Free Republic

10 Ancient Drug Epidemics That Erased Entire Civilizations | 49:53 Health with Henry | 99,530 views | June 29, 2026

New York City dished out welfare checks to nearly 865,000 people over the past year — a historic handout that has sent public assistance spending skyrocketing to a record-breaking $2.7 billion, The Post can reveal. The city’s Department of Social Services served a staggering 864,999 welfare recipients for the 12-month period ending May 30, a whopping 55.7% increase since 2022 and totals the Big Apple hasn’t seen in roughly 30 years, an examination of agency records found. The city’s taxpayer-funded budget for cash-assistance payments soared even higher — up 72.6%, from $1.57 billion in fiscal 2022 to its current $2.71...

Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed — who has questioned whether police officers need to carry guns — spent years on the campaign trail protected by an armed guard, according to his former security director. El-Sayed, who has been endorsed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) in the Democratic primary, has faced renewed scrutiny after a 2020 University of Michigan video resurfaced showing him questioning police funding and the need for armed officers. During his Senate campaign, however, he has said he does not support defunding police. “Do people really need to use guns? Do we need as much of a police...

“Squad” Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) boasted that Minnesota liberals “defeated ICE’s racist terror campaign” in a cringey video trying to hop on a new TikTok-like trend — but the embattled lefty was swiftly roasted for her efforts. Plopped into a seat, “The Squad” member adjusted her blazer and fidgeted with a microphone as if she were about to be interviewed in the 10-second clip she shared Wednesday on Facebook. Omar, 43, took a deep breath as dramatic instrumental music played in the background. “Me preparing for the documentary on how we defeated ICE’s racist terror campaign in Minnesota,” she wrote...

Two death row inmates are scheduled to be put to death on the same day in Florida — the first double execution in the Sunshine State in over six decades. Governor Ron DeSantis rescheduled the execution of former police officer and convicted child murderer James Duckett for 12 p.m. on July 28, exactly six hours before Dominick Anthony Occhicone Jr. is also set to be put to death, USA Today reported. The 68-year-old former cop was set to be executed in March for murdering an 11-year-old girl in 1987, but he received a rare and temporary reprieve from the Florida...

Friday marks as sad milestone. It was 30 years ago that TWA Flight 800 exploded in midair off of Long Island minutes after taking off from John F. Kennedy International Airport en route to Paris

A top Missouri prosecutor was booted for having an affair with an illegal migrant her office was probing for sex assault — and because she slept with two other men in glaring conflicts of interest, too, court papers allege. Disgraced Ray County Prosecutor Camille Johnston was yanked from her position Thursday when a judge signed off on Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway’s petition laying out a slew of misconduct allegations against her during her three and a half years in office, Hanaway announced. Johnston — an elected official who took office Jan. 1, 2023 — compromised the integrity of her...

WASHINGTON — The highest-ranking woman in the House of Representatives is calling for a “bright-line rule” prohibiting lawmakers from having sexual relationships with congressional staff after The Post revealed Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) slept with at least two aides to Texas Democrats. Rep. Lisa McClain (R-Mich.), chairwoman of the House Republican Caucus, told The Post that “Senator Gallego’s relationships fall short of the standard the public expects from elected officials.” “Congress should have a bright-line rule that Members should not have romantic or sexual relationships with congressional staff,” the No. 4 House Republican said. “Even if a relationship is consensual,...

A prehistoric burial near Stonehenge long known as the “Shaman of Upton Lovell” has been identified as a woman’s, overturning a belief that shaped archaeological interpretation for more than 200 years. Ancient DNA analysis revealed that the individual buried near Stonehenge about 4,000 years ago was biologically female. The finding challenges one of Britain’s best-known prehistoric identifications and is prompting researchers to rethink the roles women held in Early Bronze Age society. Researchers examined surviving skeletal remains, including fragments of the skull, a tooth and a foot bone. DNA testing identified XX chromosomes, confirming the individual was female. The findings,...

Billy the Kid continues to make headlines, 145 years after being gunned down in Fort Sumner. Thursday historians announced new evidence that he was Catholic — a detail that adds more layers of intrigue to one of the Wild West’s mythologized figures. Billy the Kid died July 14, 1881, after being shot by Lincoln County Sheriff Pat Garrett. On the first day of the Wild West History Association Roundup, Allen Sanchez said certificates of Billy the Kid’s baptism and his parents’ marriage were located inside St. Peter’s Church in New York City. St. Peter’s is connected to the Sisters of...

Apparently, USC does not have any literature classes — or at least none on ancient Greece. Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey” hit theaters on Friday, and the USC football team tried to get in on the fun, posting “Our Odyssey begins August 29” on X, referring to their first game of the year. The issue with that is Homer’s 8th century epic poem “The Odyssey” follows Odysseus’ 10-year journey back to Greece after defeating the city of Troy in the Trojan War — the same city that serves as inspiration for USC’s nickname. The literary Trojans never had an odyssey. In...

