This is to request that you investigate Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the Catholic Church, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Knights of Columbus for apparent violations of 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organizations, which by law may not attempt to influence legislation as a substantial part of their activities and may not participate in any campaign activity for or against political candidates.

We have read the Special Rules Limiting IRS Authority to Audit a Church and believe that the Catholic Church and its associated theocratic entities violate statutes in a way constistent with IRS protocol for initiating an investigation.

The Catholic Church and Cardinal Dolan have declared war against the candidacy of President Barack Obama.

Cardinal Francis George of Chicago sent two threatening letters to the president, protesting his support for the rights of LGBT Americans, before Dolan on September 20, 2011 sent Obama a threatening letter, in which he said that if Obama continued to support LGBT Americans’ rights, he would “precipitate a national conflict between Church and State of enormous proportions.” Dolan’s threatening letter was publicly posted on the US Conference of Catholic Bishops website and linked to Dolan’s blog.

They note that:

Support for same-sex marriage has been growing in the general population since at least the mid-1990s. That trend has been evident among blacks as well — but at a considerably slower pace. A poll conducted by Pew Research in April, just a few weeks before Mr. Obama’s announcement, found 39 percent of blacks supporting gay marriage and 49 percent opposing it. By contrast, a plurality of white Americans supported gay marriage in the Pew poll, as they have in most other recent surveys.

A recent ABC News/Washington Post poll found that 59% of Blacks favor same-sex marriage.

538 also notes that:

There is reason to be cautious in interpreting these numbers. First, polling has tended to overestimate support for same-sex marriage ballot referendums by about seven percentage points. In addition, the sample sizes for demographic subgroups like African-Americans are small, producing large margins of error.

In the end, the thinking is more that Obama’s announcement made it easier for various Blacks to actually voice their support rather than actually changing people’s minds. A study conducted by Melissa R. Michelson and Brian F. Harrison found that the race of the caller in polling actually effects support for same-sex marriage. Michelson stated that “So if it was an African-American calling an African-American, then they were much more likely to say they were a supporter of same-sex marriage. We don’t think people were changing their minds, but they felt more comfortable” expressing support for same-sex marriage.

J. Michael Bitzer also noted “I certainly want to see several more polls. But if these kinds of early signals are being sent, then we could see a significant transformation on same-sex marriage in the African-American community.”

Still, basically, it doesn’t look like there’s going to be a lot of people leaving Obama over same-sex marriage.

The old ‘if you hate them, put them in concentration camps’ part of the Bible, right?

David Freidman, the regional director of the Anti-Defamation League in Washington, DC, stated “Pastor Worley’s videotaped remarks are deplorable, inexcusable and incompatible with the tenets of his faith. Pastor Worley owes the LGBT community and the people of Maiden, North Carolina a swift and unequivocal apology.”

The Huffington Post reported that:

Christopher Brook, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina, said the church had posted the entire sermon on its website for a few days, and the Catawba Valley Citizens Against Hate had grabbed the clip and posted it on YouTube. The clip had been viewed 689,000 times by Thursday.

Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a religious liberty watchdog group, has filed a complaint with the Internal Revenue Service, asking that it investigate the tax exempt status of Providence Road Baptist Church.

Reverend Barry W. Lynn, the executive director of Americans United said “Pastor Worley’s vicious and mean-spirited assault on gays and lesbians is bad enough. His pulpit command that people not vote for President Obama is a violation of federal tax law. I urge the IRS to act swiftly to investigate the matter.”

In the sermon, Worley not only denounces same-sex marriage, but President Barack Obama’s support for it, and even goes so far as to state in the sermon that “our president getting up and saying that it was all right for two women to marry or two men to marry. I was disappointed bad. The Bible is against it, God is against and I’m against it. . .Somebody said, ‘Who are you going to vote for?’ I ain’t going to vote for a baby killer and a homosexual lover. You said, ‘Did you mean to say that?’ You better believe I did.”

Lynn stated that Worley’s statements are a clear violation of federal law because it prohibits all non-profit groups from intervening in elections by endorsing or opposing candidates. The demonstration is set “for Sunday morning at the Catawba County Justice Center in Newton, North Carolina, according to an invitation posed on the Catawba Valley Citizens Against Hate Facebook page.”

“The amalgamation of the races is not only unnatural, but is always productive of deplorable results. The purity of the public morals, the moral
and physical development of both races, and the highest advancement of civilization . . . all require that [the races] should be kept distinctly separate,
and that connections and alliances so unnatural should be prohibited by positive law and subject to no evasion.”

And

“The amalgamation of the races is not only unnatural, but is always productive of deplorable results. The purity of the public morals, the moral
and physical development of both races, and the highest advancement of civilization . . . all require that [the races] should be kept distinctly separate,
and that connections and alliances so unnatural should be prohibited by positive law and subject to no evasion.”

Oh, and my favorite:

“[T]he State’s prohibition of interracial marriage . . . stands on the same footing as the prohibition of polygamous marriage, or incestuous marriage, or
the prescription of minimum ages at which people may marry, and the prevention of the marriage of people who are mentally incompetent.”

And, if those look familiar, well, that is because they are being said today about same-sex marriage.

It is not surprising that the decision by the NAACP to come out in support of same-sex marriage has angered some of the more ardent bigots within the religious community, and that many pastors are harshly critical of this. For instance, Pastor Derek McCoy, the executive director of the Maryland Marriage Alliance- a group dedicated to the destruction of marriage through exclusivity- called the NAACP’s stance “unfortunate” and claimed that it would contribute to the “further demise of the family”, though he seemed to not have any actual statements regarding how.

McCoy claimed that the NAACP was “endorsing an epidemic” of fatherless households, perhaps not quite grasping that the problem is not not having a father, but not having a two parent household. Recent polling has shown that there is a shift, though, in the Black Community towards acceptance of same-sex unions thanks to the decision of President Barack Obama, General Colin Powell, actor Will Smith and the NAACP coming out in favor of these unions.

According to the Catholic News Agency:

McCoy said that redefining marriage is redefining the family in a way that is “hazardous” for children.

“Gay marriage” teaches that fathers and mothers are both dispensable, he explained, and “this is absolutely going to harm the family.”

The absence of a father has been linked to higher rates of crime, poverty, drug abuse and teenage pregnancy throughout the U.S.

Actually, the absence of two parent households have been linked to crime, poverty, drug abuse and teenage pregnancy in the US. The studies used to attack same-sex marriage are almost always ones which compare two parent households to single parent households. Studies have shown that there is little appreciable difference between same-sex parents and opposite sex parents when it comes to parenting, how their children will grow up, and the like. This is deliberately ignored by the Religious Right.

McCoy also tried to dismiss attempts to “compare” same-sex marriage opponents to those who oppose interracial marriage claiming that it is not the same issue at all, and that “The core essence of a marriage is the two sexes coming together.” Which is a religious based belief, and is reflected in the attacks on interracial marriage all those decades ago.

Alveda C. King, the niece of Martin Luther King Jr and ardent homophobe, also tried to claim that her grandfather and uncle would never have “embraced the homosexual agenda that the current NAACP is attempting to label as a civil rights agenda.

Reverend William Owens, founder of the Coalition of African American Pastors, also claimed that “We who marched with Rev. King did not march one inch or one mile to promote same-sex marriage.” Owens also went on to claim that same-sex marriage was counter to Dr. King’s work because it was an attempt to “declare that an act contrary to God’s law and to the natural law is a civil right. We call on all Americans to respect the legitimate civil rights of gay people to be free from violence, harassment, to vote, to hold jobs. But none of us has a moral or civil right to redefine marriage.”

Back about fifty years ago, this was said:

“[A]t the very time the Constitution of the United States was being formulated, miscegenation was considered inimical to the public good and was frowned upon by the colonies, and continued to be so regarded and prohibited in states having any substantial admixture of population at the time the 14th amendment was adopted.”

And this:

“Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his
arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix.”

It is ultimately sad to hear the words of the racists in the mouths of those they sought to oppress.

President Obama

Getting President Barack Obama to fight for LGBT rights has not always been easy, but he has done quite a lot for LGBT rights over the past four years. In the above campaign spot, Obama and supporter Jane Lynch outline what Obama has done in four years to secure more LGBT rights. Obama has done a lot for LGBT rights, and his decision to support same-sex marriage has only helped to secure some more moderate votes, but has not driven away any of the votes that would never have voted for him anyway.

The decision is in a class-action lawsuit. It is the first decision to be handed down since President Barack Obama announced his support for same-sex marriage.

Wilken is just the latest judge to rule in this manner. Conservative and liberal judges have upheld the Constitution and its provisions which render DOMA unconstitutional. Wilken found, like many others, that Section 3 of DOMA, which is the federal definition of marriage and spouse, “vilates the equal protection rights of Plaintiff same-sex spouses.” Furthermore, subparagraph C of Section 7702B(f) of the Internal Revenue Code “violates the equal protection rights of Plaintiff registered domestic partners.” The court found that “both provisions are constitutionally invalid to the extent that they exclude Plaintiff same-sex spouses and registered domestic partners from enrollment in the CalPERS long-term care plan.”

Wilken ordered CalPERS not to use DOMA or that tax provision to deny enrollment to same-sex spouses and domestic partners in California. She also ordered that the federal government not disqualify CalPERS’ plan from the beneficial tax treatment for following her order. The order, however, has been stayed to see if there will be an appeal.

According to MetroWeekly:

The case comes about because, even if CalPERS wanted to allow the participation of same-sex married couples or domestic partners in its long-term care program, Section 7702B(f)(2) of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) disqualifies a state-maintained plan from favorable tax treatment if it provides coverage to individuals other than those specified under the tax-code provision, which was signed into law a month before DOMA was in 1996. As Wilken noted, “The list of eligible individuals in Section 7702B(f)(2)(C) includes state employees and former employees, their spouses, and individuals bearing a relationship to the employees or spouses which is described in subparagraphs (A) through (G) of 26 U.S.C. § 152(d)(2).” Wilken found the decision to include subparagraphs (A) through (G) — and not (H) — of the underlying tax provision relevant because subparagraph (H) would have allowed for coverage for domestic partners, among others.

Of course, OMM has had no success in actually getting anyone to listen to them. Archie Comics went through with their same-sex marriage storyline- and will have a story about gender swapping soon. Of course, that isn’t stopping OMM from issuing their usual statement condemning this move and crying “think of the children”- that’s right, we can use the children that’s why we’re forming a Children’s Brigade.

Sorry, drifted off into Futurama there.

Their letter, which is below, runs the usual line of thought about how children become gay if they are exposed to homosexuality at an early age. This is rather silly since many lesbians and gays who are adults today didn’t know that they were normal until AFTER they were adults. (Heck, the first time I even knew someone could be lesbian or gay I was 15!)

Here is OMM’s rant:

Part 1: DC Comics recently announced one of their most popular, but as of yet unnamed, prominent characters will soon be coming out of the closet. DC Comics, owned by Warner Bros. Entertainment Company, has decided that one of their beloved superheroes will be homosexual. Who will they choose; Batman, Superman, Flash, Green Lantern, Plastic Man, or another one of their characters that children look up to?

Last year, DC Comics Co-publisher Dan DiDio said that the company would not change the sexual orientation of an existing superhero and would bring in a new one altogether. Parents may have been able to avoid a new character since it would not be one many children have grown to admire. DiDio has changed his mind and will not be introducing a brand new character. They will feature an existing character who was previously assumed to be straight, will now become openly gay. Senior VP Sales Bob Wayne said DiDio’s view ‘had evolved’, comparing the shift to Barack Obama’s recent endorsement of same-sex marriage, according to a report. DiDio did not specify which character would ‘come out’ or in which issue it would be featured. It will likely be a June issue during LBGT month, joining lesbian character Batwoman.

Part 2: And to make matters more shocking, Marvel, now owned by Disney, followed DC Comics’ announcement with a surprise of their own. Northstar, Marvel’s first openly gay hero, is going to tie the knot with his boyfriend in the current issue of “Astonishing X-Men.” This is the first same-sex wedding in a superhero comic book.

In “Astonishing X-Men” #50, which hit comic shop shelves Wednesday, Northstar proposes to his boyfriend, Kyle, a fellow snow sports enthusiast who possesses no superpowers. The couple will seal the deal in issue #51, slated for a June 20 release.

