Free Republic

According to the Equality Act, religious nurses, doctors, and hospitals unwilling to kill an unborn child or perform a sex-change surgery could be legally discriminating“Have you been following this ‘Equality Act?'” a Catholic priest I know asked me as I passed him on the icy sidewalk early Sunday afternoon. “A bit,” I answered. “You can be sure anything that comes out of D.C. does the opposite of its name.” “Check it out today,” he replied. “It could pass as early as this week, and it’s very, very troubling.” The two of us went our ways, carefully navigating the icy bricks...

A new front has opened up in America's culture wars, and specifically in the Left's ongoing effort to stigmatize even the most innocuous elements of our country's heritage. Their latest bugaboo is the official flag of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The Massachusetts flag, as well as the state seal, feature an image of a Native American warrior with a bow and arrow. The Indian is by no means depicted in an unflattering light. His arrow is pointed downward, an allusion to the peace achieved between Pilgrims and Indians at the first Thanksgiving. In addition, the flag and seal feature a...

It’s time to play a game of “Let’s denounce stuff.” What are we denouncing? Stuff! Why are we denouncing it? Because we’re progressives!Do we understand what the stuff is? Silence. You sound like a reactionary! We’re denouncing stuff in order to denounce stuff. We’re getting rid of all the flags. Especially the ones that confuse us. Like the Massachusetts flag. [1]We don’t know what’s going on here, but there’s an Indian in it so it’s probably racist [2]. Here’s the Boston Globe. What exactly is going on here? There’s the blue shield on the white field. And a white...

In an apparent move to distance Deval Patrick from U.S. Rep. John Tierney’s family troubles, the congressman’s newly convicted wife was removed yesterday as co-chair of a deep-pockets fund-raiser North Shore Democrats are holding in the governor’s honor Oct. 19. At a function in Waltham last night, Patrick dodged questions from the Herald as to whether he pressured Patrice Tierney to back out or if the Democratic Party now thinks of her as a liability. “I think it’s her decision and a totally understandable one,” Patrick said. “I don’t know the whole story, but it sounds like a very, very...

A testy U.S. Sen. John F. Kerry yesterday blamed clueless voters with short attention spans for the uphill battle beleaguered Democrats are facing against Republicans across the nation. “We have an electorate that doesn’t always pay that much attention to what’s going on so people are influenced by a simple slogan rather than the facts or the truth or what’s happening,” Kerry told reporters after touring the Boston Medical Center yesterday. Conservative political blogger William Jacobson, who writes Legal Insurrection, immediately pounced on Kerry’s comments, saying that attitude is why voters are looking to shake up Capitol Hill by electing...

The latest poll in the governor's race shows Gov. Deval Patrick and Republican challenger Charlie Baker running neck-and-neck. But when the poll expands to included so-called "leaners" it's bad news for independent Tim Cahill. According to the new Rasmussen Reports survey, Patrick leads Baker 42-to-38 percent. Cahill is a distant third with 11-percent. But, when pollsters asked the undecided voters which candidate they're "leaning" towards, the numbers change. Patrick leads Baker 45-to-42 percent, while Cahill loses more than half his support and drops to 5-percent. The poll of 500 likely voters was conducted Wednesday, September 15. The margin of error...

Howie thread for the week starting with his special Sat. Herald column

We're now way beyond the cliche of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. In a remarkably short period, President Barack Obama and the Democrat Party screwed up history. They told the world they had a romantic date with destiny and instead took the opportunity for the equivalent of a quickie at the Chicken Ranch. Even after feeling the fury of voters in Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts, the White House continues to demonstrate a jaded comprehension of reality. The night after Republican Scott Brown beat anointed Democrat Martha Coakley in Massachusetts' special Senate election, Obama told ABC News that...

Phone call from the Scott Brown rally, outside Mechanics Hall: Up to 5,000 supporters of Scott Brown have gathered vociferously outside the hall, loud enough at times to drown out the phone conversation. Shouting slogans, they have blocked all four street lanes for about half a block around the rally point. Only a few at a time were allowed into the hall for about 15 minutes and they have just announced that the hall is filled to capacity as are two overflow areas, one of which is Lexington Hall in the Crown Plaza hotel. At least 2,000 people are still...

[Mass.] Pike drivers might get a free ride for an entire day or several hours during traffic-heavy holidays such as Thanksgiving and Memorial Day, according to a report on the Easter traffic debacle released today. The report, which blames understaffing and a fragmented “wave through” policy for the seven-mile backup on the Massachusetts Turnpike April 12th, called for a study into creating “toll free days.” “A review should be completed to determine whether it is possible to have entire toll free days or extended toll free periods during expected high traffic delays,” an official wrote in the report. The toll...

-- If the Bay State senators could hang an ornament on the Pentagon Christmas tree, it would be pink. A pink slip, that is, for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. Democratic Senators Edward Kennedy and John Kerry called for Rumsfeld's resignation last week, following a speech at John Hopkins University in which Rumsfeld defended the war in Iraq and critiqued the mainstream media's war coverage. "We've arrived at a strange time in this country where the worst about America and our military seems to so quickly be taken as truth by the press," Rumsfeld said. As an example, Rumsfeld later pointed...

To the inflamed partisans of the left, President Bush is a simpleton, a nincompoop without a clue.I'll grant that our president is no genius. But he is smart enough to have scored a higher college grade point average than our "nuanced" junior senator from Massachusetts. That's what so frustrates Bush's most bitter opponents: How could one so lacking in brain wattage confound their well-considered schemes? How does he trump them every trick? How did Bush defeat their chosen candidates and escape every effort to smear or discredit him? There must be someone behind the scenes, someone working the puppet strings....

as i write this, i realize that no official winner of the election has been named by the networks, but the numbers simply do not add up for kerry. he has lost and bush has won.why did kerry lose? many people on this site are crediting conservative evangelicals going out to vote, and in fact the exit polls (for what they are worth) and other data obtained and reported on several networks suggest this. differing demographic groups said the top three issues were: moral issues, economy and terrorism, but not necessarily in that order. among white women, for instance, moral...

I really did think this was about the democrat convention, or Taxachusetts, somehow....

Cambridge seeks to lower voting age Local briefs Tuesday, March 26, 2002 <!CAT-LONW!> The Cambridge City Council will petition the Legislature to lower the voting age to 17 for Cambridge municipal elections - a move which, if enacted, could set a national precedent.<!ENDSUMM!> Councilors voted overwhelming last night to draft the home-rule petition after some 50 city youths turned out to support the measure. Janice Lee, a Boston-area youth organizer, praised the work of teens, saying, ``They're tired of not being heard. Youths have the right to have a say in decisions that affect their lives.''