Kyle's blog

It's the Holiday season, so inevitably that means that right-wing legislators and activists are launching their annual effort to save Christmas from the forces of secularism. 

Via AU's Wall of Separation, we learn that Sen. Chris Buttars of Utah is sponsoring a resolution calling on everyone to say "Merry Christmas" instead of "Happy Holidays" and doing so, he insists, because he's "sick of the Christmas wars":

Sen. Chris Buttars wants Utah's Legislature to declare its opposition to the "war on Christmas."

The West Jordan Republican is sponsoring a resolution encouraging retailers to embrace Christmas in their promotions rather than the generic "holidays."

"It would encourage the use of 'Merry Christmas,'" Buttars said of the non-binding statement that is still being drafted. "I'm sick of the Christmas wars -- we're a Christian nation and ought to use the word."

Several fellow lawmakers he wouldn't yet name support his effort, added Buttars, who has a long history of championing the socially conservative agenda of the Utah Eagle Forum.

I too am sick of the Christmas wars, but it seems that the proper way of handling it is to let people decide for themselves what phrase they want to use instead of demanding that they say "Merry Christmas"  ... in fact, this is exactly the sort of effort that seems destined to simply prolong the "Christmas wars" Buttars is complaining about.

And speaking of the "war on Christmas," it looks Freedom From Religion Foundation is putting up their own holiday signs this year:

In the latest round of what's become almost a winter tradition — conflicts over religious symbols in public places — a group of atheists and agnostics have put up a sign in the state Capitol that says, in part: "Religion is but myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds."

Freedom From Religion Foundation members put up the sign Monday, partly in response to a nearby Nativity scene. They also debuted a billboard in downtown Olympia that reads: "Reason's Greetings."

Of course, now people are unhappy about this:

[I]n 2006, Olympia real-estate agent Ron Wesselius saw a menorah displayed inside the Capitol and wanted to put up a Nativity scene. He was denied because he applied too late for the state to research the issues, according to the state Department of General Administration.

Wesselius, working with the Alliance Defense Fund, filed a lawsuit, the state settled, and he put up a Nativity scene in 2007. He put up another one Monday morning — a few steps from the Freedom From Religion Foundation's sign.

"I think people are losing track of what Christmas is," Wesselius said. "It's not about one religion against another religion."

Of the foundation's sign, Wesselius said: "I think they're being a little divisive there in their saying. But they have freedom of speech and equal access."

That's right - in 2006, Wesselius and the ADF sued the state of Washington because he saw a menorah in the Capitol and demanded to be allowed to put up a nativity scene and now he's complaining that other people are being "divisive" and pitting one religion against another and ultimately "losing track of what Christmas" is all about.

Last week we noted that several high-profile Religious Right leaders were part of an effort to express thanks and support to the Mormon Church for its efforts to help pass Proposition 8 in California. But just because the Right is appreciative of the role that Mormons played in the effort doesn't mean that they are necessarily ready to actually vote for a Mormon for president, as Christianity Today points out:

Evangelicals were content to partner with Mormons on Proposition 8 because the groups agreed on the end goal, said Gerald R. McDermott, professor of religion at Roanoke College and coauthor of Claiming Christ: A Mormon-Evangelical Debate.

"The outcome is to have a marriage policy that is completely agreeable to evangelicals. Before, the outcome was someone in office who, to a lot of evangelicals, represented a theology that was completely disagreeable," McDermott said. "They agree on these horizontal issues while they disagree with the vertical issues, which are theological."

While some, like early Mitt Romney supporter Jay Sekulow, are trying to tie the two issues together, saying that the cooperation between evangelicals and Mormons on Prop 8 will only strengthen Romney's chances should he choose to run again, the militantly anti-Mormon activists in the movement want to make it clear that that is not going to be the case at all:

During Romney's candidacy, Robert Jeffress, pastor at the First Baptist Church of Dallas, told his congregants that they should prefer Christian candidates to Mormon candidates, but he is grateful for Mormon involvement in helping pass Proposition 8.

