Free Republic

Why exactly does Obama want the “Strong Cities Network”? The Obama administration plans to create a global police force that counters “violent extremism” in the United States and elsewhere. The problem is that in Obama-speak “violent extremism” refers not only to jihadists wishing to harm Americans but also to conservatives and Tea Party activists. Just ask all the law-abiding right-of-center nonprofit groups targeted by Lois Lerner’s IRS during the Obama presidency. Ominously, President Obama and U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch unveiled the Strong Cities Network last week at the United Nations. America’s chief executive, who speaks in hushed and reverent...

On Wednesday, Representative Joaquin Castro (D-TX) called on President Biden to "seize" the Texas National Guard by calling them into Federal service, removing them from the command and control of the State of Texas. This is presumably in response to Texas Governor Greg Abbott's defiant tone towards the Biden Administration on closing the border. A Texas congressman has urged President Biden to take the state's National Guard under federal control if Republican Governor Greg Abbott defies a Supreme Court ruling allowing federal agents to remove razor wire from a section of the U.S.-Mexico border. The call was made by Democratic...

The issue of food scarcity and food deserts have led to protests and shined a spotlight on deep-rooted inequities in Chicago. "It is an abomination to think that 10 miles from Englewood people are living twenty years longer because they have access to things they need," said Ameya Pawar, Economic Security Project. The non-profit Economic Security Project and the city are partnering to explore the creation of a municipally owned grocery store. "Really it's filling the gaps for the market and making sure that people have access to all the goods and resources that they need to survive and thrive,"...

Chile’s President Gabriel Boric said on Thursday he would nationalize the country’s lithium industry, the world’s second largest producer of the metal essential in electric vehicle batteries, to boost its economy and protect its environment. The shock move in the country with the world’s largest lithium reserves would in time transfer control of Chile’s vast lithium operations from industry giants SQM and Albemarle to a separate state-owned company. It poses a fresh challenge to electric vehicle (EV) manufacturers scrambling to secure battery materials, as more countries look to protect their natural resources. Mexico nationalized its lithium deposits last year, and...

JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said in his annual shareholder letter Tuesday that the government may need to seize private property to advance clean energy initiatives. Dimon discussed the need to quickly begin investing in solar projects and other green initiatives and suggested that the government should use eminent domain to seize property for those projects. “At the same time, permitting reforms are desperately needed to allow investment to be done in any kind of timely way. We may even need to evoke [sic] eminent domain – we simply are not getting the adequate investments fast enough for grid, solar,...

N'DJAMENA, March 23 (Reuters) - Chad has nationalized all the assets and rights including hydrocarbon permits and exploration and production authorisations that belonged to a subsidiary of Exxon Mobil (XOM.N), the Central African nation's energy and hydrocarbons ministry said in a statement on Thursday. Exxon Mobil said in December that it had closed the sale of its operations Chad and Cameroon to London-listed Savannah Energy (SAVES.L) in a $407 million deal, but the Chadian government contested the agreement, saying the final terms were different from what Exxon Mobil had presented. It warned that it may ask courts to block Savannah's...

Truckers say the state’s lack of charging stations for big rigs is major obstacle to switching to electricAn ambitious California plan to require trucking fleets in the state to switch from diesel to electric power faces a potential backup at charging stations. The California Air Resources Board is proposing phasing out older big rigs operating in the busy corridors shuttling shipping containers between ports, rail yards and warehouses and require that all new vehicles be powered by clean fuels starting in 2024. From 2025, the state would bar trucks powered by internal combustion engines that have more than 800,000 miles...

Calls for Biden to socialize industry have moved quickly from fringe to mainstream...The energy crisis is worsening. The U.S. has fewer than 30 days of diesel and other distillate fuels, the lowest level since 1945. Supplies are so low that there will be shortages and price spikes within six months unless the U.S. enters recession, experts warn. In response, the Biden administration is releasing more oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. But the reserves are of crude oil, not refined oil products such as diesel. And the releases are stifling investment in future oil production. “People are depleting their emergency...

On October 7 Musk claimed on Twitter SpaceX had already eaten $80 million in costs for the operation, a price tag that is expected to hit $100 million by the end of the year. “We are not in a position to further donate terminals to Ukraine, or fund the existing terminals for an indefinite period of time,” SpaceX’s director of government sales wrote to the Pentagon in a September letter that was obtained by CNN. That Musk no longer wanted SpaceX to pay for critical satellite services in Ukraine and was asking the Pentagon to foot the bill didn’t sit...

