‘Mother F***er Racist Sons of B**ches From Hell’: Wedding Venue Gets Threats, Fears Shut Down After Refusing Gay Couple’s Nuptials

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Another business is facing retribution for declining service to a same-sex couple. Betty and Dick Odgaard, owners of Görtz Haus Gallery in Grimes, Iowa, are catching the ire of gay rights advocates after they declined offering their venue to Lee Stafford and his fiance Jared.

Now the owners, who are Christians, are receiving vicious and threatening emails and phone calls — and they fear that their business could shut down because of the fierce reaction.

It was less than one week ago that the Lee and Jared entered Görtz Haus looking for additional information about holding their wedding there. After Dick realized that it would be a gay ceremony, he told the couple that they would not be able to hold their nuptials at the establishment — and that’s when the controversy erupted.

“It started with emails and we noticed the emails were from a person with a name that looked like a man’s name. We’re a little suspicious about it and … two fellows walked in and that’s where it all began,” Dick told TheBlaze on Friday. “It was obvious what the situation was. I had to confirm it. I asked if this was a gay marriage celebration and I said we can’t take your money for this.”

From there, news spread that the Odgaards turned the couple away. Before long, phone calls and emails came streaming in. Betty said that some people have promised that the furor won’t stop until the business, which is a bistro, flower shop and a wedding destination, shuts down. Detractors have called Betty and Dick “haters.”

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Darrell Issa Subpoenas Treasury Department Over Auto Bailout Documents

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Claiming that it has turned over “only a fraction” of the requested documents, House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., sent a subpoena today to Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew regarding the 2009 taxpayer-funded $50 billion bailout of General Motors.

“Taxpayers deserve the full truth about how decisions were made to use their money in an Administration effort that resulted in protecting generous pensions for unionized Delphi employees while greatly diminishing benefits for non-unionized employees,” Issa said in the letter. The chairman has been investigating the matter since 2010.

For over a year, Treasury has slow-walked his document requests, he claimed.

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Obamacare Installs New Scrutiny, Fines for Charitable Hospitals that Treat Uninsured People

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Charitable hospitals that treat uninsured Americans will be subjected to new levels of scrutiny of their nonprofit status and could face sizable new fines under Obamacare.

A new provision in Section 501 of the Internal Revenue Code, which takes effect under Obamacare, sets new standards of review and installs new financial penalties for tax-exempt charitable hospitals, which devote a minimum amount of their expenses to treat uninsured poor people. Approximately 60 percent of American hospitals are currently nonprofit.

Charity for the uninsured is one of the factors that could discourage enrollment in Obamacare, which requires all Americans to purchase health insurance or else face new taxes themselves from the IRS.

“It requires tax-exempt hospitals to do a community needs survey and file additional paperwork with the IRS every three years. This is to prove that the charitable hospital is still needed in their geographical area — ‘needed’ as defined by Obamacare and overseen by IRS bureaucrats,” said John Kartch, spokesman for Americans for Tax Reform.

“Failure to comply, or to prove this continuing need, could result in the loss of the hospital’s tax-exempt status. The hospital would then become a for-profit venture, paying income tax — hence the positive revenue score” for the federal government, Kartch said. “Obamacare advocates turned over every rock to find as much tax money as possible.”

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Media Fail: 63% Want Congress to Keep Going After ObamaCare

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One of the new talking points we are seeing throughout the mainstream media is a mocking “Here we go again” attack-narrative against the Republican Congress as they maneuver to defund ObamaCare, or work to kill various parts of ObamaCare. But a new poll shows that almost two-thirds of the American people want Congress to keep at it.

Fox News notes that when asked if the “health care law needs to be changed and Congress should keep at it, 63% said yes. That is up from 58% a year ago.”

Only 31% oppose.

Watching the news coverage these days, you get the sense that America is tired of Congress going after ObamaCare. But just the opposite is true.

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Goldwater Institute to Durbin: ‘Have you no decency?’

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Conservative groups lambasted Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D., Ill.) after the lawmaker sent a letter to hundreds of alleged donors to the American Legislative Exchange Committee (ALEC) asking if they still supported ALEC and so-called “stand your ground” laws.

Durbin sent a letter to hundreds of suspected ALEC donors asking “whether companies that have funded ALEC’s operations in the past currently support ALEC and the model ‘stand your ground’ legislation.”