"I think there has been a strain in the relationship with Mormons, but I think Christians need to understand that Mormonism is not Christianity," Jeffress said. "The differences between Mormonism and Christianity aren't just minor theological differences that can be erased just because we agree on moral issues."

Of course, Jeffress was far more radical in his opposition to Romney than were most right-wing leaders, repeatedly declaring that "Mormonism is a cult" and that they "worship a false god," so it is not very surprising that he is still opposed to Romney.  But still, it should serve as a warning to Romney and any of his backers who are hoping that the Right's gratitude for the Mormon's cooperation in furthering their anti-gay agenda will somehow overcome their deep distrust and opposition to his faith.

I've always wanted to launch my own grassroots political organization dedicated to protecting our Third Amendment rights, collecting donations, and then just sitting back while turning out glowing annual reports about how, thanks to our tireless efforts, no citizen was compelled to house soldiers in their place of residence during times of peace for 217 consecutive years.

While it is not quite as ingenious as my idea, it looks like the Media Research Center is launching it's own version of this sort of can't-possibly-fail initiative, as Alex Koppelman points out:

Whether they know it or not, the staff at the Media Research Center -- a conservative press watchdog -- seems to have hit upon an ingenious new strategy: make a big deal about getting involved in fights in which your enemy is nonexistent. You can't possibly lose!

Monday, the MRC announced the formation of the Free Speech Alliance, a group dedicated to fighting against the reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine, an old FCC regulation that mandated equal time for opposing viewpoints in opinion programming. The move was announced in a post on MRC's blog, Newsbusters, that was titled "The Free Speech Alliance Declares War on the 'Censorship Doctrine.'"

The MRC is also asking people to sign a petition against revival of the regulation. "In 1987, President Ronald Reagan rescinded the Fairness Doctrine and since then, talk radio has flourished. Conservatives dominate it, and liberals can't stand it. By re-instating the Fairness Doctrine, liberals would effectively silence the conservative leaders of the day ... and would essentially take control of all forms of media," the group says in an introduction on the Web page that hosts the petition. On the same page, the MRC warns, "In recent months, the groundswell for reinstatement is intensifying. In fact, a growing number of liberal leaders in Washington, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, have openly stated their intent to do so."

...

According to the MRC, Fairness Alliance member organizations include Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform, Concerned Women for America and the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank.

Of course this sort of right-wing effort to save America from the return of the Fairness Doctrine is almost guarantee to succeed without those involved having to do anything at al since, as Marin Cogan explains, there is no effort underway or desire whatsoever to actually reinstate it:

Today, the doctrine has almost no support from media-reform advocates. According to Mark Lloyd, co-author of the CAP report, "I don't think there's any movement [to restore the fairness doctrine] at all. ... We don't support it. " Craig Aaron of the media-reform group FreePress says, "[I]n reality, the fairness doctrine as it existed is never ever coming back."

Responses from the offices of most of the Democrats who have been pegged as fairness-doctrine proponents--Schumer, Dick Durbin, Dianne Feinstein, and others--have ranged from a firm denial that the issue is a priority at all to disbelief at finding themselves at the center of a manufactured controversy. "Somebody plucked this out of the clear blue sky," says the press secretary for New Mexico Senator Jeff Bingaman, a Democrat who was questioned about the issue by a conservative radio-show host a few weeks ago. "This is a completely made- up issue." Senator Durbin's press secretary says that Durbin has "no plans, no language, no nothing. He was asked in a hallway last year, he gave his personal view"--that the American people were served well under the doctrine--"and it's all been blown out of proportion." In fact, as recently as last year, the House voted by an overwhelming three-to-one margin to temporarily prohibit the FCC from imposing the dead policy; 113 Democrats voted to support the move.

