Contrary to popular belief, Rick Santorum is not “coming for your birth control.” The senator has explained that, although state governments have the power to pass laws banning contraceptive use, he is not interested in seeing these laws get on the books. (more)
Once, it was enough to accuse your opponents of waging class warfare, the well-known practice of pitting one socioeconomic segment of Americans against another. (more)
As a Latin Mass fan and former Catholic schoolgirl (St. Jude’s, Rockville, MD), I was an unlikely attendee at “The Response,” Texas Governor Rick Perry’s Houston prayer event. But I’m glad I went; it gave me some insights into Rick Perry’s Texas. (more)
Has Mitch Daniels’ call for a “truce” on social issues been vindicated? Now that Daniels has signed into law legislation that will stop taxpayer money from going to Planned Parenthood, some people seem to think so. (Planned Parenthood is one of the world’s largest sponsors of abortions.) But color me skeptical. It seems clear that Indiana’s new pro-life legislation got to Daniels’ desk in spite of his “truce” and not because of it. (more)
When the president announced that a federal government shutdown had been averted, he noted it was “a debate about spending cuts, not social issues.” (more)
Although the last-minute budget deal that lawmakers agreed to on Friday did not defund Planned Parenthood, it did guarantee that an up-or-down vote on whether to defund the abortion provider will be held in the near future. That’s a vote that 3 self-proclaimed “pro-life” Senate Democrats must be dreading. Senator Bob Casey (D-PA), Senator Ben Nelson (D-NE), and Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV) claim to be strongly pro-life. All three are up for reelection in 2012 and will have to take a very public stance on the defunding of Planned Parenthood. This single vote has the potential to seriously haunt their future campaigns. (more)
One in five of all American moms have kids who have different birth fathers, a new study shows. And when researchers look only at moms with two or more kids, that figure is even higher: 28 percent have kids with at least two different men. (more)
I never really bought the whole Mars/Venus explanation for the differences between men and women. I understand that our gender-driven instincts may not be entirely aligned, but different planets? Isn’t that a little extreme? (more)
Yet another Catholic diocese has come under a deluge of criminal and civil suits from individuals claiming to have been sexually abused by priests. On February 16, the Archdiocese of Philadelphia agreed to reopen 37 possible cases of child sexual abuse mentioned during grand jury proceedings. The grand jury also recommended charging Monsignor William Lynn with two criminal counts of endangering the welfare of a child, and pressing other criminal charges against three priests and a Catholic school teacher. Several priests were placed on leave of absence after having been accused. (more)
The Staten Island terror charged with viciously bashing a young female middle-school classmate while demanding to know “Are you a Muslim?” is himself the son of a Muslim woman, his dad revealed today. (more)
Today tens of millions of Americans will don a green tie, four-leaf clover earrings, or perhaps drink a green-colored beer while wearing a “Kiss me, I’m Irish” shirt — even if they aren’t Irish. (more)
Last week Republicans and Tea Party members received a reminder — as if any were needed — of the contempt with which they are regarded by some in the information elite. When Ron Schiller, then a fundraiser for National Public Radio, attacked Tea Party adherents (and less directly Republicans) as “seriously racist, racist people” and claimed that the Republican Party had been hijacked before the 2008 election, he thought he was among friends. (more)
Former Arkansas governor and current Fox News personality Mike Huckabee continues to tip toe around speculation that he will run for president again in 2012. (more)
Center Brandon Davies of the Brigham Young University (BYU) basketball team has been suspended from the team for the remainder of the season. The Salt Lake Tribune reports he was suspended because he engaged in premarital sex. (more)
John Boehner said Friday that he was going after the Defense of Marriage Act (signed by Clinton), after Obama said his Justice Department will not defend it. (more)
Monday night, five potential Republican presidential candidates gathered in Waukee, Iowa to woo social conservatives in the early primary state with their conservative credentials. They panned the left, President Barack Obama, and even one of their own – Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels, who has yet to decide whether or not he will enter the Republican primary. (more)
Lawmakers and governors in many states, faced with huge shortfalls in employee pension funds, are turning to a strategy that a lot of private companies adopted years ago: moving workers away from guaranteed pension plans and toward 401(k)-type retirement savings plans. (more)
A new Texas non-profit has announced its intention to provide scholarships for one group they feel has been left out of college scholarship programs — white men. (more)
The late Sen. Ted Kennedy arranged to “rent” a brothel for a night while on a visit to Chile and other Latin American countries decades ago, according to a 1961 State Department memo obtained and published by the watchdog group Judicial Watch. (more)
When mega pastor Rick Warren asked then-presidential candidate Barack Obama in 2008, “At what point does a baby get human rights?” Obama famously stated: That’s “above my pay grade.” Liberals used to respond to this question by answering that personhood is established when the fetus is viable — meaning when the baby is able to live independently of the mother. However, as medical technology has enabled this to happen as early as 20 weeks — a time when almost all abortion advocates believe the procedure should be legal — the viability defense is no longer invoked. And now, it seems, abortion advocates — a la Obama — are opting to avoid the question altogether. Even worse, they’re using the red herring of women’s health and safety to divert attention from the real issue at hand: whether the pre-born child has the right to life. (more)
