Free Republic

British Army sergeant majors are being urged to stop shouting at junior recruits lest they upset their delicate sensibilities. The use of calm, soothing words more in the style of avuncular footballer David Beckham and less like Gunnery Sergeant Hartman in the film Full Metal Jacket has been offered up as an alternative model. In the 1987 film Hartman has responsibility for a bunch of Vietnam recruits who quickly learn just who is in charge at boot camp: Regimental Sergeant Majors (RSMs) have typically always used shouted orders in the same style to enforce discipline and focus attention on the...

Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI) said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that there were “enough” Republican senators who would not vote for the so-called “big, beautiful” spending bill without significant changes. Host Jake Tapper said, “How determined are you to be that guy if it actually means telling President Trump you are going to vote against the bill and you’re going to try to get other Republican senators to join you, unless there are major, major changes?” Johnson said, “Well, in 2010, I sprang out of the Tea Party movement and as I did parades I would shout, this...

A large-scale Russian missile and drone attack hit Kyiv overnight, killing nine people and injuring another 63, including six children, Ukrainian authorities said Thursday. The Kyiv City Military Administration said on its Telegram channel that Russia struck Kyiv with drones and ballistic missiles.

President Donald Trump’s deputies should stop talking about the apparent criminal record of the deported Salvadoran illegal migrant, says Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD). “Don’t put everything out on social media” about deported migrant Kilmar Abrega Garcia, Van Hollen told ABC’s This Week show on April 20. The issue should be decided by judges, he said, adding: The Trump administration is trying to change the [Democrats’ lnarrative]. They’re trying to distract attention. Here’s where they should put their facts: they should put it before the court. They should put up or shut up in court [under] Judge Xinis, who’s the...

China has reacted negatively to President Donald Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, with the country’s Communist Party-controlled foreign ministry accusing the U.S. of “bullying.” Trump unveiled a 34 percent tariff on Chinese goods at his “Liberation Day” event from the White House Rose Garden on Wednesday in response to China’s 67 percent tariff on American products. “In other words, they charge us, we charge them, we charge them less, how can anybody be upset,” the president said.

Sunny Hostin told her co-hosts Friday on ABC’s “The View” that President Donald Trump’s second term was an “existential crisis.” According to Hostin, Democrats need to stop playing by the rules. When asked about politicians skipping town halls, Hostin said, “It’s very un-American, and it’s cowardly. If you are just, you know, stepping in line the way Republicans generally do behind a candidate that is harming the economy, I mean, you need to listen to the people that put you in office. Instead of being so concerned about maintaining power, why not be more concerned with helping people? That’s the...

Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei wants protesters to rise up across the U.S. and Europe and challenge the renewed Israeli military campaign in Gaza. The Times of Israel reports Khamenei made his call for action in a speech designed to rally anti-Israel activists everywhere, “to strongly oppose this treacherous, horrendous act.” “Once again children are being killed, homes are being destroyed, and civilians are being displaced. The people must stop this tragedy,” Khamenei says in a Nowruz address, according to an English transcript posted on his website.

Former British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has admitted that his government was not in a position to actually fulfil his promise to the public of ending the illegal migrant crisis in the English Channel while expressing regret over the “stop the boats” slogan. In yet another admission from the so-called Conservative Party of misleading the public on promises to cut immigration, former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak admitted this week that his “stop the boats” pledge was “too stark” and that it couldn’t actually be delivered. Speaking on the BBC Radio 4’s Political Thinking With Nick Robinson podcast, Sunak appeared to...

Luigi Mangione, the 26-year-old accused of murdering UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, is urging his groupies to limit the number of photos they send him in jail. Women have been deluging the accused assassin with pictures using popular apps like Shutterfly. The Independent reports that Luigi Mangione, the suspect in the high-profile murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, has made a public plea to his groupies, requesting them to refrain from sending an excessive number of photographs. The 26-year-old, who was arrested in December for allegedly gunning down Thompson outside a Midtown Manhattan hotel, has garnered a significant following since his...

Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ) said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he was “proud” to see a movement growing to stop President Donald Trump. Booker said, “I sit with 46 other Senate Democrats and they are united in this fight working with state attorneys general, working with governors and working with the greater American population to stop Donald Trump from violating the Constitution being violating separation of powers, violating civil service laws and many other things they’re doing. The reason we’re winning case after case in front of Republican judges and Democratic appointed judges is because what Donald Trump...