Meanwhile, the president-elect himself has said in no uncertain terms that he does "not support reimposing the fairness doctrine on broadcasters." Republican paranoia is nothing more than that.

You may remember Bill Keller, the man who has dubbed himself "the world's leading internet evangelist," whatever that means, for causing a bit of a stir during the Republican Primary when he launched an all-out attack on Mitt Romney because of his Mormon faith during which he declared that "if you vote for Mitt Romney, you are voting for Satan!"

Seemingly having successfully used the power of the internet and prayer to destroy Romney's presidential aspirations, Keller has now turned his attention toward solving our economic crisis calling for a National Day of Prayer and Fasting for the Economy and is seeking 250,000 signatures for his petition asking President Bush and Congress to proclaim Thursday, December 18th as a National Day of Prayer:

The reason, Keller explained, none of the solutions put forth by the world's greatest economists to correct the falling economy have worked is simple: the problem is not an economic one.

"The crisis is a spiritual problem," said Keller. "The answer to our economic downfall is not an infusion of trillions of dollars, but the humble prayers of forgiveness and repentance for our sin and rebellion against God."

In this video from back in October, Keller explains that the only way to "fix the economy is for this nation to repent of its sins, ask God's forgiveness, and turn back to God and His truth ... Sadly this nation is so blinded by its sin, so far away from God, that it can't see that what is happening in the economy is the start of God pouring out his judgment on our nation for our sins and our wickedness. Every twenty-four hours we legally slaughter over 4,000 innocent babies, we've made a mockery of God's holy institution of marriage, we bow down and worship every idol and false god man has created. We live in complete and total rebellion to God and His word. My friends, we're not only due God's wrath and judgment, we are overdue God's wrath and judgment."

For what it's worth, WorldNetdaily gives us a little bit of background about Keller and his ministry:

A former businessman convicted of insider trading in 1989, Keller served two years in federal prison, was released and later earned a degree in biblical studies from Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia.

In 1999, Keller launched LivePrayer, which claims to have responded personally to more than 60 million online requests for prayer since its inception and claims its LivePrayer devotional is received daily by over 2.4 million e-mail subscribers.

For many years, Mat Staver of the Jerry Falwell created Liberty Counsel had seemed like a relatively reasonable man.  We didn’t agree with his legal views or agenda, but he wasn’t necessarily the type of right-wing figure to start spouting utterly nonsensical and offensive views about gays or abortion or Democratic politicians or what have you.  

But something seems to have changed recently and, ever since he agreed to join various other second and third-tier right-wing figures for the Values Voter Debate in Florida last year, he has become increasingly unhinged. 

For instance, not too long ago he was blaming our current financial crisis on the “radical redefinition of marriage” and saying that American will be cursed if it elected Barack Obama.  After Obama won, Staver told Newsweek that people who believe Barack Obama might be the Antichrist are not necessarily crazy, but are just “expressing a concern and a fear that is widely shared.” 

Now we get Staver warning that Obama (and his gay allies) are the “biggest threat to religious liberty we've ever had”:

Mat Staver, chairman of Liberty Counsel, a religious liberty legal organization, told Baptist Press he believes religious freedoms could be impacted under Obama, especially if the bills he supports become law.

"I would consider him to be the biggest threat to religious liberty we've ever had [in the White House] because he will push the homosexual agenda," Staver said. "... I think churches and pastors will be very negatively affected by Obama's policies."

…

"My biggest fear is that his agenda will not only advance the homosexual agenda but restrict freedom of speech and freedom of religion," Staver said ... "What we've seen recently with the violence and the attempt to intimidate Christians into silence following the passage of Prop 8 by the homosexual activists ought to be a wake-up call for Christians," Staver said. "That's what's coming if we don't stand up and resist now these homosexual policies."

Politico notes that even though Sarah Palin tops polls of Republican voters’ preferred pick for the party’s nominee in 2012, her support comes mainly from hard-core right-wing conservatives while her approval rating among moderates and centrists has plummeted.

