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Austin, Texas residents are expressing outrage over police staffing shortages and longer 911-call response times in the aftermath of the city council's vote to defund the department in 2020. In February, a section of the city was notably left without a single police officer for a few hours on a Saturday due to the ongoing shortages. Austin Police Association President Michael Bullock, who called attention to the vacancy on X, told Fox News Digital that a steady decline in public safety has put the city on the "brink of disaster."

Explanation: Part of the Sun disappeared earlier this month, but few people were worried. The missing part, which included the center from some locations, just went behind the Moon in what is known as an annular solar eclipse. Featured here is an eclipse sequence taken as the Moon was overtaking the rising Sun in the sky. The foreground hill is Factory Butte in Utah, USA. The rays flaring out from the Sun are not real -- they result from camera aperture diffraction and are known as sunstar. The Moon is real, but it is artificially brightened to enhance its outline...

A police chief in Texas has abruptly announced his decision to leave the force after it was hit with major staffing shortages and a lack of funds since the 'defund the police' movement. Austin Police Department's Chief Joseph Chacon said he would be retiring with a 'heavy heart' on Monday, saying it was 'the right moment' to step down. He added that it was an 'absolute honor' to become the chief of police and urged officers to 'hold your heads up' and 'keep fighting the good fight'. In a statement, he said: 'Honor the profession by keeping the citizens of...

Explanation: The Whirlpool Galaxy is a classic spiral galaxy. At only 30 million light years distant and fully 60 thousand light years across, M51, also known as NGC 5194, is one of the brightest and most picturesque galaxies on the sky. The featured image is a digital combination of images taken in different colors by the Earth-orbiting Hubble Space Telescope, highlighting many sharp features. Anyone with a good pair of binoculars, however, can see this Whirlpool toward the constellation of the Hunting Dogs (Canes Venatici). M51 is a spiral galaxy of type Sc and is the dominant member of a...

The debate of whether or not to get vaccinated has caused a divide in other places besides politics. A new poll has revealed that Americans who’ve received the COVID-19 vaccine have stopped seeing people they know haven’t been vaccinated. The poll—conducted and released by Harris—has been keeping an eye on adults nationwide throughout the pandemic in order to gage changing political and social mindsets. After fielding a sample of 1,920 surveyed individuals from Sept. 10 to Sept. 12, Harris researchers found that 33 percent of those vaccinated are breaking away from family, friends and others who remain unvaccinated. Furthermore, 76...

Their “Love in the Time of Covid” cards in each save-the-date envelope spelled it out clearly: This October wedding would be a vaccinated-only event. After all, the groom’s father, who is vaccinated against covid-19 but immunocompromised, needed to be sure he could safely attend... The couple didn’t expect...someone who hadn’t been vaccinated showing up anyway. But then a family member disclosed some shocking intel: Michelle’s father and stepmom were planning to lie about having gotten the vaccine. “That obviously threw everything completely for a loop,” she says. Not only are Michelle and her father very close, but he’s also helping...

Altiyan Childs is a former Australian Rock musician, and a former Freemason. In 2010 he won The X Factor talent show award, which boosted his career in music to stardom status. In a video he released last month, he announced that he has now put his life on the line to renounce his secret Freemason vows. His life has recently changed after being awakened in a speeding car that was heading straight into a brick wall because the driver had fallen asleep. He says he heard a whisper in his ear that woke him from a deep sleep, and that...

Joe Glickman shares why he still wears two masks and goggles when he leaves his house, even after he's been fully vaccinated.Hilarious video at source:Why vaccinated man still wears two masks and goggles

Home Depot is the latest major retailer to drop its hardline mask policy, following others such as Target, Walmart, and Starbucks. Home Depot is among the latest to drop its policy requiring all customers to wear a face-covering in the stores. Per a spokesperson, fully vaccinated customers will no longer be required to wear a mask, but unvaccinated individuals “must still wear masks in Home Depot stores and in states where mask mandates remain in place, a company spokesperson for the home improvement chain told CBS MoneyWatch.” However, like other retailers, it does not appear Home Depot will ask customers...

It’s going to be hard for them to let go. You know those I’m talking about. The people in our midst who’ve made COVID the central focus of their lives for the last year. The friends, coworkers, neighbors, and perfect strangers emboldened to stroll right up to you and tell you exactly what they think about your maskless conduct or your gathering of one-too-many people at your private party.Here’s to you, the panicky parents who won't let your kids play on playgrounds outside, to the bureaucrats in towns, cities and states from coast to coast who’ve been getting contact highs...

