Free Republic

A new study published in Scientific Reports suggests that the connection between a young adult’s cognitive ability and their future socioeconomic status is largely driven by their genes. The findings provide evidence that genetic factors play a larger role in educational and occupational success than environmental conditions. This underlying biology may help explain why some social interventions aimed at reducing inequality tend to fall short over the long term.

As fascinating as drone warfare can be — particularly the seemingly sci-fi drone-vs-drone variety — keeping up with all the developments is a fool's errand. Yesterday's hot new thing is practically outdated today, and today's hot new thing may look obsolete tomorrow. That's an exaggeration, of course, but some days it doesn't seem like much of one. That's why today's news about Ukraine's Sting counter-drone caught my eye, and what it might mean for U.S. and other Western forces going forward. I vaguely remembered reading something about the Sting a year or more ago, but I just learned today that...

If you’ve got some frozen Asian food in your freezer, you may want to double check it. On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced a “Class I” recall of Ajinomoto Foods North America products that had been sold across the country under various labels. In total, an eye-watering 36,987,575 pounds of frozen foods are being recalled. The USDA noted that “various ready-to-eat (RTE) and NRTE chicken and pork fried rice, ramen, and shu mai dumpling products” are included in this recall. Of note, this is an expansion of an already-existing Ajinomoto recall. The expanded recall now includes products made...

The men in Zhongnanhai do not rattle easily. Decades of patient statecraft, a foreign policy built on studied ambiguity, and an economy engineered to absorb external shocks have granted Beijing’s leadership a remarkable tolerance for turbulence. Operation Epic Fury, the American-Israeli air campaign now dismantling Iran’s military architecture, has produced something unusual in the corridors of Chinese power: visible confusion. Xi Jinping is scrambling. The word is not used lightly. For a leader who has built his image on strategic composure and long-horizon thinking, the current moment is acutely dangerous. Not because China faces a direct military threat, but because...

Rep Thomas Massie receiving the Quincy award from Trita Parsi, an actual Iranian lobbyist, alongside progressive Democrat Ro Khanna.

VIDEOCBS reporter Scott MacFarlane, who was wounded with severe PTSD at the Battle of Butler when he heroically survived an attack of extreme glaring by a MAGA crowd, has weighed in about Congress needing to vote on a War Authorization Measure for the Iran attack. Because MacFarlane is such a war hero, Nancy Pelosi herself provided the answer he is seeking for his question.

The Senate bill to swap the gas tax vote from a November General election to a May election has hit a Constitutional wall. As a result the bill is stalled. The petition itself on the front page in bold sets the election date. Politicians cannot just move the election date — if they could, they then could conceivably move it to 10 years in the future. Our legal commentators shared this analysis: “In 1902 the voters of Oregon voted the referendum into our Constitution by an 11 to 1 margin. They gave the legislature an explicit message: When you try...

The elderly are physically and financially healthier than ever. So why do their needs keep taking priority over younger generations? Demographics, rising profits and soaring asset values have together wrought a quiet transformation in the American economy. Much of it is now in the hands of the elderly. As of the third quarter of last year, people 70 and over controlled roughly 39% of all equities and mutual funds owned by households, compared with 22% in 2007, according to Federal Reserve data. Their share of net worth—assets minus debts—

The oldest known pieces of sewn clothing have been discovered in a cave in Oregon, potentially rewriting all of human history. Researchers from the US uncovered pieces of animal hide stitched together from the end of the last Ice Age, approximately 12,000 years ago. That would mean that humans in North America had advanced skills, specifically for working with plants, animals, and wood, thousands of years before the Great Pyramid of Egypt was constructed.

President Donald Trump’s mass deportation policies are not the only reason for the decline, but they are a big contributing factor. Enforcing immigration law and allowing more homes to be built are doing more for renters than slogans and rent control ever did. I

Call it the Post Powell Panic! After The Fed decided to do nothing at the FOMC meeting. Gold is down -12% from the peak, trading below $5,000. Silver is down -21%, trading below $100 for the first time since Friday, officially in a BEAR MARKET. Rough night in the precious metals market space. An absolute BLOODBATH. Is the top behind us? Gold -6% Silver -12% Copper -4% Platinum -13% Palladium -11% Trillions in market cap wiped out in a few hours. Powell at The Fed FOMC meeting imitating former Fed Chair Janet Yellen. And Trump has nominated Kevin Warsh for...

