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After a College Republican group withdrew its support for a Meghan McCain speech because she believes in marriage equality, she took the GOP’s “purity test.” And passed. This week I made a little news by not being “pure enough,” if you will, by College Republican standards. I was invited to speak at George Washington University on February 9 by numerous campus groups, including the George Washington College Republicans and Allied in Pride, an LGBT organization. I take great pride in being one of the few people who brings together the gay community and Republican groups. But somewhere between my accepting...

McCartney dedicates 'Michelle' to FLOTUS By: Patrick Gavin August 2, 2009 12:22 AM EST Music superstar Paul McCartney is rocking out at FedEx Field Saturday night and, since he's near the White House, Sir Paul gave a special tribute to first lady Michelle Obama: Before playing the Beatles classic, "Michelle", McCartney told the packed audience that he was dedicating it to the first lady. Considering that the song's lyrics include "I love you, I love you, I love you

Will the New York City school system be compelled to commemorate Islam on Sept. 11? It has been widely reported the New York City Council passed a resolution Tuesday recommending the school system shut down to commemorate two of the most important Muslim holidays, however the reports did not note the holidays fall on Sept. 11 in some years.... Islamic holidays are set based on the lunar calendar, meaning the dates corresponding to the Gregorian calendar change each year. As first noticed by Andrew Walden, publisher and editor of the Hawaii Free Press Eid al-Adha falls on Sept. 11 in...

As inspired by one of their iReporters. I told you in December that a Senate run was inevitable. CNN takes it one step further: The news website also launched a poll on its homepage, asking, “Should Michelle Obama run for president in 2020?” At press time for this article, with 200,000 votes tallied in the unscientific poll, 83 percent of respondents answered no, with a ratio of over 165,000 against the idea to only 35,000 in favor… Despite an overwhelming number of poll respondents voting against a Michelle Obama candidacy, online comments in reaction to O’Reilly’s video are fairly mixed....

Just when it seemed the insults hurled at Barack Obama had reached the apex of absurdity, al-Qaida weighs in with a bit of retro name-calling of its own. In a video released last week, Ayman al-Zawahiri, the top deputy to Osama bin Laden, denounced Obama as a “house Negro” and compared him unfavorably to “honorable black Americans” such as the late Malcolm X, the black nationalist who practiced Islam. Zawahiri also showed a still photograph of Obama wearing a yarmulke while visiting Jerusalem’s Wailing Wall last summer. The implication was that Obama had become nothing more than a “tool of...

Just got an email from ebay with an auction notice to get a "Once in a Lifetime Chance to Meet the Clintons".

Finally, on May 15, 2007, President Bush publicly urged the Senate to “to act favorably on U.S. accession to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea during this session of Congress.” He said that joining “will serve the national security interests of the United States, including the maritime mobility of our armed forces worldwide. It will secure U.S. sovereign rights over extensive marine areas, including the valuable natural resources they contain. Accession will promote U.S. interests in the environmental health of the oceans. And it will give the United States a seat at the table when the...

HILLARY CLINTON is to be presented as America’s Margaret Thatcher as she tries to become the first woman to win the White House. As she entered the 2008 presidential race yesterday, a senior adviser said that her campaign would emphasise security, defence and personal strengths reminiscent of the Iron Lady. “Their policies are totally different but they are both perceived as very tough,” said Terry McAuliffe, Clinton’s campaign chairman. “She is strong on foreign policy. People have got to know you are going to keep them safe.” Clinton, 59, used her website to announce that she was taking the first...

Why are so many people saying that U.S. Sen. Barack Obama could become the first black president? If by that they mean that he would become the first African-American president -- meaning his father was from Kenya and his mother from Kansas -- it would make sense. But I don't think that's what people mean. Despite the deaths of legal segregation and Jim Crow, apparently most Americans still embrace the one-drop rule. F. James Davis, a retired professor of sociology at Illinois State University, defined the one-drop rule as the belief that any person with ''any known African black ancestry''...

