Free Republic

He walks with a cane and is a bit hard of hearing. Yet Boris Chertok, 95, a former deputy chief designer in the Soviet bureau that put the first Sputnik satellite into orbit 50 years ago, still has strong opinions on the evolution of the country's space program. Chertok says the free-market changes instituted by President Boris Yeltsin after the Soviet Union fell apart were disastrous for Russian science. "We need to restore what we have lost over 15 years of destructive reforms," said Chertok, whose very name was once a state secret. "The market economy is incapable of fulfilling...

The missing American who’d traveled to Ukraine years ago to aid Russian separatists in Donbas was found dead in the country’s war-torn eastern region. The body of Russell Bentley, a 64-year-old U.S. Army vet, was recovered in the Russian-controlled region of Donetsk Oblast, Reuters reported. -snip- The former pothead, who used “Texas” as his military call-sign, left behind a yoga instructor girlfriend to travel to Ukraine. He utilized crowdfunding sites to finance his trip, and had since become a Russian citizen. He also got married after moving to Ukraine, where he began working as a reporter for the state-owned Sputnik...

In a statement released earlier this month, Tara Reade, the former staffer who accused Joe Biden of sexual assault, placed blame on Biden if something happened to her.Recall, Tara Reade accused her former boss then-Senator Joe Biden of sexually assaulting her in 1993.“He sexually assaulted me in 1993 when I worked as his staffer,” Reade said. “Mia Farrow then when I came forward publicly, he used his power and resources to destroy me. Stop. It is more than a little painful to read about his “moral center” that is a PR image not reality.”He sexually assaulted me in 1993 when...