More Problems for Obama: Irreligious Americans Less Likely to Vote

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A new poll released on Monday from Public Religion Research Institute finds that Americans who are unaffiliated in their religious views or who are less religious are less likely to head to the polls this election season. If the findings from this survey hold true, it could spell troubling news for the Obama campaign since voters who are less religious are more likely to support the president.

Americans who identify themselves as religiously unaffiliated are the fastest growing segment in America’s religious landscape. The annual PRRI survey found that 19 percent of Americans consider themselves part of this group. However, only 7 percent say they were raised in a religiously unaffiliated household.

Interestingly, President Obama, who has said he is a Christian, has a substantial lead among the religiously unaffiliated with 73 percent of those polled, while only 23 percent of that group say they support Mitt Romney, who is Mormon.

Americans who are affiliated to a religious group are much more likely to vote than those unaffiliated to a particular religion by a margin of 73 to 61 percent. For this reason, President Obama could be losing votes if the religiously unaffiliated choose not to vote in large numbers.

“The majority of Americans who are now religiously unaffiliated were raised in a particular faith,” said Daniel Cox, PRRI Research Director and report co-author. “Their reasons for leaving vary widely, ranging from a rejection of the teachings of their childhood faith or a fading belief in God, to antipathy toward organized religion, to negative personal experiences with religion or life experiences generally.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Ann Romney Opens Up on the Campaign Trail About Her MS: “I Can’t Keep Up the Pace”

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Ann Romney opened up about her struggle with Multiple Sclerosis during a surprise visit to a Cuban restaurant in Fort Lauderdale, Florida on Saturday.

‘I was very coordinated and athletic, and all of a sudden I’m falling and tripping and losing my balance and being so weak,’ Romney, the 63-year-old wife of Republican presidential nominee, told diners. ‘And I was like, “Something’s wrong!”‘

Romney was diagnosed in 1998 with the incurable neurological disease, which attacks the central nervous system and immobilizes many of its victims.

At the time, her husband was still working at Bain Capital, the venture capital firm he founded.

Ms Romney said she was an avid tennis player when she first started noticing her symptoms, which primarily affected her balance and coordination.

Read more from this story HERE.

Thousands Call Planned Parenthood for Imaginary Mammograms After Obama’s False Claim

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Nearly 2,000 pro-lifers called local Planned Parenthood clinics Oct. 18 to schedule mammograms, after President Obama implied the organization offers the service.

“When Gov. Romney says that we should eliminate funding for Planned Parenthood, there are millions of women all across the country who rely on Planned Parenthood for not just contraceptive care, they rely on it for mammograms,” said Obama Oct. 16 during the second presidential debate.

Planned Parenthood does not actually provide women with mammograms, but refers patients out to other facilities for the exam.

“Call it for what it is … if you’re not doing mammograms, don’t say that you do them,” Kate Bryan, communications director for Live Action, told EWTN News Oct. 19.

In response to the implication that the organization provides mammograms, the pro-life groups And Then There Were None and Live Action organized “Call Planned Parenthood to Schedule Your Imaginary Mammogram Day.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Home Alone Shooter Never Fired Gun Before, Mother “So Thankful to God that He was Keeping an Eye out for Her”

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A 12-year-old girl said she never had fired a gun before she took aim at an intruder while home alone this week.

“I had to do what I had to do,” Kendra St. Clair said Friday. “I was scared out of my mind.”

Kendra used her mother’s handgun to shoot the intruder Wednesday while she was home on fall break. Her mother had shown her how to shoot it, she said.

“Normally I do not leave my kids at home alone,” Debra St. Clair said. “But being a single mother of two with a full-time job, I had to that day”…

Kendra said even though she was terrified, “I kept my head on straight.”

Stacey Adam Jones, 32, was booked into the Bryan County jail Thursday. Bail was set at $250,000 at Jones’ arraignment hearing Friday afternoon, assistant Bryan County District Attorney Tim Webster said. His next court appearance will be a preliminary hearing conference in December.

Read more from this story HERE.

Mom Whose Son Was Killed in Benghazi Lashes Out at Obama’s “Optimal” Comment

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The mother of an American diplomat killed during a terrorist raid on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi has hit out at Barack Obama for describing the attack as ‘not optimal’, saying: ‘My son is not very optimal – he is also very dead.’

During an interview shown on Comedy Central, Obama responded to a question about his administration’s confused communication after the assault by saying: ‘If four Americans get killed, it’s not optimal.’

Speaking exclusively to MailOnline today, Pat Smith, whose son Sean died in the raid, said: ‘It was a disrespectful thing to say and I don’t think it’s right.

How can you say somebody being killed is not very optimal? I don’t think the President has the right idea of the English language.’

Speaking from her home in San Diego, Mrs Smith, 72, continued: ‘It’s insensitive to say my son is not very optimal – he is also very dead. I’ve not been “optimal” since he died and the past few weeks have been pure hell. ‘I am still waiting for the truth to come out and I still want to know the truth.’

Read more from this story HERE.

12 Year Old Girl, Home Alone, Shoots Burglar Through Closet Door (+video)

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By Steven Powell. A man who broke into a home [in southern Oklahoma this week], when he was shot by a 12-year-old girl who was in the home alone.

