Free Republic

Netflix’s new limited series, “The Queen’s Gambit,” leads the site’s top ten most popular list for the third straight week since its late October premiere, making it one of the platform’s most-watched shows of 2020. This feat is all the more impressive considering the steep competition among streaming providers this year. Adapted from Walter Tevis’s 1983 novel and brought to life by veteran screenwriters Scott Frank and Allan Scott, the mini-series depicts the unexpectedly cutthroat world of 1960s chess against the lavish backdrop of the Cold War era, when chess boards were just another arena in which rival nations competed...

The Orlando Police Department has a new training tool where 65% of its simulator scenarios require de-escalation. The VirTra V-300 4K simulator surrounds trainees 300 degrees with 5 giant screens and more than 300 scenarios with an average of 85 different outcomes and paths towards resolution. The Orlando Citizen Police Review Board was recently invited to test out the different scenarios, and witness first-hand what officers truly face when they must make the decision to use force or not. Board member Tom Keen had the opportunity to try three different scenarios. In one scenario, he attempted to calm a virtual...

Victoria and New South Wales residents could remain banned from Queensland indefinitely as the Premier insists the borders will not reopen until there is zero community transmission. Qld recorded zero new cases of the coronavirus in the past 24 hours, marking 28 days since the last case of community transmission was detected. “We will always put Queenslanders first,” Annastacia Palaszczuk said. “We do not have any intentions of opening any borders whilst there is community transmission active in Victoria and NSW.” The Sunshine State currently has eight active cases.

Does anyone in SoCal know of any active Conservative groups in the area? I don't want to believe that California is such a lost cause that no one out here will get active in the community and spread the gospel of personal liberty and self-determination.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is now “actively looking into” results from universal COVID-19 testing at a Boston homeless shelter. The broad-scale testing took place at the Pine Street Inn homeless shelter in Boston’s South End a week and a half ago because of a small cluster of cases there. Of the 397 people tested, 146 people tested positive. Not a single one had any symptoms.

Faith Blooms in Adversity March 28th, 2020 Fear is a powerful force. It can make us anxious, paralyze us, frustrate us, or harden us against our loved ones and neighbors. But on the other hand, it can shake us into action, teach us, motivate us, and give us occasion to pronounce our loyalties. The difference seems a matter of perception and reception of hardship, hinging on our decisions and attitude. Today’s COVID-19 pandemic presents two grave concerns: first, of course, the disease itself; second, an unprecedented disruption of our society. Obviously there is no lack of information for navigating the...

The sanctity of life remains more relevant than ever in these moments. Here’s how we can continue to proclaim it and put it into practice with courage and compassion. So this is how it ends. Cancellations, social distancing, and the Great Toilet Paper Shortage. Dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria.With no Madness to distract us from the madness, with mass media fanning the flames of freak-out and social media throwing gasoline on them, what’s a Christian to do? Shall we hunker in those bunkers once built beneath basements for weathering nuclear winter, or scamper to their more recent manifestation,...

Why are wealthy left-wing donors across the country, the abortion industry, and national gun-control groups more interested in your local school board and city council races than most of the people who live in your own town? Because they’re funding efforts to ensure their far-left agenda pervades our entire society – from getting their abortion curricula into our schools to changing our election laws – and they want to make sure that no city, no town is left to stand against them. National left-wing organizations are collecting and funneling hundreds of millions of dollars to flip local city councils, school...

Volunteers build temporary housing for refugees

A crowd of about 40 protesters fed up with illegal drug use in their Alaska village gathered along the Galena airport runway on Wednesday and presented a choice to a suspected methamphetamine dealer who had just landed, residents said... A village resident chosen as a spokesperson climbed aboard and discreetly delivered the message: Stay in the village and have every move scrutinized. Or, leave town and we’ll cover your ticket home. The woman chose option two, and never left the plane. It marked a victory for an Interior village trying to keep out drugs, but with few options for doing...

