Free Republic

Renowned Japanese brand Panasonic has announced today that it is returning with immediate effect to the U.S. TV marketplace after a near decade-long absence. The brand has confirmed, too, that its return won’t be some half-hearted toe-dipping exercise; in fact it’s going to be giving U.S. AV fans the opportunity to get their hands on its most premium OLED models—models deemed so good by the home entertainment world that they’re sometimes used as reference monitors in professional mastering suites. It came as a shock to many, including me, when Panasonic announced in 2016 that it was no longer going to...

Moderna Inc.’s cost-reduction plans, pipeline cuts and reined-in financial guidance, unveiled Thursday, triggered a wave of downgrades as analysts focused on longer timelines to launch some products and questioned when the company will return to profitability.One key concern: The company’s full-year 2025 revenue guidance, issued Thursday, is nearly 8% lower, at the midpoint, than its full-year 2024 guidance — which was recently trimmed back. The 2025 forecast, on the heels of the 2024 guidance cut issued when Moderna reported second-quarter earnings, “is likely making investors lose confidence” and battering the stock, Evercore ISI analyst Cory Kasimov said in a research...

The power toolmaker Stanley Black and Decker appears to have scrubbed its website of references to diversity quotas and LGBTQ campaigns in the face of a damaging boycott. The company, which is behind such brands as DeWalt, Black and Decker, and Stanley, has in recent days removed pages about its 'equity training' workshops and multimillion dollar giveaways to 'racial equity' groups. The move appears to be a response to the conservative group Consumers' Research launching a boycott of Stanley Black and Decker products over the company's diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts. The video player is currently playing an ad....

A London rabbi charged with performing an illegal circumcision on a baby boy in Dublin has been granted bail and has been allowed to return to the UK pending trial after a judge ruled that he was not a flight risk.

(Kitco News) – Gold has had a breakout year as the yellow metal surged to new heights above $2,500 while its grey counterpart, silver, has struggled to keep pace, but that could soon change, according to one analyst, as silver demand is expected to increase thanks to one new technological development from Samsung. According to retired investment professional Kevin Bambrough, Samsung has developed a new solid-state (SS) battery. The inclusion of silver as a key component, combined with the increasing demand for electric vehicles, means that demand for the grey metal will soon increase. “The key drivers that will ramp...

Which of the Ten Commandments has Kamal Harris publicly broken vs how many Donald Trump has broken publicly?

Nearly six in ten Americans (58 percent) are opposed to sex-change drugs and surgeries for minors, a Rasmussen Reports survey found. Out of the 58 percent who oppose sex changes for minors, 47 percent say they are strongly opposed to such measures. Thirty percent of Americans support such sex-mutilating drugs and surgeries for minors, while 12 percent are unsure, the survey found. By political affiliation, Democrats are more likely (47 percent) than Republicans (13 percent) and unaffiliated voters (27 percent) to support sex-mutilating — and often irreversible — drugs and surgeries for confused youth. Nearly half of Americans (47 percent)...

Ewe-turnOn Saturday, the Australian government announced plans to ban its live sheep export trade by 2028, a move praised by animal rights groups but condemned by farmers who were “shocked” at the 4-year timeline, even as the government offered a ~$71M package to help impacted businesses make the transition.Farmers in neighboring New Zealand, renowned for its shearling natives, will have taken notice.Indeed, NZ’s own sheep population continues to dwindle, with new data released by Stats NZ in early May revealing that the nation’s total number of sheep fell by 3% to ~24M for the year ended June 2023. That’s roughly...

The United Methodist Church lost one-fourth of its U.S. churches in a recent schism, with conservatives departing over disputes on sexuality and theology. Now, with the approach of its first major legislative gathering in several years, the question is whether the church can avert a similar outcome elsewhere in the world, where about half its members live. The question is particularly acute in Africa, home to the vast majority of United Methodists outside the U.S. Most of its bishops favor staying, but other voices are calling for regional conferences to disaffiliate. At the upcoming General Conference in Charlotte, North Carolina,...

The world is losing the battle against electronic waste, a UN expert said on Wednesday (March 20), after a report found 62 million metric tons of mobile phones and devices were dumped on the planet in just one year — and this is expected to increase by a third by 2030. Electronic waste, also known as e-waste, consists of any discarded items containing an electric plug or a battery. It can contain toxic additives and hazardous substances such as mercury, and represents an environmental and health hazard. "These goods are often not easy to repair. They easily become waste and...

