Free Republic

Magnitude: 7.5 Origin Time: 4/2/2024, 6:58:00 PM Depth: 7 mi.Lat: 23.8° N Lon: 121.7° E Location: TAIWAN

"U.S. intelligence officials have determined that the Chinese spy balloon that flew across the U.S. this year used an American internet service provider to communicate, according to two current and one former U.S. official familiar with the assessment." "The balloon connected to a U.S.-based company, according to the assessment, to send and receive communications from China, primarily related to its navigation. Officials familiar with assessment said it found that the connection allowed the balloon to send burst transmissions, or high-bandwidth collections of data over short periods of time." More at link

MAJOR X-CLASS SOLAR FLARE: Earth orbiting satellites have just detected an X1-class solar flare from Earth-facing sunspot AR2887. The blast at 1535 UT on Oct. 28th created a massive tsunami of plasma in the sun's atmosphere: The blast also hurled a CME into space. Coronagraph images are not yet available, but evidence for a CME is already pursuasive. The USAF reports strong Type II and Type IV radio emissions generated by a CME plowing through the sun's atmosphere. In addition, energetic particles accelerated at the leading edge of a CME have already reached Earth. When will the CME itself arrive?...

"They called it “Starfish Prime.” On July 9, 1962, the US military exploded a thermonuclear warhead 250 miles above the Pacific Ocean. What happened next surprised everyone. Witnesses from Hawaii to New Zealand reported auroras dancing overhead, magnificent midnight “rainbow stripes” that tropical sky watchers had never seen before. Radios fell silent, then suddenly became noisy. Burglar alarms sounded as local streetlights in Honolulu went black." ...Snip..."Geomagnetic storms are famous for causing power blackouts. snip... EMPs can do it, too. Lurching magnetic fields cause electrical currents to flow through the ground. Literally, rocks beneath your feet begin to tingle with...

"There are 11 meteor showers peaking in October every year. Here the brief description of these awesome space events that will light up the autumn sky of October. Keep your eyes to the sky and enjoy!"

This post is to provide a link to information regarding the upcoming August 4th Primary Election for Kansas FReepers to review.

United States Court of Appeals FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT No. 20-5143 September Term, 20191:17-cr-00232-EGS-1Filed On: July 30, 2020In re: Michael T. Flynn,Petitioner BEFORE:Srinivasan, Chief Judge, and Henderson, Rogers, Tatel, Garland,Griffith, Millett, Pillard, Wilkins, Katsas*, and Rao, Circuit Judges US Court of Appeals Columbia District O R D E R Upon consideration of the petition for rehearing en banc, the responses thereto, and the vote in favor of rehearing en banc by a majority of the judges eligible to participate, it is ORDERED that this case be reheard by the court sitting en banc. It is FURTHER ORDERED that...

"Like all symbols of American patriotism, the Fourth of July has meant different things in different times and places. In Memphis in the first decades after the Civil War, Brian D. Page writes, it was a distinctly Black holiday. ..(Snip)"

"Tonight – from the right part of Earth, at the right time – you might catch a rich burst of meteors from the constellation Monoceros the Unicorn. The shower might produce a burst of 100 meteors in just 15 minutes. Memorable and fun! Plus … how to watch online...." (More at link)

WASHINGTON—In the yearbook photo of the 1981 graduating class at Westmount High School near Montreal, the left hand of a beaming Kamala Harris is resting on the right shoulder of Hugh Kwok. When Kwok was asked in December for his thoughts on his old pal’s potential run, he answered a reporter’s question with a question. “She’s running for president of what?” he asked in a tone that suggested he thought the answer might be the local Rotary Club. Informed that it was the presidency of the United States, his voice rose. “No way. Oh my goodness. I can’t believe it,”...

Kamala Harris is a 54-year-old Democratic Senator from California. Harris is the daughter of immigrants from Jamaica and India. According to Global News, she is currently the Democratic Party's best chance at attracting young, female and minority voters. (Snip...) Harris lived with her mom in Montreal while her mother taught at McGill University and worked at Jewish General Hospital. She actually spent nine years living in Canada, from the 1970s to 1980s, according to CTV News.

