Free Republic

Saturday, during an appearance on Fox News Channel, syndicated radio talker and Fox News Channel host Mark Levin called in from Israel to rip the Biden administration. Levin blamed Biden foreign policy, which he said enabled Iran and weakened Israel’s ability to ward off an Iranian threat, as Iran was launching an attack on Israel. “[T]he American people need to understand — when Donald Trump was president, Iran wasn’t capable of doing this,” he said. “Joe Biden, [Antony] Blinken poured of $100 billion into Iran directly and indirectly in a failed appeasement policy. We have paid for much of what’s...

Regardless of whether you’re just popping out for a quick coffee, grabbing a pick-up order from a fast-casual restaurant, or savoring dinner at your fave local spot, you’ll probably be asked — or encouraged — to tip the server or the staff before you leave. And according to a new survey from the Pew Research Center, Americans’ views on tipping are (unsurprisingly) varied and can depend on a number of factors, from what you ordered to how old you are. Pew’s pollsters surveyed almost 12,000 U.S. adults in August, asking over a dozen questions about the who, when, where, and...

Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg on Thursday touted the achievements his department has made over the last year and gave Americans pointers on air travel before they take off for the holiday season. “This year we have seen some of the busiest air traffic days in U.S. history. And so far, this year, our aviation system has been handling the increased volume well,” Buttigieg said in a video posted to X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. “In fact, cancelations are lower than they were before the pandemic, and we’re pushing hard to keep it that way.”

The Weekly Gardening Thread is a weekly gathering of folks that love soil, seeds and plants of all kinds. From complete newbies that are looking to start that first potted plant, to gardeners with some acreage, to Master Gardener level and beyond, we would love to hear from you. If you have specific question about a plant/problem you are having, please remember to state the Growing Zone where you are located. This thread is a non-political respite. No matter what, you won’t be flamed, and the only dumb question is the one that isn’t asked. It is impossible to hijack...

There was a time when leaving a tip was optional and signified an extra gratitude for a job well done. However, as servers are often underpaid, the matter of tipping has become a hugely debated topic. Regardless, times are hard, and a little kindness goes a long way. Sadly, a seemingly good deed has led to a restaurant suing a customer, who seemingly left behind a generous tip. In Scranton, Pennsylvania a restaurant is taking a customer to court after he left a $3,000 tip that turned out to be fraudulent. The tip was left in June of 2022 for...

First, big box stores like Wal-Mart introduced self-service checkout stands. You know — the ones where we shoppers begrudgingly do the jobs of the stores for free while under intense electronic and in-person surveillance and all without so much as a discount or meaningful human interaction? Well, now — thanks to the Biden economy — the newest trend at restaurants and stores with self-service checkouts is to coerce and guilt consumers into adding unearned tips to their total.I don’t know about you, Dear Reader, but I grew up in an era when tipping was in direct proportion to the quality...

Safe Boating Tips No matter how much experience you have, it’s always a good idea for everyone to review boating safety rules before departures. Below you will find 10 basic boating safety tips to help you stay safe: 1.Be Weather-Wise Always check local weather conditions before departure; TV and radio forecasts can be a good source of information. If you notice darkening clouds, volatile and rough changing winds or sudden drops in temperature, play it safe by getting off the water. 2.Follow a Pre-Departure Checklist Proper boating safety includes being prepared for any possibility on the water. Following a pre-departure...

Consumers already contending with a squeeze on their bank accounts due to inflation are now facing more pressure as businesses introduce new tipping features at self-checkout machines. Companies, including airports, bakeries, coffee shops and sports stadiums, have now introduced the self-serve tipping option, where customers can leave tips including the typical 20%, despite facing minimal to no interaction with any employee, according to a recent report by The Wall Street Journal. Customers report feeling obligated to leave a tip as they question where and to whom the extra money is actually going, but businesses are increasingly embracing the option to...

Remember when we were told that the army of new IRS agents Biden wants to hire was only going to go after billionaires? Good times. If that’s the case, somebody should check to see if Bill Gates and Elon Musk have taken some side gigs slinging hash at a diner somewhere. (Of course, in Musk’s case it may come to that if he can’t get 10 million more people to sign up for Twitter Blue.) As it turns out, the Tax Man is launching a new program to crack down on tips received by wait staff in the food and...

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) proposed a revenue procedure this week to crack down on the service industry's reporting of tips. The Service Industry Tip Compliance Agreement (SITCA) program would be a voluntary tip reporting system in which the IRS and service industry companies cooperate, according to the announcement Monday. As part of the proposal, the IRS will give the public until early May to provide feedback on the program before implementing it. "Those 87,000 new IRS agents that you were promised would only target the rich," tweeted Mike Palicz, federal affairs manager at Americans for Tax Reform. "They're coming...

