Free Republic

GENEVA — The Obama administration announced on Tuesday that the United States would use all the tools of American diplomacy, including the potent enticement of foreign aid, to promote gay rights around the world. On Tuesday, she also announced a $3 million program to finance gay-rights organizations to combat discrimination, violence and other abuses.

Robert Haynes and his wife, Patricia, take care of their cerebral palsy-stricken son and daughter in their Macomb Township home. Taxpayers help out with monthly checks to the Haynes family. The checks, which are sent by the state, allow them to keep their son and daughter at home instead of having them institutionalized. But some of the taxpayer dollars that are supposed to go to the Haynes family are being siphoned off. The state takes a $30 monthly deduction from the checks and sends it to the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). This deduction is the result of the forced...

In 1988, you supported Al Gore’s presidential campaign. Why? In that group, he was by far the most conservative Democrat. But between Ronald Reagan and seeing what the Democrat Party was becoming, I came to the conclusion in 1989 that I needed to become a Republican. Have you seen the film An Inconvenient Truth? No, ma’am. Have you read the book? No. I generally don’t watch or read a lot of fiction.

CONCORD, N.H. -- Despite objections from law enforcement and a governor's veto, the New Hampshire House has passed a bill into law that allows people to use deadly force to defend themselves any place they have a right to be. The 251-111 vote Wednesday comes a week after the Senate voted to override Gov. John Lynch's veto. The deadly force bill is based on the Castle Doctrine, which says a person does not have to retreat from intruders at home before using deadly force. The bill expands that principle to public places, anywhere a person has a right to be....

Later this week, President Obama will be speaking on the state of the economy and the heretofore less-than-stellar performance of his efforts to create jobs. He will, undoubtedly, engage in more class warfare, Bush and GOP bashing and anti-Wall St. demagoguery before he calls for more spending, higher taxes and “shared sacrifice” (aka, his vision of W.T.F.). The one thing he will likely not be talking about is how his union appointees National Labor Relations Board and Department of Labor are helping unions destroy the very job creators they so desperately need.

http://www.angelfire.com/ak2/intelligencerreport/obama_at_bat.html

A local high school is being sued by a black student over a longstanding student tradition known as "Wigger Wednesday." Quera Pruitt, a former Red Wing High School student, says seeing her white classmates don do-rags and saggy jeans while throwing gang signs on "Wigger Wednesday" is a form of racial discrimination. "To her, and frankly to me, 'Wigger Day' is the same thing as 'Nigger Day,'" says her attorney, Joshua Williams.

Dear Mr. Vice-President: I am a 68-year old grandmother and small business owner who identifies strongly with the values of the tea party. I am in favor of smaller government, lower taxes and the federal government getting its debt under control and spending no more than it takes in. I have spent my life working hard for the money you and the rest of the government spend. May I remind you- YOU work for me, and the money you spend was once mine, that I earned, sometimes standing on my feet many hours a day in some pain. To ask...

NASHUA — Three reserved parking spaces for hybrid and low-emission cars at the new $3.3 million state liquor store are located closer to the store’s main entrance than the handicapped parking spots, causing at least one lawmaker to call the design a slap in the face to the disabled.

OTTAWA — Members of a union within Canada's largest union have delivered a strong vote in favour of strike action. The Canadian Staff Union (CSU) represents more than 400 people who work for the CUPE -- the Canadian Union of Public Employees. They voted 87 per cent in favour of job action in support of their bargaining committee in contract talks with the larger union.

STEWARTSTOWN — One week after an 11-year-old seemingly vanished from the home she shared with her mother and stepfather, the body of Celina Cass was recovered Monday from the Connecticut River, about a half-mile from where she lived. “We brought Celina home,” said New Hampshire Senior Assistant Attorney General Jane Young, her voice cracking at times during a media briefing Monday night, “obviously not the way we wanted to bring her home.” Young said Cass' death is being treated as suspicious and a criminal investigation is under way, “based on what we have seen visually.”

A Concord state representative's email to Republican colleagues at the State House about her Army training is causing national controversy this morning. In the email July 21, State Rep. Lynne Blankenbeker, R-Concord, the city's only GOP rep., described some of the training she was getting at Fort Dix, before she ships off to Afghanistan later this year. Blankenbeker, who is a Naval Reservist nurse, said she was learning how to drive a hum vee for convoys, both day and night, as well as weapons training. Blankenbeker wrote: "Today I got to be the gunner which was fun. The .50cal is...

NASHVILLE INT’L AIRPORT — A Wyoming man walked through a TSA checkpoint with a raging erection on Tuesday, daring TSA officers and even fellow passengers to give him an invasive pat down. “I’m next,” Warren Kelvin, 34, screamed as he pushed to the front of the security line. According to TSA officials, Kelvin had ingested two Viagra and wore sweatpants without boxers for his Southwest flight from Nashville to Phoenix.

.Award-winning gains by Atlanta students were based on widespread cheating by 178 named teachers and principals, said Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal on Tuesday. His office released a report from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation that names 178 teachers and principals – 82 of whom confessed – in what's likely the biggest cheating scandal in US history. This appears to be the largest of dozens of major cheating scandals, unearthed across the country. The allegations point an ongoing problem for US education, which has developed an ever-increasing dependence on standardized tests.

At a sprawling manufacturing complex here, hundreds of Chinese laborers are now completing work on the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. Next month, the last four of more than two dozen giant steel modules — each with a roadbed segment about half the size of a football field — will be loaded onto a huge ship and transported 6,500 miles to Oakland. There, they will be assembled to fit into the eastern span of the new Bay Bridge. The project is part of China’s continual move up the global economic value chain — from cheap toys to Apple iPads to commercial...

How many FReepers does it take to change a light bulb? My apology if this has been done before.

CONCORD, N.H. -- House Republican leaders want to lift a ban on guns and other dangerous weapons in the New Hampshire State House complex put in place last year by Democrats. House Speaker William O'Brien raised the issue Wednesday at a meeting of the Joint Legislative Facilities Committee, which is in charge of the State House facilities.

MEREDITH – Nearly 100 friends and family members gathered at Picnic Rock Farm on Route 3 Thursday to protest the three-year prison sentence now being served by the farm's manager, Ward Bird, on a criminal threatening conviction. "Free Ward Bird'' signs were held up to passing motorists and yellow ribbons were passed out as a petition circulated among those who had gathered to show their support for Bird, a father of four and Boy Scout leader in his hometown of Moultonborough. As darkness settled in, dozens of signs were held up, some of them by Boy Scouts. Bird reported to...

Although it has been delayed many times, the Food Safety Modernization Act (S.510) continues to be a threat to both farmers and consumers who care about local foods. This bill greatly expands FDA’s authority over both processed foods and fresh fruits and vegetables, and would give FDA authority to impose extensive, burdensome requirements on even the smallest processing facilities and farms who sell to local consumers. While the latest version of the bill included some provisions for flexibility and scale-sensitivity, the provisions do not go far enough to protect the small-scale local food businesses that could be destroyed by the...

BOSTON - Massachusetts has banned cigarette lighters that look like guns, pens, lobster claws and other objects in an effort to cut down on accidental fires started by children. State Fire Marshal Stephen Coan said the lighters are attractive to children because they look like toys. The bill was sponsored by state Rep. Geraldo Alicea. The Charlton Democrat tells The Boston Globe he was urged by fire chiefs in his district to raise the issue.