Free Republic

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (WTVO) — Illinois drivers: brace yourselves. The annual gas tax increase is about to kick in on July 1st, 2025. The automatic Motor Fuel Tax increases to account for inflation. Currently, Illinois residents pay the second-highest gas tax in the country, behind California. The gas tax is now 45 cents per gallon, but on July 1st it will go up to 48.3 cents per gallon. The average car holds between 12 and 16 gallons of gas, meaning drivers should expect to spend between .24 and .32 cents extra at the pump. The Motor Fuel Tax will account for...

Canada is launching a billboard offensive in its trade war with Uncle Sam, targeting highways in 12 red states with messages like “tariffs are a tax on your grocery bill.” “We are launching ads in the US to make sure all Americans know that tariffs are taxes on everything they buy,” Canadian Minister of Foreign Affairs Melanie Joly said on X. The Great White North is calling it an “education campaign.” “The purpose is to increase the understanding of the American public and to counter misinformation,” said John Babcock, spokesperson for Global Affairs Canada, who put up the billboards in...

Applications for Global Entry are currently taking anywhere from 6-18 months to process. The Department of Homeland Security is encouraging travelers who mostly fly domestic to skip Global Entry and opt for TSA PreCheck instead amid long application wait times that can stretch up to more than a year. “If you do not travel multiple times per year internationally, we recommend applying for the TSA PreCheck Program,” DHS wrote on its website. “Most TSA PreCheck applicants can schedule an appointment in less than 2 weeks and, if approved, can receive a Known Traveler Number (KTN) in about 3 to 5...

On September 9, U.S. Customs and Border Protection shared plans to implement changes to the Global Entry program. The proposed changes are intended to "harmonize the fees and application procedures" of three expedited entry programs, including Global Entry, the Secure Electronic Network for Travelers Rapid Inspection program (better known as SENTRI, it monitors the U.S.-Mexico border), and the NEXUS program (used at the U.S.-Canada border). And yes, these changes will have a direct impact on travelers. Most notable among the proposed changes is a fee increase for the Global Entry program, which the CBP intends to raise from the current...

We've had a GOES card for several years. Its a card from the gummit that gets you by TSA security when traveling. I just got an email saying I have to convert my account over to the new TTP system. It gives me a URL "ttp.cbp.dhs.gov" to click on. Pardon my paranoia but not quite yet!!!!!!! Anybody here have a GOES account and get this email?????

“It’s a dramatic leap in capability – like moving from black and white TV to HDTV,” explained Greg Mandt, the NOAA GOES-R program manager during a prelaunch media briefing in the cleanroom processing facility at Astrotech. “This is a very exciting time,” explained Greg Mandt, the NOAA GOES-R program manager during the Astrotech cleanroom briefing. “This is the culmination of about 15 years of intense work for the great team of NOAA and NASA and our contractors Lockheed Martin and Harris.” “We are bringing the nation a new capability. The GOES program has been around for about 40 years and...

Just for the heck of it, yesterday, I applied for GOES. Supposedly can circumvent the long TSA lines at airports. Although I have also heard that the GOES lines are not so fast these days too. Got to travel thru Chicago in a couple of months and the horror stories were non-stop. Although recently they seemed to have gotten a bit better.

Greece hasn't even filed for bankruptcy yet and the "unexpected" consequences are already coming. In comments to The Sunday Times newspaper, Irish Transport Minister Leo Varadkar said the country will likely need another "unexpected" loan from the troica, after he became the first cabinet member to cast doubt in public on Ireland's ability to raise cash. In other words once on the temporary bailout wagon, always on the temporary bailout gain. Reuters reports: "I think it's very unlikely we'll be able to go back next year. I think it might take a bit longer ... 2013 might be possible but...

Jimmy Kimmel Live - Benji Goes to Iran

It's no secret that America is on the decline. Perhaps the election of a statist in 2008 was merely a reflection of the decline. Perhaps it was a successful propaganda campaign by the enemedia. The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration's War on America. He is a disaster of unimaginable proportion. The degree of statism in a country’s political system, is the degree to which it breaks up the country into rival gangs and sets men against one another. When individual rights are abrogated, there is no way to determine who is entitled to what; there is no way to determine...

