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ORLANDO, Fla. — In the past week, 12 swans were found dead at Lake Eola Park, according to Orlando City Commissioner Patty Sheehan. The first two swans were found dead Dec. 23, and over the past five days, that number has risen to 12. Sheehan explained that the deaths happened during the holidays, and specialized veterinary experts were not available at the time. However, she said the deaths are suspected to have been caused by an avian flu outbreak. "We can't be certain until tests are completed," Sheehan said. The swans are currently stored in a secure location, awaiting necropsies...

Recently freerepublic stopped loading correctly on my Samsung phone. The spacing between lines are off and the font is too small and can't be adjusted to fit the page correctly. I've tried all the options on the phone, and returned to my carrier to fix it. They claim it has to be a website problem. Is anyone else having this problem, or know how to correct it?

The number of flu cases across the country is on the rise, following a global trend that is now reaching the U.S., say health care professionals. Britain, Australia and Japan have already reported spikes, in what has turned out to be an early flu season, according to The New York Times. Some of the areas seeing the biggest spikes so far include New York City, Denver and New Orleans, according to The Times and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s tracker. The dominant strain of the flu virus circulating this season is H3N2 subclade K – a variant of...

The Supreme Court on Monday declined an opportunity to overturn its landmark precedent recognizing a constitutional right to same-sex marriage, tossing aside an appeal that had roiled LGBTQ advocates who feared the conservative court might be ready to revisit the decade-old decision. Instead, the court denied an appeal from Kim Davis, the former Kentucky county clerk who now faces hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages and legal fees for refusing to issue marriage licenses after the court’s decision in Obergefell v. Hodges allowed same-sex couples to marry. The court did not explain its reasoning to deny the appeal, which...

Russia flooding weapons into Venezuela and threatening to give Nicolas Maduro weapons like the Oreshnik and Kalibr. The Oreshnik can carry nuclear warheads. https://youtu.be/i3hA64JUflM?si=zhMWFWoX2RalrwiN

I'm not recommending any remedies for hacked phones - not even the one at the link, because I am not technical and I'm skeptical of commercial software said to work on state level cyber spying.While Pegasus spyware was designed by an Israeli cyber-intelligence company to combat criminal and terrorist activities, it has also been used to spy on voices challenging power, like activists, journalists, and whistleblowers.Data suggests that more than 50,000 people are being, or have been, monitored by Pegasus spyware — with serious implications for their privacy and personal safety. Learn more about this unsettling spyware and get tips...

Top Kremlin official Dmitry Medvedev issued a fiery nuclear warning to the U.S. after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said officials in Moscow should learn where their nearest bomb shelter is if they don't end Russia's war. Zelensky, in an interview with Axios, said U.S. President Donald Trump had given his explicit backing to Ukrainian strikes on Russian targets such as energy infrastructure and arms factories, and that if Kyiv receives more long-range American weaponry, then "we will use it". "The Kiev drug addict said the Kremlin should know where a bomb shelter is so its occupants can hide when he...

Maureen Napleton, legal counsel at Napleton Auto Group in Hinsdale, is facing backlash over social media posts in which she celebrated the assassination of Charlie Kirk and called for violence against President Donald Trump.

The Supreme Court has already expanded President Donald Trump’s authority in a string of emergency rulings, but he’s signaling in his firing of Federal Reserve governor Lisa Cook and other issues likely headed to the court that he continues to seek broader powers for the executive branch. The cases could serve as major tests of how much further the nation’s high court is willing to go to bless the president’s assertion of executive authority. They differ from previous showdowns because of the sheer magnitude of the authority Trump is seeking to wield and because he wants greater control over powers...

In a game of Russian roulette with a standard Colt revolver, the chances of instant death are one-in-six. Terrifyingly, that’s the same as the odds of humanity being wiped out within 75 years – everyone dead in a cataclysmic and total breakdown of civilisation, according to Oxford University futurologist Toby Ord, an expert on the threat of artificial intelligence. Does it sound impossibly bleak? His colleague Nick Bostrom is more pessimistic still. He rates the possibility of human extinction by the next century as one in four. Pulitzer prize-winning writer Jared Diamond is even less hopeful, predicting our species’ chances...

A new global study reveals that ancient carbon, once thought securely stored in soils and rocks, is leaking into the atmosphere via rivers. For the first time, researchers have confirmed that carbon trapped in landscapes for thousands of years or longer can return to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide escaping from river surfaces. The study, led by scientists from the University of Bristol and featured as the cover story in Nature, suggests that plants and upper soil layers may be absorbing about one additional gigaton of CO2 annually to balance this release. This highlights an even more critical role for...

