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May 20, 2008
Right Attacks California Marriage Ruling
Not surprisingly, the Right’s reaction to last week’s ruling by the California Supreme Court in favor of equal marriage rights for gays and lesbians was swift and negative.
Former Rep. Ernest Istook, now of the Heritage Foundation, evoked Nazi metaphors to blame those who supported civil unions as a compromise: “By trying to appease homosexual rights activists, those who have refused to stand up for traditional marriage helped to create this court ruling. They are the Neville Chamberlains of the cultural wars.”
Barrett Duke of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission said he was "saddened for the people of California" but "especially for the children of that state."
"The California Supreme Court ruling not only overruled the very clear will of the people, it also proposes to overrule God's design," Duke said. "These judges may think they know more about marriage than the rest of us, but I am confident they don't know more about marriage than God. Marriage is the union of one man and one woman. Children need that environment to give them their best chance to fulfill their great potential. That's not only my opinion and the opinion of most of the people in this country, it's God's opinion, and His opinion overrules the opinion of any judges.
Indeed, the Right emphasized this “activist judges” angle; Gary Bauer, attacking the “four unelected robed radicals,” wrote:
It was an egregious exercise in judicial activism – of judges wielding raw political power to redefine our most basic values. But that is how the Left has succeeded. It cannot achieve its goals through the democratic process via the elected legislatures, so it ignores the people and goes to the courts, where it relies on political activists cloaked in black who answer to no one. The Left succeeds by using the most undemocratic methods possible.
Of course, Bauer may not realize that, while appointed at first, justices on California’s Supreme Court face voters at the next general election; each of the justices in the majority for this case has been retained by voters at least once. Bauer is probably aware, though, that the “elected legislature” in California passed marriage equality in 2005 and 2007, only to have it vetoed both times by Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Nevertheless, right-wing activists hoped the decision would energize opponents of gay rights into action. “The good news is that I believe this will re-ignite the debate over a federal constitutional amendment,” according to Concerned Women for America’s Matt Barber. Jan LaRue called on Californians to recall members of the state’s Supreme Court in the way they recalled the governor several years ago. “Are you going to sit by and do nothing while four black-robed despots take away your right to govern yourselves?”
Meanwhile, the effort to put on a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage on the California ballot continues—now, apparently, with more funding.
And, in spite of a beleaguered GOP’s effort to keep a low profile on social wedge issues during this election cycle, the Right is hoping the decision will push John McCain to “speak out more strongly in support of defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman,” as Peter Sprigg of the Family Research Council put it.
Posted by Ezra at 12:21 PM | Permalink
November 28, 2007
Heritage/Cato Economist Comes to Defense of 'Ron Paul Dollars'
Fed raid earlier this month just "validates" big-government paranoia, writes Richard Rahn of FreedomWorks, Heritage Foundation, Cato Institute, and Discovery Institute.
Posted by Ezra at 10:22 AM | Permalink
September 14, 2007
Heritage Foundation Official: Bin Laden 'Aping' Democrats
Mike Franc, apparently forgeting Bin Laden's call for tax cuts. Meanwhile, Gary Bauer: "Victory is a values issue."
Posted by Ezra at 11:33 AM | Permalink
August 15, 2007
Right-Wing Think Tank Claims Credit for Immigration Crackdown
The White House, in an apparent attempt to mollify right-wing critics of comprehensive immigration reform, announced last week that it would sharply step immigration enforcement—and at least one group that attacked reform is taking credit for this latest move. Matthew Spaulding of the Heritage Foundation writes:
The Border Security and Immigration Administrative Reform initiative is smart and sensible and deserves to be commended. Virtually all of the policies within it have been proposed by The Heritage Foundation's policy research and analysis.
Posted by Ezra at 4:48 PM | Permalink
GOP Finally Getting Hip to Blogs?
The Washington Times reports that the Right and the GOP might have finally figured out that blogs and bloggers are valuable, noting that the Heritage Foundation's Robert Bluey has been hosting weekly "Conservative Bloggers Briefings" that have included people such as Robert Novak, Rick Santorum, and Newt Gingrich.
