Chipping Away, "Free Exercise" Version

Catholic Charities is at it again, and now the Trump/Barr "Justice" Department, Evangelical Division, has stepped in:

In the latest example of the Trump administration seeking to enable legal discrimination against LGBTQ people, the Justice Department is calling on the U.S. Supreme Court to allow religious-affiliated adoption agencies to refuse child placement into LGBTQ homes.

In a 35-page brief, U.S. Solicitor General Noel Francisco and other Justice Department attorneys maintain the City of Philadelphia has “impermissibly discriminated against religious exercise” under the First Amendment by requiring Catholic Social Services to abide by a contract requiring LGBTQ non-discrimination practices in child placement.

“Governmental action tainted by hostility to religion fails strict scrutiny almost by definition,” the brief says. “This court has never recognized even a legitimate governmental interest — much less a compelling one — that justifies hostility toward religion.”

The U.S. government isn’t a party to the case, known as Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, so the brief is completely voluntary. In justifying the brief before the Supreme Court, the filing makes the case the Justice Department has a compelling interest to intervene.

The City of Philadelphia is insisting that "Christians" abide by a contract. The horror!

The case came about after the City of Philadelphia learned in March 2018 that Catholic Social Services, which the city had hired to provide foster care services to children in child welfare, was refusing to license same-sex couples despite a contract prohibiting these agencies from engaging in anti-LGBTQ discrimination.

And the DOJ's brief looks to be 35 pages of bullshit:

Although the case involves Catholic Social Services refusing to abide by the terms of its contract, the Justice Department framing of the litigation makes it seem like the City of Philadelphia is an aggressor and unfairly targeting Catholic Social Services, asserting the municipality is allowing for exemptions in some cases, but not religious-affiliated adoption agencies.

“The City impermissibly targeted religious organizations for enforcement of its newly articulated policies,” the brief says. “Commissioner Figueroa testified that, in determining whether foster-care agencies were complying with the anti-discrimination requirements of their contracts, the city focused only on religious agencies, making just a single inquiry to a secular foster-care agency…City officials made no effort to determine whether other secular agencies perform home studies for everyone who requests them, or show preference for or against individuals who fall within particular groups.”

When this happened in Illinois, the state suspended funding to Catholic Charities adoption services and threatened to pull their license. Catholic Charities got out of the adoption business -- and a number of other agencies, including those run by the Lutheran Church -- took over their case load.

Via Joe.My.God.

It's Not Incompetence (Update)

It's malevolence. Tristero has an interesting post at Hullabaloo about the fact that there never was a plan for reuniting separated families.

The Trump administration never had a plan to re-unite children ripped from their mothers. And the media has gone out of its way to publicize that lack of a plan and to blame it on Trump's incompetence. The emphasis on incompetence obscures the fact that this lack of planning was intentional. . . .

Another way to say this is that the thugs who make up the Trump administration are not merely logistically incompetent. They are morally incompetent as well. They have not a shred of human decency.

I guess in a way it's somewhat comforting to say that Trump and his thugs are incompetent -- sort of "Keystone Kops Run the Country". That way we don't have to worry so much. The fact of the matter is that they're not incompetent -- they're very good at what they're doing, which is to remake the US into a tin-pot dictatorship. The fact that they have no humanity at all just makes it easier for them.

A case in point:

And these are not — like it or not, these aren’t our kids. Show them compassion, but it’s not like he is doing this to the people of Idaho or Texas. And these are not — like it or not, these aren’t our kids. Show them compassion, but it’s not like he is doing this to the people of Idaho or Texas.

That's Brian Kilmeade on Fox and Friends, Trump's biggest cheerleaders. And don't think the choice of states to mention wasn't deliberate.

They're a bunch of psychopaths.

Update: Betty Cracker at Balloon Juice has a post on Trump honoring the "Angel Families":

WATCH LIVE: President Trump is making new comments on immigration with "Angel families" -- families affected by crimes committed by undocumented immigrants https://t.co/aK4R8XyxD8 pic.twitter.com/rs1C0BNzlB

— CBS News (@CBSNews) June 22, 2018

She included this, which as far as I'm concerned is not much of a stretch: We know Trump is a racist, his base is racist, and his strongest support is among white supremacists and Nazis.

I don't take this last thing as a goal in itself -- it's a tactic. The goal is to stay in power for life.

Today from Over the Edge

Out of touch for a couple of days, but it seems nothing has changed much -- Trump is still disgusting and his followers are just as bad.

But entertaining. First, Alex Jones:

The Pentagon developed a Atrazine-type spray that they would spray. They tested it actually in Iraq. That’s classified but it was — it got leaked. You can pull it up. Gay bomb! They always take like a clip of me going gay bomb, baby! And then I show BBC, but they cut the BBC, and it’s basically a chemical cocktail, not just of Atrazine. They add some other chemicals. It’s classified. But the word is, it’s like, what’s ecstasy’s compound? I forgot. MDMA!

“They mix that with Atrazine and stuff. And then they spray that on you and you’ll start having sex with a fire hydrant. I mean, the point is, is that sex is all based not even on visual, men it’s mainly — but it’s smells with women particularly. But they can flip that on. It’s like perfume. You know, everybody knows about that? Well, they’ve got weaponized perfumes, basically that will make men attracted to other men and they want you to do that so you don’t have kids.

