Free Republic

The new taxes and tax increases meant to pay for President Biden’s massive $1.75 trillion social spending bill would raise nearly $470 billion fewer than the White House claims — and won’t bring in enough to match the legislation’s total outlay, according to a new analysis from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business. On Thursday, the Biden administration released the final framework of the Build Back Better package, along with how it expected to offset the cost of the measure. But while the White House estimated that the new and higher levies would raise $1.995 trillion, Wharton’s Budget...

Southwest Airlines employees now know the date they must provide proof of COVID-19 vaccination to their employer, or face being placed on unpaid leave. A federal judge denied the Southwest Airlines’ Pilots Association (SWAPA) petition to temporarily strike down the carrier’s December 8, 2021 internal vaccination deadline, along with their entire lawsuit against Southwest alleging violations of the Railway Labor Act. Mandatory Vaccination Will “Improve the Safety of Air Transportation” The pilots union representing roughly 9,000 pilots working for the Dallas-based airline originally sued the carrier in August 2021, claiming the working conditions under the pandemic broke the “status quo”...

Colin Kaepernick narrates this drama series recounting his formative years navigating race, class and culture while aspiring for greatness.

White employees of AT&T have been told to read an article saying that they are racist, are told to confess to their 'white privilege' and acknowledge 'systemic racism,' and must engage with set texts or else they will be penalized in their performance reviews. AT&T, in the aftermath of the George Floyd murder, introduced an internal program called Listen Understand Act. John Stankey, the CEO of AT&T, wrote to the company's 230,000 employees in an April 2021 email, obtained by journalist Christopher Rufo and published on his website. Stankey, who took over as CEO in July 2020, urged his workers...

On Season 12 of “The Great British Bake Off” there’s a good bit of pot stirring — and it’s more than just batter. The smash hit family show features a variety of contestant whisking towards the finish line — but the last thing viewers of the UK Channel 4 and Netflix series expect is drama, aside from the occasional undercooked cake or crumpet. However, judge Prue Leith has caused a stir online after saying the decadent desserts are “worth every calorie.” Social media watchdogs are now accusing the 84-year-old South African chef-restaurateur of repeatedly making “toxic” comments that are “triggering”...

President Joe Biden has postponed his flight to meet the Pope so that he can stay in Washington DC several hours longer, and try and convince his own party to back his infrastructure bill. Biden was due to fly to Rome early on Thursday, ahead of his Friday audience at the Vatican. The president, a lifelong Catholic, has pushed his flight back by several hours to try and secure a deal. He is still expected to meet Pope Francis on Friday, and hold a meeting with Emmanuel Macron, the French president. World leaders are gathering in Rome for the G20...

As whistleblowers continue to dump documents revealing internal Facebook discussions about controlling content, one thing is striking: The thousands of pages released so far contain zero signs of staff worries about (or even awareness of) left-wing hate speech and misinformation. Perhaps we’re only seeing part of the picture. But Facebook staffers’ incessant drive to censor right-wing stories and sites suggests they really are blind to the often-outrageous speech from outlets on the other side of the spectrum. The Wall Street Journal’s blockbuster report this week detailed how the social-media giant’s “employees have consistently pushed to suppress or de-platform right-wing outlets.”...

George Orwell famously said that “there are some ideas so absurd that only an intellectual could believe them.” His adage now applies to anyone associated with academia in any capacity. The New York Times ran a report the other day on the canceling of University of Chicago geophysicist Dorian Abbot for his dissenting views on affirmative action. The paper quoted a Williams College geosciences professor, Phoebe A. Cohen, who supports Abbot’s shunning. She explained her dim view of academic freedom thusly: “This idea of intellectual debate and rigor as the pinnacle of intellectualism comes from a world in which white...

An early preview of the 1921 census papers is set to be released on Wednesday showing how our ancestors lived and worked in the wake of WWI and the Spanish flu pandemic. A sneak peek of the 100-year-old records, which were taken on June 19 1921, will be shown on the family history website Findmypast and hold information about nearly 38 million people who lived in England and Wales. Under the 1920 Census Act, the 1921 census can't be published online until more than a hundred years have passed. The public will able to learn more about how their ancestors...

Mark Zuckerberg emerged from his walk-in T-shirt closet last week to make a stunning announcement: Facebook will be changing its name. And while we don’t yet know what the new name will be, I think I may be able to help here. How about this: Boomerware? Or in keeping with Silicon Valley’s penchant for trendy misspellings: LyfeSuck? Or instead of a name, there’s just the sound of Rome burning? The reason that “Facebook” is getting retired, per Zuck, is that he wants to “transition from people seeing us as primarily being a social media company to being a metaverse company.”...

