Free Republic

Alaska draws hunters from around the world. In fact, Planned Parenthood is hunting there right now; their target is GOP senate candidate Dan Sullivan. Sullivan is trying to unseat the Democratic incumbent, Mark Begich, and that’s put him in Planned Parenthood’s crosshairs. The Planned Parenthood Action Fund has launched attack ads against Sullivan, including one that says, “Dan Sullivan would let the government control what you do with your body.” I can see why the folks at Planned Parenthood would run an ad about trying to control women. After all, they’ve been helping abusive men do that for years. Planned...

A stay temporarily halting same-sex marriages in Alaska expired Friday, technically making it legal for couples to seek marriage licenses in the state, while the U.S. Supreme Court denied a further stay. Just one minute after the 9th Circuit stay was dissolved, in a one-line response, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy denied a request for a further stay from the state of Alaska. But while marriages can go forward immediately, with state offices closed Friday in observance of Alaska Day, marriages will not resume until Monday morning.

A two-man Greenpeace submarine has been attacked by squids on an expedition in the Bering Sea -- and all the gory details were captured in a Vine.

Alaska will begin accepting marriage applications from same-sex couples Monday after a federal judge struck down the state's ban on gay marriage — the nation's first such prohibition approved by voters. The decision late Sunday afternoon caught many people off guard. No rallies were immediately planned, but some plaintiffs celebrated over drinks at an Anchorage bar. Matthew Hamby, who with his husband, Christopher Shelden, was one of five couples to sue, was "just having drinks with friends, enjoying it."

U.S. District Court Judge Tim Burgess issued a summary judgment in favor of plaintiffs arguing that Alaska's same-sex marriage ban is unconstitutional, days after their case began to be heard in court. In his decision for Matthew Hamby and Christopher Shelden, Burgess found that previous Supreme Court decisions have shown that “rights not explicitly mentioned in the Bill of Rights can be protected by substantive due process.” He likened his decision to a ruling by the high court allowing interracial marriage, in which justices relied on inherent characteristics of marriage to allow interracial unions instead of decreeing them to be...

A federal judge has struck down Alaska's first-in-the-nation ban on gay marriages. U.S. District Judge Timothy Burgess on Sunday said the ban violates the U.S. constitutional guarantee of due process and equal protection. The state could appeal to the 9th Circuit Court, where chances of it winning were slim since the federal appeals court already has ruled against Idaho and Nevada, which made similar arguments.

You don’t say… Police in Alaska say no charges will be filed in connection with a fight that broke out at a party and involved members of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s family.Police on Thursday released a report on its investigation into the Sept. 6 brawl in Anchorage, including transcripts of interviews with multiple witnesses who said Palin’s daughter Bristol and son Track were in the thick of the brawl. Those of us who grew up in small towns know that the social calendar involves the first days of various hunting seasons, Fourth of July, and quite a few...

Fortunately for the GOP, there are six races that lean toward Republicans: Alaska, Arkansas, Georgia, Iowa, Kentucky and Louisiana. We’ll refer to these states as the “Maroon 6” (because maroon is somewhere between red and purple). In each Maroon 6 state, the Republican candidate has a 65 percent to 75 percent chance of winning, according to the FiveThirtyEight forecast.

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, is a tea party stalwart.   Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., narrowly defeated a tea party opponent in the Republican Senate primary this year.   Ted Cruz has a perfect 100 percent rating from the American Conservative Union.   Pat Roberts has an 84 percent rating from the ACU.   Yet this week Cruz will be in Kansas campaigning for Roberts in an election that is crucial for GOP hopes of retaking the Senate. The reason is simple. Fox News quotes Cruz explaining, “Roberts stood by my side in the fight to defund Obamacare, and he...

A Supreme Court order legalizing same-sex marriage in five states reverberated further on Thursday, with the attorney general of West Virginia conceding that its ban on same-sex marriage was no longer defensible but South Carolina officials vowing to keep fighting to restrict marriage to a man and a woman. Since the Supreme Court decision on Monday and a ruling from a federal circuit court on Tuesday, new developments have appeared almost hourly as gay-rights advocates press for action in nine other states: Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Kansas, Montana, North Carolina, South Carolina, West Virginia and Wyoming.

