Free Republic

Excavations from 2015 to 2021 on the ancient site of Motza, just west of Jerusalem, revealed a sprawling settlement with some surprisingly advanced technology. The site dates back to 7100–6700 BCE during the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB) period...There is evidence of the use of calcitic lime plaster, or calcium carbonate-based plaster, in construction as far back as 10,000 to 12,000 years ago. It later became a dominant, durable building material used by civilizations like the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans. The earliest evidence of its use appeared in the Fertile Crescent, or modern day Jordan and Turkey. The material is produced...

WASHINGTON, May 8 (Reuters) - The U.S. Postal Service on Friday reported a net quarterly ​loss of $2 billion as it faces a growing financial crisis and has ‌warned it could run out of cash as soon as February. USPS said mail volumes fell another 6.3% in the three months ending March 31 as operating revenue rose 2.3% to $20.2 billion ​over the same quarter last year. USPS last month said it would temporarily ​suspend employer payments for a federal pension program to conserve cash ⁠and plans to raise the price of first-class mail stamps to 82 cents ​from 78...

The beams are an in-kind contribution from CERN. Matthew Kapust / SURF The US has begun lowering 10 million pounds of steel nearly a mile underground to build the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE), widely regarded as one of the world’s most ambitious particle physics experiments. The Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), the premier US national lab for high-energy particle physics announced the start of the underground detector assembly for the massive neutrino project in South Dakota on May 7. It is carried out along with the Sanford Underground Research Facility and CERN. Transported deep underground, the steel beams will...

A DECADES old cold case involving a teen girl who was found beaten and stabbed to death has come to an end thanks to a DNA link. Bobby Charles Taylor Sr., 60, was arrested in connection to the brutal rape and murder of Deanna Ogg who died in 1986 at the age of 16. Deanna Ogg was found dead in 1986, and now 40 years later authorities have arrested a man in connection with her murderCredit: Handout Mugshot of Bobby Charles Taylor Sr., who was arrested for the 1986 murder of Deanna Ogg. Bobby Charles Taylor Sr. was arrested and...

People freaking out about the Reform UK win compilation pic.twitter.com/QJIQM4wqLo— ɖʀʊӄքǟ ӄʊռʟɛʏ 🇧🇹🇹🇩 (@kunley_drukpa) May 8, 2026It's amazing. Nigel Farage and Reform UK has a platform that is more or less the same as establishment Republicans in the United States: Lots of bravado about "conservatism" but voting like Democrats going the speed limit. But because they are the only viable right-wing option for the moment, people voted for them in spades in Thursday's local elections. They are estimated to pick up well over 1,500 council seats across the country (they previously had TWO), while the left-wing Labour Party crashes out....

Union Pacific's famed Big Boy No. 4014, the world's largest operating steam locomotive, will journey to the East Coast this summer for the first time as part of a historic coast-to-coast tour to celebrate America's 250th anniversary. The tour includes a Fourth of July celebration in Philadelphia, major display events in eight cities and more than 50 whistle-stops in 10 states, including stops for the first time in Indiana, Ohio, New York and Pennsylvania.

GREENBELT, Md. — A former senior adviser to Dr. Anthony Fauci proclaimed on Friday he’s “innocent” of criminal charges that he conspired to stop investigations into the origins of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. David Morens, 78, pleaded not guilty to five counts before Magistrate Judge Ajmel Ahsen Quereshi in Maryland federal court during an arraignment hearing Friday with his defense attorneys Timothy Belevetz and Morgan Taylor. Morens, who faces up to 51 years in federal prison if convicted, told The Post, “I’m innocent” ahead of the hearing while seated in the courthouse lobby — and carried on calmly solving...

Migrants quitting asylum claims and volunteering to leave the US have increased at least seven-fold under President Trump — with the administration touting the increase as a success for the rule of law, but critics arguing it’s a sign detention practices have gotten out of hand. More than 80,000 “voluntary departure” orders were issued by US immigration judges between Jan. 2025 and March 2026 — a more than 600% increase from the 11,400 issued during the last 15 months of former President Joe Biden’s term, according to numbers from the Vera Institute of Justice reviewed by the Washington Post. And...

For 4,200 years, the Y chromosome of a Yakutian warrior has quietly echoed in Siberia's Arctic peoples. His extraordinary Stone Age grave was discovered in Russia's far northeast near Yakutsk in 2004 by scientists. The middle-aged hunter's skeleton was found on its back with arms at its side. Dozens of elk-bone plates were laid as a shield over the chest. Analysis of the radiocarbon data hints that the person died nearly 4,000 years ago. The person is presumed to be from the Ymyyakhtakh cultural horizon. This cultural horizon contains the nomadic hunter-gatherers who used more sophisticated bone and antler weapons......

