The liberal media just eat it up when a sin movement (in this case, organized homosexuality) officially goes “bipartisan.” Check out this excerpt from (the giddy) The Atlantic. I suspect that The Atlantic’s (and CBS News’) Marc Ambinder — while sympathetic to the Stupid Republican Party’s current pro-homosexuality tack — wouldn’t agree with our description of homosexuality as sinful. Just a hunch, though. — Peter LaBarbera, www.aftah.org

P.S. I just learned that a group of carefully-selected, right-leaning theologians are working on a version of the Bible (RSV – Republican Standard Version) that reinterprets all passages dealing with homosexuality so that only Democratic same-sex erotic behavior is proscribed. Whew. For a moment there, I thought these Republicans had decided that they were smarter than God.

Ambinder writes (emphasis added):

Top GOP Party Strategists Attending Log Cabin Event

Suddenly, it’s becoming less of a stigma for bigwigs to associate with gays in the Republican Party. Not only has former RNC chairman Ken Mehlman’s 9/22 fundraiser for gay marriage rights attracted numerous high-octane Republican donors and activists, but Sen. John Cornyn, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, and Rep. Pete Sessions, the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee will help the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay GOP group, raise money for its political action committee. (Part of this story was first reported last month.)

A glossy pamphlet advertising the Log Cabin Republicans’ national dinner at the Capitol Hill Club highlights an hour-long cocktail gathering with the two party committee chairs, both strong opponents of gay rights. But their attendance will add to the coffers of the LCR’s political action committee, which endorses Republicans who support gay rights.

The LCR national dinner, which follows the private fundraiser, will include Sessions, Rep. Judy Biggert, Rep. Anh “Joseph” Cao, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform. The Daily Caller’s Tucker Carlson will serve as Master of Ceremonies.

The Log Cabin Republicans’ Mission Statement proclaims fidelity to conservative principles like a “strong national defense” and “limited government” before it discusses marriage rights and an “inclusive definition of the family.” But in practice, the group does not endorse candidates who oppose gay rights…. [continued HERE]

Read the rest of The Atlantic article HERE.

Ken Mehlman

TAKE ACTION: If you are a Republican, call or write the RNC (info@gop.com or call 202-863-8500) and tell them that you oppose the promotion of homosexuality and that you will not give to the party if it continues to do so. If you are a Democrat, urge your party here and encourage your representatives to stop supporting President Obama’s agenda of homosexualizing the U.S. miliary and overturning the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).

By Peter LaBarbera

The Republican Party has a big and growing  ”gay” problem. It is slowly going pro-homosexual even as GOP leaders continue to advertise theirs as the party of “family values.” Just one more reason why so many grassroots conservatives who regularly vote Republican call the GOP “The Stupid Party.”

The latest GOP hypocrisy: Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairman Michael Steele’s congratulatory words for former RNC chief Ken Mehlman, who has confirmed longstanding rumors that he (Mehlman) is a practicing homosexual.

The Washington Post reports that Steele said this about Mehlman’s “coming out”:

‘I am happy for Ken,’ Steele said. ‘His announcement, often a very difficult decision which is only compounded when done on the public stage, reaffirms for me why we are friends and why I respect him personally and professionally.’”

RNC Chairman Michael Steele

Why couldn’t Mr. Steele just have kept quiet about this tragic revelation by which another sexually confused man seeks to rationalize his misbehavior (sin) by declaring homosexuality part of his inherent being? Nope, instead, like a three-year-old boy approaching a puddle, Steele just had to step in it. Pro-family writer Laurie Higgins of Illinois Family Institute observed:

So, Steele is “happy” that Mehlman is homosexual and/or happy that he is public about it? Why would he be happy for a friend embracing immoral and dangerous practices or for a friend being public about his embrace of immorality? And why does he respect him for his “difficult” decision to announce his immorality publicly? What fecklessness or cowardice Steele’s comment demonstrates. And this from the leader of the Republican Party…

Now let’s examine whether Mehlman deserves our respect, per Steele’s comments. In a piece highly sympathetic to the former RNC boss (the media largely view homosexual identification as a good thing detached from moral considerations), Atlantic Monthly reports:

Privately, in off-the-record conversations with this reporter over the years, Mehlman voiced support for civil unions and told of how, in private discussions with senior Republican officials, he beat back efforts to attack same-sex marriage. He insisted, too, that President Bush “was no homophobe.”