When a dozen of conservatism’s best minds take on Socialism and expose it for the utopian fraud it is, attention must be paid. In a brief foreword to a special issue of National Review, Editor-in-Chief Richard Lowry admitted that many conservatives thought socialism in America had been “vanquished” after the collapse of Soviet Communism 30 years ago. But as T. S. Eliot insisted, “There is no such thing as a Lost Cause because there is no such thing as a Gained Cause.” The experts examine socialism in its many guises, beginning with Charles Cooke’s blunt assessment that socialism is not...

n Comiskey Park in Dubuque, Iowa, local barber Courtney Holmes decided to do something special. The father of two decided to give free haircuts to kids who would read to him.

A federal lawsuit aiming to halt the construction of the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park is getting bigger. Three separate groups on Tuesday filed amicus briefs joining the original suit filed by Protect Our Parks, alleging that it would be illegal for the Obama Foundation to go forward with the project in federally protected parkland. The groups Preservation Chicago and Jackson Park Watch, composed of community members who have been opposed to the project from the beginning, argue that there is no precedent for a museum to be built on protected parkland, contrary to claims the city and Obama...

The Seal Beach community is rallying around a donut shop owner amid their family's health crisis. For three decades, John and Stella Chan have been serving donuts in the community at Donut City on Pacific Coast Highway.

No man is an island entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main . . . Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. ~JOHN DONNEFor the moment, forget everything you’ve ever heard about right-to-die or right-to-life positions. Put aside the court rulings. Push out of your mind the tug-at-your-heart stories you’ve seen in the movies or read about online.Now, with no one reading your thoughts, may I ask, “Do you know when it...

I saw my first movie in several years. Death of a Nation by Dinesh D'Souza. It was an advance showing at a local theater. The movie was outstanding, entertaining and well documented as would be expected from D'Souza. I'm sure there will be a lot of Progressive/Democrat heads exploding when the film is in general release. Like many other conservative films you may have to search to find it or as a last resort buy a copy of the DVD if not show locally.

t’s easy in California to find a home, hide behind fences, cocoon in one’s abode, and come out only to travel the freeways to work. Finding community in many neighborhoods is rare. People are unlikely to know the names of more than two or three families on their street. Laughing along with sitcoms and crying at disturbing news seems to be our most common way of connecting, but it isn’t very satisfying. I’m no different, having a distant relationship with most of my neighbors. I may wave, but I get my needs met for community at my church, through professional...

The leaders of the Jewish communities of four Nordic countries said that a bill proposing to ban nonmedical circumcision in Iceland “will guarantee” that no Jewish community is established there. The presidents of the umbrella groups of Jewish communities in Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland issued the unusual warning Tuesday in an open letter to all Icelandic lawmakers in reaction to the submission last month of a bill proposing to ban all nonmedical circumcision of boys younger than 18 in Iceland, a Scandinavian island nation of some 300,000 people with a few hundred Jews and Muslims. Lawmakers from four parties...

A five-alarm fire ravaged a large nursing home complex in West Chester late Thursday night into Friday morning, forcing the evacuation of more than 200 residents into 40-degree temperatures and sending an unknown number to area hospitals. At a 6:30 a.m. briefing, officials would not provide information about casualties, including whether anyone was dead or missing. They only reported that the fire was declared under control at 1:22 a.m. and that the cause is under investigation. There were no reported injuries among firefighters. Hours after the inferno at the Barclay Friends facility was declared under control, firefighters poured water on...

Though he has stayed active in politics — and reappeared on the campaign trail in New Jersey and Virginia just two weeks ago — Obama said he believes he’s up to something bigger, and thereby more curative for what he believes has gone wrong in elections. “The moment we’re in right now, politics is the tail and not the dog,” he said. “What we need to do is think about our civic culture, because what’s wrong with our politics is a reflection of something that’s wrong with the civic culture, not just in the United States but around the world.”...