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov wore a CCCP sweatshirt as he arrived in Alaska for the summit with President Trump. That is the Russian acronym for the USSR. Serhii Plokhy, a professor of history at Harvard University, explains how the shirt fits into Russia's position on Ukraine and in the world.

Former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev has claimed the Kremlin could launch "preemptive strikes" on Western nations if they escalate the war in Ukraine just days after United States President Donald Trump demanded a ceasefire. On Tuesday, President Trump threatened to impose "very severe" tariffs on Russia unless the Kremlin negotiated an end to its invasion. The US leader also declared he was "very unhappy" with Russian President Vladimir Putin's reticence to engage in peace talks, in a notable shift away from previous comments praising Russia's leader. The Kremlin subsequently dismissed the threat, with Mr Medvedev, who now acts as the...

Prominent Russian propagandists have warned Donald Trump of severe consequences following his approval of weapons to Ukraine and threat of sanctions. -snip- The move was met with fury in Moscow state TV propagandist and war pundit Aleksandr Sladkov accusing the United States of attempting to intimidate Russia into agreeing to peace. He said: “Trump is trying to scare us with missiles, but this is difficult to do, Trump should be scared. “Everyone is trying to push us to turn Kyiv and Lviv into Hiroshima and Nagasaki.” Sladkov continued his threat of nuclear war, telling the audience that Russia’s strategic nuclear...

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) was ripped on social media after she called President Trump “a rapist” online — with many suggesting a tweet from the Congresswoman was grounds for a defamation lawsuit from the commander in chief. Ocasio-Cortez sparked outrage when she tweeted Friday about Trump and the release of files related to notorious pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. “Wow who would have thought that electing a rapist would have complicated the release of the Epstein Files?” Ocasio-Cortez wrote on X, apparently referring to Trump and the 2023 civil trial where he was found liable of sexually abusing writer E. Jean Carroll....

NATO chief Mark Rutte has chillingly warned that World War III will start with simultaneous invasions from Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin. Secretary-general Rutte suggested the combined attacks from the Chinese and Russian leaders could trigger a World War nightmare and bring the planet to the brink of Armageddon. According to the NATO chief, China would start by seeking to grab Taiwan - while ensuring the Kremlin dictator simultaneously attacks NATO territory, amid fears Putin is anyway eyeing the Baltic republics Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, formerly part of the USSR.

he move “was made to put America’s interests first,” a White House spokeswoman said. U.S. munitions have been depleted. The Trump administration found dangerously low levels of artillery rounds, air defense missiles, and precision munitions. Biden sent billions to Ukraine, leaving the U.S. vulnerable. According to NBC News, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth paused a shipment of missiles and ammunition to Ukraine. Two defense officials and two congressional officials sources told NBC there are concerns about the U.S. military’s stockpiles. Hegseth ordered a review of the U.S. stockpile of munitions week ago. The supply has been depleted in recent years as...

A fatwa is an interpretation of Islamic law issued by a Marja--a title given to the highest level of twelver Shia religious cleric. ================================================================== Tehran: Iran's top Shiite cleric has issued a 'fatwa' or religious decree against US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, calling them "enemies of God". The decree from Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi called on Muslims across the world to unite and bring down the American and Israeli leaders for threatening the Islamic republic leadership. "Any person or regime that threatens the Leader or Marja (May God forbid) is considered a 'warlord' or...

The court tied the hands of judges at a time when Congress has been cowed and internal executive branch constraints have been steamrolled.The Supreme Court ruling barring judges from swiftly blocking government actions, even when they may be illegal, is yet another way that checks on executive authority have eroded as President Trump pushes to amass more power.The decision on Friday, by a vote of 6 to 3, will allow Mr. Trump’s executive order seeking to end birthright citizenship to take effect in some parts of the country — even though every court that has looked at the directive has...

Key Points and Summary - At this week's NATO summit in The Hague, Ukraine was largely sidelined as the alliance focused on internal matters, primarily a new commitment to raise defense spending to 5% of GDP to placate US President Donald Trump. -While European allies pledged new military aid—including German artillery rockets, Dutch F-16s, and British-funded drones—the final summit declaration omitted previous language about Ukraine's "irreversible path" to membership. -This shift, combined with a strained and brief meeting between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, leaves Kyiv in a precarious position, increasingly dependent on European support as US commitment appears...