Free Republic

The Fix's Chris Cillizza marvels at Rick Santorum's increasing polling strength among Republican women, as measured by a new Washington Post/ABC News poll: Judging from the coverage of Rick SantorumÂ’s presidential campaign over the last few weeks, you might think that the former Pennsylvania SenatorÂ’s numbers would be cratering among women.But you would be wrong. Way wrong.In a new Washington Post-ABC poll, SantorumÂ’s numbers among Republican and Republican-leaning women have soared over the past month. He now has the highest favorability rating among that group of any of the top-tier Republican presidential candidates. ...The poll numbers reinforce findings from recent...

Santorum Says He Would Enforce US Obscenity Laws That Obama Ignores By NBC's Andrew Rafferty ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, IL -- Rick Santorum accused President Barack Obama of not enforcing the country's obscenity laws and said Friday that as chief executive he would crack down on illegal pornography. Santorum found himself answering pornography questions during a stop at an Italian restaurant here after the discovery of a statement posted in his campaign website in which he asserts that "America is suffering a pandemic of harm from pornography." Recent reporting has shed light on the letter in which the former Pennsylvania senator vowed...

A pro-abortion activist writing at one of the leading pro-abortion web sites is admitting what many the pro-life movement has always known but what leading defenders of abortion refuse to admit. Until now.Jessica DelBalzo, an activist writer from Flemington, New Jersey who has written for numerous progressive web sites, puts her extreme pro-abortion views on display at RH Reality Check, where she candidly admits in a headline, “I Love Abortion: Implying Otherwise Accomplishes Nothing for Women’s Rights.”“I love abortion. I don’t accept it. I don’t view it as a necessary evil. I embrace it. I donate to abortion funds. I...

The culture war might be likened to fighting a war against a coalition of powers. Imagine WWI-style trench warfare on a long front. In the center of the enemy lines are the forces of moral relativism. These forces oppose the idea that there is a universal moral law. On one flank are the forces of the sexual revolution, including gays, feminists, adulterers, the promiscuous, and the pro-abortion folks. On the other flank are the cultural relativists, and multiculturalists. This camp opposes the ideas of truth, beauty, and intrinsic quality. It seeks to suppress the literary, philosophical, and artistic heritage of...

LifeNews Note: Reprinted with permission from Ethika Politika, the blog of the Center for Morality in Public Life.Remember the Georgetown Law student, Sandra Fluke, who was forced to suffer through $3,000-worth of protected sex during her stint at law school? Turns out, thereÂ’s a bit more to the story.According to some sources, Fluke might just have been a well-placed fake. Not exactly the young-and-helpless female law student most took her for, FlukeÂ’s LinkedIn profile speaks for itself:With a six year hiatus between her undergraduate time and GT Law, Fluke is probably closer to 30. And sheÂ’s had plenty of involvement...

Theologian William Hamilton, a member of the Death of God movement of the 1960s that reached its peak with a Time Magazine cover story, has died in Portland, Ore. He was 87. Hamilton died Tuesday from complications from congestive heart failure at the downtown apartment he shared with his wife, his family said. Hamilton told The Oregonian newspaper in 2007 that he had questioned the existence of God since he was a teenager, when two friends — an Episcopalian and a Catholic — died from the explosion of a pipe bomb they were building, while a third — an atheist...

Mark this in your book of bizarre celebrity sightings. Renowned physicist Stephen Hawking is somewhat of a regular at a Devore, California sex club, RadarOnline.com is exclusively reporting. According to a source who has been a member of Freedom Acres swingers club for nearly half a decade, Hawking, 70, shows up to the club with a bevy of nurses and assistants and has naked woman grind on him.

Does high school musical sitcom "Glee" go out of its way to be hostile to Christianity? Some may think so, given the matter-of-fact treatment in so many episodes of teen drinking, drug use, sex, pregnancy, and its acceptance of same-gendered relationships. As a progressive Christian and fan of the show, even I wonder at times if they are pushing the envelope a bit too far. I've often commented that I'm not sure younger teens should be watching the show. It is, after all, an exaggerated, satirical look at how adults view adolescence. I'd be a little worried if some middle-schooler...

"That’s the kind of balance you need," said Geithner. "Why is that the case? Because if you don't try to generate more revenues through tax reform, if you don't ask, you know, the most fortunate Americans to bear a slightly larger burden of the privilege of being an American, then you have to -- the only way to achieve fiscal sustainability is through unacceptably deep cuts in benefits for middle class seniors, or unacceptably deep cuts in national security."

This is Not Just a “Culture War,” It’s An Attack on The First Amendment Posted by Ron Futrell Feb 8th 2012 at 6:30 The media is calling the Barack Obama attack on the Catholic Church a “culture war.” Culture War. The words and graphics are everywhere. It was the ABC News headline one morning, “Candidate’s Culture War” is what the graphic said. As if this is some sort of battle between Obama and the Republican candidates. Yes, it is that, but it us much, much more.This is also a fight much larger than “culture.” Culture is something that defines...