What?

And another deplorable, Rick Wiles:

When they slaughter a little baby in a Planned Parenthood baby butcher shop, where does that baby’s blood go? Where does the baby’s brains and guts go? I’ll tell you where it goes. It goes down the drain, into the sewer system and the blood of those babies is running through your town’s sewer, under your street. The sewage pipes in your city – carrying the blood, the guts, the brains, the tissue of all the babies murdered in your city today. It’s going right into your city’s sewer system. You’re actually drinking the babies’ blood, being recycled and going right back into the city’s water supply. Cannibalism.

Of course, if Wiles' hero has his way, we'll be drinking raw sewage, so there might be a word of truth here. Except for all of it.

You Start to Go Numb

And then something like this pops up. From Tom Sullivan at Hullabaloo:

In addition to the House ethics fiasco and Iowa Republican Rep. Steve. King's attempt to encroach on the Supreme Court's turf, on Tuesday a House Republican introduced a rule to make it easier for the United States to rid itself of public lands We the People own. Think Progress reported:

A new rule, written by House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Rob Bishop (R-UT), establishes as fact that any legislation to dispose of public lands and natural resources would cost taxpayers exactly $0. This paves the way for the new Congress to get rid of vast swaths of public lands — all at the expense of the American taxpayer.

Some detail on the mechanics from Brody Levesque at NCRM:

The Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives passed a rules change this past week by a vote of 234 to 193, that would allow Congress the ability to essentially give away federal lands and buildings for free. The new rule, authored by GOP Rep. Robert Bishop of Utah, Chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, codifies that any legislation to dispose of federal land and natural resources would have a net sum zero cost to taxpayers. As the rule applies only to the House legislative rules, it is not subject to approval by the Senate or a presidential signature and is effective immediately. . . .

Since the House is required to account for any cost associated with any legislation it considers under Congressional Budget Office accounting rules and guidelines, legislation put forward now shall skip several steps in the normal legislative process, coming up for a vote without any discussion of the costs and benefits. This means that the House does not need to render an assessment or cost analysis of estimated financial losses resulting in legislation giving away public lands or buildings.

They're not wasting any time. The Bundys must be wetting their paints in glee. Wait until they find out that it's not for them:

The Wilderness Society said "this move paves the way for a wholesale giveaway of our American hunting, fishing and camping lands that belong to us all. Make no mistake, the giveaway is for the benefit of the drilling and mining interests that have a lock-grip on Congress and the rest of Washington."

(And just in case there's any doubt in your mind as to who the intended beneficiaries are:

According to the advocacy and activist group Oil Change International which tracks campaign contribution monies from fossil fuel corporations and the coal industry via the group's Dirty Energy Money web project, since 1999 Congressman Bishop has accepted campaign funds and contributions of more than $452,610 dollars from oil, gas and coal interests. Figures collected by Oil Change International show that greater than ten percent of that figure has come from the coal-friendly National Rural Electric Cooperative Association, which has led the fight against the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan. Oil giants Exxon-Mobil, Chevron, and Tesoro are also listed among Bishop's top campaign contributors.

When I was a kid, every summer we'd load up the car with our tent and camping gear and head west. One year, when my dad and mom were both between jobs, we did a grand tour: through the Badlands on our way west, then down to visit my uncle in Colorado, then up through Rocky Mountain National Park on our way to Yellowstone (you get no sense of how huge bison are from pictures -- you have to be standing a dozen yards away to really feel the kind of presence they have), then up to Glacier (looking across a mile-wide gorge and just being able to spot a little dot of white -- a Rocky Mountain goat picking its way across a mountainside), with a dip into Canada (just like Kansas, only flatter -- miles of wheat), then across the Idaho panhandle to Olympic National Park -- both

parts (I've never experienced such profound silence as in the mountain section, and the coast, foggy and all grays, was pure mystery). Down through Oregon to Nevada, Bryce Canyon and the Grand Canyon (a mile deep, and sort of a reverse Glacier: distances were down and across, instead of up and across, and equally vast). There were also times spent camping in the Everglades (which is mostly walkways -- there's not that much dry land -- and a boat ride through the mangroves, being paced by dolphins), and Smoky Mountains National Park (beautiful, old, worn-down mountains, not so far from my ancestral home, covered in forest, comfortable and reassuring).

So now some teabagger from Utah with no soul wants to give it away so his donors can make more money. Yeah, go ahead -- start fracking in Yellowstone and watch the whole West just go up in one huge eruption.

Assholes.

Today in Trump's America

This is -- how shall I put it? -- deplorable:

A bigoted Brooklyn woman launched a sickening attack on two Muslim women pushing their babies in strollers — punching them in the face and trying to pull off their hijabs, prosecutors said Friday.

Emirjeta Xhelili, 32, hurled Islamophobic insults as she pounced on the two victims near her Bath Beach home about 1:30 p.m. Thursday, authorities said.

“Get the f--k out of here,” Xhelili, 32, allegedly yelled at the pair, according to prosecutors. “Get the f--k out of America, b-----s.”

As she punched the 23-year-old women in the face and kicked them in their legs, she tried to rip the traditional Muslim veils off their heads at Bay 20th St. and Cropsey Aves., police sources said.

“This is America — you shouldn’t be different from us,” she yelled, prosecutors said.

