Today's Cultural Warfare Update (1/2)
Jan. 20th, 2007 11:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
solarbirdSo we're back to this: Dinesh D'Souza blames "the cultural left," particularly queers, for the 9/11 attacks. He thinks the US should change its culture in response and, one presumes, crack down on women, t3h gay, contraception, etc. Yes, this is January 2007. Yes, he thinks that this is an original assertion; no, he apparently doesn't remember why Fallwell et Robertson Delenda Est. Yes, all this still pisses me off - credit for the spot to Andrew Sullivan;
I don't usually include other people commenting about the fundamentalist movement, and I think this one has a few things wrong - I think he underestimates the influence of not Rushdooney himself, but of Rushdooney's successors, for example - but I think the author has a few compelling points, so I'm including it;
"Christian Lawyers to Petition Queen to Block Gay Rights Bill" - the argument being that equal rights law for GBLT people is inherently discriminatory against (anti-gay) Christians; it's the same thing we see in the US, where the fundamentalists say that if they can't discriminate against queers in the public space, then they can't practice their religion;
Concerned Women for America's Janet LaRue, writing for townhall.com, tries to wedge the "GL" away from the "B" in a column that also asserts all bisexual people need to marry one person of each gender in order to have their rights respected, and this is why we can't have same-sex legal marriage;
"Answers in Genesis," a creationist website, says that Neanderthals had to have been humans because all humans are "descended from Noah's three sons and their wives"; they're attacking a study placing an approximate age from the split-off of the neanderthals and cro-magnon man from a common ancestor; the funny thing is where they condemn and then use the same data in one paragraph, the condemnation is for indicating too old an age for the mitochondrial DNA in question, since the world is only 6,000 years or so old, of course;
Dinesh D'Souza on NRO outlines clearly that he wants an alliance between American fundamentalists and Muslim non-radicalised "social conservatives" who are against things like GBLT people, church-state separation, and reproductive rights, to fight in "the war at home" with Mr. Bush against queers, secular government, and social "liberals"; states you can't win a war on radical Islamist movements without winning the "war at home" against non-theoconservatives;
Rabidly anti-gay theocon Senator Brownback (R-Kansas) formally announces his entry into the Presidential race; this'll be really neat to watch in an academic way, as he's the Ellen Craswell of the national Republican Party; the theocons love him desperately, but the non-theocon party elite want no part of him - and he's alienating the neocons. Will the Dobsons (et al) push their followers to someone else to keep the alliance intact? stay tuned;
Anti-abortion clergy to hold "preborn memorial" in Senate auditorium, including a "memorial" to "honor those who have lost their lives to abortion, euthanasia and embryonic stem-cell research";
Mr. Bush issues proclamation of "National Sanctity of Human Life Day" tomorrow;
Focus on the Family wants the HPV vaccine - the one that prevents cervical cancer from the sexually-transmitted human papillomavirus - "opt-in" and a separate shot from the rest of the school vaccination requirement set; they can't bring themselves to outright oppose it, clearly - and even state outright that it will save lives - but since HPV is sexually transmitted (one has to presume) then apparently it's radioactive;
Focus on the Family carries water for the Bush team on Mr. Bush's fantastically expensive prescription-drug programme; the story implies that drug prices can be negotiated under the current programme (untrue, and the entire point of the revisions), implies that people can't buy these drugs at all outside the programme (wtf?), and says that negotiations over price and the government _not_ paying for some expensive prevision drugs is "the same thing as involuntary euthanasia";
FotF: "Wisconsin Officials Will Denounce Marriage" - by not supporting the anti-marriage amendment recently passed, and issuing a declaration saying they oppose it and will work to overturn it;
New anti-marriage amendment introduced in New Mexico;
Another article on the conflict within evangelical Christianity over global warming, with Focus becoming slightly less condemnational, but still pushing the idea as a "liberal... wedge";
FotF outraged that a public school painted over bible verses ("So the King will greatly desire your beauty; because He is your Lord, worship Him") added to a public middle school girls' bathroom by volunteers;
Focus on the Family says "ministers and state officials" will be "forced" to perform civil unions in New Jersey; first, civil unions aren't marriage; second, civil marriage isn't church marriage; third, "ministers" and "state officials" aren't the same thing no matter how much Focus on the Family wants them to be. The story closes with the assertion that anti-gay state officials should be allowed to opt-out of job duties if they hate queers;
FotF tries to make the "Embryo Saved From Katrina's Flood is Now a Boy Named Noah" into a rally for efforts to ban embryonic stem-cell research;
FotF attacks Lawrence v. Texas (2003) again by noting that a polygamist in Utah is using it as part of his appeal to the Supreme Court;
FotF declares Virginia school curriculum that talks about when abortion is legal to be "advocacy";
The late Terri Schiavo's brother and sister will march in anti-abortion rally on Monday;
Anti-abortion activists plan to appeal ruling striking down a law requiring doctors to deliver an anti-abortion lecture to women considering abortion; FotF's subheading on it is, "Doctors may once again be compelled to disclose the truth about abortion";
Focus on the Family ACTION ITEM against Federal hate-crimes bill; they assert it will be used to make opposition to "homosexuality" illegal;
FotF article on "trigger laws" - comprehensive abortion bans that only take effect when and if Roe v. Wade is overturned;
Planned Parenthood article on pharmacists refusing to prescribe "Plan B" (the morning-after birth control pill) includes the claim - again - that Plan B "can cause an early abortion";
"How the left caused 9/11," by Dinesh D'Souza; one of "the left's" crimes is working to make contraception available to Muslim women;
Concerned Women for America: "'Thought Crimes' Bill Re-introduced in Congress"; says liberals care more about gay men being killed than a "4-year-old daughter" being killed;
CWA condemns embryonic stem-cell research bill, jumps on the Noah Markham Is Our New Poster Child bandwagon mentioned above;
CWA condemns UN report calling for more gender equality worldwide, says they expected "more" out of a Bush appointee; I'm particularly nauseated by the they mock report concerns about women having no control over their sexual lives in many countries;
CWA ACTION ITEM against Fox Sports's NFL playoff broadcast for showing a picture of a woman wearing a T-shirt reading "Fuck Da Eagles"; says Fox has no "right to air... offensive language";
CWA's Mike Mears on a Virginia attempt to overturn their recent anti-marriage/anti-civil-unions Constitutional amendment;
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If homo lovers are liberal, then mullah lovers are conservative?
Classical Values
Pajamas Media
January 13, 2007
http://www.classicalvalues.com/archives/004439.html
If homo lovers are liberal, then mullah lovers are conservative?
Via Glenn Reynolds, I see that Dinesh D'Souza has a new book. According to D'Souza, it is the "cultural left" which is responsible for the 9/11 attacks:
"In this book I make a claim that will seem startling at the outset. The cultural left in this country is responsible for causing 9/11. ... In faulting the cultural left, I am not making the absurd accusation that this group blew up the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. I am saying that the cultural left and its allies in Congress, the media, Hollywood, the nonprofit sector, and the universities are the primary cause of the volcano of anger toward America that is erupting from the Islamic world. The Muslims who carried out the 9/11 attacks were the product of this visceral rage--some of it based on legitimate concerns, some of it based on wrongful prejudice, but all of it fueled and encouraged by the cultural left. Thus without the cultural left, 9/11 would not have happened.
Hollywood and the universities? They got al-Qaeda so stirred up that flying planes into buildings was the only way to stop cultural depravity?
Hmm...
Does that make Brokeback Mountain a sort of victory film?
I'm no fan of the left, but to claim these people are responsible for Muslim religious rage strikes me as a logical stretch, to say the least. Does D'Souza mean that if the "cultural left" is stopped, then the terrorists will stop hating us? Should that be our goal? Precisely what does D'Souza mean by the term "cultural left" and how far does it go? Did Western-looking women who got raped for looking like sluts invite the rapes by their "left-wing" behavior? How about the gay men thrown off buildings by the Taliban or hanged in Iran?
[More at URL]
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Through a Glass, Darkly
How the Christian right is reimagining U.S. history
Posted on Wednesday, January 10, 2007. Originally from December 2006.
By Jeff Sharlet
Harper's Magazine
http://www.harpers.org/ThroughAGlassDarkly-12838838.html
We keep trying to explain away American fundamentalism. Those of us not engaged personally or emotionally in the biggest political and cultural movement of our times—those on the sidelines of history—keep trying to come up with theories with which to discredit the evident allure of this punishing yet oddly comforting idea of a deity, this strange god. His invisible hand is everywhere, say His citizen-theologians, caressing and fixing every outcome: Little League games, job searches, test scores, the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, the success or failure of terrorist attacks (also known as “signs”), victory or defeat in battle, at the ballot box, in bed. Those unable to feel His soothing touch at moments such as these snort at the notion of a god with the patience or the prurience to monitor every tick and twitch of desire, a supreme being able to make a lion and a lamb cuddle but unable to abide two men kissing. A divine love that speaks through hurricanes. Who would worship such a god? His followers must be dupes, or saps, or fools, their faith illiterate, insane, or misinformed, their strength fleeting, hollow, an aberration. A burp in American history. An unpleasant odor that will pass.
We don’t like to consider the possibility that they are not newcomers to power but returnees, that the revivals that have been sweeping America with generational regularity since its inception are not flare-ups but the natural temperature of the nation. We can’t conceive of the possibility that the dupes, the saps, the fools—the believers—have been with us from the very beginning, that their story about what America once was and should be seems to some great portion of the population more compelling, more just, and more beautiful than the perfunctory processes of secular democracy. Thus we are at a loss to account for this recurring American mood.
[More at URL]
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Christian lawyers to petition Queen to block gay rights bill
This Is London
01.01.07
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23380090-details/Christian%20lawyers%20to%20petition%20Queen%20to%20block%20gay%20rights%20bill/article.do
Thousands of Christian lawyers are to petition for the Queen's help to stop the Government from imposing sweeping new gay rights laws on Britain.
They will ask the Queen, as defender of the Church of England, to make the case to Tony Blair that the proposed Sexual Orientation Regulations discriminate against Christians.
A torch-lit protest will also take place outside the Houses of Parliament, ahead of a Lords debate on the new rules next Tuesday.
The laws, meant to come into force in April, are supposed to prevent discrimination against gays. But the Church of England has pointed out that priests could be sued for refusing to bless same-sex civil partnerships under the rules.
And Catholics have warned they will close their adoption agencies rather than be forced to allow gay couples to adopt children.
Black churches have added their voices to the protest, saying pastors and churchgoers would go to jail rather than accept rules that would mean they had to open their meeting halls to gay lobby groups.