Posted by Kyle at 12:24 PM | Permalink
August 8, 2007
Right-Wing Coalition United against SCHIP (Mostly)
While the conservative movement coalition of the economic right and social right has shown some small cracks in the last year, one bill in Congress has them singing the same tune: a proposal to expand the coverage of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). The Religious Right is complaining that the bill defines “children” beginning with birth, rather than conception. According to Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, making “unborn children” ineligible to sign up for insurance “is a calculated move to open the door to federal taxpayer-funded abortions.” (FRC’s David Christiansen clarified: “The federal dollars wouldn't necessarily be used to do the abortion, but it's freeing up states to perform these other services, including abortion, with their own state money.”)
Meanwhile, National Right to Life Committee asserted that the bill would lead to Medicare “rationing” and thus “involuntary euthanasia.” “They have attacked the sanctity of life both at the beginning and the latter stages of life,” cried Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention, speaking of “the Democratic leadership” in Congress.
In addition, the Religious Right warns that the bill renews funding for abstinence education, but doesn’t restrict it to abstinence-only programs. “They’re simply giving states more money to fund Planned Parenthood and the programs that teach our children to have sex,” complained Linda Klepacki of Focus on the Family. “Comprehensive sex education will once again have a monopoly on your school systems.”
Meanwhile, economic-right activists are warning that expanding SCHIP is “a step towards socialism.” In this, they find welcome support from Perkins, who – despite his warnings about abortion – wrote that the “[m]ost important” aspect of the bill is that “its expansion represents a direct attack on private insurance, pushing Americans closer to what many Democratic leaders have long advocated--government-run, taxpayer-funded, universal health care, managed with the same efficiency and customer care as your local DMV.”
Both the Heritage Foundation and Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform have trashed the bill. But as Robert Novak reports, they are having some trouble on the details, arguing with each other over right-wing amendments offered by Republicans.
The 42 senators and 196 House members who have signed a no-tax-increase pledge received a stern warning Wednesday from Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform: If you vote for Amendment 2548 to the Democratic-sponsored expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), you will violate your solemn promise. However, Amendment 2548 is not the product of tax-and-spend liberals but of conservative lawmakers and policy experts.
Sen. Richard Burr, a first-term conservative Republican from North Carolina and principal sponsor of 2548, pulled it off the floor Thursday night as SCHIP expansion passed the Senate, 68 to 31. The conservative movement is split over Norquist's warning, with two right-wing think tanks at each other's throats. Sponsors of the Burr amendment are furious that they are being depicted as tax-increasers when they claim they are fighting a movement toward "socialized medicine" in America.
This disarray on the right is part of a broader conservative breakdown. SCHIP passage, with notable Republican support, means that the Democrats -- 12 years after the failure of "Hillary care" -- have figured out how to market a government-financed plan. The quarrel over the Burr amendment reflects not only a failed Republican reaction to big government but also a weakening of GOP resolve to hold down taxes.
Posted by Ezra at 10:15 AM | Permalink
June 18, 2007
Romney Names High-Profile Supporters to Religious-Right Committee
Mitt Romney has been aggressively courting the Religious Right for months, slowly recruiting supporters from among the cadre of full-time activists. Earlier this year he scored Pat Robertson’s superlawyer Jay Sekulow, along with Gary Marx of the Judicial Confirmation Network and James Bopp, a prominent anti-abortion attorney.
Last week Romney’s campaign announced the formation of its National Faith and Values Steering Committee, a list of 50 better- and lesser- known religious-right figures. Among the co-chairmen of the committee are Sekulow, Marx, Bopp, Matthew Spaulding of the Heritage Foundation, Barbara Comstock of the Susan B. Anthony List (an anti-abortion PAC), and Jack Templeton, head of the Templeton Foundation and Let Freedom Ring – suggesting the kind of “values” Romney hopes to be absorbing from this caucus.