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey was reluctant to ban President Donald Trump's account, and only acted after his team said that Trump's tweets were inspiring calls for violence among his supporters on Parler, according to a new report. As well, anxious Twitter employees compared the situation to IBM's work for the Nazis during World War II, pleading with him to ban Trump. Dorsey was working remotely a private island in French Polynesia on January 6 when Trump's supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol, and his top lieutenants pushed to suspend the president's account, according to an account in the New York Times.

Marijuana has been called a “Gateway” drug. The thinking is that once a person experiences the effects of pot, they will have lost their reluctance to try stronger drugs such as cocaine, meth and heroin. “I smoked pot and lived through it. I kind of liked it. Maybe the stronger drugs won’t hurt me. Maybe they will be like pot, only better. They probably won’t kill me. Plus, it’s kind of exciting.” We sit after this election wondering how so many of our fellow citizens feel the need to cheat to achieve a political goal. Cheating is against the rules....

Have you noticed how deeply invested Democrats and only Democrats are in this Covid-19 narrative no matter how non-lethal and non-threatening it has proven to be? Yep, the same people who have been willing to say anything and do anything to get rid of Donald Trump? –even frame him for something they did? I will concede one thing: The death rate is much higher than even they report because for seven months, they’ve been scaring people to death. Shelby County woman who passed away 6 months ago gets letter saying she is COVID-19 positive...

For months, I’ve been laying out evidence that: a new coronavirus was never properly discovered; the diagnostic tests are therefore meaningless; and most of the people who are sick are suffering from traditional illnesses which have been re-packaged under the empty umbrella label, “COVID.” Of course, most people in the world have a religious belief in the new virus. And that opens the door to: “psychological COVID.” Here is what it can look like. A person is watching TV for hours. He’s treated to wall-to-wall news, ads, public service announcements—all about the virus and the pandemic. After days and weeks...

Polls indicate that Americans are very poorly informed about COVID facts. That doesn’t surprise me, and I don’t think it should surprise anyone. A lot of people have trouble with complex scientific information, especially if there’s math involved. It doesn’t help, either, when the popular sources of information – the writers and pundits of the MSM, and/or social media – either don’t understand the information itself, or purposely present it in a skewed and/or confusing manner in order to stir up fear...It amuses me, in a bleak way, that the site reporting on this news gets it wrong, as well....

McEnany replied..."He's not in the business of 'basket of deplorable' politics. He doesn't talk about QAnon. He doesn't think about it."...McEnany said, "He has not at all looked into who QAnon is," calling it "some group on the internet..."...Until Wednesday, the president had remained silent on the conspiracy -- twice ignoring a question last week about whether he supports QAnon and in 2018 then-White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Trump “condemns and denounces any group that would incite violence against another individual."

“There are no solutions, only trade-offs,” Thomas Sowell famously said. When government takes action, even if that action is desperately needed, we still give something up. In the case of the Wuhan virus — with the endless mask mandates, social restrictions, and shutdowns it has ushered in — that something is our precious freedom. The American founders recognized this conundrum. According to James Madison in Federalist 37, one of the greatest challenges of the Constitutional Convention was to find the right combination, the right proportions, of government power and individual liberty. The more we ask from our government, the more...

LOUISVILLE, Kentucky -- A Kentucky couple is under house arrest after one of them tested positive for coronavirus and refused to sign self-quarantine papers. Elizabeth Linscott got tested for COVID-19 because she was planning to go visit her parents. "My grandparents wanted to see me, too, so, just to make sure that, you know, if I tested negative, that they would be okay, everything would be fine," Linscott said. After testing positive but without showing any symptoms, Linscott said the health department contacted her, requesting she sign documents. "I agreed to comply to call the Health Department if I was...

In a 911 call, you hear a dispatch operator tell an officer three people are “refusing to leave, not wearing a mask… they’ve asked several times and she refuses.” About three minutes later the operator tells the officer, “They’re calling back and advising that that female is pulling down her pants and is now urinating inside the business.” Roseville Police got to the scene and confirmed the incident to CBS13. Spokesperson Rob Baquera says officers arrested the woman after finding several stolen items from a nearby Dick’s Sporting Goods store in her vehicle.

OK, so the media has convinced Karen-America that we are all going to die. That it is not safe for kids to be in school. That we can't go to a baseball game. With that said....Could someone please identify any American who has DIED of COVID-19 and who, at the time of their death, was 1) under 80 years old AND 2) was reasonably healthy? Seriously. For you Twitter people, please tweet this out. I want names, locations, etc. No "urban legends" about someone's cousin. There must be newspaper articles out there of the COVID deaths involving the younger and...