“The story of Northstar and Kyle is universal, and at the core of everything I write: a powerful love between two people who have to fight for it against all odds,” said X-Men comic writer Marjorie Liu in a statement.

Children desire to be just like superheroes. Children mimic superhero actions and even dress up in costumes to resemble these characters as much as possible. Can you imagine little boys saying, “I want a boyfriend or husband like X-Men?”

This is ridiculous! Why do adult gay men need comic superheroes as role models? They don’t but do want to indoctrate impressionable young minds by placing these gay characters on pedestals in a positive light. These companies are heavily influencing our youth by using children’s superheroes to desensitize and brainwash them in thinking that a gay lifestyle choice is normal and desirable. As Christians, we know that homosexuality is a sin (Romans 1:26-27).

Unfortunately, children are now being exposed to homosexuality at an early age. Comic books would be one of the last places a parent would expect their child to be confronted with homosexual topics that are too complicated for them to understand. Children do not know what straight, homosexual, or coming out of the closet even means, but DC Comics and Marvel are using superheroes to confuse them on this topic to raise questions and awareness of an alternative lifestyle choice. These companies are prompting a premature discussion on sexual orientation.

Northstar’s wedding will be the first same-sex wedding in the world of mainstream superhero comics, but not the first gay comic books character. Earlier this year One Million Moms emailed Toys ‘R’ Us concerning the “Life With Archie” No. 16 with two gay characters getting hitched. Toys ‘R’ Us had the audacity to display “Archie- Just Married” at the front of the store by the checkout counters.

Dylan in 2011

Today we wish a very happy 71st birthday to a musical legend, Mr. Bob Dylan.

Born Robert Allen Zimmerman on May 24, 1941, Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician and artist. He has been an influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly reluctant figurehead of social unrest. A number of Dylan’s early songs, such as “Blowin’ in the Wind” and “The Times They Are a-Changin’”, became anthems for the US civil rightsand anti-war movements.

Leaving his initial base in the culture of folk music behind, Dylan’s six-minute single “Like a Rolling Stone” has been described as radically altering the parameters of popular music in 1965. However, his recordings employing electric instruments attracted denunciation and criticism from others in the folk movement.

Dylan age 19

Dylan’s lyrics incorporated a variety of political, social, philosophical, and literary influences. They defied existing pop music conventions and appealed hugely to the then burgeoning counterculture. Initially inspired by the songs of Woody Guthrie, Robert Johnson, and Hank Williams, as well as the music and performance styles of Buddy Holly and Little Richard,Dylan has both amplified and personalized musical genres. His recording career, spanning fifty years, has explored numerous distinct traditions in American song—from folk, blues and country to gospel, rock and roll, and rockabilly to English, Scottish, and Irish folk music, embracing even jazz and swing.

Dylan with guitar

Dylan performs with guitar, keyboards, and harmonica. Backed by a changing line-up of musicians, he has toured steadily since the late 1980s on what has been dubbed the Never Ending Tour. His accomplishments as a recording artist and performer have been central to his career, but his greatest contribution is generally considered to be his songwriting.

Since 1994, Dylan has published three books of drawings and paintings, and his work has been exhibited in major art galleries.As a songwriter and musician, Dylan has received numerous awards over the years including Grammy, Golden Globe, and Academy Awards; he has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, and Songwriters Hall of Fame. The Pulitzer Prize jury in 2008 awarded him a special citation for “his profound impact on popular music and American culture, marked by lyrical compositions of extraordinary poetic power.“  In April 2012, President Barack Obama named Dylan as a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Let’s listen to some Dylan together with one of my personal favorites, Tangled Up in Blue from 1974.

Related articles

• Bob Dylan: 20 best lyrics on his birthday (csmonitor.com)
• Bob Dylan to the White House next week (politico.com)
• Bob Dylan, Albright to receive Presidential Medal of Freedom (dawn.com)

Mitt and Ann Romney campaigning

Aware that he is having problems connecting with women, even with his wife explaining how much work goes into raising five sons, Mitt Romney is trying to bridge his gap with “personal” stories of women he has met and spoken with at small, private gatherings away from the press. He has quite a collection.

The press is not permitted to meet these women or to have names or addresses to verify their existence. And in some instances, those omissions raise questions about how these women’s stories relate to the policies Romney advocates. At a fundraiser last week, Romney explained to potential donors that “In some towns that I go to, I ask to get a group of women business owners, and I meet with them. I have them describe their experiences.” So, here are some of the stories he presents to rallies and fundraisers…

Romney describes the woman whose unemployed husband signed up for an upholstery class. When she queried her husband about his choice of retraining, he explained that there was a shortage of upholsterers in their area. She realized he was right, and opened an upholstery business where she employs her husband and 40 others. Romney thinks that was “pretty impressive.”

The first question I want answered is when did this happen? Forty employees is not something one starts off with, it’s something that is built up to. And then, where? I used to live in a small city in Georgia, population 17,000. There was an upholsterer in town, total personnel four people. Most of the furniture refinishing businesses I’ve known over the years are very small operations and upholsterers are even smaller. We have become a society that replaces furniture instead of refinishing it or reupholstering it, unless it’s an irreplaceable piece, an antique or something with great personal value. So, where and when, please?

Next up is a woman married to a caricature artist. As Romney explained, “It’s hard to make a great living out of just being a caricature artist. He does caricatures at county fairs and so forth.” So, the woman decided that she had to become the primary breadwinner. Having been born in Mexico and being fluently bi-lingual, she got a job translating construction manuals from English to Spanish. It’s “just remarkable!”

Really? How about visiting a Federal Court in the near future? You will find freelance translators in a variety of languages who are contracted for suspect interrogations and court proceedings. Pick up a newspaper or check jobs websites in any state with a large Hispanic population. You will find ads for bi-lingual employees. I’m not putting down this particular woman, but her story isn’t really all that remarkable. It is somewhat remarkable that she chose to support an artistic husband. It’s a pity Romney didn’t ask her about birth control which makes it possible for her to pursue her career instead of being perpetually pregnant and stuck at home collecting welfare or forcing her husband to go flip hamburgers and abandon his art.

One of Romney’s favorites, because it is twisted to his party’s narrative, is the lady who owns a trucking company. She used to buy new trucks every year and employs both men and women to drive them. But, now, she is waiting to buy new equipment, she is “uncertain how many new regulations or taxes the Democrats might force upon her in the coming months and prefers to wait to purchase big ticket items until a Republican is in the White House. She runs the place with a very strong hand, a very successful hand.”

New regulations, huh? She must be a Fox News viewer or has right wing radio on at work all day. President Obama has pushed to streamline business regulations, not increase them. She’s a small business owner. Her taxes have been reduced by this administration. The administration wants to make taxes more fair, not just heap new taxes on people, and there are new tax incentives for her business, like the credit for hiring unemployed veterans, many of whom have great experience at driving trucks. Interest rates are at nearly historic lows, so this is a perfect time for making large purchases. They will cost less over time. I’ve known truckers. The trucking industry suffers when gas prices are high. Long haulers are expected to take larger loads in less time. In a recession, with businesses closed and factories stilled, there is less cargo being shipped. There are a lot of reasons for this woman’s business to be suffering, but the threat of new regulations and phantom tax increases are not among them.

Now, this one defies explanation for why Romney includes it. He says he met a woman in Cleveland who just graduated from college, but is going back for a second degree because she can’t get a job in her field and can’t afford to make payments on her student loans, which are currently sitting at $40,000. If she goes back to school, she can put off making payments on her loans. Romney explains “She can’t find a job, so she’s doing three part-time jobs. She doesn’t know how they’re going to make it. She’s having a hard time.”

Oh, let me at it. She can’t find a full-time job because of four lovely people at the top of the Forbes 400 whose company showed American businesses that if they limited their employees to part-time, they would not have to provide benefits. It’s called “the WalMart model” inside the retail and hospitality industries, and it has spread to health care now. Kids who were working in supermarkets during college are still working there because they can’t find full-time jobs. Three that I knew had their degrees in education, where we are losing jobs instead of recovering them as states and town tighten their belts. And let’s not forget, Mitt Romney told students to get a loan from their parents to go to school or start businesses, and the Republicans are insisting on cutting programs to pay for lower interest rates for that woman’s student loans. Just how the hell is anything the Republicans are offering going to help this woman, or the millions of students and graduates out there who are holding a total of nearly one trillion dollars in debt?

Finally, Romney talks about a woman he met in Appleton, Wisconsin. She sells perfume in a department store. She and her husband had planned on being retired at this point, but the real estate they bought, two duplexes, have decreased in value. He says he has met other older women who are finding retirement eluding them.

I really don’t understand the duplex lady. How did the decrease in her property values decrease her income from three rental properties? Did her mortgage payments rise? If she lives in Wisconsin, I know that her property taxes have not risen in the past year, but did state property taxes impact their profit from the rentals? If the expenses of the properties rose, why didn’t they raise the rent? Any other landlord would have. This story makes less sense than any of the others.

When I look at my own situation, facing eleven months when my husband will be on Medicare and we don’t know how we will be able to afford medical insurance for me; when I get ready for work or watch my husband go off to work instead of enjoying a comfortable retirement, that’s when I remember something that happened in 1992. H. Ross Perot was running for President and had to release his tax returns. In 1991, Perot threw a million dollar wedding for his daughter Margo, but he paid less actual money in Federal income taxes than my family did – a family of four at a median income. Today, both Perot and his son are in the Forbes 400 billionaires list and my husband and I are working part-time to supplement his Social Security and pension. I don’t resent Mr. Perot’s wealth. I resent the taxes he didn’t pay and the entirely legal way he avoided paying fair taxes. And I resent the idea that I’m supposed to suffer cutbacks in Social Security and Medicare to pay for men like Henry Ross Perot to get even bigger tax breaks and better ways to avoid taxes.

Mitt Romney suffers from something greater than being out-of-touch with ordinary Americans. He’s intellectually lazy. He has this set of beliefs and he fits what he hears into them, even if he has to chop bits off the round peg to put it in the square hole. He only half-listens to what people are saying to him and has no point of reference to evaluate what is being said. I’m not sure which is worse, Mitt’s problems connecting with reality, or the fact that the Republican Party and their well-paid media shills have done such a spectacular job of turning their followers’ brains to mush.

Related articles

• After backing Romney in 2008, Ross Perot declines to endorse anyone for 2012(trailblazersblog.dallasnews.com)

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• Mitt Cites Perot (thepage.time.com)
• ‘A woman who. …’: Romney’s stories court females (goerie.com)

There are 7 Catholic organizations and 43 Catholic Dioceses that have filed a law suit on Monday against the federal government mandate requiring employers to include birth control in their health care plans

Catholic leaders contend the President Barack Obama’s-endorsed health care initiative requires employers to include coverage in their health benefit plans for abortion-inducing drugs, sterilization and artificial contraception, “all of which violate the Catholic Church’s teaching on the sanctity of human life and the dignity of the human person.

While individual State Catholic Conferences took the issue to court, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops has not involved themselves in this strategy as a national Catholic Conference. There appears to be a difference within the Conference on how best to approach this topic without getting involved in partisan politics. Currently 13 Dioceses out of 200 Catholic Dioceses are involved in this partisan political strategy of aligning with the GOP by taking a coordinated court approach which is sure to generate a lot of media coverage.

Cardinal Francis George of Chicago while supporting the efforts of those state conferences has not allowed the Illinois State Conference to get involved. Two dioceses in Illinois Springfield, and Joliet, however have decided to side with Cardinal Timothy Dolan and against Cardinal George’s approach to steer away from patrician politics.

New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said, “We have tried negotiation with the administration and legislation with the Congress, and we’ll keep at it, but there’s still no fix,” in explaining why Catholic institutions have resorted to the courts.

Cardinal Dolan has yet to explain what has our federal government done to impede the religious rights and intrude on religious freedoms? He can’t see through the mist of dogma.

Erin Shields, a spokeswoman for the Health and Human Services Department, said Monday the agency does not comment on pending litigation. The liberal advocacy group Catholics United accused the bishops of serving a “right-wing political agenda.”

The differences in approach highlights I think a division in US Conference of Catholic Bishops on strategy. Cardinal Dolan promotes the idea of victimization by the government of the Church; Cardinal George on the other hand promotes the idea of religious freedom. While the Rainbow Sash Movement disagrees with both of these approaches and supports women’s health over dogma. It would seem that Cardinal George is attempting to be reasonable in promoting his idea, while Cardinal Dolan foams at the mouth.