What makes the article interesting is this statement from Richard Land, who was one of Palin’s earliest backers touting her candidacy way back in early August and constantly gushing about her during the campaign, suddenly suggesting that the Right doesn’t “have all their hopes and dreams vested” in her future:

The GOP intra-party debate over Palin has become a proxy for the larger question of her party's future, and conservative chieftains like Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission President Richard Land fear that attacks on Palin are at times veiled swipes at the party base.

"It would be a mistake to say that social conservatives have all their hopes and dreams vested in Sarah Palin," Land said, but he added Palin "does have the one thing you can't coach, charisma," and continues to have "star power" with conservatives.

Now Land has a long history of trying to portray himself as more of a pundit than a Religious Right hack and setting himself up as perhaps a more sensible alternative to the likes of James Dobson.  In that capacity, he often serves as a moderately reliable bellwether of the Right’s views on political issues, such as his early adoration of Fred Thompson which then quickly evaporated when it was clear that his campaign was going nowhere or his lukewarm support of John McCain’s candidacy that was kicked into overdrive by his choice of Palin as his running mate.

So it is interesting to see Land start backing away ever-so-slowly from the idea that Palin represents the future of the Religious Right movement in American politics, presumably out of concern that Palin’s future itself might be rather limited, as Ed Rollins points out:

Ed Rollins, who ran presidential bids for Republicans including Ronald Reagan and Huckabee, argued that "independents are something she can focus on later."

In the end, though, Rollins expects that Palin "will be very similar to [Dan] Quayle."

"When he started to run, [Quayle] got nowhere," Rollins said. "The potential is there [for Palin] but out of 10 weeks she had two good weeks." For the 2012 race, "she's now not starting at the top but starting at the bottom," he said, adding that Palin would have to campaign for years in Iowa and New Hampshire to mount a viable campaign.

Back in October we noted that the Family Policy Council of West Virginia was pressing the Governor and state legislature to put an anti-gay marriage amendment on the next ballot based entirely on a poll they took that reportedly showed that more than 70% of voters would support such an amendment.  Shortly thereafter, the call was seconded by the West Virginia Convention of Southern Baptists and now the Family Policy Council is starting to mobilize right-wing support in order to force the Governor and legislature to place an amendment on the ballot  

Members of West Virginia's religious communities are mobilizing to protect traditional marriage.

The Family Policy Council of West Virginia has taken the lead in asking Democratic Governor Joe Manchin and the legislature to let voters decide whether to change the state's constitution to prohibit same-sex marriage." Jeremiah Dys, founder of The Family Policy Council of West Virginia, explains the apparent conservative viewpoint.
 
"They do not want their government setting a policy, and they especially do not want courts imposing a system that...deprives children of a mom or a dad -- and so we're simply asking our legislature, we're asking our governor especially, to lead the effort to allow West Virginians to do what they want to do," he notes.

As we noted last time, West Virginia does not have a petition process allowing citizens to gather signatures and place a constitutional amendment on the ballot so any such amendment must first pass through the state House and Senate, both of which are controlled by Democrats, so it is up to the Family Policy Council to pressure them into letting West Virginians “do what they want to do” and pass an anti-gay constitutional amendment so as to ensure that the courts don’t “deprive children of a mom or a dad.”

Local papers continue to cover Mike Huckabee’s appearances as he crosses the nation on his book-signing tour where his fans and supporters are turning out in full force to get the autograph of the failed Republican presidential nominee.  This article from the St. Petersburg Times covers a recent appearance in Tampa, Florida where about 75 fans gathered to meet their hero and comment that Huck appears to have a bright future ahead of him: 

"This is bigger than the presidency," said Kathy Cox of St. Petersburg. "This is about him getting a message out that integrity matters. I like his values. I'm Christian; he's a Christian."

