Free Republic

As April Miller drove to work, still too stunned to grasp the magnitude of the fight erupting around her, an old song crackled over the car radio. "Will you still love me for the rest of my life?" the band Chicago sang. "I can't go on if I'm on my own." Miller pulled over. And for the first time since she and her partner stepped into the vortex of history, she wept. [Snip] The couple has lived quietly together for years, never intending to lead a battle that has consumed their town of Morehead, where Miller is a tenured university...

When it comes to engaging people on Facebook, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) has some work to do. About 865,000 different people commented on, shared a note or otherwise engaged with the Kentucky lawmaker when he announced his campaign for the White House on Tuesday, according to Facebook. In all, Paul’s announcement generated a total of 1.9 million interactions — both positive and negative — during the day. By comparison, 2.2 million Facebook users talked about Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) when he announced his campaign last month, generating a total of 5.7 million interactions. The metrics are just one sign of...

WALKERTON, Ind. - A small-town pizza shop is saying they agree with Governor Pence and the signing of the controversial Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The O'Connor family, who owns Memories Pizza, says they have a right to believe in their religion and protect those ideals. “If a gay couple came in and wanted us to provide pizzas for their wedding, we would have to say no,” says Crystal O'Connor of Memories Pizza. She and her family are standing firm in their beliefs. The O'Connor's have owned Memories Pizza in Walkerton for 9 years. It's a small-town business, with small-town ideals....

Zaneta Rago, the Director of Rutgers’ Social Justice Center, said that she was surprised there were not more millennials who believed that gender exists on a spectrum. “It's wonderful that approximately half of the respondents understood gender as a spectrum, but that means we're only half way there," she said. Daniella Anconetami, a School of Arts and Sciences first-year student, said that she believes in the gender spectrum. She said that she discovered that gender “wasn’t black and white” in high school, and said that her opinions about gender identity changed after meeting someone who was transgender in high school....

Alabama's Stand Against Gay Marriage Crumbles MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Feb 13, 2015 By KIM CHANDLER Alabama's stand against gay marriage crumbled Friday as judges in most counties sided with federal courts rather than their own chief justice, a Republican who once called homosexuality an inherent evil. Many counties in the Bible Belt state began issuing the licenses to same-sex couples after the latest strongly worded order from U.S. District Judge Callie Granade. She said Thursday that a judge could no longer deny marriage licenses to gays and lesbians, reiterating her ruling striking down the state's ban on same-sex marriage.

One day in 1977, about a year after Bruce Jenner shattered a world record to win the decathlon gold medal at the Montreal Summer Olympics, he met up with his sportswriter friend Barry McDermott to play tennis in New York City. McDermott suggested a match at his private club — but that wasn’t Jenner’s style. Privacy was never his priority. The pair went to Central Park, where word quickly spread that Bruce Jenner (Bruce Jenner!) was playing on the public courts. McDermott remembers the crowd growing, as he had known it would, gawkers pressed against the chain-link fence, watching the...

Appearing on the View yesterday, Glee star Naya Rivera raised eyebrows by saying that “showering once a day is such a white people thing.” The comment came after co-host Nicolle Wallace said that, as the owner of dogs and the mother of a baby, she finds herself showering more and more. Sometimes, Wallace said, there would be “mud” or “pee” in her hair, so she showers, even as many as “three times a day.” “You know, I have to say, I have a theory about showering, which is that white people shower a lot more than ethnics,” Rivera responded. She...

Complete Headline: EXCLUSIVE: The beginning of the end for Rosie and Whoopi as ABC considers abandoning The View and extending Good Morning America as infighting grows and ratings plunge The View is dimming at the show that Barbara Walters built. Network insiders tell Daily Mail Online that the long-running talk show could end after this season, amid struggling ratings and infighting among the talk show hosts. Currently in its eighteenth season, the show created by retired TV journalist Barbara Walters is suffering some of its lowest ratings ever with its new team of Whoopi Goldberg, Rosie O'Donnell, Nicolle Wallace and...

President Obama has led tributes to Stuart Scott, the longtime SportsCenter anchor and ESPN personality who died today from cancer at age 49. The network says Scott died Sunday and had fought cancer since a diagnosis in late 2007, remaining dedicated to his craft even as he underwent chemotherapy, radiation and surgery. In his sports presenting career, which began in 1987 in South Carolina, he rose from local stations to prominence on the national sports network, coining now-unavoidable phrases including the celebratory 'boo yah'. Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2896280/Longtime-ESPN-sportscaster-Scott-dies-49.html#ixzz3NtFFzWHE Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

North Korea blamed its recent Internet outage on the United States on Saturday and hurled racially charged insults at President Barack Obama over the hacking row involving the movie "The Interview." North Korea's powerful National Defense Commission, which is headed by country leader Kim Jong Un and is the nation's top governing body, said Obama was behind the release of the comedy that depicts Kim's assassination. The commission described the movie as illegal, dishonest and reactionary.