Besides Illinois, the lawsuits have been filed in seven states and the District of Columbia by the archdioceses of Washington and New York, the Michigan Catholic Conference, Catholic Charities in Mississippi, Missouri and Indiana, health care agencies in New York and two dioceses in Texas.

In any case, the horse has left the barn. If the Supreme Court found for the government against Amish paying social security and unemployment taxes the court will have no other recourse than to support the government’s current position on the birth control issue as far as Roman Catholic Hospitals, Universities and Charitable organizations are concerned, despite their religious belief.

Clearly there appears to division among Roman Catholic Bishops on what the best strategy should be. Now that the issue is in hands of the court only time will tell.

Powell, if everyone remembers, was the architect of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, which has now been repealed. Powell told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer that “It was the Congress that imposed ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,’ it was certainly my position, my recommendation to get us out of an even worse outcome that could have occurred.”

For Powell, the issue is not about religion, but about public policy. He stated “I respect the fact that many denominations have different points of view with respect to gay marriage and they can hold that in the sanctity in the place of their religion and not bless them or solemnize them.”

He also stated that he has “a lot of friends who are individually gay but are in partnerships with loved ones, and they are as stable a family as my family is and they raise children. And so I don’t see any reason not to say that they should be able to get married under the laws of their state or the laws of the country.”

Powell served as President George W. Bush’s Secretary of State, and is a moderate Republican.

Church member Geneva Sims stated that “So he had every right to say what he said about putting them in a pen and feeding them. The Bible says they are worthy of death. He only preaches the word…God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.”

So, where is Worley’s sermons calling for the stoning death of Mark Sanford, John Ensign, John Edwards, and all adulterers. The Bible is quite clear on this one, in fact. Adulterers are suppose to be stoned to death.

Stacey Pritchard, also a member, stated “Sometimes you’ve got to be scared straight. He is trying to save those people from going to hell.”

She should try asking Larry Craig about that. It isn’t so much getting scared straight as getting scared into hiding it from everyone and doing it in the dark.

Jeremy Hooper over at Good as You unearthed audio of Worley from, apparently, 1978 stating “Forty years ago [LGBT people] would’ve hung, bless God, from a white oak tree!”

The Huffington Post notes that:

In the video, reportedly filmed on May 13, Worley calls for gays and lesbians to be put in an electrified pen and ultimately killed off. “Build a great, big, large fence — 150 or 100 mile long — put all the lesbians in there,” Worley suggests. “Do the same thing for the queers and the homosexuals and have that fence electrified so they can’t get out…and you know what, in a few years, they’ll die out…do you know why? They can’t reproduce!”

He also condemned President Obama’s endorsement of same-sex marriage, proclaiming, “I’m not going to vote for a baby killer and a homosexual lover!”

Of course, part of the problem is that the laws laid down in Leviticus include a lot of prohibitions that are ignored these days, including by Worley and his congregation. Like many Christians, Worley unfortunately ignores the word of Christ in favor of Saul of Tarses or the Old Testament. Christ said about as much about homosexuality as he did about television. The problem for the Worleys in the world is that Christ’s actual words take away from the power that they want over people.

From Creative Commons

I just found a fabulous website. It is run by a lady who only identifies herself as Middle Molly. She resides in Chicago, and she has posted less personal information about herself than I have, and I refuse to post a profile. Molly has the most concise, precise analysis about unemployment in America that I have ever seen. You can find her at mollysmiddleamerica.blogspot.com.

Quick summary, so visit Molly for the detailed analysis –

When Barack Obama took office, we had already lost 4,462,000 jobs, a million more than the Bush administration had admitted to.

In the next few months, we lost 4,317,000 additional jobs, all before a single Obama policy could take effect.

During the recession, we lost a total of 8,779,000 jobs.

We have gained 4,248,000 private sector jobs since February, 2010.

However, we have lost 503,000 public sector jobs – school teachers, road maintenance, police and fire fighters, library workers – almost all at the state and local level.

The net job gain for the Obama administration is 3,745,000.

We still need 5,034,000 jobs just to break even with what we have lost. That number does not take into consideration the new jobs needed for people who have graduated high school and college or immigrated to this country legally since 2006 when the recession began.

So, the question facing Americans is really very simple – do we want to return to the policies that cost us 8,779,000 jobs or continue with the guy who has helped to restore 3,745,000 of them?

Visit Molly monthly to track the jobs numbers and get that most elusive of things in this election year – real, honest, unbiased facts.

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• Quick! Guess How Many Jobs Were Created Per Month During The Bush Administration… (jhaines6.wordpress.com)

Yesterday, President Obama attended the graduation ceremony for the Joplin High School Class of 2012. Their school was leveled by the tornado. They lost friends, teachers, classmates and their school that day. But they persevered. They survived. They rebuilt their lives and are moving forward. The President was there to honor them and the spirit of the city.

Their principal, Dr. Kerry Sachetta, was on Andrea Mitchell’s MSNBC show this afternoon telling her how honored the students were by the President’s presence. When people bother to listen to him, Barack Obama is a great speaker and can hit the right notes in a time of tragedy or triumph like few presidents before him.

His speech stayed away from politics, and spoke of the “power of community” and the community’s response to the tragedy without “greed and selfishness; ignorance and cruelty.” Not for Joplin the kind the of price gouging we have seen in the aftermath of hurricanes or the exclusion of certain people from assistance, no new zoning laws were passed to prevent the less acceptable from reclaiming their lives. All was good in Joplin last night.

President Obama told the class that what they have done in the past year is “…the same spirit we need right now to help rebuild America. And you, class of 2012, you’re going to help lead this effort. You’re the ones who will help build an economy where every child can count on a good education; you’re the ones who are going to make sure everyone who is willing to put in the effort can find a job that supports a family; you’re the ones who will make sure we’re a country that can control our own energy future and we lead the world in science and technology and innovation. No matter how tough times get, you’ll always be tougher. No matter what life throws at you, you will be ready. You will not be defined by the difficulties you face, but by how you respond – with grace, and strenght and a commitment to others.”

Related articles

• Obama Speaks At Joplin High School’s Graduation One Year After Devastating Tornado(huffingtonpost.com)

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• Joplin: Remember, Rejoice, Rebuild(whitehouse.gov)

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• Obama: “You Are From Joplin And You Are From America.”(duanegraham.wordpress.com)

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• Joplin remembers deadly tornado, one year later (wtvm.com)
• Joplin hospital honors 2011 tornado survivors (miamiherald.com)

President Barack Obama meeting with healthcare stakeholders in the Roosevelt Room at the White House. Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius is to his right. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Back in the early days of John Boehner’s twenty-one year career in Congress, the House leadership had to take him aside and explain that one does not walk around the chamber handing out lobbyists’ checks to colleagues before a vote. That is a fair picture of how most Americans view lobbyists – the guys with the checks who pay for a vote that favors their client’s interests. And that is what most of us were thinking of when candidate Barack Obama promised to end the culture of lobbyists in Washington.

But, the lobbyist who hands out checks or who arranges a special deal on the lease for a high-end apartment (another perk Boehner enjoyed for years) is not what all lobbyists do. Therein lies the basis for accusations that the Obama administration has broken its promise to limit lobbying.

Lobbying firms are people who arrange meetings between their clients and members of the government. Where lobbyists cross the line is in arranging for their clients to provide perks for a government official. Where government officials cross the line is writing laws that benefit the special interests represented by the lobbyists.

The Washington Post has published a story that starts off criticizing the White House and waits until page two to explain who the lobbyists are who have had access to the administration. Ooooh – looky here, he broke a campaign promise – there are still lobbyists visiting the executive branch!!!!

Let’s start on paragraph six of the WP story….President Obama barred persons who had recently worked as lobbyists from joining his administration. He also forbid federal employees accepting free admission to conferences or semi-social events run by lobbying groups. It certainly didn’t end lobbying, but is created a low wall between the lobbyists and the administration.

But it is who the lobbyists are and what they are lobbying for that really matters. Start off with, most of them are liberals or have had ties to the Democratic party. Lobbying firms routinely hire people on both sides of the aisle to allow them to access any administration or legislator. So, who has had access to the administration?

Marshal Matz was an unpaid advisor to the campaign and as a lobbyist has arranged meetings with administration officials for the general counsel for the Biotechnology Industry Organization, the CEO of General Mills, advocates for farmers in Africa, the Federal Forest Resource Coalition, Beef Products, Inc.

Bill Samuel is a lobbyist for the AFL-CIO, the master union of all unions. He has met with William Daley, the former chief of staff and Gene Sperling, director of the National Economic Council. Samuels has explained that his firm is working as an interface between the administration and Congress on laws to assist job creation.

Nancy Zirkin is a lobbyist for the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. Laura Murphy represents the ACLU.

Tim Hannegan was another advisor to the Obama campaign, and represents several businesses, including Comcast, Taser International, Kelly Services, the temp agency, and for-profit colleges. Hannegan arranged meetings between the CEO of Kelly and aides in the jobs council to discuss the tax credit for businesses hiring unemployed veterans. The Hire Heroes Act was signed into law six weeks later. However, Samuels was not able to persuade the administration to back reduced regulations for the for-profit colleges. (The Washington Post owns Kaplan University. Just throwing that in for the sake of disclosure.)

Some lobbyists arrange meetings to tell members of the administration that an organization or industry wants something. Some lobbyists connect the administration to people with intimate information about an industry or issues. Others are asked to arrange the meetings so taht the administration can explain a policy or law to an interested industry, organization or business. One such meeting was arranged for Andrew Menter, CEO of Vivature Health, a medical billing firm for college health programs. He wanted to understand the Affordable Care Act and had his lobbyist, Tom Downey, arrange the meeting.

Downey is a unique case. He is married to Carol Browner, Obama’s energy czar until last year. While Browner was working for the administration, Downey’s firm dropped any client involved in any way with the energy industry, to avoid charges of conflict of interest on both sides. Downey also arranged meetings for the head of the Credit Union National Association. The group wanted to lift the cap on the percentage of assets that can be used to make loans. This is not the administration to ask for relaxation of banking regulations.

This is the first administration to release the visitor logs for the White House and all executive offices. The releases are delayed three months, and were initiated in response to a lawsuit. No other administration has been sued over visitors, and maybe the way these logs have been misused is the reason. The right wing found the name William Ayers on a visitor log for the White House. They immediately claimed that it was the infamous Weather Underground domestic terrorist Bill Ayers, former professor at the University of Chicago. Not so, according to the White House and the Chicago Bill Ayers. But, facts never get in the way of a good right wing narrative, and so the loyal followers of right wing media believe that President Obama has entertained his “good friend” the domestic terrorist in the White House.

Roughly 2,600 people are given badges to enter the White House, Blair House which is the vice-president’s residence and the new and old Executive Office Buildings. There are over 2 million visitors on the log database for the past 3½ years, 1.3 million unique names. No information is given about the identity of the visitors or their professions. Since there is no list for any previous administration, these logs cannot be compared with who had contact with previous presidents, cabinet members or special czars.

With the exception of the hiring vets tax credit, the Washington Post offered no information about any instances of a direct line between the White House or the administration and the people lobbyists advocate for. The overall tone of the opening of this article and the headline made it appear there was something wrong going on here, but what the article presented was a picture of people with a special interest meeting with people who could advocate for them with the leaders of the administration if they chose to.

Nothing will end the lobbying industry. They are too valuable to their clients. What is important about lobbying is the manner in which they approach the administration. Are they arriving with blank checks for campaign chests? Are they handing out favors in exchange for meetings? Nothing in the article suggests that.

Most of the links below show how the right wing is using the information about lobbyists and the executive branch.

Related articles

• Obama Discovers Lobbyists Are Hard to Get Rid Of(usnews.com)

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• White House Visitors Logs Shows Obama is a Lying Lobbyist Whore(gds44.wordpress.com)

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• Even after Obama’s promise, lobbyists still run the White House(rt.com)

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• Lobbyists “a steady stream” at White House despite Obama pledge (hotair.com)

The picture gets worse when factoring in the groups’ total cash on hand. Priorities USA finished April with $4.7 million available. Restore Our Future had $8.2 million and American Crossroads a whopping $25.5 million. In addition, a nonprofit spinoff of American Crossroads, Crossroads GPS, which does not disclose donors, recently announced a $25 million ad campaign.

