The National Council of the Boy Scouts of America passed a resolution permitting openly gay youth the participate in scouting activities on Thursday afternoon at a national meeting in Grapevine, Texas. Passed by a vote of 61% among 1,400 members, the resolution will go into effect in January 2014, and overturns more than century of organizational precedent.
The officer in charge of the Air Force's sexual assault prevention office has been charged... with sexual assault, for allegedly grabbing a woman's breasts and butt in a parking lot. According to police, the woman fought him. And judging by the photo of his face, well, she beat him up.
Today in viral videos: evidence from the streets of London that the Dame can do no wrong, a dog that will never give up, and the seven-month-old water skier who reminds us that the world is in good hands.
The very horny and very loud insects haven't arrived in full force for the Mid-Atlantic cicada sex invasion quite yet, but when they do, they will come with a huge body-count advantage over people, outnumbering us 600-to-1, or maybe even 20,000-to-1.
The league's roster of outspoken gay rights supporters has been depleted, and just when the NFL appears to need them most: Football is preparing for its own Jason Collins moment, a week after the first major American team sport athlete came out. But were these less prominent voices released because of their loud voices on the NFL's big gay issues, or because they weren't good enough? And will the real Pro Bowlers please stand up?
Federal authorities have apparently determined that the biggest threat posed by 19-year-old Robel Phillipos now is telling dumb lies about visiting an alleged terrorist's dorm room, not fleeing a side investigation into how his pals threw out a backpack full of explosives.
Nobody told Kurtz, but four years before Collins came out of the closet, he was engaged to Carolyn Moos. And nobody told Moos that Collins was gay until a few days ago, but now she wants to tell — or at least sell — her story to the world.
Jill Lawrence on bogus arguments against gun control, Nancy DiTomaso on how social networks affect black unemployment, Kelefa Sanneh on David Graeber's anarchy, Lisa Miller on NYU Abu Dhabi, and Marin Cogan on the intoxication of power.
At least one of three State Department witnesses at a Congressional hearing on Wednesday will testify that Hillary Clinton willfully ignored the advice of his counterterror group within the department, and that he has been threatened about saying as much in public, and that al-Qaeda was involved all along.
The funeral home where 26-year-old Boston bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev is having the hardest time finding somewhere to bury him. The city of Cambridge, Mass. where the Tsarnaev family settled when they came to the U.S. from Dagestan won't take him.
In an investigation that seems to go in a new direction every other day, some incriminating evidence is causing officials to take a deeper look into Katherine Russell, the 24-year-old of Tamerlan Tsarnaev.
Mountain Dew has had a bad week in advertising.
Today in viral videos: a joke about chips to use this weekend, a fix for Walking Dead withdrawal, and the only Iron Man 3 primer you need.
You'd think people would learn by now to avoid ever invoking the Nazis to defend yourself in an argument, but the former Bush press secretary turned pundit probably wishes he could take his most recent CNN debate point back.
The late Beastie Boy Adam Yauch (a.k.a MCA) has received the "ultimate honor for a kid from New York City" with a Brooklyn Heights park named after him as of Friday afternoon.
Robel Phillipos was the third name we heard on May 1, when the FBI announced that they had arrested three more suspects connected to the Boston bombings last month. Phillipos's past and character isn't as much of a mystery to us as fellow suspects Dias Kadyrbayev and Azamat Tazhayakov, but the question still remains, how did this former daycare worker turn into a suspect?
Nussaibah Younis on the Iraqi prime minister, Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry on how to think about retirement, Marco Rubio on immigration reform, Jodi Jacobson on a "Gosnell Amendment," and Keguro Macharia on giving up.
In a plot more nefarious — and real — than Walt and Jessie's fictional run on methylamine, the plant that exploded two weeks ago was a frequent target of theft and sabotage. Not from farmers looking for free soil supplements, apparently, but from people looking to acquire one of the key ingredients for making methamphetamine.
For a few brief shining moments on Friday morning, The Drudge Report's splashy top story linked to a "news" report from The Daily Currant about New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg that is not even close to being true.
Wildfire season is off to a troubling start in Ventura County, California, where a wildfire raged all day Thursday and burned at least 10 square miles, including a very toxic pesticide plant.
As more details of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's bedside interrogation leak out, we learned on Thursday night that the brothers originally planned a Fourth of July attack but built their bomb too quickly, leading them to consider another target.
Hope you're hungry for schadenfreude, because The New York Times's recent Thursday styles piece on "Will.i.amsburg" was not only laughable, it was incorrect. And somehow, so are the corrections.
Rhode Island became the tenth state in the nation to legalize gay marriage on Thursday evening, when Governor Lincoln Chafee signed the recently passed bill into law. The final vote wasn't even close.
After an 11-year study, the CDC has come to a startling conclusion: more people now die in this country by their own hand than from car accidents. And an even more shocking discovery behind the jump — and perhaps a key to the way we think about suicide next — is how many of America's Baby Boomers are taking their own lives.
For the first time, the FBI has added a woman to its "Most Wanted Terrorists" list. There are a number of caveats that temper that benchmark, including that Joanne Chesimard's crime is probably not the sort of terrorism that you might assume.