Most newsworthy was the endorsement of Lou Sheldon, head of the Traditional Values Coalition and one of the most fervently anti-gay activists in the country. Nicknamed “Lucky Louie” by imprisoned lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who directed a gambling company to donate generously to TVC in exchange for support on legislation, Sheldon is the author of “The Agenda: The Homosexual Plan to Change America,” an agenda he describes as “an attack on everything our Founding Fathers hoped to give us,” consisting of Hitler-like propaganda designed to “recruit” children. “As Homosexuals continue to make inroads into public schools, more children will be molested and indoctrinated into the world of homosexuality. Many of them will die in that world,” he wrote in one “special report.”
"When I give my support for a candidate, I am giving the green light, if he wins, all the way down the line in terms of so many moral and social issues," Sheldon recently said. Sheldon joined other big-name religious-right leaders in a meeting with Romney last fall, and he recently met with the candidate for five hours, leaving with a promise that Romney would swear his oath of office on the Bible, not the Book of Mormon. “My thinking is that Mitt Romney is a person with the experience and with the Jude[o-]Christian moral values,” Sheldon told CBN’s David Brody, adding that he’d “been around Mormons long enough to know that … they are sincere about” Jesus.
Other religious-right activists on Romney’s committee include Christian Coalition board member Drew McKissic, Jay Sekulow’s son Jordan, anti-immigration writer James Edwards, and leaders or activists associated with the Alliance Defense Fund, Iowa Christian Alliance (formerly the Christian Coalition of Iowa), Heartbeat International, Legacy Law Foundation, and Citizens for Traditional Values.
Posted by Ezra at 5:00 PM | Permalink
May 10, 2007
Cosmopolitan Religious-Right Groups Travel to Europe to Fight Gay Marriage, Abortion
“[T]he cultural battle has gone international," declared Allan Carlson, president of the Illinois-based Howard Center for Family, Religion, and Society. "The American religious right, instead of being isolationist, has in fact gone global." Indeed, representatives from leading far-right groups – including American Family Association, Concerned Women For America, the Family Research Council, Focus on the Family, the Heritage Foundation and the Discovery Institute (advocate of “Intelligent Design” creationism) – are taking a field trip to Poland this weekend for the Howard Center’s fourth World Congress of Families.
The conference is centered around a “manifesto” co-authored by Carlson outlining his model of “the natural family,” described by Salon.com as a combination of encouraging mothers to stay at home and have many children and fervent opposition to gays and abortion:
"It is not enough to stop public recognition of 'gay marriage,' nor to oppose 'safe sex education' in the public schools, nor to ban partial birth abortion, nor to create optional 'covenant' marriages," it reads. "Victory for the natural family will come only as we change the terms of debate."
Joining the jet-setting religious-right activists is Assistant Secretary of State Ellen Sauerbrey, and as we noted, members of the European parliament are not happy with this apparent “official U.S. government stamp of approval [on the] extremist and intolerant views” likely to come together in the conference as it battles “the secularists” (in the Howard Center’s words) and a conspiracy of world governments (as a papal representative warned at a previous Congress of Families) that are pushing the continent to a “demographic winter.” "If Europe succumbs to the modern, post-family, secular worldview completely, it's like losing a great ally in a global contest," warned Carlson.
The Right has also found a new hero in the conservative Polish government, which recently proposed firing teachers accused of promoting “homosexual culture” in schools. The Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute is circulating a petition in advance of the conference commending Poland’s fight against the “radical homosexual movement.” Poland’s president will be speaking at the World Congress of Families.
The pro-choice website RH Reality Check will be covering the conference from Poland; you can find their posts here.
Posted by Ezra at 5:28 PM | Permalink
April 18, 2007
Right-Wing Reaction to Don Imus
Some on the Right voiced criticism of radio host Don Imus, whose slur against the Rutgers women’s basketball team led to his firing from CBS radio and MSNBC. Jerry Falwell, who was frequently mocked on the show, called Imus’s comments “the most demeaning thing possible.” “He has built his career on saying outrageous, indecent, racist, even blasphemous things,” wrote Tom Minnery of Focus on the Family, adding that Imus also targeted Focus founder Dobson. Michael Steele, the former Senate candidate and new chairman of Newt Gingrich’s GOPAC, said Imus should be fired and criticized John McCain for supporting the talker.