Obama still has the advantage, though. He has $115 million in his war chest while Romney has $61 million. Obama also outraised Romney last month. Still, the RNC and Romney nearly raised as much as the DNC and Obama did; however, it should be noted that Obama tends to rely heavily upon small donations while Romney is reliant upon large ones, and people will begin to donate more as time goes along. Romney may also face bigger problems with fundraising as there are many Social Conservatives who are still not sure about supporting him.

Still, this is going to be a difficult and expensive election complicated by the Supreme Court and Citizens United.

Rep. Joe Walsh

Tyrant. . .the word that many Tea Party Republicans are looking for is Tyrant. Unfortunately, they seem to be missing the words Tyrant and Tyranny in their lexicon. Instead, they substitute the words socialism, communism and Naziism for those. During a town hall, Representative Joe Walsh was confronted by a woman who stated that she believes that Americans are losing their freedoms because of “elected officials who were falsifying their ideologies to get elected.”

She stated “It is sedition. I mean, they did it underground. If they are honest brokers and they believe in what they’re saying and where they want this country to go, like Obama, then you’re right. He should have said it before he was elected, and said ‘I’m a socialist, I believe in socialism, in communism, Nazism,’ whatever, and say ‘this is where I want to lead the country’ — not do it underhandedly.”

Actually, sedition is making statements that leads to insurrection or rebellion among the populous. In fact, the people who are acting in a seditious manner would be. . .well, the Tea Party and the Republicans. The word she is looking for is ‘treason’.

Walsh, of course, doesn’t bother with refuting her claim. After all, he is of the same seditious ilk as she is. He goes on to state “However you want to label or define it, don’t you think after three and a half years as a country now we have a really good idea where this president wants to go? There are people in this audience — it’s fine — who believe in this America we’re living under right now. That’s fine, that’s a legitimate viewpoint. I will fight to my last breath against it, but I wish politicians on the other side would be honest about how they feel.”

Apparently, both believe that freedom involves being allowed to die horribly in poverty while others are forced to make up the money it takes to care for you through higher prices at the hospital.

Freedom. . .it’s just another scam to get free funny hats to the Republicans, and only for the select few. Everyone else doesn’t get freedom, right?

“Build a great, big, large fence — 150 or 100 mile long — put all the lesbians in there. Do the same thing for the queers and the homosexuals and have that fence electrified so they can’t get out…and you know what, in a few years, they’ll die out…do you know why? They can’t reproduce! . . .I’m not going to vote for a baby killer and a homosexual lover!. . .It makes me pukin’ sick to think about — I don’t even whether or not to say this in the pulpit — can you imagine kissing some man?”

First of all, according to estimates, between ten and thirteen percent of the American population is lesbian or gay. So, that would be between 30,000,000 and 40,000,000 lesbians and gays in this country. So, yeah, that big a fence isn’t going to work. Secondly, more lesbians and gays will be born since they are- typically- the children of straight people. Finally, apparently this guy doesn’t get that there are many lesbian and gay families with children. You would have to emasculate every single gay man in there in order to pull this one off.

Of course, for some reason, I am reminded that there was someone who did try something like this back in the 1930′s and 1940′s.

I’m just not going to bother posting his name here.

Coat of Arms of Vatican City

It is not surprising that the University of Notre Dame is suing the Obama Administration and its officials over the mandate requiring that almost all employers in the United States cover birth control. The school is claiming that the mandate violates religious freedom by requiring many religiously affiliated schools, hospitals and charities to provide this medication that can be used for non-contraceptive reasons. It is the latest in a long line of schools doing this.

The university is considered to be the most prominent Roman Catholic school in the nation, and the Vatican has been doing everything it can to force President Barack Obama, who is not a Catholic, to enforce their doctrinal beliefs. Since taking office, Pope Benedict has pushed the Catholic Church deeply into American politics- a move that is starting to cause severe unrest among Catholics.

President Obama offered to alter the rules regarding the mandate, but the US Conference of Catholic Bishops refused the offer. This is part of a wider war on women that Pope Benedict and the Catholic Hierarchy are engaged in.

The NAACP lissued a statement saying “The NAACP Constitution affirmatively states our objective to ensure the ‘political, education, social and economic equality’ of all people. Therefore, the NAACP has opposed and will continue to oppose any national, state, local policy or legislative initiative that seeks to codify discrimination or hatred into the law or to remove the Constitutional rights of LGBT citizens. We support marriage equality consistent with equal protection under the law provided under the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. Further, we strongly affirm the religious freedoms of all people as protected by the First Amendment. “

The NAACP is one of the oldest Black Civil Rights Movements in America. The NAACP dates back to 1909, and is now 103 years old. Among the founders was W.E.B. Dubois, a Harvard scholar, as well as Ida B. Wells, Archibald Grimké, Henry Moscowitz, Mary White Ovington, Oswald Garrison Villard, and William English Walling. One of its most famous members rose all the way to the United States Supreme Court. That would be Thurgood Marshal.

Among the ranks of the NAACP were many Whites, including Walter F. White, who worked with Marshal, and William Walling, one of the founders. Allies are always welcome while fighting for equality.

Today, the board of the NAACP announced its support for same-sex marriage rights. The decision comes in the wake of the endorsement of the same by President Barack Obama. It does put the NAACP at odds with more religious based Black Civil Rights groups, and with many Black pastors and churches; however, there are several Black religious leaders such as Reverend Joseph Lowery and Reverend Al Sharpton who have spoken out in support for same-sex marriage stating:

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” As leaders in today’s Civil Rights Movement, we stand behind the President Obama’s belief that same sex couples should be allowed to join in civil marriages. We also affirm that individuals may hold different views on this issue but still work together towards our common goals: fair housing and equitable education, affordable health care and eradicating poverty, all issues of deep and abiding concern for our communities.

President Obama stated his view that same-sex couples should be allowed to marry. This is a view that we concur with, because as civil rights leaders we cannot fight to gain rights for some and not for all. At the same time, we acknowledge that the President stated his personal opinion, which everyone is entitled to – both those who agree with him, like us, and those who disagree. The President made clear that his support is for civil marriage for same-sex couples, and he is fully committed to protecting the ability of religious institutions to make their own decisions about their own sacraments.

There will be those who seek to use this issue to divide our community. As a people, we cannot afford such division. It is our hope that conversations on strengthening African American families continue in a civil and respectful way, on all sides, both with those who support the ability of same-sex couples to marry, and those who do not.

We are glad that President Obama has joined Dr. Joseph Lowery, Dr. Julian Bond and so many others in full embrace of equality for gay and lesbian individuals in our country. We also welcome the civil debate on this issue that will surely spring. And we encourage all individuals to keep all issues of import to our communities in mind in the days ahead, and we seek to secure equal justice, opportunity and dignity for all God’s children.

Some Republicans have hoped to use the President’s endorsement of same-sex marriage to undermine him in the Black Community, but that may not be as possible as they would hope.

NAACP President Benjamin Todd Jealous stated in a release on Saturday “Civil marriage is a civil right and a matter of civil law. The NAACP’s support for marriage equality is deeply rooted in the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution and equal protection of all people. The well-funded right wing organizations who are attempting to split our communities are no friend to civil rights, and they will not succeed.”

The Washington Post notes that:

Surveys show blacks remain generally uncomfortable with same-sex marriage. A Washington Post-Kaiser Family Foundation poll in November found that 58 percent of African Americans called same-sex marriage “unacceptable,” while 35 percent said it was “acceptable” in terms of their own values and morals.

More than half of all African Americans in a new Post-ABC News poll backed the president’s statement in support of marriage, suggesting there may be an opening to for Obama to help push support for gay rights among black Americans.

Pakman went on to explain:

Gordon also added that “when president obama endorsed homosexual marriage, he blamed jesus christ,” and made direct attacks against President Obama and against me, saying that the devil promotes homosexuality through straight people like David Pakman and President Obama. Another hugely dangerous comment he made is that straight marriages and society are hurt by gay marriages through the abuse of children which he claims is a constant in gay marriage/gay parenting (confusing to me as well).

From the sounds of it, not only is Klingenschmitt wrestling with his own demons, but that he sounds desperate to prove that he is right just so he can assuage his own problems.

Muslim Brotherhood Emblem

THE MUSLIMS ARE COMING! THE MUSLIMS ARE COMING! Or more specifically, the Muslim Brotherhood is coming. It has been the panic cry of the right wing ever since the Arab Spring dethroned Hosni Mubarak over a year ago. Some in the right wing media accused President Obama of “revealing his Muslim affinities” by “hosting” the Muslim Brotherhood at the White House, when what he was doing was holding some preliminary meetings with the majority party of the Egyptian parliament.

Well, all the hysteria was premature. Two polls have been released together, one taken in February and one taken in April. They show a dramatic shift in Egyptian opinion.

Though 63% of Egyptians supported the Brotherhood, in part because they had the most efficient political organization in the country, last February, in April their support has fallen to 42%. The nation is preparing for Presidential elections.

Support for the more conservative Salafis has also fallen, from 37% to 25% over the same period. The Muslim Brotherhood has been trying to position itself as the more moderate, but Muslim party. The Salafis support imposition of Sharia law and expulsion of all non-Muslims from Egypt. As in other Muslim countries, this kind of extremist position is most popular in rural areas where the populations tend to be less educated and less affluent.

Egyptians are also expressing reservations about letting the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafis, who hold the majority seats in Parliament, write the new constitution. Support for the parliamentary majority to choose those writing the constitution has fallen from 62% to 44%, while support for having the new president make those choices has grown from 9% to 14% and support for the current military rulers to choose has gone from 14% to 17%.

Egyptians are also retreating from having the majority party choose the new prime minister. Support for that has dropped from 46% to 27%, and support for the new president to make that decision is up from 27% to 44%.

When asked if people thought it was a good thing or a bad thing for the Muslim Brotherhood to hold a strong position in the parliament, the “good thing” fell from 62% to 36% and the “bad thing” rose from 27% to 47%.

After the rebellion that liberated Egypt from the rule of Hosni Mubarak, the Muslim Brotherhood was the only group able to hit the ground with a strong political organization. That strongly impacted the parliamentary elections. They could field more candidates and put more money into the election. Now, it appears the Egyptian people are having a mass case of buyer’s remorse.

Democracy is a messy process, and in its infancy it closely resembles human infants – lots of spitting up, shitty diapers, barfing and burping occasionally interrupted by heart-melting smiles and shining eyes. Egypt has a long way to go in its evolution to a modern democracy, and all the rest of us can do is watch and hope that in the chaos they will not choose to retreat to the security of a dictator.

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• Candidate Aboul Fotouh highlights diversity of Egypt’s Islamists (csmonitor.com)
• Muslim Brotherhood Goes Hardline (commentarymagazine.com)

But, the fact that the President voided those parts of the NDAA did not stop a group of journalists from bringing suit against the law. Lead plaintiffs Pulitzer Prize winner Chris Hedges of the Nation Institute, Tangerine Bolen of RevolutionTruth, joined by Daniel Ellsberg of the Pentagon Papers, MIT professor and activist Noam Chomsky and WikiLeaks Birgitta Jonsdottir, argued to Federal Judge Katherine Forrest that the law infringes on freedom of the press, freedom of speech and due process.

The prime issue to Hedges and Bolen is the vague definition in the law of who could be indefinitely detained as “a person who was a part of or substatially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban or associated forces.” Hedges and Bolen, along with a lot of American journalists, have had contact with terrorists as part of their work. Anyone who has ever worked in the Middle East or has investigated terror cells in any country might have come in contact with such persons. In another one of those “if we don’t defend it, it will go away” moments we have come to appreciate in the Holden Justice Department, the DoJ attorney defending the law refused to say that the government would never detain without charges or trial any member of the press. If the DoJ had argued that based on what Obama would do, there was no guarantee that the promise of journalistic immunity would be honored by a subsequent administration. Better to have the law stricken down by the court.

Judge Forrest, who was appointed in 2011 to the historic United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, one of the first courts established by our government, ruled that she found the language of the law “too vague.” She wrote, “At the hearing on this motion, the government was unwilling or unable to state that these plaintiffs would not be subject to indefinite detention under [section] 1021. Plaintiffs are therefore at risk of detention, of losing their liberty, potentially for many years. An individual could run the risk of substantially supporting or directly supporting an associated force without even being aware that he or she was doind so. In the fact of what could be indeterminate military detention, due process requires more.”