These are three outright lies (George Floyd, Renee Good and now Alex Pretti); you are able to definitively triangulate between three to tell what's going on—two events by themselves would have been enough, but there's no arguing with three. The real issue is, not your refusal to "believe your lying eyes", but, first, the mentality of the insurgents, then, the ultimate motivation for their wanting, to the point of being death-fanatics, to overturn reality, to accomplish, in the term by Friedrich Nietzsche, a "transvaluation of values", which is just a fancy "philosophical" term for calling evil: good, and good: evil....

Brief summary of the video: The YouTube video (from WCCO - CBS Minnesota, uploaded January 24, 2026) is a ~7-minute clip of a press conference by U.S. Border Patrol Commander Greg Bovino. He discusses a fatal shooting that morning in south Minneapolis during a targeted DHS operation involving Border Patrol agents. Key points from Bovino's statements: The suspect was identified as Jose Werta Chuma (described as an undocumented immigrant with prior criminal history including domestic assault and disorderly conduct). During the operation, the man allegedly approached agents armed with a 9mm semi-automatic handgun and extra loaded magazines. Agents attempted to...

The analysis is based on the average living costs for retirees 65 or older in each state, drawn from the latest data published by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. From there, GOBankingRates subtracted average Social Security payments and estimated the savings needed to cover the remaining expenses, using an annual 4% withdrawal rate.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was told over the weekend that a new Nick Shirley video being released soon - maybe even as early as Monday — is "ten times worse" than the "Quality Learing Center" daycare scam. In Shirley's previous video, he and his source, David Hoch, who has been investigating this billion-dollar-plus scam for years, discovered multiple daycare centers in one building without children in them for years. And this is where Hoch says is the heart of the ongoing continuing criminal enterprise. Hoch says the new video will show that most of these companies are Somali-owned, and...

Crystal-clear new footage shows the moments leading up to the killing of Renee Nicole Good, filmed by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent who shot her. Good, 37, could be seen smiling at Jonathan 'Jon' Ross while sitting in her Honda Pilot on Wednesday afternoon and saying, 'That's fine dude. I'm not mad,' in a video shot by the officer that was obtained by Minnesota outlet Alpha News. Her wife, Rebecca Good, 40, could be heard urging the agent to 'show his face' as she asks him, 'You want to come at us?' 'You want to come at us?...

...and the woman driving the car was very disorderly, obstructing and resisting, who then violently, willfully, and viciously ran over the ICE Officer, who seems to have shot her in self defense. Based on the attached clip, it is hard to believe he is alive, but is now recovering in the hospital. The situation is being studied, in its entirety, but the reason these incidents are happening is because the Radical Left is threatening, assaulting, and targeting our Law Enforcement Officers and ICE Agents on a daily basis. They are just trying to do the job of MAKING AMERICA SAFE....

Minnesota Star Tribune: ICE shooting victim identified as Renee Nicole Good, 37. Mother said "her daughter is 'not part of anything like that at all,' referring to protesters challenging ICE agents."https://t.co/EcUhYa6PJL pic.twitter.com/8I7MFpytkd— Steve Lookner (@lookner) January 7, 2026

A Minneapolis child care center with a history of safety violations is being investigated by federal and state authorities for possible financial fraud. The FBI and the Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS) executed a search warrant Wednesday morning at Salama Child Care Center at 1411 Nicollet Av. near downtown Minneapolis. Families of children at the facility were turned away for a time as authorities from both agencies carried out computers, boxes and folders of documents to waiting vans. Officials from DHS, the FBI and the U.S. attorney's office in Minneapolis all declined to comment on the nature of the...

Juan Orlando Hernández was accused of receiving millions in bribes and partnering with cocaine traffickers. He was convicted in Manhattan in 2024 and sentenced to 45 years in prison.President Trump announced on Friday afternoon that he would grant “a Full and Complete Pardon” to a former president of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernández, who, as the center of a sweeping drug case, was found guilty by an American jury last year of conspiring to import cocaine into the United States.The news came as a shock not only to Hondurans, but also to the authorities in the United States who had built...