So, we learn that Mehlman used his tremendous influence within the Republican Party to undermine the GOP’s clear platform language in support of preserving traditional marriage. All the while rank-and-file Republican Joe’s and Jane’s were assuming that the RNC leader was standing up for marriage between a man and a woman. Mr. Mehlman has just proved: 1) why homosexual activism should be kept out of the Republican Party, since it undermines core conservative values supported overwhelmingly by the GOP grassroots; and 2) why secret homosexuals working within the GOP against the Republican platform should be exposed.

Atlantic Monthy — which calls Mehlman “the most powerful Republican in history to identify as gay” — tips its hat to homosexual “outing” activist Mike Rogers by pointing out that Rogers previously had sought to “out” Mehlman:

Mehlman, who has never married, long found his sexuality subject to rumor and innuendo. He was the subject of an outing campaign by gay rights activist Mike Rogers, starting when Mehlman was Bush’s campaign manager. Rogers’s crusades against closeted gay Republicans split the organized gay lobby in Washington but were undoubtedly effective: he drove several elected officials, including Virginia Rep. Ed Shrock, from office, pushed out a would-be presidential campaign manager for George Allen well before Allen was set to run, slung rumors about Sen. Larry Craig’s sexual orientation well before Craig’s incident in a Minneapolis airport bathroom, and even managed to make homosexuality a wedge issue within the party’s activist circles.

Indeed, the former Republican chief is just one of several political VIPs whose homosexuality Rogers correctly exposed — giving added credence to Rogers’ accusations against his latest target, Illinois Republican and U.S. Senate hopeful Rep. Mark Kirk. Here is a piece in Chicago’s HillBuzz blog — run by homosexuals — that claims that both Kirk and Illinois Rep. Aaron Schock (R-Peoria) are homosexuals. (Both Kirk and Schock have denied that they are homosexuals.)

Homosexuals have the complete freedom to compete in the battle for control of the Republican Party, but they shouldn’t do so in secret. Republicans deserved a party chairman who was really working to defend tradtional marriage, not a fake conservative like Mehlman who, as a covert “gay” activist, was actually working to undermine it. Too bad Steele couldn’t find words to address that aspect of the Mehlman story instead of acting like the embrace of homosexuality is a swell thing.

For his part, Mehlman plans to continue advocating for the acceptance of homosexuality in GOP circles — and even orchestrated his public “coming out” to advance the cause of homosexual “marriage”:

Once he realized that the news would probably leak, he assembled a team of former advisers to help him figure out the best way to harness the publicity generated by the disclosure for the cause of marriage rights.

“What I will try to do is to persuade people, when I have conversations with them, that it is consistent with our party’s philosophy, whether it’s the principle of individual freedom, or limited government, or encouraging adults who love each other and who want to make a lifelong committment to each other to get married,” Mehlman told Atlantic Monthly. “I hope that we, as a party, would welcome gay and lesbian supporters. I also think there needs to be, in the gay community, robust and bipartisan support [for] marriage rights.”

Sadly — just as Mehlman seems to ignore the loss of ”individual freedom” that comes with State-enforced pro-homosexual laws – many libertarians within the Party will ally with Mehlman in attempting to redefine the Republican brand to accommodate a post-Christian sexual ethos and homosexual activism in the name of “liberty.”

Needless to say, Atlantic Monthly reporter Marc Ambinder does not dwell on how GOP conservatives will react to Mehlman’s behind-the-scenes treachery on same-sex “marriage,” but rather focuses on how Mehlman’s “outing” and past actions will be judged by homosexual advocates.

“And in DC, Kirk wasn’t all THAT closeted. You see Mark Kirk told me he was gay.”