Bolen, unfortunately, went overboard with her victory speech. She said “We dealt a pretty big blow to two branches of Congress and President Obama.” Like Jonsdottir, she works on WikiLeaks and the Bradley Manning case and has interviewed Iraqis and Afghans as part of her defense of WikiLeaks and Manning. With typical WikiLeaks lack of journalistic research, she did not understand that the President had already voided the provisions she was objecting to. Jonsdottir, however, is an Icelandic citizen and this ruling would not blanketly exempt her from arrest if she were engaged in activities involving terrorists. Paranoia must be contagious in WikiLeaks because Bolen was pretty sure that if she “became a thorn in the side of the U. S. Government in fighting for our rights…” she could be rounded up and detained.

Author/activist Naomi Wolf was even more over-the-top with her assessment of the hearing, saying that she found the judges questions to the federal lawyers and them not answering chilling, saying “To hear those words — it’s so true, it’s so obvious — it puts in glaring relief the hideousness, the unconstitutionality, the darkness of this legislative efffort and others like it. She [Judge Forrest] is so completely, obviously right. It’s nothing short of treason to have put forward legislation like this, let alone to have had most of the people who represent us and our president sign off on this clearly, obviously criminally unconstitutional — unconstitutional is inadequate. It’s anti-constitutional. It’s dictatorial. I’m so happy as a mother. It’s so profound. All of us were put in danger by this law.”

I really hope that Daniel Ellsberg at least is mature and rational enough to understand that the Obama administration handed this ruling to them. President Obama was opposed to this section of the law, but could not veto the law without cutting off paychecks for our troops and their families. By using a signing statement, he preserved the operational flow of the military and killed those provisions he objected to.

Meanwhile, in Washington, Reps. Adam Smith, Democrat of Washington, and Justin Amash, Republican of Michigan, have offered an amendment to the 2013 National Defense Authorization Act that would also void Section 1021 of the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act. According to Rep. Amash, their amendment would “..ensure that persons arrested on U. S. soil aren’t detained indefinitely without charge or trial.” Amash asked his colleagues in the House to pass the amendment because, “If our constituents haven’t sent a clear enough message, tonight’s ruling surely does. Congress must act now to guarantee the constitutional right to a charge and trial.”

Aw, shucks. Didn’t anyone explain to Amash that his own party loves this section and loves to ignore the signing statement because then they can accuse the President of trying to be a dictator who “wipes his ass” with the Constitution.

I will never claim that I am familiar with every law that our Congress has ever passed or every court ruling ever handed down, but I can’t recall off-hand any time a section of a law was killed three times just for good measure.

Related articles

• Smith-Amash Detainee Amendment Is Dangerous Policy(heritage.org)

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• Is the NDAA illegal? NOT NO BUT HELL NO!!!!!!!!!!! (tatoott1009.com)
• NDAA 2013 Headed to Full House; Smith/Amash Amendment Offered (revolutioninmedia.com)
• Journalists, Activists Challenge NDAA Law (commondreams.org)

If there is anything that watching The Rocky Horror Picture Show has taught me it is that these guy’s perceptions of what it means to be gay is stuck way back in the 1970′s. In some ways, it would be like watching X-rated movies involving straight sex and assuming that heterosexuals are all amoral individuals who will shag anything that has the right genitalia. While there are straight people who engage in orgy-like behavior, let us be honest here, they are the exception and not the rule. The same with lesbians and gays.

So, it is not surprising that the Family Research Institute’s Paul Cameron kind of outed himself on The David Pakman Show. Cameron recently stated, in fact, that “The long term goal of the homosexual movement is to get every little boy to grab his ankles and every little girl to give it a try. They will not rest until every one of our children at least gets to try, has the opportunity and maybe is forced to at least once experience homosexual acts.” He also stated that Obama’s support for same-sex marriage proves that the President is actually gay.

Cameron was asked by Pakman about the idea that Obama is gay, and answered rather nonsensically that “Obama is a smart fellow. Here you have a situation in which, if anything, he should have just stepped back politically. Instead, he took…an enormous risk coming out for something that, quite clearly, the majority of Americans do not approve of.”

Pakman then pressed him on it again, and Cameron replied “If you look at his church…if you look at his connections with Hollywood…as Liz Taylor said, ‘Without gays, there is no Hollywood.’”

Cameron even stated, trying to justify his view about children and homosexuality, that “In those societies in which homosexuality gets a fair degree of prominence — for instance, Afghanistan; for instance, Pakistan — you have an enormous…incorporation of children into homosexual activity.” Of course, Cameron just shows his own ignorance with regards to those cultures and, quite honestly, his ignorance about homosexuality. What he does show is that, like so many anti-gay pundits, he has a problem with ethnocentrism, and is judging the behaviors of other cultures based upon his own.

The Huffington Post, though, notes that Cameron finally goes kind of completely off the rails:

Finally, in perhaps the most bizarre point in the interview, Cameron acknowledges having been raped as a child and “overcoming” sexual feelings about men as he approached his adolescent years. “I reacted to my environment,” he said. “As you’re probably aware, I was seduced, or raped, as a child…I was raped homosexually. Had that continued, I don’t know where I would’ve ended up.”

He went on to note, “I do know that the culture, which was directed toward heterosexuality, overcame whatever feelings I had — and I had some, that I acquired as 3-year-old — and by the time I was 9 or 10, I was thoroughly interested in girls.”

Of course, we want to know why he felt sexually attracted to boys at the age of three. . .a time when most kids are hardly attracted to much more than themselves. . .and why he pretends that he isn’t gay.

President Obama presented the Congressional Medal of Honor today to the widow and brother of a Vietnam War infantryman who sacrificed his life to save the men of his platoon. It is the greatest sacrifice a human being makes, to give up one’s life for another. But watching the ceremony I was struck by something about the right wing hatred of President Obama — in hating him so vehemently, in denying his legitimacy as our President, in labeling him most of things Americans hate from his race to his political position –- the right wing has diminished the honors being bestowed on Americans during his term of office. They are saying to our first responders, our soldiers and sailors, our artistic achievers, our outstanding students and teachers, our innovators, the families of our fallen, that their accomplishments and losses are not special because they are being honored by a man the right wing refuses to acknowledge is our President.

Leslie Sabo, a naturalized citizen born in Hungary, died in Cambodia in 1970. He was 22 years old and a newlywed.  His Medal of Honor is long overdue. Not enough of these medals were bestowed on Vietnam War soldiers, sailors and airmen. Our nation was so traumatized by the war, and our Presidents since then so eager to distance themselves from it, that we have failed to recognized the heroism and sacrifices of those men and women.

When a sports team member refuses to attend an honor ceremony at the White House because he denies the legitimacy of the President, he insults and demeans his teammates. When the right wing attacks the President’s speeches and meetings with our heroes and fallen, they insult and diminish those being honored. And these people call themselves patriots and tell themselves they are better than those who respect the office of the Presidency and the man who occupies that office. They say our President and all liberals hate our soldiers, but it is the right wing who dishonors them.

Liberals hated George W. Bush. There’s no denying that fact. But we were appalled that he refused to meet the fallen as they returned from his personal war in Iraq. We criticized him for the way he wanted to ignore the sacrifice. We wanted him to face the price of his actions, and we wanted him to honor those who fell. Catholics of all political bends were furious when Pope John Paul II refused to receive the firefighter’s helmet of a gay priest who died shielding an injured man on 9-11. It didn’t matter if Father Mike was gay. What mattered was that he removed that helmet to properly administer to a dying man. It is possible to hate the man while respecting the office and understanding the importance of the honors that office pays to our heroes, our achievers and our fallen.

Today, President Obama told a group of Vietnam veterans gathered for the Medal of Honor ceremony, “You did your job, you served with honor, you made us proud.” My friends, my school mates, my relatives, my generation have waited too long for those words to be spoken by a President of the United States of America on behalf of the American people. Leslie Sabo was one of the forgotten, a file in a box in an archive warehouse. His widow Rosemary and his family deserved this respect and this honor, this acknowledgment of their loss and their sacrifice forty years ago. His parents should not have gone to their graves not knowing how bravely their son died. Rosemary should have had that one little thing to cherish as a memory of a husband taken from her so young, so newly married before they had an opportunity to have children and build a life together. Leslie Sabo was one of 58,220 American men and women who died in the Vietnam War, 11% of the Americans who served. They all deserved the respect of a grateful nation, even those who came home and protested it.

The right wing haters should be ashamed of themselves for the way their hatred dishonors others Americans, but they won’t be. They have been so indoctrinated in that hate they can’t see the harm they do, how unpatriotically they are behaving, how inhumane they have become.

Related articles

• President Obama Awards Posthumous Medal of Honor to Specialist Leslie H. Sabo, Jr (whitehouse.gov)

Comedian Bill Maher

Newsweek has declared that Barack Obama is, somehow, the “First Gay President”. . .just like Bill Clinton was the “First Black President”. Personally, I think the whole idea of declaring who is the first of something when they aren’t really part of that minority is rather stupid. Last night, Bill Maher went on “Conan” where he shared some thoughts about the whole thing by first noting that the headline on Newsweek was an allusion to Toni Morrison’s remarks about Bill Clinton.

Maher stated:

She said [Clinton] was the first black president because she said so many things about him were similar to the black experience. Single mother, working class, grew up poor. Then she said ‘saxophone playing,’ as if all black people do that. McDonald’s eating… Okay, so Clinton was like black people for those reasons. What about Obama is gay? I don’t understand how this translates. What does he do that’s gay?

Of course, you know, the idea that the Obama is targeting Romney’s donors could backfire. . .just the way that the National Organization for Marriage and others discovered soon after they started pushing the idea that they have to keep their donors secret because they could be targeted.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

President Obama

New York University may want to ask Bill Donohue for their doctorate back. Now, I’m a lowly interdisciplinary scholar with a Masters under her belt and a second under way, but even I know how to read the studies that are out there and what they say about same-sex couples and parenting. Donohue, the president of the Catholic League, went on Piers Morgan’s CNN show to discuss President Barack Obama’s recent announcement about same-sex marriage. He faced off against Chad Griffin of the Human Rights Campaign.

Griffin started out by explaining why Obama’s statement was important to the LGBT Community. He said “What the President of the United States said today – the first President of the United States said today – is that he cares for them (LGBT people). He is their president, he is standing up for them and he believes that they too are equal under the law. And that is incredibly significant.”

Donohue countered by stating “Obama has always liked the idea of two men getting married. He had to change, because he wanted to become president and he said he invoked his Christian moorings. Now today he had to wiggle with that.”

Now, 250 years ago in the United States, a Papist like Donohue would have been in serious trouble in the United States, and 200 years prior to that, he could have been executed by the Crown of England for being a Catholic. Donohue, of course, decided to compare same-sex marriage to incest. This is a normal tactic, and one that has long since grown tired and long in the tooth. When Morgan confronted Donohue about his personal problem with gays, Donohue went on to say:

Oh, it’s very simple. It’s absolutely very simple. I have a doctorate in sociology from NYU, and I know what the literature says. The literature is definitive. There is one gold standard, one gold standard for children. That is: there is no substitute for a marriage between a man and a woman. I want the law to discriminate against straight people who live together — I used to call it “shacking up,” but now it’s called cohabitation. I want the law to discriminate against all alternative lifestyles, against gays and unions. I want to promote and to put in a privileged position that institution of marriage between a man and a woman, which has been shown over and over to be the gold standard.

Think Progress noted that:

Donohue might want to revisit sociology before he makes such grandiose claims. Not a single study has compared married opposite-sex couples to married same-sex couples and found a difference in their parenting ability. Any claim otherwise is a distortion of the research, not a “gold standard.”

. . .

With his brutally honest admission that he wants to discriminate, Donohue serves as a unique surrogate for the leadership of the Catholic Church. Though his organization “does not speak authoritatively for the Church,” he seems to say what the bishops are thinking. An open will to discriminate has little do with protecting Catholics from defamation — the actual mission of the Catholic League — just as same-sex couples marrying poses no threat to the religious liberty of practicing Catholics, who largely support marriage equality.

Now, here is the thing. There are studies out there that have been misused in order to try and portray same-sex marriage as harmful to children. Donohue shows his lack of academic ethics by embracing the studies that show that same-sex marriage is harmful to children because those studies are actually showing that two-parent households are better than one-parent households. An ethical and unbiased sociologist would then look at that study, dismiss it as irrelevant, and note that all studies that compare like to like- that is straight two-parent households to gay/lesbian two-parent households- show little or no difference between the two.

