Free Republic

Angry residents and workers Sunday decried the hordes of hookers brazenly peddling themselves on a Queens street, where it was business as usual the day after The Post exposed the rampant illegal trade. “The police do nothing — nothing!” fumed Anna Garcia, 42, who works at a cellphone store along the seedy stretch of Roosevelt Avenue in Corona dubbed the “Market of Sweethearts” by the prostitutes. “Drugs, prostitution, alcohol — it’s terrible,” she said of the flagrant “underground” red-light district taking over the neighborhood filled with families with children.

Politicians lean on the financial industry to target activities they don’t like.The first credit card processor to announce plans to track purchases at gun shops is Discover Financial Services. The company hints that its competitors, specifically Visa, MasterCard, and American Express, are on the same schedule to implement a controversial gun-specific merchant category code announced last year. Given that the ideologically charged bank behind the new code has big plans for targeting gun purchases you can expect more fireworks to follow. "Discover Financial Services, a provider of credit cards, told Reuters it will allow its network to track purchases at...

About $2billion of customer funds have vanished from collapsed crypto exchange FTX, according to two people familiar with the matter. Founder and CEO Sam Bankman-Fried secretly transferred $10 billion of customer funds from FTX to the trading company Alameda Research, which is run by his girlfriend Caroline Ellison, Reuters reports. A large portion of that total has since disappeared, they said. One source put the missing amount at about $1.7 billion. The other said the gap was between $1 billion and $2 billion.

The war between Azerbaijan and Armenia is already dubbed “the first loitering systems war”. And to that one should add “Israeli-made loitering systems.” What until some years ago was considered a “luxury” item for a fighting unit, is now almost a baseline demand. Loitering weapon systems are in high, very high demand and the Israeli defense industries are working hard to provide that demand. It can be said without any doubt that the “big leap” started some five years ago. Until that time the only operational loitering weapon system made in Israel was the Harop, developed by Israel Aerospace Industries...

Shopping malls have always been a hangout for bored teenagers or families looking for something to do on a rainy day. They've probably also been around a lot longer than you might think. Long before Americans made malls their own, residents of ancient Rome met in the marketplace to buy goods and catch up on the latest gossip. In Victorian times, arcades with covered walkways became the precursors to today's malls. With the rise of the suburbs and automobile culture in the mid-20th century, what's generally accepted as the first enclosed mall in the country opened near Minneapolis in 1956....

PORTLAND, Ore. — Columbia Sportswear has spent years designing ski jackets and hiking boots to withstand the elements: wind, rain, snow and, increasingly, tariffs. Located on a sprawling campus adorned with hanging canoes, the 80-year-old retailer has long protected its outdoor gear from the whims of Washington by engaging in what the company calls “tariff engineering” — adjusting its products to lessen import taxes on materials from outside the United States like rubber soles, zippers and waterproof nylon. But now Columbia worries that its approach is under threat from a president whose trade strategy leaves little room for American companies...

IG Farben was the monstrous German chemical cartel. In the age of monopoly capitalism, if you were a sausage maker, you couldn't be a solo act, you'd either join the sausage cartel or they'd drive you out of business like Standard Oil did to small petroleum shippers. IG Farben took the blame for losing WW1, after their invention factory developed the Haber-Bosch Nitrogen Fixation process to make gunpowder and fertilizer out of air, they were 6 months too late making gasoline out of coal, so they took the blame, were looking for the man who became Hitler by 1923. Their...

For the very first time, a modern day Noah’s Ark has opened its doors for an exclusive inside look offering up plans for the ultimate Billionaire bunker and doomsday escape. Vivos founder and CEO Robert Vicino announced Vivos Europa One which will be an invitation only, five star, underground survival complex, similar to an underground cruise ship for the elite. Each family will be provided a private 2,500 square foot of floor area, capable of two story improvements for a total of 5,000 square feet of private living quarters. With fit and finish comparable to a mega-yacht, each member family...

RIO GRANDE VALLEY, Texas - Every day students in Texas public schools pledge allegiance to the flags of the United States and Texas. But when a teacher in a Rio Grande Valley high school assigned students to stand and pledge allegiance to the Mexican flag and sing Mexico's national anthem, one student refused. The resulting controversy has one East Texas lawmaker wanting changes in the state's curriculum on how culture and patriotism are taught in schools. 15-year-old Brenda Brinsdon entered her sophomore year at McAllen ISD's Achieve Early College High School just wanting to do well in her classes.

Legal bills have mounted fighting complaints that she called partisan, false and frivolous, starting with "the politically motivated Troopergate probe," Palin said in a written response to questions. "I must defend against these baseless ethics accusations out of my own pocket as the use of public monies to do so could itself violate state law," Palin wrote. "On August 29, it seems the political landscape changed in Alaska. Now, it seems in order to do this job as Governor, with the political blood sport some are playing today, only the independently wealthy or those willing to spend their income on...