Perhaps it isn't fair to Barak Obama that the Illinois GOP declared 2004 as Their Nominate-A-Mongoloid Year when they contended against his rise to the US Senate. After all, Tim Johnson of South Dakota and Harry Reid of Nevada have both beaten back very serious opposition and proven they can beat a quality opponent in a tight Senatorial Election. Barak Obama? He spent 2004 as a grown man fighting out the T-Ball World Series. How bad were the GOP candidates he ran against? So bad that.... We'll start with Jack Ryan. If you were to type "Ryan, Illinois, sex-scandal" into...

MANCHESTER, N.H. – With standing room crowds chanting for the star to show, Sunday's Democratic fundraiser could have been a rock concert. But it was only Sen. Barack Obama's first visit to the nation's first primary state. If Senator Obama should jump into the Democratic presidential primary, where he is now ranked just behind Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York in recent polls, Democrats in the land of retail politics wonder if there's a living room big enough to hold the throngs who'd come to hear him. "Right now, he's a rock star. Getting 1,500 people out on a...

Maureen Dowd is worried that the Republican smear machine is at it again, attacking Barack Obama by using…his middle name. It seems Ed Rogers referred to Obama by his full name on "Hardball" a while back, setting off indignation among some on the left. I don't know why it came to Rogers' mind, but it is true I included Obama's middle name in an NR story (not available on the web) in early November: "Obama has joked that he worried his political career was over after 9/11 because his name sounded too much like Osama. In fact, it's better than...

Barack Obama is to Christianity what Michael Jackson is to heterosexuality. He might be one, but he’s not the poster child for the cause. You know, when I watch Obama and the other overtly ideological southpaw’s queue up to play the Christ card, it takes me back to Kerry in ’04 when he tried to convince gun owners and hunters that he’s a Nimrod. The fact is that if evangelicals didn’t represent a president-making voting block, they would get the same attention from our liberal brethren as Ugly Betty at a Playboy party. Since evangelicals swing a big stick, the...

Maureen Dowd plays the false indignation card in her pay-per-view column of today, What’s in a Name, Barry?The gist: those mean Republicans are trying to tar the rising star of the Democratic party [legally-mandated descriptor] by making malign associations with his moniker. The GOP's latest mischief - letting people know that the middle name of the junior senator from Illinois is "Hussein." Bunk. Any possible shock value in the Barack Hussein Obama handle has already largely faded. And this being a nation that likes to see itself as open and accepting, I'd say that, should he stay in the race,...

CONCORD, N.H. - Democratic Sen. Barack Obama, who is mulling a presidential bid, will make his first visit to New Hampshire next month. The Illinois senator will join the state's Democrats on Dec. 10 for a belated celebration of their big win in the midterm election. Obama has traveled to Iowa, site of the leadoff presidential caucuses, but New Hampshire hasn't been on his itinerary. Obama has gotten encouragement to seek the presidency in 2008 from fellow Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, who sent a letter to political supporters this week encouraging them to sign a "Run, Barack, Run" petition. "Barack...

Leftist filmmaker Michael Moore has delivered a message to the newly empowered Democrats: "Bring the troops home now. Not six months from now. NOW.”

Rising black star of Democrats connects with evangelicals IN THE latest sign that the “God gap” between Republicans and Democrats is narrowing, one of America’s biggest evangelical churches will this week welcome Senator Barack Obama, the rising African-American star of the Democratic party who has become a leading contender for the 2008 presidential elections. Obama will appear on Friday at the Saddleback church in Lake Forest, California, where at least 20,000 conservative Christians gather each week for services led by Pastor Rick Warren, the evangelical author of the bestselling inspirational book The Purpose Driven Life. At first glance Warren and...

