Free Republic

Tech companies are notoriously dominated by white men, as we've learned from their various diversity reports in the past year. Many firms have pledged to do better, citing the way inclusion fosters creativity and innovation. "This Monday only a handful of technology companies will close their doors and honor the King Holiday," Jackson said in an open letter to the tech industry. "It does not make sense to tout diversity and inclusion, to promote change and innovation and not recognize the King Holiday."

A rodeo clown wearing an Obama mask was denounced by everyone from the lieutenant governor on down who demanded that the people responsible be held accountable.The rodeo clown got actual death threats. He was banned for life. The man who hired him was forced to resign. The Kansas City Star suggested that the Secret Service should investigate the event.The NAACP demanded a federal probe.When a parade float featuring an outhouse as the Obama presidential library happened, Democrats claimed that it crossed the line and was unacceptable.None of these were assassination threats, even though the left had openly trafficked in...

An update on five small businesses that refused to participate in same-sex weddings... Arlene’s Flowers—Richland, Wash....Barronelle Stutzman sold flowers to gay couple ...for more than nine years, and considered Ingersoll a friend. But when he asked her to create the flower arrangements for the couple’s wedding...she couldn’t because of her “relationship with Jesus Christ.”...Sweet Cakes by Melissa—Portland, Ore. ...Today, Melissa only bakes cakes to sell to friends...Ongoing attacks are posted on Sweet Cakes’ Facebook page...Masterpiece Cakeshop—Lakewood, Colo. Phillips appealed the commission’s ruling...is waiting for a trial date... “Masterpiece Cakeshop continues creating cake art and producing baked goods,” Martin wrote. “But...

The old, classical idea of liberalism embraced freedom of speech. A commitment to liberty meant respecting the right of every person to speak, and it equally meant opposing the use of state power to censor or in any way “chill” freedom of speech. By the same token, all people were free to associate for the purpose of advancing their peaceful interests and government had no right to interfere either directly or indirectly, such as by compelling the release of membership information. The leading case in this regard is NAACP v. Alabama. Alabama’s segregationist officials, irked that the NAACP was working...

BEAVERCREEK — Walmart on Pentagon Boulevard in Beavercreek turned away customers while a planned protest got underway inside the store. Protesters called the event a “Die-in inside the Beavercreek Walmart to Demand Justice for John Crawford III.” On Aug. 5, 22-year-old Crawford was shot and killed inside the store by a Beavercreek police officer who was responding to a report of a man with a gun inside the store. Crawford had been walking around the store carrying a pellet gun that he had picked up from one of the shelves. The protesters have issued demands, including an indictment on the...

oday, the Council of the District of Columbia will consider a bill that could force employers in the nation’s capital to cover elective abortions in their health plans and require even pro-life organizations to hire individuals who oppose their views on abortion. This latest attempt to violate the freedom of individuals in the District should spur Congress to better protect the conscience rights for all Americans. The “Reproductive Health Non-Discrimination Act,” would specifically prohibit employers from discriminating in “compensation, terms, conditions or privileges of employment” on the basis of an individual’s “reproductive health decision making” – including the “termination of...

A vote December 2 by the Washington, D.C., City Council could compel private religious schools and universities in the nation’s capital to allow groups that oppose the schools’ moral values access to their campuses, programs, and funds. The council voted to eliminate faith-based schools’ 25-year-old legal protections from discrimination lawsuits as part of a “human rights amendment.” Barring an act of Congress, D.C.’s religious schools will likely have to go against their religious values when it comes to permitting use to their campuses or programs. The city’s rules hold that it’s “unlawful discriminatory practice” to limit any use of facilities,...

DECEMBER 6, 2014 BY JOHN HINDERAKER Did the Kennedy Administration Try to Drive Reagan Off the Air? Ronald Reagan apparently detested Bobby Kennedy, another sign of Reagan’s good judgment since Kennedy was an awful human being. But this is something I hadn’t heard before: Michael Reagan says that Bobby leaned on General Electric to get Reagan off television: [A] few months after [subpoenaing Reagan before a grand jury], Kennedy tried to get him fired from General Electric Theater. Or, at least, that’s what Reagan believed. “Dad told us he had just lost his job with GE,” Reed recalls Reagan son...

Not just fleeing the Middle East: It’s not just the Mideast from which Christians are being driven. “Christians are being driven from the Middle East in suffering,” Pope Francis said in a video message yesterday as French Cardinal Phillipe Barbarin visited the Iraqi city of Irbil, where thousands of Christians have taken refuge. “And from America; and from the military, who need God’s protection, as we do in the USA,” adds Fred Abel of jfredabel@gmail.com. Abel is spot on. The main difference between Christians being driven out of the Middle East and those being driven out of America is that...

In a unanimous vote earlier this week, the D.C. Council passed legislation repealing “the exemption allowing religiously-affiliated educational institutions to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation.” The repealed exemption (2-1402.41) read: (3) Notwithstanding any other provision of the laws of the District of Columbia, it shall not be an unlawful discriminatory practice in the District of Columbia for any educational institution that is affiliated with a religious organization or closely associated with the tenets of a religious organization to deny, restrict, abridge, or condition — (A) the use of any fund, service, facility, or benefit; or (B) the granting...