The Biden administration is reportedly in talks to appoint Kim Wyman, a Republican secretary of state who challenged former President Trump's false claims of fraud, to lead efforts to protect elections from interference.It would make Wyman, 59, one of the most senior GOP appointments in the administration.And it would propel her into a prominent position working with election officials around the country at a time when much of her own party has sown doubt about voting integrity.Federal officials have spent weeks in talks with Wyman, Washington state's secretary of state, to become the election security lead for the Department of...

Once upon a time it was simple. Children went to sleep on a diet of bedtime stories that grew out of folklore, depended on magic or were just enchantingly simple: Little Red Riding Hood, Cinderella and Goodnight Moon. Not anymore, because these days bedtime is all about getting woke. Take a glance at the shelves of the children's department of any major bookstore. Teach Your Dragon About Diversity, sits next to 'Daddy & Dada'. Glance a few books along and you'll find, Joey, not a heartwarming tale about a baby kangaroo, but an illustrated hagiography of Joe Biden written by,...

Social media users are calling for the arrest of Dr. Anthony Fauci and his removal as the nation's top infectious disease expert after his agency was found to have used taxpayer funds to finance cruel experiments on dogs. The hashtag #ArrestFauci was trending on Twitter over the weekend, amplifying the outrage over the experiments, including one which saw beagles trapped in cages so flies could eat them, and another where they were 'debarked' before being pumped with drugs and killed. One of the most disturbing incidents funded by Fauci's National Institutes of Allergies and Infectious Diseases involved $375,000 given to...

Sheer chaos and anarchy on the border? Afghanistan — the most humiliating defeat in recent US military history? A labor-starved supply chain in shambles and holiday shelves emptying out? The worst inflation in 30 years that seems soon ready to match Carter-era levels? Gas hitting $5 a gallon with winter heating fuels soaring? Free-for-all looting in the major cities without consequences? Joe Biden’s policies and Biden himself diving in the polls? Never in recent American history has any administration birthed such disasters in its first nine months. Yet most Americans are arguing not over the sheer chaos and disasters of...

From the same people who brought you 2 weeks to flatten the curve, masks will protect you, lockdowns work, vaccine passports, etc.

Just west of the Pacific Coast Highway in the Paradise Cove area of Malibu, a major construction project is underway. Every day, at least 20 pickup trucks full of workers, earthmovers and multiple cranes belching black smoke crowd onto the lot, power up and get to work building Laurene Powell Jobs’ dream beach compound. To date, Steve Jobs’ widow has spent more than $80 million on three oceanfront lots — tearing down the existing houses and, according to one person in the know, now building a “massive 20,000-square-foot home for her and her two grown daughters and two smaller ‘cottages’...

Attorney General Merrick Garland basically admitted Thursday that the White House contacted the Justice Department about that odious letter from the National School Boards Association begging the feds to use the Patriot Act against “domestic terrorist” parents who raise questions about critical race theory being pushed in their kids’ schools. This is outrageous, even though Garland fudged on whether it was at the White House’s behest that he issued his remarkable public guidance. He told federal prosecutors and the FBI to actively investigate threats or violence against school officials and/or boards, a dramatic display of intimidation. There’s every reason to...

There’s more trouble in Zuck-town. A new Facebook whistleblower has reportedly emerged, dishing to US regulators that an official at the social network in 2017 blew off concerns about hate speech as a “flash in the pan,” adding that while “some legislators will get pissy” Facebook is “printing money in the basement.” The new whistleblower told the Securities and Exchange Commission under penalty of perjury that the company has constantly shrugged off concerns about hate speech and misinformation in pursuit of growth, the Washington Post reported on Friday. Like Frances Haugen, another former Facebook employee-turned-whisteblower who testified in Congress earlier...

Four Hours at the Capitol is an immersive chronicle of the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, when thousands of American citizens from across the country gathered in Washington D.C. to protest the results of the 2020 presidential election, many with the intent of disrupting the certification of Joe Biden’s presidency. The documentary film is executive produced by Dan Reed (HBO’s Leaving Neverland, Three Days of Terror: The Charlie Hebdo Attacks, Terror at the Mall) and directed by Jamie Roberts. ‌ ‌Tightly focused on the facts of the day itself, the documentary features never-before-seen footage and vivid...

Jill Biden vowed on Thursday to continue the fight for free community college amid reports it would be dropped from her husband's trillion-dollar social spending package as part of a cost-cutting effort. Her pledge after she acknowledged the challenges that come with being first lady and the 'hurt and anger' she's met when she's visited red-leaning states that didn't vote for Joe Biden in the 2020 election. Free college tuition is a priority for Biden, who teaches at a Northern Virginia community college, being one of the first presidential spouses to hold an outside job during her husband's White House...