When some liberals called for reining in harsh political rhetoric after the Arizona shootings, Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) took it one step further. He called for bringing back the Fairness Doctrine, in what was widely considered an attempt to clamp down on talk radio. A week later, those calls have abated, and no one is seriously pursuing the idea of returning to the long-defunct policy, which required media on the public airwaves to present both sides of controversial political issues. Not Clyburn, not another Democrat who echoed his call for regulatory remedies, Rep. Louise Slaughter (N.Y.), and not the Federal

This year’s Kristallnacht event in Germany hosts a former German Jew, whose presence inherently connects the pogrom with his known opposition to a Jewish presence in Judea and Samaria and his blame of Israel for “promoting anti-Semitism globally.” In what may signal a desire of Germans to leave the past further behind them, Germany hosted a French-German intellectual – in a church – who fled the Nazi regime in 1933 and did not experience the horrors of the Holocaust but now equates Gaza with a concentration gap. Kristallnacht, or the “night of broken glass,” occurred on this day in 1938,...

Obama’s Department of Justice has suddenly turned on a dime, becoming the great pro-active protector of voters’ rights: Poll watchers in Harris County, Texas — where a Tea Party group launched an aggressive anti-voter fraud effort — were accused of “hovering over” voters, “getting into election workers’ faces” and blocking or disrupting lines of voters who were waiting to cast their ballots as early voting got underway yesterday. Now, TPMMuckraker has learned, the Justice Department has interviewed witnesses about the alleged intimidation and is gathering information about the so-called anti-voter fraud effort…. Terry O’Rourke, the first assistant in the Harris...

Customs has instituted a new program called the Global Entry System, Trusted Traveler Program. If you do international travel, you might want to consider participating. Go to the web site: https://goes-app.cbp.dhs.gov/pkmslogout Fill out the survey, pay $100, schedule and attend an interview, and you are good to go.

Under the Senate Finance Committee bill, HHS Secretary Kathleen will determine the meaning of terms such as "physician services," "premium," "prescription drug coverage," "deductible," and "emergency room care.

BEIJING — Toothbrushes and nylon socks have become the latest projectiles in the continuing trade skirmish between the China and the United States. The Chinese Ministry of Commerce issued a preliminary ruling Monday that imposed a 36 percent tariff on American-made Nylon 6, a synthetic filament that ends up in a wide array of products, including toothbrushes, auto parts, socks and the handles of Glock handguns. Nylon 6 from Taiwan and Russia would also be taxed, but at much lower rates.

<p>TMZ has learned Mel Gibson exploded in anger last night on a college campus after an expert on Mayan culture accussed him of racially stereotyping the Mayans in the movie "Apocalypto."</p> <p>It happened last night at Cal State University at Northridge in the San Fernando Valley. Gibson was speaking to a film class about his movies, and several members of the Mayan community came to hear the famous director.</p>

Blair delays holiday as fighting goes on By George Jones, Political Editor (Filed: 05/08/2006) Tony Blair bowed to pressure yesterday and delayed his summer holiday to continue working with other world leaders in an "all-out effort" to secure a ceasefire in Lebanon. Downing Street said the Prime Minister, who was due to leave for Barbados, believed that the next few days would be "crucial''. An Israeli air attack hit farm workers in the Bekaa Valley The violence continued unabated as Israel launched more than 150 air strikes and continued its cross-border ground offensive. Hizbollah rained rockets on northern Israel, killing...

CHICAGO, June 7 /Christian Newswire/ -- After exactly twenty years the NOW v. Scheidler RICO case is finally history. On Thursday, June 8, 2006, just one day short of the twentieth anniversary of the filing of the lawsuit, Judge David Coar will enter judgment for the defendants, Joseph M. Scheidler, Timothy Murphy and Andrew Scholberg and the Pro-Life Action League, negating all charges against them. "Judge Coar's action tomorrow will be a great weight off of me," said Joseph Scheidler, National Director of the Pro-Life Action League. "It has taken all this time to vindicate the pro-life movement and declare...

FORT BLISS, Texas (Army News Service, June 5, 2006) – The first-ever Afghan soldier to attend the Sergeants Major Academy has graduated as a member of SMA Class 56, at Fort Bliss, Texas, May 19. Sgt. Maj. Roshan Safi was selected to attend the U.S. SMA on recommendations from his commanders and U.S. Army mentors in Afghanistan because of his consistent leadership potential as a career-soldier, which began with the post-Taliban controlled Afghan military. “We have officer and enlisted training in Afghanistan,” says Safi. “But in the future we want to establish more non commissioned officer enlisted and officer schools.”...