Free Republic

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky will tell this week’s NATO summit that Russia is “preparing new military operations on the territory of Europe”, a warning that comes as the gaze of the world again shifts from Eastern Europe to the Middle East. The head of Ukraine’s Main Directorate of Intelligence of the Ministry of Defence (GUR) has briefed President Volodymyr Zelensky that Russia is preparing a military strike on Europe, the President revealed on the eve of his trip to Western Europe. Zelensky arrived in London on Monday morning by Presidential plane where he is to meet with senior British figures...

New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy ripped NJ Transit engineers for going on strike Friday — blasting their actions as a “slap in the face” to commuters and a “mess of their own making.” The Democrat lashed out after roughly 400 rail engineers walked off the job after marathon contract talks stalled ahead of a midnight deadline, setting off the first strike to hit the major transit system in more than 40 years. “It did not have to come to this,” Murphy told a news conference after the morning commuter rush got underway. “A small handful of locomotive engineers have walked...

A Brooklyn teen was busted for allegedly making multiple threats to schools across Texas and Florida – even personally targeting a relative of one of the victims of the 2022 Uvalde school massacre on TikTok, authorities announced this week. The 16-year-old boy was picked up May 1 at his Brooklyn home and charged with one felony count of making terroristic threats, the Uvalde Police Department said Wednesday. In addition to the threats to the Uvalde shooting victim’s family, he is accused of making multiple “swatting” – or false report – calls and sending threats to the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School...

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) conducted operations in Nashville this week, resulting in the arrests of a convicted child sex predator and an alleged gang member, but the mayor of the city said the arrests were not focused on making the city safer. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) shared Democratic Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell’s letter to the city about the ICE arrests. “Our top priority is keeping people safe, and we’re deeply concerned that what appear to be federal actions are making that harder,” O’Connell wrote. “Overnight, we understand that US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agents detained people...

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) assured attendees at one of his “Fighting Oligarchy” rallies Saturday they are “making Donald Trump and Elon Musk very nervous” as he laid out a string of grievances with the current Washington administration. The 83-year-old senator spoke to his supporters as they gathered in the Gloria Molina Grand Park in Los Angeles alongside guests including politicians, union representatives and musical acts.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said during Thursday’s Cabinet meeting that countries are approaching the United States with offers they never previously would have because of President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs. Lutnick was the second cabinet member to speak after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth just a day after Trump put a pause on his reciprocal tariffs on countries that did not retaliate against them. According to the White House, some 75 countries are looking to negotiate, while escalations with Beijing have led to the administration ramping up reciprocal tariffs to 125 percent on China. “They have come with offers that...

President Donald Trump announced Friday that he has spoken with House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) about making interest payments on loans for American-made cars tax deductible. While speaking with reporters in the Oval Office, Trump revealed that he has spoken with the leaders of both chambers of Congress about his vision for tax deductions on loans for U.S.-made cars. “If you buy a car in the United States that’s made in the United States, if it’s manufactured here… if you borrow money you have interest payments, we’re going to let you deduct the...

Representative Adam Smith (D-WA) said Tuesday on MSNBC’s “Ana Cabrera Reports” that President Donald Trump is telling the American people an “absolute lie” that the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is about making the federal government more efficient. Smith said, “If we identify what Trump and Musk are doing as what it is, which is basically trying to smash the federal government so that they can have greater power and control, this has nothing to do with efficiency and effectiveness. You line up 100 CEOs in the country and say, ‘Is this the way you run your business if you...

Former Attorney General Bill Barr said Monday the indictment against his former boss Donald Trump for allegedly mishandling classified documents is “entirely of his own making” and “not the result of unfair government prosecution.” “For the sake of the country, our party, and a basic respect for the truth, it is time that Republicans come to grips with the hard truths about President Trump’s conduct and its implications,” Barr wrote in an article for The Free Press. “The effort to present Trump as a victim in the Mar-a-Lago document affair is cynical political propaganda.” The former AG went on to...

How many times have we seen it from the liberal media? They detail a large gathering, with the insufferable comment “no masks.” The mask has been the crutch for the panic peddlers, something they think offers a total shield against COVID. Wrong. It doesn’t. I wore a mask and I still contracted the virus last November. Second, the so-called experts led by Dr. Anthony Fauci and his crew have clung to mask-wearing even for those who have been vaccinated which is nothing but theater. If we go down the list, the experts have been wrong on just about everything. Contracting...

