Free Republic

The Russian capital Moscow is growing increasingly Islamic, as the number of Muslims in the city has increased to over 1.5 million in the past decade, according to Russia’s chief imams. There are hundreds of mosques in Moscow, but not enough to accommodate the huge number of worshippers, forcing many to pray on the streets. In 2015, more than 160,000 Muslims attended prayers marking the Eid holiday, according to the Moscow police. “A large number of labor migrants come to our mosques and during holidays our mosques -- there are only four of them in Moscow now -- of course...

For those who missed it. GOP Tax Bill celebration victory.

OK, I've put this vanity post off for a month or more. Its a bit lame but when I find I enjoy something a bit I like to post what I found. So here goes,,,,, when I'm at the computer and not on FR I do solitaire. Yeah I did say lame but I put my time in. I did SOAP II, Autocoder, GMAP, COBOL, Burroughs medium systems assembler, several variations of SDL and finally C++. But to get back.... Specifically I find Freecell very entertaining. Statistically one can win 9 out of 10 games. Maybe half of those won...

The Palestinians will seek full membership in the United Nations and join 22 international organizations in response to US recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said in remarks at the start of a meeting with senior Palestinian leaders in Ramallah on Monday night. Abbas elaborated on his theme from last week’s Islamic Conference Organization emergency meeting in Istanbul to the effect that Israel is unworthy of international recognition. “There are no borders to Israel, and international law is against any recognition of it,” he said. “But they deceived the General Assembly by saying...

(recipes at link)

Gallup started tracking former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's favorability rating more than 25 years ago, and based on the latest data, her public image has hit an all-time low. In the latest poll results, released Tuesday, Gallup concludes Clinton’s favorability has a 36 percent rating. Sixty-one percent of American adults have an unfavorable view of the former presidential hopeful, a new high, the Washington Examiner noted. This current favorability rating is the lowest the former secretary of state has earned since the analytics company first began tracking Clinton's public image in 1992, when she earned 38 percent favorability right...

began her diatribe during Rachel Maddow's evening show, asking the MSNBC host whether American citizens should show up on Capitol Hill to protest the passage of the Republican-backed tax bill. "Ok so @Maddow – for real – should we all just getting our cars – on the train – right now – and show up in dc – right now – we mobilize – someone has to call it #SAYGO come on – #nowORnever show up – like a musical – masses of humans – show up now #SHOWUP [sic]," O'Donnell tweeted. ok so @maddow – for real – should...

What the Bible really says EDITOR: Letter-writer Dean Davis says, “the God of the Bible thunders against things like abortion” (Letters, Saturday). Many fundamentalist Christians unfortunately believe that the Bible condemns abortion. Not so, perhaps because abortion was so widely practiced and accepted in Biblical times. There are many extremely vague Biblical passages which pro-lifers infer to be God’s position on abortion. Ironically in the Bible’s 1,700-plus pages, with slews of common human practices like eating pork getting condemned, abortion is never mentioned. Not once. In one noteworthy passage (Numbers 5: 11-28), God sanctions and literally causes an abortion (for...

Whether a government shutdown is on the horizon for the holiday season, a majority of federal employees who took an anonymous online survey from Federal News Radio said their federal agencies are ready if a shutdown does happen. Congress has until midnight on Friday, Dec. 22 to avoid a government shutdown. To do that, the House and Senate must pass either another stopgap continuing resolution or approve an omnibus spending plan, which came closer to reality on Tuesday, when President Donald Trump signed a bill authorizing more than $700 billion in defense spending for the rest of fiscal 2018. The...

Donald Trump Jr. declared Tuesday that there are high-level forces in the U.S. government working against his father, President Trump. Speaking at a conservative conference in West Palm Beach, Fla., Trump's oldest child said there is a movement to not let "America be America." "There is, and there are, people at the highest levels of government that don't want to let America be America," he said at the Turning Point USA Student Action Summit. Trump Jr. also said that special counsel Robert Mueller's federal Russia inquiry is indicative of the sort of "rigged system" that his father complained about during...