*          *          *

“In an effort to move the base in the Illinois Senate race, Kirk decided to tack right and that means throwing the gays (like him) under the bus. And once he voted that way [against the repeal of the ban on homosexuals-in-the-military], the phone began to ring. Not one or two, or three but 5 separate individuals contacted me about the now divorced Mr. Kirk.” – Homosexual “outing” activist Michael Rogers, “Truth or Consequences”

Homosexual blogger Mike Rogers "outed" Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Illinois; pictured above) as a homosexual after Kirk voted against the repeal of the ban on homosexuals in the military. Rogers says that Kirk once told him he was "gay."

By Peter LaBarbera

The following is a post by homosexual “outing” activist Michael Rogers, reprinted from his “Blogactive” website. (It was picked by the left-wing Huffington Post.) Note Rogers’ pro-”gay” standard for political “outing” (publicizing a person’s alleged homosexuality): as long as the presumably homosexual legislator helps the “gay” activist movement, he is left alone. But when he — like Rep. Mark Kirk (R-IL) — votes the “wrong” way on a high-profile piece of legislation important to the Homosexual Lobby,well, as Rogers puts it, “the gig is up.” (Note below that Kirk has very high pro-gay scorecard ratings for a Republican, as measured by the nation’s leading homosexual organization.)

In this case, Kirk voted AGAINST the repeal of the military’s ban on homosexuals, thus igniting a new round of online homosexual wrath that could affect his bid to win the U.S. Senate seat once held by Barack Obama. (In the GOP Illinois Senate primary, long-shot candidate Andy Martin ran radio ads statewide targeting Kirk for his alleged homosexuality.)

I have written before about Rogers, who has taken “outing” activism to a new level. Note how Rogers and his followers take credit for the pro-ENDA (Employment Non-Discrimination Act) vote switch by “conservative” Republican Rep. David Dreier (CA). (Dreier’s alleged homosexuality was reported by the liberal alternative press–i.e., beyond just the gay press; two Dreier staffers separately hung up on this writer inquiring about his sexual preference, as one reportedly did to this L.A. Weekly reporter coming at the issue from an opposite perspective.)

Folks, this is serious business: if secretly homosexual politicians are subject to pro-”gay”-agenda voting pressure by the likes of Rogers, their constituents (and the wider public) certainly have a right to know — just as they have the right to know if a “pro-family” legislator is mocking those values through the act of adultery. This is why Americans For Truth refuses to play the “outing game” by “gay”/liberal activist rules, which are mainly designed to embarrass hypocritical, conservative Republicans.

Here is the liberal rationale for outing as provided by L.A. Weekly writer Doug Ireland (emphasis his):

I have always taken the view that outing a gay person should be approached with caution, and that in doing so one should strictly adhere to the Barney Frank Rule. As articulated by the openly gay Massachusetts congressman during another anti-gay GOP witch-hunt over a decade ago, when Frank threatened to out a number of gay-baiting Republican fellow congressmen, the rule insists that outing is only acceptable when a person uses their power or notoriety to hurt gay people.

This homosexuality-affirming rationale enjoys increasing though not yet widespread respect in the “mainstream” media, which often shills for the GLBT agenda. To the contrary, AFTAH supports exposing (“outing”) covert homosexuals who either:

1. are using their position of power to advance the pro-homosexuality agenda –  a mission more effectively accomplished by stealth because it masks the obvious conflict-of-interest that being open about their homosexuality would present (CNN reporter Anderson Cooper, who is reported to be homosexual by OUT magazine and other “gay” media, would fall into this category); or
2. threaten to undermine pro-family public policy goals through being targeted by the brand of “queer extortion” employed by Rogers (e.g., case of Rep. David Dreier); or
3. are “living a lie” by practicing behavior that flouts either the traditional values of their own constituents or the pro-family platform that the politician publicly espouses. (Note the similarity of this criterion to exposing heterosexual philandering pols who are publicly pro-family.)

