Free Republic

Ecclesiastes says there is nothing new under the sun, and while the transgender movement may feel new and modern, it echoes a cult from ancient Rome—during a “culture war” not dissimilar from our own, according to the detransitioner Forrest Smith. The cult of Cybele or the Magna Mater, an ancient Roman “mystery religion,” highlighted effeminate men and even included the story of a man getting castrated in a religious ritual. “I learned about this because it was a piece of rhetoric within my former community that trans people have always existed,” Smith—a man who identified as a woman and went...

Former Clinton aide and Democratic strategist Paul Begala said the Democratic Party has drifted toward becoming a "faculty lounge," criticizing what he described as growing elitism within its ranks. During an appearance on "Real Time with Bill Maher" Friday, Begala discussed how Democrats’ election strategy has evolved, and Maher referenced California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s recent comment that the party needs to be more "culturally normal" to win. In a February interview with CNN, Newsom said Democrats should be "less prone to spending disproportionate amount of time on pronouns, identity politics." "We used to be the party of the factory floor,...

NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani is facing furious backlash after breaking his Ramadan fast with Muslim jailbirds on notorious Rikers Island – and describing it one of his “most meaningful evenings” since taking office. “It was a night that will stay with me for quite some time,” the city’s first Muslim mayor gushed Friday on X about his under the radar and historic visit on Monday, which by Saturday sparked a firestorm of outrage. Earlier in the week, the soft-on-crime socialist told NPR of his Rikers powwow: “This is one of the most meaningful evenings that I’ve had as the mayor...

Gov. Hochul was fittingly ridiculed last week for urging wealthy New Yorkers who fled the state for Florida to return and bring their rich friends with them. “We need your money” was the gist of her plea. She has zero chance of success. The rich didn’t get rich by being so easily duped, but Hochul had to know that. So why did she decide to make a fool of herself? It’s not because she’s dumb, but because she thinks voters are — and that they have short memories. After all, this is the same Hochul who, during her 2022 campaign,...

Netflix’s Queen Cleopatra docuseries has caused an immense storm of controversy surrounding its depiction of Cleopatra VII Philopator as a black woman, and whilst Cleopatra herself was not black, there were indeed black pharaohs who ruled over Egypt at one point in the 8th and 7th centuries BC. The 25th Dynasty, also known as the Nubian Dynasty, or Black Pharaohs, ruled Egypt between 744 BC and 656 BC as part of the wider Kushite Empire. The 25th Dynasty originated from the city-state of Napata in Nubia, in what is today Sudan. The Nubian Kushite civilization, from whom the 25th Dynasty...

A newly revealed surveillance video from the night of Jeffrey Epstein’s death shows the prison guards casually milling about only a few feet from the cell where he killed himself. Correctional officers Tova Noel and Michael Thomas are seen lounging in front of the officer station in the Special Housing Unit of Manhattan’s Metropolitan Correctional Center at around 3:15 a.m., both writing on a piece of paper, walking back and forth and talking on the phone — instead of conducting the mandatory 3 a.m. rounds, according to video unearthed in the trove of DOJ documents recently released. Epstein was just...

Two more nations signed on to a letter Saturday strongly condemning Iran’s partial blockade of the Strait of Hormuz – isolating the Islamic Republic diplomatically as it seeks to apply maximum economic pressure by bottling up oil shipments. The two latest to join are Australia and the United Arab Emirates – one of Iran’s Gulf neighbors who has been bombarded with missile attacks from Tehran – bringing the total to 22 countries. Earlier signatories were the UK, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Japan, whose Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi told reporters Thursday that she informed President Trump what her country...

The 13th Academy Awards – the ones where The Philadelphia Story was nominated in six categories – were the first held with sealed envelopes to keep the winners secret. For the very first awards in 1929 at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel the winners had been announced three months in advance; there were only 270 people in attendance, the ceremony only lasted fifteen minutes and it wasn't broadcast. For the next decade the Academy did its best to make the awards an event, but they announced the winners hours before the ceremony and in 1939 the L.A. Times published a leaked...

There's a clip on YouTube of director Samuel Fuller in the early '80s talking about the opening scene of his classic 1953 film noir Pickup on South Street. He would be about seventy years old at the time but he's full of energy and enthusiasm, as you would be if you were Samuel Fuller being interviewed for what I presume is French television. Fuller was and had been for decades something like a deity for French cineastes (the director had moved to France around this time) and he would never have an audience this avid anywhere else in the world....

Historic Big Boy No. 4014 Steam Locomotive to Tour the East Coast Union Pacific Railroad, founded by President Abraham Lincoln in 1862, unveiled its plans today to celebrate the United States, its amazing history and the people behind its unparalleled success story with two new locomotives and the first Big Boy steam tour to the East Coast in honor of America’s 250th anniversary. Big Boy, the world’s largest operating steam locomotive, will journey to Philadelphia for Fourth of July, with stops planned in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, New York and Pennsylvania. Our nation’s origin will be celebrated with a beautiful No....

