Free Republic

MSNBC host Jen Psaki said Sunday on “Inside” that second gentleman Doug Emhoff had “reshaped the perception of masculinity.” Psaki said, “There has also been an important part, an interesting part about how people have talked about your role, how it has reshaped the perception of masculinity. I’m not sure you planned on that, but you are an incredibly supportive spouse. Has that been an evolution for you? Do you think that’s part of the role you might play as First gentleman?” Emhoff said, “It’s funny, I have started to think a lot about this. I have always been like...

Jessie Thompson, a 36-year-old mother of two in Chicago, is reminded of the Covid-19 pandemic every day. Sometimes it happens when she picks up her children from day care and then lets them romp around at a neighborhood park on the way home. Other times, it’s when she gets out the shower at 7 a.m. after a weekday workout. “I always think: In my past life, I’d have to be on the train in 15 minutes,” said Ms. Thompson, a manager at United Airlines. A hybrid work schedule has replaced her daily commute to the company headquarters in downtown Chicago,...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Former California Rep. Fortney “Pete” Stark, Jr., an influential Democrat whose legislative work helped reshape America's health care system, has died. He was 88. Stark's family said he died Friday at his home in Maryland. They did not disclose a cause of death. During his 40-year career in Congress representing the East Bay, Stark helped craft the Affordable Care Act, the signature policy change of the Obama administration. He also created the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act, the 1986 law best known as COBRA, which allows workers to stay on their employer's health insurance plan after...

The Aztecs who conquered the city of Xaltocan in ancient Mexico around 1435 may have fundamentally changed the genetic makeup of the people who lived there, new research suggests... Xaltocan was the capital of a pre-Aztec city-state ruled by the Otomi, an indigenous people who lived in Mexico. The period before the Aztec conquest was a tumultuous time for the Otomi, when a century of warfare led to the collapse of their capital city. Colonial records from the 1500s onward told tales of the Otomi fleeing the city en masse in 1395. Those records suggested that the city was abandoned...