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...

[SNIP] Here are some of the details -- wildly different, depending on who's offering the information -- that Officer John Daily submitted in his official report: 1. When he arrived, a shirtless, "heavily intoxicated" and "belligerent at first" Track Palin, Sarah Palin's adult son, was about to step into a white limousine with his parents, Sarah and Todd. They'd all been at the party at Korey Klingenmeyer's house. 2. Track told the officer some guys were "talking rudely" to his sisters and making them cry. So he stuck up for them. When one of his friends, identified only as Steven,...

Alaska Senate nominee Dan Sullivan (R) is moving toward conquering the Last Frontier. The Republican has surged to a lead against Sen. Mark Begich (D) in recent polls in the race that’s likely to be critical to the balance of Senate power. Though the race is expected to remain close, some Democrats are worried that Begich is playing catch-up in a state where it’s tough to make up ground for their party. “[Begich] is up against a guy who’s playing very smart poker,” one Alaska Democrat and Begich ally told The Hill. “My sense is Mark isn’t having the best...

At least 35,000 walruses have beached themselves on a remote Alaskan coastline in a phenomenon blamed on the melting of arctic ice due to climate change, experts said Wednesday. Initially there had been only 1,500 of the tusked pinnipeds counted on one beach, but in recent days that number has exploded. "Our best estimate is almost a 24-fold increase," said Megan Ferguson of the Aerial Surveys of Arctic Marine Mammals.

Snoop Dogg has promised to play a concert in Alaska – if voters in the US state choose to legalise recreational use of marijuana.

Republican challenger Dan Sullivan has edged further ahead of incumbent Democrat Mark Begich in Alaska’s U.S. Senate race. The latest Rasmussen Reports statewide telephone survey of Likely Alaska Voters finds Sullivan with 48% support to Begich’s 43%. Five percent (5%) prefer some other candidate, and four percent (4%) are undecided.

After clinching the Republican nomination for the Alaska Senate race, Dan Sullivan has now surged six points according to a new Public Policy Polling poll. An August poll conducted prior to the primary showed Begich leading Sullivan 43 percent to 37 percent. But now Sullivan leads 43 percent while Begich has fallen two points. Begich suffered from campaign missteps earlier this month after his campaign was forced to pull a controversial negative ad. The poll surveyed 880 likely voters from September 18th to 21st - right after Begich cast the deciding vote to defeat an amendment proposed by Sen. Jeff...

PPP's newest Alaska poll finds toss up races for both the US Senate and Governor. Dan Sullivan leads Mark Begich 43/41 for the Senate, with minor candidates combining for 5%. Bill Walker leads incumbent Sean Parnell 42/41 for Governor, with minor candidates combining for 5% in that race as well. Sullivan has gained 6 points since our last poll in early August, while Begich has dropped 2. Sullivan's gain has come largely due to consolidating his support among Republican leaning voters since winning the primary last month. He now leads 75/9 among folks who voted for Mitt Romney in 2012,...

The U.S. Senate Energy Committee advanced a bill on Wednesday that would force congressional approval of TransCanada's proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline project, but the measure seems unlikely to be taken up by the full Senate. The bill, the latest effort by lawmakers to breathe life into the long-delayed pipeline from Canada to the U.S. Gulf Coast, will languish without a commitment from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to bring it to a vote. The measure, from Democratic Senator Mary Landrieu of Louisiana and Republican Senators John Hoeven of North Dakota and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, would take a decision...

Rod Coronado, a convicted eco-terrorist, is the leader of the controversial “Yellowstone Wolf Patrol,” a new environmental group that plans to shadow legal Montana wolf hunters during the state’s fall and winter wolf season and document the hunts with a video camera. Coronado, a resident of Michigan, is a radical environmentalist who “sank whaling ships nearly 30 years ago in Iceland and later went to prison after torching a Michigan State University lab in 1992 for conducting research for the fur industry” according to The Buffalo News of Buffalo, NY. He also serves as a spokesman for the radical, militant...