"You shouldn't be different from us." From who? With a name like Emirjeta Xhelili (sounds real Anglo-Saxon, doesn't it?), I'd love to know where her family originated.

This is the sort of people that Trump not only attracts, but validates -- he's given permission for behavior like this.

It can get much worse, and I fear it will -- I remember hearing reports after 9/11 of Sikh business owners being shot dead at their establishments, because everyone who wears a turban must be a terrorist, right? And given that Trump's basket of deplorables includes racists, gun nuts with their penis substitutes, the ignorant, "Christians", the KKK, Tony Perkins and the rest of our society's lower depths, it's only a matter of time.

Via TPM.

Today's Must-Read: Swiftboating Clinton

Digny has a good, thoughtful post on the Trump campaign's efforts (with the willing cooperation of the GOP establishment and the usual suspects in the media) to get the whole "brain damage" mantra out there:

I wrote about the latest smear that Hillary Clinton has brain damage for Salon today

How do we know it's the dog days of August in a presidential election year? Swimmers and swiftboats, that's how. Actually until August of 2004, we used to call swiftboating by other names: whisper campaigns and smear jobs. But after the success of the slick, pre-packaged set of lies about Senator John Kerry's war record this tactic will always be known for the boat that first made Kerry a hero and later destroyed his reputation.

This year, we're treated to an especially ugly form of swiftboating.  The right wing smear machine is working at warp speed to convince the nation that Hillary Clinton has brain damage. That is not hyperbole or some kind of a joke. They are literally claiming that she is hiding a physical and mental disability that renders her unfit for office. And they are, as usual, being helped by members of the mainstream media who are simply unable to resist "reporting" such a juicy tale even knowing that it is absurd. And so it becomes part of the narrative, true or not, that will color the rest of the campaign and Clinton's presidency should she win. 

It's really hard to fathom how much the right hates the Clintons. Probably because, first, they were "outsiders" in the White House; second, because try as hard as they might, they weren't able to bring them down.

The sad thing is, it's going to have an effect. We've seen it work again and again, going all the way back to Willie Horton.

I guess the only appropriate response, if someone should bring this up in your hearing, is "Says who?"

Today in Disgusting People (Update)

And I can't think of anyone more disgusting than George Zimmerman. Here's his latest bid for attention:

Calling the gun "an American Firearm Icon," Zimmerman lists it as "the firearm that was used to defend my life and end the brutal attack from Trayvon Martin on 2/26/2012."

He says it is "fully functional as the attempts by the Department of Justice on behalf of B. Hussein Obama to render the firearm inoperable were thwarted by my phenomenal Defense Attorney."

Zimmerman adds, "I am proud to announce that a portion of the proceeds will be used to: fight BLM [apparently Black Lives Matter] violence against Law Enforcement officers, ensure the demise of [State Attorney] Angela Correy's persecution career and Hillary Clinton's anti-firearm rhetoric."

"Now is your opportunity to own a piece of American History."

Do I need to add anything?

Update:

It seems this auction is not going to happen, at least not immediately: from commenter Piet, the BBC announced that the original auctioneer has pulled the offering. Now, from CNN:

George Zimmerman tried to sell the gun purportedly used to kill Trayvon Martin on two different auction websites Thursday.

Both times, the websites kicked him off.

Zimmerman said he used the gun to kill Martin, an unarmed African-American teen, in Florida four years ago. He claimed self-defense and was found not guilty.

Bidding on the gun was supposed to start Thursday morning on GunBroker, but the website sent out a message in the afternoon saying it had rejected the idea.

"Our site rules state that we reserve the right to reject listings at our sole discretion, and have done so with the Zimmerman listing," the GunBroker statement said. "We want no part in the listing on our web site or in any of the publicity it is receiving."

He then tried a second site:

Zimmerman then tried to sell the gun through United Gun Group, an online marketplace for firearms. It listed the weapon at a starting bid of $5,000, the same as on the previous site.

But United Gun Group put out a statement Thursday night, saying the gun will not be sold on its site.

"As an organization, we stand by the rule of law and, while no laws have been broken, we do not feel like it is in the best interest of the organization to continue to host this sale on our platform," it said.

"Our mission is to esteem the 2nd amendment and provide a safe and secure platform for firearms enthusiasts and law-abiding citizens; our association with Mr. Zimmerman does not help us achieve that objective."

Zimmerman also claimed that the Smithsonian had approached him about acquiring the gun. The Smithsonian said:

"We have never expressed interest in collecting George Zimmerman's firearm, and have no plans to ever collect or display it in any museums," it said in a statement.

You get the idea that no one wants to have anything to do with this loser?

Maybe he can arrange a private sale to Ted Nugent.

Today's Must Read

This piece, by Amanda Marcotte, on the desperation of the "religious" right:

Unfortunately, though, Davis’s behavior isn’t just a bratty tantrum. This whole incident is also a sign of a troubling development in the religious right: As their cultural power declines in the face of growing diversity and liberalism, religious conservatives are embracing scary levels of radicalism. They don’t have the numbers anymore, so they are turning to scarier and more radical demands to seize power in any way that they can.