Reclusive billionaire David Koch, a powerful donor in American conservative politics, says he’s a “social liberal.” “I’m basically a libertarian, and I’m a conservative on economic matters, and I’m a social liberal,” Koch told ABC News’ Barbara Walters.... Koch, who supports abortion rights and gay marriage, said he isn’t concerned with candidates he supports who don’t share some of his views. He said his primary concern when choosing a candidate to support is their fiscal policies.

On Monday, ABC’s Good Morning America provided First Lady Michelle Obama’s school lunch program, entitled the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, with some free publicity. Co-host George Stephanopoulos touted how “new federal guidelines pushed by the First Lady have cafeterias serving up healthier foods. And a new study finds those lunches may be better than the ones parents pack for their kids.”The ABC co-host then turned to contributor Claire Shipman, wife of former White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, to further promote the study’s findings: School cafeteria lunches. For years, they've been the butt of jokes. But this morning a new...

Texas Gov. Rick Perry is making his first court appearance on felony charges that accuse him of abusing his power when he vetoed funding for public corruption prosecutors. The potential 2016 presidential contender will be at a hearing Thursday in Austin. The Republican has said the charges are politically motivated and has asked for the case to be dismissed. Perry was indicted in August by an Austin grand jury. He's accused of carrying out a threat to veto $7.5 million for a public corruption division within the office of Travis County District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg after she refused to resign...

Former ice cream man Doug Ducey scooped up a sweet win today in the Arizona gubernatorial race. The Republican and former CEO of ice cream chain Cold Stone Creamery most recently served as Arizona's state treasurer, however it was his cool past that Ducey frequently invoked on the campaign trail. In the heat of the Arizona summer, he handed out mini containers of Cold Stone ice cream outside his campaign office, according to the Arizona Republic. On Ducey's website, he listed "ice cream" as the No. 3 reason to vote for him, writing: "The experience Doug gained as Cold Stone...

The 2014 midterm elections are days away, but preparation are already underway for the first debate of the 2016 presidential primary contest. The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation announced on Thursday that it will invite GOP presidential candidates to attend a televised debate at California's Reagan Library in September 2015. While the Regan Library hosted GOP debates in the last two presidential contests, it's unclear if the Republican National Committee will sanction the one now set for Sept. 16, 2015. The RNC recently approved new rules that would limit the number of presidential primary debates.

Klingenmeyer told police he was considering filing charges and was "angry that the Palins had showed up and were causing problems," according to the report. He told police he had asked Bristol to leave and she responded, "Who the f*** are you?" Klingemeyer told her he owned the home and Bristol said she didn't believe him and "she will kick his a**," the police report states. Klingenmeyer said that's when Bristol first punched him and he then said he told her to hit "him again if it makes her feel better and she does," according to the document. After five...

Pope Francis, cardinals and bishops from around the world have gotten an unexpected lecture on the joys of sex, from a Catholic couple brought in to talk about what makes a marriage last. Ron and Mavis Pirola, parents of four from Sydney, Australia, told a Vatican gathering of some 200 prelates that sexual attraction brought them together 57 years ago and that sex has helped keep them married for 55 years. "The little things we did for each other, the telephone calls and love notes, the way we planned our day around each other and the things we shared were...

Ever since David Muir was tapped to replace Diane Sawyer when she leaves ABC World News in September, gossip about his sexual orientation has gone into overdrive. Kenneth in the 212 reports Muir is allegedly “openly gay in his day-to-day life.” Another juicy rumor claims that he and field reporter Gio Benitez are an item. Neither of these men are openly gay, but have been linked together after a series of coincidental appearances on ABC World News. Eagle-eyed viewers claim that Gio usually files his reports to Diane Sawyer from the field. But when Muir fills in as anchor, Benitez...

An Oklahoma man who had been suspended from his job was charged Tuesday with first-degree murder in the gruesome beheading of a co-worker, who was attacked from behind as the man sought revenge, a prosecutor said Tuesday. Nolen had recently converted to Islam but Cleveland County Prosecutor Greg Mashburn said it appeared Nolen's assault was tied more to his suspension. Mashburn said Vaughan's human resources department suspended Nolen earlier Thursday after another co-worker, Traci Johnson, had complained that she had had an altercation with Nolen "about him not liking white people." "It had more to do with race rather than...

The View’s alleged Republican, Nicolle Wallace, probably thinks she did NJ Gov. Chris Christie a favor when she endorsed him today. Wallace, who has been a perennial Palin basher since she worked on the ill-fated McCain-Palin campaign in 2008, described Christie as “progressive.”