Free Republic

HELENA, Mont. (AP) — A Montana man said Wednesday that he was inspired by last week’s U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage to apply for a marriage license so that he can legally wed his second wife. Nathan Collier and his wives Victoria and Christine applied at the Yellowstone County Courthouse in Billings on Tuesday in an attempt to legitimize their polygamous marriage. Montana, like all 50 states, outlaws bigamy — holding multiple marriage licenses — but Collier said he plans to sue if the application is denied. “It’s about marriage equality,” Collier told The Associated Press Wednesday. “You...

Republican presidential candidate and Texas Senator Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) denounced the US opening an embassy in Cuba wondering “How sad is it that under the Obama administration the United States is going to have an embassy in Havana before we have an embassy in Jerusalem?” on Wednesday’s “Hugh Hewitt Show.”Cruz said, “I think this is a serious mistake. It’s a manifestation of the pattern of weakness and appeasement towards our enemies that has characterized the Obama-Clinton foreign policy. It’s the same pattern that occurred — that is occurring with regard to Russia, with regard to Iran, and it’s a...

A road trip down old Route 66 led to a Wild West-style motel shootout for a pioneering CNN anchor and her former-soldier hubby. Lynne Russell — the first woman to ever solo-anchor a primetime network news show — and Chuck de Caro, 65, had stopped at a Motel 6 for the night in Albuquerque when an intruder slipped into their room as Russell went to grab something from the car around 11:30 p.m. Tuesday. “I opened the door and he materialized out of nowhere; he was inside,” she told The Post. “And he pushed me into the room and onto...

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell concedes that there’s little congressional Republicans can do to fight the Supreme Court’s ruling in favor of same-sex marriage nationwide, though he predicted a flurry of litigation aimed at protecting “religious liberty” in light of the decision. The Kentucky Republican has been a staunch opponent of same-sex marriage: He was one of just six Senate Republicans to sign an amicus brief urging the high court to reject federal protection of same-sex marriage. And though he reiterated to Kentucky TV station WDRB on Tuesday evening that his position has not changed, he also said there is...

Donald Trump said Tuesday that if elected president he will erect a wall along the country’s southern border and said that taxpayers won’t have to pay a dime for it. “I will build a great, great wall on our southern border and I will have Mexico pay for that wall,” Mr. Trump said. He did not provide any details on how he would get Mexico to go along with his plan.

The attack Friday at a Tunisian beach resort killed at least 18 Britons, but officials said Monday the actual number was likely to be 30. That would make it by far the deadliest terrorist attack on Britons since the London transport bombings 10 years ago. Yet it was just one of three terrorist attacks on three continents that followed one another in frightening succession last week. While it is not yet known whether the attacks were linked, they have left officials in numerous countries concerned about how to keep their citizens safe. Not long after that, a bomb ripped through...

British Prime Minister David Cameron has called on the BBC not to use the term "Islamic State" for the extremist group in Iraq and Syria, according to the Daily Mail, arguing that the reference to Islam perpetuates a "perversion of a great religion." "I wish the BBC would stop calling it Islamic State because it's not an Islamic State; what it is is an appalling, barbarous regime," Cameron said, during an interview on a BBC morning show. "It is a perversion of the religion of Islam and many Muslims listening to this program will recoil every time they hear the...

The Supreme Court effectively blocked an attempt by Arizona and Kansas to require voter ID after the high court declined to hear an appeal. By rejecting a joint appeal by the states, the high court left in place a November 2014 ruling by the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. That appeals court decided that the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, a federal agency that oversees changes to state voter registration procedures, was not required to grant the states' request that proof of citizenship be added to registration requirements. The Election Assistance Commission was established in 2002 to support and enforce...

Memphis Mayor A C Wharton Jr. announced a proposal last week to remove the statue and grave sites of Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest and his wife. “These relics, these messages of this despicable period of this great nation, it’s time for those to be moved,” the Democratic mayor, who is black, said in a news conference, a local NBC affiliate reported. Mr. Wharton told The Associated Press that he wants the statue removed from Health Sciences Park and “returned to Forrest Monument Association that had it placed there.” He said the graves of the noted KKK leader and his...

Circulating throughout Conservative sites this week is information about Hillary being fired by her Watergate supervisor, US HOUSE Judiciary Watergate committee counsel Jerry Zeifman. A close analysis of this bold assertion puts the whole flap into real perspective. When asked in an interview why he terminated Hillary’s employment, Zeifman responded, “Because she was a liar. She was an unethical, dishonest lawyer; she conspired to violate the Constitution, the rules of the HOUSE, the rules of the committee and the rules on confidentiality.” A Rush Limbaugh transcript stays very close to this syntax. In an article written after a 2008 campaign...

By June 16, 2014 (NASA) (Source: NASA) In the remote and forested terrain of Juina in western Brazil, an ugly rock with an uglier name surfaced months ago inside a diamond mine. It was a tiny green crystal, all scars and bumps. It “literally look[ed] like [it had] been to hell and back,” one scientist said in March. But despite the provenance, the ringwoodite stone wasn’t scorched — it was, in fact, sopping wet. Providing an unparalleled glimpse into the our planet’s innards, the stone rode a violent volcanic eruption to the surface from 325 miles inside the Earth’s mantle....