NBC5.com Obama Urges Gradual Withdrawal Of Troops From Iraq Senator Careful Not To Set Specific Timetable UPDATED: 1:13 pm CST November 20, 2006 CHICAGO -- Democratic Sen. Barack Obama, who is contemplating a run for the presidency, on Monday called for a "gradual and substantial" reduction of U.S. forces from Iraq that would begin in four to six months. Speaking to the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, the Illinois senator envisioned a flexible timetable for withdrawal linked to conditions on the ground in Iraq and based on the advise of U.S. commanders. Obama also called for intensified efforts to train...

When Sen. Barack Obama slipped into Sen. Robert Byrd's Capitol office one day last year, he was seeking counsel from an elder who had been in the Senate since before Obama was born. Senators these days, Byrd cautioned the young Illinois Democrat, become fixated on the White House. "I remember the advice," Obama said matter-of-factly in an interview with The Associated Press last week. "The importance of senators staying in the Senate." Obama has been in the Senate less than two years. Now he is thinking of running for president. Presumptuous? "In a country of 300 million people," he said...

CHICAGO --Responding to a newspaper report, Sen. Barack Obama said Saturday that arrangements he had with a political fundraiser accused of shaking down companies might have raised the appearance of impropriety. Antoin "Tony" Rezko, whom Gov. Rod Blagojevich has described as a friend and a fundraiser, has pleaded not guilty to charges that he plotted to squeeze millions of dollars in kickbacks out of investment firms seeking state business. He also has pleaded not guilty to obtaining a $10.5 million loan from General Electric Capital Corp. through fraud and swindling a group of investors. Photo/Tony Dejak

Sen. Barack Obama may have thought a wrought iron fence would give him all the separation he needed from indicted Wilmette businessman Antoin "Tony" Rezko. But before everything is said and done, our star senator is going to wish he'd done a lot more a lot sooner to distance himself from his longtime political supporter.

Obama in '08 Might Bring GOP Smiles By Peter Brown Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois is the flavor of the month among Democrats who are seeking an alternative to Sen. Hillary Clinton for president in 2008. As much as the Republicans would like to see Sen. Clinton as the Democratic nominee, believing she is quite beatable, they probably wouldn't be upset to see Obama as their opponent either. Actually, they might even like running against him better. (snip) Among those who know who Obama is - a minority, and disproportionately those who would fit the definition of political junkie --...

Why Not Obama? By Richard CohenTuesday, October 24, 2006; A19 Ancient Rome had a term for a certain political process: cursus honorum , the honors race. It was, I am told by Anthony Everitt in his new biography, "Augustus," the process by which politicians moved up the ladder. Along the way, they were evaluated until, finally, some made it to the top. Nowadays, the system is different. All you have to do is appear on "Oprah."I am referring, obviously and insidiously, to Barack Obama, who announced Sunday that he might run for president. This followed, of course, the aforementioned...

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton said Monday that it was great her fellow Democrat, Sen. Barack Obama, is thinking about running for president. Polls show Clinton is the front-runner among potential 2008 Democratic presidential contenders and she said Friday during a debate that she has also been thinking about running. "I think it's great that anybody thinks about whatever they want to do in the future," she said when asked about Obama during a campaign stop at a senior citizens' center just north of Albany. "I'm focused on my campaign. I'm focused on reaching as many voters as possible, talking about...

"Before his particularly impressive entry into the US Senate last fall - with a big victory that brought many independents and even Republicans to his side - Obama had been a community organizer, civil rights attorney, and leader in the Illinois senate. He hasn't yet had time to make much of a mark in the US Senate, but he's already gaining the respect of his colleagues on the Veterans Affairs and Foreign Relations committees." "Political observers are saying he's a strong future presidential possibility. It's unrealistic, but I'll ask: Why not now? He's already proved he can attract the votes...

(AP) London, March 2, 1867: Karl Marx, a rising star among centrist economists, announced today the publication of the first volume of his work, 'Das Kapital'.OK, perhaps I exaggerate a tad. But is there any man of the left that the MSM is unwilling to cast as a "centrist" or moderate, particularly when he is seen as a potential Democratic presidential nominee? The Associated Press offers a perfect illustration of the phenomenon this evening. This article reports Barack Obama's indication on today's Meet The Press that, earlier protestations to the contrary notwithstanding, he is indeed contemplating a run for the...

