Free Republic

The TV anchor boyfriend of the late broadcast journalist Alison Parker, who was slain Aug. 26 on live TV alongside her cameraman, has vowed to honor her memory by covering issues of gun violence and mental illness. Anything, he says, to spare another family. "I pledged to her father," Chris Hurst, the 28-year-old evening anchor at WDBJ, tells PEOPLE. "Her father wants me to help him do whatever it takes to make sure not one more family has to go through this kind of unspeakable violence."

The federal government is looking beyond fuel taxes for new sources of highway funding. (CNSNews.com) - A new Congressional Budget Office study says taxing motorists based on the number of miles they drive would be a fair and "efficient" way to charge motorists for the real cost of using the nation's highways. "Vehicle-miles traveled" taxes (or VMT taxes) also would provide a strong incentive for people to drive less. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood floated the idea of a VMT tax one month after President Obama took office, but Obama’s spokesman immediately shot it down. "It is not and will not...

Forget about going quietly into the night. Senate Democrats on Tuesday unveiled a broad agenda for an end-of-session sprint that, in other years, could be a whole year's worth of activity — ranging from an arms-reduction treaty with Russia to a major immigration bill to overturning the ban on gay troops. And that's not to mention the nearly 2,000-page, $1.1 trillion massive spending bill Senate Democrats said they'll try to push through. The bill contains hundreds of pork-barrel spending projects and new rules governing everything from airport baggage to detainees at the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. "We're not through....

The immigration compromise brokered in Washington may be a tough sell for conservatives in Georgia. U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss was met with boos and hisses from crowd when he mentioned a temporary guest worker program at the state Republican Party convention. "It's not a matter of getting everything we want," Chambliss said. "But it's a matter of getting everything we can that's good in an immigration reform bill." Chambliss and Georgia's other U.S. senator, Johnny Isakson, defended the still-developing proposal. They said it contained tough measures, like construction of a border fence and the creation of biometric IDs for immigrants....

This Saturday in Orlando, at a meeting of state party chairs, a parade of potential candidates are going to be making the case for why they should be the next chair of the Democratic National Committee. I don't have a candidate. But I do have a litmus test: Anyone raising the idea that the party needs to "move to the middle" should immediately be escorted out of the building. Better yet, a trap door should open beneath them, sending them plummeting down an endless chute into electoral purgatory – which is exactly where the party will be permanently headquartered if...

February 13, 2004 Have They No Decency? The entertainment elites are angry. The little people (a.k.a. the rest of America) are interfering again. Those little people want to be heard. They want an end to gratuitous sex and violence on television. They want us to clean up our act. How dare they. "It's a hysterical overreaction," said an irritated Steven Bochco, creator of NYPD Blue, after ABC had discussed removing a sexually explicit scene from the drama in markets where it aired before the 10 pm time-slot. The network proposed the change in light of the public outcry over the...