Free Republic

They were told to expect a kiss from a 'special someone'. But the joke was on teenagers at Rosemount High School when the mystery lip locks they suspected came from their classmates... were actually from their parents. Now that footage of the cringe-worthy pep rally prank has gone viral, John Wollersheim says as the school principal he owes an apology to everyone who was offended by the incestual display.

On Thursday, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said that they were surprised by the applause at the memorial pep rally on Wednesday for the victims of the Tucson shootings. "I will say that I read the speech several times and thought that there wouldn’t be a lot of applause if any. I think many of us thought that. But I think there was a celebration, again, of the lives of those who had been impacted. Not just at that grocery store but throughout the country. And I think that, if that is part of the healing process, then that’s...

What was billed as a memorial for victims of the Arizona shooting rampage turned into a rollicking rally, leaving some conservative commentators wondering whether President Barack Obama's speech was a scripted political event. Not so, insisted the White House and host University of Arizona. Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs said Thursday he and other aides didn't expect the president's remarks at the school's basketball arena to receive as much rousing applause as it did. Gibbs said the crowd's response, at times cheering and shouting, was understandable.

White House Says It Wasn't Responsible for Picking Rowdy Basketball Arena for Arizona Memorial Service Thursday, January 13, 2011 By Fred Lucas Washington (CNSNews.com) – White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said Thursday that the White Houes was not responsible for choosing a basketball arena, as opposed to a church or a smaller auditorium that might be more conducive to a solemn event, for Wednesday's night's memorial service in Tucson, Ariz. The McKale Memorial Center, an athletics facility at the University of Arizona, was packed with a reported 14,000 people, who repeatedly broke out in cheers and screams of a...

I'm retired now, but once upon a time, as a church pastor, I was called on to conduct funerals and memorial services. All too often. I never saw them as opportunities to convert any possible unbelievers in attendance, exaggerate the virtues of the deceased, or advance some localized ecclesiastical agenda. That's not what they're about. Funerals and memorial services are about looking beyond the moment where the cold immediacy of death has taken hold, and toward whatever divine, otherworldly, or transcendent beliefs are held by, most importantly, the family, but also their friends.  When the October 2002 memorial service for...

Flanked by Dallas County and state officials, Gov. Rick Perry led a bipartisan pep rally Wednesday for the $7 billion Trans-Texas Corridor, his sprawling transportation project that has drawn criticism from several quarters. Perry announced that the private sector has offered to build the southern sector of Loop 9 as a toll road. The proposed outer loop around the Dallas metropolitan area has been under study for decades and could eventually tie in with the corridor project. Cintra-Zachry, a U.S.-Spanish consortium proposing to build the first segments of the corridor, has notified the Texas Department of Transportation that the company...

The Drudge Report could be seen on a computer during a CBS News conference with employees about Katie Couric replacing Bob Schieffer as the Evening News anchor.

In the wake of the controversial memorial service for Sen. Paul Wellstone Tuesday, the head of the Wellstone campaign apologized Wednesday for the event’s sharply political tone. "It was not our intent to inject that into the service," campaign chairman Jeff Blodgett said of comments made at the Tuesday night ceremony. "I take responsibility for that and I deeply regret it." Blodgett said the event at the University of Minnesota was not scripted and the comments of individual speakers were not previewed. Organizers simply asked participants to speak from their hearts, he said. "I regret if people took offense or...