The plea to the Queen is being made by the Christian Concern for Our Nation, an offshoot of the Lawyers' Christian Fellowship, a group which lists more than 2,000 barristers and solicitors among its members.
The petition warns the Queen the rules are a serious affront' to the Gospel.
[More at URL]
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Another homosexual activist cuts bisexuals out of wedding march
By Janet M. LaRue
January 8, 2007
townhall.com
http://townhall.com/columnists/column.aspx?UrlTitle=another_homosexual_activist_cuts_bisexuals_out_of_wedding_march&ns=JanetMLaRue&dt=01/08/2007&page=1
It turns out that some are more equal than others.
Another nationally-known homosexual activist, Michaelangelo Signorile, dismissed the prospect of legalized polygamy as a scare tactic and went on record against a “married” ménage-a-trois, which is the topic of my recent column. Even so, I’m guessing that Signorile and friends are applauding Wednesday’s ruling by a Canadian appeals court that a five-year-old boy has a legal right to two mommies and a daddy. If the ruling isn’t the Tour de Luge to polygamy, what is?
Wednesday night, Bill O’Reilly interviewed Signorile on the subject of “gay marriage.” O’Reilly says if homosexuals can marry, you can’t stop polygamy. Signorile essentially dismissed polygamy as a “ploy,” saying it “isn’t within the scheme of marriage.”
After watching and reading the transcript of the program, I think O’Reilly failed to stop Signorile’s centrifugal spin by failing to press for answers to some key questions:
[More at URL]
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What About the Neandertal DNA?
A preliminary report
Answers in Genesis
http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/206.asp
There has been recent media fanfare about the sequencing of parts of Neandertal mitochondrial DNA.1 Some researchers claim that it gives powerful support to the theory that all humanity descended from an ‘African Eve’ about 100,000 to 200,000 years ago, and that Neanderthals were an evolutionary dead end.
Some researchers claim that the genetic differences indicate the Neanderthals were a different species than the early humans who swept them aside in Europe and western Asia—although they appear to have split from a common ancestor 500,000 years ago (according to evolutionary dating methods).2
As always, we urge caution. In the last 12 months we have seen big media fanfare about the ‘feathered dinosaurs’, ‘176,000-year-old’ Aboriginal remains, and especially ‘Mars life’. But the media never seem to give the same prominence to the refutation of these ‘evidence’, even by secular scientists. However, Creation magazine3 and of course the News section of the Answers in Genesis Website have dealt with all these issues as they arose. So let’s wait for more data.
[...]
Apart from the claimed dates, this is consistent with the Biblical model, where all people are descended from Noah’s three sons and their wives. These descendants’ languages were confused at Babel, so people separated into small groups and migrated their own separate ways. Nothing in the new data rules out the possibility that Neandertals interbred with ordinary Homo sapiens, which would make them part of the same species.5
[Ed. note: The "claimed dates," which they oppose, are the key element of the data. It's based on what's often referred to as the "molecular clock," which is to say, the rate at which various nuclear and genetic changes due to random mutation take place. So they're attacking the same data that they're proceeding to use.]
[More at URL]
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Eyeing the Enemy
Dinesh D’Souza looks left.
January 16, 2006
An NRO Q&A
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZmUzZTlmNGY3ZDM5Mjg2ZWQ3ZjVmMWVmNDhkOWU0NjU=
In his new book, The Enemy at Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11, Dinesh D’Souza attempts to invigorate and refocus the American reaction to the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States. In The Enemy at Home, D’Souza argues that “the cultural left and its allies in Congress, the media, Hollywood, the nonprofit sector, and the universities are the primary cause of the volcano of anger toward America that is erupting from the Islamic world.
[...]
D’Souza: Nobody’s asking you to ally with the radical mullahs in Iran. I’d like to see them all deposed. Our concern should be with the traditional Muslims, who are the majority in the Muslim world. These people are also religious and socially conservative, and they are our natural allies. In fact, since the cultural Left in America is de facto allied with the radical Muslims, we as conservatives have no choice but to ally with the traditional Muslims. We cannot win the war on terror without them. No matter how many Islamic radicals we kill, it’s no use if twice as many traditional Muslims join them. Now building bridges to this group doesn’t mean changing our way of life, and if we are conservative there is nothing that needs to be changed. Our values are quite similar to those of traditional Muslims. There’s no point chasing after “liberals” who believe in secularism and feminism and homosexual rights.
[...]
Lopez: Dinesh, you write that “American conservatives should join the Muslims and others in condemning the global moral degeneracy that is produced by liberal values.” Um, what would that coalition look like? Ahmadinejad and Pat Robertson? That’s not exactly a ticket anyone but David Duke will run to rally behind.
D’Souza: Already there have been working relationships between traditional Christians and traditional Muslims in the United Nations and some other international forums to block liberal efforts to declare abortion as a right under international law. In fact the U.N. Charter lists no such right, but this is part of the liberal campaign of cultural imperialism that is trying to force the values of the Western Left on the rest of the world. Planned Parenthood is distributing condoms to teenage girls on every continent. Leftist groups are suing to overturn restrictive abortion laws in South America. The Left is trying to force Turkey to liberalize its laws on homosexuality as a condition of joining the European Union. So here are opportunities for people who differ on theology but agree on morality to form an international coalition to block these bogus “rights” from being imposed on cultures that do not want them. I emphasize that I am not contesting any of the rights of classical liberalism. But this is a new liberalism that is trying to smuggle its own political preferences and call them “rights.” Come to think of it, hasn’t the Left been doing that here in this country for several decades now? Here are home we have to fight these bogus “rights” ourselves, but abroad we have the entire traditional world as an ally. Why wouldn’t we want that? This has nothing to do with putting Pat Robertson and Ahmadinejad together, and everything to do with forming coalitions among mainstream groups across international boundaries.
[...]
Lopez: What’s the one constructive point you hope people can manage to take from your book?
D’Souza: Bush is fighting two wars, one against the enemy abroad and the other against the enemy at home. There is no way to win the second war without winning the first war. The book spells out why this is critical and how it can be done.
[More at URL]
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Sen. Brownback joins presidential field
Banks on conservative credentials to single him out of the field
MSNBC/Associated Press
Jan 20, 2007
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16723107/
TOPEKA, Kan. - Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., began a long-shot bid for president on Saturday, hoping his reputation as a favorite son of the religious right can help him outdistance better known rivals.
"My family and I are taking the first steps on the yellow brick road to the White House," Brownback said, returning to his home state to declare his intention to seek his party's nomination in 2008.
The two-term senator said he will fight to renew the nation's cultural values and pledged to focus on rebuilding families.
[...]
"Search the record of history. To walk away from the Almighty is to embrace decline for a nation," Brownback said. "To embrace Him leads to renewal, for individuals and for nations."
Brownback laced his speech with the themes that have made him the leader of the GOP's conservative wing and a strong spokesman in Congress for socially conservative Christians.
[More at URL]
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Senate Building Will Host Preborn Memorial
Focus on the Family
1-19-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000003670.cfm
A conference of clergy will meet in a U.S. Senate auditorium on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade to honor those who have lost their lives to abortion, euthanasia and embryonic stem-cell research.
Co-sponsors of the event include the National Pro-Life Religious Council, the National Clergy Council, Faith and Action, Priests for Life and Catholics United for Life.
Participants will meet Monday, Jan. 22, 2007, from 8:45 to 10:30 a.m. in the Dirksen Auditorium of the U.S. Senate -- just prior to the March for Life.
[More at URL]
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Bush Issues Pro-Life Proclamation
Focus on the Family
1-19-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000003671.cfm
President Bush has proclaimed Sunday as National Sanctity of Human Life Day. The Presidential Proclamation recognized that all life – from conception to natural death – must be respected.
“National Sanctity of Human Life Day serves as a reminder that we must value human life in all forms, not just those considered healthy, wanted, or convenient. Together, we can work toward a day when the dignity and humanity of every person is respected.”
[More at URL]
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States Consider HPV Vaccine
The drug will save lives, but will parental rights suffer?
Focus on the Family
1-19-2007
from staff reports
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000003672.cfm
Following FDA approval of Gardacil, the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine, many lawmakers are debating mandatory vaccinations for public-school girls 12 and older.
The Center for Disease Control andf Prevention estimates more than 6 million Americans contract HPV each year. It’s the most common sexually transmitted infection in the U.S. and takes an estimated 4,000 lives annually.
[...]
Linda Klepaki, analyst for sexual health at Focus on the Family Action, said parents should have the final say whether their daughter receives the vaccine, not the government. Many state lawmakers agree and have written opt-in or opt-out provisions into legislation.
"Opt-in programs are really the best programs for states to have,” Klepacki said. “That puts the burden on the states to educate the parents about this virus and about the vaccine. And then the parents actually have to sign a form for their child to have this vaccine.”
[More at URL]
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Prescription-Drug Bill Hurt Seniors
A bid for lower prices may lead to fewer breakthroughs in drug research.
from staff reports
Focus on the Family
1-19-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000003673.cfm
While advocates claim a prescription-drug bill in the U.S. Senate would bring more affordable medications for seniors, others fear it would keep life-saving medicines from being introduced.
H.R. 4 passed the House on Jan. 12 and has been referred to the Senate Finance Committee. President Bush has promised a veto the bill if it passes.
Medicare negotiates drug costs in order to lower prices. H.R. 4 would allow the government to tell drug manufacturers it won’t pay for specific drugs, if the price doesn’t come down far enough.
Burke Balch, director of the Robert Powell Center for Medical Ethics, said the impact could be devastating.
[...]
He explained that 81 percent of FDA-approved drugs aren’t available to U.S. veterans because they cost too much. H.R. 4, he added, would have a similar impact on seniors who could afford higher prices, but wouldn't be able to get drugs they need.
"It’s the same thing as the government prohibiting you from getting life-saving medical treatment, life-saving drugs," Balch explained. "That’s the same thing as involuntary euthanasia."
Barbara Lyons, executive director of Wisconsin Right to Life, said the bill would victimize older Americans.
“Most older Americans are on many prescription drugs that enhance their life and keep some very complicated conditions under control," she said. "Essentially the government would say, ‘Too bad, you’re not going to have access to that.’”
[More at URL]
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Wisconsin Officials Will Denounce Marriage
Focus on the Family
January 18, 2007
[Received in email; no URL]
The Madison, Wis., City Council voted Tuesday to allow members of various city committees to denounce the state's constitutional amendment protecting marriage when they take their oath of office, The Associated Press reported.
