Free Republic

Jeremy Trentelman’s cardboard fort for his kids came with windows, trap doors and a green slide. Then the city of Ogden, Utah, gave him 15 days to take it down. With the help of their kids Max, 3, and Story, 2, Trentelman and his wife, Dee, cut and taped the cardboard to build two towers, trap doors, tunnels, and a slide. They built the whole thing last week with the help of their friend, Byron Owens, and his two kids Satoria and Oliver in Ogden, Utah. His friend’s daughter also wrote a sign on the door of the fort reading,...

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) is the only major Republican likely 2016 presidential candidate who hasn't weighed in on the controversy over Indiana's "religious freedom" law that erupted this week — and his explanation for avoiding the issue is questionable.

(KUTV) A co-founder of genealogy company Ancestry.com has been arrested, accused of sexually abusing a teen. Prosecutors say 50-year-old Daniel Taggart gave his daughter and her 15-year-old friend alcohol and sex toys during an overnight party. Police say Taggart played cards with the girls and encouraged a twerking contest. The 15-year-old allegedly got shot glasses and sex toys as prizes. Eventually the alcohol, police say, took effect. According to the Salt Lake Tribune, the victim told police once Taggart’s daughter feel asleep, he turned on a pornographic video and sexually assaulted her. She said the same thing happened at another...

A former Utah State University fraternity president is accused of sexually abusing a woman at a fraternity party. Logan police arrested Ryan Wray, 26, on Tuesday night on suspicion of forcible sexual abuse, a second-degree felony. During Pi Kappa Alpha parties at the fraternity house, which is off-campus, people who "could no longer take care of themselves" were placed in Wray's care, said police Capt. Tyson Budge on Wednesday. "Several of the girls got talking and realized that they may have been taken advantage of," between last October and now, Budge said. One of the college-age women gave a statement...

Cards and board games are a big part of Utah culture -- perhaps it comes with the Nerdiest State title -- and Kickstarter is usually swimming with projects and ideas for new entertainment. At the moment, Kickstarter has 645 live projects involving games, with names and genres ranging from Dungeonmancer and Demon Lord to Assumptions and the recently completed and funded game Exploding Kittens (which received $8.7 million in pledges, making it the fourth highest funded project in Kickstarter history). Needless to say, even though there are hundreds of games being thrown at consumers out there, there's still demand and...

And unless there are any changes, this is the order. Iowa, New Hampshire,Colorado,Minnesota,New York,Utah.Then from Feb.6 thru Feb.23,we have Nevada,South Carolina,North Carolina and Michigan on the 23rd. Obviously the odds of Bush even winding up in the top three are about the same as the odds of Joe Biden taking the Democrat Nomination in 2016. The far left media will probably keep Bush in the top three with their "Left Leaning Polls". Should be interesting to watch their reactions when Jeb wont even make the top four in Iowa.

Utah is considering a bill that would allow patients with certain debilitating conditions to be treated with edible forms of marijuana. If the bill passes, the state's wildlife may "cultivate a taste" for the plant, lose their fear of humans, and basically be high all the time. That's according to testimony presented to a Utah Senate panel (time stamp 58:00) last week by an agent of the Drug Enforcement Administration. "I deal in facts. I deal in science," said special agent Matt Fairbanks, who's been working in the state for a decade. He is member of the "marijuana eradication" team...

Seven Southwestern states will soon be infiltrated by 1,200 military special ops personnel as part of a controversial domestic military training in which some of the elite soldiers will operate undetected among civilians. Operation Jade Helm begins in July and will last for eight weeks. Soldiers will operate in and around towns in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, Nevada, Utah and Colorado where some of them wil drop from planes while carrying weapons loaded with blanks in what military officials have dubbed Realistic Military Training. ....snip....

A new study says that nearly one of every three farmworkers in Utah is an undocumented immigrant. So is one of every six construction workers. The Pew Research Center released a study Thursday that uses U.S. census and other government data to examine labor trends among undocumented workers nationally. It included a variety of state-by-state information. It estimates that 31 percent of the farmworkers in Utah in 2012 were undocumented immigrants, as were 17 percent of all construction workers. Randy Parker, CEO of the Utah Farm Bureau Federation, says the numbers are surprising at first, but may be close to...

After last election cycle, when Colorado House Republicans received 189,000 more votes than House Democrats, we began to highlight how grossly gerrymandered the statehouse has become. Now, even the liberals at the Daily Kos blog are acknowledging that the Colorado House is the Democrats’ “best chamber” in the entire nation. It favors Democrats even more than California’s general assembly. The reapportionment process is obviously deeply flawed ... Democrat obstructionists in the House should be careful. While they may think they’re the party of the people, they’re not actually representing the majority of people who voted in the last election. And...

