« April 20, 2008 - April 26, 2008
|
May 4, 2008 - May 10, 2008 »
April 27, 2008 - May 3, 2008
May 1, 2008
Phony 'Official' Group Prays for More Bush Judges
This morning, President Bush celebrated a National Day of Prayer, an annual non-sectarian rite going back decades. A much younger tradition was also observed: a phony “official” Day of Prayer group tried to usurp the national celebration with its own Religious Right-flavored broadcast.
As we explained last year, the National Day of Prayer Task Force—chaired by Shirley Dobson, James Dobson’s wife—is in fact an independent group whose platform runs contrary to the multi-faith spirit of the law. NDPTF specifically excludes participation by “Non-Judeo-Christian” groups, promotes fighting a “cultural war,” and its volunteers must swear their belief in an inerrant Bible.
Despite efforts this year by Jews on First, the Interfaith Alliance, and others to clarify that NDPTF is not a federal agency, confusion remains. The president himself helped to muddy the waters during the official White House ceremony, inviting the Dobsons and others involved with NDPTF and opening his remarks by thanking Shirley Dobson “for being the Chairman of the National Day of Prayer.”
The NDPTF ceremony this afternoon featured segments on the three branches of government, each featuring a prominent Republican speaker. The representative of the judicial branch was Judge Janice Rogers Brown, perhaps the most extreme-right of the controversial appeals-court nominees put forth by Bush. After Brown spoke on the nation’s “spiritual trajectory” (through events such as putting “In God We Trust” on coins), Vonette Bright—widow of Bill Bright and co-founder of Campus Crusade for Christ—led a prayer for more right-wing judges to “uphold God’s plan for marriage” and ban abortion:
Posted by Ezra at 5:40 PM | Permalink
Suburban Immigration Warriors Confuse Press
Prince William County, Virginia did something this week to address social and financial problems stemming from its recent crackdown on immigrants. What exactly it did is not entirely clear:
Washington Post headline: “Pr. William Softens Policy on Immigration Status Checks.”
Washington Times headline: “Prince William stiffens crackdown on illegals.”
Washington Examiner headline: “Pr. William softens illegal immigration policy.”
NBC 4 played it safe with “Prince William Votes To Change Immigration Enforcement.”
So what happened? As the Post and the Examiner report, the board of supervisors in this wealthy D.C. suburb, where police have been checking the immigration status of crime suspects, changed the policy slightly. Now the police only check the status of those arrested. (A proposal to check only those arrested and put in jail failed by a wide margin.)
While the Washington Times immigration coverage is always suspect, and the paper’s editorial page has been pushing the county to stay the course, in this case they do point to another change in policy: whereas before, local police needed “probable cause” that the person was undocumented (wonder what that means?), they now check everybody. Broadening the law, claimed the supervisors, would help protect them from lawsuits for racial profiling. But as Chairman Corey Stewart, leader of the crackdown, asserted, “This will increase the number of people who will have their immigration status checked.”
In any event, it’s hardly the “reconsideration” of the crackdown we were teased with in April.
Posted by Ezra at 2:26 PM | Permalink
April 30, 2008
Persecution of Arabic-Language Instruction Reexamined
The New York Times has published an extensive feature revisiting the unfortunate public battle that emerged last summer over the opening of a charter school offering Arabic language and cultural instruction. As we wrote in September, while 67 other schools in New York City were earning applause for dual-language instruction, the announcement of the Khalil Gibran International Academy resulted in a right-wing backlash that seemed to presume Arab American culture to be of a piece with international terrorism. In the end, a handful of fringe websites and third-string commentators, with promotion by two conservative newspapers, managed to force the resignation of the respected founding principal and to tarnish the new school, essentially sabotaging the first year of the educational effort.
Daniel Pipes led the charge against the school and its architect, Debbie Almontaser. He described to the Times how he sees openly Muslim Americans as posing a new threat, not of violence or law-breaking but of cultural change:
The conflict tapped into a well of post-9/11 anxieties. But Ms. Almontaser’s downfall was not merely the result of a spontaneous outcry by concerned parents and neighborhood activists. It was also the work of a growing and organized movement to stop Muslim citizens who are seeking an expanded role in American public life. The fight against the school, participants in the effort say, was only an early skirmish in a broader, national struggle.
