Free Republic

For the past half hour or so, FR has been slow to respond, with a long delay. Refreshing a page pauses for 10-30 seconds, then suddenly bingo it's there. All other sites are acting normally. I'm on Spectrum in Upstate NY with very high-speed cable. No other symptoms. Anybody else noticing a longish delay to get a page from FR? Disclosure: I'm spoiled. The early years of FR were pretty slow all the time, and JohnRob has had this site working extremely well for so long now that a 10 second pause is unusual. Kudos JohnRob, and I hope if...

Details were still being ironed out, but it was confirmed yesterday that the world could now look forward to another debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden. While Biden's list of conditions to agree to the debate made the rounds on social media, Trump's list of demands was not made public… until now. The Babylon Bee has obtained the following list of Donald Trump's debate demands: Benny Hill music must be played whenever Biden wanders around the stage: His aimless shuffling will be much more entertaining to the viewing audience set to "Yakety Sax." Moderators have to be smoking hot:...

WASHINGTON, D.C. — To avoid further embarrassment from bewildering and offensive speeches, White House officials have installed a breathalyzer on Kamala Harris's microphone. The decision was reportedly made in a closed-door meeting in which top administration advisers elected to equip her with a microphone that won't turn on unless she tests free of mind-altering drugs, and below the blood alcohol concentration threshold of 0.08%, "Hopefully this will help us avoid more disaster," said one White House insider. "We've just been going into these speeches blind. Everything will seem to be going smoothly, then all of a sudden she's up...

NEW YORK CITY, NY — Former President Donald Trump made sure members of the jury in the Stormy Daniels hush money trial knew the adult film actress was much much hotter when he first met her. "She was an eight or a nine back then, let me tell you," Trump explained to members of the jury. "Now she's a bit of a dog; Dogface Daniels, that's what they call her. But not when I met her, I would never touch a dog, not a dog guy. Not that I did touch her…but if I had…she was smokin'. Don't know what...

President Joe Biden made significant changes to Title IX last week, expanding the definition of the word "woman" to an emoji of someone shrugging followed by a pride flag. There were other changes, however, that flew under the radar. The Babylon Bee has compiled the following comprehensive list of Title IX changes imposed by the Biden administration: Every women's bathroom must now have glitter dispensers for drag queens: It's always important to freshen up with new glitter after a trip to the restroom. Breastfeeding in public is outlawed as it may make trans women feel inadequate: Making the men...

U.S. — O.J. Simpson has passed away from cancer at the age of 76. According to sources from the afterlife, the former football star is looking forward to asking God who really killed his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson. "I've been racking my brains for decades trying to figure out who may have done it," said Simpson. "It will be great to have all my questions finally laid to rest. I really can't imagine who might have committed such a crime." At publishing time, O.J. Simpson's questions unfortunately remained unanswered after a majority-black jury declared him "not dead."

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Doing their part to engage in the day's traditional hijinx, the United States Congress played a hilarious April Fools joke by announcing they are working hard to serve the American people. In the ridiculous gag, timed perfectly to coincide lawmakers assured the public they are toiling tirelessly to devise solutions to the pressing problems faced by everyday Americans, totally owning their constituents in the process. "We promise to do our best," Nancy Pelosi while holding back a snicker during a Congressional press conference. "The American people have our solemn pledge that everything we do in Washington,...

NEW YORK, NY — After news broke that the bond amount in his fraud case had been lowered from $454 million to $175 million, former President Donald Trump announced he would pay the bond in its entirety with bags of nickels. Trump notified the court that preparations had already been made for a fleet of armored trucks to arrive at the courthouse and begin unloading cases and cases of freshly minted and rolled nickels totaling $175 million. "Beautiful, shiny nickels. So many nickels," Trump said in his announcement. "It's a total sham that I have to pay anything, but...

OTTAWA — In a groundbreaking decision that sent ripples across the geopolitical landscape, the Canadian Supreme Court has ruled that the term "Justin Trudeau" is outdated and should instead be replaced with the more inclusive term, "Person With A Vagina." The unanimous ruling asserted that using the narrow term "Justin Trudeau" fails to accurately represent the diverse spectrum exemplified by the person who currently holds the position of Prime Minister of Canada. "We must move beyond archaic labels that do not reflect the full breadth of our society and indeed the person who governs it," declared Chief Justice Richard...

Another State of the Union address is upon us! As frightening as that may be to hear, it is important for the American people to hear from the president and find out about all the things that have been accomplished in the last year. Here are the top accomplishments Biden covered during his speech: Creation of several brand new words: This will be accomplished just during the speech itself. Finalization of the Louisiana Purchase: He will announce he hammered out the deal with Napoleon last week. The Mexico-Egypt border has been totally secured and there are no problems down there...

