Free Republic

Joe Biden is being encouraged to replace Kamala Harris with a blast from the past to aid his floundering chances at re-election. Biden, who has struggled in the polls nationally and in key swing states, has left Democrats wondering if major change is needed to beat Donald Trump Questions and doubts exist over the health and ability to perform the job of Biden, at 81 Harris - the first female and first black vice president in American history - has also struggled, with poll numbers saying a majority of Americans don't think she would be a good president. Pulitzer Prize-winning...

Donald Trump has opened up on the potential existence of aliens, and revealed discussions he has had with 'serious' fighter jet pilots who claim to have seen UFOs in America. The former President appeared as a guest on YouTuber-turned-WWE star Logan Paul's podcast on Thursday, and no subject was off the table as they discussed the war in Gaza, Joe Biden, America's drug crisis and deepfakes. Trump was even quizzed on extra-terrestrials and asked whether he believes in the existence of aliens, UFOs or UAPs. 'It's such an interesting question,' Trump began. 'I've met with pilots that look just like...

(Kitco News) – The established financial world order of the past 50 years is now transitioning to a new and unknown paradigm as the petrodollar agreement between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia was allowed to expire this past Sunday. The term ‘petrodollar’ described the U.S. dollar’s (USD) role as the currency used for crude oil transactions on the world market. It traces back to the early 1970s when the United States and Saudi Arabia struck a deal shortly after the U.S. went off the gold standard – and the agreement has had far-reaching consequences for the global economy. The petrodollar...

The University of Minnesota paused the hiring of a professor who wrote that Israel’s military operation against Hamas in Gaza after Oct. 7 was “a textbook case of genocide” to head the school’s Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies (CHGS), Jewish Insider has learned. The pause, which has not yet been publicly announced by the university, came on Monday evening after two members of the center’s advisory board resigned in protest on Friday. Segal, who was selected as the center’s new director by Ann Waltner, the interim dean of the College of Liberal Arts at University of Minnesota, also co-authored...

Diversity bosses in Washington state accused a student council of promoting white supremacy for suggesting a mural of hammer-wielding Norse god Thor could represent their school team. Students at Mountain View High School in Vancouver offered a mural of the god - whose name translates as 'thunder' - to decorate a wall in a newly renovated building as their senior gift. Its team is nicknamed 'The Thunders' and there is already a Thor statue in the school's main entrance. But the AI image they came up with horrified the district's equity office which demanded the god be removed or accompanied...

A factory in China is developing hyper-realistic humanoid robots that can chillingly mimic human facial expressions and emotions in scientists' latest attempt to replace workers with machines. Ex-Robots, a robotics firm based in the northeastern coastal city of Dalian, is trying to create lifelike droids that engineers hope will soon be used in the healthcare and education industries. Terrifying footage from inside the Ex-Robots factory shows workers surrounded by piles of disembodied heads, neck-length silicone masks and spare limbs as they work to construct the most complex class of robotic products in the world. Drawings of robot designs are adorned...

Chinese officials have been forced to apologise after a hiker found a secret waterpipe supplying China's tallest waterfall. The video, posted to TikTok's sister app Douyin on Sunday, showed a large water main embedded at the top of Yuntai Mountain Waterfall, touted as China's tallest uninterrupted waterfall. Millions of tourists visit the 1024ft-tall waterfall every year, drawn in by the ancient geological formations that date back more than a billion years. Officials for Yuntai Mountain Geopark, a UNESCO-listed site, made a bizarre social media post, apologising for the additional pipe by speaking as the waterfall itself. 'I didn't expect to...

Doctors across the US are reporting an alarming health trend in the wake of the pandemic. Since about 2021, they are noticing rare and unusual cancers in patients who shouldn't fit the bill - many of them young and without family history of disease. Cancers that typically affect seniors in their 70s, and 80s are now striking people in their 40s, including bile duct and rare blood cancers. The pandemic forced people to isolate and put off preventative care measures that would screen for various types of cancers, out of fear of being infected. But doctors do not believe this...

A New York City couple got their hands on about $100,000 in cash from a safe they pulled up from a lake while 'magnet fishing' in Corona Park. To pull of this unique feat, James Kane and Barbie Agostini attached a neodymium magnet - which go for as little as $21.99 on Amazon - to a fishing rod and reeled the old safe out from the depths of the water. And at first, it was a mundane discovery because as Kane told NY1: 'We have found plenty of safes before, this is just what a magnet fisher does.' The couple...

A US police officer from the city of San Diego resigned after an ’embarrassing incident’ emerged last year, where he was forced to seek help from a fellow policeman after he became locked in the backseat of his police cruiser with a woman he had arrested for suspected car theft. The officer identified as Anthony Hair had been assisting in the arrest of individuals suspected of car theft on the night of August 15, 2023. One of the arrested individuals was a woman with an outstanding bench warrant, according to the KFMB San Diego outlet. According to the internal investigation,...

