Free Republic

A Long Island Tea Party member is getting the last laugh after being awarded 1.12 million dollars in compensatory damages. Nancy Genovese, 58, a mother of three, was arrested in 2009 for attempting to photograph a helicopter at an Air National Guard base in the Hamptons. She claimed that she was ​only ​arrested during the incident because she belonged to the Tea Party. She intended to use the photo on a “Support the Troops” website; she was arrested for trespass and insulted as a “Teabagger.”

A new proposal in Oklahoma would bar drunk drivers from buying or consuming alcohol -- and already is raising concerns over how it would be enforced. Fox 25 in Oklahoma City reports that state Sen. Patrick Anderson is proposing a bill that would allow a judge to enforce the alcohol restrictions on anyone with a DUI charge for a set period of time.

Moving to quash a conservative GOP insurrection, Assembly Speaker-designee John Hambrick on Saturday harshly rebuked Assemblywoman Michelle Fiore, telling her to stop playing “childish games” and undermining him by insisting she’s still Republican majority leader. Hambrick said in an email to Fiore that he had full authority as the elected leader of the Assembly Republican Caucus to remove her as majority leader and as chair of the Assembly Taxation Committee. He said he removed her last month for insubordination and for how she’s handling a dispute with the Internal Revenue Service over unpaid payroll taxes for her home health care...

Investigators said a police chief in Georgia reported accidentally shooting his wife early on New Year’s Day. A Georgia Bureau of Investigation spokeswoman, Sherry Lang, said the Peachtree City police chief, William McCollom, called 911 at around 4.15am on Thursday and reported that he had accidentally shot his wife. Margaret McCollom was flown to a hospital. Police say she is in critical condition

CARSON CITY — The Nevada Supreme Court on Wednesday gave a victory to the city of Reno in its decision in May to lay off 32 firefighters after federal funding that supported their positions ran out. The court, in a unanimous decision written by Justice James Hardesty, found that a Reno District Court did not have the authority to grant a preliminary injunction in the labor dispute because the underlying grievance was not arbitrable under the parties’ collective bargaining agreement. A District Court judge in Reno issued the preliminary injunction in June preventing Reno from completing scheduled layoffs. The order...

When Ohio teenager Josh Alcorn told his parents he wanted to live as a girl, that he felt trapped in his own body, his parents said they wouldn’t stand for that. “We don’t support that, religiously,” his mother told CNN Wednesday, her voice breaking. “But we told him that we loved him unconditionally. We loved him no matter what. I loved my son. People need to know that I loved him. He was a good kid, a good boy.” Crossing out the name “Josh,” the 17-year-old signed the name he wanted to be known as — “Leelah” — in a...

Portland protesters for #Ferguson movement blocked the busy intersection of 39th & Belmont, got into several shouting matches with drivers, sung Christmas carol parodies that included “Deck the halls with rows of dead cops” and “Cop free Christmas”, chanted “What do we want? NO COPS”, got into more shouting and shoving matches, and were plowed into by one driver on Peacock Lane, which is home to one of the biggest Christmas light displays in Portland.

A feminist activist ran topless through St Peter's Square and rushed the nativity scene before attempting to flee with the baby Jesus figurine. The woman, who had the words 'God Is Woman' written on her chest, started her protest just one hour after Pope Francis delivered his Christmas message. Thousands of pilgrims were still standing in the famous square when the woman, who is a member of Femen, was ambushed by a guard on her way off the platform. She was quickly arrested by officers from the Vatican police.

A startling new anti-gun ad released by a San Francisco-based production company encourages children to commit a series of crimes by stealing their parents’ guns and turning them over to school officials, The Daily Caller reported Monday. Sleeper 13 Productions released the controversial video on Dec. 13. It shows a pouty, young boy wandering into his parents’ bedroom, stealing a handgun out of their dresser drawer and then shoving it into his backpack

In the end, making a political issue personal might have done in Assemblywoman Michele Fiore. The Las Vegas Republican was coming off a tumultuous week — she’d been deposed and then quickly restored as majority leader-designate and chairwoman of the Assembly Taxation Committee by Speaker-designate John Hambrick, R-Las Vegas — when she doubled down on allegations that certain Republican forces were targeting her and other conservatives. Speaking on the Alan Stock radio show on KDWN-AM 720 on Tuesday, Fiore not only repeated her rhetoric about a “war on women,” but blamed some of the alleged infantrymen in that conflict: Republican...

