Free Republic

Joe Biden is falling back into nakedly partisan politics in which teachers’ unions get what they want no matter what the evidence shows or common sense dictates.Outside of his family, few people believe Joe Biden will seek a second term in 2024, at age 82. Thus, he is uniquely positioned to rise above partisan politics, stand up to the special interests and put regular Americans first. But if the debate about re-opening schools is any guide, Biden is wasting that opportunity and falling back into nakedly partisan politics in which the Democratic Party’s biggest donors—here, teachers’ unions—get what they want...

Some people have a hard time getting the message about social distancing in Canada. That seems to be the case in Newfoundland, where police arrested a woman for the second time after she refused to self-isolate. She was previously taken into custody on March 25. Narcity spoke with Constable James C. Cadigan, the Media Relations Officer with the Royal Newfoundland Constabulary. He confirmed that officers were called to the community of Curling on Thursday morning. There, they found the 53-year-old woman who had been arrested previously walking down a road. Constable Cadigan confirmed that officers were met with noncompliance when...

Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, professor of medicine at Stanford University and co-author of the Great Barrington Declaration, told podcast host Megyn Kelly that lockdowns have ineffectively addressed the concerns and danger COVID-19 poses to certain communities. “I’ve come to think of it as trickle-down epidemiology. We’ve used the lockdowns to protect the rich, whereas we essentially expose the — like in California for instance, it’s the poor areas that have had the high death rates from COVID. The lockdowns haven’t protected people living in places where there’s high poverty,” Bhattacharya said on “The Megyn Kelly Show.” “Minority populations, especially Hispanics, have...

About 2 million Australians begun their first full day of a strict coronavirus lockdown on Monday following the discovery of one case in the community in Perth, capital of Western Australia state, but no new cases have since been found. Authorities ordered a five-day lockdown of Perth after a security guard at a hotel used to quarantine people returning from overseas was found to have contracted the virus. The state government said 66 people have been deemed close contacts of the unidentified guard and none of those already tested were infected. "In total 13 close contacts have now tested negative...

Despite it being legal under volunteer exemption.. Police in the UK arrested a man for handing out free soup in a park, claiming that he had violated COVID-19 restrictions. Nick Smith had been giving out free soup to people in his village for 17 weeks before Sussex Police intervened, claiming he had violated COVID rules by encouraging people to gather. However, Smith cited exemptions under the rules for volunteering, which allows for up to 15 people to gather either indoors or outdoors. Smith said he found the whole experience “very shocking” and insisted he was only trying to help people...

New York’s Democrat Gov. Andrew Cuomo is the poster child for the most macabre chutzpah we have ever seen. Having mismanaged his state’s Wuhan China virus pandemic to the point of herding COVID-19 patients into nursing homes where even he admits it spread like a wildfire through dry grass. Yet he blames everyone but himself for his state’s carnage, has written a book bizarrely claiming to be his state’s savior, and even won an Emmy for his daily bloviating press conferences. Ir should have been for best performance in a horror show. Now we know the carnage and death he...

“We’re the police, we’re not just someone, you idiot”.. Two viral videos encapsulate the state of the UK at the moment with police abusing powers given to them to enforce lockdown laws. In one case a man was arrested on his way to work for not identifying himself, while another who went to a shop was hauled away for not wearing a mask properly. West Midlands police were forced to apologise after a man in Solihull was followed, called an idiot, and finally arrested by overly officious police. The police can be seen harassing the man, asking him where he...

A historic pub in the centre of Oxford that has served students, scholars and literary greats for over 450 years is to close. The Lamb and Flag, once frequented by the likes of Lord of the Rings author J.R.R. Tolkien and his friend C.S. Lewis, who wrote The Chronicles of Narnia, has suffered a disastrous loss of revenues since the start of the pandemic. It first opened in 1566 and moved to its present location on St Giles, a broad thoroughfare in the city centre, in 1613. It is owned by St John’s College, one of 45 colleges and private...

POLICE have today threatened to dish out £200 Covid fines for people having snowball fights and sledging in the snow. Forces in London, Surrey and Wiltshire sent out warnings urging Brits not to break lockdown while enjoying the snow, saying "Covid regulations still apply." Police forces reminded Brits that 'Covid regulations still apply' in the snow Surrey Police tweeted today: "We are currently receiving lots of calls and reports relating to snowballs being thrown and people outside sledging. "Enjoy the snow today but please don't involve other people, particularly more vulnerable residents. "Please stay safe and remember that Covid regulations...

More than 8 million Americans fell into poverty over the past six months as social safety measures put into place at the start of the coronavirus pandemic expired, according to a new study published this week. The report, released by economists at the University of Chicago and University of Notre Dame, found that the nation's poverty rate increased by 2.4 percentage points between June and December, surging from 9.3% to 11.8%. An additional 8.1 million people are now considered poor. At the end of March, Congress passed the massive $2.2 trillion CARES Act to blunt the financial pain of the...