But many right-wing commentators defended Imus or used the controversy to push their own agendas. Quite a few decided to attack Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton as “race hucksters” (columnist David Limbaugh) or “nappy-headed demagogues” (Yale Kramer for the American Spectator). Mychal Massie, a spokesman for the right-wing Project 21, described the firing of Imus as a “lynching” and accused Jackson, Sharpton, and other Imus critics as “race-baiters” who “are today fomenting unrest and belching racial bile.”
Others used the opportunity to change the subject to their own issues and suggested that Imus critics are hypocritical for not making the same connections. John Berlau of the Competitive Enterprise Institute charged that “Imus’s insensitive remarks pale especially in comparison to disparaging comments and cruel recommendations made time and again by leaders of environmental groups.” Alveda King, director of African-American outreach for Frank Pavone’s Priests for Life and a frequent religious-right speaker, declared in a press release, “Yes, Don Imus's apologies are necessary. But I demand the same from every public figure who has ever said that babies in the womb are not persons.”
And a few commentators and activists have suggested that critics of Imus are ignoring “anti-Christian” references in the media. Catholic League President Bill Donohue complained about the lack of interest in his campaign against a Manhattan boutique hotel’s display of a “chocolate Jesus” sculpture and concluded, “In other words, Catholic bashing is humorous and an exercise in liberty. Racism is awful. Bigotry, then, is neither good nor bad—it just depends who the target is.” Syndicated columnist Cal Thomas also decried a supposed “double standard”:
Why aren't these keepers of the First Amendment flame coming to the defense of Don Imus? It's because they have a double standard. Evangelical Christians, practicing Roman Catholics, politically conservative Republicans, home-schoolers and others not in favor among the liberal elite are frequent targets for the left. Anything may be said about them, and frequently is. But if someone insults the left's "protected classes," be they African-Americans, homosexuals or to a lesser extent, adherents to the religion of "global warming," they must be silenced and punished.
According to former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, “The message of the ongoing Imus scandal is simple: verbal offenses against anyone other than conservatives or Christians or Jews, will be treated as crimes, and Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton are the judge and jury.” And Star Parker, author of “Uncle Sam’s Plantation,” warned that Congress is considering extending violent-hate-crimes protections to gays and wrote, “With the passage of this so-called hate-crime bill, pastors will be intimidated to condemn homosexual behavior from their pulpits. Is this the freedom we want?”
Finally, a few right-wing commentators tried to make Imus a symbol of white-male victimhood. MSNBC’s Pat Buchanan decried the “Imus Lynch Party,” writing, “The issue here is not the word Imus used. The issue is who Imus is -- a white man, who used a term about black women only black folks are permitted to use with impunity and immunity.” In a Human Events column, Mac Johnson declared that “Apologizing to Al Sharpton Was Imus’s True Racist Act” and speculated,
Now think about how stupid and racist all this is. Were Chris Rock, in the heat of a comedic diatribe, to call someone, say, a “limp-haired slut” what would he do next? Would he ask to go on David Duke’s radio show so that Duke could accept an apology on behalf of all “white people” and then issue a suitable penance? (“Donate to my charity, Chris! You don’t look sorry enough yet.”) Somehow, I don’t think so.
And Rebecca Hagelin, vice president of the Heritage Foundation, attacked “the tentacles of radical feminist thought” that she claims are “poisoning the image” of white males through the media and Title IX sports programs. “The white, Anglo-Saxon male, the young teenage guy, is probably the most discriminated against kid on the face of the earth right now,” she declared on “The O’Reilly Factor.”
See comments on the Imus controversy by People For the American Way Foundation staff and by founder Norman Lear here.
Posted by Ezra at 8:50 AM | Permalink
March 19, 2007
'The Natural Family As The Springtime of Nations'
“Pro-family” conference starring CWA, FRC, Heritage.
Posted by Ezra at 11:59 PM | Permalink
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