CARSON CITY — Las Vegas Assemblywoman Michele Fiore’s tax liens and problems with the IRS were cited in her second removal from Assembly leadership positions Thursday. Fiore’s removal could clear the way for moderate Republicans to control the Assembly in the 2015 session and eliminate any talk of a GOP-Democratic partnership challenge to the leadership. It could also smooth the way for Gov. Brian Sandoval to win more funding for public education. Assembly Speaker designate John Hambrick reversed course on Fiore for a second time in recent weeks and removed the controversial lawmaker as majority leader. She has also been...

CARSON CITY — Las Vegas Republican lawmaker Michele Fiore, a lightning rod in an ongoing Assembly GOP power struggle, said Tuesday she is fully in compliance with the Internal Revenue Service over more than $1 million in tax liens against her home health care businesses. In her first comments on the controversy, Fiore appeared on the Alan Stock radio show on KDWN in Las Vegas, saying her actual active liens total less than $200,000. Liens dating back to 2003 had previously been resolved, she said. Fiore said her lien problems stemmed from a dishonest bookkeeper, who she said is facing...

Things are pretty volatile in the Chaos Caucus. Every since Republicans took over the Assembly, things have been anything but smooth. That shouldn’t be much of a surprise. After all, even the GOP itself didn’t expect to be in charge of the lower house, and the last time the party was in charge, Ronald Reagan was in the White House and the pinnacle of technology was the Apple IIe desktop computer. You already know about the disastrous election of Ira Hansen, R-Sparks, as speaker. He was undone by ugly sentiments penned in a Sparks newspaper over a long career as...

Attorney General-elect Adam Laxalt is joining the charge to condemn President Barack Obama’s executive action on immigration. In one of his first public moves since winning the attorney general race on Nov. 4, Laxalt signed onto a joint statement sponsored by the Republican Attorneys General Association objecting to Obama’s decision to prevent the deportation of an estimated 5 million people. The statement also questions the validity of Obama’s oath to “protect the Constitution.” Signed by 20 attorneys general and attorneys general-elects, the letter doesn’t outline any course of legal action from RAGA members. But it dovetails with Republican promises to...

Assemblyman Ira Hansen has concerns about the Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Forest Service overreaching their policing powers. Spurred in part by the BLM’s April roundup of Bunkerville rancher Cliven Bundy’s cattle that brought an armed confrontation between federal agents and Bundy supporters, the Sparks Republican is pushing for a bill that would prohibit BLM and Forest Service law officers from enforcing state laws. He is trying to get Nevada’s 17 counties, including Clark County, to take an interest in the issue that would be considered by the 2015 Legislature. Hansen’s concerns are tied in part to a variety...

Embattled Nevada Assemblyman Ira Hansen was found innocent after facing a misdemeanor charge of illegally setting animal traps. A New River Township Justice Court judge ruled that Hansen was not guilty of a misdemeanor when he set four animal traps known as snares within 200 feet of public roadways in Churchill County. The decision caps what’s been a yearlong battle and difficult month for Hansen, a Sparks lawmaker who recently stepped down as the Assembly speaker-elect. In November 2013, the Nevada Department of Wildlife spotted Hansen removing traps that were within the 200-foot limit. The department assembled a case and...

NEW YORK (PIX11) - Police arrested multiple people at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade Thursday after a protesters broke from their designated route and clashed with officers. Seven people were arrested, according to the NYPD after a group of people tried to overturn a trash can and run toward the parade route.

SPARKS — A 41-year-old Washoe County sheriff’s deputy has been arrested in Spanish Springs after police say he was firing a gun while drunk and threatened to shoot at a sheriff’s helicopter. Sparks police say Robert Brunsvold was arrested Sunday for suspicion of possession of a firearm while intoxicated and resisting police with a firearm. His bail was set at $20,000. It was not immediately clear if he had a lawyer.

A rookie New York City police officer shot and killed an unarmed 28-year-old man in a darkened stairwell in Brooklyn late Thursday night, according to the police. Police Commissioner William J. Bratton said that the victim, Akai Gurley, was “a total innocent” and called the shooting “an unfortunate accident.” He was not engaged in any activity other than trying to walk down the stairs, Mr. Bratton said. Mayor Bill de Blasio was also quick to offer his condolences to Mr. Gurley’s family. “This is a tragedy,” he said. The officer who shot Mr. Gurley, Peter Liang, has been on the...

President Barack Obama, who’s coming to Las Vegas today, picked the right state to sell his new executive order that will protect up to 5 million undocumented immigrants from being deported. More than 10 percent of Nevada’s workforce is living here illegally, the highest rate in the country and double the national average. Also, about one in five schoolchildren in the Silver State have at least one parent who’s an undocumented immigrant — far more than any other state, according to the Pew Research Center. These adopted Nevadans are among the 11 million illegal immigrants who have been “living in...