Cox's sister, Nancy Main, was visiting for Thanksgiving from North Carolina. She likes Huckabee, too, and said he could play the same role Pat Robertson has played for years as the proxy for religious conservatives. "He's someone the rural parts of America can relate to," Main said.

Since some Catholic priests seem intent on telling Catholic who voted for Barack Obama that they have sinned and must confess before they can accept communion, I guess I’ll just keep posting about it:

Parishioners of St. Joseph's Catholic Church in Modesto have been told they should consider going to confession if they voted for Barack Obama, because of the president-elect's position condoning abortion.

"If you are one of the 54 percent of Catholics who voted for a pro-abortion candidate, you were clear on his position and you knew the grav- ity of the question, I urge you to go to confession before receiving communion. Don't risk losing your state of grace by receiving sacrilegiously," the Rev. Joseph Illo, pastor of St. Joseph's, wrote in a letter dated Nov. 21.

The letter was sent to more than 15,000 members of the St. Joseph's parish. It is one of 34 parishes in the Stockton Diocese, which has more than 200,000 members in Stanislaus, San Joaquin and four other counties.

Illo also delivered this message in a homily.

There have been several articles in recent days from conservative Republican and Religious Right leaders arguing about how the GOP can re-establish itself as a viable force in American politics after getting thumped in the last two elections.  Immediately after the election, some voices emerged suggesting that the only hope was for the party to throw the right-wing elements overboard, a suggestion that was not surprisingly met with outrage by the leaders of that section of the base.  

Now it seems as if the GOP’s “culture warriors” have found their voice and decided to fight back on their own terms.  Thus, you have Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina arguing that what the party really needs is to establish tighter control over its “franchise” and just who had the right to call themselves a “Republican” because the party’s “tent cannot be so big as to include political franchisees who don’t act on the core tenets of conservatism.” And you have Katon Dawson, chairman of the South Carolina Republican Party and RNC Chairmanship hopeful, calling on the GOP to “renew our commitment to our Party’s timeless principles…by reconfirming our commitment to be the party of smaller government, lower taxes, individual freedom, strong national security, respect for the sanctity of life, traditional marriage, the importance of family and the exceptionalism of America.” 

Along the same lines, you have Rod Dreher arguing not only that the social conservatives were in no way responsible for the GOP’s current plight, but that they offer the only route to political salvation for the party:

[W]as it the religious right that conceived and executed the disastrous Iraq war? Did preachers deregulate Wall Street? Did evangelical leader James Dobson screw up the Federal Emergency Management Agency's response to Hurricane Katrina? Jack Abramoff — did he concoct his crooked lobbying schemes during long protest vigils outside abortion clinics? To be fair, religious conservatives didn't stand up to any of this. We own a share of the GOP's failure. But to scapegoat us for the Republican implosion is preposterous … far from being the demise of the GOP, the coming generation of evangelicals, Catholics and fellow travelers can be the seeds for the conservative movement's intellectual rebirth.

In case they weren’t being clear enough, the Right is making sure that its place in the party is clearly understood:  

"People are trying to rebrand the GOP; they're trying to find a course for the future. They want to get back in power, and many of the voices that the GOP is listening to are telling them we need to be moderate, we need to jettison the social conservative issues, we need to not talk about life or marriage," [David Nammo, executive director of Family Research Council Action] contends. "And if that is what the direction of the GOP is going to be, I think they're going to find themselves in the minority party for many years to come."

Even James Dobson has gotten in on the action, personally penning a response to Kathleen Parker entitled '”We Won’t Be Silenced”:

[W]e don’t need an embossed note from Ms. Parker — or anyone else — to take part in the political dialogue — of either party. Our invitation to engage the process comes straight from our Founders. We will continue to stand up for the sanctity of human life, the sacredness of marriage and the right to have a say in the principles that will continue to guide this nation founded on biblical  principles. Where Ms. Parker gets it most wrong is in writing that socially conservative Christians are an “element that used to be relegated to wooden crates on street corners.”