The 14-4 vote means as many as 500 elected and appointed officials can add a statement to their oath -- which is an oath to uphold the state constitution -- that they are taking it under protest because the marriage amendment "besmirches our constitution." Included in the statement is a promise to work to overturn the amendment and prevent discrimination resulting from its passage.
According to Michael May, an attorney for the city, the statement can be considered a political statement separate from the oath, similar to an inaugural address.
Council member Jed Sanborn voted against the measure because he said it will embarrass the city.
"People are going to roll their eyes at this, and it's going to look like grandstanding," he said.
Wisconsin voters last November overwhelmingly approved an amendment that defines marriage as the union of one man and one woman.
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Another Marriage Amendment Introduced
Focus on the Family
January 18, 2007
[Received in email; no URL]
New Mexico will consider a state constitutional amendment that would define marriage as the union of one man and one woman, the Farmington Daily Times reported.
Rep. Gloria Vaughn, a Republican from Alamogordo, N.M., introduced the resolution Wednesday.
It's the right thing to do," she said. "Maybe children would grow up with both parents."
The resolution must pass both the state House and Senate and be signed by the governor before it will be placed on the ballot to be approved by voters.
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Evangelicals Wrangle Over Global-Warming Alarmism
Focus on the Family
January 18, 2007
from staff reports
[Received in email; no URL]
Should evangelicals be worried about global warming? Some point to the Christian’s duty to take better care of the world, but others worry the issue could eclipse more basic evangelical values like the right to life and the sanctity of marriage.
Richard Cizik of the National Association of Evangelicals told Family News in Focus that global warming deserves attention.
“I’m not saying it’s the pre-eminent issue, the most important issue – no, it’s probably not,” Cizik said. “But does it deserve consideration? Most assuredly.”
But others warn evangelicals to beware of an ulterior motive.
“We’re observing a very strong effort by liberal environmentalists to use that sound motivation as a wedge,” said E. Calvin Beisner of Knox Theological Seminary.
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Scriptures Scrubbed from Kentucky Middle-School Restroom
Focus on the Family
1-17-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000003648.cfm
Volunteers painted the graffiti-covered walls of a middle-school school girls' restroom over Christmas break and added positive Bible verses, but school officials found the Scripture to be just as offensive as the profanity it replaced.
The Associated Press reported that Superintendent Dr. Bob Lovingood -- in, ironically enough, Christian County -- ordered the verses removed after one parent complained.
Volunteers spent three days painting over vulgar images, profanity and graffiti and adding art and inspirational messages, including Psalms 45:11: "So the King will greatly desire your beauty; because He is your Lord, worship Him."
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N.J. Pastors Spared from Performing Civil Unions
But experts expect activists will seek to force ministers and state officials to perform the ceremonies.
from staff reports
Focus on the Family
1-17-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000003650.cfm
Gay couples in New Jersey will be allowed to apply for civil unions starting in February, but Attorney General Stuart Rabner has announced that clergy members are not required to perform such unions.
Len Deo, president of the New Jersey Family Policy Council, said the decision was a relief for ministers who feared being charged with hate crimes for refusing to perform the ceremonies.
"This is good news," he told Family News in Focus. "There is definitely a separation on the law against discrimination and deeply held religious beliefs and convictions."
[...]
Doyle also expressed concern about state officials who likewise don't want to participate in such ceremonies.
"Though it's gratifying that members of the clergy will not have to perform civil unions," he said. "It also raises the issue of what about the Justices of the Peace and Town Clerks who, in conscience, do not wish to participate in this."
[More at URL]
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Embryos, Floods and the Naming of Names
Something for backers of embryonic stem-cell research to remember.
by Stuart Shepard, managing editor
Focus on the Family
1-17-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/clcommentary/A000003645.cfm
Noah.
I'll get back to that in a minute.
When the Democrat-led House debated the value of destroying humans at the embryonic stage in order to extract stem-cells for an ever-growing list of maladies that such research promises to cure, they mentioned lots of names.
Specifically lots of little boys and little girls.
"This legislation is pro-life," they boldly conjectured last week on the floor of the chamber, "because we know children or our children know children or, at least, we know people who have children who would benefit -- the little children that is -- from the promises of this very important research. And, here, let me say their names to show you how valuable this very important research really is."
[...]
In fact, law enforcement officers put their own safety at risk and piloted boats to New Orleans' Lakeland Hospital to rescue Noah -- although he didn't have a name at that particular moment -- along with 1,400 or so other frozen in vitro fertilization embryos who were also at risk of being defrosted.
Yep, Noah was just a little embryo down the flooded street. It's important to note that just last year the not-yet rescued, saved and delivered Noah was frozen and kept -- just like all the nameless embryos the supporters of human embryonic stem-cell research long to spend our tax dollars to kill. All in hopes of saving those other little children whose names they know.
They should now know this name: Noah Benton Markham.
He was once nameless.
He was worth rescuing.
He deserved a chance at life.
Noah. There's a name to remember.
[More at URL]
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Polygamist Appeals to Supreme Court
He's arguing a court victory for homosexuals should also protect his multiple marriages.
from staff reports
Focus on the Family
1-17-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000003651.cfm
Convicted polygamist, Rodney Holm, is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the law that put him behind bars for marrying three women and he's citing Lawrence v. Texas -- the decision that struck all the remaining state anti-sodomy laws.
The high struck down Texas' sodomy law in 2003 saying the government can't interfere with consensual partners.
Peter Sprigg, vice president for policy at the Family Research Council, explained how the court's earlier decision led to this argument.
"(Holm) considered them to be religious marriages," he said. "Because he didn't seek government recognition (for his second and third marriages), he feels that that should be protected within the zone of privacy that was declared by the Lawrence v. Texas case."
[More at URL]
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Abortion Advocacy Added to Curriculum in Va. School District
Focus on the Family
01-16-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000003633.cfm
Students in a Virginia school district will learn that abortion is permissible under certain circumstances, if an advisory board’s recommendations are approved, The Associated Press reported.
An advisory board in Alexandria is recommending that curriculum such as the Family Life Education series include the topic of abortion by the beginning of the 2007-2008 school year.
Lessons would include a discussion of the state’s parental-notification law and a history of abortion from Colonial times.
The series also includes a unit on theories that explain sexual orientation.
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Schiavo Family Will Join March for Life
Focus on the Family
01-16-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000003634.cfm
The brother and sister of Terri Schindler-Schiavo plan to participate in the annual March for Life in support of medically vulnerable people who cannot speak for themselves.
Bobby Schindler, Terri’s brother, said Terri’s court-ordered death by dehydration and starvation nearly 22 months ago highlighted the need to bring attention to the need to protect all stages of life.
"It’s not just about abortion, anymore," Bobby Schindler said. "The culture of death in our nation is threatening the lives of people like my sister through euthanasia.
"It is happening quietly every day in nursing homes, hospitals and hospices," he added. "People need to be aware that this could touch a member of their family at any time."
[More at URL]
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S.D. Abortion Ruling Reconsidered
Doctors may once again be compelled to disclose the truth about abortion.
from staff reports
Focus on the Family
1-16-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000003638.cfm
In 2005, Planned Parenthood succeeded in getting an activist court to ban South Dakota’s law requiring doctors to inform women that abortion ends a human life. Now, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has decided to rehear the controversial ruling.
Planned Parenthood had sued to overturn South Dakota's informed-consent law claiming it forces an ideology on doctors. Rob Regier, executive director of the South Dakota Family Policy Council, said the measure was to go into effect last summer, but never saw the light of day.
"Right now, there are essentially no restrictions on a female of any age obtaining an abortion," Regier told Family News in Focus. "No counseling is required."
[More at URL]
----- 22 -----
Hate-Crimes Legislation Reappears
The real question is: Will the president veto the bill?
by Pete Winn, associate editor
Focus on the Family
01-16-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000003639.cfm
A new hate-crimes bill introduced earlier this month in Congress may eventually pass both Houses, pro-family experts say. The president's help may be needed to keep it from becoming law.
The House Judiciary Committee has begun consideration of H.R.254, sponsored by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas. The legislation is similar to measures passed by the House in 2005 and by the Senate in 2004.
The Lee bill seeks to establish a new federal offense for hate crimes and would mandate a separate federal criminal prosecution for state offenses tried under its provisions. A sentence of life imprisonment could await those convicted.
Focus on the Family Action, and other pro-family groups, oppose the bill.
[...]
But Amanda Banks, federal policy analyst for Focus on the Family Action, said that, based upon previous votes in both the House and Senate, the bill will likely pass both chambers if it is brought up for a vote.
"We're going to have to rely on the president to veto this anti-faith, anti-family legislation," she told Family News in Focus.
The problem is -- President Bush has not faced a viable hate-crimes bill while he has been in office, and no one knows for sure what he will do. That makes it all the more important to take action.
"Please call the president and ask him to veto any hate crimes legislation that may reach his desk," Banks said.
TAKE ACTION
1. Please contact your representative and ask him/her to oppose HR 254, the hate-crimes bill. For more about the bill, and help in contacting your lawmakers, please see the CitizenLink Action Center.
2. Call the White House comment line and ask President Bush to veto any hate-crimes legislation that reaches his desk, 202-456-1111
[More at URL]
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States Anticipate Roe Being Overturned
Trigger laws would ban abortion.
from staff reports
Focus on the Family
1-15-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000003626.cfm
Lawmakers in Texas, Oklahoma, Utah and Virginia are considering "trigger laws" that would ban abortion if the Supreme Court overturns the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.
Sometimes called "post-Roe activation clauses," the trigger laws are designed to sit on the books ready to go into effect the moment a ruling comes down. South Dakota and Louisiana already have such laws in place.
Dorinda Bordlee, executive director of the Bioethics Defense Fund, said many anticipate Roe v. Wade being overturned and want state laws to be ready.
"There's a big misunderstanding," she said. "People think that when Roe is reversed, abortion will be illegal. That's simply not true. We're going to have to move into the democratic process of each state."
[More at URL]
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Planned Parenthood Targets Pro-Life Washington Pharmacists
Focus on the Family
1-15-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000003623.cfm
Planned Parenthood is lobbying the Washington state Board of Pharmacy to modify its conscience clause that allows pharmacists to opt out of dispensing controversial drugs, such as the morning-after pill.
The pro-abortion group says it wants to make sure pharmacists "won't intimidate or harass a patient."
Karen Brauer, president of Pharmacists for Life International, told Family News in Focus that language would apply to pharmacists who simply explain to customers that the morning-after pill, also known as "Plan B," can sometimes cause an early abortion, and that they won't dispense it on moral grounds.
[More at URL]
----- 25 -----
How the left caused 9/11, by Dinesh D'Souza
An interview with the conservative polemicist, who accuses the cultural left of provoking al-Qaida's attack in his new book, "The Enemy at Home."