A key fight over efforts to curb climate change is happening in the relative anonymity of various state legislatures. Colorado just voted to increase its use of renewable energy. North Carolina voted to do the opposite. But only one side wins.
People of the Acela corridor: The time to prepare for four to six weeks of the little six-legged sexual power saws is over. People of America: The invasion is here. Prepare your backyards — and your ears.
Alex Pareene on Howard Kurtz's Jason Collins mistake, Matthew Yglesias on Medicaid in Oregon, Matthew K. Lewis on liberalism, Gary Marcus on replication in social psychology, and Daniel Henninger on Obama's permanent campaign.
If you weigh more than 260 lbs. you technically (the Department of Transportation won't "strictly" enforce this) aren't allowed to use one of New York City's nifty new shared bikes. Cue the outrage, cries of discrimination and, of course, a shameless New York Post picture of a very large man on a tiny bike.
Oh no. It's happening again. The New York Times is discovering that Brooklyn is a popular place, and it's running trend pieces about how hipsters love the Williamsburg neighborhood therein. But this latest edition is more trollish than the others
PublicMind Polls released a doozy on Wednesday afternoon. According to their research, Americans generally want new gun laws. Oh, and a quarter of us see a conspiracy in the Sandy Hook shootings and three-in-ten think armed rebellion is imminently necessary.
The United States government drastically underestimated the amount of oil and natural gas in North Dakota and Montana. And its new estimates may still be too low.
The most ravenously picked apart teenage digital trail in the history of American terrorism got picked apart again Wednesday afternoon: If you unravel the criminal complaint against Tsarnaev's fellow 19-year-old friend, you'll find an instantly historic LOL. But LOL has lost its historical significance, and everybody needs to calm down with their investigative linguistics.
According to the criminal complaints filed against the three new suspects in the Boston bombing case, here's how they became involved in the entire affair.
The people responsible for a large percentage of America's gun violence are worried that New York's strict new gun laws will severely affect them. Sounds good. Except that the people all work for Hollywood.
Three of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's college classmates have apparently been arrested for aiding Tsarnaev after the bombings, and according to one veteran criminal defense lawyer, this is a common development. We spoke with Ron Kuby in an effort to learn how arrests like this happen — and how associates of alleged criminals might be implicated.
It appears we've already been introduced to two of the three new suspects in the Boston bombing investigation: Azamat Tazhayakov and Dias Kadyrbayev, young Kazakh men now coming under the public microscope. As the federal charges against all three continue to unfold, here's a running biography of the men who may have helped their accused terrorist classmate — not roommate — after the bombing, based on combined news reports, social media, and beyond.
When you buy gasoline, as you know, you're paying for more than the gasoline itself. Twice a year, the government tracks how much people in each state are paying in tax — and the highest taxes may not be where you'd think.
The ad features a song including the lyric "ching ching, chop suey," plus other references that offended Asian viewers as well as dated depictions of the Middle East. Perhaps the strangest part of the scandal is that each of those references offended different markets in the rollout in a different way, leading to bifurcated self-censorship by one of the largest car companies on Earth.
Blake Zeff on the real Anthony Weiner, Thomas L. Friedman on mediocrity, Amy Davidson on the hunger strike at Guantanamo, Jonathan Chait on opinion journalism, and Helena Fitzgerald on teenagers' online lives.
Three friends of Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev are accused of obstructing justice after the fact by destroying evidence from his apartment. Here's how a sudden development in the case unfolded Wednesday.
There are anecdotal reports that the Congressional race in South Carolina just took a nasty turn, with a pollster insinuating that Colbert Busch, among other things, had an abortion. South Carolina has a history of such smears — and such reports.
Seven out of ten Americans support the death penalty for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev if he's found guilty of his role in the Boston marathon bombings. There are some reports, however, that the punishment may be negotiated away.
As of Wednesday morning, at midnight, same-sex couples in Colorado were finally allowed to get a civil union — and, more importantly, to get that union recognized by the state. These are just some of the hundreds of happy couples from Denver and beyond.
The American Orthotic and Prosthetic Association (AOPA) told reporters on Tuesday afternoon that it would provide prosthetics to the estimated 20 to 25 victims of the Boston bombings who lost limbs.
Yes, this story gets weider: Police have found evidence indicating that the man arrested for sending ricin-tainted letters to D.C. attempted to create the poison. According to the AP, a dust mask found in Everett Dutschke's martial arts studio tested positive for the potent poison.
Zimmerman and his attorneys appeared in court to waive his right to seek an immunity hearing under Florida's "Stand Your Ground" law — and keep the rest of their strategy close to the vest. His fate in the killing of Trayvon Martin will now be put in the hands of a jury beginning June 10, when one of the most emotional trials in recent American history will begin.
During the second half of last year — the hottest recorded year in U.S. history — ocean temperatures off the East Coast also hit their highest temperatures in the 150 years measurements have been kept. It's not a comforting record.
The trial of Philadelphia doctor Kermit Gosnell has been sent to the jury for deliberations. The trial hasn't inspired a flurry of news articles, though — mostly because nothing much of interest is happening in the trial.
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