Free Republic

<p>Legislation that would award the injured from the 2009 Fort Hood shooting the Purple Heart would adversely affect the trial of Maj. Nidal Hasan by labeling the attack terrorism, according to a Defense Department document obtained by Fox News.</p> <p>The document comes following calls from survivors and their families for the military honor, because they say Fort Hood was turned into a battlefield when Hasan opened fire during the November 2009 attack. Fox News is told that the DOD “position paper” is being circulated specifically in response to the proposed legislation.</p>

Started by Mayor Bloomberg in 2006, Mayors Against Illegal Guns is a coalition of over 800 mostly Democrat Mayors in all states except Alaska, Montana, Oklahoma, South Dakota, and Wyoming. Since pretty much everyone is against illegal guns, the group would more accurately be called, Mayors For Gun Control. Bloomberg may want to consider background checks on these pro gun-control Mayors before they are accepted into the group, because the reckless and criminal behavior of some of the members is not helping their cause, from a PR standpoint. The Washington Free Beacon recently reported that some current and former members...

Even as Democratic lawmakers rush to announce their support for gay marriage, a look back at the congressional debate over the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996 shows they haven't always championed the rights of same sex couples. ((snip)) "I am not for same-sex marriage. I have said that publicly. I would not vote for same-sex marriage," Kerry, now U.S. secretary of state, said. Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California made a similar point. "I personally believe that the legal institution of marriage is the union between a man and a woman," she said. "But, as a matter of public policy,...

An Arizona judge has refused to grant a divorce to a transgender man who gave birth to three children. The judge said there was insufficient evidence that Thomas Beatie was male when he married; the state bans same-sex marriage. In 2008, Mr Beatie, who had lived as a man for decades, gave birth to a girl, the first of three pregnancies. He is legally male but kept his female reproductive organs and bore children because his wife was infertile. A spokesman for Mr Beatie, Ryan Gordon, said Maricopa County Family Court Judge Douglas Gerlach's comments came as a shock. He...

The Health and Human Services Department is considering whether Medicare and Medicaid should cover sex-change operations. HHS's Departmental Appeals Board is weighing a challenge to the department's ruling that sex-change procedures are experimental and should not be covered by Medicare and Medicaid. The department had said early Friday that it would accept public comments on whether to reopen the decision not to cover sex changes. But a spokesperson said Friday evening that the agency has shut down that comment period in light of the administrative challenge.

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New York's Assembly passed the state's $135 billion budget for fiscal year 2013-2014 on Thursday just before midnight, the third budget in a row to be delivered on time in a state known for regularly being late. Lawmakers rushed to sign off on the legislation during a week that was punctuated with religious holidays and have succeeded in getting the job done ahead of the start of the state's fiscal year on April 1. Getting the budget ready on time may not sound like much to be proud of, but it is being touted as a triumph in a state...

President Obama is the most radical man ever to occupy the Oval Office. The national debt, which he is intent on increasing, has passed $16 trillion. He believes that more government borrowing and spending are the solution to every problem. He seems unaware that the free-enterprise system has lifted more people out of poverty than any other economic system devised by man. The president has launched a war on Americans' Second Amendment rights. He has launched a war on religious freedom. He has launched a war on fossil fuels. He is working to nationalize one-sixth of the economy with job-killing...

For a Republican Party embarked on a mission of modernization, an ethnic slur uttered by a senior House Republican this week offered an unwelcome reminder of the past. Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) used a derogatory term for Latinos in a radio interview Thursday, less than two weeks after the Republican National Committee issued a post-election report that called for broadening the party’s tent. The comment, coupled with an anti-gay remark that an RNC official posted on his Facebook page this week, highlighted the challenge Republicans face in their nascent effort to woo a more diverse cross section of America as...