We’ve never been that marginalized in our culture and government — and won’t be anytime soon, the efforts and epithets of big media notwithstanding.

If the moderate elements in the Republican Party thought they could just re-brand the GOP by dumping the Religious Right base, that base has now made it abundantly clear that any effort to that will result in an all-out war for control of the party that will likely doom it to minority status for years to come.

A few weeks ago, The Onion ran a satire piece entitled “I'm Not One Of Those 'Love Thy Neighbor' Christians” in which the author explained her personal brand of Christianity:

My faith in the Lord is about the pure, simple values: raising children right, saying grace at the table, strictly forbidding those who are Methodists or Presbyterians from receiving communion because their beliefs are heresies, and curing homosexuals. That's all. Just the core beliefs. You won't see me going on some frothy-mouthed tirade about being a comfort to the downtrodden.

I was reminded of that piece today when I came across two articles mentioning the rabidly anti-gay right-wing preacher Ken Hutcherson who has made a name for himself in recent years by trying to take over Microsoft and trying to shut down the Gay-Straight Alliance in his daughter’s school.

Now it seems as if Hutcherson has turned his sights on saving eHarmony from the scourge of the homosexuals:

A well-known Christian activist says it's outrageous that the founder of the world's largest online dating site has bowed to the pressure of homosexuals.  

eHarmony was founded by Dr. Neil Clark Warren who is a professing Christian. Three years ago, a homosexual filed a lawsuit claiming he was the victim of discrimination when the company refused to accept his advertisement for a same-sex partner. And now eHarmony has agreed to begin matching homosexual couples -- a decision that stemmed from the lawsuit settlement.

Dr. Ken Hutcherson is pastor of Antioch Bible Church in Redmond, Washington and he is not surprised with the court's ruling against eHarmony. However, Dr. Hutcherson says eHarmony should have taken a stand.

"To bow and say okay…that is turning against God who made his business successful," he argues.

Hutcherson says it is time for Christians to take a stand. "We're simply becoming evan-jellyfish with no spiritual vertebrae…and I'm appalled, I am mad, I am frustrated.  I want to fight this and that is something we need to do," he chides.

But it is not as if Hutcherson is solely focused on battle the gay agenda, because he also shows up in this CBN News article on the rise of “tent cities” in Seattle, Washington due to the economic and housing crises.  The article notes that several local churches have been allowing those living on the streets to set up tents on their property, and Hutcherson is not happy about that either: 

Providers of tent cities say they are offering the homeless much needed shelter. But some are offering a much different perspective on tent cities.

"Our Saviour died to keep us off the cross. I don't think he'd be satisfied keeping us in tents," Pastor Ken Hutcherson of Antioch Bible Church in Redmond, Wash., said.

"I think the Bible gives it to us straight, if you don't work, you don't eat," he said. "We're supposed to give hands up, not hand outs to the point of letting people stay the way they are."

It seems that, back in 2006, Kentucky State Rep. Tom Riner inserted a provision into Homeland Security legislation that required the state Office of Homeland Security to openly and repeatedly stress “the dependence on Almighty God as being vital to the security of the Commonwealth" and thank God for keeping the state safe.

Apparently, under former Governor Ernie Fletcher, the office dutifully carried out this obligation but now Riner is upset that under current Governor Steve Beshear, the office isn’t praising and mentioning God as it is required to do so by law: 

The 2006 law organizing the state Office of Homeland Security lists its initial duty as "stressing the dependence on Almighty God as being vital to the security of the Commonwealth."

Specifically, Homeland Security is ordered to publicize God's benevolent protection in its reports, and it must post a plaque at the entrance to the state Emergency Operations Center with an 88-word statement that begins, "The safety and security of the Commonwealth cannot be achieved apart from reliance upon Almighty God."

State Rep. Tom Riner, a Southern Baptist minister, tucked the God provision into Homeland Security legislation as a floor amendment that lawmakers overwhelmingly approved two years ago.