In this light, the ignorance displayed by leading Republican figures about the way the American legal system works is a little more sinister. Mike Huckabee, although we consider him laughable, is probably the best example:

Mike Huckabee has been at the frontlines of pushing the claim that Christian conservatives simply have the right to ignore or overturn democracy to impose their will, and not just because he’s been running around Kentucky, trying to get himself on camera as much as possible in support of Davis’s attempt to ban gay marriage by fiat. He’s also been using the campaign trail to argue that the president should be able to simply end rule of law and start ruling like a dictator.

He doesn’t use the word dictator, of course, but make no mistake, Huckabee has repeatedly and shamelessly promised that if he is elected president, he will start declaring his beliefs to be the law of the land without the cooperation of Congress. In a Google hangout, he laid out the scheme: Declare as president that there are “constitutional rights of the unborn” and simply ban abortion by fiat. He claimed a similar authority during the Republican debate, a moment that got startlingly little play even though it was literally a candidate for president arguing that he would make himself a dictator.

The calls for armed insurrection start to take on a little more weight. And if you don't think it can happen here consider this:

Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes announced yesterday that he had reached out to Davis’ lawyers at Liberty Counsel to offer the protection of his group, which he says is already forming a presence in Rowan County, Kentucky, where Davis was recently released from jail after prohibiting her office from issuing marriage licenses. Rhodes said in a statement that his position has nothing to do with gay marriage, but rather his conviction that Davis had been illegally detained by the federal judge who held her in contempt for violating multiple court orders.

You may remember them as the group that forced the stand-off at the Bundy Ranch, when Cliven Bundy wanted to use our land for free to graze his cattle.

What could possibly go wrong?

Who Could Have Predicted This?

The white supremacist right wing is insisting that Dylann Roof has nothing to do with them:

“If starting a race war is what this kid is about, he did it in the worst possible way,” said Kirk Lyons, a prominent lawyer who has defended Ku Klux Klan members, supporters of the old southern Confederacy and a notorious Holocaust denier.

“I’m a Christian,” Lyons added. “I consider the congregants of black churches my fellow Christians. These are the last people you want to hurt.”

On far-right online comment forums, avowed white nationalists and white supremacists substantially agreed, worrying that the Charleston killings might become an excuse for the government they hate to arrest them, crack down on gun ownership and suppress public displays of the Confederate flag many of them revere.

(Emphasis added.)

I suspect we can see the real reason they're distancing themselves: they certainly don't want any closer scrutiny.

While they're claiming no knowledge of who Roof was and swearing that he had no association with anyone in their movement, they're dodging the question of who's responsible for creating the environment:

Whether Dylann Roof had a serious agenda or was just a deeply disturbed individual using the language of racial hatred to justify an irrational act, it is little mystery where he derived his ideas. News reports suggest Roof told either his friends or the police he meant to incite a race war – a term frequently thrown about online in response to the civil unrest in Ferguson, Missouri last year or in Baltimore in April. In the website manifesto, the author referenced the killing of Trayvon Martin, the black teenager from Florida who was shot by a neighbourhood watch leader three years ago.

A picture on Roof’s Facebook page showed him wearing a jacket with flags from apartheid-era South Africa and Rhodesia on the front – an association frequently made by advocates of an all-white America, or an all-white republic within its borders. The website containing the manifesto linked to his name was called The Last Rhodesian.

Where do you suppose he got the idea?

When domestic violence does break out, it reliably sparks panic in groups that skirt close to the wind in their rhetoric but do not want to be identified with acts of gratuitous violence.

Ben Jones of the Sons of Confederate Veterans – a one-time actor who appeared on the TV show Dukes of Hazzard – wasted no time denouncing the Charleston killings as “an act of purposeful evil”. He added: “We must not allow the sickness of one demented individual to become that with which the media and our ‘politically correct’ opponents define us. We are the same good-hearted people that we were last week and last year.”

Somehow, the "good-heartedness" of these groups eludes me. What is in stark relief is their moral cowardice.

Footnote: And why does this remind me of Tony Perkins' reaction to Dan Savage's comment, in the wake of a rash of suicides by gay teenagers, that Perkins went to his office every day and sat on a pile of dead queer kids? As you'll recall, Perkins' reaction was so close to hysterical as to make no difference. I smell a little bit of guilty panic here.

More On the Refugee Children

Very good post at Mahablog, with some good insights:

What the children are fleeing is anarchy. they are fleeing failed states in which there is no functional criminal justice system and criminal activity, including murder, is carried out with impunity. People arm themselves and join gangs just to survive. In short, it’s the sort of place the “open carriers” and Bundy Ranch militia crowd are trying to turn the U.S. into.

I have nothing to add, except to note that conditions in Central America are the reality of what the Bundy Ranch morons and their confreres want to turn the U.S. into. Unfortunately, it's nothing like the fantasy in their minds.

(And do read the article linked in the quote -- quite an eye-opener.)

They Just Don't Get It

This is probably one of the most offensive things I've read in a good long while -- and I don't mean "offensive" in the polite, PC way that so many people use the term, I mean outright, grievously insulting. And this is a statement meant to ameliorate previous insults. Sandy Rios, who has the double whammy of having a radio show for AFA and being a Fox News commentator. (Uh, Ms. Rios -- be careful. You know what they say about three strikes.) >Via Joe.My.God.