Every few days the past month, my phone receives a text message from an unknown number, purporting to be Nikki Haley, and telling me to get information on how to support her by clicking a link in the message. YEAH, RIGHT. Of course, it's almost certainly not really from Nikki, it's MALWARE from some cretin looking to scam me. So I hit "Delete and Report Junk". Again, and again, and again.... I'd guess a lot of folks are getting these. BTW, I'm in Upstate NY, registered Independent. Man, I really hate malware scammers. Find 'em and hang 'em.

PALM BEACH. FL — In a surprise move, former President Donald Trump endorsed Bud Light as the "Official Beer Of MAGA" and announced trans icon Dylan Mulvany as his running mate in the 2024 election. "Dylan Mulvaney is the greatest woman, the most fantastic woman, anyone who doesn't think so is a total RINO," said Trump at the announcement. "When you think of making America great, you think of baseball, Donald Trump, drinking Bud Light, and Dylan Mulvaney. We're going to take America back, believe me." The controversial pick was met with immediate applause from the crowd at Trump's...

A Florida man has chosen the next cultural wars flashpoint he will rally behind in an effort to mobilize the 2024 US presidential electorate: central bank digital currencies (CBDCs). "Such a currency would give a federal government, our federal government, the absolute control over your money," the former Wrestlemania star declared of CBDCs from a rally in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on Wednesday. "They could take your money – you wouldn’t even know it was gone. This would be a dangerous threat to freedom." The busy former reality television host and American president took a moment away from his E. Jean...

ARLINGTON, VA — In an announcement that comes on the heels of history-making achievements in flight crew diversity, aerospace giant Boeing has revealed its new aircraft features larger lavatories so all-female crews can go to the bathroom together. Similar to the celebration of aircraft manned by an all-female crew, the announcement of extra-large bathrooms aboard the new airplanes was hailed as an enormous step forward that will allow these female flight crews to continue the time-honored-yet-mysterious tradition of women traveling to the bathroom in groups. "Our groundbreaking female crew members have spoken, and we have heard them," said Boeing...

SCARSDALE, NY — As thousands of illegal migrants continue to arrive in New York, a local white liberal resident was seen quietly removing his "All Are Welcome Here" sign from his front yard. The man, who asked to remain anonymous to avoid being canceled by friends and neighbors in his gated community, removed the sign shortly after seeing yet another bus full of foreign nationals arrive down the street. "I want them to feel welcome here…but not, like, HERE here," he said as he tossed the sign away and out of view. "I believe very strongly that these people...

U.S. - As society becomes increasingly dominated by nerds, hipsters, and computer programmers, people have fixated on what they think is our biggest problem: masculinity. "It's just toxic and causes nothing but problems," said Elisha Mcewen, a vegan activist and no threat whatsoever to spiders or tight jar lids. "I was sharing my feelings on masculinity with other men in my drum circle, and we all agreed that if we ever encountered masculinity, we would run far away." Masculinity is said to have in the past been the cause of such things as violence, war, bullying, defeating the Nazis,...

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The nation rejoiced yesterday as smoke rose from the White House, indicating the elderly President has survived yet another year. "Look! There it is!" said a jubilant crowd of bureaucrats, Chinese spies, and other interested onlookers as Biden's 81 birthday candles were set ablaze and produced a column of thick, black smoke that rose into the horizon above the nation's capital. "The President! He still lives! Rejoice, for our leader's body still draws breath, leaving us free to keep running the government behind his back!" Sources say the plume of smoke was visible for miles around...

SAN FRANCISCO, CA — Elon Musk has generously offered to give Mark Zuckerberg $1 billion to simply change Facebook's name to "Faceboob." "Think of how much happier everyone will be logging onto 'Faceboob'," said Mr. Musk. "I already jotted down some great ideas for the new site logo. They're pretty good, if I do say so myself. Just trying to do a little good for humanity." The offer comes on the heels of a similar proposition Musk made to the head of Wikipedia this week to change the name of the online reference site to something quite clever that...

Some of its suggestions are poison. Others - like banana and tomato tea - might as well be An AI recipe generation bot released by New Zealand discount supermarket chain Pak'nSave has raised eyebrows for recommending home cooks whip up chlorine gas cocktails, bleach rice, and combine .The "Savey Meal-bot" web app is powered by GPT-3.5. It automatically generates recipes from a list of ingredients chosen by users, then provides instructions on how to cook the made-up item. One user decided to play around with the chatbot, suggesting it create something with ammonia, bleach, and water. Savey Meal-bot obliged, spitting...

WASHINGTON, D.C. — As part of his administration's expanding efforts to celebrate Pride Month, President Joe Biden has announced the Iwo Jima memorial will be updated to feature the Pride flag. "This flag is now the most revered symbol in our nation," Biden said during his announcement. "It's only right for the Iwo Jima memorial to be updated to represent the brave men and women and non-men and non-women and those other things who are fighting even more bravely than the soldiers of World War II. These fellas with breasts who were on my lawn — they're the true...