Atlanta Fire Rescue Chief Kelvin Cochran has been suspended for one month without pay, ordered to undergo sensitivity training, and told by government officials to check his beliefs “at the door” for publishing a book affirming that homosexuality and other forms of sex outside marriage violate the Bible's teachings.

Yesterday, my girlfriend and I borded an Amtrak passenger train in Stockton to travel to visit her friends in Visalia for Thanksgiving. Amtrak offers its passengers free WIFI as part of their amenities on the trip. As part of the log on, it specifies that Amtrak block access to "offensive" web sites, but otherwise allows free access to the Internet. I agreed to their conditions and found myself connected. Four attempts to connect to FreeRepublic resulted in being notified that my browser could not connect to the server! Thinking FR might be down, I turned off my WIFI, and reverted...

It’s called being a sore-loser. As journalists’ latest cause &nndash; pushing for the cancellation of the Duggar family show – fell flat, the media had a meltdown, complete with name-calling and murder accusations.  A three-month-old Change.org petition demanding TLC cancel its “19 Kids and Counting” show reached 150,000 signatures Nov. 22. The petition bashed the show’s stars, the Duggar family, for “LGBTQ fear mongering.” In response, LifeSite organized a counter-petition on that now boasts 180,000 signatures – after four days. While TLC stayed silent, media attacked the “homophobic” family and faulted Michelle Duggar of “think[ing] that she’s stabbing gay Americans” while “bloodying herself.”  On Sunday,...

An anchor for Fox Business Network who used to work for CNBC told viewers that her superiors at the network "silenced" her reporting on Obamacare, telling her she was "disrespecting the office of the president" by pointing out that Obamacare's math didn't add up. Daily Caller: Fox Business Network anchor Melissa Francis said she was “silenced” by CNBC when management told her she was “disrespecting the office of the president” by reporting about Obamacare. Francis highlighted Obamacare architect Jonathan Gruber’s comments about the “stupidity” of American voters and the administration intentionally misleading the public about what’s in the law and...

And you’ll never guess why! Well, unless you guessed “global warming,” which is what you did the moment you saw Al Gore’s name. He cannot and will not shut up about it. And I, for one, don’t want him to.Here’s the President of the Environment: It’s time for a national policy on food. Brilliant essay in today’s Washington Post: http://t.co/bvGjpej5wN— Al Gore (@algore) November 9, 2014 If Al Gore thinks it’s brilliant, it must be hilarious. Let’s take a look!

While he was early voting on Friday, a Douglasville, Georgia man says he was asked to remove a hat he wears everywhere, one that reads “NRA Instructor,” because poll workers said it was too closely associated with the Republican party.Bundy Cobb, who is certified by the National Rifle Association in firearms training, wears the hat in part to promote his business, True Aim Defense. But poll workers apparently saw it as something different.“I went by the first two ladies, and they didn’t say anything. And then the next lady, she said ‘sir, you’re going to have to take off your...

A British pensioner who quipped "I'm not a Muslim" when asked to remove his shoes at airport security spent more than six months with a criminal charge of racism hanging over him, before the Crown Prosecution Service dropped the case just one day before it was due in court. Paul Griffith, who was flying from Stansted Airport in Essex, has described the experience as "incredibly stressful", the Daily Mail has reported. Griffith, 75, was on his way to Malaga, Spain, for a week’s holiday when he set off the scanners on his way through security at Stansted Airport earlier this...

It is becoming pretty obvious that the American Left is virtually bankrupt of tolerance or understanding. Under the guise of political correctness a group of hyper-sensitive liberals are petitioning a Colorado restaurant to change its name. Since the mid 1990’s, Pete Turner has expanded his Boulder-based restaurant to six locations along the Front Range; but he might have to consider rebranding his business because a bunch of self-victimized leftists are throwing a hissy fit. According to the Coloradoan:Three weeks shy of opening his newest Illegal Pete's restaurant in Old Town Fort Collins, restaurant owner Pete Turner came to Fort Collins on...

Since the story broke about the Human Rights Campaign's slanderous persecution of the very people their group was designed to protect – bisexuals and children of same-sex couples – I have received a great deal of support from people.  While it was nerve-wracking to have the truth about the 26 months of harassment by GLAAD, the Human Rights Campaign, Scott Rosenzweig, Jeremy Hooper, and a host of other totalitarians circulate at my job, it has been healthy.  My colleagues and students had no idea about the extent of this campaign of suppression, censorship, and harassment.  Now they know the...

A ‘Christian’ wedding chapel—a private business—in Idaho is suing for the right not to marry gay couples. There is no such right. Yet.The first thing you need to know is that most “wedding chapels” are not actually chapels. They are private businesses, sometimes run by ordained ministers who are thus licensed to perform marriage ceremonies, but just as often run by Elvis impersonators. Thus, the question of how marriage-equality laws apply to private wedding chapels is ostensibly a question of under what circumstances the government can lawfully step on a for-profit company’s blue suede shoes. Ground zero for this debate...