Donohue, basically, violates his own religion’s teachings on truthfulness and bearing false witness in order to maintain his hatred of lesbians and gays. In the end, if you have to surround a “truth” with a bodyguard of lies, then you should be reexamining whether or not what you believe is a truth is actually true.

Here’s the segment:

http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2012/05/10/481651/donohue-wants-to-discriminate/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/11/bill-donohue-sounds-off-o_n_1509206.html

President Obama

Originally posted 11 May 2012

Within 90 minutes of it becoming known that President Barack Obama now supports same-sex marriage, he raked in some $1 million. He then held a fundraiser with George Clooney that raised at least $15 million. In the same time, Mitt Romney has had no real spike in fundraising.

The rather ironic bit about all of this is that while the Republicans have pushed for bans on same-sex marriage, their money is getting kind of tight, and a lot of businesses are now supporting same-sex marriage. This was reflected in the coverage from FOX News in which all they could do to criticize Obama was to say that this was a cynical political move designed to garner votes.

Last night, on the Daily Show, they covered all of those:

A 2010 Bendixen & Amandi International poll found 74 percent of Latinos support marriage equality or other forms of legal recognition for gay and lesbian couples. Similarly, a NBC/Wall Street Journal poll released in March 2012 showed support for marriage equality among African Americans at 50 percent. A Field Poll of California voters released in February 2012 found that 53 percent of Latino and 50 percent of African-American respondents approved of allowing same-sex couples to marry. A Public Religion Research Institute poll found that a majority of Latino Catholics and a third of Black protestants support marriage equality.

We ask that any journalist who is reporting on these stories consider including the following supportive voices:

Rev. William Barber, (North Carolina) President, North Carolina NAACP and pastor, Greenleaf Christian Church Disciples of Christ, Goldsboro, NC 120 year old congregation with over 400 members and 30 active ministries. He is an Adjunct Instructor at NCCU, Master of Public Administration and Duke Divinity Masters Program and author has written one book entitled “Preaching Through Unexpected Pain.”. Rev. Dr. Barber earned a Master of Divinity Degree, Duke University School of Divinity where he was a Dean Scholar, Benjamin Mays Fellow and his Ph.D from Drew University in Madison, NJ.

Rev. Roland Stringfellow, (Berkeley) Since 1990, Rev. Stringfellow has a been a licensed minister in the Baptist Church. Roland has also worked in education as a teacher, guidance counselor, college advisor and vice principal. Currently Rev. Stringfellow continues the dialogue on LGBT equality with church congregations and in religious institutions in his role as director of ministerial outreach with the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies in Religion and Sexuality at the Pacific School of Religion. He has been consulted about the relationship between marriage equality and communities of faith at the local, state and national level. In June 2011, Rev. Stringfellow was elected with the most votes to become a grand marshal in the San Francisco Pride Parade. He jointly holds his BS in Education and a MS in Counseling from Indiana University and a MA in Ministry from Grace Theological Seminary.

Rev. Joseph Tolton, (New York) Pastor of Rehoboth Temple Christ Conscious Church, in New York. Elder Tolton also serves as Director of The REVIVAL Initiative, a spiritual forum purposed to advance the civil rights of gay and lesbian people in the African diaspora. Elder Tolton earned his BA in religion from Vassar College and his MBA in management from Columbia Business School.

Bishop Yvette Flunder, (San Francisco) founded the City of Refuge UCC in 1991 in order to unite a gospel ministry with a social ministry. A native San Franciscan, Bishop Flunder is a third generation preacher with roots in the Church of God in Christ. She was licensed in the COGIC and later ordained by the Bishop Walter Hawkins of Love Center Ministries where she served as Associate Pastor and administrator for the Oakland-based Love Center Church. Bishop Flunder is also an ordained Minister of the United Church of Christ and a graduate of the Ministry Studies and Master of Arts. Bishop Flunder is a Trustee and Adjunct Professor at Pacific School of Religion, Berkeley California and has been a lecturer, Adjunct Professor and speaker at Lancaster, Duke, Drew, Eden, Yale and New York Theological. She is the author of “Where the Edge Gathers: A Theology and Homiletic of Radical Inclusion” Pilgrim Press. She is a board member of the National Sexuality Resource Center, an active voice for the Religion Council of the Human Rights Campaign and Co-Chair of the Religious Advisory Committee of the National Black Justice Coalition. She also serves on the UCC Unified Governance Working Group as representative of the United Church of Christ Seminaries.

Rev. Cedric Harmon, (Maryland) An ordained pastor affiliated with the National Baptist and Missionary Baptist Churches, Cedric served as religious organizer for Americans United for the Separation of Church and State. For 13 years, he recruited and trained clergy from around the country to provide legislative testimony about issues of religion and government. He’s also known for his writing and television appearances—again on human rights and social justice—and serves on several boards having to do with sexuality and religion.

Rev. Candy Holmes, (Maryland) An African American Marylander who is a Lesbian, who has lived in the state of Maryland for nearly 35 years. She is a reverend with the Metropolitan Community Church.

Rev. Manny Santiago, (Washington) The Rev. Manny Santiago the first openly gay Hispanic minister is in the American Baptist Denomination and our own newly installed Minister at University Baptist Church in Seattle. Rev. Santiago is an international leader within the Baptist movement sitting on national boards of the Baptist Peace Fellowship and Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists which advocates for full inclusion of LGBT persons in every aspect of the church.

Rev. Dr. Miguel A. De La Torre, (Denver), Professor of Social Ethics and Latino/a Studies at the Iliff School of Theology in Denver, Colorado. Additionally, he was elected as the 2012 President of the Society of Christian Ethics.

Ed Gillespie (photo by Gage Skidmore)

Originally posted 10 May 2012

Ed Gillespie, the senior adviser for the Romney Campaign, had a little talk with Chuck Todd regarding President Barack Obama’s support for marriage equality. Gillespie is apparently not on the same page as his candidate. Gillespie told Todd “Sure. I think it’s an important issue for people and it engenders strong feelings on both sides. I think it’s important to be respectful in how we talk about our differences, but the fact is that’s a significant difference in November.”

He went on to state that Romney would be pushing for a Constitutional Amendment to ban same-sex marriage. Gillespie was President George W. Bush’s Republican National Committee Chairman during the 2004 campaign when the Republicans pushed for various state constitutional amendments to ban same-sex marriage as a means to get out the Conservative vote. It should be noted that eight years ago was a long time ago.

Support for same-sex marriage is now at just over 50% nationally, and in many states, it is far beyond that. Six states now have same-sex marriage as well as Washington DC and two Native American reservations. ThinkProgress noted that Romney has been playing up his pro-hatred and pro-discrimination stand throughout the campaign. Romney even said before CPAC in February saying “On my watch, we fought hard and prevented Massachusetts from becoming the Las Vegas of gay marriage.”

House Speaker John Boehner also dodged the questions. A reporter asked “A Romney adviser said this morning that they plan to make gay marriage a campaign issue and that they’re also going to push for a constitutional amendment. Do you agree with that?” Boehner reported “I’m going to stay focused on jobs.” Boehner then left the stage.

Rush Limbaugh, by Donkey Hotey, Creative Commons

Originally posted 10 May 2012

It is not surprising that Rush Limbaugh is busy running amok over the fact that President Barack Obama would support same sex marriage even going as far as saying “We’ve Arrived At A Point Where The President Of The United States Is Going To Lead A War On Traditional Marriage”

Of course, Limbaugh knows something about traditional marriage. After all, he has been married how many times? In a traditional marriage, he would not have been allowed to get a divorce. But it is not surprising that those who constantly talk about so-called traditional marriage ignore the actual traditions that were part of marriage.

Jon Stewart

Jon Stewart is probably one of the most astute political commentators in the country today. On last night’s show, Stewart took on President Obama’s announcement about supporting same-sex marriage, and North Carolina’s vote outlawing same-sex unions. He even explored marriage’s historic meaning- which is hardly nice.

So, now we know that this is a campaign between the bullied and the bully as Mitt Romney told FOX’s Brian Kilmeade that he did, indeed, bully closeted gay students. Romney stated “They talk about the fact that I played a lot of pranks in high school. And they describe some that you just say to yourself, back in high school I just did some dumb things and if anybody was hurt by that or offended by it, obviously I apologize. I participated in a lot of hijinks and pranks during high school and some might have gone too far and for that, I apologize.”

This is the standard non-apology apology. Basically, he is not saying that his actions are wrong. Rather, he is saying that he apologizes for offending someone. What is more, one man’s prank is another man’s bullying. The Huffington Post states that:

It’s never quite clear whether a politician’s high school years are fair game for political attacks. Romney suggested during the interview that the acts he was apologizing for were merely youthful indiscretions; the Post described him pinning a closeted gay classmate to the ground and cutting his long hair, for example. But with the story suggesting latent homophobia in an adolescent Romney and with President Barack Obama having endorsed same-sex marriage on Wednesday, the piece reverberated.

Still, Romney said he was “not going to be too concerned” about the item. He insisted that he grew up in a tolerant environment and that there was nothing about his pranks that were discriminatory towards gays.

Romney tries to dismiss the whole thing saying “The people involved didn’t come out of the closet until years later. The idea that this is something that was known by me … is obviously absurd. I had no idea that this person might have been gay. . . I don’t remember that incident and I’ll tell you I certainly don’t believe that I, I can’t speak for other people of course, thought the fellow was homosexual. That was the furthest thing from my mind back in the 1960s, so that was not the case. But as to pranks that were played back then, I don’t remember them all, but again, high school days, if I did stupid things, why I’m afraid I got to say sorry for it.”

The HuffPo goes on to opine that “The idea that Romney, as the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, holds the same mindset now as he did in his prep school days is, of course, absurd. People change, including Obama who had, until Wednesday, spent several years in public life opposing same-sex marriage.”

The thing is, Romney still holds the same mindset that he did back in prep school. That is obvious because of his rather lame defense of bullying other students. He claims that they were pranks, but if you aren’t part of the prank, it is not very funny. He seems to dismiss the incidents because he did not know that those students he bullied were gay, but that does not take away the damage that bullying does. While a lot of focus has been placed on the bullying of lesbians and gays in school, the reality is that anyone can be bullied. Back in Brunswick, Georgia, there was a Jewish student who was bullied for being Jewish. As far as everyone else knew, she was straight and has never come out of the closet.

Back in 1989, a student at Brandon High School was bullied because his father was a very vocal atheist, and his father had been protesting the use of the school’s auditorium by a neighboring church to perform services while their church building was being renovated. That student was not gay. One morning, just after school started, he took his father’s gun, sat on the side steps of the school, and put a bullet into his brain.

Bullying doesn’t care if you’re Black or White, gay or straight, religious or atheist. It hurts, and to have Mitt Romney largely dismiss his own bullying past as if it never really mattered is just disheartening.

It makes it obvious that Romney doesn’t care about others.

Gavin Newsom, the Lt. Governor of California, spoke out today about President Obama’s decision to support same-sex marriage. On the Young Turks on Current TV he stated “The first sitting president in the history of this country that used those words, ‘I support same-sex marriage’ — a point of real courage. This is not a politician running for re-election for city council or mayor of a blue city or, for that matter, governor of a blue state. He’s running for re-election in a very close election where he’s got to pick up these swing states. It was a point of remarkable courage.” Obama’s reluctance to strongly endorse same-sex marriage follows growing dissent among Democrats, including vice president Joe Biden. Newsom says this statement restores strength to Obama’s campaign. “He’s become once again the president we elected.”

Additionally, we have this press release from the Rainbow Sash Movement:

The Rainbow Sash Movement a National Organization of Gay and Lesbian Roman Catholics responds to the public statement of Cardinal Dolan current president of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, head of the New York Archdiocese and Rev. Bryant Wright, president of the Southern Baptist Convention.

Both of these men claim to speak for Christians on Gay Marriage, expressing distress and sadness at President Obama’s newly announced support for gay marriage. On the contrary President Obama spoke of his personal religious belief in his understanding of the Golden Rule of do unto others as you would have done unto yourself. Given the current state of religious hypocrisy neither Dolan or Wright stand on solid ground.

The Rainbow Sash Movement commends President Obama on his integrity, and recognizing that it was time for Presidential leadership on Gay Marriage. Christianity like the Bible has no single group speaking for it, and any who claim to speak for either are not of God..