Trucks hauling everything from cars to produce use Southeast Texas roads to deliver their goods, and when a proposed Interstate 69/Trans Texas Corridor is completed, local drivers could see even more of them, local transportation officials said. The proposed I-69 corridor stretches from Michigan down to Texas. Once in Texas, the corridor goes about 650 miles from Texarkana to Brownsville and Laredo and includes separate lanes for cars and semis and areas for trains and utilities. It doesn't cut through Beaumont, but local arteries like U.S. 69 and Interstate 10 would connect to it. Travelers and truckers just need to...

COOS BAY, Ore. (AP) - A police survey says panhandlers outside a Wal-Mart here can make $300 a day. Inside, it takes a clerk a week to make that much. Police say people who have a problem with that needn't look to the law--asking for money is considered protected free speech. "We are not going to target panhandlers," said Coos Bay Police Capt. Rodger Craddock, who spoke a recent gathering of business owners about panhandling. "We can't do that. But if they aren't getting money from us, they aren't going to stand on that corner." He said most panhandlers are...

BELLVILLE — In what is becoming a regular occurrence in Southeast Texas, more than 1,000 Austin County residents and interested outsiders jammed a county fairgrounds exhibit hall Monday night to let a panel of state transportation officials know that the Trans-Texas Corridor was not welcome here. State Rep. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, opened the public remarks to thunderous applause when she told the panel, "You all thought I was crazy in Austin when I said my people don't want it and I don't want it." The panel, which included Texas Department of Transportation Executive Director Amadeo Saenz and Deputy Executive Director...

Gov. Rick Perry's ambitious Trans-Texas Corridor plan, and his advocacy of toll funding for future roads, hit the skids in a skeptical Legislature last spring. The road shows no signs of getting any smoother as state transportation officials try to sell the plan to Houston-area audiences. "This will wipe me out," Dee Bond told a panel of corridor advocates at a town hall meeting in Rosenberg last week. The panel, which included Texas Transportation Commissioner Ned Holmes of Houston and Steve Simmons, deputy executive director of the Texas Department of Transportation, was there to explain and gather comment on a...

Cardinal Denounces Proposal to Legalize Abortion in the Dominican Republic Says Supporters of the Measure Are Either "Sick", "Hypocritical", or "Comedians" By Matthew Cullinan Hoffman DOMINICAN REPUBLIC, September 10, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com)--The Cardinal Archbishop of Santo Domingo, in the Dominican Republic, lashed out last week at politicians and groups agitating to legalize abortion in the country. When asked  about a recent proposal to legalize abortion for "therapeutic" purposes, he shot back: "No, no abortion, there is nothing more to say." "No one has the right to kill anyone and some of us are sick, some are hypocrites, some comedians who are...

Merchants say higher fees are forcing them to hike prices. Congress may take up the issue. WASHINGTON — Credit card companies have always taken their cut when a customer uses plastic, part of the cost of doing business electronically. But a surge in the fees has sparked an intense dispute, with small merchants complaining that the higher charges are forcing them to raise prices and, in some cases, threatening to drive them out of business. With the two sides at loggerheads, Congress is preparing to step in on behalf of merchants and consumers.

Russia of 16-17th centuries could be called a trading country, as trade of that time flourished. Despite the fact that Russia remained first of all agrarian, some changes in production occurred, manufacturers mastered new technologies. The main occupation of working people in Russia in the 16th - the first half of 17th centuries was agriculture with cattle-breeding playing the key role. Livestock products turned to be the second after bread kind of goods going on sale to the domestic market. Apiculture, fishing and hunt were in favour among the crafts connected with agriculture. The craft requiring a considerable level of...

/begin my translationK-6 Merchants Pummel anti-U.S. base activists Tension between owners of stores at Anjung-ri in front of K-6 (Camp Humphreys), who are in favor of U.S. base expansion, and Nationwide Response Committee Against Expansion OF U.S. Base Expansion(NRC) came to a boil, finally resulting in violence. Around 9pm, July 8th, at Won-jung Intersection, which is the entrance to Daechu-ri, Paeng-sung Town, Pyong-taek City, a site scheduled for U.S. base expansion, an NRC member Mr. Kwak(age:33, Daechu-ri, Paeng-sung Town) and two of his colleagues rode a van into Daechu-ri, when he was battered by Anjung-ri merchants, according to NRC. Mr. Kwak...

When a currency loses the confidence of its people, its fall becomes exponential, as has happened to the Zimbabwe $, where in 1982 one U.S.$ equalled 1 Zimbabwe $. Today around Z$200,000 buys one U.S. $ if you can find someone idiot enough to sell one for the Z$. In day-to-day terms, the smallest note in Zimbabwe a Z$500 is the size of a U.S.$. The price of a single-ply sheet of toilet paper is more expensive at around Z$867. The U.S.$ is nowhere near there, but clearly the U.S. Administration has no plan or even desire to rectify the...

SEATTLE -- In an effort to protect kids from violent imagery and the rest of us from violent kids, the state of Washington is prepared to make it illegal for stores to give youngsters access to interactive images of mayhem. A bill that restricts the sale or rental of some violent video and computer games to adults-only customers passed unanimously in both the state House and Senate. Gov. Gary Locke is expected to sign the measure this week. If he does, legal experts who are debating the law's constitutionality say it will mark the first time a state has made...