“It’s a battle that’s really just begun,” said Daniel Pipes, who directs a conservative research group, the Middle East Forum, and helped lead the charge against Ms. Almontaser and the school.
In the aftermath of Sept. 11, critics of radical Islam focused largely on terrorism, scrutinizing Muslim-American charities or asserting links between Muslim organizations and violent groups like Hamas. But as the authorities have stepped up the war on terror, those critics have shifted their gaze to a new frontier, what they describe as law-abiding Muslim-Americans who are imposing their religious values in the public domain.
Mr. Pipes and others reel off a list of examples: Muslim cabdrivers in Minneapolis who have refused to take passengers carrying liquor; municipal pools and a gym at Harvard that have adopted female-only hours to accommodate Muslim women; candidates for office who are suspected of supporting political Islam; and banks that are offering financial products compliant with sharia, the Islamic code of law.
The danger, Mr. Pipes says, is that the United States stands to become another England or France, a place where Muslims are balkanized and ultimately threaten to impose sharia.
“It is hard to see how violence, how terrorism will lead to the implementation of sharia,” Mr. Pipes said. “It is much easier to see how, working through the system — the school system, the media, the religious organizations, the government, businesses and the like — you can promote radical Islam.”
Almontaser is suing the city for forcing her resignation, but it’s remarkable that such a small group of people—led by activists like Pipes and Aryeh Spero, who are as a rule ignored—could intimidate New York City, armed only with overactive imaginations and a paranoid suspicion of Muslims.
Posted by Ezra at 12:18 PM | Permalink
April 29, 2008
The Triumphant Return of the Christian Coalition
Times have been tough for the Christian Coalition in recent years. Since its meteoric rise to prominence under the helm of Ralph Reed in the1990s, the Coalition has become but a shell of its former self since Reed’s departure in 1997.
While Reed struck out on his own only to see his once promising political career strangled by his ties to corrupt lobbyist Jack Abramoff , the organization he built has likewise struggled to stay in business, losing nearly all of its relevance in the political arena:
After Reed’s 1997 exit, the Christian Coalition continued to deteriorate and, by 1999, found itself $2.5 million in debt, as well as facing the repayment of back taxes after having had its tax-exempt status revoked and fines for having improperly supported Newt Gingrich’s election and sharing its mailing list with right-wing Senate candidate Oliver North.
The Coalition moved its headquarters to Washington, DC in 2000 and just a few months later was sued by 10 black employees who alleged that they had been forced to eat in a segregated section and enter the office through the back door. The Coalition settled the suit for a reported $300,000 and its decline continued. Revenue shrank from a high of $26 million in 1996 to just $1.3 million in 2004 and the organization soon found itself facing lawsuits from landlords, lawyers, and clients for failure to pay its bills. In 2002, nearly broke and in shambles, the organization was forced to relocate to South Carolina, and was even sued by its moving company as it tried to collect $1,890 on an unpaid bill
Since then, the Christian Coalition only seems to be able to generate press when it gets embroiled in embarrassing fights, like when state chapters sever their ties with the national organization and then start suing each other or when they try to hire a new president to turn the organization around, only to have him resign before ever taking office because they are unwilling to consider broadening their agenda.
Still, the Coalition continues to limp along, occasionally getting some press for its efforts on behalf of “net neutrality” but, beyond that, doing nobody knows what since they haven’t even issued a press release in six months.
But just because the Coalition has been dormant for years doesn’t mean they are not longer capable of quickly reacting to breaking developments that threaten this nation:
Miley Cyrus should be held accountable for taking the semi-topless Vanity Fair photos, Michele Combs, a spokesperson for Christian Coalition of America, tells Usmagazine.com.
"Disney should reprimand her," Combs says.
Combs is calling for a televised press conference, where "Miley should say it was a mistake and that kids have to be very careful at such a young age." (Cyrus issued a statement, apologizing; the Disney Channel claims the magazine "manipulated" her, which Vanity Fair denies.)