I would never say that homosexuals cannot love. They can, of course. Capable of great love. And I know there’s been tremendous heartbreak in the homosexual community – and I’ve talked about this before – heartbreak when you lose a loved one, heartbreak when you break up. Because, you know, there aren’t many lasting relationships – maybe among lesbians, but certainly not among gay men, that’s not the norm. So, there’s a lot of heartbreak, a lot of rejection when you get older, so I know that you’re capable and able. You’re humans, you love. The point is, the right kind of love. The right kind of love is life-giving. And the right kind of love is love for God, love for your natural family, love between a man and a woman and a woman and a man in marriage. Not cohabitating. There’s just some standards that God lays down.

The key part, of course, starts with "the right kind of love." I imagine that's the love experienced by the "right kind" of people, if you know what I mean. (And I have to give the standard response to the "God" part: Which god would that be, exactly?)

And this is supposed to somehow ameliorate the comments she made equating the love between two men or two women with the "love" that Ariel Castro felt for the women he kidnapped and imprisoned.

They Tried That Once

I know I've been away for quite a while, but it's been a topsy-turvy few weeks. This story, however, deserves a comment, although there's not much I really have to say about it.

As I wrote about earlier this month, there were protests planned for anti-gay zealot and bigot Pastor Charles Worley after he was recorded preaching this sort of hatred towards lesbians and gay people from the pulpit in his Baptist church in North Carolina: NC Pastor: Put an Electric Fence Around Gays and Lesbians to Make Sure They "Die Out."

Here's some background from Pam Spaulding.

I'm sure you've seen the story, as well as Anderson Cooper's interview with one of this bastard's parishioners, who obviously can't walk and breathe at the same time without close supervision. And here's some choice bits from Spaulding again on the parishioners and their warped idea of "Christian love."

Geneva Sims said she’s been listening to Worley preach the Gospel since the 1970s. She wasn’t surprised by the 71-year-old pastor’s now infamous sermon. In fact, she supports him and his message.

“He had every right to say what he said about putting them in a pen and giving them food,” said Sims. “The Bible says they are worthy of death. He is preaching God’s word.”

Providence Road Baptist Church member Stacey Pritchard agreed.

“Sometimes you’ve got to be scared straight,” she explained. “He is trying to save those people from Hell.”

Pritchard said Worley’s message isn’t one of hate. Instead, she interpreted it as tough love guided by Good Book.

Alvin McEwen pointed out something that hadn't occurred to me, strangely enough: this has been done before. It happened in Germany in the 1930s and '40s. This sort of arrangement is generally known as "concentration camps."

Christian love.

Do I need to say more?

BAM!

The cat is out of the bag. NOM Exposed has posted previously confidential internal documents from our good friends Brian Brown and Maggie Gallagher that detail NOM's strategy for denying civil rights to GLBTs. And it turns out they're not only anti-gay, they're race baiters as well.

“The strategic goal of this project is to drive a wedge between gays and blacks—two key Democratic constituencies. Find, equip, energize and connect African American spokespeople for marriage, develop a media campaign around their objections to gay marriage as a civil right; provoke the gay marriage base into responding by denouncing these spokesmen and women as bigots…”

Alvin McEwen has a pertinent comment about this:

NOM has portrayed whatever African-American opposition to marriage equality its spotlighted as spontaneous attempts by leaders and members of the black community to keep its civil rights legacy from supposedly being "tainted" by a comparison to gay equality.

But now we see that there was nothing spontaneous about this. It was a cynically planned effort by NOM - which the organization continues to exploit - in order to drive a wedge between blacks and gays.

I wonder how the black community is going to react to the news that they've been manipulated by a bunch of white folks who want to get rid of President Obama.

Expose Obama as a social radical. Develop side issues to weaken pro-gay marriage political leaders and parties and develop an activist base of socially conservative voters. Raise such issues as pornography, protection of children, and the need to oppose all efforts to weaken religious liberty at the federal level.

And then there is the Latino bloc:

"The Latino vote in America is a key swing vote, and will be so even more so in the future, both because of demographic growth and inherent uncertainty: Will the process of assimilation to the dominant Anglo culture lead Hispanics to abandon traditional family values? We must interrupt this process of assimilation by making support for marriage a key badge of Latino identity - a symbol of resistance to inappropriate assimilation."

Their problem there is that, while family is very important to Latinos in general, that can work against NOM: sons and daughters may be gay, but they are still family. It's also notable that Latin America is making great strides in equal rights for gays and lesbians, in some cases far ahead of the U.S. The assimilation argument is going to backfire, big time, if the folks back home in Mexico or Brazil or Argentina or Chile recognize same-sex marriages and adoption rights.

If you look at the documents (all available at the NOM Exposed link), it becomes clear that NOM is nothing more than a Republican front with a Republican agenda -- "traditional marriage" is simply a screen.

NOM is right in line with Rick Santorum, Michele Bachmann, the Catholic bishops, and the rest of the right-wing theocrats.

Jim Burroway has an excellent summary of the whole thing. Read McEwen's full post as well.

Catching Up: Pink Ribbons

It's been quite a week. As you can see from my comments (started this draft yesterday), this story happened almost too fast to keep track of, which is my excuse if this post is a little incoherent.

Most light -- and heat -- is the Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation's decision to cut future grants to Planned Parenthood. PP currently is one of the largest organizations providing breast cancer screenings. SGK's reasons are -- shall we call them "flimsy" and let it go at that? I have a feeling that the foundation's not going to like the amount of light generated by this one, even less than they're going to like the heat.