"An Arianespace Ariane 5 rocket will launch a new mission to Mercury tonight, to send a set of spacecraft to the innermost planet! The joint mission by the European Space Agency and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency will lift off at 9:45 p.m. EDT (0145 GMT) from a pad at the Guiana Space Center in Kourou, French Guiana. You can watch the launch live here, beginning at 9:15 p.m. EDT (0115 GMT), courtesy of ESA."

High levels of chocolate consumption might be associated with a one third reduction in the risk of developing heart disease, suggests a study published online in the British Medical Journal.... The findings confirm results of existing studies that generally agree on a potential beneficial link between chocolate consumption and heart health. However, the authors stress that further studies are needed to test whether chocolate actually causes this reduction or if it can be explained by some other unmeasured (confounding) factor.... They analysed the results of seven studies, involving over 100,000 participants with and without existing heart disease. For each study,...

Shanghai shares crumbled from fresh selling on Tuesday as a rout shows no sign of slowing down in the market as investors flee the market. The Shanghai Composite Index opened at 3,004.13 point, down 6.41 per cent, or 205.87 points. The CSI300 index of Shanghai-Shenzhen large cap stocks opens at 3,070.01 , down 6.27 per cent or 205.52points. The Shenzhen Composite Index opens at 1,751.28, down 6.97 per cent or 131.18 points. The NASDAQ-style ChiNext Price Index dropped 6.94 per cent, or 149.30 points to open at 1,996.04..

Four men who got into a gunfight that killed the owner of a Kansas gun shop will face first-degree murder charges, the Kansas City Star reported on Sunday, citing county records. The newspaper identified the four suspects as Nicquan K. Midgyett, 19; Hakeem W. Malik, 18; Londro E. Patterson, 19; and De’Anthony A. Wiley, 19.

An anti-illegal immigration rally featuring Kris Kovac, who participated in formulating the Arizona anti-illegal immigration law, and Joe Arpaio, the tough Maricopa county sheriff, was disrupted today by telephoned bomb threats and discovery of a package with unknown contents. The rally, which had been moved once because of concerns by an Overland Park College, continued after police notified those attending of the threat. Overland Park Kansas police bomb units are attempting to determine if the package that was found actually contains explosives.

In a back room at Schlafly Bottleworks in Maplewood, about 50 people gathered on a recent Wednesday night to talk rock 'n' roll. Why are Bob Marley and Kurt Cobain considered by some to be messiahs? When did rock music lose its edge and become another product manufactured and marketed by huge conglomerates such as Viacom? It was a conversation perfectly suited to the setting. Beer-stained wooden tables and the smell of hops complemented a free-flowing, spirited debate among hip young people in scruffy beards and T-shirts. In 2007, this is church.

PRIESTS, PROSTITUTES, psychologists, cops, jazz musicians, poker players. Every trade has its jargon and "insider lingo." ... ..."Embrace the suck" isn't merely a wisecrack; it's an encyclopedic experience rendered as an epigram, gritty shorthand for "Face it, soldier. I've been there. War ain't easy. Now deal with the difficulty and let's get on with the mission."... ...Dynamic truth: Basically means "this is the plan when my supervisor gave it to me, but change is already in the works."

Sept. 21, 2006: Almost every day, the great antennas of NASA's Deep Space Network turn to a blank patch of sky in the constellation Ophiuchus. Pointing at nothing, or so it seems, they invariably pick up a signal, faint but full of intelligence. The source is beyond Neptune, beyond Pluto, on the verge of the stars themselves. It's Voyager 1. The spacecraft left Earth in 1977 on a mission to visit Jupiter and Saturn. Almost 30 years later, with the gas giants long ago seen and done, Voyager 1 is still going and encountering some strange things....

BBC "Cannabis 'more harmful than tobacco" Tuesday March 21, 2000 Smoking three cannabis cigarettes a day is as dangerous as having a whole packet of standard cigarettes, say researchers. Regular smokers of cannabis are at increased risk of developing the potentially fatal lung disease emphysema, claim doctors based in Bristol. They investigated the smoking habits of four cannabis, or marijuana, users who had advanced emphysema. Three of the men smoked far less than would usually be associated with the disease, which destroys the surface of the lungs, in standard tobacco smokers. They said their results questioned the common perception that ...