When — as in years preceding the Mark Foley scandal — talk of the VIP’s reported homosexuality becomes so widespread that it demands clarification, AFTAH and this writer ask politicians, potential judges and VIP media members the “Homosexual Question.” Deeply-held private biases affect public policy, so the voting public has a right to know those biases, especially when they are the target of hard-ball pressure politics. Of course, Michael Rogers — who queried this writer on the same question — comes at it from the opposite perspective. The following is reprinted from Rogers’ “Blogactive” website:

Truth or Consequences

Blogactive, by Michael Rogers, June 1, 2010

If you’ve been around long enough, you’ll remember the original television game show Truth or Consequences. (For those around longer, it was preceded by a radio show of the same name and format.) It was rather simple, answer a question correctly or “suffer” the consequences. In this case, consequence meant the performance of “usually a zany and embarrassing stunt.” I use the term “suffer” lightly, as most contestants tried to give the wrong answer just so they could perform the assigned punishment activity.

The same game exists in politics. In DC, the format is a bit different. Instead of a handful of players each week, this version has 535 contestants: 435 in the House, the remainder in the Senate. And, sometimes, you have to wonder if these guys are purposefully getting the answer wrong just so they get to perform the stunt. In this case the punishment is unwanted and is usually an appearance before a camera, humiliation of his wife, and blaming the whole damned thing on the environment in DC while invoking god. Wouldn’t it have been simple enough To Tell the Truth? (Oh, wait, that’s a different game show.)

In many cases, players decide not to play the Capitol’s version of the game, and that’s just fine. If someone doesn’t get up and get the first part wrong, they never face part 2.

Sometimes it’s not so simple.

Why report on Mark Kirk (R-IL)? Why now?

Until now, Mark Kirk elected not to play the typical Washington game. Instead of supporting his party’s dismal record on gay rights, Kirk received Human Rights Campaign ratings of 67% in 2002, 88% in 2004, 76% in 2006 and 85% in 2008. That’s more impressive than a lot of Democrats. I even let Kirk slide by when he didn’t co-sponsor earlier legislation relating to the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. My thoughts then were that he wasn’t THAT bad on gay stuff and that the bill was going nowhere anyway.

Times have changed. Now, for the first time in his congressional career, Mark Kirk really had the chance to stand up and do what is right with the power of a vote. When I heard that five GOPers voted to lift the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell ban I instinctively thought Kirk would be one of them. What a disappointment when he wasn’t. The five were: Judy Biggert (R-IL), Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), Ron Paul (R-TX), Joseph Cao (R-LA), and Charles Djou, (R-HI).

“Where was Mark Kirk?” I wondered. I left a messages at both the campaign and DC offices of the Representative who wants to be Senator. No one responded. Shocker.

In an effort to move the base in the Illinois Senate race, Kirk decided to tack right and that means throwing the gays (like him) under the bus. And once he voted that way, the phone began to ring. Not one or two, or three but 5 separate individuals contacted me about the now divorced Mr. Kirk. (Mr. and Mrs. Kirk were married from 2001 to 2009, the marriage produced no children.)

Within hours of the DADT repeal vote I was contacted by two people who knew Kirk from his college days.

“In law school in DC everyone knew Mark was gay,” the first source told me. I explained that the information was intriguing, it would not be enough to go on. He continued, “But I had sex with him a number of times.” Well, now we’re onto something I thought. “Could someone verify for me that you knew Kirk and went to school with him?” I asked. “Yes” was the swift reply. “Could you recall personal details about Kirk that others may not know?” “Yes,” he said.

And he did.

The next source claimed to have gone to undergraduate school with Kirk. I asked for proof that he and Kirk were in school together and once that was shared with me, I met with the source. The source introduced me to a man who had also been friends with Kirk in college. They both shared with me their interactions with Kirk, including one sexual in nature. The source who claimed to have sex with Kirk described personal details about the House, um, er, “member.” The description was the same as the first source.

And in DC, Kirk wasn’t all THAT closeted. You see Mark Kirk told me he was gay. Before I had BlogActive, I had a life in Washington. As a fundraiser I raised major gifts from $5,000 to over $1,000,000… You don’t do that kind of work at a keyboard, you do it at events attended by people with money. The movers and shakers and their friends.