Maha has a good summary of the origins of this. Key point:

According to Sarah Kliff, the Komen Foundation says it is de-funding Planned Parenthood because it is under congressional investigation. Of course, the only reason it is under congressional investigation is that wingnuts in Congress are subjecting it to a witch hunt.

Here's the story from NYT. The Grey Lady also had a bit of editorial commentary on the whole thing.

Mr. Stearns’s “investigation” is nothing more than a political witch hunt, stirred up by Republican leaders and by a right-wing antichoice group, Americans United for Life, which now displays the pink ribbon on its Web site as part of a fund-raising campaign for Komen. The inquiry is part of the Republican campaign to stigmatize Planned Parenthood and end financial support for its invaluable network of clinics. Abortions make up only about 3 percent of its work, but most of this crowd also objects to its leading role in providing access to contraceptives.

Digby has a few words about SGK's initial attempts at damage control:

Look, at this point it's quite clear that the Komen Foundation has gone over to the dark side. This isn't a result of bullying. This woman agrees with this decision and is simply dancing as fast as she can to tamp down the reaction. The willing hire of a forced childbirth zealot was the first clue.

Watch the video at the link, and see if you agree with me: Nancy Brinker is a) lying through her teeth, and b) desperately trying to get out of the shitstorm.

Read the article by Jeffrey Goldberg that Digby links to. Nothing like a little inside information to clarify things.

[T]hree sources with direct knowledge of the Komen decision-making process told me that the rule was adopted in order to create an excuse to cut off Planned Parenthood. (Komen gives out grants to roughly 2,000 organizations, and the new "no investigations" rule applies to only one so far.)

Funny how that worked out, isn't it?

Charles Pierce points out that the "investigation itself is nothing more than part of a campaign to pull an ACORN on Planned Parenthood:

Of course, the real reason is a politically motivated audit undertaken a part of a general jihad against Planned Parenthood undertaken by Florida congresscritter Cliff Stearns, the chairman of an oversight subcommittee and a real freaking prize in his own right. Stearns is the guy who added to the Zadroga bill, which provided for federal relief to the first responders who worked on the pile at Ground Zero in New York, the ludicrous requirement that the names of all applicants for such relief first be checked against all terrorist watch-list. He also once attacked PBS because the South African version of Sesame Street introduced a character who was HIV-positive.

The prime catalyst for this seems to have been Karen Handel, SGK's new Senior Vice President for Public Policy. She's a Georgia wingnut. Ed Kilgore has the dirt on her.

(OK -- how bad is the backlash? Even rock bands are piling on.)

People are on to them now. (And I confess I didn't see this coming -- at least, not this fast.) Komen appears to have done a 180, which is being greeted with no little amount of scepticism.

Greg Sargent of the Washington Post got a Komen board member on the phone, and he said that “it would be highly unfair to ask us to commit to any organization that doesn’t go through a grant process that shows that the money we raise is used to carry out our mission. … Tell me you can help carry out our mission and we will sit down at the table.”

By the way, about SGK's "mission" -- 24% of their outlays go to research on a cure for breast cancer. This is the Susan G. Komer for the Cure foundation. 24%. Do the math.

The mantra, of course, is that Planned Parenthood is using SGK money for abortions. That's bullshit. It's become a McArdleism: "Money is fungible." No, it's not. I've worked for not-for-profits, specifically with grant writing and accounting. You have to account for every penny and show that it was spent in support of the program it was intended for. You don't move money from breast cancer screenings to abortion services. You can't. As for the idea that giving money for one program frees up money for another, that's also bullshit. If you don't give money for a particular program, it doesn't happen. That's the not-for-profit universe.

Does anyone see the pattern here? It's not just the so-called "pro-life" contingent. The right wing is going after everything that might actually do some people (read "those" people) some good. Remember ACORN? Gaius Publius has some good observations on the strategy here.

As my old Uncle Straight Talk used to say (who's much more direct than yours truly) — "Do they care about blacks? They care about winning. Do they care about gays? They care about winning. Do they care about women? They care about winning. Got that, son?"

Got that?

(Footnote: One source claims that Planned Parenthood raised $3 million in three days after SGK's announcement that PP was being de-funded.)

This Is Just Sick

I don't think I need to comment at all, except to note that, if you go to the comments at this post (which is where I first found the video), pay particular attention to commenter "timjoebillybob" -- he never seems to have heard the phrase "the common good," and doesn't seem to understand that others are paying taxes for his benefit as well as their own. Big effin infant, all caught up in the idea that his taxes might actually pay for something that benefits someone else, too.

Here's a more complete version of that video -- Bernie Sanders calls it what it is.



See also this take-down of the "conservative" position on Medicare by Maha.

And as a footnote, and an indicator (if you needed another one) of the basic philosophy of the "fiscally responsible" right, here's Gov. Haley Barbour's reaction to the potential devastation in Mississippi from flooding:

As the water rose, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour moved furniture out of his lake house outside Vicksburg on family land that was inundated during the 1927 flood. A week ago, he urged residents to flee low-lying areas, saying that the state wouldn't assist the evacuations and that people should help one another secure their property and get out.

