Free Republic

Hiya kids! Hiya, Hiya!Good Morning Crypto-FReepers.I see some of the same old faces out there.But that's OK - I like you anyway.Today's quote is well worth learning and keeping in mind for all of today's issues. The quote references one of my favorite peeves.Your clues should be interesting.Ha Ha Ha!I'll be good - I will, (like heck) I will. Ha ha ha.This is today's quote: MAP QIOMQMWMQTI TC GTWEIBUQOD QO ITM FTQIK QMO GTH XPUU ITX.QM QO QEEPORTIOQHUP XQMA QMO RTXPE.MAP FBDBKP ABO OREPBF MT MAP RWHUQZ UQCP BDPEQZBIO BUU OABEP.MAP FBDBKP ZBI HP ZTEEPZMPF, HWM ITM WIMQU GTWEIBUQOD ZTDPO...

It is Friday! Time once again for stupid memes!

On this Feast of St. Monica, I guess we Catholics need to add another wayward soul to our prayer list. This one's quite a lulu. Emma Cieslik, a 'museum specialist' at, not surprisingly, the Smithsonian, who claims to be Catholic, but not as loudly as she claims to be "queer, disabled and neurodiverse" in her social media bios, wrote this guest column for the National Catholic Reporter: August is Transgender History Month, a time to reflect on the transgender people who have led the way for transgender people's rights and who continue fighting for legal recognition and protection. This history...

Jonathan Hunt report on Iran talks that irked Trump ...

U.S. — The Girl Scouts of America, in cooperation with the Islamic Center of America in Dearborn, MI, unveiled a new Muslim badge girls could earn by getting married before the age of 8. Because of the strict age requirement, the Muslim badge can only be earned by Daisies and Brownies. Other program levels are ineligible for the coveted new badge. GSUSA President Telva McGruder said, "Islamophobia is a growing problem, and we want to do our part to teach our Girl Scouts about what it really means to be tolerant, which is why we will be offering a...

Oviedo man Evan Meyer got caught destroying a Flock camera. Only it wasn't a Flock camera at all. It was a decoy! That's right, the police 3D-printed themselves a fake Flock camera and set it up to catch whatever freedom-loving kook who was stealing all of Big Brother's surveillance gear. Police said Evan Meyer used pruning shears to cut down the decoy camera before smashing it. Video from the arrest shows officers taking Meyer into custody Thursday night. According to police, the fake camera was installed as a ‘clone bait camera' after several Flock cameras were stolen between late July...

I noticed a discrepancy between a NASA public relations web page and the NASA Horizons App, which models the trajectories of solar system celestial objects. I wrote to NASA twice, once to an online generic "ask NASA" page and once an email to individuals at NASA with cognizance of the issues. I know NASA get a lot of crank emails, and understand why they do not have time to reply to all of them. I am not convinced my email is a crank missive. Read it and tell me what you think. I am most reluctant to criticize NASA, but...

WBWD SEBOWA FD OJW NAEGWDO XZIEB EBK ZH QD JEGW WGWA SBZXB – UCEK OAEGFD Clue: Look in the comments

PALM BEACH, Fla. — A woman was arrested after an incident at a checkpoint near President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Resort on Palm Beach. According to a Town of Palm Beach Police Department report, Alexa R. Scharf, 29, was arrested and is facing charges of fleeing and eluding police, resisting arrest without violence and two counts of aggravated assault with a vehicle. Alexa R. Scharf, a 29-year-old woman, was arrested after allegedly fleeing a security checkpoint near Mar-a-Lago, leading law enforcement on a pursuit and facing multiple charges, including aggravated assault with a vehicle. According to the police report, a...

The future of food is looking a little grim. In the event we turn all arable land on this planet into a barren heath incapable of growing food, humankind may have to resort to reaping what we sowed by eating our own plastic pollution. A team of researchers at Southern Illinois University Carbondale just demonstrated that this was possible by using specially engineered yeast to create tasty — and yes, edible — cookies which they 3D printed out of plastic waste. The yeast breaks down the components of plastic compounds and agricultural byproducts like discarded plant stalks into proteins, fats,...