By Alex Koppelman
Salon.com
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/01/20/d_souza/?source=whitelist
Jan. 20, 2007 | For almost 20 years, Dinesh D'Souza has been a prominent force in the conservative intelligentsia, writing such provocative books as "Illiberal Education," an attack on multiculturalism, and "The End of Racism," which blasts affirmative action. Today, the former senior policy analyst for the Reagan administration is the Robert and Karen Rishwain Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution, a conservative think tank.
In his new book, "The Enemy at Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11," D'Souza argues that "The cultural left in this country is responsible for causing 9/11 ... the cultural left and its allies in Congress, the media, Hollywood, the non-profit sector and the universities are the primary cause of the volcano of anger toward America that is erupting from the Islamic world." On Tuesday, during an appearance on Comedy Central's "Colbert Report," D'Souza was prodded by host Stephen Colbert into admitting that he agrees "with some of the things that these radical extremists [who attacked the United States on 9/11] are against in America."
[...]
The cultural seeds are somewhat different, and that is that the radical Muslims have been able to stir up a lot of hatred against America by saying, in effect, Islam is under attack. If you think about it, that's really the rallying cry of Islamic radicalism, and that's the only believable motive for why large numbers of people from a wide range of countries would be willing to risk their lives to strike out against America. I simply refuse to believe that people in Pakistan and Somalia would go to their deaths because the Palestinians don't have a state. So this idea that America is against your religion and is out to destroy your religion and your values, and undermine the Muslim family, and corrupt the innocence of young people and Muslim girls -- this is a very powerful attack, because it's not in the abstract realm of politics -- it affects the ordinary Muslim in his everyday life.
[...]
So in that sense, when they say that Islam is under attack and that, not American values, but these American values that are being globally pushed by the left, the values of, I mean, you have left-wing organizations filing lawsuits all over South America to liberalize abortion laws. These are democratically passed laws in Catholic countries, but under the bogus rubric of international law, there's an effort here to overturn these democratically passed laws in the name of some notion of abortion as an international right. Again, you have Planned Parenthood distributing contraceptives to Muslim girls.
[More at URL]
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''Thought Crimes'' Bill Re-introduced in Congress
Liberals seeking to enshrine [sic]
Concerned Women for America
1/19/2007
By Sarah Rode
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/12198/CWA/family/index.htm
A North Carolina man was recently arrested on suspicion of decapitating his 4-year-old daughter. In New York, three teenaged girls were arrested after brutally beating a 13-year-old girl and posting the video footage on YouTube and MySpace. And a former Penn State defensive lineman was arrested recently for the murder of a student who was stabbed 93 times during an apparent robbery.
As heinous and horrific as these crimes may seem, according to a bill recently re-introduced in the new liberal Congress, the penalties will be greater and harsher if those same crimes are committed against homosexuals. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) has introduced H.R. 254 known as the "David Ray Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2007". The bill currently has no cosponsors and it has been referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary.
It may seem surprising that liberals in Congress would support H.R. 254 which mandates harsher penalties for criminals. They have fought vehemently against capital punishment and in favor of improving prison conditions for terrorists in the past. Recall that Rep. Lee was one Member who called for the closure of Guantanamo Bay prison facilities because they were not pleasant enough for terrorists.
If you're tempted to think that there's been a change of heart regarding punishment of criminal behavior, think again. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee is beholden to the radically pro-homosexual Human Rights Campaign for their endorsement of her during the November 2006 elections. She scored 100% in the group's voter scorecard for the 109th Congress.
This bill isn't just another cog in the homosexual agenda machine. This legislation actually sends the message that it is more hateful to kill a homosexual than a little child. For instance, under this bill, the North Carolina man previously mentioned would receive a much harsher sentence if he were to be convicted of decapitating a homosexual rather than his 4-year-old daughter. This defies logic.
[More at URL]
----- 27 -----
The Littlest Katrina Survivor
Recognizing life is the key to saving it.
Concerned Women for America
1/19/2007
By Sarah Rode
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/12199/CWA/life/index.htm
Sixteen months after Hurricane Katrina, the youngest survivor is alive and well - and newly born! The world knows him as Noah Benton Markham, but Noah was rescued by Dr. Belinda Sissy Sartor when he was just a frozen embryo at a fertility clinic. A week after Katrina hit New Orleans, Dr. Sartor coordinated a rescue effort of the embryos with the governor and state police. They took boats into the flooded clinic and located the embryo storage tank. Dr. Sartor and her team rescued 1,400 embryos that day - not scientific experiments, but human lives. Eight pregnancies have resulted thus far, and Noah is the second birth to come from the rescued embryos. "The fact that we are making sure that they can come into the world is a very wonderful feeling," said Dr. Sartor.
[...]
Despite the recent and extremely viable stem cell alternatives discovered by medical researchers, Congress seems bent on committing taxpayer dollars to the destruction of human embryos. But little Noah Markham gives a face to what Congress is giving money to kill.
[More at URL]
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Gender Equality Gobbledygook
The whole second page of the report builds the case that gender equality is essential for "child survival and development"
Concerned Women for America
1/16/2007
By Janice Shaw Crouse
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/12176/BLI/nation/index.htm
One would think that the just-released 148-page United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) report, "The State of the World's Children 2007" -- with its exclusive focus on gender equality -- was produced by leftists and feminists. Instead, it is the product of Ann M. Veneman, the Executive Director of UNICEF and a Bush appointee who promised to bring back a sane perspective on children's issues. It is obvious at the outset, however, that the report merely re-packages the feminist agenda without even changing the tired old rhetoric.
The first page of the report focuses on "the discrimination and disempowerment women face throughout their lives" -- and outlines what must be done to "eliminate gender discrimination and empower women and girls." It is not until the very bottom of the first page that the thesis for the report reveals some connection with children: "The rights of women and children are mutually reinforcing." The whole second page of the report builds the case that gender equality is essential for "child survival and development" and that the Millennium Declaration is essential for constructing a world "fit for both women and children." In fact, the report bluntly states that the Millennium agenda recognizes the "centrality of gender equality to human development."
Thereafter, the report argues for "full implementation of CEDAW and the Convention on the Rights of the Child." Implementation of these "sister treaties," according to the report, is not just a "method for accelerating human development: It is also morally right." Later, the report scolds opponents: "Failure to secure equality for all has deleterious consequences for the moral, legal and economic fabric of nations."
[...]
A two-page sidebar details the "deleterious consequences" of gender discrimination across the life cycle. The report is quite concerned about early sexual activity for girls in "some countries" and notes that it is usually older boys or men who initiate it and such girls are at risk for partner violence. Ironically, these are the same voices that speak out here in the United States claiming that teens are "going to do it anyway" so they need condoms for "safe" sex. The report calls prostitution "commercial sex work" and acknowledges that "many are forced into it." Do they really think that children can and do agree to become prostitutes? The report acknowledges the risks of "unprotected" sex. Their solution? Knowledge of "reproductive health" and "protection." They claim that women are "at least twice as likely as men to become infected with HIV during sex." Their solution? Give women more negotiating power. What are two "pernicious" risks for women? Motherhood and Old Age. Well, at least they acknowledge motherhood instead of ignoring it.
[...]
We have a right to question whether UNICEF under Veneman's leadership is any different than it was under her liberal predecessor, Carol Bellamy. Veneman's appointment was supposed to herald a return to conservative principles that placed priority on children's issues, especially their survival in the face of malaria and the childhood diseases that are rampant in underdeveloped nations. Her appointment was supposed to signal a retreat from the feminists' domination of the UNICEF agenda and a return to matters of children's health and well-being -- indeed, those issues that affect life and death for children around the world.
Instead, the 148-page UNICEF report is all about the left's "women's agenda," albeit papered over with slogans such as "a world fit for women is a world fit for children." We expected more of a Bush appointee who was supposed to bring a whiff of reality to UNICEF. As a result, once again we have to ask, "Can anything good come out of Turtle Bay?"
[More at URL]
----- 29 -----
Fox Intentionally Broadcasts 'F-Word' During Prime Time Football Playoff
You can file a complaint with the FCC right here.
Concerned Women for America
1/16/2007
By Jan LaRue, Chief Counsel
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/12175/LEGAL/pornography/index.htm
Families joining together in their homes to watch a football game shouldn't expect the network to send the pig along with the pigskin into their parlor. "Pig in the parlor" is the term the Supreme Court used when it upheld the right of the FCC to enforce federal decency laws on broadcasters. Patently offensive words - including the F-word - belong in a barnyard, not your parlor.
The Fox network did just that during Saturday night's broadcast of the NFL playoff game between the New Orleans Saints and the Philadelphia Eagles.
As a camera scanned the stadium crowd of 70,000, the camera operator managed to find a woman wearing a T-shirt clearly inscribed with the words "F--k Da Eagles" (spelled out - no dashes). A director or producer saw the shot among all of the other camera shots he had to choose from and made the decision to air the shot of the woman and her profane shirt. The camera stayed focused directly on the woman and her shirt for several seconds. There can be no doubt that this was an intentional and gratuitous airing of patently offensive language by Fox on the public airwaves. All of the V-chips on the planet couldn't have blocked the shot from your home and your family -
Fox subjected viewers on the East Coast to this display of indecency during the Family Hour (8:30 p.m. ET). Even worse, it aired at 5:30 p.m. on the West Coast.
[More at URL]
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Virginia Legislator Proposes to ‘White-Out’ Marriage Protection
Concerned Women for America
1/18/2007
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/12193/CWA/family/index.htm
Although an overwhelming majority of Virginia citizens voted to define and protect traditional marriage last fall, some in the state legislature are seeking to undo the Constitutional amendment by simply crossing it out. Mike Mears, CWA’s Director of State Legislative Relations has more on this unique attack on traditional marriage.
[Mike Mears, Director of State Legislative Relations: "What Delegate England is trying to do... is trying to wipe out the will of the people, they're trying to get rid of the marriage amendment that was just passed ... here in Virginia..." "basically what they've done is gone back to the Constitution that was just added, this amendment, they've taken it out... they've basically whited it out." "One thing that we should mention is... is there going to be enough support for them to repeal this? probably not... but this is where activists... need to be aware of what liberals do... they will introduce this, every year, ad nausium... my advice to activists in Virginia is to be ever so vigilant..." Includes ACTION ITEM to call Delegates to oppose any attempt to modify the anti-marriage-rights amendment. "For the legislature to turn around and try to repeal it... white it out... is just outrageous." "I'm not sure that our founding fathers would have ever imagined a morality in this country the way we've seen it in the last couple of years."]
