Free Republic

NEWARK, N.J. -- From the moment they held hands, pledged their love and signed documents in New York registering themselves as domestic partners, Kimberly Robinson and Jeanne LoCicero considered themselves a family. And when they decided to have a baby through artificial insemination, the Essex County couple wanted the courts to consider them one as well. On Wednesday, they got their wish. In a first-of-its kind ruling in New Jersey, a judge granted LoCicero full co-parenting rights to the baby Robinson bore, without having to go through lengthy adoption proceedings. Thus, they will both be listed as parents on the...

Lionel Tate (search), the youngest person in modern U.S. history to be sentenced to life in prison (search), has been arrested after a pizza delivery man said the teenager pointed a gun at him. Tate, now 18, was being held early Tuesday at the Broward County Jail (search) on charges of armed robbery and armed burglary with battery. He was serving probation following his release on a guilty plea to second-degree murder in the beating death of a 6-year-old family friend when he was 12.

Sisters pregnant at 12, 14 and 16. So what does their mother do? She blames the school Three sisters have each had children while still at school, the youngest at the age of 12. Jemma, Jade and Natasha Williams, who receive benefits totalling more than £31,000 a year, are raising their babies alone after they became pregnant within three months of each other. The sisters, aged 12, 14 and 16 when they gave birth, live in Derby with their twice-divorced mother, who holds the education system responsible for their plight. "I blame the schools - sex education for young girls...

The same day in May 1999 that Kweisi Mfume abruptly announced that he would not be a candidate for mayor, an internal investigative memo was sent to top officers of the NAACP describing allegations of Mfume's mistreatment of female subordinates at the organization's Baltimore headquarters. For the next five years, the civil rights organization - still recovering from the 1994 sex scandal under former Executive Director Benjamin F. Chavis - kept that memo secret and did nothing more, even as Mfume refused to answer any questions from the board's lawyers about the allegations. But in an internal report last year,...

BOSS BLOWS UP AFTER 4TH STRAIGHT LOSS BY GEORGE KING April 18, 2005 -- BALTIMORE - One dozen games into the season George Steinbrenner has had it with his high-priced and underachieving Yankees. Shortly after yesterday's 8-4 loss to the Orioles in front of a sun-splashed Camden Yards crowd of 47,883 that stretched the Yankees' losing streak to four, The Boss cried uncle. "Enough is enough," Steinbrenner said in a statement. "I am bitterly disappointed, as I am sure all Yankee fans are, by the lack of performance by our team. http://www.nypost.com/sports/sports.shtml

Good evening FRiends. I wanted to share some good news with all of you. At 0741 today, my son Matthew Reagan, first and middle name respectively, was delivered via c-section three weeks ahead of schedule. Matt weighed in at 8 lbs 14 ozs and was a 20 incher. Mom is doing pretty well but is a bit sore and tired. Ironically, we found out mom was pregnant the same day I signed up on FR. I'll be heading back to the hospital soon after I post this with supplies and this was the first opportunity today and most convenient way...

NASHVILLE - Sen. John Ford has used campaign money to pay for a wedding and thousands of dollars in payments to the mothers of his children, filings show. The Memphis Democrat has been the focus of scrutiny recently over a child support fight that raised questions about whether he lives in the district he represents and whether he failed to disclose more than $200,000 of income from a TennCare subcontractor. Now that subcontractor, the governmental affairs company Managed Care Services Group and chief executive Ronald R. Dobbins, have been fired. A Doral Dental spokesman said the firm fired Dobbins both...

A state lawmaker from northeast Georgia has introduced a bill that would require hospitals to ask unmarried women who their baby's father is. Representative Ben Bridges -- a Republican from Cleveland introduced the so-called Baby's Right to Know Act yesterday. It would require hospitals to ask women: Who's the father? Bridges says his goal is to give children access to their full medical history by identifying the biological father and getting his name on the birth certificate. The bill would NOT legally require the new mother to name the man. Bridges says House Bill Four is NOT meant to punish...

BERLIN (AFP) - A proposed law to ban paternity tests undertaken without written permission from the child's mother was dividing the governing coalition in Germany. Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries, a member of Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's Social Democrats (SPD), wants to make it illegal for any man to seek such a test without the mother's permission, and any laboratory that undertook the test would also be liable to prosecution. But the Greens, who share power with the SPD, say the proposed law is unacceptable. The president of the Greens' parliamentary party, Katrin Goering-Eckardt, told Friday's Sueddeutsche Zeitung newspaper that the alternative...