On March 17 in Salt Lake City, a good samaritan going by the name of Nick (he declined to give his last name) witnessed a man pull a knife on another man. He recounted that a the knife-wielding suspect began attacking the other individual, who was unarmed, swinging the knife at him several times. Nick, a concealed carry permit holder, got out of his car and pulled his handgun on the suspect, stopping the attack and possibly saving the unarmed man’s life.“I told him to lay down on the ground and he stayed there,” said Nick.While Nick held the attacker at...

It is a macabre choice to make - and almost unique to some inmates on Utah's death row: would you be injected with toxic chemicals, or shot in the heart? But, amid cries of outrage against the southwestern state bringing death by firing quad back into law, almost half of those due to die that way have picked the punishment themselves. Ron Lafferty, who slit the throats of his sister-in-law and her baby daughter in 1984, is one of three who has opted to die by the bullet. Two others in Utah's eight-strong death row have made the same choice,...

Gov. Gary Herbert signed into law Monday a bill to make firing squads the state's back-up method of execution — used whenever the state is unable to obtain drugs needed to perform lethal injections. The Republican executive signed the firing-squad bill despite international attention on the state as it becomes alone in allowing that method of execution. (Oklahoma authorizes execution by firing squad only if lethal injection and electrocution are found unconstitutional, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.) Numerous groups called for a veto, but Herbert signaled last week that he was leaning toward signing it. "Those who voiced...

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Utah Gov. Gary Herbert gave his stamp of approval Monday to a law that brings back the firing squad in the only state that has used it in the past 40 years. Under the law, firing squads will be a backup method if lethal injection drugs aren't available. Utah and other states have struggled to keep up their inventories as European manufacturers opposed to capital punishment refuse to sell the components of lethal injections to U.S. prisons.

Ted Cruz is set to announce is candidacy for President of the United States. Rand Paul is apparently going to announce early next month before going on a campaign tour. Until today technically the only candidate was Jeb Bush, who announced late last year his intentions. At the time everyone thought that Bush was going to force everyone else to declare their candidacy early. It doesn’t appear that has happened, Cruz and Paul have appeared in no rush to make a formal announcement. Scott Walker, perhaps the front runner in the race, still hasn’t formally announced his candidacy and there’s...

A 26-year-old North Ogden woman tried to hide 12 stolen checks under the seat of a patrol car, according to court documents. Kerri Roean Tennant was arrested by a Utah Highway Patrol trooper early Wednesday morning. At the time of her arrest, Tennant had given officers a false name, according to the probable cause statement filed in 2nd District Court in Ogden. She was later identified and troopers learned she had a warrant issued for her arrest out of Morgan County. Troopers found methamphetamine, drug paraphernalia and an altered Utah driver’s license on Tennant, according to the document. A second...

predation, not human activity, has reduced bird’s numbers. A coalition of rural Western counties and business interests is contesting the science being used to decide whether to list the Greater sage-grouse as endangered or threatened, accusing the Obama administration of relying on “selective, false and biased” research. Denver attorney Kent Holsinger filed three Data Quality Act challenges Wednesday with the Department of the Interior on behalf of the coalition, which includes the Western Energy Alliance, ranchers, mining and drilling companies and 19 counties in Colorado, Montana, Nevada and Utah. “We’ve documented real issues with transparency and scientific integrity ... The...

Republican Sens. Mike Lee of Utah and Marco Rubio of Florida have released a blueprint for federal tax reform called “The Economic Growth and Family Fairness Tax Plan.” First, we should not embrace the language of progressive socialism in believing tax reform should have as a goal to advance “family fairness.” The plan should simply be entitled “The American Growth and Opportunity Plan.” That said, the Lee-Rubio plan is a great improvement over the current system. For the individual tax structure, the plan introduces a two-tier system to replace the current seven tax brackets. This plan moves America from a...

Congress’s two top tax chairmen warned President Obama on Wednesday not to claim unilateral executive powers to raise taxes on his own, saying it violates the Constitution and ruins chances for a lasting deal. Rep. Paul Ryan, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, and Sen. Orrin G. Hatch, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said they were troubled by White House’s announcement earlier this month that Mr. Obama is “very interested” in exploring what options he has to raise taxes without going through Congress. “This would be a mistake, both constitutionally and politically,” the two lawmakers said, adding...

Talk about the Norfolk terrier tail wagging the Great Dane. If they are to have any hope of winning their party’s nomination, Republican presidential hopefuls better support ethanol mandates, Hawkeye State politicos told potential candidates at the recent Iowa Agricultural Summit in Des Moines. “Don’t mess with the RFS,” Republican Governor Terry Branstad warned, referring to Renewable Fuel Standards that require refiners to blend increasing amounts of ethanol into gasoline. “It is the Holy Grail, and I will defend it,” said Rep. Steve King, another Iowa Republican. It is vital for reducing carbon dioxide emissions and preventing dangerous climate change...