Free Republic

Everyone wants to know whether Jeb Bush can survive his support for Common Core and comprehensive immigration reform in today's Republican Party. One deal-breaker that might surprise people, though: His opposition to gay marriage. NBC News and Marist College are out with a batch of new 2016 primary polls. And as you might expect, Common Core, immigration reform, belief in man-made climate change and support for raising taxes on the wealthy are among those with the potential to alienate lots of conservatives. But according to the polls, so does opposition to gay marriage--an issue on which Bush agrees with basically...

Wounded warrior retired Senior Airman Brian Kolfage was startled by a strange sight as he wound his way through Davis Mountain Air Force Base in Tucson, Ariz. — Old Glory, with rainbow stripes replacing the alternating red and white. It was a sight one might see at University of California, Berkeley, perhaps — but a military base? “For those of you with military ties, you’ll understand the stark contrast between military and civilian life, and ultimately know duty comes before self,” he wrote for The Blaze. “More specifically, it’s one of the Air Force’s three core values that is drilled...

This is so expected.  First, the “gay pride” flag was flown over the U.S. Embassy in Madrid.  Then it was Israel’s turn to hoist the rainbow ensign over the embassy in Tel Aviv.  Now, Secretary of State John Kerry will appoint an LGBT special envoy. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said US Secretary of State John Kerry would “soon” make the appointment. “It will be an openly gay foreign service officer. We don’t have a finalized name yet. But we will announce soon,” Harf said. Resume qualifications for this position:  be openly gay.  It’s not like there’s any discrimination going...

VATICAN CITY – Michael Sam, the NFL’s first openly gay player, got engaged to boyfriend Vito Cammisano last week while on vacation in Italy. Popular entertainment and gossip site TMZ mentioned the news on January 8, but Michael Sam kept silent on social media until January 16, when he tweeted out the following photo: Sam popped the question atop St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City.

City of Atlanta Fire Chief Kelvin Cochran has been fired, Mayor Kasim Reed announced in an afternoon press conference on Tuesday. The announcemet comes after Cochran was suspended for one month without pay after reportedly publishing a paperback book with, what Reed called, "disturbing sentiments about the LGBT community." Mayor Reed listed among the reasons motivating his decision the fact that Cochran wrote a book with inflammatory language without asking permission from him and that he spoke out during the investigation. Reed stressed that this was not about Cochran's religious beliefs but about the judgment to publish a book that...

Even as same-sex marriage edges closer to becoming legal nationwide, gay rights advocates face other challenges in 2015 that may not bring quick victories. In Congress, for example, liberal Democrats plan to introduce civil rights bills in the House and Senate that would outlaw a broad range of discrimination against lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgender people. However, Republicans will control both chambers in the new Congress, and there is no sign that GOP leaders will help the bills advance. Absent such a federal law, activists will seek to pass more nondiscrimination laws at the state and local levels, but some...

) — The old saying, "Home for the holidays" carried special meaning Thursday, when another 195 Fort Carson soldiers made it back to Colorado Springs from Afghanistan just in time for a turkey dinner with their loved ones. Tears, hugs and gratitude were as abundant as the pumpkin pie to come. "It gives a new meaning to the word 'Thanksgiving,'" said Lt. Brian Solomonson, kissing his daughter, Sophia, who was born on Thanksgiving Day last year. The homecoming marked the return of nearly all of the 2,500 deployed soldiers of the 4th Infantry Brigade Combat Team. Another 250 soldiers with...

A prominent activist for homosexual rights in the military is awaiting trial for forcible sodomy and abusive sexual contact, the Washington Blade reports. Air Force Lt. Joshua Seefried was initially charged in April, a development that went largely unreported by the media. The charges came about after complaints from U.S. Marine Lt. Edgar Luna, who is also homosexual. On a weekend in May of 2012, Seefried had gathered with a group of homosexual military officers in New York City. Luna was also present, and the group was celebrating the repeal of the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, which Seefried’s...

U.S. pastor and pro-family activist Scott Lively The First Circuit Court of Appeals has allowed a lawsuit to proceed against U.S. pastor Scott Lively accusing him of “crimes against humanity” for his overseas activism opposing the homosexual agenda.The plaintiffs are seeking unspecified damages "to be determined at trial" and a declaration that he violated "the laws of nations" by speaking against homosexual “rights.”Pastor Scott Lively, who recently completed an unsuccessful bid for governor of Massachusetts, was sued in 2012 by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) on behalf of "Sexual Minorities Uganda." The Ugandan homosexual activist group claims Lively’s speeches...

Rose McGowan apologized Wednesday on Twitter for making generalizations about the gay community but reaffirmed comments she made about misogyny among gay men last month. While a guest on author Bret Easton Ellis's podcast, McGowan spoke about her frustration with gay men not supporting feminists causes, with some comments drawing criticism from the gay community. 'Gay men are as misogynistic as straight men, if not more so,' the actor claimed. 'I have an indictment of the gay community right now, I’m actually really upset with them.'

