Free Republic

I live near this event (The April 19th Reenactment of the encounter between Colonials and the British at the Old North Bridge) but had only gone to it once before many years ago, and it was rainy with no visibility of the event due to crowd size. I determined it wasn't worth going to again until this anniversary. I thought this would be something I should go to. In 1976, the 200 Year Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, I had no opportunity to see any of it because I was an E2 Airman Apprentice doing Scullery Duty in the...

Below, I provide excerpts and comments from California's Department of Justice reports on crimes for years 2022, 2023, and then a portion of a Crimes and Clearances report updated in June 2024 (covers 2021 to 2023)As I look at crime statistics in California, I find perplexing discrepancies in reporting, with some sources claiming crime is decreasing and others claiming that crime is increasing. With our borders wide open, urging migrants to flood the US, decriminalization etc., I would expect to see an increase in crime stats. But in some cases, reports of crime are decreasing, and perhaps that's largely due...

The use of “technicals” by military forces to round up citizenry as part of genocide. This post looks into the role that (so called) “technicals” play in national upheavals. A “technical” is a pickup truck that has been modified into a mobile heavy weapons platform. These machines have been commonly used in just about every national conflict over the last two decades. Here, we look at the role that they have, and why there are used. As opposed to other vehicles constrained for other purposes. Summary A technical is a light improvised fighting vehicle, typically an open-backed civilian pickup truck...

As the impasse over Iran’s nuclear-weapons program grows inexorably into a crisis, a kind of consensus has taken root in the minds of America’s foreign-policy elite. This is that military action against Iran is a sure formula for disaster. The essence of the position was expressed in a cover story in Time magazine this past September. Entitled “What War with Iran Would Look Like (And How to Avoid It),” the essay focused on what the editors saw as the certain consequences of armed American intervention in that country: wildly spiking oil prices, increased terrorist attacks, economic panic around the world,...