"Kids look up to her," Combs adds. "Something needs to be done."
Miley, 15, also admitted in the interview that Sex and the City is her favorite TV show.
"If she's gonna go out there and represent wholesome values, she needs to be more accountable for her actions," Combs says.
Combs adds that famed photographer Annie Leibovitz has "a reputation for doing racy things ... Miley should have thought this out before she agreed to go in front of Annie."
She said the photos — as well as other ones of a lingerie-clad Cyrus that recently hit the Internet — are "very disappointing ... sad.
The photos are "gonna hurt a lot of people," Combs says. "It's gonna hurt her image.
Posted by Kyle at 4:14 PM | Permalink
Right Steps Up Attacks on 'Racist' Planned Parenthood
For several years, a handful of far-right activists have promoted the idea that the occurrence of African American women choosing abortion amounts to a so-called “black genocide” perpetrated consciously by clinics. But it’s only seeming to catch on now, as more and more right-wing media outlets have picked up on the claim in the last few months. Televangelist Rod Parsley recently embraced the notion as a personal cause, and a UCLA student group deployed actors to call Planned Parenthood offices and pose as racist donors (under the assumption that if the operator accepts the money, the organization must be racist).
Activists promoting the “black genocide” idea converged on Thursday at a Washington, DC clinic protest. From a CBN report:
Kristan Hawkins, Students for Life: Planned Parenthood, guess what? Your secret is out!
John Jessup, CBN: That secret? That Planned Parenthood is deeply rooted in targeting African Americans for Abortions.
Day Gardner, National Black Pro-Life Union: Black America must wake up, and stand up, to this racist organization that purposefully plants abortion facilities firmly in black and minority neighborhoods. […]
Rev. Clenard Childress, Black Genocide: I believe, as always, that if abortion was not lucrative, it would not be legal and they are benefiting off of the blood of innocent babies.
Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) attended, promising to offer legislation to make it illegal “to abort a baby based solely on their sex or their race,” while others pushed Congress to prevent Planned Parenthood from receiving any federal funding for its non-abortion health programs. (Federal funding of abortion is already prohibited by law.)
Protesters also linked their cause to the presidential campaign. Gardner’s National Black Pro-Life Union sent a letter to presidential candidates, calling on them to condemn Planned Parenthood’s supposed “racist business practices.” In particular, Barack Obama seemed to be the target. "If (Obama) supports abortion, which is a scourge of our community, which is devastating our community, then we cannot, we must not, support him," said Dallas pastor Stephen Broden at the protest.
The National Black Pro-Life Union has dogged Barack Obama for some time, as have others at Thursday’s protest. Clenard Childress of BlackGenocide.org, for example, recently accused Obama of being a black “front” man for Planned Parenthood.
Posted by Ezra at 9:59 AM | Permalink
April 28, 2008
Alan Keyes In a Nutshell
It appears as if Alan Keyes’ presidential hopes have officially come to an end … at least for this year.
After launching a vanity campaign last summer, Keyes had high hopes for a solid showing in Iowa that never panned out. Keyes then relocated his campaign to Texas, where he pledged to deliver a major breakthrough that likewise never materialized.
Without apparently actually bothering to withdraw from the Republican Primary, the Keyes campaign went quiet before it emerged earlier this month to make a major announcement that he would be officially leaving the Republican Party to seek the Constitution Party’s presidential nomination.
The Constitution Party’s convention was held over the weekend and Keyes did not fare well:
Things aren't working out well for Alan Keyes. The perennial candidate with a worse electoral track record than Harold Stassen spent most of his adult lifetime in the Republican Party. He lasted in the Constitution Party for less than two weeks.
…
Chuck Baldwin -- a preacher, radio show host, and columnist who actually agreed with the Constitution Party's platform on the issues in question -- beat Keyes 3-to-1, a margin worthy of Barack Obama or Barbara Mikulski. Paleocons praised the Constitutionalists for sticking to their principles, which they did, but Keyes's odd notions about how to win friends and influence people also contributed to his drubbing.