And to think if we'd just shown him a little more "respect," Pedro Martinez would be back pitching with the Red Sox for the next three years. Maybe if we'd put his statue on top of the golden dome of the State House. Maybe if Peterborough, N.H., had changed its name to Pedroborough. Maybe if we'd built a Pedro Library on Columbia Point, something equal to the JFK Library. Maybe that would have been enough respect to keep him here. Actually, no. Upon further review, it now can be said that Pedro knows only one measure of respect. And that...

Hall of Fame basketball player Calvin Murphy was found not guilty today of charges he molested five of his daughters. Jurors deliberated just two hours before finding Murphy not guilty on all six counts. When the verdict was read, Murphy closed his eyes, then looked up at the ceiling. Earlier today during closing arguments, prosecutors Murphy as a cheat and a child molester today, while defense attorneys maintained that the daughters accusing him of sexual abuse were lying in an orchestrated effort to make him pay. "You can never fully repair his reputation," defense attorney Rusty Hardin told jurors during...

Nearly a Month Later, Ohio Fight Goes On 1 hour, 13 minutes ago By JOHN McCARTHY, Associated Press Writer COLUMBUS, Ohio - Nearly a month after John Kerry conceded Ohio to President Bush , complaints and challenges about the balloting are mounting as activists including the Rev. Jesse Jackson demand closer scrutiny to ensure the votes are being counted on the up-and-up. Jackson has been holding rallies in Ohio in recent days to draw attention to the vote, and another critic plans to ask the state Supreme Court this week to decide the validity of the election. Ohio essentially decided...

In a move blatantly planned to whip the Democrat base to new heights of frenzy, Jesse Jackson shouted and preached to a riotous crowd at an Ohio congregation virtually screaming that President Bush had ‘stolen the Ohio votes’. Jackson’s exact words were: “We can live with losing an election! We cannot live with fraud and stealing!!!" It’s obvious to anyone that he and the rest of the leftist Democrats CANNOT live with losing the election.

Raised from birth by trailblazing lesbians, Ry Russo-Young has the outlook of a generation that has come of age between gay and straight cultures -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- October 24, 2004 Growing Up With Mom and Mom By SUSAN DOMINUS y Russo-Young, a 22-year-old filmmaker and performer, has a lot to explain, starting with her name. It's Ry, just Ry, not short for Ryan, or a misspelling of Ray, or a nickname someone gave her as a child or a pretension she took on in her teens. Ry is simply a name that her mothers liked the sound of when they named her,...

Matt Morris vs. Curt Schilling. Red Sox lead the series 1-0 (and yes I am series).

Yankees look for sweep; Astros try to pull even October 17, 2004 BRISTOL, Connecticut (Ticker) - After a record-breaking rout against the Boston Red Sox in Game Three, the New York Yankees are on the verge of their 40th World Series appearance. The Yankees - and the two teams combined - set a League Championship Series record for runs scored in a 19-8 rout of the Red Sox on Saturday, taking a three games to none lead. Of the 25 instances when a team has taken such a best-of-seven series lead previously, it has closed out the series in four...

WASHINGTON -- Like everyone else in America, I open my Inbox every day to confront a glut of spam e-mails from pitchmen for virility-enhancing drugs and deposed African finance ministers. None of those missives, however, are as bizarre as a message that materialized the other day from an online florist: Endless Choices this Boss' Day. Boss' Day? They had to be kidding. I was aware of the propensity of the "celebration community" -- florists, balloon manufacturers and greeting-card companies -- to hype dubious holidays and prolong established ones (as in the "Halloween Season" that seems to begin in late August)....

Matt Damon has admitted that he'll probably grow old with Ben Affleck rather than the woman of his dreams. Speaking to German magazine Brigitte Damon said he believed in his long term friendship with Affleck and added: "I can well imagine growing old with him." He also said that it was unlikely a woman would come between them. "My longest relationship with a woman lasted two and a half years. That's very short when I consider how long I've been friends with Ben," he said. The actor, who wrote and starred in Good Will Hunting together with Affleck, also stood...

The head of the Hamas military wing in the West Bank city of Hebron, Imad Kawasme, surrendered to the Israel Defense Forces on Wednesday morning when troops surrounded his safe house in an arrest raid. Kawasme is suspected of dispatching two suicide bombers who carried out the August 31 terror attack in the southern city of Be'er Sheva in which 16 people were killed and 100 others wounded.