The cupboards of the Natural History Museum in London hold spectacular dinosaur fossils, from 10-centimeter, serrated Tyrannosaurus rex teeth to a 4-meter-long hadrosaur tail. Now, researchers are reporting another spectacular find, buried in eight nondescript fossils from the same collection: what appear to be ancient red blood cells and fibers of ancient protein. Using new methods to peer deep inside fossils, the study in this week’s issue of Nature Communications backs up previous, controversial reports of such structures in dinosaur bones. It also suggests that soft tissue preservation may be more common than anyone had guessed. “It’s encouraging,” especially because...

Abstract Exceptionally preserved organic remains are known throughout the vertebrate fossil record, and recently, evidence has emerged that such soft tissue might contain original components. We examined samples from eight Cretaceous dinosaur bones using nano-analytical techniques; the bones are not exceptionally preserved and show no external indication of soft tissue. In one sample, we observe structures consistent with endogenous collagen fibre remains displaying ~67 nm banding, indicating the possible preservation of the original quaternary structure. Using ToF-SIMS, we identify amino-acid fragments typical of collagen fibrils. Furthermore, we observe structures consistent with putative erythrocyte remains that exhibit mass spectra similar to emu...

RIGA, Latvia — In a significant move to deter possible Russian aggression in Europe, the Pentagon is poised to store battle tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and other heavy weapons for as many as 5,000 American troops in several Baltic and Eastern European countries, American and allied officials say. The proposal, if approved, would represent the first time since the end of the Cold War that the United States has stationed heavy military equipment in the newer NATO member nations in Eastern Europe that had once been part of the Soviet sphere of influence. Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the war...

Constitutional conservatives don't like it. Trade unions abhor it. Obama critics hate it. Environmentalists despise it. Outside the Beltway bubble, a broad coalition of voters from the left, right and center opposes the mega-trade deal getting rammed through Congress this week by the Republican establishment on behalf of the White House. Here's why. The Obama administration, House GOP leader John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have sold out American sovereignty. Their so-called Trans-Pacific Partnership Commission will have sweeping authority over trade, immigration, environmental, labor and commerce regulations. As alert watchdogs U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., chairman of the...

Why America Hates the GOP-Obamatrade Deal by Michelle Malkin Creators Syndicate Copyright 2015 Constitutional conservatives don’t like it. Trade unions abhor it. Obama critics hate it. Environmentalists despise it. Outside the Beltway bubble, a broad coalition of voters from the left, right and center opposes the mega-trade deal getting rammed through Congress this week by the Republican establishment on behalf of the White House. Here’s why. The Obama administration, House GOP leader John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have sold out American sovereignty. Their so-called Trans-Pacific Partnership Commission will have sweeping authority over trade, immigration, environmental, labor and...

One of last week's top stories was an alleged incident aboard a United Airlines flight where a Muslim chaplain from Northwestern University named Tahera Ahmad claimed she was denied an unopened can of soda because the flight attendant told her it could be used as a weapon. Ahmad further alleged a fellow passenger made anti-Muslim statements to her. However, her claims appear not to be true. SNIP Why would CNN, ABC News, The Washington Post or, for that matter, Jon Stewart care about verifying Ahmad's story? Ahmad has an agenda and liberal media outlets are only too happy to take...

Jeb Bush will enter 2016 with plenty of advantages, but the first-in-the-West nominating contest likely won’t be one of them. Nevada lawmakers this week opted against changing the state’s presidential caucus to a primary, a decision that runs counter to the wishes of Bush, Marco Rubio, and other GOP establishment-types who had hoped a switch would give them a better chance at posting a momentum-building victory there. Caucuses require a good deal more effort and patience from voters than primaries, and as a result the contests tend to favor candidates that have built a network of highly motivated activists. That...

The National Security Agency and its closest allies planned to hijack data links to Google and Samsung app stores to infect smartphones with spyware, a top-secret document reveals. The surveillance project was launched by a joint electronic eavesdropping unit called the Network Tradecraft Advancement Team, which includes spies from each of the countries in the “Five Eyes” alliance — the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Australia. The top-secret document, obtained from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, was published Wednesday by CBC News in collaboration with The Intercept. The document outlines a series of tactics that the NSA...

It was an unlikely display of protesters: nuns cloaked in white, a black-clad priest clutching a golden scepter and dozens of Arab schoolchildren picketing outside the hulking headquarters of Israel’s Education Ministry. Their message, raised high on large banners: “Take your hands off our schools.” Private Christian schools are among Israel’s highest ranked educational institutions, established by churches in the Holy Land hundreds of years ago—long before Israel’s own creation. But school administrators are accusing Israel of slashing their funding as a pressure tactic to get them join the Israeli public school system—a move they say would interfere with the...