[Editor's note: I looked for a non-theocon news source for this but didn't find anything on it in a rather brief search. Anybody know what this is really about?]
I don't usually include other people commenting about the fundamentalist movement, and I think this one has a few things wrong - I think he underestimates the influence of not Rushdooney himself, but of Rushdooney's successors, for example - but I think the author has a few compelling points, so I'm including it;
"Christian Lawyers to Petition Queen to Block Gay Rights Bill" - the argument being that equal rights law for GBLT people is inherently discriminatory against (anti-gay) Christians; it's the same thing we see in the US, where the fundamentalists say that if they can't discriminate against queers in the public space, then they can't practice their religion;
Concerned Women for America's Janet LaRue, writing for townhall.com, tries to wedge the "GL" away from the "B" in a column that also asserts all bisexual people need to marry one person of each gender in order to have their rights respected, and this is why we can't have same-sex legal marriage;
"Answers in Genesis," a creationist website, says that Neanderthals had to have been humans because all humans are "descended from Noah's three sons and their wives"; they're attacking a study placing an approximate age from the split-off of the neanderthals and cro-magnon man from a common ancestor; the funny thing is where they condemn and then use the same data in one paragraph, the condemnation is for indicating too old an age for the mitochondrial DNA in question, since the world is only 6,000 years or so old, of course;
Dinesh D'Souza on NRO outlines clearly that he wants an alliance between American fundamentalists and Muslim non-radicalised "social conservatives" who are against things like GBLT people, church-state separation, and reproductive rights, to fight in "the war at home" with Mr. Bush against queers, secular government, and social "liberals"; states you can't win a war on radical Islamist movements without winning the "war at home" against non-theoconservatives;
Rabidly anti-gay theocon Senator Brownback (R-Kansas) formally announces his entry into the Presidential race; this'll be really neat to watch in an academic way, as he's the Ellen Craswell of the national Republican Party; the theocons love him desperately, but the non-theocon party elite want no part of him - and he's alienating the neocons. Will the Dobsons (et al) push their followers to someone else to keep the alliance intact? stay tuned;
Anti-abortion clergy to hold "preborn memorial" in Senate auditorium, including a "memorial" to "honor those who have lost their lives to abortion, euthanasia and embryonic stem-cell research";
Mr. Bush issues proclamation of "National Sanctity of Human Life Day" tomorrow;
Focus on the Family wants the HPV vaccine - the one that prevents cervical cancer from the sexually-transmitted human papillomavirus - "opt-in" and a separate shot from the rest of the school vaccination requirement set; they can't bring themselves to outright oppose it, clearly - and even state outright that it will save lives - but since HPV is sexually transmitted (one has to presume) then apparently it's radioactive;
Focus on the Family carries water for the Bush team on Mr. Bush's fantastically expensive prescription-drug programme; the story implies that drug prices can be negotiated under the current programme (untrue, and the entire point of the revisions), implies that people can't buy these drugs at all outside the programme (wtf?), and says that negotiations over price and the government _not_ paying for some expensive prevision drugs is "the same thing as involuntary euthanasia";
FotF: "Wisconsin Officials Will Denounce Marriage" - by not supporting the anti-marriage amendment recently passed, and issuing a declaration saying they oppose it and will work to overturn it;
New anti-marriage amendment introduced in New Mexico;
Another article on the conflict within evangelical Christianity over global warming, with Focus becoming slightly less condemnational, but still pushing the idea as a "liberal... wedge";
FotF outraged that a public school painted over bible verses ("So the King will greatly desire your beauty; because He is your Lord, worship Him") added to a public middle school girls' bathroom by volunteers;
Focus on the Family says "ministers and state officials" will be "forced" to perform civil unions in New Jersey; first, civil unions aren't marriage; second, civil marriage isn't church marriage; third, "ministers" and "state officials" aren't the same thing no matter how much Focus on the Family wants them to be. The story closes with the assertion that anti-gay state officials should be allowed to opt-out of job duties if they hate queers;
FotF tries to make the "Embryo Saved From Katrina's Flood is Now a Boy Named Noah" into a rally for efforts to ban embryonic stem-cell research;
FotF attacks Lawrence v. Texas (2003) again by noting that a polygamist in Utah is using it as part of his appeal to the Supreme Court;
FotF declares Virginia school curriculum that talks about when abortion is legal to be "advocacy";
The late Terri Schiavo's brother and sister will march in anti-abortion rally on Monday;
Anti-abortion activists plan to appeal ruling striking down a law requiring doctors to deliver an anti-abortion lecture to women considering abortion; FotF's subheading on it is, "Doctors may once again be compelled to disclose the truth about abortion";
Focus on the Family ACTION ITEM against Federal hate-crimes bill; they assert it will be used to make opposition to "homosexuality" illegal;
FotF article on "trigger laws" - comprehensive abortion bans that only take effect when and if Roe v. Wade is overturned;
Planned Parenthood article on pharmacists refusing to prescribe "Plan B" (the morning-after birth control pill) includes the claim - again - that Plan B "can cause an early abortion";
"How the left caused 9/11," by Dinesh D'Souza; one of "the left's" crimes is working to make contraception available to Muslim women;
Concerned Women for America: "'Thought Crimes' Bill Re-introduced in Congress"; says liberals care more about gay men being killed than a "4-year-old daughter" being killed;
CWA condemns embryonic stem-cell research bill, jumps on the Noah Markham Is Our New Poster Child bandwagon mentioned above;
CWA condemns UN report calling for more gender equality worldwide, says they expected "more" out of a Bush appointee; I'm particularly nauseated by the they mock report concerns about women having no control over their sexual lives in many countries;
CWA ACTION ITEM against Fox Sports's NFL playoff broadcast for showing a picture of a woman wearing a T-shirt reading "Fuck Da Eagles"; says Fox has no "right to air... offensive language";
CWA's Mike Mears on a Virginia attempt to overturn their recent anti-marriage/anti-civil-unions Constitutional amendment;
----- 1 -----
If homo lovers are liberal, then mullah lovers are conservative?
Classical Values
Pajamas Media
January 13, 2007
http://www.classicalvalues.com/archives/004439.html
If homo lovers are liberal, then mullah lovers are conservative?
Via Glenn Reynolds, I see that Dinesh D'Souza has a new book. According to D'Souza, it is the "cultural left" which is responsible for the 9/11 attacks:
"In this book I make a claim that will seem startling at the outset. The cultural left in this country is responsible for causing 9/11. ... In faulting the cultural left, I am not making the absurd accusation that this group blew up the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. I am saying that the cultural left and its allies in Congress, the media, Hollywood, the nonprofit sector, and the universities are the primary cause of the volcano of anger toward America that is erupting from the Islamic world. The Muslims who carried out the 9/11 attacks were the product of this visceral rage--some of it based on legitimate concerns, some of it based on wrongful prejudice, but all of it fueled and encouraged by the cultural left. Thus without the cultural left, 9/11 would not have happened.
Hollywood and the universities? They got al-Qaeda so stirred up that flying planes into buildings was the only way to stop cultural depravity?
Hmm...
Does that make Brokeback Mountain a sort of victory film?
I'm no fan of the left, but to claim these people are responsible for Muslim religious rage strikes me as a logical stretch, to say the least. Does D'Souza mean that if the "cultural left" is stopped, then the terrorists will stop hating us? Should that be our goal? Precisely what does D'Souza mean by the term "cultural left" and how far does it go? Did Western-looking women who got raped for looking like sluts invite the rapes by their "left-wing" behavior? How about the gay men thrown off buildings by the Taliban or hanged in Iran?
[More at URL]
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Through a Glass, Darkly
How the Christian right is reimagining U.S. history
Posted on Wednesday, January 10, 2007. Originally from December 2006.
By Jeff Sharlet
Harper's Magazine
http://www.harpers.org/ThroughAGlassDarkly-12838838.html
We keep trying to explain away American fundamentalism. Those of us not engaged personally or emotionally in the biggest political and cultural movement of our times—those on the sidelines of history—keep trying to come up with theories with which to discredit the evident allure of this punishing yet oddly comforting idea of a deity, this strange god. His invisible hand is everywhere, say His citizen-theologians, caressing and fixing every outcome: Little League games, job searches, test scores, the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, the success or failure of terrorist attacks (also known as “signs”), victory or defeat in battle, at the ballot box, in bed. Those unable to feel His soothing touch at moments such as these snort at the notion of a god with the patience or the prurience to monitor every tick and twitch of desire, a supreme being able to make a lion and a lamb cuddle but unable to abide two men kissing. A divine love that speaks through hurricanes. Who would worship such a god? His followers must be dupes, or saps, or fools, their faith illiterate, insane, or misinformed, their strength fleeting, hollow, an aberration. A burp in American history. An unpleasant odor that will pass.
We don’t like to consider the possibility that they are not newcomers to power but returnees, that the revivals that have been sweeping America with generational regularity since its inception are not flare-ups but the natural temperature of the nation. We can’t conceive of the possibility that the dupes, the saps, the fools—the believers—have been with us from the very beginning, that their story about what America once was and should be seems to some great portion of the population more compelling, more just, and more beautiful than the perfunctory processes of secular democracy. Thus we are at a loss to account for this recurring American mood.
[More at URL]
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Christian lawyers to petition Queen to block gay rights bill
This Is London
01.01.07
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23380090-details/Christian%20lawyers%20to%20petition%20Queen%20to%20block%20gay%20rights%20bill/article.do
Thousands of Christian lawyers are to petition for the Queen's help to stop the Government from imposing sweeping new gay rights laws on Britain.
They will ask the Queen, as defender of the Church of England, to make the case to Tony Blair that the proposed Sexual Orientation Regulations discriminate against Christians.
A torch-lit protest will also take place outside the Houses of Parliament, ahead of a Lords debate on the new rules next Tuesday.
The laws, meant to come into force in April, are supposed to prevent discrimination against gays. But the Church of England has pointed out that priests could be sued for refusing to bless same-sex civil partnerships under the rules.
And Catholics have warned they will close their adoption agencies rather than be forced to allow gay couples to adopt children.
Black churches have added their voices to the protest, saying pastors and churchgoers would go to jail rather than accept rules that would mean they had to open their meeting halls to gay lobby groups.
The plea to the Queen is being made by the Christian Concern for Our Nation, an offshoot of the Lawyers' Christian Fellowship, a group which lists more than 2,000 barristers and solicitors among its members.
The petition warns the Queen the rules are a serious affront' to the Gospel.