ESPN host Stephen A. Smtih’s latest foray into politics has upset veteran politico James Carville. On his podcast, Politicon, Carville addressed Smith’s recent ruminations about a 2028 run for the Democrat nomination. “If you’re the Democrats, that’s why Stephen A. Smith is in the news,” Smith said recently on The Stephen A. Smith Show, “because y’all don’t have anybody. You don’t have anybody. Who you got? Who you got? Kamala Harris better not run. She better not run.” Carville noted Smith’s prowess when it came to sports. But, he took a decidedly different tone when it came to the ESPN...

CNN — A month into Donald Trump’s first term, the president’s then-political sage Steve Bannon coined a doctrine to explain the conservative wrecking ball now demolishing the US government: “the deconstruction of the administrative state.” It took eight years, but the theory is becoming reality, and could portend a fateful reshaping of American governance under a mighty presidency that was never envisaged by the founders. Trump and his merchant of chaos Elon Musk are pummeling federal agencies, targeting bureaucrats, clawing back spending approved by Congress, buckling the world order and busting trade pacts. They are following a playbook developed by...

President Trump has selected Gerald Parker, a veterinarian and former top-ranking federal health official, to head the White House's pandemic office, two U.S. officials tell CBS News. Congress created the White House Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy after the COVID-19 pandemic. As part of one of the lessons learned from the outbreak, the office was intended to formalize the so-called czar roles that had led efforts across the federal government to prepare and respond to pandemic threats. Parker was previously the associate dean for Global One Health at Texas A&M University. "One Health" refers to the study of...

Many Americans are understandably concerned about the cost of aid to Ukraine. But they are thinking about the issue the wrong way — we should be considering the cost of Ukraine losing. Analysis conducted at the American Enterprise Institute has determined that Russia defeating Ukraine would cost American taxpayers an additional $808 billion over what the U.S. has planned to spend on defense in the next five years. This is about seven times more than all the aid appropriated to the Pentagon to help Ukraine since Russia’s 2022 invasion. This estimate is based on a scenario in which the U.S....

Green radicals from the Just Stop Oil activist collective defaced Charles Darwin’s grave on Monday, claiming that humanity will not be able to adapt to the supposed climate crisis. Members of the climate change alarmist Just Stop Oil group used orange spray paint to deface ‘Father of Evolution’ Charles Darwin’s grave memorial in Westminster Abbey, with the message “1.5 is dead”, a reference to the 2015 Paris Agreement, which called on governments to prevent the world from increasing temperatures beyond 1.5 degrees Celsius. “Two Just Stop Oil supporters have painted Charles Darwin’s grave to demand that the UK government works...

CNN Republican commentator Scott Jennings said Friday during the network’s special coverage of the House Speaker vote that Republicans need to stop fighting “amongst themselves.” Jennings said, “You know what strikes me about all this machination? This is all a bridge to nowhere. I mean, all these people voting no, voting present. What is — to what end is the Republican party doing this?” He continued, “And I think this is probably what Donald Trump’s frustration is and why he’s putting so much time and effort into getting Johnson elected here. There’s no alternative, you know, these no votes, present...

Residents in Seattle, Washington, plan to stop tipping as a minimum wage hike in the Democrat-run city looms. The city’s minimum wage is supposed to go from $19.97 to $20.76 an hour on January 1, the Daily Mail reported on Friday. Tipping workers on top of the approaching hourly rate hike does not appear to be a popular idea with some residents who have said they will no longer be shelling out the extra money for workers. The Mail article continued: One user who shared a Reddit post on the wage hike, which has picked up steam in the local...

Cleanup in Terminal 3! A group of travelers and one employee threw punches, grabbed hair and whacked each other with “Wet Floor” signs in a wild, caught-on-camera brawl reminiscent of a WWE match inside Chicago O’Hare International Airport last week. Insane video shared on social media of the Dec. 12 melee shows three men — including an employee in a blue shirt — seemingly teaming up against one man in a white T-shirt inside American Airlines Terminal Three. The men punch each other and use the yellow floor signs as weapons, smacking each other in the head and body as...

A poll from Quantus Insights released Friday showed Vice President Kamala Harris sliding in Virginia as former President Donald Trump pledged to make a “final stop in Virginia before” the presidential election. The Quantus Insights poll, conducted between October 22-24, of 725 likely voters found Harris leading by one point with 49 percent of support, while Trump received 48 percent of support. A previous poll from Quantus Insights, conducted between August 20-22, found Harris leading in Virginia with 49 percent, while Trump received 46 percent of support, representing a three-point lead for Harris

On Friday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “America Reports,” Pentagon Deputy Press Secretary Sabrina Singh responded to a question on why the U.S. hasn’t taken the Houthis out of commission by stating that “it’s really up to the Houthis when they make the calculation to stop” attacking. Co-host John Roberts asked, “The U.S. military’s got the capability of putting the Houthis out of business this afternoon, why don’t we just do it?”