Free Republic

Friends, If you are experiencing rage and despair about what is happening in America and the world right now because of the Trump-Vance-Musk regime, you are hardly alone. A groundswell of opposition is growing — not as loud and boisterous as the resistance to Tump 1.0, but just as, if not more, committed to ending the scourge. Here’s a partial summary — 10 reasons for modest optimism. Please add any that I may have missed in the comments. 1. Boycotts are taking hold. Americans are changing shopping habits in a backlash against corporations that have shifted their public policies to...

Lies on Elon Musk’s X have instigated some of the worst racial riots in Britain’s history. Musk recently posted a comment to his hundreds of millions of followers claiming “Civil war is inevitable” in the U.K., and asserted that the British criminal justice system treats Muslims more leniently than far-right activists. European Union commissioner Thierry Breton sent Musk an open letter reminding him of EU laws against amplifying harmful content “that promotes hatred, disorder, incitement to violence, or certain instances of disinformation” and warning that the EU “will be extremely vigilant” about protecting “EU citizens from serious harm.” Musk’s response...

On Saturday, during a campaign speech in Durham, New Hampshire, Donald Trump invoked Vladimir Putin (of all people) as proof that he's being persecuted: "Putin says that Biden's—and this is a quote—politically motivated persecution of his political rival is very good for Russia, because it shows the rottenness of the American political system, which cannot pretend to teach others about democracy." Some commentators see this and other Trump assertions about being persecuted as calculated efforts to fuel his base. But what if Trump really thinks he's being persecuted? What if he has a persecution complex? What if he believes his...

Trump has been engaged in a several-years-long attempt to undermine the institutions of the US government and it shows no sign of abatingTrump’s attempted coup against the US continues. We are now in phase three. Phase one was his refusal to concede the loss of the 2020 election and his big lie that the election was “stolen” from him, without any basis in fact. Trump’s actions in phase one were not illegal, but they were immoral. They violated the norms that every president before Trump had dutifully followed. Phase two was his plot to overturn the result of the 2020...

Finally Trump’s tax returns have been made public. Here are the 10 big things you need to know about them:  1. Did he break the law? Almost surely. Details of tax practices suggest fraud on a massive scale. As Michael Bromwich, a former inspector general at the Justice Department, said yesterday, based on the Times’s story, Trump faces federal and state prosecution for bank fraud, tax fraud, wire fraud, and mail fraud, as does his entire family. 2. How little has he paid in taxes? In 11 of the 18 years examined, Trump paid no taxes at all. In his first year...