PETA is trying to tempt Stormy Daniels into being the face of their new anti-horse racing campaign with a mock-up ad targeting Donald Trump. The animal rights organization wrote to the former adult film star this week asking her to be the face of a PSA to 'protect horses from the cruelties of horse racing'. They included a 'rough mock-up' of what the campaign would look like and promised it would take a jab at the former president. In the ad, Stormy stands with her back to a racetrack with the caption 'Nobody likes a two-minute ride. Turn your back...

Liberal Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor admits she sometimes finds herself in tears over the rulings of the conservative dominated high court. Sotomayor, 69, is one of three remaining Democrat-appointed judges on the court alongside Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson. While she's always been in the minority on the court, recently the court has taken a more rightward turn under a 6-3 majority, which includes the repeal of Roe vs. Wade. In a talk as she was given an award at Harvard's Radcliffe Institute Friday, she admitted it brings her to tears sometimes. 'There are days that I've come...

An iconic American eatery's stock has plummeted in recent week after the company's CEO said the restaurant is no longer 'relevant'. Cracker Barrel, the Southern country-themed restaurants with 662 locations across the nation, has been diminishing in popularity over the past decade - with its loyal clientele of elderly people failing to return after the pandemic. The business tanked even more when its chief executive Julie Felss Masino told investors, 'We're just not as relevant as we once were.' While speaking on an investor call, Masino, who took over the CEO position nine months ago, admitted, 'Some of our recipes...

silver is up $1.75 today so far

Tony McFarr passed away Monday at his home outside Orlando, Florida. His family say they are yet to learn how he died, but Farr's mom Donna told TMZ his passing was 'unexpected and shocking.' The Orange County Medical Examiner told the outlet that it is running toxicology reports as it investigates the death. McFarr was a talented stuntman known for his work in Jurassic World, Antman and The Wasp and Darkest Minds among others, stepping into the shoes of some of Hollywood's biggest names. McFarr stood in for Pratt's as Star Lord in the popular Marvel Universe franchise movies. The...

President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden are carrying a personal debt of up to $815,000, their financial records show, and no one is buying the president's books. Most of the couple's debt is the mortgage on their Delaware home and an equity loan on that home. In total, the Bidens reported assets between roughly $1 million and $2.6 million and liabilities between roughly $350,000 and $850,000, according to an Office of Government Ethics form that lists ranges rather than precise figures. The Bidens' financial records, along with those of Vice President Kamala Harris and her husband Doug Emhoff,...

EVs may be safer for the environment but owners claim the vehicles are causing harm to their health. There are growing reports of electric car drivers suffering motion sickness, dizziness and nausea from the vehicles' braking and acceleration systems. And a former Tesla owner has claimed that she experienced nosebleeds, hair loss and 'debilitating' body pains while using the vehicle she purchased in 2021. While she was not entirely sure the Tesla was at fault, the Georgia resident and said her symptoms disappeared after selling the car. Tesla owners have had to trade in some models because the air conditioning...

The oldest human viruses, including herpes, have been uncovered in 50,000-year-old Neanderthal bones - and experts could soon recreate them. Researchers at Brazil's Federal University of São Paulo identified remnants of the herpesviruses, which causes cold sores, the sexually transmitted papillomavirus and adenovirus, also known as the common cold, in two male Neanderthals' DNA found in a Russian cave. Previous theories suggested that Neanderthals may have gone extinct because of viruses and the latest study may be the first to provide evidence for this idea. Now, the team hopes to synthesize the viruses and infect human cells in a lab...

When North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un released his latest song two weeks ago, surely he couldn’t have foreseen it becoming a hit on TikTok. But the propaganda tune has gone viral online with Gen Z users bopping around to the synthy-electro pop. “Let’s sing Kim Jong Un, the great leader/ Let’s brag about Kim Jong Un, our friendly father,” the song goes. It’s just a really great tune, TikTokkers say. “Taylor Swift was not expecting to get blown out of the water right after dropping her new album,” one fan joked online. “Wait, this slaps”, “This song needs a...

HONG KONG, May 2 (Reuters) - A senior U.S. official on Thursday urged China and Russia to match declarations by the United States and others that only humans, and never artificial intelligence, would make decisions on deploying nuclear weapons. State Department arms control official Paul Dean told an online briefing that Washington had made a "clear and strong commitment" that humans had total control over nuclear weapons, adding that France and Britain had done the same. "We would welcome a similar statement by China and the Russian Federation," said Dean, principal deputy assistant secretary in the Bureau of Arms Control,...