WASHINGTON - Sen. Barack Obama acknowledged Sunday he was considering a run for president in 2008, backing off previous statements that he would not do so. The Illinois Democrat said he could no longer stand by the statements he made after his 2004 election and earlier this year that he would serve a full six-year term in Congress. He said he would not make a decision until after the Nov. 7 elections. "That was how I was thinking at that time," said Obama, when asked on NBC's "Meet the Press" about his previous statements. "Given the response I've been getting...

'We've got a nice spirit in here' For the umpteenth time in his short career, Sen. Barack Obama on Tuesday deflected talk of a presidential run -- but did show off some diplomatic chops that could come in handy one day. As a war of words escalated inside 57th Street Books between a store manager and photographers trying to snap Obama's picture -- a snotty who/what/where/how come? scrap -- Obama cut the conflict short. "Don't get salty, now," he warned the two camps. "We've got a nice spirit in here." Truce. But lasting peace between media members and those assigned...

In his second memoir in 11 years, The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream, Sen. Barack Obama paints a picture of America as it is and as he believes it should be. Obama, 45, tackles faith, politics, values, race, opportunity and the United States' place in the global village in the 288-page tome from Crown Publishing Group scheduled to hit bookstore shelves Tuesday. The title of Obama's new book comes from the keynote address he delivered at the Democratic National Convention in July 2004, in which he said the "audacity of hope" is "God's greatest gift to...

Sen. Barack Obama has the charisma and ambition to run for president, but is he ready to answer the tough questions? Foremost among them is whether he will run in 2008, and he's not denying it. But the mania surrounding the Illinois Democrat's book tour is reminiscent of the Colin Powell mania in 1995, when the general leveraged speculation of a presidential run into huge book sales. And that's not all they have in common.

WASHINGTON — When Sen. Barack Obama heads to Africa for a five-nation tour this week, he will take with him a credential no other U.S. senator can claim — and one that may make Africans listen to what he has to say. Obama departs Friday on a 15-day tour that will take him not only to his father's homeland, but also to South Africa, Congo, Djibouti and Sudan. While he has visited Africa twice before, this trip is certain to be different. (snip) Earlier this year, Obama attached an amendment to a pending bill that would provide up to $52...

HOUSTON, Texas - This oil-sated city didn't grind to a halt when George Bush proclaimed last week that America is addicted to crude. Hardly. Oversized vehicles of all sorts continued to scream up and down wide freeways at breakneck speeds, cruising past an endless profusion of strip malls decorated by fast food joints. It seemed appropriate that the Enron trial got under way here the same week that Bush admitted in his State of the Union address that time had run out on the big lie, the one first foisted on a gullible public by the Great Deceiver, Ronald Reagan....

The Times February 02, 2006 The President is a dolt – so how can America be such a success story? Anatole Kaletsky TWO CEREMONIAL events occurred in Washington on Tuesday evening that shone a spotlight on one of the most important but paradoxical features of a modern democratic society. The more widely reported was President Bush’s State of the Union address, a weak and defensive speech even by his undemanding standards. At the other end of Washington, meanwhile, Alan Greenspan, the retiring chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, was bidding farewell to the institution whose skilful management of US monetary...

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez (L) greets U.S activist Cindy Sheehan as he arrives at the meeting with World Social Forum Organizations in Caracas, Venezuela January 27, 2006. REUTERS/Jorge Silva

(Vanity)Looking for Hillary bathing suit pictures (don't ask why)

During the past eight months there have been many news cycles, many front-page stories, many events. There have been elections. There have been hurricanes and tidal waves. Nevertheless, in the grand scheme of things, eight months is not a very long time. In most of the world, something that happened eight months ago is considered "recent." In Washington, however, it seems that eight months ago is considered "ancient." How else to explain the nomination of Alberto Gonzales to the post of attorney general of the United States? Or, more to the point: How else to explain the widespread assumption that...