Katelyn Boss is a 22-year-old server at a sports bar in Salt Lake City, Utah. She thought it was a waste of time at first. The tips were bad, and her base wage was $2.13 an hour. Then she tried putting her hair in pigtails to get higher tips from male customers — and it worked. When I first started working as a waitress at a sports bar and grill, I was struggling to make tips. It almost felt like I was wasting my time. I was making so little money, because the minimum wage in Utah for tipped employees...

Before her third consecutive double shift at a pizzeria last year, Grace Velez pulled her hair, which fell past her waist, into pigtails. Ms. Velez says she was used to inappropriate comments from customers, but what she experienced that day shocked her. Regulars who usually never tipped put money in the pizzeria’s tip jar. A few older men winked at Ms. Velez, 21, as they dropped in cash. Another man, who Ms. Velez guessed was in his 30s, tried to flirt with her for 10 minutes before asking her whether she was a high school student. About halfway through her...

If you want to fathom Russian women you should read Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy. However, you may not have time before your first date to check out at the library. That is why we're here to provide you with some advices on how to successfully court a Russian woman. All women in Russia are young women! Never-ever adress a woman with «woman» (zhentshina), «girl» (devotshka) or «baby». Even if your beloved is closer to her 50s than her 40s, she's a «young woman» to you (devoushka). Any other form of adress is not only going to confuse her, but rather even...

Authorities in Washington, DC, have provided a list of tips for residents as carjackings rise in the city, urging people to “drive in the center lane to make it harder for potential carjackers to approach the car” and to “GIVE UP YOUR CAR” without argument in the event of a criminal issuing a threat with a weapon. “Unfortunately, we have been seeing a rash of these recently in the D.C. area,” 7News reported on Monday, referencing “violent” carjackings last week that resulted one man shot and another held at gunpoint.

The big idea When Black diners get poorer service from wait staff and bartenders than white customers, it’s more likely because of racial bias than the well-documented fact that they tip less, according to a new survey I recently published. To reach that conclusion, my colleague Gerald Nowak and I recruited over 700 mostly white full-service restaurant servers and bartenders to review a hypothetical dining scenario that randomly involved either white or Black customers. We then asked them to predict the tip that the table would leave, the likelihood that the table would exhibit undesirable dining behaviors and the quality...

North Carolina authorities have been investigating a flurry of calls suggesting that Brian Laundrie is hiding out on the Appalachian Trail, according to local reports. The sheriffs’ offices in Watauga and Avery counties both confirmed to WSOC-TV that they had received more than half a dozen tips earlier this week about Gabby Petito’s 23-year-old fugitive boyfriend. It has also been a focus for the private search team led by Duane “Dog the Bounty Hunter” Chapman, whose daughter Lyssa Chapman tweeted a plea for “experienced HIKING/SURVIVALIST near the Appalachian Hiking trail in North Carolina.” “If you have hunters in your family,...

At Vanessa’s Bistro in Berkeley, owner Vi Nguyen recently encountered a customer who stood in her kitchen doorway to yell at her after a server made a simple mistake. “Not talk, yell,” Nguyen emphasized, sounding increasingly exasperated as she told the story. “This was the beginning of the reopening, and we had a line of takeout orders. Her husband stood at the doorway and was like, ‘She's hungry! She needs her food right now!’”This wasn’t an isolated incident for Nguyen. Since California’s June 15 reopening of the economy, customers have gotten … a little difficult. Well, a lot difficult. Nguyen...

14 December 2020 Washington, D.C. Yon-Genre, unedited mind dump: This is intended for journalists -- the few still on the field -- and peaceful people. I spent all day Saturday, 12 December 2020, with various protest groups in Washington, D.C. I believed the probability for violence was 90 percent. And it happened. Numerous stabbings, beatings, large fireworks, pepper spray, arrests, etc. Long time readers know that I spent years in serious wars, and more years in serious conflicts short of war but that were often as violent as war. And yet more time in lower-level conflict. This stuff is second...

A Texas waitress who claimed she was stiffed on a mystery diner’s $2,000 tip will take home the money after all — now that her employer has agreed to cut her a check. Emily Bauer, 21, will be given the money by the owner of Red Hook Seafood and Bar in San Antonio after the joint claims the diner’s credit card transaction didn’t go through, news station KENS reported. “It’s Christmas time, and everybody is struggling,” owner John Cheng told the outlet Wednesday. “I’m ready to give it to her as a Christmas gift.” Cheng reportedly wrote Bauer a check...

Cruising is easy. Or so cruisers will tell you. For starters, you only have to unpack once, even as you travel from place to place. You also don’t have to go hunting for a restaurant every night. There usually are a bunch just steps away from your cabin, and they have tables waiting for you. And you’ll have no trouble finding entertainment. But even in its simplicity, cruising still can be daunting for a first-timer. What should you bring? What should you plan on doing in ports? What is the best way to book? As The Points Guy’s cruise writer,...