker and then George Bailey will make his yearly appearance. The presents are wrapped and under the tree. After dinner, I'll imbibe a latte and then maybe a little vino. Anyone else solo tonight?

The most terrifying force of death comes from the hands of Men who wanted to be left Alone. They try, so very hard, to mind their own business and provide for themselves and those they love. They resist every impulse to fight back, knowing the forced and permanent change of life that will come from it. They know that the moment they fight back, their lives as they have lived them, are over. The moment the Men who wanted to be left alone are forced to fight back, it is a form of suicide. They are literally killing off who...

To the extent that Mitt Romney, handsome rich guy, is a sympathetic figure, it is because his attempts to prostrate himself before the left fail so consistently. The “binders full of women” comment, perverted as it was by the media, was also a total capitulation to the idea that there ought to be more quotas and affirmative action in hiring. But even then – even then! – they still painted him and Paul Ryan as racists who wanted to kill grandma and crawl through your window at night to steal your birth control. The lesson Republican voters took away was:...

In a discussion about trusting in God when times are bad in Bible class right now, we learn that Christians are to have a specific trust in God when leaders and/or society are evil. God promises to, in His time, to remove evil and make things right. Throughout history, he has. Then the thought came out in class which reflects what is happening right now in society. Evil people reject God's Word and the principles found there. So, when events, leadership and decisions don't go their way, evil people panic, have intense anxiety and react in violent, destructive ways. Instead...

Donald Trump on Friday denied claims from fellow 2016 Republican presidential contender Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) that Trump’s friends at the National Enquirer and Trump “political henchmen” are behind a story that the Texas senator engaged in several extramarital affairs. Trump posted a statement on Friday responding to the Cruz accusation: I have no idea whether or not the cover story about Ted Cruz in this week’s issue of the National Enquirer is true or not, but I had absolutely nothing to do with it, did not know about it, and have not, as yet, read it. Likewise, I...

Due to really bad family dysfunction I'm staying at my apartment alone on Christmas. It's the most difficult thing one can do. You just never, ever adjust to it.

In 1947, a group of Christians in Nebraska formed a fellowship known today as the Berean Church Fellowship. The name of the group is borrowed from the Acts of the Apostles 17:11, which the group quotes on their Web site (www.bereanchurchfellowship.org): "Now the Bereans… Received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true." The fellowship’s Articles of Faith begin with the following statement: "We believe the Bible, consisting of both the Old and New Testament Scriptures in their entirety, is the only divinely inspired, inerrant, objectively true, and authoritative...

It's highly unlikely we're alone in the universe, NASA experts are saying, and we may be close to finding alien life. In fact, it may happen in the next two decades. NASA held a panel discussion at the agency's Washington headquarters on Monday, where space experts talked about the search for Earth-like planets that host life. Based on recent advancements in space telescope technology, scientists estimated that in the coming decades we'll confirm suspicions that we're not alone. "I think in the next 20 years we will find out we are not alone in the universe," NASA astronomer Kevin Hand...

Michigan woman dead for six years found only after money runs out For six years the bills were paid, the grass was cut and no one noticed the body of the dead woman sitting in the back seat of a car in a garage of a residential Pontiac, Michigan neighborhood. Her mummified body was finally found this week by someone dispatched to check on the property that fell into foreclosure after the money ran out of her account and the mortgage payments stopped, police said on Friday. "It is kind of the perfect storm for a mysterious set of circumstance...

<p>There also was not a herd of pink elephants walking in the Reflecting Pool in DC, but I can't prove there wasn't. See the point?</p>

THE recent announcement by a team of astronomers that there could be as many as 40 billion habitable planets in our galaxy has further fueled the speculation, popular even among many distinguished scientists, that the universe is teeming with life.The astronomer Geoffrey W. Marcy of the University of California, Berkeley, an experienced planet hunter and co-author of the study that generated the finding, said that it “represents one great leap toward the possibility of life, including intelligent life, in the universe.” But “possibility” is not the same as likelihood. If a planet is to be inhabited rather than merely habitable,...