[More at URL]
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Another homosexual activist cuts bisexuals out of wedding march
By Janet M. LaRue
January 8, 2007
townhall.com
http://townhall.com/columnists/column.aspx?UrlTitle=another_homosexual_activist_cuts_bisexuals_out_of_wedding_march&ns=JanetMLaRue&dt=01/08/2007&page=1
It turns out that some are more equal than others.
Another nationally-known homosexual activist, Michaelangelo Signorile, dismissed the prospect of legalized polygamy as a scare tactic and went on record against a “married” ménage-a-trois, which is the topic of my recent column. Even so, I’m guessing that Signorile and friends are applauding Wednesday’s ruling by a Canadian appeals court that a five-year-old boy has a legal right to two mommies and a daddy. If the ruling isn’t the Tour de Luge to polygamy, what is?
Wednesday night, Bill O’Reilly interviewed Signorile on the subject of “gay marriage.” O’Reilly says if homosexuals can marry, you can’t stop polygamy. Signorile essentially dismissed polygamy as a “ploy,” saying it “isn’t within the scheme of marriage.”
After watching and reading the transcript of the program, I think O’Reilly failed to stop Signorile’s centrifugal spin by failing to press for answers to some key questions:
[More at URL]
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What About the Neandertal DNA?
A preliminary report
Answers in Genesis
http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/206.asp
There has been recent media fanfare about the sequencing of parts of Neandertal mitochondrial DNA.1 Some researchers claim that it gives powerful support to the theory that all humanity descended from an ‘African Eve’ about 100,000 to 200,000 years ago, and that Neanderthals were an evolutionary dead end.
Some researchers claim that the genetic differences indicate the Neanderthals were a different species than the early humans who swept them aside in Europe and western Asia—although they appear to have split from a common ancestor 500,000 years ago (according to evolutionary dating methods).2
As always, we urge caution. In the last 12 months we have seen big media fanfare about the ‘feathered dinosaurs’, ‘176,000-year-old’ Aboriginal remains, and especially ‘Mars life’. But the media never seem to give the same prominence to the refutation of these ‘evidence’, even by secular scientists. However, Creation magazine3 and of course the News section of the Answers in Genesis Website have dealt with all these issues as they arose. So let’s wait for more data.
[...]
Apart from the claimed dates, this is consistent with the Biblical model, where all people are descended from Noah’s three sons and their wives. These descendants’ languages were confused at Babel, so people separated into small groups and migrated their own separate ways. Nothing in the new data rules out the possibility that Neandertals interbred with ordinary Homo sapiens, which would make them part of the same species.5
[Ed. note: The "claimed dates," which they oppose, are the key element of the data. It's based on what's often referred to as the "molecular clock," which is to say, the rate at which various nuclear and genetic changes due to random mutation take place. So they're attacking the same data that they're proceeding to use.]
[More at URL]
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Eyeing the Enemy
Dinesh D’Souza looks left.
January 16, 2006
An NRO Q&A
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZmUzZTlmNGY3ZDM5Mjg2ZWQ3ZjVmMWVmNDhkOWU0NjU=
In his new book, The Enemy at Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11, Dinesh D’Souza attempts to invigorate and refocus the American reaction to the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States. In The Enemy at Home, D’Souza argues that “the cultural left and its allies in Congress, the media, Hollywood, the nonprofit sector, and the universities are the primary cause of the volcano of anger toward America that is erupting from the Islamic world.
[...]
D’Souza: Nobody’s asking you to ally with the radical mullahs in Iran. I’d like to see them all deposed. Our concern should be with the traditional Muslims, who are the majority in the Muslim world. These people are also religious and socially conservative, and they are our natural allies. In fact, since the cultural Left in America is de facto allied with the radical Muslims, we as conservatives have no choice but to ally with the traditional Muslims. We cannot win the war on terror without them. No matter how many Islamic radicals we kill, it’s no use if twice as many traditional Muslims join them. Now building bridges to this group doesn’t mean changing our way of life, and if we are conservative there is nothing that needs to be changed. Our values are quite similar to those of traditional Muslims. There’s no point chasing after “liberals” who believe in secularism and feminism and homosexual rights.
[...]
Lopez: Dinesh, you write that “American conservatives should join the Muslims and others in condemning the global moral degeneracy that is produced by liberal values.” Um, what would that coalition look like? Ahmadinejad and Pat Robertson? That’s not exactly a ticket anyone but David Duke will run to rally behind.
D’Souza: Already there have been working relationships between traditional Christians and traditional Muslims in the United Nations and some other international forums to block liberal efforts to declare abortion as a right under international law. In fact the U.N. Charter lists no such right, but this is part of the liberal campaign of cultural imperialism that is trying to force the values of the Western Left on the rest of the world. Planned Parenthood is distributing condoms to teenage girls on every continent. Leftist groups are suing to overturn restrictive abortion laws in South America. The Left is trying to force Turkey to liberalize its laws on homosexuality as a condition of joining the European Union. So here are opportunities for people who differ on theology but agree on morality to form an international coalition to block these bogus “rights” from being imposed on cultures that do not want them. I emphasize that I am not contesting any of the rights of classical liberalism. But this is a new liberalism that is trying to smuggle its own political preferences and call them “rights.” Come to think of it, hasn’t the Left been doing that here in this country for several decades now? Here are home we have to fight these bogus “rights” ourselves, but abroad we have the entire traditional world as an ally. Why wouldn’t we want that? This has nothing to do with putting Pat Robertson and Ahmadinejad together, and everything to do with forming coalitions among mainstream groups across international boundaries.
[...]
Lopez: What’s the one constructive point you hope people can manage to take from your book?
D’Souza: Bush is fighting two wars, one against the enemy abroad and the other against the enemy at home. There is no way to win the second war without winning the first war. The book spells out why this is critical and how it can be done.
[More at URL]
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Sen. Brownback joins presidential field
Banks on conservative credentials to single him out of the field
MSNBC/Associated Press
Jan 20, 2007
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16723107/
TOPEKA, Kan. - Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., began a long-shot bid for president on Saturday, hoping his reputation as a favorite son of the religious right can help him outdistance better known rivals.
"My family and I are taking the first steps on the yellow brick road to the White House," Brownback said, returning to his home state to declare his intention to seek his party's nomination in 2008.
The two-term senator said he will fight to renew the nation's cultural values and pledged to focus on rebuilding families.
[...]
"Search the record of history. To walk away from the Almighty is to embrace decline for a nation," Brownback said. "To embrace Him leads to renewal, for individuals and for nations."
Brownback laced his speech with the themes that have made him the leader of the GOP's conservative wing and a strong spokesman in Congress for socially conservative Christians.
[More at URL]
----- 8 -----
Senate Building Will Host Preborn Memorial
Focus on the Family
1-19-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000003670.cfm
A conference of clergy will meet in a U.S. Senate auditorium on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade to honor those who have lost their lives to abortion, euthanasia and embryonic stem-cell research.
Co-sponsors of the event include the National Pro-Life Religious Council, the National Clergy Council, Faith and Action, Priests for Life and Catholics United for Life.
Participants will meet Monday, Jan. 22, 2007, from 8:45 to 10:30 a.m. in the Dirksen Auditorium of the U.S. Senate -- just prior to the March for Life.
[More at URL]
----- 9 -----
Bush Issues Pro-Life Proclamation
Focus on the Family
1-19-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000003671.cfm
President Bush has proclaimed Sunday as National Sanctity of Human Life Day. The Presidential Proclamation recognized that all life – from conception to natural death – must be respected.
“National Sanctity of Human Life Day serves as a reminder that we must value human life in all forms, not just those considered healthy, wanted, or convenient. Together, we can work toward a day when the dignity and humanity of every person is respected.”
[More at URL]
----- 10 -----
States Consider HPV Vaccine
The drug will save lives, but will parental rights suffer?
Focus on the Family
1-19-2007
from staff reports
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000003672.cfm
Following FDA approval of Gardacil, the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine, many lawmakers are debating mandatory vaccinations for public-school girls 12 and older.
The Center for Disease Control andf Prevention estimates more than 6 million Americans contract HPV each year. It’s the most common sexually transmitted infection in the U.S. and takes an estimated 4,000 lives annually.
[...]
Linda Klepaki, analyst for sexual health at Focus on the Family Action, said parents should have the final say whether their daughter receives the vaccine, not the government. Many state lawmakers agree and have written opt-in or opt-out provisions into legislation.
"Opt-in programs are really the best programs for states to have,” Klepacki said. “That puts the burden on the states to educate the parents about this virus and about the vaccine. And then the parents actually have to sign a form for their child to have this vaccine.”
[More at URL]
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Prescription-Drug Bill Hurt Seniors
A bid for lower prices may lead to fewer breakthroughs in drug research.
from staff reports
Focus on the Family
1-19-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000003673.cfm
While advocates claim a prescription-drug bill in the U.S. Senate would bring more affordable medications for seniors, others fear it would keep life-saving medicines from being introduced.
H.R. 4 passed the House on Jan. 12 and has been referred to the Senate Finance Committee. President Bush has promised a veto the bill if it passes.
Medicare negotiates drug costs in order to lower prices. H.R. 4 would allow the government to tell drug manufacturers it won’t pay for specific drugs, if the price doesn’t come down far enough.
Burke Balch, director of the Robert Powell Center for Medical Ethics, said the impact could be devastating.
[...]
He explained that 81 percent of FDA-approved drugs aren’t available to U.S. veterans because they cost too much. H.R. 4, he added, would have a similar impact on seniors who could afford higher prices, but wouldn't be able to get drugs they need.
"It’s the same thing as the government prohibiting you from getting life-saving medical treatment, life-saving drugs," Balch explained. "That’s the same thing as involuntary euthanasia."
Barbara Lyons, executive director of Wisconsin Right to Life, said the bill would victimize older Americans.
“Most older Americans are on many prescription drugs that enhance their life and keep some very complicated conditions under control," she said. "Essentially the government would say, ‘Too bad, you’re not going to have access to that.’”
[More at URL]
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Wisconsin Officials Will Denounce Marriage
Focus on the Family
January 18, 2007
[Received in email; no URL]
The Madison, Wis., City Council voted Tuesday to allow members of various city committees to denounce the state's constitutional amendment protecting marriage when they take their oath of office, The Associated Press reported.
The 14-4 vote means as many as 500 elected and appointed officials can add a statement to their oath -- which is an oath to uphold the state constitution -- that they are taking it under protest because the marriage amendment "besmirches our constitution." Included in the statement is a promise to work to overturn the amendment and prevent discrimination resulting from its passage.
According to Michael May, an attorney for the city, the statement can be considered a political statement separate from the oath, similar to an inaugural address.
Council member Jed Sanborn voted against the measure because he said it will embarrass the city.
