Free Republic

A well known University of California-Berkeley mathematics professor has slammed admissions standards at the top-flight university — where she says huge portions of her students are failing to keep up with college calculus and she’s forced to teach middle-school algebra and fractions students. “Some students are five to eight years behind in mathematics. Office hours that should be spent discussing integrals instead become lessons on fractions and basic algebra you would expect students to learn in middle school,” wrote Zvezdelina Stankova, of UC Berkeley, in an op-ed piece on Saturday for the San Francisco Standard. Stankova — who rose through...

DUBAI — Iran’s parliament approved on Sunday the general principles of a bill that ​would criminalize interviews and other communications with media deemed hostile to the ‌Islamic Republic, including US or Israeli media and outlets financed by either country, Iran’s Shargh newspaper reported. Osman Salari, a member of parliament’s judicial and legal commission, said the individual provisions of the bill, ​which is aimed at countering foreign intelligence influence, have yet to be ​debated and approved. Reports about the bill’s details should not yet be ⁠considered final, Salari told the Mizan news agency. Under the proposed bill, interviews or participation ​in...

A Tennessee teacher who was named Teacher of the Year has quit after accusing the school district of directing her to change a failing student’s grade. Samira Hardcastle, named the 2025-2026 Teacher of the Year at John F. Kennedy Middle School in Antioch, Tenn., submitted her letter of resignation in May after eight years teaching art in Metro Nashville Public Schools. “District leaders asked me to fabricate grades for a parent who sat in the office for hours until her daughter’s failing grades were changed,” Hardcastle said in an impassioned speech at Tuesday’s school board meeting. “It creates false entitlement....

I asked Grok how the red states and blue states performed economically between 2000 and 2026. It only gave me up until 2024, but if trends continued, the red states have continued to close the gap and may actually be higher income economies than blue states. Approx. Real GDP CAGR 2000–2024 Yearly Red-leaning group ████████████████ ≈ 2.3–2.6% Blue-leaning group ██████████████ ≈ 1.9–2.2% U.S. overall ███████████████ ≈ 2.1% Approximate cumulative real GDP growth (total multiplicative increase) These are simple compounds of representative average annual rates over 24 years: Red-leaning group (~2.4% average annual): Growth factor ≈ 1.77 → ~77% total cumulative...

Calls to poison centers involving liver injuries caused by medications, supplements, alcohol and other substances jumped nearly 400% between 2000 and 2024, according to a new study from UVA Health published in Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology. Researchers led by UVA's Christopher P. Holstege, MD, looked at liver damage caused by "xenobiotics," foreign substances not naturally found in the human body. This category includes drugs, food additives, alcohol and environmental pollutants. More than 80% of the liver injuries required inpatient care, with the majority of cases stemming from medications. Acetaminophen was the most frequently implicated substance. "Xenobiotic-induced liver injuries reported to...

The Vera C. Rubin Observatory is a major astronomical facility located on Cerro Pachón in Chile, jointly funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation and the Department of Energy. It is named after astronomer Vera Rubin, who provided the first convincing evidence for the existence of dark matter. Key operational milestones include:First Light: Achieved in June 2025, with the release of the first images revealing billions of stars, galaxies, and thousands of previously unseen asteroids. Full Survey Operations: The Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) officially began in July 2026 and will run for ten years. The observatory features...

A skyrocketing number of California residents have developed an incurable lung disease linked to kitchen quartz countertops — with many needing lung transplants, according to a terrifying new state study. One of those victims is Enrique Gonzalez, a San Fernando Valley stone worker who has been unable to work for the past two years after developing silicosis from years of working in granite and stone manufacturing. Gonzalez’s family says the disease has made it impossible for him to continue working as his condition has progressed, leaving the family struggling to cover medical expenses and everyday costs. The number of Californians...

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A CNN panel exploded in a heated clash Monday night after Dems accused Republicans of launching an “anti-Muslim” attack on Michigan Senate hopeful Dr. Abdul El-Sayed by running an ad campaign using his full name. During “CNN NewsNight” with guest host Jon Berman, the panel discussed Sen. Tim Scott’s (R-SC) defense of an ad campaign that blasts El-Sayed as a dangerous candidate and uses the controversial lefty pol’s full name, Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed. In an interview clip, the senator was asked whether the ads are an attempt to tell voters “hint, hint…he’s Muslim.” Scott responded, “Not at all … I...

Mayor Zohran Mamdani threw his staff under the bus Tuesday after an awkward public disagreement between City Hall and NYPD officials over whether the department will send cops to serve as security detail for his wife Rama Duwaji’s upcoming Middle East trip. Mamdani appeared to blame a mistake by his City Hall staff after a high-profile back-and-forth with the police department. “There was a miscommunication. She has not yet taken that trip and when she takes that trip it will be without any NYPD detail,” Mamdani told PIX11. The mayor’s clarification came after The Post reported late Monday that Duwaji...