On Wednesday, Thailand’s House of Representatives voted 400-10 in favor of same-sex “marriage.” Only 10 lawmakers voted against the bill. Two abstained and three didn’t vote. The country’s Senate “rarely rejects any legislation that passes the lower house,” the Associated Press noted. Once it passes the Senate, it then must be approved by the majority-Buddhist country’s king. In addition to redefining marriage, the bill “extends all rights and protections contained in the Civil and Commercial Code to LGBTI+ persons,” the pro-LGBT group “Fortify Rights” said in a press release. The group’s lobbying to add the “gender-neutral language of ‘parent’ addition...

WASHINGTON (AP) — For Jonathan Peter Jackson, a direct relative of two prominent members of the Black Panther Party, revolutionary thought and family history have always been intertwined, particularly in August. That’s the month in 1971 when his uncle, the famed Panther George Jackson, was killed during an uprising at San Quentin State Prison in California. A revolutionary whose words resonated inside and out of the prison walls, he was a published author, activist and radical thought leader. To many, February is the month dedicated to celebrating Black Americans’ contributions to a country where they were once enslaved. But Black...

Cities coast-to-coast grappling with broken-down e-buses that cannot be fixed .. Between the federal government, states and municipalities, untold billions in taxpayer dollars have been spent adding electric buses to transit fleets across the U.S. in an effort to reduce carbon emissions. However, cities from coast-to-coast are grappling with broken-down e-buses that cannot be fixed, are too expensive to fix, or they have scrapped their electric fleets altogether. Officials in Asheville, North Carolina, recently expressed frustration that three of the five e-buses the city purchased for millions in 2018 are now sitting idle due to a combination of software issues,...

Ann Coulter Tries to Debunk Ray Epps "Conspiracy Theory" by Invoking NY Times

Home schooling has become — by a wide margin — America’s fastest-growing form of education, as families from Upper Manhattan to Eastern Kentucky embrace a largely unregulated practice once confined to the ideological fringe, a Washington Post analysis shows. The analysis — based on data The Post collected for thousands of school districts across the country — reveals that a dramatic rise in home schooling at the onset of the pandemic has largely sustained itself through the 2022-23 academic year, defying predictions that most families would return to schools that have dispensed with mask mandates and other covid-19 restrictions. The...

Richard Roundtree, star of the genre-defining blaxploitation series Shaft, has passed away at 81 years old, according to his agency. Per Deadline, Roundtree died Monday afternoon surrounded by family, after a brief bout with pancreatic cancer. A statement from his representatives reads: “Artists & Representatives Agency mourns the loss of our friend and client Richard Roundtree,” the agency said in a statement. “His trailblazing career changed the face of entertainment around the globe and his enduring legacy will be felt for generations to come. Our hearts are with his family and loved ones during this difficult time.” ....Snip..... At the...

A naked selfie of Joe Biden's brother Frank has been discovered on a gay porn site. The photo was uploaded to GuysWithiPhones.com in 2018, when Frank – who has a long-term female partner Mindy Ward – was 64. *** When approached by DailyMail.com, Frank, 69, conceded he was the man in the photo but denied he was the one who posted it. 'I've absolutely no comment. I could care less. I haven't even looked at it,' Frank said Monday morning when asked about the shot at his Florida home. 'They must have hacked my phone,' he added. 'Anything that is...

Twitter sparked backlash this week after some users noticed it had quietly removed language in its hateful conduct policy that explicitly protected transgender people from online harassment. The social media platform had prohibited the targeted misgendering or deadnaming of transgender people since 2018. Some online noticed this month that the sentence had been plucked from Twitter’s section on slurs and tropes, while all other descriptions of policy violations remained intact. Archives captured by the Wayback Machine showed the previous version still existed April 7, the day Twitter announced it had updated its abuse and harassment policy to redefine “targeted harassment.”...

Before the COVID pandemic, Dr. Paul Marik became well-known for his development of a highly effective sepsis protocol using intravenous vitamin C, which resulted in a dramatic reduction in mortality rates. Then, in 2020, he cofounded the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC) and subsequently published one of the most comprehensive and effective protocols for treating COVID-19. Despite a stellar career up to that point, the sin of insisting on early treatment for COVID-19, and sharing that information with the public, resulted in him being vilified, discredited and ultimately forced to resign. I’m a veteran of this too, so...

One of Hollywood’s leading Native American figures is being accused of faking her claims of Cherokee heritage, The Post can reveal. Award-winning Heather Rae, 56, serves on the Academy of Motion Pictures’ Indigenous Alliance, previously headed up the Sundance Institute’s Native American program and claims “my mother was Indian and my father was a cowboy.” Multiple prior news reports have also cited her as having a Cherokee mother. But a watchdog group called the Tribal Alliance Against Frauds is now demanding the Academy and the producer drop her “false claims” while activists insist she’s at best 1/2048th Cherokee. The group...