Free Republic

Florida recently passed a law that eliminates squatter's rights.. Squatting laws have become a frequent target of exploitation by savvy criminals who fraudulently move into vacant homes across the nation. Experts warn that the problem could be compounded by the ongoing immigration crisis, with migrants catching wind of the laws and taking advantage of them. "I have thought about invading a house in the United States," migrant Leonel Moreno said in Spanish in a TikTok video that went viral last month. "I found out that there is a law that says that if a house is not inhabited, we can...

Those trying to deal with the impact of Joe Biden's decision to open America's southern border and entice millions of illegal aliens into the country now have started removing students from school buildings, so that the immigrants can be housed there. But what's coming is going to be worse, according to X owner Elon Musk. Soon, he said, authorities will be "coming for your homes." A report from Washington Examiner pointed out that Musk is charging that "the government may soon target people’s homes to accommodate illegal immigrants." He said, online, "This is what happens when you run out of...

California may be on the verge of eliminating single-family zoning statewide. This is huge. And it’s a sign of how quickly the politics around housing and land use have shifted in just the last year. ... Senate Bill 50 — San Francisco Sen. Scott Wiener’s bill to allow denser, taller housing ... Single-family houses could be converted to four-unit buildings, by right, anywhere in the state. That is, a property owner could subdivide or remodel a house to turn it into four apartments. Or a developer could build a fourplex on a vacant single-family lot. ... Let’s just pause on...

Not many films can claim as their source material a novel published by the CIA and distributed by the Vatican. In fact, as far as I know, there is only one: Doctor Zhivago.Banned from publication in its native Russia for its unglamorous portrayal of the rise of communism, Boris Pasternak’s manuscript was smuggled from the country by British Intelligence and passed on to the CIA. Restrained by politics from publicly distributing the novel themselves, the agency sought help from one of communism’s most fervent foes, the Catholic Church. That’s how it came to pass that Russian citizens were able to...

The critically lambasted musical from composer Lucy Simon, lyricists Michael Korie and Amy Powers and book writer Michael Weller, will shutter Sunday, May 10 at the Shubert-owned Broadway Theatre, having played 26 preview and 23 regular performances. The show is staged by Tony winner Des McAnuff (Jersey Boys, The Who’s Tommy) and choreographed by Kelly Devine.

A secret package arrived at CIA headquarters in January 1958. Inside were two rolls of film from British intelligence — pictures of the pages of a Russian-language novel titled “Doctor Zhivago.” The book, by poet Boris Pasternak, had been banned from publication in the Soviet Union. The British were suggesting that the CIA get copies of the novel behind the Iron Curtain. The idea immediately gained traction in Washington.

For those interested, Turner Classic Movies will air "Doctor Zhivago" tonight starting at 8PM E.S.T.. While I don't approve of the adultery of the film's hero, it is one of the few times when Hollywood produced a huge epic showing how awful life under Soviet totalitarian communism truly was. For that reason alone it's worth seeing at least once. Tom Courtnenay's youthfully idealistic Pasha provides a great example of a liberal who gets power then proceeds to torment everyone else for the "common good." The scene where Zhivago returns to his wife and family after World War I only to...