John Kerry, you are my dream man. You have experience both at home and abroad, and I want a man with actual experience. Some people say you’re just a smooth talker, but I know you mean what you say. With all of your years of public service, I am certain that you would show the same commitment to me as you have to our country. John Kerry, if you and I were ever to have children, I know that your policies would fully fund their education. From after school programs to their college tuition, your plans would ensure that a...

Unlike his arch enemy, President Bush, Cuban leader Fidel Castro is known for his nocturnal work habits. So it is not hard to imagine that Castro stayed awake late Sunday awaiting the results of the recall referendum that would determine the fate of his friend and ally, Hugo Chávez. No surprise then that the early Monday edition of Cuba’s official Communist Party daily, Granma heralded the embattled Venezuelan president’s win with a bold red front-page headline, “Chávez ’s Decisive Victory”. Although President Castro has not yet commented on the referendum results, he announced last week that he was postponing the...

Our president, George W. "bring-it-on" Bush, and his efforts to bring us into war with Iraq remind me of the statement of the notorious Luftwaffe commander Hermann Goering. In an interview from "Nuremberg Diary" by Gustave Gilbert, I quote his statement: "Why, of course the people don’t want war. Why should some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece? Naturally, the common people don’t want war: Neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that...

Watching presidential politics lately, I've been thinking back to when I was 13 years old and had my heart broken for the first time. It was 1972, and I was antiwar and infatuated with Senator George McGovern. But as I handed out McGovern leaflets in Yamhill County, Ore., I was greeted as if I were the Antichrist. Soon afterward, Mr. McGovern was defeated in a landslide. As Howard Dean will probably be, if the Democrats nominate him. It is, of course, the Democrats' privilege to stand on principle, embrace the man they admire most and leap off a cliff together....

"It's easy for people to say that if they shoot up on heroin the only people they're hurting are themselves. But that's not true. ... Drug abusers destroy their families ... If we legalize these vices, we erode the societal support for prohibitions against crimes such as murder. The erosion of the moral fabric of society is a gradual, insidious process." -- Rush Limbaugh, The Way Things Ought to Be, pp 53-54. As I sifted through hundreds of comments from Rush Limbaugh fans over the last week, some interesting trends emerged. About 50 percent just wanted to call me names....

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This bears repeating: Caring about the USA means caring for it. While it is understandable that there are those foul-weather patriots who turn out waving flags in times when our country is rolling the drums of war, what is more admirable are those who have cared for this country day in and day out. However, it is difficult to understand why some folks think patriotism is demonstrated by ostentatious displays of Old Glory or loudly and proudly declaring their unblinking, unthinking support for the president. It is even more difficult to understand why these war hawks demean people and groups...

According to a member of the European Parliament, Irish taxes may soon contribute to a European Union initiative to provide abortions throughout the developing world, even though abortion is unconstitutional in Ireland. Dana Rosemary Scallon, Connacht/Ulster MEP, has stated that "the Irish government can no longer remain silent on this matter. The Irish people deserve to be informed and consulted, and have the right to decide in accordance with their conscience and their constitution, if they want their tax money to fund a compulsory EU programme which will impose abortion, without debate, on the poorest countries." Scallon is referring to...

Under the heavily ironic heading "Behind Every Choice is a Story," Planned Parenthood is advertising an artwork and poster contest "celebrating 30 years of choice." Serrin Foster, with Feminists for Life, is concerned about the images in the minds of women who have suffered through an abortion. "And I think what they're going to miss are the untold stories of women who've had abortions and all the millions of young men and young women who aren't with us this year," Foster said. "The thoughts that they're going to have on the 30th anniversary of Roe v. Wade imagining the children...

Since I am approaching my one year anniversary of being a "freeper" and since I have never contributed a dime to FR, jim or the republican party, I am going to beat the powers to be at FR and voluntarily leave, rather than have them come up with one of the cock and bull stories to ban me. Been fun,Bye