Free Republic

A group of civil rights organizations is pushing technology companies to create policies to more effectively address hate speech and extremist groups. The six organizations, joined by 40 other organizations who echoed the call, wrote in a report that they want the platforms to take more firm stances against “racism, sexism, xenophobia, religious bigotry, homophobia and transphobia,” and enforce policies against hate speech and extremist groups more strictly. The groups, which include the Center for American Progress, Color Of Change, Free Press, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the National Hispanic Media Coalition and the Southern Poverty Law...

Just a third of Americans can pass a multiple choice "U.S. Citizenship Test," fumbling over such simple questions as the cause of the Cold War or naming just one thing Benjamin Franklin is famous for. And of Americans 45 and younger, the passing rate is a tiny 19 percent, according to a survey done for the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation. Worse: The actual test only requires that 60 percent of the answers be correct. In the survey, just 36 percent passed. Among the embarrassing errors uncovered in the survey of questions taken from the U.S. Citizenship Test and conducted...

Sep 23 2018 Washington—Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) today sent a letter to Chairman Chuck Grassley calling for an immediate postponement of the Brett Kavanaugh nomination.“I am writing to request an immediate postponement of any further proceedings related to the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh,” Feinstein wrote. “I also ask that the newest allegations of sexual misconduct be referred to the FBI for investigation, and that you join our request for the White House to direct the FBI to investigate the allegations of Christine Blasey Ford as well as these new claims.”Full text of the letter follows:September 23,...

Elizabeth Heng nearly beat incumbent Democratic congressman Jim Costa in California’s open primaries in early June. The 53–47 outcome would have made her the darling of the national political media, had she been a Democrat. She will face Costa again in the general election in November. My colleague Alexandra DeSanctis wrote an excellent piece last month profiling the young, smart, 33-year-old Republican contender. So this happened yesterday. Heng’s campaign had tried to place this video as an ad on Facebook. It begins with her family’s roots — amidst the horror of Cambodian genocide. Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUJXqJ4f_to And Facebook responded with a...

The #WalkAway campaign began on Facebook after a handsome, gay hairdresser from New York named Brandon Straka posted a video last month explaining why he was walking away from the Democrat party. People are leaving the Democrat party in droves because all they have to offer is violence, intolerance, divisiveness and hatred. Brandon Straka’s videos are so popular that he is beginning to get recognized in public. On Thursday, Brandon Straka went into a camera shop to purchase some new supplies when he was abused by leftists working there; they recognized him and refused him service.

Thousands of people in Sweden are inserting tiny microchips under their skin — making their lives much easier as they no longer have to carry IDs, gym passes, and keycards to get into work....But it's not without data risks. About 3,000 Swedes have inserted the tiny chips into their bodies over the past three years, the electronic tags are about the size of a grain of rice and are implanted in the back of the hand 'via a syringe'. Libberton warns that by having a microchip implanted in your hand, you also give your data away. "The real issue is...

Newly revealed e-mails show that former Federal Bureau Investigation (FBI) deputy director Andrew McCabe was keenly aware of CNN’s internal understanding of a secret briefing about the infamous Steele dossier, days before CNN published any stories on the matter. The e-mails, which were obtained by Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.), also reveal that top officials used coded language to refer to the salacious and unverified allegations made by Steele. Former FBI director James Comey briefed then-President-Elect Donald Trump on January 6, 2017, on at least one unproven allegation contained in Steele’s dossier, which was jointly funded by the Hillary Clinton campaign...

A leaked internal video from Google portrays the company’s vision of “total data collection.” The 2016 video made by Google X’s Head of Design Nick Foster was obtained by the Verge, and discusses how users could choose a “life goal,” which Google then attempts to steer them towards through personalization. “It imagines a future of total data collection, where Google helps nudge users into alignment with their goals, custom-prints personalized devices to collect more data, and even guides the behavior of entire populations to solve global problems like poverty and disease,” declared the Verge, who reported that “the middle section...

While “Avengers: Infinity War” has dominated the box office in recent weeks, a new documentary about a different kind of hero has still managed to draw crowds. “RBG,” a look at the life and career of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg (the glass-ceiling shattering jurist who became a meme), secured the 10th slot at the domestic box office this weekend with $1.16 million. That’s a major feat considering that the non-fiction film, directed by Betsy West and Julie Cohen, was showing in just 180 screens. Magnolia Pictures and Participant Media’s collaboration launched in limited release on May 4, with...

A mysterious, cone-shaped device, shown in a demo Monday at Microsoft's Build event in Seattle, hinted at a big leap in capability for the company's digital assistant: the ability to see and identify people. In the ruthless war among Amazon's Alexa, Apple's Siri, and Google's Assistant, this is a feature we haven't yet seen from the competition. What we don't know is what this prototype is, and whether it will ever come out. Microsoft’s official, overshadowed demonstration showed us the conference room of the future. Microsoft incorporated Cortana, the Surface Hub, and Skype’s translation and transcription features, together with PowerBI...

