Free Republic

The faculty of the University of Kentucky's African American and Africana Studies program has asked UK president Eli Capilouto to change the name of Rupp Arena because the legendary basketball coach's name "has come to stand for racism and exclusion" and "alienates Black students, fans, and attendees." In a letter to Capilouto on Thursday, the African American and Africana Studies program faculty outlined additional steps it wanted Kentucky to take to eradicate racism on campus.

Richard F. Dawahare wants University of Kentucky games pulled from WLAP, the home of all things Wildcats and KSR’s radio shows (morning, pregame and postgame) in Lexington. Dawahare, an attorney, writes, “It is no secret that these stations are exclusive provinces of conservative ideology. They spew propaganda with a breathtaking lack of regard for truth and with a pervasive tone of contempt and ridicule for those with a different perspective.”

Watching the celebration at the NRA convention over the defeat of background checks was the most nauseating experience of the day. I am not a New York gun control liberal, either. I support a shotgun for home defense, a handgun for limited conceal/carry, and an assortment of hunting rifles to balance West Virginia's exploding deer population (as evidenced by hourly collisions with cars). So, I am hardly out of the mainstream. But, the gun safety debate is B.S. This foaming at the mouth, Obamar is coming for the guns, Nanny Bloomberg is a bad billionaire, and most despicable of all,...

In a bizarre op-ed in The Charleston Gazette last week, journalism professor Christopher Swindell argued that the National Rifle Association “advocates armed rebellion against the duly elected government of the United States of America.” Stirring words, to be sure, but Swindell was hardly done — not even close. He also said that the NRA is guilty of “treason” “worthy of the firing squad.” “To support the new NRA president’s agenda of arming the populace for confrontation with the government is bloody treason,” Swindell charged in his wacky essay. After briefly playing the race card and alluding to the Civil War,...

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – An astronomer argues that his Christian faith and his peers' belief that he is an evolution skeptic kept him from getting a prestigious job as the director of a new student observatory at the University of Kentucky. Martin Gaskell quickly rose to the top of a list of applicants being considered by the university's search committee. One member said he was "breathtakingly above the other applicants." Others openly worried his Christian faith could conflict with his duties as a scientist, calling him "something close to a creationist" and "potentially evangelical." Even though Gaskell says he is not...

As the former state cabinet secretary whose duties included overseeing health care, Masten Childers II has spent a lot of time dealing with hospitals. Case in point: Howard Chapman, a patient in whose abdomen UK surgeons left a blue surgical towel, an oversight that was not discovered for more than two years after he had kidney surgery. Chapman, who is represented by Childers, sued UK, two doctors and a scrub technician in September. Since that filing, UK has not denied that its doctors and a scrub technician left the towel behind, or that it caused Chapman serious problems and had...