Convicted child killer Tanner Horner will take up residence in one of the most brutal death row prisons after being sentenced to die by a Texas jury this week. Horner will rot away at the Polunsky Unit, an infamously restrictive prison outside Houston where the state’s death row inmates are housed in an all-solitary confinement wing and spend at least 22 hours a day in their 60-square-foot cells. The former FedEx deliveryman, 34, was booked at the notorious prison Tuesday within hours of being sentenced for the gruesome murder of Athena Strand, 7, whom he admitted strangling while delivering a...

Delta Air Lines expects a $300 million boost from its Pennsylvania oil refinery this quarter as jet fuel prices surge globally, giving the carrier a significant advantage over competitors scrambling to manage soaring costs.

A man went out on a morning walk in southwest Norway and stumbled upon a surprise: an elite warrior's sword scabbard that was purposefully buried 1,500 years ago. The rare gold object, which was richly decorated with serpentine animals, was probably an offering to the gods at a time of famine and societal turmoil, researchers say...The sixth-century gold artifact, which is about 2.4 inches (6 centimeters) long and weighs 1.2 ounces (33 grams), once adorned the scabbard of an elite warrior's sword. Only 17 others have been discovered to date in Northern Europe, and most were found in hoards with...

Content evoking the Soviet era is becoming increasingly common on social media... "Nostalgic content aimed at young people — showing Soviet-era interiors or images of panel apartment blocks, paired with audio and instructions on how they should be viewed — would have seemed bizarre 15 years ago. Now it has become a trend," says Marleen Mihhailova, a junior researcher in semiotics at University of Tartu... What motivated Mihhailova to study the topic, however, was specifically an interest in young people's nostalgia, since they have no firsthand experience of the Soviet period. She interviewed 10 young people born after 1990, half...

A prose tract or polemic by John Milton, published November 23, 1644, at the height of the English Civil War... Milton, though a supporter of the Parliament, argued forcefully against the Licensing Order of 1643, noting that such censorship had never been a part of classical Greek and Roman society. The tract is full of biblical and classical references which Milton uses to strengthen his argument. The issue was personal for Milton as he had suffered censorship himself in his efforts to publish several tracts defending divorce (a radical stance at the time and one which met with no favor...

The call is coming from inside the house. The Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais has made progressives even more determined to delegitimize the court — and Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson is among them. In a dissent involving a post-decision procedural question, Jackson accused the majority of acting out of pure partisanship. Her opinion said that the court “unshackles itself” from all constraint and “dives into the fray” (meaning the partisan fray). In its jurisprudence, “principles give way to power.” It is acting with an “abandon” that is “unwarranted and unwise.” These harsh charges occasioned a stinging and well-deserved...

Don’t break up because of that Mam! New York leaders are desperately trying to stop billionaire bigwigs from hightailing it out of the Big Apple with their cash, businesses and thousands of jobs — as fears mount that Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s policies will accelerate the Empire State’s nation-leading loss of wealth. The splashy one-two punch of Citadel CEO Ken Griffin and Apollo Global Management honcho Marc Rowan pledging to expand outside New York City has been coupled with a silent wave of businesses “quiet quitting” the city over its hostile environment, insiders told The Post. The burgeoning biz bolt has...

With six months until the high-stakes midterm elections, the Democratic Party is struggling to raise money and keep up with its GOP counterparts, leading to frustrations among some donors with Democratic National Committee leadership and its chair Ken Martin. At the end of March, the Republican National Committee outraised the DNC $21.2 million to $11.4 million, according to new reports filed with the Federal Election Commission. The RNC reported having nearly eight times more cash on hand -- $116 million to the DNC’s $13.8 million. In addition, the DNC is a little over $18 million in debt, according to FEC...

Dark earth, the strange patches of black soil rich in nutrients that cause plants to grow at accelerated rates, while also capturing unusually high amounts of carbon from the air, is one of the Amazon rainforest’s greatest mysteries. Since these patches of dark earth were first discovered by European colonizers in the 1880s, debate has raged over their origins, with ideas ranging from the natural to the artificial. Variants of this dark, nutrient-rich soil have been found in a range of locations around the world, and are most often associated with the accumulation of materials in soil after long periods...

During the 4th-century, a remarkable artifact was produced by Roman artisans that exhibits optical qualities so unique they have baffled scholars for centuries. Known as the Lycurgus Cup, it is one of the most unusual examples of glassworking ever produced by the Roman Empire, as it is made from dichroic glass—a material that appears to exhibit an entirely different coloration when light passes through it—causing it to look green when illuminated from the front but appearing a striking amber-red when illuminated from behind. The artifact’s unique name refers to its depiction of King Lycurgus, who, according to mythology, attempted to...

Senior Airman John Linzmeier/U.S. Air Force via AP Over the decades, many United States Air Force aircraft have gone into the famous boneyard at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Arizona, but few have come out again. The warbirds there are generally there for the long haul, and no matter how well prepped for storage, it seems likely that many of them, after a few years, are no longer recoverable. Now, though, we learn that one warbird has emerged, phoenix-like, from the boneyard. It's a B1B Lancer, known to the crews as the "Bone." Formerly named Rage, the rebuilt, refitted, refurbished...