It was early 2004 when I was at a social gathering on Capitol Hill. I’m guessing there were 35-40 people present, including the guy who brought me as his guest. While the party was no means a “gay” party, I’d guess that of the men at least 75% were overtly gay. The others present were either straight men or their women friends.

It was at that party that I met Mark Kirk. I was introduced to him by the person I came with and at the time did not realize he was a member of the House. As my friend walked away, Kirk asked me if the man who introduced us was “single or attached.” When I said that he had a partner, Kirk replied disappointingly, “oh, well.” At the end of that interaction I walked away and didn’t think much of it at the time.

Then Kirk became a hypocrite. Kirk voted against repealing Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, despite his being a closeted gay man in the military. As a Commander in the Navy Reserves Kirk has voted to keep a policy that if he were investigated under he would be tossed.

Recently we learned that it’s not just his being a closeted gay man that Kirk lies about; he has a habit of making up awards supposedly given to him by the Navy.

Nice try, Mark. The gig is up.

__________________________________

Related articles:

“NBC: The guy trying to out Mark Kirk also outed Mark Foley, Larry Craig” (Republican News Watch)

“Gay community pushes Mark Kirk out of the closet” (Republican News Watch)

“Mark Kirk outed by filmmaker Mike Rogers — just as we told you this would happen. Waiting for response from Fran Eaton and Illinois Review.” (HillBuzz blog)

Charlene Cothran of TheEvidenceMinistry.org can never become "ex-Black," but she is thriving as a former lesbian. Cothran lived 29 years as a lesbian and "gay" leader before accepting Jesus Christ and leaving the lifestyle. If RNC Chairman Michael Steele were to take the time to meet people like Charlene, he might retract his unfortunate comparison of homosexuality to race.

TAKE ACTION: 1) Call or write Michael Steele at the RNC and urge him to meet with former homosexuals like Charlene Cothran (right), per PFOX’s press release below). Write chairman@gop.org or call 202-863-8500; and 2) Read this web alert by the radical homosexual group GLAAD targeting ex-”gay” Richard Cohen and use the contact information provided to urge CNN (404-827-1500) to continue featuring ex-gays and critics of homosexuality every time they feature a “gay” activist on their network. How can the ‘Gay’ Lobby talk about “diversity” when they are orchestrating campaigns designed to censor former homosexuals?

____________________________________________

Michael Steele, meet Charlene Cothran. As a former lesbian and one-time leading homosexual activist who now ministers to others seeking to leave that destructive and sinful lifestyle, Charlene might disabuse you of the notion that homosexuality is like race (see PFOX release below).

I recently had the opportunity to present at a Florida church alongside Charlene, who spoke at AFTAH’s 2007 banquet. She is now four years out of the homosexual lifestyle and has a powerful testimony of transformation through Jesus Christ. (Incidentally, Charlene is not a big fan of “Reparative Therapy” and relies on obedience to the Word of God as the primary instrument of change.)

Mr. Steele, you will never meet an “ex-African American” or a “former Latino,” but you can easily get to know some former self-identified “gays” — and you should, to put the issue of homosexual behavior in its proper perspective.

What the homosexual “Log Cabin Republicans” and “GOP Proud” activists want from you and from the Republican Party is to be treated as a legitimate “minority” — even though the purpose of their organizations is to build acceptance for immoral behavior and an illegitimate lifestyle choice. Strangely, if people practicing homosexuality comprise a “minority,” then it is one whose numbers shrink at the expense of another “minority”: ex-homosexuals. The same cannot be said of Blacks, Latinos, or any other real minority.

(And please do not equate deviant-sex-affiliation or homosexual practice with religion as some kind of behavior-based “minority” deserving rights; America was built on refugees from other, oppressive lands seeking religious freedom — so religious liberty is sacrosanct here. Moreover, from the beginning our Judeo-Christian-based legal system proscribed sodomy, so how can it be a “constitutional right”?)