“Have you no sense of decency?” the Goldwater Institute responded in a letter to Durbin echoing a famous question posed to Sen. Joseph McCarthy.

“It is the same question we pose to your office today in response to your effort to intimidate us for daring to associate with the free market, limited government organization known as the American Legislative Exchange Council,” the Goldwater Institute continued.

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Obama Offers Up Surprise Benghazi Revelation During Presidential Press Conference (+video)

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President Barack Obama revealed for the first time the existence of a sealed indictment in the Benghazi terror attack, a move that would mean legal trouble for anyone other than the commander-in-chief.

During a presidential press conference on Friday, Obama was asked why justice has been slow in the aftermath of the Benghazi attack that left four Americans dead, including U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens.

“[W]e have informed, I think, the public that there’s a sealed indictment,” the president said. “It’s sealed for a reason. But we are intent on capturing those who carried out this attack, and we’re going to stay on it until we get them.”

While it was widely reported that the first “charges” in the Benghazi investigation had been filed, Obama’s comments marked the only official confirmation on record of a sealed indictment. Administration and intelligence officials have repeatedly refused to confirm reports of a sealed indictment.

There’s a reason no one has been willing to talk. Under federal law, “no person may disclose [a sealed] indictment’s existence,” and a “knowing violation … may be punished as a contempt of court,” ABC News reports.

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‘We’re Ready for Battle’: Sheriff Joe Arpaio Arms Officers With AR-15-Style Rifles After Comrade Was Killed in Driveway (+video)

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PHOENIX (TheBlaze/AP) — A detention officer with the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office died Thursday after being shot in the driveway of his Arizona home while he prepared to head to work. Now, all officers in the department are being armed with rifles by the direction of Sheriff Joe Arpaio for added protection.

Jorge Vargas, 27, was rushed to a hospital after the 4 a.m. attack and died a short time later, Phoenix police Sgt. Trent Crump said.

No one was in custody yet and there was no information on a motive.

“It’s really a whodunit,” Crump said, adding that investigators are looking into whether the shooting was connected to the victim’s job.

“Anytime we have a homicide and the suspect is unknown, we start with our victim,” Crump said. “But we can’t rule out a random act.”

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Tim Scott Denounces Harry Reid’s Remarks on Race

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Sen. Tim Scott, the U.S. Senate’s only black lawmaker, said Friday he is “disappointed” in Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s “offensive” comments about race made during a call-in radio show in Nevada.

Reid, a Democrat, said Friday he “seriously” hopes that Republicans are not blocking President Obama’s initiatives because he is black.

Reid was was responding to a caller who asked him if he believes Republicans are working to make President Obama a failure, which some Republicans had signaled they would do when he was first elected . . .

Reid paused, then added, “I say this seriously. I hope it’s based on substance, and not the fact that he is African American.”

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Coal Country Begs Obama for Mercy as Hundreds of Coal Plants Ready for Closing

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Coal industry lobbyists and politicians have been urging the Obama administration to ease up on its regulatory agenda and craft carbon dioxide emission rules that would allow the coal industry to survive.

All the while, reports indicate that hundreds of coal plants are slated to be shut down in the coming years.

The unveiling of President Obama’s plan to cut carbon dioxide emissions from coal-fired power plants earlier this summer stoked the fears of coal supporters who have already been hit hard by stricter environmental regulations.

However, the industry is not going down without a fight.

Coal lobbyists met with White House officials at the end of July, the Hill newspaper reports, to ask the administration to consider a plan that would allow new coal plants to be built.

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Bill to Allow Transgender Students to Choose Bathrooms Moves to California Governor’s Desk

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A bill that would let school kids use whatever bathroom or play on whichever sports team they believe matches their gender identity – and not necessarily their anatomy – is on the desk of California Gov. Jerry Brown.

Brown won’t say what he plans to do, but the measure passed easily in the two legislative chambers despite criticism from conservative groups who want biology to dictate bathroom use.

Supporters say transgendered kids feel alienated when they can’t use the bathroom of the sex with which they associate.

The law would end exclusion that “negatively impacts students’ ability to succeed in school and graduate with their class,” said Jesse Melgar, a spokesman for Equality California.

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