In a Tuesday letter first obtained by Fox News, Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, Republican chairman of the Committee on Homeland Securty and Government Affairs, requested a variety of information from the GSA director, including a description of the steps taken by the agency to determine if it was appropriate to provide the documents to the special counsel’s office... In his letter to the agency, Johnson said the GSA did not have “authority” over transition documents. He said that the Presidential Transition Act of 1963 gave the GSA a prominent role in the transition process, but that it “acts merely as...

Consider neutral-themed parties such as a ‘winter celebration,’” the handout read. “Decorations, music, and food should be general and not specific to any one religion.” It was part of a Dean’s Dialogues “Religious Diversity and Holidays” event within the College of Food, Agricultural and Natural Resource Sciences earlier this month, and was first reported on by the Intellectual Takeout. “Our religious/spiritual beliefs and practices can play a key role in our identity but can be ‘off limits’ for discussion especially in public spaces,” part of the event’s description read. The controversial handout listed about a dozen items “not appropriate for...

“What he wrote is disturbing,” I replied, “though I hasten to add that I do not believe it was intentional. Christians believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, albeit in human form. Thus, he is not just another human being.” No matter, Cenedella has convinced me that he is well meaning. I am also convinced that he is more sensitive to other demographic groups than he is Christians. Will the Catholic League protest his Santa crucified? No. Good intentions, while not dispositive, are important when assessing such matters. Also Cenedella’s willingness to engage me is much appreciated. Besides,...

Swedish Socialist party Finance Minister Magdalena Andersson announced that the retirement age would likely be raised in the near future in order to offset increased welfare costs, Swedish newspaper Expressen reports. “Looking at those who start working at 30, there should be opportunities to work longer than 65,” Andersson said. The minister made her remarks following an economic report from the Local Authorities and County Council (SKL) released earlier this week. The report claimed that the welfare state would grow faster than revenue obtained through taxation due to the dramatic rise of Sweden’s population. Due to the influx of migrants...

Police in western New York have charged a man who they say impersonated a police officer in an attempt to get discounted coffee. WIVB-TV reports the man flashed a fake badge and gun at a Starbucks in Buffalo around 11 p.m. Friday. Police say the man claimed he was a detective and asked for a discount.

All 500 machines on the TOP500 supercomputer list run Linux. Here’s how the little OS that could, did.After years of pushing toward total domination, Linux finally did it. It is running on all 500 of the TOP500 supercomputers in the world, and who knows how many more after that. That’s even more impressive than Intel’s domination of the list, with 92 percent of the processors in the top 500. So, how did Linux get here? How did this upstart operating system created by a college student from Finland 26 years ago steamroll Unix, a creation of Bell Labs and supported...

Video at link is 1 minute, 9 seconds in length. It's a cute Christmas video that was developed in response to Jean Claude Van Damm's split video.

Dan Konzelman was driving with his girlfriend southbound on Interstate 5, south of Tacoma, Washington, Monday morning when, to his astonishment, he saw an Amtrak train go off an overpass ahead of him and crash onto the busy freeway. While most of the stunned onlookers in nearby automobiles stayed in place, no doubt making 9-1-1 calls for help, Konzelman – an Eagle Scout – took a nearby exit and ran to the scene. He and his girlfriend, Alicia Hoverson, found that first-responders had not yet arrived. The two climbed into one of the train cars, noting only a few of...

Retired Cmdr. David Fravor spent 18 years as a Navy pilot, but nothing prepared him for what he witnessed during a routine training mission on Nov. 14, 2004. "I can tell you, I think it was not from this world," Fravor told ABC News. "I'm not crazy, haven't been drinking. It was — after 18 years of flying, I've seen pretty much about everything that I can see in that realm, and this was nothing close." Fravor's stunning retelling of his encounter off the California coast with what appeared to be a 40-foot-long wingless object that flew at incredible speeds...

All eyes are on what Donald Trump will do, as the oracles on Twitter and the Hill have predicted that the president may fire special counsel Robert S. Mueller around the holidays. Trump’s lawyers have denied that he is considering such a move, and Trump himself has not directly criticized Mueller. However, Trump has recently expressed dissatisfaction with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, calling him “weak” and a threat. Along with those comments, the Washington Post reports that “Trump appeared to be contemplating changes in the Justice Department’s leadership.” In short, there’s a good chance that the guillotine is poised...