RNC Chairman Michael Steele

P.S. Memo to GLAAD, Wayne Besen, Ex-Gay-Watch, Tim Kincaid, Warren Throckmorton (the “gay” bloggers’ favorite Christian professor, it seems), and the rest of the gang at “Focus on the Failures” — my term for those who regularly cast doubt on the ability of People Practicing Homosexuality to experience profound lifestyle change: you might want to examine Charlene Cothran’s website. She is over lesbianism, she’s not looking back and she is helping many others find freedom in Christ! (Ironically, Besen actually wrote an article attacking ex-gays for Cothran’s magazine, Venus, back when it was devoted to affirming homosexuality among African Americans.)  Check out her 2007 speech at AFTAH HERE and her website HERE. — Peter LaBarbera, www.aftah.org

____________________________________

Our friends at PFOX (Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays) write:

RNC Pays for Lesbian Erotica While Refusing to Meet with Ex-Gays

Contact: Christopher Doyle, Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays & Gays (PFOX) at PFOX@pfox.org

[Note from AFTAH President Peter LaBarbera: Please support PFOX with your tax-deductible donations; dollar for dollar, this is one of the most effective pro-family groups on the planet; sometimes it seems as they get more done with their tiny budget to challenge the GLBT juggernaut than gigantic pro-family organizations; go to http://pfox.org/donate.html and make your gift today!]

Washington D.C. — “Michael Steele, chair of the Republican National Committee, has consistently refused to meet with members of the ex-gay community,” said Greg Quinlan of Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays & Gays (PFOX).  “Now we know why. The RNC would rather use donor funds for its staff to watch lesbian erotica at nightclubs than help support individuals who wish to leave homosexuality.”

In last year’s interview with Gentleman’s Quarterly magazine, Steele compared being homosexual to being Black, and was quoted as doubting that ex-gays exist.  PFOX offered to meet with Steele on numerous occasions to show him that ex-gays do exist and explain the process of individual change.  To date, Steele has refused to meet with members of the ex-gay community, including African-American former homosexuals.  In the past, ex-gays have met with Ed Gillespie, one of Steele’s predecessors.

“It’s no wonder the RNC continues to lose factions of its members, such as Tea Party conservatives,” said Christopher Doyle, a former homosexual and PFOX board member.  “Michael Steele would be better off if he extended ex-gays a place at the table rather than paying his staff to watch lesbians dance on it at strip clubs.”

###

Remember to read the PFOX blog regularly for ex-gay views and news. See http://pfox-exgays.blogspot.com/

Tom Minnery of Focus on the Family

With the upcoming Supreme Court vacancy, the question of homosexual judges is back in the news. Monday, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) said he could accept a nominee who is openly homosexual to replace retiring Justice John Paul Stevens. On March 24, well before the announcement of Stevens’ retirement, AFTAH received this statement from Tom Minnery, Vice President of Public Policy at Focus on the Family. Minnery emphasized that the Focus clarification has been available to anyone who inquired about the controversial statements made last year by a Focus analyst to The Plum Line.

“This is not a new statement,” Minnery told AFTAH. “And we were quick to correct this mistake.”

The following is the clarification by Tom Minnery of Focus on the Family:

“It has been reported that we would not oppose any U.S. Supreme Court nominee over their ’sexual orientation.’ Our Judicial Analyst [Bruce Hausknecht] made a statement to this effect in an interview with The Plum Line. To be honest, this is one of those conversations we’d like to ‘do over.’ We can assure you that we recognize that homosexual behavior is a sin and does not reflect God’s created intent and desire for humanity. Further, we at Focus do affirm that character and moral rectitude should be key considerations in appointing members of the judiciary, especially in the case of the highest court in the land. Sexual behavior–be it heterosexual or homosexual–certainly lies at the heart of personal morality.”

_______________________

Related Articles:

The Hill [Monday, April 12]: “[Sen.] Cornyn: Openly gay SCOTUS nominee might be acceptable”

By J. Taylor Rushing  -  04/12/10 06:59 PM ET

An openly gay nominee to the vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court might be acceptable, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Monday.

Cornyn, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, called on President Barack Obama to make a measured choice in filling the pending Supreme Court vacancy.

Cornyn, a former Texas Supreme Court justice, was initially reluctant when asked if he would support an openly gay nominee — as Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), the Judiciary Committee’s ranking Republican, said last year he might.