"People are going to roll their eyes at this, and it's going to look like grandstanding," he said.
Wisconsin voters last November overwhelmingly approved an amendment that defines marriage as the union of one man and one woman.
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Another Marriage Amendment Introduced
Focus on the Family
January 18, 2007
[Received in email; no URL]
New Mexico will consider a state constitutional amendment that would define marriage as the union of one man and one woman, the Farmington Daily Times reported.
Rep. Gloria Vaughn, a Republican from Alamogordo, N.M., introduced the resolution Wednesday.
It's the right thing to do," she said. "Maybe children would grow up with both parents."
The resolution must pass both the state House and Senate and be signed by the governor before it will be placed on the ballot to be approved by voters.
----- 14 -----
Evangelicals Wrangle Over Global-Warming Alarmism
Focus on the Family
January 18, 2007
from staff reports
[Received in email; no URL]
Should evangelicals be worried about global warming? Some point to the Christian’s duty to take better care of the world, but others worry the issue could eclipse more basic evangelical values like the right to life and the sanctity of marriage.
Richard Cizik of the National Association of Evangelicals told Family News in Focus that global warming deserves attention.
“I’m not saying it’s the pre-eminent issue, the most important issue – no, it’s probably not,” Cizik said. “But does it deserve consideration? Most assuredly.”
But others warn evangelicals to beware of an ulterior motive.
“We’re observing a very strong effort by liberal environmentalists to use that sound motivation as a wedge,” said E. Calvin Beisner of Knox Theological Seminary.
----- 15 -----
Scriptures Scrubbed from Kentucky Middle-School Restroom
Focus on the Family
1-17-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000003648.cfm
Volunteers painted the graffiti-covered walls of a middle-school school girls' restroom over Christmas break and added positive Bible verses, but school officials found the Scripture to be just as offensive as the profanity it replaced.
The Associated Press reported that Superintendent Dr. Bob Lovingood -- in, ironically enough, Christian County -- ordered the verses removed after one parent complained.
Volunteers spent three days painting over vulgar images, profanity and graffiti and adding art and inspirational messages, including Psalms 45:11: "So the King will greatly desire your beauty; because He is your Lord, worship Him."
----- 16 -----
N.J. Pastors Spared from Performing Civil Unions
But experts expect activists will seek to force ministers and state officials to perform the ceremonies.
from staff reports
Focus on the Family
1-17-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000003650.cfm
Gay couples in New Jersey will be allowed to apply for civil unions starting in February, but Attorney General Stuart Rabner has announced that clergy members are not required to perform such unions.
Len Deo, president of the New Jersey Family Policy Council, said the decision was a relief for ministers who feared being charged with hate crimes for refusing to perform the ceremonies.
"This is good news," he told Family News in Focus. "There is definitely a separation on the law against discrimination and deeply held religious beliefs and convictions."
[...]
Doyle also expressed concern about state officials who likewise don't want to participate in such ceremonies.
"Though it's gratifying that members of the clergy will not have to perform civil unions," he said. "It also raises the issue of what about the Justices of the Peace and Town Clerks who, in conscience, do not wish to participate in this."
[More at URL]
----- 17 -----
Embryos, Floods and the Naming of Names
Something for backers of embryonic stem-cell research to remember.
by Stuart Shepard, managing editor
Focus on the Family
1-17-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/clcommentary/A000003645.cfm
Noah.
I'll get back to that in a minute.
When the Democrat-led House debated the value of destroying humans at the embryonic stage in order to extract stem-cells for an ever-growing list of maladies that such research promises to cure, they mentioned lots of names.
Specifically lots of little boys and little girls.
"This legislation is pro-life," they boldly conjectured last week on the floor of the chamber, "because we know children or our children know children or, at least, we know people who have children who would benefit -- the little children that is -- from the promises of this very important research. And, here, let me say their names to show you how valuable this very important research really is."
[...]
In fact, law enforcement officers put their own safety at risk and piloted boats to New Orleans' Lakeland Hospital to rescue Noah -- although he didn't have a name at that particular moment -- along with 1,400 or so other frozen in vitro fertilization embryos who were also at risk of being defrosted.
Yep, Noah was just a little embryo down the flooded street. It's important to note that just last year the not-yet rescued, saved and delivered Noah was frozen and kept -- just like all the nameless embryos the supporters of human embryonic stem-cell research long to spend our tax dollars to kill. All in hopes of saving those other little children whose names they know.
They should now know this name: Noah Benton Markham.
He was once nameless.
He was worth rescuing.
He deserved a chance at life.
Noah. There's a name to remember.
[More at URL]
----- 18 -----
Polygamist Appeals to Supreme Court
He's arguing a court victory for homosexuals should also protect his multiple marriages.
from staff reports
Focus on the Family
1-17-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000003651.cfm
Convicted polygamist, Rodney Holm, is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the law that put him behind bars for marrying three women and he's citing Lawrence v. Texas -- the decision that struck all the remaining state anti-sodomy laws.
The high struck down Texas' sodomy law in 2003 saying the government can't interfere with consensual partners.
Peter Sprigg, vice president for policy at the Family Research Council, explained how the court's earlier decision led to this argument.
"(Holm) considered them to be religious marriages," he said. "Because he didn't seek government recognition (for his second and third marriages), he feels that that should be protected within the zone of privacy that was declared by the Lawrence v. Texas case."
[More at URL]
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Abortion Advocacy Added to Curriculum in Va. School District
Focus on the Family
01-16-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000003633.cfm
Students in a Virginia school district will learn that abortion is permissible under certain circumstances, if an advisory board’s recommendations are approved, The Associated Press reported.
An advisory board in Alexandria is recommending that curriculum such as the Family Life Education series include the topic of abortion by the beginning of the 2007-2008 school year.
Lessons would include a discussion of the state’s parental-notification law and a history of abortion from Colonial times.
The series also includes a unit on theories that explain sexual orientation.
----- 20 -----
Schiavo Family Will Join March for Life
Focus on the Family
01-16-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000003634.cfm
The brother and sister of Terri Schindler-Schiavo plan to participate in the annual March for Life in support of medically vulnerable people who cannot speak for themselves.
Bobby Schindler, Terri’s brother, said Terri’s court-ordered death by dehydration and starvation nearly 22 months ago highlighted the need to bring attention to the need to protect all stages of life.
"It’s not just about abortion, anymore," Bobby Schindler said. "The culture of death in our nation is threatening the lives of people like my sister through euthanasia.
"It is happening quietly every day in nursing homes, hospitals and hospices," he added. "People need to be aware that this could touch a member of their family at any time."
[More at URL]
----- 21 -----
S.D. Abortion Ruling Reconsidered
Doctors may once again be compelled to disclose the truth about abortion.
from staff reports
Focus on the Family
1-16-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000003638.cfm
In 2005, Planned Parenthood succeeded in getting an activist court to ban South Dakota’s law requiring doctors to inform women that abortion ends a human life. Now, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has decided to rehear the controversial ruling.
Planned Parenthood had sued to overturn South Dakota's informed-consent law claiming it forces an ideology on doctors. Rob Regier, executive director of the South Dakota Family Policy Council, said the measure was to go into effect last summer, but never saw the light of day.
"Right now, there are essentially no restrictions on a female of any age obtaining an abortion," Regier told Family News in Focus. "No counseling is required."
[More at URL]
----- 22 -----
Hate-Crimes Legislation Reappears
The real question is: Will the president veto the bill?
by Pete Winn, associate editor
Focus on the Family
01-16-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000003639.cfm
A new hate-crimes bill introduced earlier this month in Congress may eventually pass both Houses, pro-family experts say. The president's help may be needed to keep it from becoming law.
The House Judiciary Committee has begun consideration of H.R.254, sponsored by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas. The legislation is similar to measures passed by the House in 2005 and by the Senate in 2004.
The Lee bill seeks to establish a new federal offense for hate crimes and would mandate a separate federal criminal prosecution for state offenses tried under its provisions. A sentence of life imprisonment could await those convicted.
Focus on the Family Action, and other pro-family groups, oppose the bill.
[...]
But Amanda Banks, federal policy analyst for Focus on the Family Action, said that, based upon previous votes in both the House and Senate, the bill will likely pass both chambers if it is brought up for a vote.
"We're going to have to rely on the president to veto this anti-faith, anti-family legislation," she told Family News in Focus.
The problem is -- President Bush has not faced a viable hate-crimes bill while he has been in office, and no one knows for sure what he will do. That makes it all the more important to take action.
"Please call the president and ask him to veto any hate crimes legislation that may reach his desk," Banks said.
TAKE ACTION
1. Please contact your representative and ask him/her to oppose HR 254, the hate-crimes bill. For more about the bill, and help in contacting your lawmakers, please see the CitizenLink Action Center.
2. Call the White House comment line and ask President Bush to veto any hate-crimes legislation that reaches his desk, 202-456-1111
[More at URL]
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States Anticipate Roe Being Overturned
Trigger laws would ban abortion.
from staff reports
Focus on the Family
1-15-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000003626.cfm
Lawmakers in Texas, Oklahoma, Utah and Virginia are considering "trigger laws" that would ban abortion if the Supreme Court overturns the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.
Sometimes called "post-Roe activation clauses," the trigger laws are designed to sit on the books ready to go into effect the moment a ruling comes down. South Dakota and Louisiana already have such laws in place.
Dorinda Bordlee, executive director of the Bioethics Defense Fund, said many anticipate Roe v. Wade being overturned and want state laws to be ready.
"There's a big misunderstanding," she said. "People think that when Roe is reversed, abortion will be illegal. That's simply not true. We're going to have to move into the democratic process of each state."
[More at URL]
----- 24 -----
Planned Parenthood Targets Pro-Life Washington Pharmacists
Focus on the Family
1-15-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000003623.cfm
Planned Parenthood is lobbying the Washington state Board of Pharmacy to modify its conscience clause that allows pharmacists to opt out of dispensing controversial drugs, such as the morning-after pill.
The pro-abortion group says it wants to make sure pharmacists "won't intimidate or harass a patient."
Karen Brauer, president of Pharmacists for Life International, told Family News in Focus that language would apply to pharmacists who simply explain to customers that the morning-after pill, also known as "Plan B," can sometimes cause an early abortion, and that they won't dispense it on moral grounds.
[More at URL]
----- 25 -----
How the left caused 9/11, by Dinesh D'Souza
An interview with the conservative polemicist, who accuses the cultural left of provoking al-Qaida's attack in his new book, "The Enemy at Home."