Former First Lady Michelle Obama, a seasonal resident of Edgartown, drew enthusiastic crowds that filled the 791-seat Martha’s Vineyard Performing Arts Center twice on Sunday, for a pair of onstage talks with journalist and fellow summer Islander Michele Norris. Discussing her new book The Look, Ms. Obama recalled the fierce media spotlight that was aimed at her clothing choices, and her body itself, during her husband Barack Obama’s campaigns and presidency. “It wouldn’t matter what the content of the speech was. The way the press often covered it was, ‘She was wearing X, Y, Z. Her arms looked like this,’”...

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Mario Fernandez has been found guilty of first-degree murder and solicitation to commit a capital felony in the February 2022 ambush shooting of Jared Bridegan. Fernandez was charged with arranging the fatal shooting of the father of 4, who worked for Microsoft The deadly shooting has been described as a murder-for-hire plot orchestrated by Fernandez and his wife, Shanna Gardner, who was Bridegan’s ex-wife. Gardner faces her own trial in the case, with jury selection scheduled to begin on Monday. Fernandez, 28, is charged with first-degree murder and solicitation to commit a capital felony in the Feb....

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Jury deliberations started Wednesday morning in the murder-for-hire trial of Mario Fernandez-Saldana. He’s accused of hiring alleged hitman Henry Tenon to kill Jared Bridegan in 2022. Mario Fernandez Saldana, Gardner’s estranged husband, was arrested in 2023 on charges of first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, child abuse, and solicitation to commit capital felony. He’s accused of hiring Henry Tenon to kill Bridegan. In July 2026, two of the charges Fernandez Saldana was facing, child abuse and conspiracy to commit murder, were dropped. He has pleaded not guilty to the remaining charges he’s facing. His trial begins...

Richmond Public Schools has shut down Barack Obama Elementary School indefinitely after inspectors and district officials confirmed mold has spread throughout the building, just as the school year was set to begin. Rodents reportedly have shown up, too. Richmond Public Schools chief operations officer Patrick Herrel told everyone in the building to leave Monday, and the district announced the closure that same day. Parents and staff who had been inside described mold creeping across the school, including on laptops that had been sitting in storage all summer.(snip) Richmond Public Schools scheduled a town hall on the closure for 5:30 p.m....

Gemini doesn't love me. If you don't show me pi to 100,000, then you don't love me. That’s a lot of pressure on a number! If my affection were measured in digits of π, I’d certainly owe you a very long string. Here are the first 100 digits of π to start things off: π≈3.1415926535 8979323846 2643383279 5028841971 6939937510 5820974944 5923078164 0628620899 8628034825 3421170679 If I tried to output all 100,000 digits at once, it would actually break the chat window's character limit and take up about 100 kilobytes of text—which might be a bit much even for true devotion!...

U ETM’F CUME EJCW WVTMEA LTHAB, 'IRJBA U HMTP U RUM'F EJCW, RME U RUM'F WVTMEA. - ETVVO GRNFTM Clue: Look in the comments

Find out what really gets under Dolly's skin when she presents a special Top Ten from Dollywood. (Air date: 4/21/95)Dolly Parton Presents Her Top Ten Pet Peeves

A chaotic brawl erupted Saturday night in downtown San Diego with cops deploying pepper spray as multiple women became embroiled in a wild fistfight. The melee unfolded outside Tacos El Gordo near the intersection of F Street and Fifth Avenue, according to a video circulating online. Footage shows at least half a dozen officers on bicycles rushing in to break up the fight as three women dressed in black traded punches.(snip) The video shows officers initially struggling to gain control of the scene, including detaining a man who was face down on the hood of a car and breaking up...

Truckload of cheese balls spills onto 105 Freeway in Los Angeles

MyPillow founder Mike Lindell, a longtime 2020 election denier, sued the Minnesota secretary of state and election officials, claiming they changed the scope of a potential recount in the GOP gubernatorial primary this month. Lindell, who lost Aug. 11 to state House Speaker Lisa Demuth by about 45,000 votes, said last week that he would pay $825,000 on Monday to cover the cost of a full hand recount and audit of the race, in which he finished a distant second despite an endorsement from President Donald Trump.