“I’d have to think about that,” he said. “As long as it doesn’t interfere with their job, it’s not a particular issue.”

AFTAH: “Flashback:  Gary Glenn Assails Focus on the Family’s ‘Moral Retreat’ on Openly Homosexual Judges”

The Plum Line: Top Religious Right Group: We Won’t Oppose Gay SCOTUS Pick

In a move that will surprise gay activists and liberals, a spokesperson for Focus on the Family, a top religious right group, tells me that his organization has no problem with GOP Senator  Jeff Sessions‘ claim today that he’s open to a Supreme Court nominee with “gay tendencies.”

The spokesperson confirms the group won’t oppose a gay SCOTUS nominee over sexual orientation….

AFA’s OneNewsNow: “Should homosexuality be a ‘litmus test’ for high court?”

Ashley Horne, federal policy analyst at Focus [on the Family], says just like a nominee’s ethnicity and life experience, homosexuality should not be a litmus test.

“Someone’s sexual orientation or their preferences, none of these things should come into consideration when we’re talking about evaluating someone who will make decisions based on precedent under the law [and who will] practice judicial restraint,” Horne explains. “Those are the things we look at for whether or not someone would make a fit justice on the Supreme Court.”

Gary Glenn, president of the American Family Association of Michigan, contends the position held by Focus on the Family is the equivalent of “moral retreat.”

“It’s not just the damage caused by Focus on the Family’s moral retreat on the issue,” Glenn argues. “[That explanation] will be used by homosexual activists and their allies in the media to further marginalize and delegitimize any pro-family organization that continues to take a biblical standard.” ….

Politico.com: “[Sen.] Sessions Could Support Gay Justice”

P.S. It says a lot about the left-wing ninnies over at Media Matters that they thought this video would embarrass the Right; we used their Youtube because the quality was better than the others:

TAKE ACTION: Call or write CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference) Chairman David Keene of the American Conservative Union (703-836-8602, ext. 19) and urge him to keep social liberals from corrupting CPAC’s conservative message. E-mail: cpac@conservative.org. Urge Keene to drop GOProud as a CPAC co-sponsor because GOProud supports the same radical homosexualist agenda as other GLBT organizations — which is corrupting children and tearing apart America’s moral fiber.

'One of these groups doesn't belong': the homosexual activist group GOProud joins truly conservative organizations co-sponsoring the annual CPAC conference. Matt Barber of Liberty Counsel is leading a pullout of CPAC by social conservative groups unless GOProud is removed as a co-sponsor.

[Note: since publication of this article we have published a letter to AFTAH clarifying that GOProud does NOT support "hate crimes" laws, as most other homosexual groups do. -- Editor]

By Peter LaBarbera

Folks, for years religious conservatives have been complaining about getting  the short end of the stick from CPAC, the annual Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C. There is usually only a token panel or two dealing with “Culture War” social issues like abortion and homosexuality (and rarely one explicitly on fighting the “gay” agenda) – as organizers seek to appease the CPAC libertarians, some of whom support goals like homosexual “marriage” that are anathema to socially conservatives.

Now CPAC’s tenuous ”Big Tent” could collapse altogether as social conservatives led by Liberty Counsel’s Matt Barber threaten to launch a boycott of the conference (scheduled for Feb. 18-20, 2010) unless CPAC drops a homosexual activist group, GOProud, as a co-sponsor. Barber, my good friend, an AFTAH Board Member, and the Director of Cultural Affairs at Liberty Counsel, is leading the charge to keep the CPAC sponsorship list … conservative.

GOProud describes itself as “the only national organization for gay conservatives and their allies,” but we at AFTAH dispute their definition of “conservative,” which would have the movement’s Founding Fathers, like Russell Kirk (see quotation at bottom), rolling over in their graves.