Most Births Among Those Under 30 Are To Unwed Moms It used to be called illegitimacy. Now it is the new normal. After steadily rising for five decades, the share of children born to unmarried women has crossed a threshold: More than half of births to U.S. women younger than 30 occur outside marriage. Once largely limited to poor women and minorities, motherhood without marriage has settled deeply into middle America. The fastest growth in the past two decades has occurred among white women in their 20s who have some college education but no four-year degree, according to Child Trends,...

"It's the economy, stupid" was the slogan Bill Clinton used to bash George Bush in 1992. The GOP, which had planned to hammer the Democrats this year over the economy, may now switch to quite a different rallying cry: "It's the culture, stupid." Recent economic good news hurts Mitt Romney's case that he is the right man to take on President Obama. Meanwhile, Obama's decision to ignite a culture war by making it illegal for Catholics to obey their own teachings on contraception could persuade Republican voters that Rick Santorum might me the best man to battle the president in...

WASHINGTON (AP) — All of a sudden, abortion, contraception and gay marriage are at the center of American political discourse, with the struggling — though improving — economy pushed to the background. Social issues don't typically dominate the discussion in shaky economies. But they do raise emotions important to factors like voter turnout. And they can be key tools for political candidates clamoring for attention, campaign cash or just a change of subject in an election year. "The public is reacting to what it's hearing about," said Andrew Kohut, president of the Pew Research Center. In a political season, he...

Last summer, when a School Board member shared concerns about teen boys wearing long wigs, dresses and makeup to class, the principals of the three city high schools insisted they hadn't seen it. Superintendent Deran Whitney said he had heard no complaints and had observed only one boy - in jeans and a shirt - dressed in "what is traditionally viewed as female clothing." Now, Whitney has proposed modifications to the student dress code that include a change that addresses cross-gender clothing. The regulations, to be considered by the board tonight, ban clothing "that is not in keeping with a...

You can’t argue with the research… Researchers have long known that people who have frequent sex are generally healthier Most health benefits seem to be linked to penile-vaginal intercourse Frequent sex may also bring longer life, fewer coronary events, lower blood pressure Researchers have long known that not only is sex fun (when done with the right person, of course), but that people who have frequent sex tend to live longer and have healthier hearts and lower rates of certain cancers. These studies also show that men with an active sex life have healthier sperm, and sexually active women have...

LETTERKENNY, Ireland – Arguing that the Catholic Church in Ireland is under attack from “aggressive secularism” constitutes a “hate crime,” according to a formal complaint made to Irish police. John Colgan, called a “leading humanist” by the Irish Independent, told police this week that Bishop Philip Boyce of the Raphoe diocese in northwestern Ireland was guilty of “incitement to hatred” against secularists when the latter said in a sermon last August that the Church was being “attacked from the outside by the arrows of a secular and godless culture.”

New Playgrounds Are Safe—and That's Why Nobody Uses Them The problem with safety guidelines is that they make most playgrounds so uninteresting as to contribute to reduced physical activity. Playgrounds don't look like they used to. Steep metal slides and wooden towers have given way to slow, plastic slides and carefully penned-in climbing contraptions. And forget about seesaws -- they're a thing of the past. When kids are bored by unimaginative (read: safe) playground equipment, they're less active as a result, and with childhood obesity at epidemic proportions, that's a danger, too. An interesting new investigation looks into this phenomenon....

When Anders Aslund, a Swedish economist who has studied and advised most of the leaders in the former Soviet Union, visited Kiev in late 2004, at the height of the Orange Revolution, he returned to his office in Washington, D.C., with a surprising observation. Most reports depicted the Orange Revolutionaries, with their determined, subzero encampment of the capital city's central square, either as western Ukrainians rebelling against the government's pro-Russian stance, or as idealistic students who were unwilling to stomach political repression. Both characterizations were true, but Aslund saw a third dynamic at play. The Orange Revolution, he told me,...

LOS ANGELES (AP) — An anti-profanity crusader on Tuesday asked ABC to pull this week's "Modern Family" episode in which a toddler appears to use a bleeped curse word. "Our main goal is to stop this from happening," said McKay Hatch, an 18-year-old college student who founded the No Cussing Club in 2007. "If we don't, at least ABC knows that people all over the world don't want to have a 2-year-old saying the 'F-bomb' on TV."

~~snip~~ The Girl Scouts have a cross-dresser in the front office. Ten years ago, Girl Scouts media relations officer Joshua Ackley was frontman for the “homopunk” band the Dead Betties. In publicity shots, he’s dressed in women’s clothing, and in music videos, he appears to be naked and feigning masturbation. The video for “Hellevator” portrays a woman being strangled in an elevator shaft while Mr. Ackley flashes a menacing grin. Today he issues press releases, posts news and views on the Girl Scouts’ blog, and tries to mollify moms who are concerned about Girl Scout ties with Planned Parenthood. In...