As amended, Homeland Security's religious duties now come before all else, including its distribution of millions of dollars in federal grants and its analysis of possible threats.

The time and energy spent crediting God are appropriate, said Riner, D-Louisville, in an interview this week.

"This is recognition that government alone cannot guarantee the perfect safety of the people of Kentucky," Riner said. "Government itself, apart from God, cannot close the security gap. The job is too big for government."

…

Under previous Gov. Ernie Fletcher, a lay Baptist preacher, Homeland Security interpreted the law at face value, prominently crediting God in its annual reports to state leaders and posting the required plaque.

Under Gov. Steve Beshear, officials this week said they didn't know about the plaque until the Herald-Leader called to ask whether it's still there. (They checked; it is.) The 2008 Homeland Security report, issued a month ago, did not credit God, but it did complain about a decline in federal funding from Washington.

…

There is no reference to God in Homeland Security's current mission statement or on its Web site, which displeases Riner.

"We certainly expect it to be there, of course," Riner said.

The Religious Right is understandably concerned about what a Barack Obama administration will mean for their influence and agenda in the coming years and its leaders are already hard at work trying to reign him in by suggesting that, despite his clear victory, he doesn't have any sort of mandate: 

Wasting little time, conservative Christian groups have already drafted open letters to Obama stressing their opposition to abortion, and are taking steps to reassure supporters that they will fight any attempt to give the new administration a blank cheque -- especially on social issues.

"Barack Obama can clearly claim a mandate from the American people on the economy, maybe even our standing in the eyes of the rest of the world, but he cannot claim a mandate to impose or to advance a liberal social agenda," said Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council ...

Though conservative Christians won't have "the same type of relationship we had with the Bush administration," Perkins said the passage of amendments in three states that banned same-sex marriage shows their values have staying power.

"This was, I think, more of a referendum on the Republican Party than conservative values," he said. "We focused upon the marriage amendments in the three states ... They passed in two states (California and Florida), which Barack Obama carried handily."

Fair enough, but what about the various anti-choice issues that were also on the ballot and all lost? Those apparently don't count:  

None of the state referenda on abortion -- including one on parental consent in California and a "personhood" amendment in Colorado -- passed on Election Day, but [Richard] Land said conservative Christians will be undeterred by those losses at the polls.

"Pro-life Catholics and pro-life evangelicals aren't going anywhere," he said.

So the anti-gay amendments that passed prove that Obama has no "mandate to impose or to advance a liberal social agenda," but conversely nothing at all can be concluded about choice issues even though every such initiative failed just because the anti-choice forces say so?  

for the chairmanship of the Republican National Committee.One of the prevailing themes of the Republican Party at the moment is rampant finger-pointing in which just about every faction of the party is blaming every other faction of the party for the fact that they keep losing elections. 

First you had moderates blaming the Religious Right while the Right was blaming the Republican leadership for being insufficiently committed to the right-wing agenda and others were blaming the anti-immigration "nativists."

Now comes the Family Research Council complaining that Rep. Pete Sessions, incoming Chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, dared to meet with the Log Cabin Republicans and warning that any moves toward treating them like a legitimate element of the party will only undermine the GOP's efforts to reach out to Black and Hispanic voters and will ultimately doom the Republicans to being in the minority for the foreseeable future:

According to a press release from the pro-gay "marriage" group, Log Cabin Republicans, one of the first stops for the newly elected Chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), Congressman Pete Sessions (R-Texas), was the fundraising dinner for the homosexual organization. The release states that Representative Sessions said that the GOP cannot win elections and reach out to voters if it continues to oppose the issues that Log Cabin stands for, presumably including same-sex "marriage." My team sought clarification from Sessions' office and was told he did speak to the Log Cabin group, but that a copy of his remarks was not available. If the Log Cabin portrayal is true, it is disturbing on a number of accounts. One, Sessions' new position as the head of the NRCC is to train and recruit new candidates for the Republican Party. If this is his idea of "campaign advice" then the Republicans better prepare for a longer term in the minority then they faced prior to 1994. Secondly, if the GOP is serious about reaching out to new voters, especially African-Americans and Hispanics, then it should look closely at the exit polls on issues important to families. Both minority groups strongly support traditional family values that embrace life and protect marriage, two things the Republican Party once stood for also. Under these circumstances, pro-family voters should reserve judgment about giving their financial support to either political party.