Mm -- that's "fiscally responsible, small-government conservatives." (But he did ask the feds for disaster assistance -- ya don't want government to get too small, now.)

Liberty

The idea that the teabaggers and religious right wingnuts are actually interested in liberty should by now be shown up for the sick joke that it is.

Let's start off with this clip from Rachel Maddow:

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

Add in the book challenges in libraries -- school and public -- every year, most of which go unreported. There seems to be quite a cottage industry in this area, as a matter of fact, with librarians making pre-emptive strikes -- or trying to until they get caught.

What this reveals is an ugly mindset, antithetical to everything that America stands for -- these people (meaning the so-called "conservatives" who are trying not only to censor ideas but to eradicate them) are not content with avoiding things they object to, or forbidding their children to experience them, but insist that no one, child or adult, may have access to them.

These are extremists, and one finds a similar mindset on the extreme left. Actually, it needn't even be that extreme. They won't burn books, but they'll try to silence those who aren't politically correct enough. I call it the "What will the neighbors think?" syndrome: it's those who want to eliminate the drag queens, leather folk and nearly naked dancers from Gay Pride parades, for example, so that we'll be more "acceptable." Thankfully, their voices seem to be fading, but I had occasion to pose this question in a comment thread recently: "Acceptable" on whose terms -- how much of yourself are you willing to give up to be tolerated?

But I digress.

Granted, those who physically attacked works of art are seriously disturbed people, but that disturbance has to have an anchor point. For them, that anchor is the same attitude that infects people like Tony Perkins, Maggie Gallagher, Peter Sprigg, Peter LaBarbera, and their ilk.

Why do you suppose they get all the air-time?

Uganda, and a comment on the War Against Kevin Jennings

A quickie, noting some significant developments in the "Kill Gays" bill before the Ugandan parliament.

First, from Jim Burroway, this note about an op ed in the Ugandan official news, written by a close adviser to the president. It seems pretty strong to me:

And that is where same-sex lovers’ haters will do their nut! The recent month I was away a parliamentarian introduced a Bill of hugely draconian measure, including heavy penalties on those who wouldn’t report same-sex lovers they knew about! In the US there was a man whose name, McCarthy, is now a synonym (as mccarthyism) for cruel witch-hunting. For him Communism was the hot issue, although he would doubtless have looked at same-sex love as a product of that political system.

In the Inquisition period, evil prelates tortured people who deviated from current beliefs, including by saying the world was not flat but round! Now we all laugh about these odd characters. Lower down the scale, people were tortured for being left-handed (indeed called sinister for it) or being very short, or being blind: in short for not being normal. I believe, and I am raising the bar, that we must laugh at this MP and others like him: laugh and stay sane. What crime have same-sex lovers committed, per se, by being who they are? Would those who believe God made mankind exclude them, and on what grounds?

Remember that this is the government owned news outlet.

My second note is about Rick Warren, Obama's favorite Christianist. He's changed direction on the "Kill Gays" bill -- I guess he sort of had to, given his close ties to one of the bill's chief architects, Martin Ssempa. Warren originally tried to stay out of it:

However, it is not my personal calling as a pastor in America to comment or interfere in the political process of other nations." On Meet the Press this morning, he reiterated this neutral stance in a different context: "As a pastor, my job is to encourage, to support. I never take sides."

However, it seems the PR disaster-in-the-making was too much. Here's his statement as of this week:



He's gotten a lot of praise from the gay blogs for this one, but Ed Brayton is calling bullshit:

Without even acknowledging that he's flipped positions completely, one can only assume that the real reason for doing so is because he's taking a lot of heat for it and is in damage control mode. Anyone who has followed Warren for any length of time recognizes this as a pattern, where he backs vile policies and then pretends that he never did - even when he did so on video for the world to see.

He explicitly compared gay marriage to incest and beastiality, then lied and said he didn't. He explicitly endorsed Prop 8 in California and told his followers to vote for that referendum, then lied and said he didn't. In both cases, we have him on video saying exactly what he later denied saying. And he has never owned up to the lies.

This is Rick Warren's MO. We should all be used to it by now. So pardon me if I don't join others in praising his disingenuous johnny-come-lately statement. If he actually meant it, he would have said it the first time he was asked about it.

Rick Warren is, I think, one of the most facile snake-oil salesmen on the right. The only thing that keeps him out of the same league as, say, Lou Sheldon, Peter LaBarbera, Fred Phelps, and that whole wing is that he's not crazy. He's just a very shrewd manipulator who, for a change, is not a conspiracy thinker. Yes, of course he's a liar -- he sort of has to be, now doesn't he? But he's come out an made a video condemning the Ugandan bill in no uncertain terms. (And, as a sidebar, how is it that his good friend, president Obama, has remained mum? Any guesses on the depth of his commitment to equality for gays and lesbians?)

And speaking of Liars for Jesus, check out this post at Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters. I'm not going to excerpt it here, because it's something you need to read in its entirety. It's pretty gruesome. I will say, however, that I'd like to get this Allie Duzett in a corner and ask her some hard questions, starting with "How, as a Christian, do you justify spreading lies and inciting hatred against a total stranger?" I'd love to hear her answer.

Dominion, Not Influence

I realize I'm spending a lot of time commenting on Mike Huckabee, but the man is scary weird. He's a snake oil salesman with a lot of charm and a poisonous product.