Joe Murray the Executive Director of the Rainbow Sash Movement said “We can no longer allow religious leaders to promote second class citizenship to any group of US Citizens based on their narrowly defined dogma which only promotes bigotry in the name of biblical fundamentalism as was done in North Carolina. Constitutional violence is just as wrong as any other form of mindless violence.

We are glad that we have a president who believes in the separation of Church and State.

God bless President Obama, you make us proud to be Americans once again.”

Originally posted 9 May 2012

Reince Priebus apparently doesn’t know what game he is playing. Maybe he thinks that he’s playing parcheesi or Snakes & Ladders instead of, well, politics. In fact, by complaining about President Barack Obama’s support for same-sex marriage as playing politics is, well, playing politics. Priebus, who is the head of the Republican National Committee, stated “While President Obama has played politics on this issue, the Republican Party and our presumptive nominee Mitt Romney have been clear. We support maintaining marriage between one man and one woman and would oppose any attempts to change that.”

Of course, as far as the Republican Party is concerned, marriage should be between a man and a woman, the woman should not have the right to determine how many children she has, she should not have access to protections from domestic violence, and she should be inferior to her husband.

The details on rather damning even before we have to hear from Mitt Romney, who once supported LGBT rights emphatically. He stated even before Obama’s ABC interview:

“Well when these issues were raised in my state of Massachusetts, I indicated my view, which is I do not favor marriage between people of the same gender, and I do not favor civil unions if they are identical to marriage other than by name. My view is the domestic partnership benefits, hospital visitation rights, and the like are appropriate but that the others are not. . .I think same-sex couples should be able to get married.”

Christopher Hecker

Originally published May 8, 2012

Sooner or later, one of Ted Nugent’s followers would hit the big time.

Last month, Turner Corp., the parent company of CNN received an interesting e-mail. It read, in part, “I sent a bomb threat to the White House today and to several radio stations. Sooner or later I will grab someone, maybe in the woods, on the trail, and beat the life out of them. He [Obama] is the one that is destroying patriotism in the U.S.A. Ted Nugent is right. So, Obama is allowing me to be tortured to the point that I may murder someone, rather that deal with the mess he made. Your president is a coward.”

The author of this and several other threatening e-mails, Christopher Hecker of Waynesboro, Virginia, was arrested outside the Waynesboro Public Library where he had been using their computers to send the e-mails. He threatened to bomb the White House, hotels, the Philadelphia City Hall, and the World Trade Center site. The e-mails were sent to a variety of media outlets.

Hecker was arraigned in Federal Court in Harrisonburg, Virginia, on Friday. At the hearing, Hecker said he was going to plead “no contest” to the charges and wanted to be immediately given the death sentence. The judge ordered a psyche evaluation on him.

Now, didn’t we say at the time of Nugent’s NRA rant that there was probably some lunatic who would take him seriously? Okay, Nugent, if you really want to convince us that you were just being rhetorical, how about you volunteer to pay this poor man’s legal costs?

Related articles

• Virginia man accused of threatening to kill President Obama (rawstory.com)
• Man accused of Obama threats (timesleader.com)
• Virginia man accused of threatening to kill President Obama | The Raw Story (tribuneofthepeople.com)
• Army Cancels Ted Nugent Concert After Threatening Remarks (towleroad.com)

President Obama

Reaction from the Gay-o-Sphere has been swift. Numerous organizations have already come out in praise and support of President Barack Obama for his decision to publically support same-sex marriage. He has stated that it is a personal decision, but it should be noted that his Administration has already been supporting same-sex marriage through attempts to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act.

Equality New Mexico stated:

Just moments ago, President Obama became the first sitting US President to say he supports giving loving, committed same-sex couples the freedom to marry.

For the thousands of same-sex families that call New Mexico home, President Obama’s words provide genuine hope that our country will soon come to treat their relationships with the equal respect and recognition that comes through marriage.

This is a historic day. Thank you, Mr. President.

As always,

Nick

Nick Rimmer

Equality New Mexico

The Civil Rights Agenda out of Illinois stated:

The Civil Rights Agenda (TCRA), Illinois’ leading lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) civil rights advocacy organization, has learned that President Obama has stated that he now supports the right of same-gender couples to marry.

“I’m proud to be an Illinoisan today,” said Anthony Martinez, executive director of The Civil Rights Agenda. “The State that promoted Abraham Lincoln may now also claim the President who will work to end government sanctioned discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. He understands that his legacy rests on the basic issues of civil rights. Like President Lincoln, President Obama knows this is what makes our country great.

“Today’s announcement by President Obama is not only historic, but is a major step forward for LGBT Americans who everyday live with the idea that we are supposed to be equal citizens and are supposed to have the same rights as everyone else, but that is not the case. We are second class citizens in the land of the free. Today, the President has taken a firm stand that all people should be equal. No matter who one loves, every citizen should be able to access the same rights and responsibilities of the civil institution of marriage.”

“This is an amazing moment,” said Rick Garcia, policy advisor for The Civil Rights Agenda. “The President was a supporter of our issues since I worked with him in the Illinois Senate. Frankly, President Obama has been on record supporting gay marriage, when he ran for Senate. This just shows us that politically, LGBT issues are not the wedge issue they once were. We are in a new era and we must continue to build the momentum towards full and equal rights for all LGBT Americans. Now we just have to make sure LGBT folks get out and vote in this upcoming election.”

And finally, GLAAD stated:

GLAAD, the nation’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) media advocacy and anti-defamation organization, today responded to President Barack Obama’s historic announcement in support of marriage equality for gay and lesbian couples.

“The arc of history today bent a little closer to equality for every American,” said GLAAD President Herndon Graddick. “After hearing the stories of countless couples and families, President Obama has drawn the same conclusion shared across party lines and by a majority of Americans today: everyone deserves the opportunity to marry the person they love. As our nation draws closer to a more perfect union in which every person is created equal, we are left deeply encouraged by this truly watershed moment.”

In an interview with Good Morning America’s Robin Roberts today, President Obama stated:

“I have to tell you that over the course of several years as I have talked to friends and family and neighbors when I think about members of my own staff who are in incredibly committed monogamous relationships, same-sex relationships, who are raising kids together, when I think about those soldiers or airmen or marines or sailors who are out there fighting on my behalf and yet feel constrained, even now that Don’t Ask Don’t Tell is gone, because they are not able to commit themselves in a marriage, at a certain point I’ve just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married.”

President Obama’s landmark announcement comes just days after Vice President Joe Biden told NBC’s Meet the Press that he was ‘absolutely comfortable’ with equal marriage protections for gay and lesbian couples, and just hours after voters in North Carolina approved a constitutional amendment known as Amendment One that will change the state’s constitution to recognize only married straight couples; bans civil unions; and eliminates health care, prescription drug coverage and other benefits for public employees and children receiving domestic partner benefits. In a written statement on Tuesday, the president said he was “disappointed” in the passage of the amendment.

A new Gallup poll released Tuesday finds that for the second time in the organization’s history, half of Americans support marriage equality.

Other recent polls that reflect growing support of marriage equality include:

A Quinnipiac University poll found that 59% of respondents oppose federal legislation that denies eligibility for federal benefits to gay and lesbian spouses.
A Public Religion Research Institute poll that found 51% support legal marriage for lesbian and gay couples.
An ABC News and Washington Post poll that found 51% of respondents said they thought marriage equality should be legal, a 17 percentage-point increase from the 2006 polling results.
A CNN and the Opinion Research Corporation poll that showed 51% of respondents were in favor of legal recognition for marriages for gay and lesbian couples.

Now we just have to get out there and make sure that Obama is reelected.

President Barack Obama finally evolved on marriage. In an ABC interview with Robin Roberts of ABC, Obama finally stated his support for same-sex marriage. He stated “I have to tell you that over the course of several years as I have talked to friends and family and neighbors when I think about members of my own staff who are in incredibly committed monogamous relationships, same-sex relationships, who are raising kids together, when I think about those soldiers or airmen or marines or sailors who are out there fighting on my behalf and yet feel constrained, even now that Don’t Ask Don’t Tell is gone, because they are not able to commit themselves in a marriage, at a certain point I’ve just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married.”

Obama’s announcement comes the day after the vote to ban all same-sex unions in North Carolina. The personal beliefs come even as his administration has already committed to broadening marriage rights to same-sex couples through the dissolution of the Defense of Marriage Act.

President Obama

President Barack Obama has voiced his dissatisfaction with the vote in North Carolina to ban any form of same-sex union. Obama’s NC campaign spokesman Cameron French stated that “The president has long opposed divisive and discriminatory efforts to deny rights and benefits to same-sex couples.”

He went on to say “He believes the North Carolina measure singles out and discriminates against committed gay and lesbian couples, which is why he did not support it. President Obama has long believed that gay and lesbian couples deserve the same rights and legal protections as straight couples and is disappointed in the passage of this amendment. On a federal level, he has ended the legal defense of the Defense of Marriage Act and extended key benefits to same-sex partners of federal employees.”

While the voters of North Carolina voted 61 to 39 in favor of the amendment amid allegations of voting irregularities, this is not going to be seen as a full on set back for the LGBT rights movement, but rather as another attempt to bully other states into not holding votes on this issue moving forward.

Meanwhile, people are awaiting word from President Barack Obama himself about the issue of marriage equality. In fact, it is expected that Obama will now endorse same-sex marriage fully.

Speaker of the House John Boehner

Originally published May 8, 2012

Last summer, the Republican leadership agreed to a budget deal. They agreed to a budgetary cap on the ordinary spending of executive branch budgets. This week, they gave the White House the finger and cut $27 billion more from domestic agencies than agreed to last summer.

There are two different cuts involved. One is a straight underfunding of $19 billion. The other is a transfer of $8 billion from domestic programs to the Pentagon.

The cuts include funding for NASA, science programs, Legal Aid, hiring grants for stressed communities to afford more police officers, and a wide range of programs in the Departments of Justice and Commerce in particular.

House Speaker John Boehner has broken his agreement with the White House because the Tea Party is up in his face, demanding he do more to dismantle the government that issues all their paychecks and which is giving 40 to 50 of his House members free rent and utilities as they squat in their office buildings. The administration has exceeded its part of the agreement, already posting a $50 billion reduction in the deficit in the first six months of the fiscal year, when all that was agreed to was $60 billion for the year. If everything holds until September 30, we are on track to reduce the budget deficit by 67% more than expected.

The House budget includes travel for Congressmen to all sorts of places to investigate things first hand. Maybe we should push for large groups of Republicans, particularly the Tea Party freshmen, to be airdropped into Europe so they can learn some basic economics. Don’t even bother with Greece, because they all believe it is the victim of socialism. How about Ireland? Once the strongest free market economy in Europe, now up to their necks in a national debt equal to 11.65 times their gross domestic product? How about the United Kingdom, financial center of Europe, with a national debt equal to four times their GDP and officially in a double dip recession? How about Spain – full blown depression, 50% youth unemployment? They all did the conservative thing – drastic cuts to government programs, tax cuts to those phantom job creators – and this is what they have reaped in the past three years, everything President Obama warned them would happen if they kept up the trickle down economics that created their economic collapse instead of embracing Keynesian policies. Our recovery may be slow, but theirs is non-existent.

The White House has vowed to veto any spending bill that violates last summer’s agreement, no matter who votes for it. The President’s position is clear – the Republicans cut this deal, they have to live by it.

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What is now important is not so much that Amendment One passed, as was expected, but by how much. Many LGBT activists, at this point, are more focused on the courts with regards to marriage equality. Should the Defense of Marriage Act go down, then so long as one state has marriage equality, it will no longer be an issue.

President Obama

Originally published May 8, 2012

Officially, President Obama’s views on same-sex marriage are still “evolving.” Nothing’s changed, there’s nothing to see here, move along people…..

I really don’t get the idea that statements of personal opinion by Vice-President Biden and Secretary of Education Duncan represent some kind of division in the administration. I don’t understand why commentators are going nuts over this and analyzing it to death.

There is a major difference between pandering to a fringe for votes and knowing how a single issue can be manipulated to drive voters to the polls. Anyone suggesting that President Obama is refusing to take a public stand on same-sex marriage to pander to Southern voters is wrong.