I walked by the television this morning and saw Trump's picture and the block letters "FACEBOOK SCANDAL" in red on a blue background. The sound was turned down, but the earnest-appearing, attractive young woman in a tight black form fitting dress was clearly portraying the appropriate gravity for this "situation". It was the same thing I saw last night before going to bed, an older, serious looking man with a similar backdrop and identical grave look on his face. Again, the sound was turned down, but it is clear there is a real problem in American society right now. And...

Former top FBI official Andrew McCabe, who was fired late Friday night by Attorney General Jeff Sessions two days before becoming eligible for full pension benefits, said in an extraordinary statement that he was targeted because President Donald Trump wants to destroy him as part of his "war" against special counsel Robert Mueller. "This attack on my credibility is one part of a larger effort not just to slander me personally, but to taint the FBI, law enforcement and intelligence professionals more generally," McCabe said in a statement released shortly after Sessions announced his decision. "It is part of this...

VICTOR — Sean Martineck...(spoke to) the government class of Victor Senior High School teacher Mike Myers ... on ... the ...serious topic of gun violence, the Second Amendment and getting illegal guns off the streets — something that takes up a great deal of his time as a special agent for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives, assigned to the Violent Crime Task Force in the Rochester satellite office. Martineck read (the Second Amendment), noting it was passed in 1791. “What did our Founding Fathers mean by that?” he asked. “Do you think our Founding Fathers envisioned...

Former CIA chief John Brennan on Friday predicted "rough waters ahead," particularly on international issues, because President Trump is "unstable, inept, inexperienced, and also unethical." In an interview with MSNBC's "Deadline: White House," Brennan told host Nicole Wallace that the president was "ill prepared" to take on the duties of commander-in-chief, particularly growing military aggression from Russia and North Korea. "It is no secret to anybody that Donald Trump was very ill prepared and unexperienced in terms of dealing with matters that a head of state needs to deal with, head of government, and I think this is now coming...

314 Action Wants to Elect Scientists, But Only if They're Democrats The U.S. Congress is made up mostly of professional politicians and lawyers. This comes as a surprise to precisely no one, but the sheer numbers are rather striking.According to the Congressional Research Service (PDF, Table 2), the 115th Congress consists of 168 Representatives (out of 435) who are lawyers, and the Senate has 50 lawyers (out of 100). Combined, lawyers make up nearly 41% of Congress.How many lawyers are in the U.S.? One law firm (with a nifty interactive map!) estimates roughly 1.3 million. Given that the U.S. population...

Just a couple of last thoughts on the Left’s attempt to deep-six Columbus Day because he was a white imperialist pig whose sole intent in taking to the high seas was to find some poor indigenous peoples to oppress. Because that’s just what white guys do.As I mentioned yesterday, the Salt Lake City Council unanimously decided to join the trendy observance of Indigenous Peoples Day on the second Monday of October, the same day as Columbus Day. Don’t worry, it won’t replace Columbus Day, which is a federal holiday, although they would if they could. Instead it will be...

With President Donald Trump's attacks against protesting NFL players still reverberating, the league's TV partners decided to air live coverage of the national anthem before Week 3 games. Those partners left out a key element of the coverage: crowd shots of angry fans. Networks typically do not televise the national anthem except for the Super Bowl and other special occasions, but they recognized there would be intense viewer interest this past weekend. Some fans, if they reacted at all, happily clapped and cheered during protests, but others did not, and they angrily let their home teams know it. The audio mics picked up the boos. Yet the TV networks mostly avoided crowd...

Did CBS's 60 Minutes photoshop Steve Bannon into looking like a bleary-eyed drunk in his interview? That's the verdict of a professional photographer, who suspected something off after having seen Bannon in person. The short video Peter Duke made, explaining the photoshopper's art, is a must-see. Duke noted that color correction and grading can be used to make faces look better, but they can also be used to make people look worse. He pulled up some stills from the 60 Minutes interview.

Kid Rock says his critics are "Wasting Time." The rocker shared a lengthy response to recent criticism about his upcoming concerts in Detroit saying the backlash to his use of the Confederate flag at concerts is politically motivated. "Pay NO attention to the garbage the extreme left is trying to create! (and by

The Los Angeles City Council voted 14-1 on Wednesday to officially mark the second Monday in October as Indigenous Peoples Day on the city’s calendar — a day to commemorate “indigenous, aboriginal and native people.” The day will remain a paid holiday for city employees, the Los Angeles Times reported. The vote followed a contentious hearing, during which some Italian-Americans said the switch would eradicate a key portion of their history, while others argued that city lawmakers needed to “dismantle a state-sponsored celebration of genocide indigenous peoples” and dismissed the idea of celebrating Indigenous Peoples Day on a different date...