Andrew Sullivan (yes, I'm still reading the Daily Dish) is after Huckabee. I guess the idea of amending the Constitution to bring it in line with Jehovah's standards got to him.

The post itself is merely reporting blog wars on the right, namely Hugh Hewitt's response to Stephen Bainbridge's -- well, I guess "attack" is an appropriate description -- on Huckabee's relationship with Christian Reconstructionism. If anyone needed any further evidence that Hewitt is out there someplace, this should suffice:

Huck called for amendments to the Constitution to protect life and traditional marriage. These are mainstream, conservative positions. He is not a "reconstructionist" Christian, as even a casual glance at his decade of governing in Arkansas shows. Professor B's tortured string of cites never delivers anything remotely connecting Huck to "reconstructionism," and implying otherwise is just imagination.

Disagree with Huck on economics, but his positions on life and marriage are mainstream GOP positions, repeatedly endorsed at the ballot box across the country.

I don't see how anyone could justify such a statement. Note also the neo-right idea that civil rights are fit subjects for plebiscites. That's hardly a traditional conservative position in itself. Frankly, since the right is so fond of "slippery slope" arguments, this seems like an excellent example: once you start amending the Constitution to conform to Jehovah's plan for humanity (or at least your interpretation of it), where do you stop? Huckabee claims that abortion and marriage are the only two issues for which he favors Constitutional amendments, because the right to life and the sanctity of traditional marriage are being challenged. Any guesses on what his response would be to the next challenge to traditional Christian tribal taboos? (Here's some more information on Huckabee's links to Dominionists and Reconstructionists, embedded in a wake-up call from tristero at Hullabaloo.)

I have to join tristero in pointing out that Huckabee and his supporters are the most dangerous element in American society right now. I've heard comments in discussion groups (in fact, Huckabee has his own thread at EA Forums) to the effect that "well, when he was governor of Arkansas he didn't do that." Of course, his tenure as governor had other problems, most notably his lack of judgment and willingness to be stampeded by pressure from the right -- sort of like another governor who recently became president, and look what that's done to us. Do I want Donal Wildmon and his ilk dictating domestic policy? I don't think so.

However, my real comment on Sullivan's post is on his conclusion.

I don't think people have really understood the logical consequences of the fundamentalist psyche. There is nothing more antithetical to the principles underlying traditional conservatism. Eventually, the complacent Republicans will realize the tiger they are riding. Huckabee is charming. The charming ones are often the most dangerous.

It's not just antipathy toward the principles of traditional conservatism that's in play here. If I can repeat myself yet again, it's a fundamental antipathy to the underlying princples of American democracy. Sullivan outlines that in the preceding paragraph, and somehow misses the point.

I can't say I'm surprised.

Update:

Hilzoy has a terrific analysis of Huckabee's statement and its implications:

In his clarification, he suggests that he was just pointing out a difference between the Constitution and the Bible: the Constitution can be amended, while the Bible cannot. But that won't wash. It is, of course, true that the Bible cannot now be amended, although at various points in its earlier history, it could.

This touches on something that has always puzzled me, but I've gotten to the point where I just ascribe it to willful ignorance: the Bible as it is known to most American fundamentalists and literalists is a translation of scattered religious texts that were selected, edited and assembled in the Middle Ages to conform with the Church's idea of what the Christian scripture should be. And yet somehow it is inerrant and not subject to change. Aside from the obvious cognitive dissonance inherent in this position, it also begs the issue that our understanding of things changes, including the Bible.

Or, I guess that's true unless you're Mike Huckabee.

What Republicans Want

Colin McEnroe finds the philosophical basis of the smear campaign against Graeme Frost and his family:

These people -- even with their combined income of a VERY modest $45,000 -- have no business turning to the government for help with their medical bills because they haven't been bankrupted yet. They're income is low, but they've managed to hang onto some assets that place them a little closer to the middle class. It's disgusting that they get help from the government if they have anything.

Of course, since privileged Republicans can afford insurance (or own stock in insurance companies), they don't have to worry, so things like an expanded S-CHIP are probably a socialist plot (Republicans who aren't wealthy are becoming a vanishing species):

And look at this! Malkin and her friends don't want to fix that problem. On the contrary, they insist on it! They insist on the risk of bankruptcy as kind of a moral imperative; and they say members of the shaky, eroding American middle class who are not willing to put up with the ruination of their financial health from medical bills are leeches and wussies! Wow.

Of course, if it's a moral good to be bankrupt, why aren't they volunteering? Like they did to serve in Iraq?

Commenter ny nick has a good question:

My question is, god forbid one of these kids had fallen into an irreversable coma like Terry Schiavo, Michelle Malkin and her friends in the flying monkey brigade would be more than willing to let the government pay to keep the brain dead person on life support. Why are they willing to spend government money on Terry Schiavo but not on rehabiliting a child back to health?

Simple -- because the right wing doesn't want to help anyone who can talk back.


Thanks to Atrios.

Ted Nugent, a/k/a Macho Man

From the Chicago Sun-Times, more on that real he-man, Ted Nugent. The headline to Richard Roeper's story tells it all:

Facing a draft, Nugent bravely wet his pants

It's sort of amazing what has-been second- or third-string rockers will do to get attention, isn't it?