The video “2026 Great Barrier Reef Statistics: They told us a fairy tale” (by Reef Rebels / Dr. Peter Ridd) argues that official data show the Great Barrier Reef is not in crisis, contrary to long-running media and institutional claims. Key points from the video: • Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) monitoring data show six consecutive years of exceptionally high (or record/record-equaling) coral cover—higher than or matching levels seen over the previous ~35 years of systematic surveys. • Ridd frames the repeated “reef is dying / doomed” narrative as a “fairy tale.” He walks through the reef’s natural history:...

Licensed Maryland clinicians can receive abortion training and a $4,000 stipend through the University of Maryland, Baltimore’s (UMB) “Reproductive Health Fellowship.” The fellowship offers a “comprehensive curriculum on abortion and reproductive health care,” a $4,000 stipend, an abortion simulation, and post-completion support “to actively deepen your knowledge in reproductive health and abortion care.” “Join Maryland’s next generation of reproductive health leaders in providing high-quality, trauma-informed abortion care,” the description reads. “Build your confidence and expertise in prescribing medication abortion while gaining valuable exposure to procedural abortion care.” “Upon completing the program, clinicians become part of a strong, supportive community committed...

One of the top honchos with the Democratic Socialist of America struggled to explain what “taxing the rich” meant and appeared clueless about the Clinton era landmark Israeli Palestinian peace effort, during an embarrassing radio interview with The New Yorker Friday. Megan Romer, one of the two national co-chairs of the organization, seemed bewildered by a question from the magazine’s editor David Remnick about one of the DSA’s signature positions. “Well, what does ‘taxing the hell out of them’ mean?’” Remnick asked on the episode of The New Yorker Radio Hour titled “How Socialist Is the DSA? Megan Romer Explains“....

Those of us in the majority of Americans who have been deprived of an excellent education have never had more opportunities to remediate ourselves.Many Americans have assumed that if you want a serious education in history, philosophy, or literature, you must go to college, preferably a highly rated one. The Harvards, Yales, and Princetons of the world have theoretically been where the classics were taught, great ideas debated, and intellectual life was supposed to flourish.That assumption is beginning to change, and not just because of headlines like “The Elite College Students Who Can’t Read Books.” The “academy” no longer has...

Hammer and Sickle? Who under the age of 60 would even remember that barbaric symbol of Communism? Or the tens of millions it executed under its totalitarian death grip? Or the fact that several nations still smart beneath its jackboot? Given the degraded state of contemporary education, such ignorance is to be expected. To call this a mere problem is too benign a word, like calling the bombing of Dresden an incident. No, tragedy more befits this development.Educated Americans sincerely query how such amnesia could have settled upon our nation. The statistics take us aback. Nearly 38 percent of Americans...

Fire and looting erupted across Los Angeles in the early morning hours Saturday as two unruly street takeovers spiraled into chaos just hours apart. The disturbing incidents unfolded in East Los Angeles and the Gramercy Park neighborhood. Both sprang from rowdy street takeovers, despite mounting public outrage and a steady infusion of city resources dedicated to stopping them. A car fire erupted after a street takeover in the southern part of the city. Los Angeles fire officials told The California Post that an engine responded to an auto fire around 4:52 a.m. and put out the massive blaze. Footage from...

Conservative activist Scott LoBaido was dead for two minutes after a confrontation with Mayor Zohran Mamdani at a pro-cop event on Tuesday ended in a heart attack — but he promised The Post not even a coronary could stop his crusade to keep the socialist away from the 25th anniversary of 9/11 at Ground Zero. Even while recovering from his near-fatal heart attack — in which witnesses and friends said his heart stopped for two minutes and he had no pulse — LoBaido orchestrated a plane to fly around Manhattan on Friday with a banner bearing a warning to the...

They’re lowering the bar. New Mexico is the newest state in the country to offer an alternative to the traditional bar exam — which critics bashed as yet another woke example of lowering academic standards. New Mexico has become the latest state to give law school graduates an alternative to the traditional bar exam, allowing them to earn a license by completing 675 hours of supervised legal work under an attorney or approved host organization. Law school grads will now be able to get their license after finishing 675 hours of supervised legal work under an attorney or host organization,...

Brookfield police pulled someone over, guns drawn, after a Flock camera flagged their car for a Milwaukee homicide. It turned out to be a mix-up involving the wrong person. Flock camera error What we know: It happened at around 4:45 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 6. Video from I-94 in Waukesha County shows multiple officers with guns drawn – and a passenger sticking their hands out the window. Police pulled the car over after a Flock camera flagged it for a Milwaukee homicide. But when Brookfield Police called the Milwaukee Police Department, MPD said they no longer needed the car or the...

A North Carolina elementary school is facing backlash after parents discovered a transgender music teacher was educating students while wearing a dress, causing a bitter divide. Middle Creek Elementary School in Apex, near Raleigh, went back to school on July 30, where students were met with a new music teacher, who is a 'transgender biological male, who dresses as a woman,' State Representative Erin Paré said in a statement. At a school board meeting on Tuesday, many parents said they were unaware of the new hire, with many finding out via social media, after popular creators, such as Libs of...