Game Time: 8:05 pm EDT TV: FOX Pitching Matchup: C. Schilling vs. M. Mussina Aaron Boone ended the Boston Red Sox's season last year with a walk-off home run for the New York Yankees in the bottom of the 11th inning of Game 7 of the American League championship series. An intriguing and eventful offseason and 19 more heated and sometimes bloody meetings have brought the Red Sox and Yankees together yet again, with another World Series trip on the line. The highly anticipated rematch for the American League title begins Tuesday, with every indication that baseball's most bitter rivalry...

Moms the word - Lesbian couple first on birth certificate By Casey Ross Friday, July 16, 2004 In a milestone for same-sex parents, a married lesbian couple from Jamaica Plain is believed to be the first homosexual pair recognized as parents on their child's birth certificate. Cora Roelofs and Liz Steinhauser are named as mother and ``second parent'' on a certificate issued by the town of Wellesley and approved by the state Department of Public Health. ``We hope people realize this is both justice and a joy, and we hope they support our family,'' said Roelofs, who gave birth June...

A 23-year-old female teacher in Tampa, Fla., was arrested Monday for the second time on charges of having sex with a 14-year-old male student. Debra Lafave, (pictured, left) was accompanied by her new attorney, John Fitzgibbons as she surrendered to Marion County deputies in Ocala. Lafave, who is married, is a reading teacher at Greco Middle School in Temple Terrace, just northeast of Tampa. The new charges accuse Lafave of pursuing the 14-year-old student to Ocala, Fla., while he was visiting his 15-year-old cousin. Detectives said Lafave had sex with the student twice in Ocala - once in the back...

The Rev. Jesse Jackson will take a bus tour through Ohio, West Virginia and Pennsylvania Sunday through next Wednesday to kick off the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition's "Reinvest In America: Put America Back To Work!" campaign. The tour will be launched with three public rallies in Pittsburgh. Today, there will be a noon rally in Market Square, Downtown. On Sunday, at 3 p.m. at Monumental Baptist Church, Hill District, there will be a black community mass rally; it will be followed by another rally at 6 p.m. at Five Gateway Center, the United Steelworkers Building, before the bus leaves on the tour....

Who Is The Father? The following are all replies that women have put on Child Support Agency forms in the section for listing father's details: These are genuine excerpts from the forms (names removed) : 1. Regarding the identity of the father of my twins, child A was fathered by [name removed]. I am unsure as to the identity of the father of child B, but I believe that he was conceived on the same night. 2. I am unsure as to the identity of the father of my child as I was being sick out of a window when...

BENTON HARBOR, Mich. (AP)--The Rev. Jesse Jackson said community members--even those responsible for nighttime rioting this week--need to come together for a period of healing. ``People need healing. They need hope, and they need faith,'' the civil rights activist said Friday morning after a closed-door meeting with police and community officials. ``Faith has substance. Those who are torching the buildings, they, too, need help.'' Jackson's visit came after the second relatively peaceful night in this southwestern Michigan city of 12,000, following two nights of riots and high tensions. Apparent arson fires burned five buildings Friday morning near the site of...

DEFENDERS: Pay To Get Kidnapped? Some People Do New Thrill Is An Extreme Adventure, Some Say Posted: 5:47 p.m. EDT May 16, 2003 In a dark basement, somewhere in metro-Detroit there is something very strange and frightening going on. Local 4 Defenders have learned that local men and women are being kidnapped right off the public streets and brought to the basement for a game of mind manipulation and torture. Local 4 followed the kidnappers as they stalked a local man and waited for the perfect time to act. A group of masked men waited in their minivan as they...

Expecting Stark staying off Monday night sidelines May 13, 2003 SportsLine.com wire reports Melissa Stark will not return to ABC's Monday Night Football for a fourth season as a sideline reporter because she is pregnant. Stark is expecting her first child in September. She has worked Monday night games since 2000, when she and Eric Dickerson replaced Lesley Visser on the sidelines. Dickerson left after two seasons. ABC Sports vice president Mark Mandel said Tuesday the show is seeking a new reporter for the 2003 season. AP NEWS The Associated Press News Service Copyright 2003, The Associated Press, All Rights...

"US will lose war", says former UN inspector March 26 2003 at 06:42PM Lisbon - The United States does not have the military means to take over Baghdad and will lose the war against Iraq, former United Nations weapons inspector Scott Ritter said. "The United States is going to leave Iraq with its tail between its legs, defeated. It is a war we can not win," he told private radio TSF in an interview broadcast here Tuesday evening. "We do not have the military means to take over Baghdad and for this reason I believe the defeat of the United...

Sex Secrets of the Clonaid Group developing on Drudge....developing..breaking..