Free Republic

The municipal government of the city of Venice, Italy has passed a law banning the terms “mother” and “father on forms parents must fill out to gain a place for their children at publicly funded day care and kindergartens. The “civil rights and anti-discrimination” policy was introduced by city councilor Camilla Seibezzi, who said that such changes to language are a fundamental objective to combat stereotypes. “The [linguistic] construction forms a category of thought, a daily practice,” she said. The newspaper, Corriere del Veneto, reports that the terms will be replaced by “parent 1” and “parent 2”. The change has...

President Obama surprised aides when he revealed today the existence of a sealed indictment in the Benghazi, Libya, attack, leaving some wondering if he crossed a legal line. At a press conference at the White House, President Obama was asked whether justice would come to those responsible for the terrorist attack nearly a year ago in Benghazi, Libya, that killed four Americans, including the U.S. ambassador. "[W]e have informed, I think, the public that there's a sealed indictment," the president responded. "It's sealed for a reason. But we are intent on capturing those who carried out this attack, and we're...

“Elected six times to the House from the state of Georgia, Cynthia McKinney cut a trail through Congressional deceit like a hot ember through ash. She discovered legislators who passed laws without reading them… [and] black-skinned individuals shilling for the white status quo. She excoriated government lassitude over Hurricane Katrina… [and] held the only critical Congressional briefing on 9/11… She read truth into the Congressional Record, held town hall and hearings, led protests, showed up while others played along to get along... This is the Cynthia McKinney saga as it stands to date—what she saw, what she learned, and how...

A woman has married a 600-year-old bridge in France. Jodie Rose, an Australian artist, visited Le Pont du Diable as part of her 'Singing Bridges' project, recording the vibrations in bridge cables. Explaining that she felt the world move under her feet while standing on the 14th Century structure, Rose wrote on her website: "The Devil's Bridge is everything I could desire in a husband - sturdy, trustworthy, sensual, kind and handsome. "He understands that I love other bridges - and men. Ours is a love that embraces the vagaries of life, as materialised in the swirling currents of the...

I've almost completed the 1st week of Insanity. I understand that it is designed to be a rough workout, but I have a hard time keeping up with Shaun T. I was wondering if other have completed this and if they were happy with the results. A guy I work with does P90X and repeats it - he's done it 6 times so far. I definitely feel better after a week.

“A Queens man was arrested Wednesday for allegedly firing a lifelike weapon and handing it over to his toddler-age son…. Jack Pawlowski was led out of his Queens home in handcuffs Wednesday, with his stunned wife and three young kids looking on. He said nothing as detectives put him into a squad car.

SUFFOLK, Va. — Two Suffolk second graders have been suspended for making shooting noises while pointing pencils at each other. Media outlets report the 7-year-old boys were suspended for two days for a violation of the Suffolk school system’s zero-tolerance policy on weapons. They were playing with one another in class Friday at Driver Elementary. “When I asked him about it, he said, ‘Well I was being a Marine and the other guy was being a bad guy,’” said Paul Marshall, one of the boys’ fathers. “It’s as simple as that.”

The Miami Dolphins’ quest for public funding for an overhaul of Sun Life Stadium will go down to the wire in the Florida Legislature. After hopes appeared to be fading early Friday, the Senate version of the bill was scheduled for a second reading on Monday. There are five days remaining in the session, and the House version of the bill remains bogged down in committee.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) -- The California Assembly passed a bill on Thursday that would make the state the first in the nation to allow non-citizens who are in the country legally to serve on jury duty. Assemblyman Bob Wieckowski, D-Fremont, said his bill, AB1401, would help California widen the pool of prospective jurors and help integrate immigrants into the community.

Homeless people in California would have the right to rest in public spaces, including sidewalks, without the threat of arrest, and local governments would have to provide access to bathrooms and showers, under a bill that passed its first major test Tuesday. The bill, called the Homeless Person's Bill of Rights and Fairness Act, could supersede local laws - including in San Francisco - that bar people from sitting or lying on sidewalks unless those localities meet certain requirements. It was introduced by Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, and passed the Assembly Judiciary Committee on a 7-2 party-line vote, with...