The Department of Homeland Security has revealed what is in store for the Canadian woman accused of pummeling a patriotic teenager at the Jersey Shore on Fourth of July weekend. Kaitlyn Tracey, 33, a Canadian national, is currently in custody at Delaney Hall immigrant detention center in Newark, New Jersey, after the alleged July 3 beatdown at Point Pleasant Beach. She arrived in the US in 2024 using her passport but overstayed her visa, officials said. “This illegal alien who assaulted a teenager has no business being in our country,” DHS wrote in a statement on X, dubbing her a...

In 1832 president Andrew Jackson deemed it of very high importance that the people of Quallah Battoo knew who America was. The result was one of the US Navy’s least known military escapades, when sailors and marines fought Sumatran pirates. Because, don’t all good stories involve pirates? Marines and Sailors Versus Pirates: The Quallah Battoo Expedition | 16:11 The History Guy: History Deserves to Be Remembered 151,217 views | October 25, 2024

A few weeks ago, I reviewed Eric Metaxas’s bestselling book Revolution: The Birth of the Greatest Nation in the History of the World. Since then, it has remained on the New York Times bestselling list and is currently ranked number two in nonfiction behind Maggie Haberman’s TDS offering, Regime Change.One would have thought a book published during the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence would be stocked and displayed prominently at Barnes & Noble. Instead, during his frequent appearances on Steve Bannon’s War Room program, the author testifies that the nation’s leading storefront bookseller doesn’t typically have copies on...

Disgraced ex-Rep. Eric Swalwell’s zombie congressional campaign has dwindled to just over $11,000 after he coughed up another $50,000 to celebrity defense attorney Sara Azari and refunded nearly $190,000 to donors following his epic career collapse following sexual assault allegations. The details were documented this week in new federal campaign filings and come as California ethics investigators continue probing more than $300,000 in payments made to Azari from Swalwell’s failed gubernatorial campaign — raising fresh questions about the disgraced Democrat’s mounting legal bills as his political career continues to unravel. Swalwell’s federal campaign filings, which list him as treasurer, paint...

Former CNN host and independent journalist Don Lemon claimed in a new interview that he’s “serious” about possibly running for president in the 2028 election — and insisted he’d be a “really good” commander-in-chief. Lemon made the eyebrow-raising declaration on “Can’t Be Censored” podcast hosted by Karman Wong and Travis Dhanraj, insisting that everyone wants to know if he has White House aspirations. “Do you have political ambition? Is that true?” Dhanraj asked on Wednesday’s show. “No, but people keep asking me if I’m running for president,” Lemon answered. “And I don’t know. I might. I’m serious. I don’t know....

They raised a stink. City Council members overwhelmingly voted Thursday to give themselves an 18% raise — a shamelessly self-serving move that comes after months of thwarted attempts to pass a fat pay hike. A veto-proof 42-6 vote approved the measure to inflate council salaries to $175,500, as well as hike Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s pay to $305,800 a year, backdated to January — the start of new terms in office and the first day on the job for some lawmakers. The nay votes all came from Republicans and conservative Democrats, including Councilman Phil Wong (D-Queens), who said he pushed for...

For fresh proof of how little New York authorities care about social-services fraud, consider the curious case of adult daycares in Flushing. Dr. Mehmet Oz, who oversees the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, puts out that within a one-mile radius in the Queens neighborhood, a full 64 Social Adult Day Care centers operate, with thousands upon thousands of supposed elderly enrollees. This reeks: Over the past three years, such New York senior centers have generated $2.5 billion in billings, with $2.1 billion of that coming from Flushing. Flushing’s Medicaid-eligible senior population grew by 20% from 2018 to 2024, yet...

The $450 million Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library opened its doors on July 4th. And for the first time, a major institution went accurate about who Roosevelt really was. Glenn Beck says that's actually the problem. Because when you read what TR wrote in his own hand — to Charles Davenport at Cold Spring Harbor on January 3rd, 1913 — the museum isn't making Roosevelt look like a progressive. Roosevelt was a progressive. And that's what the exhibit is hiding.

Who were the Barbary Pirates? For over 300 years, the Barbary Pirates terrorized coastal Europe -- striking as far north as Iceland and as close to home as Ireland, England, Spain, and Italy. Men, women, and children vanished from beaches in the dead of night. Some estimates suggest more than a million Europeans were captured and sold into slavery. Yet today, few people are aware of this forgotten slave trade. In this documentary, join Kevin Hicks as he uncovers who the Barbary Pirates really were, how they built a slave-trading empire that the most powerful nations of the time struggled...