Following his embarrassing defeat, Keyes granted an interview to "Missouri Viewpoints" where he expressed bitterness over being repeatedly stabbed in the back by every party he belongs to. Recounting that he had been “invited in by the leadership of the Illinois party” to run against Barack Obama, he complained that the party then failed to support him and instead, as he put it, “tried to kill me.” Keyes noted that there seems to be a pattern in all of his campaigns and activities where “people invite me in, and then they kill me; they invite me in and then they kill me; they invite me in and then they seek to kill me.”
But with his loss in seeking the Constitution Party’s nomination, Keyes finally has it all figured it all out and explains it as only he could:
The Lord shared with me that, Alan, the child that you are defending in the womb … in the act of procreation, people are joyfully, ecstatically, with great pleasure in every fiber of their being, saying "yes" to the coming of that new life. They invite the child in. And then in abortion, they kill it. So what, in point of fact my political career is, is the paradigm and pattern of that which I am trying to stop for the child. I kind of represent, in political terms, the abortion. You're invited in, but they kill you. You're invited in, but they kill you.
Posted by Kyle at 4:20 PM | Permalink
Huckabee Not The Forgiving Type
A while back, we noted that Mike Huckabee had been mending fences with the likes of The Club for Growth and the Family Research Council despite the fact that the groups had been cool, if not outright hostile, to his presidential aspirations.
While Huckabee may be trying to make nice with some of the DC powerbrokers, it doesn’t look like he is quite as forgiving of those who crossed him back in Arkansas.
Back when his campaign was starting to pick up steam, former Republican state representative Randy Minton was among those who started showing up in the press bad-mouthing Huckabee to anyone who would listen:
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, suddenly a serious candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, is “the biggest RINO I know,” according to former state Rep. Randy Minton.
…
“I call (Huckabee) a pro-life, pro-gun liberal,” says Minton, who says he himself belongs to “the Re-publican wing of the Republican Party.”
Minton says he is philosophically aligned with the anti-tax Club for Growth, which has begun running political ads attacking Huckabee as “Tax Hike Mike.”
…
“He says he’s pro-family. If you’re raising taxes on the families of Arkansas, causing wives to go out and get jobs to make ends meet, that’s not pro-family,” Minton said.
Minton was so opposed to the prospect of a Huckabee presidency that he even traveled to Iowa, on Ron Paul’s dime, to campaign against him:
Earlier this week, a group of Arkansans went to Iowa for three days of media appearances to lobby against Huckabee. Randy Minton, a former state legislator and chairman of the conservative Eagle Forum, was one of these new Travelers. “I will be going across the state raising awareness [of Huckabee's record],” said Minton before the trip. He cited Huckabee's record of raising taxes and his liberal use of pardons as two issues he planned to discuss.
Huckabee’s campaign eventually faltered and folded and Huckabee re-emerged as the head of a new PAC and, wouldn’t you know it, now that Minton has decided to run for a House seat in Arkansas, HuckPAC has likewise decided to back his opponent:
Despite his new status as national political celebrity, Huckabee is backing Minton's opponent in a very local legislative race.
Davy Carter of Cabot is Minton's GOP opponent for the House District 48 seat in the May 20 Republican primary. Sarah Huckabee, the former governor's daughter and executive director of HuckPAC, a newly created political action committee, confirmed Friday that her father is supporting Carter, and that the PAC would be supporting him, as well.
Minton did what he could to ensure that Huckabee’s candidacy went down in defeat and it looks like Huckabee has decided to return the favor.
Posted by Kyle at 4:18 PM | Permalink
RNC Plans "Aggressive" Religious Outreach on Behalf of McCain
Via The Brody File: "'We are going to have a very aggressive program to reach out to religious voters whether they are Evangelical, Protestant, Catholic or whatever. That is a staple of our campaign because what we find is that the most religious voters certainly in terms of Church attendance tend to vote Republican more than the general public. There are a lot of voters there for us. The senator’s team has been meeting with these (pro-family) groups. He has conducted some meetings and he’ll continue to have such meetings.'" David Barton is probably waiting by his phone for a call from the RNC to start ramping up his efforts.
Posted by Kyle at 1:34 PM | Permalink