Free Republic

Obama told Republicans Friday that it’s a fool’s errand for them to use the threat of a government shutdown to gut his signature healthcare law, decrying what he called “political grandstanding” that is hurting the American economy. With Republicans seeing both the looming expiration of government funding and the need to increase the country’s borrowing limit as pressure points to extract political concessions on the healthcare law, the president said bluntly: “I said that yesterday and I’m gonna repeat it: that’s not gonna happen.” “A lot of what is taking place right now is political grandstanding,” Obama told reporters at...

Senate Democrats' inclusion in their proposed debt package of $1 trillion in savings from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan may not satisfy ratings agencies threatening a credit downgrade since the wars were expected to end with or without a debt deal. The budget gimmick is one that has been used by both parties. President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner had earlier considered employing it during discussions that have since broken down. Now Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid is using the trick in his $2.7 trillion deficit-reduction plan, according to aides. Boehner has not indicated where he would draw...

Tea Party conservatives hope to make a push on the House floor to force President Obama to avoid a national default if Congress fails to raise the debt limit. Members of the Senate Tea Party Caucus have met with House freshmen to discuss a plan to pressure House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) to bring the Full Faith and Credit Act to the floor. The legislation would direct Obama to prioritize federal payments to the nation’s creditors, Social Security recipients and soldiers serving in Afghanistan and Iraq. The bill has been revised since it was introduced earlier this year. The previous...

NEW ORLEANS -- A same-sex couple in California has won a federal court ruling that their adopted son's Louisiana birth certificate must bear the names of both adoptive fathers. The facts are so clear that no trial is needed, U.S. District Judge Jay Zainey wrote. "What a great Christmas present for these guys!" said Kenneth D. Upton Jr. who represented Oren Adar and Mickey Ray Smith of San Diego. In his ruling Monday, Zainey said Louisiana's Office of Vital Records must give full faith and credit to the New York State court in which Adar and Smith adopted the boy,...

Same-sex union not recognized in Tennessee - In a brick house on a quiet street in Cordova live a newly married couple whose nuptials are getting national attention.Derek Norman, 23, and his partner of four years, Robert Blaudow, 40, were married in California on Monday, moments after the state's same-sex marriage ban was lifted. "This has given us the ability to make that proclamation to the world that we are just like everyone else," Norman said. "We love each other just like heterosexual couples, and we'd like to proclaim that love publicly." However, their proclamation was more spur-of-the-moment than planned....

The State of New York has been ordered to recognize homosexual "marriages" performed in U.S. states and foreign countries where the practice is legal. New York's highest court – the Court of Appeals – refused to review a lower-court ruling that ordered recognition of so-called foreign "same-sex marriages" performed outside the State of New York. Such unions must now be honored in New York if they were created legally -- for example, in Massachusetts or Canada. Peter LaBarbera of Americans for Truth About Homosexuality says activist judges are now forcing homosexual marriage on New York citizens. "[T]his is a very...