Patty Hearst was abducted by a revolutionary group in 1974, as reported by the BBC. But 50 years ago, on 20 March 1976, she was found guilty of siding with her captors. ---SNIP--- Her kidnappers were in the obscure far-left Symbionese Liberation Army, or SLA, one of many small radical groups of the era. Reporting for the BBC, US correspondent John Humphrys said that little was known about the group "except what they have written about themselves in their various pronouncements. That and the fact that members of the SLA are prepared to commit murder for their cause." The group's...

President Donald Trump has waived the Jones Act for 60 days to mitigate supply disruptions resulting from conflict in the Middle East. This raises a fundamental question: why do policymakers regularly suspend this law during emergencies yet leave it in place the rest of the time?The Jones Act is an antiquated 106-year-old law officially known as the Merchant Marine Act of 1920 that places draconian restrictions on the use of ships to transport goods within the United States. According to White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, the waiver allowing the use of foreign vessels to transport goods “will allow vital...

Damage to a critical Qatari facility is threatening to keep energy prices high around the world even if the war in Iran ends soon in what some analysts are calling an “Armageddon” situation. Qatar’s Las Raffan plant supplies a fifth of the world’s liquefied natural gas, which is used for electricity, heating and cooking – but Iranian strikes have damaged the facility, worsening what is already the largest-ever energy supply disruption. “I woke up this morning and thought, ‘No, please no,’” Anne-Sophie Corbeau, former head of gas analysis at BP now at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy, told...

WASHINGTON — The Senate failed to fund the Department of Homeland Security on Friday, as airline passengers fought through lengthy lines and a growing number of Transportation Security Administration employees began calling out sick. Only 84 senators showed up for the fifth attempted vote to reopen DHS, which failed to clear a 60-vote threshold or even a simple majority — and fell largely along party lines. Forty-six Republicans and Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania voted to fund DHS, while 37 Democrats led by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) opposed its reopening in protest of President Trump’s immigration agenda....

…. In Timisoara, a small protest against the eviction of a dissident Hungarian pastor from his church-owned flat quickly escalated into a huge anti-government demonstration. Ceaușescu allowed the police, the armed forces and the Securitate to open fire on the crowds and many men, women and children were killed or injured. When dissenting voices began to be heard across the country about the Timisoara massacre and who was ultimately to blame for it, Ceaușescu …held an open-air meeting in Bucharest three days after the massacre, blaming anti-Romanian troublemakers for the uprising. The crowd was having none of it, and what...

Cesar Chavez is disappearing across California. Statues are coming down, street names are being stripped, and murals are being covered up in a rapid-fire backlash against the once-revered labor leader, as officials move to distance public spaces from a legacy now under scrutiny. In San Fernando, a statue of Cesar Chavez was removed Thursday, while at Santa Ana College, murals and other campus imagery bearing his likeness have been covered. In Fresno, city leaders unanimously voted to strip Chavez’s name from a major boulevard, restoring its original designation, a dramatic reversal of a tribute that once symbolized pride in the...

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps spokesperson Ali Mohammad Naini has been killed in ‌strikes ⁠launched by the US and Israel, ⁠Iranian state TV reported ⁠on Friday. Naini, also the agency’s deputy of public relations, was assassinated just days after Israeli forces eliminated the clerical regime’s de-facto leader, Ali Larijani, and its anti-protest enforcer Gholamreza Soleimani. Hours before his death, Naini insisted that Tehran was still able to build missiles despite the US forces’ bombardment from Operation Epic Fury. “These people expect the war to continue until the enemy is completely exhausted,” he said. “This war must end when the shadow...

WASHINGTON — Education Secretary Linda McMahon is sending a letter to 43 million Americans with student loans — about 9 million of whom are in default — to notify them that the Treasury Department is taking over debt collection, The Post has learned. The letter describes the transfer of responsibilities as a way to protect taxpayers by improving the efficiency of the collection process — after loan repayments were paused through much of the Biden administration, with borrowers protected from delinquency through September 2024. “For too long, Americans have shouldered the consequences of poor leadership and persistent mismanagement of our...

Uncover the sunken remains of a 4th-century basilica in Turkey. Submerged beneath the waters of Lake Iznik for hundreds of years, the church could reveal crucial insights into the early days of Christianity. Join a team of international researchers as they travel back through time—and grapple with Turkey’s many earthquakes, which could sink the structure deeper at any moment. Sunken Basilica Reveals Glimpse of Early Christianity | Full Episode Secrets of the Dead | 55:35 PBS | 1.69M subscribers | 23,809 views | March 18, 2026

Diplomacy is not surrender, and talking to an opponent is not a reward for good behavior. In dealings with China, Russia, or Iran, U.S. diplomatic initiatives must always be measured not by the process or optics—or by whether they support an abstract goal—but by whether the outcome results in greater or weaker constraints on a rival’s ability to harm us and our interests. Does it increase or decrease his dependency on us? Does it aid or complicate his ability to concentrate military power against us? Does it ease or impede his path of conquest?A corollary has to do with allies....