“It seems to me that in the gay community the people who should be running interference for NAM/BLA are the parents and friends of gays. Because if the parents and friends of gays are truly friends of gays, they would know from their gay kids that the relationship with an older man is precisely what 13-, 14-, and 15-year-old kids need more than anything else in the world.” – Harry Hay, founder of the modern “gay rights” movement None of it matters: Neither common sense, nor an abundance of victim testimony, peer-reviewed studies, nor their own loathsome admissions and actions....

A high profile gay rights activist and Democrat fundraiser has been charged with sexually abusing a 15-year-old boy with his boyfriend. Terry Bean, 66, co-founded two of the biggest national campaign groups and raised more than $500,000 for Barack Obama's 2012 re-election bid. He was arrested at his home in southwest Portland on Wednesday and indicted with two counts of third-degree sodomy and one count of third-degree sex abuse.

The one thing cropping up faster than children for the Duggar family is controversy. A petition on Change.org urging TLC to cancel the family's reality show, "19 Kids and Counting," is gaining momentum. "End LGBTQ fear mongering by the Duggars," a letter posted on petition page reads. "The Duggars have been using their fame to promote discrimination, hate, and fear-mongering against gays and transgendered people. You need to take a stand on the side of justice and cancel their show." The petition currently has over 12,500 signatures. Last week, the couple posted a Facebook photo of them kissing and encouraged...

Gay men just got a step closer to being able to donate blood. Since 1983, men who have had sex with men anytime since 1977 were barred from donating blood, a policy put in place because of the HIV/AIDs epidemic, which especially ravaged the gay community in its early years. But on Thursday, the Department of Health and Human Services’ Advisory Committee on Blood and Tissue Safety voted 16-2 to tweak the ban, according to Bloomberg BusinessWeek, suggesting instead that men who have had sex with men could give blood, but with a caveat. They’d have to be abstinent for...

Six Magistrates Have Now Stepped Down Because of Gay Marriage LegalizationSince gay marriage was legalized in North Carolina on Oct. 10, at least six North Carolina judges have resigned from their benches because they do not want to go against their Christian faith and conduct wedding ceremonies for same-sex couples. While it was reported last week that Rockingham County magistrate John Kallam Jr. and Swain County magistrate Gilbert Breedlove resigned from their positions because of the legalization of gay marriage, media reports have surfaced indicating that at least four other magistrates have done the same. All six magistrates, Kallam, Breedlove,...

There is one particular thing that illustrates better than anything else the unreasonableness — and some would say gall — of homosexuality activists. It’s not demanding that bakers, shirt printers, and wedding planners be party to events and expression deeply contrary to their principles, as offensive as that is. What I speak of is something even more fundamental, something again brought to light by the recent Vatican synod on the family. As many know, the synod made news with an unwisely released and widely misrepresented mid-term report containing language that the secular media interpreted as signaling church capitulation on the...

Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s Ebola quarantine policy is drawing strong opposition from people who work closely with him on another infectious disease: AIDS. New York State’s imposition of a 21-day quarantine on health workers who have had contact with Ebola patients in West Africa “is not supported by scientific evidence” and “may have consequences that are the antithesis of effective public health policy,” according to a letter released Monday with signatures from over 100 H.I.V. activists, researchers and clinicians. They consider the state’s quarantine policy unacceptable even though, as Governor Cuomo announced Sunday night, affected people will be able to serve...

Transgender military personnel from a number of American allied countries met in Washington, D.C. this week to discuss what they say are the benefits of allowing open transgenders in active military service. Organized by the American Civil Liberties Union, the conference met in the nation’s Capitol to continue pressure on the Pentagon to allow open transgenders to serve in the U.S. military. Advocates and many in the medical and scientific field believe that people are not born with a specific gender but are assigned one at birth, but that assignment may not match up to the person’s “gender identity” such...

My name is Rivka Edelman, and I am the product of same-sex parenting. Recently I published an essay on Public Discourse about the ruthless misogyny that pervades LBGT culture. I pointed out it that it can and will victimize women and children with impunity and then, in America’s narcissistic fugue, get hailed as brave and heroic. Scott Rose has made threats of violence against Ryan T. Anderson, the editor who published my piece on October 2, 2014: Since my essay was published, there have been hundreds, maybe thousands, of posts calling me a liar or trying to shame, discredit, intimidate,...

In a new study based on Google News reports, controversial family values crusader Paul Cameron says he has found evidence that wherever social and political attitudes towards homosexuality are more positive, sex crimes against minors with a homosexual element are more numerous. Cameron, who is head of the Family Research Institute based in Colorado Springs, released his findings in Rome last week, hoping to influence the Extraordinary Synod on the Family that has Catholic leaders from around the world in the Eternal City. “The Catholic Church is doing something very important,” Cameron told LifeSiteNews. “We hope they will look at...