By Alex Koppelman
Salon.com
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/01/20/d_souza/?source=whitelist
Jan. 20, 2007 | For almost 20 years, Dinesh D'Souza has been a prominent force in the conservative intelligentsia, writing such provocative books as "Illiberal Education," an attack on multiculturalism, and "The End of Racism," which blasts affirmative action. Today, the former senior policy analyst for the Reagan administration is the Robert and Karen Rishwain Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution, a conservative think tank.
In his new book, "The Enemy at Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11," D'Souza argues that "The cultural left in this country is responsible for causing 9/11 ... the cultural left and its allies in Congress, the media, Hollywood, the non-profit sector and the universities are the primary cause of the volcano of anger toward America that is erupting from the Islamic world." On Tuesday, during an appearance on Comedy Central's "Colbert Report," D'Souza was prodded by host Stephen Colbert into admitting that he agrees "with some of the things that these radical extremists [who attacked the United States on 9/11] are against in America."
[...]
The cultural seeds are somewhat different, and that is that the radical Muslims have been able to stir up a lot of hatred against America by saying, in effect, Islam is under attack. If you think about it, that's really the rallying cry of Islamic radicalism, and that's the only believable motive for why large numbers of people from a wide range of countries would be willing to risk their lives to strike out against America. I simply refuse to believe that people in Pakistan and Somalia would go to their deaths because the Palestinians don't have a state. So this idea that America is against your religion and is out to destroy your religion and your values, and undermine the Muslim family, and corrupt the innocence of young people and Muslim girls -- this is a very powerful attack, because it's not in the abstract realm of politics -- it affects the ordinary Muslim in his everyday life.
[...]
So in that sense, when they say that Islam is under attack and that, not American values, but these American values that are being globally pushed by the left, the values of, I mean, you have left-wing organizations filing lawsuits all over South America to liberalize abortion laws. These are democratically passed laws in Catholic countries, but under the bogus rubric of international law, there's an effort here to overturn these democratically passed laws in the name of some notion of abortion as an international right. Again, you have Planned Parenthood distributing contraceptives to Muslim girls.
[More at URL]
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''Thought Crimes'' Bill Re-introduced in Congress
Liberals seeking to enshrine [sic]
Concerned Women for America
1/19/2007
By Sarah Rode
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/12198/CWA/family/index.htm
A North Carolina man was recently arrested on suspicion of decapitating his 4-year-old daughter. In New York, three teenaged girls were arrested after brutally beating a 13-year-old girl and posting the video footage on YouTube and MySpace. And a former Penn State defensive lineman was arrested recently for the murder of a student who was stabbed 93 times during an apparent robbery.
As heinous and horrific as these crimes may seem, according to a bill recently re-introduced in the new liberal Congress, the penalties will be greater and harsher if those same crimes are committed against homosexuals. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) has introduced H.R. 254 known as the "David Ray Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2007". The bill currently has no cosponsors and it has been referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary.
It may seem surprising that liberals in Congress would support H.R. 254 which mandates harsher penalties for criminals. They have fought vehemently against capital punishment and in favor of improving prison conditions for terrorists in the past. Recall that Rep. Lee was one Member who called for the closure of Guantanamo Bay prison facilities because they were not pleasant enough for terrorists.
If you're tempted to think that there's been a change of heart regarding punishment of criminal behavior, think again. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee is beholden to the radically pro-homosexual Human Rights Campaign for their endorsement of her during the November 2006 elections. She scored 100% in the group's voter scorecard for the 109th Congress.
This bill isn't just another cog in the homosexual agenda machine. This legislation actually sends the message that it is more hateful to kill a homosexual than a little child. For instance, under this bill, the North Carolina man previously mentioned would receive a much harsher sentence if he were to be convicted of decapitating a homosexual rather than his 4-year-old daughter. This defies logic.
[More at URL]
----- 27 -----
The Littlest Katrina Survivor
Recognizing life is the key to saving it.
Concerned Women for America
1/19/2007
By Sarah Rode
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/12199/CWA/life/index.htm
Sixteen months after Hurricane Katrina, the youngest survivor is alive and well - and newly born! The world knows him as Noah Benton Markham, but Noah was rescued by Dr. Belinda Sissy Sartor when he was just a frozen embryo at a fertility clinic. A week after Katrina hit New Orleans, Dr. Sartor coordinated a rescue effort of the embryos with the governor and state police. They took boats into the flooded clinic and located the embryo storage tank. Dr. Sartor and her team rescued 1,400 embryos that day - not scientific experiments, but human lives. Eight pregnancies have resulted thus far, and Noah is the second birth to come from the rescued embryos. "The fact that we are making sure that they can come into the world is a very wonderful feeling," said Dr. Sartor.
[...]
Despite the recent and extremely viable stem cell alternatives discovered by medical researchers, Congress seems bent on committing taxpayer dollars to the destruction of human embryos. But little Noah Markham gives a face to what Congress is giving money to kill.
[More at URL]
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Gender Equality Gobbledygook
The whole second page of the report builds the case that gender equality is essential for "child survival and development"
Concerned Women for America
1/16/2007
By Janice Shaw Crouse
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/12176/BLI/nation/index.htm
One would think that the just-released 148-page United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) report, "The State of the World's Children 2007" -- with its exclusive focus on gender equality -- was produced by leftists and feminists. Instead, it is the product of Ann M. Veneman, the Executive Director of UNICEF and a Bush appointee who promised to bring back a sane perspective on children's issues. It is obvious at the outset, however, that the report merely re-packages the feminist agenda without even changing the tired old rhetoric.
The first page of the report focuses on "the discrimination and disempowerment women face throughout their lives" -- and outlines what must be done to "eliminate gender discrimination and empower women and girls." It is not until the very bottom of the first page that the thesis for the report reveals some connection with children: "The rights of women and children are mutually reinforcing." The whole second page of the report builds the case that gender equality is essential for "child survival and development" and that the Millennium Declaration is essential for constructing a world "fit for both women and children." In fact, the report bluntly states that the Millennium agenda recognizes the "centrality of gender equality to human development."
Thereafter, the report argues for "full implementation of CEDAW and the Convention on the Rights of the Child." Implementation of these "sister treaties," according to the report, is not just a "method for accelerating human development: It is also morally right." Later, the report scolds opponents: "Failure to secure equality for all has deleterious consequences for the moral, legal and economic fabric of nations."
[...]
A two-page sidebar details the "deleterious consequences" of gender discrimination across the life cycle. The report is quite concerned about early sexual activity for girls in "some countries" and notes that it is usually older boys or men who initiate it and such girls are at risk for partner violence. Ironically, these are the same voices that speak out here in the United States claiming that teens are "going to do it anyway" so they need condoms for "safe" sex. The report calls prostitution "commercial sex work" and acknowledges that "many are forced into it." Do they really think that children can and do agree to become prostitutes? The report acknowledges the risks of "unprotected" sex. Their solution? Knowledge of "reproductive health" and "protection." They claim that women are "at least twice as likely as men to become infected with HIV during sex." Their solution? Give women more negotiating power. What are two "pernicious" risks for women? Motherhood and Old Age. Well, at least they acknowledge motherhood instead of ignoring it.
[...]
We have a right to question whether UNICEF under Veneman's leadership is any different than it was under her liberal predecessor, Carol Bellamy. Veneman's appointment was supposed to herald a return to conservative principles that placed priority on children's issues, especially their survival in the face of malaria and the childhood diseases that are rampant in underdeveloped nations. Her appointment was supposed to signal a retreat from the feminists' domination of the UNICEF agenda and a return to matters of children's health and well-being -- indeed, those issues that affect life and death for children around the world.
Instead, the 148-page UNICEF report is all about the left's "women's agenda," albeit papered over with slogans such as "a world fit for women is a world fit for children." We expected more of a Bush appointee who was supposed to bring a whiff of reality to UNICEF. As a result, once again we have to ask, "Can anything good come out of Turtle Bay?"
[More at URL]
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Fox Intentionally Broadcasts 'F-Word' During Prime Time Football Playoff
You can file a complaint with the FCC right here.
Concerned Women for America
1/16/2007
By Jan LaRue, Chief Counsel
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/12175/LEGAL/pornography/index.htm
Families joining together in their homes to watch a football game shouldn't expect the network to send the pig along with the pigskin into their parlor. "Pig in the parlor" is the term the Supreme Court used when it upheld the right of the FCC to enforce federal decency laws on broadcasters. Patently offensive words - including the F-word - belong in a barnyard, not your parlor.
The Fox network did just that during Saturday night's broadcast of the NFL playoff game between the New Orleans Saints and the Philadelphia Eagles.
As a camera scanned the stadium crowd of 70,000, the camera operator managed to find a woman wearing a T-shirt clearly inscribed with the words "F--k Da Eagles" (spelled out - no dashes). A director or producer saw the shot among all of the other camera shots he had to choose from and made the decision to air the shot of the woman and her profane shirt. The camera stayed focused directly on the woman and her shirt for several seconds. There can be no doubt that this was an intentional and gratuitous airing of patently offensive language by Fox on the public airwaves. All of the V-chips on the planet couldn't have blocked the shot from your home and your family -
Fox subjected viewers on the East Coast to this display of indecency during the Family Hour (8:30 p.m. ET). Even worse, it aired at 5:30 p.m. on the West Coast.
[More at URL]
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Virginia Legislator Proposes to ‘White-Out’ Marriage Protection
Concerned Women for America
1/18/2007
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/12193/CWA/family/index.htm
Although an overwhelming majority of Virginia citizens voted to define and protect traditional marriage last fall, some in the state legislature are seeking to undo the Constitutional amendment by simply crossing it out. Mike Mears, CWA’s Director of State Legislative Relations has more on this unique attack on traditional marriage.
[Mike Mears, Director of State Legislative Relations: "What Delegate England is trying to do... is trying to wipe out the will of the people, they're trying to get rid of the marriage amendment that was just passed ... here in Virginia..." "basically what they've done is gone back to the Constitution that was just added, this amendment, they've taken it out... they've basically whited it out." "One thing that we should mention is... is there going to be enough support for them to repeal this? probably not... but this is where activists... need to be aware of what liberals do... they will introduce this, every year, ad nausium... my advice to activists in Virginia is to be ever so vigilant..." Includes ACTION ITEM to call Delegates to oppose any attempt to modify the anti-marriage-rights amendment. "For the legislature to turn around and try to repeal it... white it out... is just outrageous." "I'm not sure that our founding fathers would have ever imagined a morality in this country the way we've seen it in the last couple of years."]
[Editor's note: I looked for a non-theocon news source for this but didn't find anything on it in a rather brief search. Anybody know what this is really about?]
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Date: 2007-01-22 05:51 pm (UTC)