In 2000 and 2004, we saw the Republican Party use same-sex marriage to get people to the polls. They included same-sex marriage amendments on state ballots so that they could increase turnout among people who would vote against Democrats. In 2008, with the economy in freefall, they could not use a single religion-based issue to drive voter turnout. They have spent the past four years building up their smoke-and-mirror issues and throwing dirt at the President to see what will stick and what might get out the hate vote. He doesn’t need to hand them gay rights on top of all the rest of the stuff they have nurtured.

Listen to them, to conservatives and Republicans, and you hear allegations that he supports illegal immigration because illegals turned out in droves to vote for him; that he wants to turn the United States into a communist dictatorship; that he “wipes his ass with the Constitution”; that he supports killing babies; that he is anti-religion; that he has not done anything in four years; that he spends millions upon millions of taxpayer dollars on his lavish lifestyle; that he should be hung as a traitor; that he hates America; that he hates business; that he is bosom buddies with radicals he barely knows and sat at the feet of Saul Alinsky as a student, though Alinsky died when Obama was in short pants. They have dug up nonsense from thirty, forty years ago to smear anyone who gets within two-hundred yards of Obama and paint them as Maoists who control the President. You hear racism at every turn, with people calling the President of the United States of America a monkey, a gangbanger, a coon and describe our First Lady as resembling a “crack ho wiping cum from her lips.”

No candidate in his right mind is going to hand the opposition another way to get gullible people to the polls for a single, hate-driven issue. It’s bad enough a third of Republicans think he’s a Kenyan-born Muslim.

It does not matter what President Obama says in public about same-sex marriage or gay rights. He may, honestly, as a Christian, have reservations about same-sex marriage. What matters at this time are his actions. He signed the law ending DADT. He ended government defense of DOMA. He has made his position crystal clear….he opposes restriction of civil rights for any reason.

Isn’t that what really matters?

Related articles

• Obama’s shift on same-sex marriage puts focus on GOP centrists(boston.com)

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• Why Republicans should resist using the same-sex marriage issue against Obama.(althouse.blogspot.com)

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• Clay Aiken Tells Hate Group Leader Tony Perkins He’ll Be Ashamed of His Opposition to Same-Sex Marriage: VIDEO (towleroad.com)
• New Amendment on Same-Sex Marriage: Constitutional or Not? (parishgov.wordpress.com)

The reason why is very simple, of course. While Republicans may favor voting for Romney, they are not enthusiastic about it.

Gallup, though, writes:

It is unclear why Americans are more inclined to predict an Obama than a Romney victory when the two are essentially tied in Gallup’s latest election polling. It may be that Americans recognize the advantages Obama has as the incumbent and that historically, presidents seeking re-election usually win. For example, in March 2004, when President George W. Bush and John Kerry were about tied in voter preferences, more said Bush (52%) than Kerry (42%) would win. Or, Americans may expect in the months between now and the election that conditions in the U.S. will improve, which would make the incumbent’s re-election more certain.

…..

In three separate measurements in 2004, Americans thought Bush would be the winner in two and were split in their predictions in the other, conducted immediately after the Democratic convention. In the final prediction, from mid-October, 56% thought Bush would win and 36% thought Kerry would.
The accuracy of the 2000 election prediction is harder to evaluate, given that Al Gore won the popular vote and George W. Bush the electoral vote. In four out of five measurements that year, Americans thought Bush would win, though in the final measurement, taken in mid-September, Americans gave Gore the edge.
In an August 1996 poll, Americans overwhelmingly believed incumbent Bill Clinton (69%) would defeat Bob Dole (24%).

What does it all mean? Not a whole heck of a lot. Obama could still lose the election. There is a lot of campaigning between here and election day.

Rusconi believes that the couple targeted him because he is gay and a single father. Rusconi stated “They all called me a sexual deviant and a pervert. That’s all stemming from my sexuality.”

He was arrested on 17 June 2011, and both of his daughters were taken away from him and given to the couple making the accusations. They stated that they were the best caretakers for the twins. Rusconi was released the next day on $220,000 bail. Six months later, a rape kit produced negative results and by that point, prosecutors were unconvinced by the allegations. At that point, he got his daughter back. He is now suing his accusers saying “the people I let into my life is much tighter, and I intend on keeping it that way.”

The Huffington Post notes that “The photographer is known for his celebrity photography, including photos featuring Mary-Kate Olsen, Tyra Banks, Karl Lagerfeld, and President Barack Obama.”

Mitt and Ann Romney

Sometimes the political calculus is not so much about what can gain you the most flat out, but rather, what you can gain and lose. Ask two different pundits about President Barack Obama’s support for same-sex marriage and you will get two different answers. What is amazing, though, is that they will both be mostly correct. By supporting same-sex marriage openly, Obama has managed to lose some voters while gaining others.

Political calculus is never really about the base gain, but rather the balancing act between the gain and the loss.

Bill White is a good example. The openly gay New Yorker has been a strong supporter for Mitt Romney, and even donated $2,500 to his campaign. However, after President Obama announced his support for same-sex marriage, White found himself in a position to make a choice, and he made it. The vehement opposition to same-sex marriage that came out of Mitt Romney’s mouth after Obama’s announcement was enough. White asked for his money back.

White stated in a letter to Romney’s campaign which was quoted in the Huffington Post “I feel that I no longer wish to support your presidential campaign and ask you that you please return the maximum contribution that I gave to you last year. You have chosen to be on the wrong side of history and I do not support your run for president any longer.”

White is a registered Independent. He does not agree with President Obama on fiscal issues, but “I feel like [Romney has] declared war on my marriage. And I could just sit back and not say anything. Or I could do something about it. And I’ve chosen to do something about it.”

The Huffington Post notes that:

Obama’s campaign has sought to draw on that growing support by highlighting the “strong contrast” between the president and Romney. One day before Romney’s speech, the Obama team’s director of religious outreach, Rev. Derrick Harkins, said that Obama stands for “values like loving our neighbors, being our brother’s and sister’s keeper and dignity for all,” a reference to the president’s stance on same-sex marriage.

There is more to this than just that. Many businesses are opposed to banning same-sex marriage these days as they are finding it hard to hire workers who are not open minded. In North Carolina and Minnesota, businesses vehemently opposed bans on same-sex marriage.

The entire exchange on Meet the Press goes:

GREGORY: Have your views evolved?

BIDEN: The good news is that as more and more Americans come to understand what this is all about is a simple proposition. Who do you love? Who do you love and will you be loyal to the person you love? And that’s what people are finding out what all marriages at their root are about. Whether they are marriages of lesbians or gay men or heterosexuals. [...]

GREGORY: You’re comfortable with same-sex marriage now?

BIDEN: Look, I am Vice President of the United States of America. The president sets the policy. I am absolutely comfortable with the fact that men marrying men, women marrying women and heterosexual men marrying women are entitled to the same exact rights. All the civil rights, all the civil liberties. And quite frankly I don’t see much of a distinction beyond that.

Biden also stated:

The president continues to fight, whether it’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell or whether it is making sure, across the board that you cannot discriminate. Look [at] the executive orders he’s put in place: Any hospital that gets federal funding, which is almost all of them, they can’t deny a partner from being able to have access to their partner who’s ill or making the call on whether or not they — you know — it’s just — this is evolving.

And by the way, my measure, David, and I take a look at when things really begin to change, is when the social culture changes. I think “Will and Grace” probably did more to educate the American public than almost anything anybody’s ever done so far. And I think — people fear that which is different. Now they’re beginning to understand.

Later, a Biden spokesperson issued a statement saying:

The vice president was saying what the president has said previously – that committed and loving same-sex couples deserve the same rights and protections enjoyed by all Americans, and that we oppose any effort to rollback those rights. That’s why we stopped defending the constitutionality of section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act in legal challenges and support legislation to repeal it. Beyond that, the Vice President was expressing that he too is evolving on the issue, after meeting so many committed couples and families in this country.

None of this amounts to any actual endorsement of same-sex marriage. Right now, most of Obama’s political advisors are rather uncertain about signaling full support for same-sex marriage in the nation because they view the endorsement of it to be something that could galvanize many Republicans in the upcoming election even though GOP voters are, right now, uncertain about their presumptive candidate- Mitt Romney.

In the end, the political risks for Obama outweigh the benefits when it comes to marriage equality.

SWAN explains:

The Summit, held in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday, May 8, will provide military sexual assault survivors and their families the opportunity to share personal experiences with Congress members. The day will begin with remarks from members of Congress, a veterans panel on resilience and reintegration, and a law and policy panel on strategies for system reform.

An awards ceremony will follow, keynoted by Mary Lauterbach, the mother of Marine Lance Corporal, Maria Lauterbach, who was 20 years old when she was murdered in 2007 by a fellow Marine accused of raping her only weeks before. Since her daughter’s death, Mary has been actively working to increase awareness of sexual assault in the military and to improve both the care and justice that service members receive when sexually assaulted.

Following the keynote, The Lauterbach Award for Truth and Justice, a distinction recognizing sustained commitment to the elimination of sexual violence in the military, will be presented to Rep. Niki Tsongas (D-MA), Rep. Michael Turner (R-OH), Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) and Sen. John Kerry (D-MA). Last year, Rep. Tsongas and Rep. Turner introduced the Defense Sexual Trauma Response Oversight and Good Governance (STRONG) Act, which then received Senate support from Sen. Collins and Sen. Kerry. Elements of this legislation were introduced into law through the 2011 National Defense Authorization Act which was signed into law by President Barack Obama last December. These included key reforms such as expedited base transfers for sexual assault survivors and retention of evidence in unrestricted sexual assault investigations for 50 years.

After the awards ceremony, more than 100 survivors participating in the Summit will attend advocacy training and then mobilize at the Capitol to share their personal experiences with their Congressional representatives. These visits to policy makers will take place one day before the House Armed Services Committee begins full mark up of the 2013 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which contains additional proposals for reforming military sexual assault investigations and prosecutions.

‘Pansy’ if used against a person is typically a derogatory statement made against someone who is gay. It’s kind of like ‘sissy’ or ‘fag’. So, of course, it isn’t surprising that, given his abrasive personality, his tendency to attack and demean others, and act like a bit of a bully himself that the National Organization for Marriage is going after him.

Here is what they wrote:

By now you’ve probably heard about leading gay marriage activist Dan Savage’s vile attack on Christian teens during his “anti-bullying” presentation at a student journalism conference in Seattle last month.

But did you know that President Obama has endorsed Dan Savage and his “It Gets Better” campaign as a core part of the official White House campaign against school bullying?

Is this what stands for “anti-bullying” inside the Obama White House?

Please take a moment right now to tell President Obama that Savage’s hostility toward Christians has no place in an anti-bullying campaign.

Tolerance and respect for the basic human dignity of each person is core to what we believe at NOM. There is simply no excuse for bullying—in any arena—and the White House is right to encourage a culture of civility and respect in our nation’s schools.

But when a key gay marriage spokesman verbally abuses students simply because they are Christians who believe what the Bible teaches about marriage and sexuality…President Obama has to draw a line.

What part of “anti-bullying” does Dan Savage not get?

You can see Savage’s unbelievable attack here, but we warn you—this is a profanity laden attack on faith, and not for children’s eyes or ears.

Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time Savage has descended to such lows—including grotesque efforts to infect presidential candidate Gary Bauer with the flu in 2000, and more recently targeting Sen. Rick Santorum and Pastor Rick Warren with verbal abuse and vulgar intimidation tactics.

Dan Savage is one of the leading pro-gay marriage activists in the nation. He regularly appears on national television shows to advocate his peculiar ideas about marriage, including repudiating the idea that marriages should be faithful and monogamous. Though he likes to shroud himself in “anti-bullying” language, Savage is himself a notorious bully, as the video shows. Savage has even said that the media should stop giving coverage to any pro-traditonal marriage voice, likening supporters of marriage to the KKK.

It’s time for Savage to go, and I hope you’ll join me in calling on President Obama to make it clear that the Obama Administration does not condone Dan Savage’s attack’s on people of faith.

There are those of us who, in all honesty, just don’t like Savage, even those of us in the Community. It is not surprising that NOM and the like are willing to make milage out of Savage’s behavior. As far as they are concerned- get rid of Savage and the whole movement will be hurt. The problem is that we are not like them, and we are more than just Dan Savage.

What NOM wants to ignore is that hatred breeds hatred. If Savage is bitter, hateful and angry, then it is not because he was born so, but because the bullies out there like NOM made him so. Their unreasoning and unwarranted hatred created him.