Free Republic

WASHINGTON — For more than two decades, the defining battles within the Supreme Court over social and moral controversies have been fought between two devout Catholics appointed by President Reagan. Justice Antonin Scalia believes the law can and should enforce moral standards, including criminal bans on abortion and on "homosexual conduct" that many "believe to be immoral and destructive." Justice Anthony M. Kennedy is a libertarian conservative who believes the Constitution protects the freedom of individuals to "make personal decisions relating to marriage, procreation, contraception, family relationships, child rearing and education." Now the ideological fight between the conservative giants is...

In the final debate before General Convention approved a provisional church liturgy to bless the lifelong relationships of same-gender couples, Episcopal Diocese of Chicago Deputy Ian Hallas, 22, spoke about his sister, Louisa, and her civil union. “The love that she shares with her partner is unconditional and speaks to the ideal relationships all of us should strive to have,” he told the House of Deputies on July 10 in Indianapolis. “I often get asked by churchgoers and nonchurchgoers why I am a part of this body. The reason I return is for my sister. I seek to assure that...

In a three-hour interview with The Wall Street Journal, casino mogul Sheldon Adelson excoriated President Barack Obama, Democrats and unions, as one would expect of a top donor to conservatives and Republican causes in the 2012 election. But the billionaire, sitting with his wife Miriam, an Israel-born physician, shared political beliefs that may leave some surprised. “Number one, I’m supporting stem-cell research,” he said, pointing to a chart of the new Adelson medical research foundation that is funding some stem-cell based science. “I’m pro choice,” he said. Republicans are pro-life, but he and his wife are not pro-life in politics,...

Even if lawmakers somehow stop the Bush-era tax rates from expiring, taxes are still expected to rise on Jan. 1 -- thanks to a trio of new fees tied to the federal health care overhaul. The IRS this past week published rules for some of the first major taxes meant to help pay for President Obama’s massive insurance coverage expansion. Together, they will raise investment and income taxes on top earners and impose a separate -- and controversial -- tax on medical devices. The bundle of fees has been largely overlooked as lawmakers and the White House bicker over the...

Today's feature is one of my favorite epic westerns of all time. "The Big Country" features a terrific cast and perhaps the most memorable western score ever by Jerome Moross. Charlton Heston is terrific in an atypically, unheroic role for him. Wm. Wyler was so impressed with him he cast him as "Ben-Hur" the next year. The lovely Jean Simmons is fantastic as well as the beautiful and intelligent school marm whose ranch is the centerpiece of the feud. Of all Gregory Peck's leading ladies, she's the one he had the best chemistry with. The scene where they swap horror...

British astronomer and broadcaster Sir Patrick Moore has died, aged 89, his friends and colleagues have said. He "passed away peacefully at 12:25 this afternoon" at his home in Selsey, West Sussex, they said in a statement. Sir Patrick presented the BBC programme The Sky At Night for over 50 years, making him the longest-running host of the same television show ever. He wrote dozens of books on astronomy and his research was used by the US and the Russians in their space programmes. Described by one of his close friends as "fearlessly eccentric", Sir Patrick was notable for his...

FULL TITLE: 'He's treated like the worst of the worst': Sandusky put on hard routine and separated from other inmates for his own protection Serial child sex offender Jerry Sandusky lives under tight restrictions in prison for his own safety, it has been revealed. The former Penn State coach is on hard routine after he asked for more prison privileges and then received threats from inmates. 'He is being housed in the appropriate facility in order to assure his safety,' said Susan McNaughton, press secretary for the Pennsylvania state Department of Corrections. She responded to questions from Reuters after one...

No end is in sight as the United Nations directs the U.S. to negotiate a peaceful settlement. Following years of demands by la Raza that the United States relinquish all occupied territories to Mexico, missiles began falling on El Paso, Texas and neighboring areas north of the border between Texas and Mexico during the early morning hours of December 6th. Under the previous administration, the United States had imperiously ignored all such demands and no significant progress toward returning the territories to Mexico had been made even under the current administration. Due to the persistent failure of the imperialist United...

DEERFIELD BEACH, Fla.,- This year, a Nativity scene in Deerfield Beach, Fla., features a "Festivus pole" made of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer cans, as well as a Menorah. The pole, a reference to the Dec. 23 atheist "holiday" that became a pop culture hit after being featured in a "Seinfeld" episode, was installed Thursday by activist blogger Chaz Stevens, the South Florida Sun Sentinel reported. Stevens said he had been trying to get the city to remove the Nativity scene for five years, and this year he decided to ask for space to express his own beliefs. "It's just 23...