America welcomed a new president last week. As predicted, the theme of Joe Biden’s inaugural address was unity. That’s not surprising after five years of toxic political discourse, in which families splintered and relationships were broken off by the mere admission that somebody supported Donald Trump. But just talking about unity isn’t enough. President Biden needs actions to match those lofty words, and he needs to make sure others in his administration and party do the same. He can start by calling for an end to the lockdowns that governments have ordered since last March in response to COVID-19.As I...

Keeping schools closed is having a "calamitous" impact on children, some of the UK's top paediatricians have warned as they called for teachers to be prioritised for a vaccine. The group said they were witnessing an "acute and rapid increase in mental health and safeguarding cases", with parents suffering breakdowns and other psychological stress due to home-schooling. Vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi insisted it was the government's "absolute priority" to re-open schools. But Labour said people "need certainty" about how low coronavirus rates need to sink for all children to be sent back to the classroom. Over the weekend, Health Secretary...

The campaign to recall California Gov. Gavin Newsom is inching closer to meeting the required number of signatures needed to qualify for a statewide ballot. Organizers said over the weekend they’ve gathered 1.2 million of the 1.5 million signatures needed by March 17. Rescue CA has a goal of getting in enough signatures to help the effort get to 2 million signatures. 1.5 million validated signatures are required to qualify a recall for a special election, according to Anne Dunsmore, Campaign manager and finance director, Rescue California. Currently the Secretary of State has confirmed that the signatures have been 84%...

Protesters block roads, hurl rocks at police after string of crackdowns on synagogues, educational institutions stokes tensions between Haredi factions and law enforcement; officer fires warning shot in the air after becoming surrounded by large crowds Hundreds of members of the extremist ultra-Orthodox Jerusalemite Faction blocked roads in the city of Bnei Brak on Sunday in protest against the government's coronavirus measures. Protest leaders defined it as an action against what they deemed as "the government's decision to restrict the movement of the ultra-Orthodox public in any way possible while using violent and tyrannical methods reserved for regimes we thought...

Infections higher after lockdown went into place.. Infectious diseases expert Professor Steven Riley says current data shows that the national lockdown in the United Kingdom is not working. Riley, who is professor of infectious disease dynamics at Imperial College London, cited a React study which shows “the prevalence of infection increased between 6 and 15 January,” after the national lockdown was announced on January 4. “It’s long enough that, were the lockdown working effectively, we would certainly have hoped to have seen a decline,” said Riley. The professor added that current research “certainly doesn’t support the conclusion that lockdown is...

Marc Morano, founder of Climate Depot and author of the forthcoming Green Fraud: Why the Green New Deal Is Even Worse than You Think, warned “climate change” would be used as a pretext for lockdowns as is being done with coronavirus. “They want to use the COVID lockdown as the model for climate lockdowns,” said Morano of Democrats and the broader left, offering his remarks on Tuesday’s edition of SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Daily with host Alex Marlow.

Federal prisons were locked down Saturday to prevent possible violence ahead of President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration, officials said,

"Real Time" host Bill Maher on Friday night addressed the death of Ashli Babbitt, the Air Force veteran from California who was fatally shot inside the Capitol on Jan. 6. Maher stressed that Babbitt "lost her life trying to prevent Biden from becoming president" -- despite the fact she was previously an Obama voter. He sympathized with Babbitt as a struggling business owner who was "pissed off at the greed and corruption," but insisted a second term for President Trump term would not have solved her problems since it was her home state of California that was "doing most of...

SAINT PAUL, MN—With Democrats in control of Congress, Americans are looking forward to seeing their elected representatives put the needs of the American people first. Democrats have responded by pursuing the one thing every American affected by devastating lockdowns needs: another Trump impeachment. According to experts, there are millions of struggling Americans-- many of whom are completely destitute-- wondering where their next Trump impeachment is coming from. Local unemployed waitress and single mother Alissa Martins spoke to reporters, saying she is "very happy" about this development. "I haven't made a dime in over 3 weeks," said the struggling young mother....

What we’re witnessing is the dangerous normalization of a dystopian concept of “freedom” in which government dominates your life “for your own good.”When the Australian state of Victoria issued a 48-hour warning on New Year’s Eve that its border with the neighboring state of New South Wales would be indefinitely closed, it likely secured the award for the most egregious measure by a western government to curb COVID-19. The state government instructed residents to return home by 11:59 p.m. on Jan. 1. Those who did not arrive at the border by the midnight curfew were turned away by police. Thousands...