Free Republic

Executive summaryAutism is a huge problem in America and other countries. In my state, 5% of the kids are autistic and it keeps getting worse.Even though this is a crisis, we do not really want to know the true cause of autism.Why? Because if we used a time proximity analysis, it would reveal that the parental decision to follow their pediatrician’s advice and vaccinate their kids is the cause.Congress will not investigate because they will lean on large studies which use methods designed specifically not to find a signal to claim vaccines don’t cause autism. But those studies only prove...

Nine-banded armadillos are a common sight across the southern US. You’ll find them digging in flower beds and underneath your porch. Sometimes, unfortunately, they unsuccessfully attempt to cross a busy road. They are, for the most part, harmless. But experts say the adorable armored creatures may be the culprit behind a rising number of cases of an ancient disease. Well, “ancient” is only partly true — leprosy, aka Hansen’s Disease, is a 4,000-year-old illness, but it infects as many as 200,000 around the world today. In the US, there are a few hundred cases a year and numbers are climbing....

Washington — Sen. Lindsey Graham is being remembered in Washington, D.C., Tuesday, with an afternoon funeral at the National Cathedral and an arrival ceremony at the U.S. Capitol in the morning. President Trump will deliver his eulogy, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, are also expected to attend Graham's funeral. Graham, a four-term senator known for his close relationship to the president and his hawkishness on foreign policy, was a key player in a number of major bipartisan agreements before his death on July 11. He had just returned from a trip to Ukraine, where he...

Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy are set to meet in Washington today before the funeral of Senator Lindsey Graham. The Republican senator was a staunch supporter of Ukraine, and his final act as a public official was to visit Kyiv and secure an agreement on a new Russian sanctions package. Trump will welcome Zelenskyy to the White House later before the funeral at Washington National Cathedral. It'll mark the second sit-down between the two leaders this month. The Ukrainian president will then move on to the Capitol for a meeting with senators, a source told the Reuters news agency. Posting...

Reform UK say they are reporting Green Party leader Zack Polanski to the police after he shared a post to his Instagram which included a photo of a man wearing a top featuring the name "Nigel" alongside an image of a guillotine. Polanski accepted a request to collaborate with another account and shared a series of pictures of a Green Party event on Sunday with his 713,000 followers. One of the images showed a man wearing a T-shirt which said: "We're only making plans for Nigel". A Green Party spokesperson said: "Once this image was brought to [Zack's] attention he...

Entries from early 2020 in a now-exposed personal diary kept by Dr. Anthony Fauci during the COVID-19 pandemic show that he privately estimated the death rate from the illness was significantly lower than what he told Congress under oath only weeks later. Fauci, 85, has come under intense scrutiny for years regarding his approach leading the U.S. response to the coronavirus pandemic, and his alleged links to the Chinese lab where the virus originated. He will return to Capitol Hill on Wednesday before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee to speak about his newly publicized personal records. "The...

The Democratic National Committee, cash-poor ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, has made the risky decision to post their headquarters as collateral in exchange for a $15 million loan, according to a report from NOTUS.This isn’t the first time that Democrats have used the building to secure cash, according to the report. This, however, is the largest loan that Democrats have ever taken during a midterm cycle. The move has caused concern amongst Democrat leadership that DNC Chair Ken Martin could be running the group into the ground.

The disgraced Cornell University student who went viral for declining an interview with an NYC startup because he said he didn’t want to be “working for a Jew,” claims he’s returning the upstate Ivy league campus in the fall. Austin Franco, 19, the rising junior who delivered the message to VrfID’s Jewish co-founders Gabe and Aiden Einhorn via job board site Handshake in June, told conservative nonprofit Accuracy in Media that he hardly got a slap on the wrist from Cornell.

Anthony S. Fauci, the former government official who helped lead the nation’s coronavirus response, is set to again face Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky), who has spent years accusing Fauci of playing a role in the virus’s creation. Paul, the chairman of the Senate’s government oversight committee, announced Thursday morning that Fauci will testify on Wednesday after being subpoenaed. Paul has been investigating the potential origins of the outbreak. Fauci, who last testified in front of Congress in June 2024, has repeatedly denied accusations from Paul and other Republicans as “preposterous.” The 85-year-old former National Institutes of Health (NIH) official left...

A major police operation is under way in Berlin after a vehicle was driven into a crowd. One person is dead and at least 17 injured. The nearby Pride parade was cancelled hours after it began. Follow the latest on this story below. .... At least one person has died, with more than a dozen injured, several seriously, after a transporter reportedly drove into a crowd. A manhunt is under way, and police say a suspect was known to police as a member of the "Islamist scene." The suspect is said to have fled after crashing into a tree. Helicopters...