Lord Christopher Monckton was escorted from the UN Conference of the Parties (COP18) by the organization’s security after telling delegates that there has been no global warming for the last 16 years. After Educating Delegates, Lord Monckton Booted From UN Climate Summit The New American 09 December 2012 Lord Christopher Monckton had an opportunity to educate representatives of governments and dictatorships at the United Nations climate change summit in Doha, Qatar, about the fact that there has been no global warming for the last 16 years. However, after pretending to be a delegate from the regime ruling Burma to...

Captain John has faced hardship his entire life, but has succeeded in bringing his dreams to reality. A refugee before the age of 15, he opened Toronto's first floating restaurant in 1970. Even when his dreams were just that, he has always managed to survive. John knows how lucky he is and has always tried to share his good fortune with those in need. Now, circumstances beyond his control threaten his ability to walk off his ship and retire with dignity. Despite his 40 years of fair and generous public behaviour, Captain John is being unfairly persecuted. Without notice the...

Time Magazine is holding open on line polling for the Person of the Year for 2012. The poll closes on December 12th so start your Poll Freeping!

Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood government is set to receive more tanks and fighter jets from the U.S. These include 200 M1A1 Abrams battle tanks and "a squadron of F-16 Falcon" fighters. Besides the obvious problems associated with sending weaponry to a government run by the Muslim Brotherhood, one must also consider the precarious position the U.S. will find itself in should war break out between Israel and Egypt. This concern becomes paramount when one considers how the billions in aide provided annually by the U.S. have enabled Egypt to develop "far and away the largest army in Africa." Egypt is also...

”For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, that no one should boast.” (Ephesians 2:8, 9) A key idea in the contemporary evangelical movement is that revival can be engineered. The Purpose Driven Web site says, “Peter Drucker called him [Warren] ‘the inventor of perpetual revival’ and Forbes magazine has written, ‘If Warren’s church was a business it would be compared with Dell, Google or Starbucks.’”1 The Purpose Driven movement can cite this business management guru approvingly only because they have a...

This was a week of some surprises and some perfectly foreseeable consequences of forces which have been in play for some time. The fiscal cliff talks have gone nowhere, to the surprise of only the most daft who do not realize that the President does not want a pragmatic solution. He's fixated on soaking "the rich", stirring up class hatred and trying to drive a wedge between his opposition forces. Among the surprises is this: Michigan, long seen as the showplace home of America's industrialized unions, has voted to become a right to work state. Its Governor Rick Snyder said...

How close did Israel just come to its own Cuban missile crisis? By Paul Alster Published December 07, 2012 | FoxNews.com HAIFA, Israel – Hundreds of Iranian-made, long-range missiles already smuggled into Gaza provided a secret sense of urgency behind Israel's recent campaign against Hamas, and the the Jewish state acted with the Obama administration's full knowledge, intelligence experts told FoxNews.com. Jonathan Schanzer, a former counter-terrorism analyst at the U.S. Department of the Treasury, said the real agenda behind Israel’s assault last month on Hamas’ munitions stockpiles and smuggling tunnels was not simply to end the daily barrage of relatively...

HELENE COOPER, NEW YORK TIMES: "I really do think at the end of the day, Larry, what you describe sounds like sort of the White House negotiating right now -- easily saying, 'Yeah, we can go over the fiscal cliff.' But at the end of the day, this is a president, he would have to own it. He may not think he has to own the recession; but if we go over that, he is going to have to own that. And that's something he definitely knows."

Firearm prohibitionists love to use tragedy to leverage their agenda. So, it’s important for gun rights advocates to stand their ground and fire back (proverbially) whenever this happens. Last week I posted a graphic on Facebook claiming the average number of people killed in mass shootings when stopped by police is 18.25, and the average number of people killed in a mass shooting when stopped by civilians is 2.2. I based it on 10 shootings I found listed on some timeline somewhere. I honestly don’t even remember where. I presented the case studies in a blog post on the Silver...

...as we close the book on the election, it bears noting that another less obvious bloc of key swing state voters helped the president win a second term. They're the "nones" — that's the Pew Research Center's shorthand for the growing number of American voters who don't have a specific religious affiliation. Some are agnostic, some atheist, but more than half define themselves as either "religious" or "spiritual but not religious," Pew found in a recent survey. They are typically younger, more socially liberal than their forebears, vote Democratic, and now make up nearly 20 percent of the country's population....

2012 Doomsday Psychology, Millions of Chinese, Russians and Americans Believe the End of the World Is Nigh Politics / Social IssuesDec 08, 2012 - 07:47 AM By: DK Matai Panic buying of candles and essentials has accelerated not only in China and Russia, but there has been a simultaneous explosion in the sale of survival equipment, food, fuel and emergency shelters in America in preparation for the Mayan calendar's long count deadline: December 21st, 2012. The precise mechanism for the Armageddon to manifest remains vague, ranging from: 1. Catastrophic celestial collision between Earth and the mythical planet Nibiru, also known...