FRC might soon actually have a lot more say in these sorts of matters now that Ken Blackwell, one of its own Senior Fellows, is contemplating his own run for the chairmanship of the Republican National Committee.

The Hartford Courant raises some interesting questions about just what the Law Enforcement Legal Defense Fund - a right-wing Virginia non-profit organization overseen by the likes of Ed Meese, William Bradford Reynolds, and Al Regnery - is doing with the funds it has been raising because it seems like most of it is going to toward fund-raising, salary for its leadership, and to prop up right-wing organizations to which they have ties, like The American Spectator, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, and the Federalist Society :

Tens of thousands of Americans have contributed to the Law Enforcement Legal Defense Fund after reading letters like Stephanie Lawlor's. But while those donations total millions every year, the fund spends only pennies on the dollar directly assisting officers facing criminal charges, state and federal filings show.

Over the past five years, the charity collected more than $13 million, primarily through direct-mail pitches. But most of that money — more than $9 million — went right back to the professional fundraisers hired by the nonprofit legal defense fund.

Last year, for example, the group spent 81 cents on fundraising for every dollar collected, according to federal tax forms. After other expenses, the defense fund last year devoted only about 8 cents on the dollar to charitable grants, the tax forms show.

That grant money — about $275,000 — was less than the group's co-founders paid themselves in salary and benefits for the year. David H. Martin, a Washington lawyer who serves as chairman, collected $156,000, while Alfred Regnery, publisher of The American Spectator Magazine, received $81,000 for the part-time job of secretary-treasurer. In addition, the charity paid $54,000 into retirement accounts for Martin and Regnery.

In a telephone interview earlier this month, Martin said the charity is at the mercy of expensive mail solicitations. "It's hard to raise money through direct mail. Why? Because postage is so expensive," he said. "It's just a killer."

Martin said he believed the group's fundraising efficiency had consistently improved in recent years. But federal filings suggest just the opposite, showing the cost of raising money increasing each of the last five years, from about 60 cents in fundraising costs for every dollar raised in 2003, to 81 cents last year.

At the same time, administrative costs have soared, particularly for salaries and rent. For years, the legal defense fund was run out of Martin's law office. But the nonprofit now subleases space at Regnery's financially strapped American Spectator. The initial rent in 2003 was $9,000 a year, but the nonprofit agreed last year to increase its payments to $42,000 a year — about a third of the total rent for the American Spectator's space. Martin said the rent covers a large amount of storage space and offices for himself and a clerk, and he said he thought the rent was fair.

And even as the charity devoted only a small fraction of its budget to grants, not all of the money doled out went to help accused officers. Instead, the charity's executives have sent a sizable and growing amount of cash to a small number of universities and conservative policy groups not mentioned in their fundraising pitches.

The charity's biggest beneficiary last year, for example, was not a police officer, but the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, a national campus-based think tank that promotes "limited government, individual liberty, personal responsibility, the rule of law, market economy, and moral norms."

The Law Enforcement Legal Defense Fund sent $75,000 to the institute last year, part of at least $360,000 the defense fund has pledged. Regnery, secretary-treasurer of the defense fund, is chairman of the institute's board of trustees. The charity has also given tens of thousands of dollars to the Federalist Society, described by The American Conservative magazine as a "training ground for young conservative lawyers"; to the Law and Economics Center at George Mason University in Virginia, a leading center of conservative and libertarian legal studies; and to a project at McDaniel College — Martin's alma mater.