Debra St. Clair, the girl’s mother, said her daughter called her at work to say an unknown man was ringing the doorbell. When the girl didn’t answer, the man went around to the back and kicked in the back door.

She told her daughter to grab the family gun, barricade herself in the closet and call 911.

“I drove home at a really fast pace to try to get to her, and when I got here the police were already here. And they had the suspect,” she said.

St. Clair’s daughter had hid in the closet with a .40 Glock.

But Undersheriff Ken Golden said the intruder kept making his way through the house.

“And what we understand right now, he was turning the doorknob when she fired through the door,” he said. Read more from this story HERE.

Here’s a local news report on the shooting:

Federal Court Strikes Down Defense of Marriage Act, Says Homosexuals are a Protected Class

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A federal appeals court on Thursday ruled that gay Americans are a class of people who deserve the same kinds of constitutional protections as many other victims of discrimination.

The 2-to-1 ruling, by the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York, came as the panel struck down the federal law prohibiting federal recognition of same-sex marriage. It is the first time that a federal appeals court has applied this level of constitutional protection — known as heightened scrutiny — to those unions. The case is now considered by some legal scholars to be the leading candidate for a Supreme Court review of the same-sex marriage issue.

Thursday’s decision was the second by a federal appeals court striking down the Defense of Marriage Act. Now the case, Windsor v. United States, could be considered by the Supreme Court, or the court could choose other cases in its pipeline concerning same-sex marriage. Those include an earlier decision on the act by the First Circuit in Boston and one from the Ninth Circuit overturning California’s ban on same-sex marriage. It could also decide to hear all of them.

“It’s an incredible moment in the struggle for gay rights in this country,” said James D. Esseks, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s project dealing with lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues.

The new case was brought on behalf of Edith Windsor of New York City, who married her longtime partner, Thea Clara Spyer, in 2007 in Canada. When Ms. Spyer died in 2009, Ms. Windsor inherited her property. Because the Internal Revenue Service was not allowed, under the Defense of Marriage Act, to consider her a surviving spouse, she faced a tax bill of $363,053 that she would not have had to pay if the marriage had been recognized.

Read more from this story HERE.

Manager Who Posted Comments Critical of Gay Marriage on Private Facebook Account Demoted (+video)

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By Bob Unruh. A court trial is under way in the United Kingdom to determine if a Christian manager of a housing organization should be compensated for damages because his employer demoted and penalized him for stating his biblical beliefs on his private Facebook page.

Smith lost his managerial position and had his salary cut by 40 percent after his employer, Trafford Housing Trust, told him his private Facebook page posting, to which only he and his friends had access, violated its standards of conduct.

The case developed in February 2011 when Smith saw a news article titled “Gay church marriages get go ahead.”

He linked to the story and wrote, “An equality too far.”

One of his coworkers asked him to explain, and he responded: “I don’t understand why people who have no faith and don’t believe in Christ would want to get hitched in church. The Bible is quite specific that marriage is for men and women. If the state wants to offer civil marriage to the same sex then that is up to the state; but the state shouldn’t impose its rules on places of faith and conscience.” Read more from this story HERE.

Here’s a BBC update on the case:

Video: Ann Romney Says She’s Prolife but Mitt was a Prochoice Governor

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By Hugo Gye and Meghan Keneally. The wife of the Republican presidential candidate gave a passionate defense of the pro-life stance held by her and her husband during an appearance on daytime talk show The View.

Ann Romney said she will not be the one making the decisions but her husband, who is now running as a pro-life candidate in spite of serving as a pro-choice governor of Massachusetts.

‘The good news is, I’m not running for office and I don’t have to say what I feel. But I am pro life. I’m happy to say that,’ she said.

‘He could not have, on his conscience, creating human life for experimentation,’ she said in reference to Mr Romney’s decision against stem cell research during his time as governor.

‘That’s when he came out saying he was pro life. I think we all have to understand this is an issue that is so tender and there are people on both sides of the issue, with very good conscience, coming with a different opinion.’ Read more from this story HERE.

Here’s Ann Romney’s interview on the View:

Aerosmith Lead Singer’s Aborted Child’s Mother to Speak at Prolife Benefit

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American Idol judge and Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler will not be at the annual benefit dinner for the Life Legal Defense Foundation next month. But his one-time fiancé and mother of his aborted child will.

Julia Holcomb will relate the story of how her relationship with the rock star in the late 1970s resulted in an abortion that nearly destroyed both of them.

Holcomb began telling her story recently after Tyler’s comments about the abortion and his regrets over it surfaced in Walk this Way: The Autobiography of Aerosmith, a book about Tyler’s life.

Holcomb’s own journey led her through pain, trauma, and abuse, but came full circle on the road to recovery that eventually returned her to the church. Today, she offers a passionate plea to end the sexual exploitation of young women and the tragedy of abortion. After decades of silence, Julia Holcomb is now a fierce advocate for respecting the life of unborn children and strengthening the sanctity of marriage.

“The Life Legal Defense Foundation stands up for those who speak out to save innocent lives and prevent women from experiencing suffering as Julia Holcomb did following her abortion,” said Dana Cody, Executive Director of the Life Legal Defense Foundation.

Read more from this story HERE.