As we all know by now, a respirator or mask is most useful for protection when you must be in close quarters with one or more people. That's why they are a must for healthcare workers and it looks like we'll be seeing more mask mandates for the general population. If you have to wear a mask in public, my feeling is it might as well be a good one. At the start of the Covid-19 epidemic, demand for masks worldwide outstripped production capacity and prices jumped to outrageous levels, prompting many of the handier types, like myself, to some...

In its first ruling of 2015, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has held that businesses may not allow individuals to use their equipment to further process incomplete firearm blanks, frames and receivers , attorney Joshua Prince reported Saturday. Such businesses may not assist or provide machinery access to unlicensed individuals without being licensed firearms manufacturers. The ruling, signed by ATF Director B. Todd Jones on Friday, also holds that the businesses must “identify (mark) any such firearm and maintain manufacturing records,” and that Gun Control Act requirements may not be avoided by allowing persons to perform processes...

The making of a Steinway piano is a time-honored process involving the hands of many skilled craftspeople over the course of almost a full year. Steinway & Sons pianos are built in just two factories worldwide - one in Astoria, NY and one in Hamburg, Germany. Both factories have been building pianos for well over a century, and although Steinway has always been at the cutting edge in utilizing and perfecting the latest technology where it could make the piano better, we have found that certain things are simply better when done by skilled craftspeople than by a machine. For...

This mailer arrived in our box for my wife today. My first suspicion was that this mailer was under her ‘familiar’ name, not her ‘legal’ name. Plus, she’s already registered to vote. But there was something fishy about this mailer so I couldn’t help but delve deeper. It appeared to come from the Virginia State Board of Elections, but upon further investigation it actually came from the Voter Participation Center, which is a partner organization with the George Soros funded Center for American Progress and both groups have direct ties to the Obama White House. It started out as part...

As the Administration’s push for alternative fuels grows stronger, Congress is set to consider H.R. 1380, which would create very generous tax credits to manufacturers who retrofit existing work vehicles to run on natural gas rather than on that terrifying global menace known as oil, and very generous subsidies to natural gas vehicle consumers: $7500 per car and a whopping $64,000 for heavy-duty trucks and 18-wheelers. It’s common knowledge in DC that Texas hedge-fund operator and natural gas-magnate T. Boone Pickens is the force behind this bi-partisan, pork-laden legislation, possibly because his natural gas empire would greatly profit from the...

After taking credit for President Obama releasing his long-form birth certificate to quell doubts about his citizenship, real estate developer Donald Trump may have to release his own records to address questions about his past. Donald Trump, who claimed this week that a high draft number kept him from fighting for his country in Vietnam, actually received a series of student deferments while in college and a medical deferment after graduation, according to Selective Service records. The Smoking Gun first reported the revelation after obtaining the paperwork from the National Archives and Records Administration. But it's still not known what...

With unemployment still above 9% nationwide and new up-ticks to over 12% in the nation’s largest state, President Obama spoke out on the need to “turn things around.” “For an economy to grow we need to build and invent stuff,” the president observed. “I’m not quite sure on what it takes to get stuff invented and built, but my Administration has been working hard to try to put together the right mix of bailouts, subsidies, and tax increases to do the trick.” According to the president, “one of the deterrents to inventing stuff is the uncertainty of turning a profit...

Kevin Drum, who I recently learned lives not far from me, has some thoughts on yesterday’s Obamacare decision and the enumerated powers of the Constitution: The state of Massachusetts can basically do anything it wants as long as it’s arguably rational and not specifically prohibited or reserved to the federal government. And this works out fine, which is why it’s so odd to hear opponents of a federal individual mandate chatter so furiously about slippery slopes and tyranny. After all, the argument goes, if the commerce clause of the constitution is interpreted to mean the federal government can force you...

Dinesh D’Souza makes a good point in the video you’re about to watch. Obama never does speak about entrepreneurship and business in a positive light. He’s always demagogues the hell out of free markets, as if all financial successes were the result of “greed” and the “rich” not paying their fair share. (Like government bureaucrats are in any position to judge what a “fair share” of taxable income even is.) Here’s an idea: How about Obama talk about the “greed” of government politicians who have an insatiable appetite for confiscating more and more money that they never earned. But I...

Let me first always remind readers that polls are a snapshot in time. Two years from now, President Obama could be sitting on top of the world politically. But for now, he has lost all but 38 percent approval from the critical "independent" American voters. They're the ones that gave him the presidency. He appears headstrong in his determination to show the nation what a disastrous presidency looks like. Pundits often point to the presidency of Jimmy Carter as the modern example of a failed leader. It is no secret that I have, despite my former years as an active...