Dr. Anthony Fauci will testify next Wednesday in front of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee after being subpoenaed, panel Chair Rand Paul (R-Ky.) said Thursday. Paul has been laser-focused on Fauci, the nation’s former top infectious diseases doctor, for allegedly covering up the U.S.’s involvement in risky viral research in a Chinese lab that the Kentucky senator says created the virus that caused the COVID-19 pandemic. “I expect he will not tell the truth,” Paul said in a Fox Business interview Thursday. “I don’t expect him to be honest, he hasn’t been honest in the last six...

Axel Rudakubana, who murdered three children at a dance class in Southport, has been moved from prison to a secure psychiatric hospital. The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) confirmed he was transferred from HMP Belmarsh to Broadmoor, the high-security psychiatric hospital in Berkshire. Rudakubana murdered Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, Bebe King, six, and Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, and injured eight other children and two adults in an attack at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in July 2024. He was given a 52-year prison sentence in January 2025 but the judge was unable to impose a whole life order due to...

Former Rep. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.) is making a run for the late Sen. Lindsey Graham’s (R-S.C.) seat after his death, Sanford announced Thursday morning. “Our country is at a financial tipping point, and I can’t sit on the sidelines while Washington adds a trillion dollars to the debt every 100 days,” Sanford wrote on social media Thursday. “I’ve spent my entire time in politics fighting this fight, and I’m running for U.S. Senate to keep the American dream alive for our sons, my grandson, and those you love. Join us,” he added. Sanford’s post also featured a video of himself...

SpaceX to launch 13th Starship flight test What we know: SpaceX's latest test flight is currently scheduled for Thursday with the 90-minute launch window opening at 5:45 p.m. The latest test flight will test the company's Super Heavy booster with the objective of a successful launch, ascent, stage separation, boostback burn and landing burn. SpaceX said the booster's hardware has been modified to improve relight reliability. For Starship, the company hopes to launch 20 Starlink satellites and have a successful relight of an engine while in space with a controlled entry, descent and splashdown in the Indian Ocean. The company...

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who has voted repeatedly for resolutions to withdraw U.S. troops from the military conflict with Iran, told reporters Wednesday that the United States is “worse off” than it was before President Trump launched the war in late February. “I think the Iran war has not been a success. I’ve been opposed to the Iran war from the beginning. I think by any objective measure we’re worse off than we were before the war,” Paul said on Capitol Hill. “If you look at the militarization of the Strait of Hormuz, that’s never happened before,” he said. “There’s...

SAN FRANCISCO, July 22 (Reuters) - Amazon on Wednesday cut jobs in its artificial general intelligence group, marking the latest in a series of smaller reductions across the company since a much larger one in January. Artificial general intelligence is a hypothetical AI ‌system that surpasses human intelligence and can learn, grow and operate autonomously. Many of the top AI companies are working to develop similar systems, with the hope of deploying them to solve difficult problems. "We've been building large AI models for several years, and it remains one of the most important things we're working on," said an...

Ticket sales begin today in the United Kingdom, marking the first time a lottery outside the United States will contribute to the Powerball jackpot.The expansion will debut with Wednesday night's drawing, which features an estimated $567 million annuitized jackpot with a $251.8 million cash value.Lottery officials say adding players from across the Atlantic is expected to help jackpots grow faster — without changing the game for players in the United States.

Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC) said Wednesday that a photo from Abdul El-Sayed’s Detroit rally told him “all he needs to know” about the progressive candidate’s standing with black voters in Michigan’s Democrat Senate primary.Clyburn, who is backing Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI), was reacting to a photo from the rally. His comments landed 13 days out from the August 4 primary, with establishment Democrats pressing their advantage over El-Sayed.“I saw a picture that concerned me coming out of Michigan. I saw the rally,” Clyburn said. “I didn’t see a single person that looks like me. That tells me all I need...

~ The FReeper Canteen Presents ~ ~ Remembering Our Troops!! ~ Welcome Aboard! Future service members participate in a swearing in ceremony held during the Wings Over Wayne air show at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, North Carolina. The Wings over Wayne Air Show and Science and Technology Expo is a biennial event and has grown to be the largest free air show in North Carolina. (U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Leighton Lucero) Canteen Mission StatementShowing support and boosting the morale ofour military and our allies' militaryand family members of the above.Honoring those who have served...

SUMMARY The US is due to sign a deal that will allow Saudi Arabia to develop a civilian nuclear programme - timeline of their talks An announcement is expected from US President Donald Trump's administration, according to CBS News, the BBC's US partner The deal will reportedly allow US companies to run nuclear power for the Saudis on Saudi soil Nuclear experts and former officials in Israel - the US's top ally in the Middle East - have warned that such an agreement could lead to Saudi Arabia being able to develop a nuclear weapon The fear is that if...