The cookware giant has decided to temporarily stop selling pressure cookers at retail locations, including the Garden City store in Cranston. If you're in the market for a new pressure cooker to whip up some stew or pulled pork, don't head to the Cranston Williams-Sonoma for the time being. Williams-Sonoma, the specialty retailer of home furnishings and gourmet cookware with more than 250 stores in the United States, has pulled pressure cookers from their shelves following the Boston Marathon bombing. It was first reported that Williams-Sonoma pulled pressure cookers from shelves in stores in Massachusetts, but a call to the...

THE Supreme Court has frequently handed down judgments that have shaken America to its core. Now, it has turned its attention to the raisin. A group of farmers has brought a complaint about the Agricultural Marketing Agreement Act of 1937, under which the government confiscates part of the annual national raisin crop. The Court is considering whether the arrangement is constitutional. But why is a country that generally celebrates red-blooded capitalism regulating the raisin trade in the first place?Since the 1940s a government agency called the Raisin Administrative Committee has confiscated a portion of the annual raisin crop: 47% in 2003 and...

IMAGINE if African-American men and boys were committing mass shootings month after month, year after year. Articles and interviews would flood the media, and we'd have political debates demanding that African-Americans be "held accountable." But when the criminals and leaders are white men, race and gender become the elephant in the room. Nearly all the mass shootings in this country in recent years have been committed by white men and boys. Unlike other groups, white men are not used to being singled out. So we expect that many of them will protest that it is unfair if we talk about...

Today I swung my front door wide open and placed my Stevens 320 right in the doorway. I gave it 5 shells, and noticing that it had no legs, even placed it in my wheelchair to help it get around. I then left it alone and went about my business. While I was gone, the mailman delivered my mail, the neighbor boy across the street mowed the yard, a girl walked her dog down the street, and quite a few cars stopped at the stop sign right in front of our house. After about an hour, I checked on...

<p>A state judge on Monday stopped Mayor Michael Bloomberg's administration from banning the sale of large sugary drinks at New York City restaurants and other venues, a major defeat for a mayor who has made public-health initiatives a cornerstone of his tenure.</p>

An 18-year-old woman with a necrophilia fetish had three-way sex on the corpses of two men who she and her sexual partners strangled, it was claimed today. Joshua Miner, 24, piled the bodies of Eric Glover and Terrence Rankins, both 22, together and placed a beige sheet across them so he and his longtime girlfriend, Alisa Massaro, could lie together on top of them at Massaro's home in Joliet, Illinois, according to police reports. Adam Landerman, the 19-year-old son of a police sergeant, may have joined Massaro and Miner's sexual romp, as well, the report says. After killing the men,...

The Washington Post's Bob Woodward ripped into President Barack Obama on "Morning Joe" today, saying he's exhibiting a "kind of madness I haven't seen in a long time" for a decision not to deploy an aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf because of budget concerns. "Can you imagine Ronald Reagan sitting there and saying, 'Oh, by the way, I can't do this because of some budget document?'" Woodward said.

A 5-year-old Pennsylvania girl who told another girl she was going to shoot her with a pink Hello Kitty toy gun that blows soapy bubbles has been suspended from kindergarten. Her family has hired an attorney to fight the punishment, which initially was 10 days for issuing a 'terroristic threat.' But her punishment was reduced to two days after her mother met with school officials and had the incident dropped to 'threatening to harm another student,' which apparently carries a lesser punishment.

PARIS -- Anyone who can't withstand a rational debate on the subject of gun control -- particularly in light of last week's Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in Connecticut -- should be automatically prohibited from ever owning a firearm. In fact, this should be the number-one requirement of gun ownership: Can someone applying for ownership of a deadly weapon withstand an hour-long debate against someone in favor of gun control without resorting to physical or verbal assault? Is it too much to ask that every person wanting to possess a firearm be subject to a battery of tests -- everything...

It's been less than a year since we learned former NBA star Allen Iverson was broke, despite a $150 million career. Now we know why. TMZ has obtained court documents from Iverson's ongoing divorce proceedings that clearly show a man drowning in debt. Though he still earns $750,000 per year, Iverson is bleeding an estimated $360,000 each month. About a third of his debt is owed to creditors –– his bank account was seized last year when he couldn't come up with $860,000 he owed to a jeweler –– and another chunk goes to his mortgages. But there are a...