– Responding to concerns from parents and educators about student safety during elections, the township committee has decided not to use public schools as polling places. The decision to explore changing the traditional polling locations came within days of the Dec. 14 mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in the Newtown, Conn., where 20 children and six adults were killed. "It was in the wake of the shootings," said Wyckoff Mayor Rudy Boonstra. "We were contacted by the Board of Education and some parents concerned about the security in the schools on Election Day. The discussions were about finding...

American gun rights advocates said Thursday that they remain determined to block a far-reaching U.S. agreement on international arms sales, warning that the pact could lead to a national firearms registry and disrupt the U.S. gun market, even as the accord ran into an unexpected last-minute snag in negotiations in New York. In its budget debate last weekend, the Senate approved a nonbinding amendment opposing the treaty offered by Sen. James M. Inhofe, Oklahoma Republican, with eight Democrats joining all 45 Republicans backing the amendment. Despite the Senate vote, numerous groups have pressured Mr. Obama to support the treaty. Amnesty...

NEW YORK – A New York judge has tossed out a lawsuit seeking to stop the display of a cross-shaped steel beam found among the World Trade Center's wreckage. Federal judge Deborah Batts on Friday rejected the arguments of a national atheists' group. American Atheists had sued the National September 11 Memorial & Museum's operators in 2011 on constitutional grounds...

Speaker John Boehner told fellow House Republicans in an Easter week memo that his decision to allow the sequestration cuts to take effect has forced President Barack Obama and the Democrats to confront economic issues they have long been avoiding. “We forged a new tactical plan that focused on using our limited leverage to maximum effect in support of the reforms needed to support economic growth and job creation for all Americans,” Boehner wrote in the memo distributed to House Republicans on Thursday. … The memo noted that GOP efforts had forced Senate Democrats to produce their own budget plan...

The Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), a group with Muslim Brotherhood origins and an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terror-financing trial, recently toured the White House and met with multiple officials. According to the group, Paul Monteiro, Associate Director of the Office of Public Engagement, “cited ISNA as his primary means of outreach to the American Muslim community.” The Obama administration’s close relationship with ISNA is about more than photo ops and press releases. It is about policy formulation. The input of ISNA is so treasured that the officials coached the organization on how to engage the...

The unpopular war hurt Republicans, but Obama’s failures could help. Is the Iraq War to blame for the mess we are in?Now, I should qualify that question by explaining “mess” and “we.” By “mess,” I mean the dawn of Barack Obama’s second term, the predictably catastrophic rollout of Obamacare, the exploding debt and deficit, the stimulus boondoggles, etc. By “we,” I mean conservatives (particularly those, like me, who supported the war), but also anyone else who doesn’t think Obama has done a bang-up job.There seems to be a growing consensus that the answer to that question is “yes.” In a...

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Is the Iraq war to blame for the mess we are in? Now, I should qualify that question by explaining "mess" and "we." By "mess," I mean the dawn of Barack Obama's second term, the predictably catastrophic rollout of Obamacare, the exploding debt and deficit, the stimulus boondoggles, etc. By "we," I mean conservatives (particularly those, like me, who supported the war), but also anyone else who doesn't think Obama has done a bang-up job. There seems to be a growing consensus that the answer to that question is "yes." In a recent column, the Washington Examiner's Philip Klein writes,...

CNSNews.com) – The National Science Foundation awarded a grant for $876,752 to the University of Iowa to study whether there is any benefit to sex among New Zealand mud snails and whether that explains why any organism has sex.

Last week I reached out to Duane Liptak, Director of Product Management and Marketing at Magpul Industries Corporation. After Colorado Democrats signed new gun control rules into law Magpul promised to move operations from the anti-gun state. In our communications Liptak revealed the next steps for Magpul’s escape from Colorado. This is breaking news—- After weeks of bizarre testimony and protests, where lawmakers encouraged women to defend themselves with ballpoint pens and vomit, Colorado Democrats pushed through their new gun control laws last week. Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper signed three new gun bills into law on Wednesday. But, before the...