Dutch farmers are going to be forced to sell their farms to the government... It's not wanting us to have control of our food supply....

Germany said on Wednesday it had agreed to nationalise Uniper, raising the bill to rescue the gas importer to 29 billion euros ($28.7 billion) amid an escalating energy crisis that shows just how much Europe's top economy has relied on Russian fuel. The deal brings the total cash pumped into Germany's three biggest importers of Russian gas, also including EnBW's (EBKG.DE) VNG (VNG.UL) division and former Gazprom (GAZP.MM) unit Sefe, to at least 40 billion euros.

Rosneft Germany will be placed under ‘trustee administration’ Germany has today announced it is taking control of three Russian-owned refineries. The Federal Network Agency, the German electricity and gas regulator has said it has been appointed fiduciary of Berlin-based Rosneft Deutschland GmbH and RN Refining & Marketing GmbH. It has been reported that the decision has been to help the country secure energy supply ahead of a predicted ‘tough’ winter. Germany’s regulator said: “The fiduciary management, ordered on the basis of the Energy Security Act, means that the original owner no longer has authority to issue instructions. “The fiduciary is...

The United States will become a second-rate economic power unless it can match the educational performance of its rivals abroad and get more of its students to achieve at the highest levels in math, science and literacy. Virtually every politician, business leader and educator understands this, yet the country has no national plan for reaching the goal. To make matters worse, Americans have remained openly hostile to the idea of importing strategies from the countries that are beating the pants off us in the educational arena... ...Lurking behind these test scores, however, are two profoundly important and closely intertwined topics...

Police on the scene during the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, on Tuesday reportedly handcuffed a woman who wanted law enforcement to enter the building sooner, and used a Taser on a father who tried to pull his own son off a school bus. The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday: “The police were doing nothing,” said Angeli Rose Gomez, who after learning about the shooting drove 40 miles to Robb Elementary, where her children are in second and third grade. “They were just standing outside the fence. They weren’t going in there or running anywhere.” … Ms. Gomez, a farm...

Senate Republicans on Thursday blocked a bill to create domestic terrorism offices within federal law enforcement agencies in response to a mass shooting in Buffalo, N.Y., that left 10 people dead. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) framed the Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act as an opportunity to vote on Republican and Democratic amendments to curb gun violence, but his plea for GOP support to begin the debate fell flat with Republican colleagues. “The bill is so important because the mass shooting in Buffalo was an act of domestic terrorism. We need to call it what it is, domestic terrorism. It...

(Reuters) - Russian lawmakers on Tuesday gave the first stamp of approval to a bill that would allow Russian entities to take over foreign companies that have left the market in opposition to Moscow's actions in Ukraine, the government's online portal showed. Scores of foreign companies have announced temporary shutdowns of stores and factories in Russia or said they were leaving for good since Russia sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24. The bill, passed in the first reading by the lower house of parliament, or Duma, would allow the state development bank VEB or other...

Hakeem Jeffries says quiet part out loud. Hugo Chavez is his hero.

Protesters gathered in Fayetteville in North Carolina for a second night on Monday after a black man was shot dead by an off-duty cop, who claims he acted in self-defense to protect his wife and daugter. Jason Walker, 37, was killed just after 2.15pm on Saturday outside his home on Bingham Drive. The deputy involved in the shooting, identified as Lieutenant Jeffrey Hash, was taken into custody, but not arrested, and put on administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation.

When first responder communications networks failed after 9/11, the government decided to build a nationwide wireless emergency communications network that would actually work. It took a decade of general histrionics and dysfunction by Congress, but in 2012 the Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act formally created the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet). FirstNet is an entirely new federal agency tasked with coordinating the build of a 700 MHz LTE-based coast-to-coast emergency broadband network. But since its creation the effort (tell us if you've heard this one before) has been plagued with dysfunction, allegations of incumbent carrier cronyism, and...

A federal law passed in February 2012 to help middle class families by creating jobs and cutting payroll taxes included a section mandating the creation of a nationwide interoperable broadband communications system for law enforcement and first responders. The system, which is being created under the direction of the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet), seeks to create a nationwide broadband network capable of being used for a variety of law enforcement purposes including remote surveillance, mobile biometric applications like field fingerprint scanning and facial recognition, as well as automated license plate reading. The system is currently in a pilot phase...