Matt Barber, author of The Right Hook: From the Ring to the Culture War (www.righthookbook.com)

I received an email sent by Barber to conservatives nationwide in which he wrote:

“I was disturbed to learn that CPAC is allowing the ‘Republican’ homosexual activist group GOProud to sponsor a booth at the 2010 conference. Among other things, GOProud advocates in favor of both ‘gay marriage’ and ‘civil unions,’ against pro-marriage constitutional amendments ; is pushing for the repeal of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,’ and advocates in favor of federal ‘partnership benefits’ for homosexuals. This group is pushing a radical leftist agenda that is an affront to the GOP platform, conservatism and, most importantly, the Word of God.”

In other words, GOProud is just another “gay” activist group, with a twist: the rest of its agenda (outside its pro-homosexual special interest) is conservative.

Barber is committed to leading a social conservative pullout of a pro-homosexuality CPAC, and AFTAH has learned that a number of leading pro-family organizations have already hinted that they will heed his call if CPAC retains GOProud as a co-sponsor.

TAKE ACTION: Call or write CPAC Chairman David Keene of the American Conservative Union (703-836-8602, ext. 19) and urge him to keep social liberals from corrupting CPAC’s conservative message. Urge Keene to drop GOProud as a CPAC co-sponsor because GOProud supports the same radical homosexualist agenda as other GLBT organizations — which is corrupting children and tearing apart America’s moral fiber.

What is conservatism?

It boils down to this: there is nothing “conservative” about — as Barber inimitably puts it — “one man violently cramming his penis into another man’s lower intestine and calling it ‘love.’” Or two women awkwardly mimicking natural procreative relations or raising a child together in an intentionally fatherless home. This does not mean that people practicing those and other immoral (and changeable) behaviors cannot think and act conservatively on other issues like lowering taxes, cutting government spending, ending abortion, etc. But let’s be honest: the “proud” in GOProud is not about pride in opposing the death tax, or defending the right to bear arms; it’s about proudly embracing sinful homosexual behavior – and that is hardly a conservative value.

I challenge every thinking conservative to explain why we should jettison our nation’s Judeo-Christian heritage (which clearly rejects homosexual acts as immoral) for some new, secularized brand of “conservatism” that fails to conserve natural, normal, and noble sex within God-ordained marriage. Where does the expansion of “conservatism” stop? Would CPAC welcome “Republicans for Abortion” as a co-sponsor? How about “Conservatives For Higher Taxes”? We doubt it. So let’s stop the double-standard on one issue — homosexuality — that happens to be politically incorrect in this decadent age.

Libertarians for a Big Gay Government?

And for you protesting libertarians who attend CPAC: please tell me what part of the statist Big Gay Government agenda you support: the part that expands newfangled federal “rights” based on aberrant-sex and -gender preferences — at the expense of Americans’ historic religious and First Amendment freedoms? The part that redefines criminal prosecution to factor in people’s thoughts (“hate crimes”)? The part that forces men and women in the U.S. Armed Forces to bunk and shower with people who define themselves by their sexual attractiom toward those of the same sex — thus sublimating straight soldiers’ and sailors’ privacy concerns to the demands of activist homosexuals? Or could it be the part that uses taxpayer-funded public schools to indoctrinate innocent, impressionable children in one side of the homosexuality debate?

We’re all ears.

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“A society in which men and women are governed by belief in an enduring moral order, by a strong sense of right and wrong, by personal convictions about justice and honor, will be a good society—whatever political machinery it may utilize; while a society in which men and women are morally adrift, ignorant of norms, and intent chiefly upon gratification of appetites, will be a bad society—no matter how many people vote and no matter how liberal its formal constitution may be.”
–Russell Kirk, historian, essayist, author, among many other books, The Conservative Mind: from Burke to Eliot

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The following item was posted on GOProud’s website Dec. 8:

GOProud to Cosponsor CPAC 2010

Jimmy LaSalvia, Executive Director – “GOProud is thrilled to be a cosponsor of the single most important conservative gathering in the country.”

(Washington, DC) Today, GOProud, the only national organization for gay conservatives and their allies, announced they are a cosponsor of CPAC 2010. Jimmy LaSalvia, GOProud’s Executive Director, said, “GOProud is thrilled to be a cosponsor of the single most important conservative gathering in the country.”

The Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) will take place February 18-20 at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in Washington, DC. “GOProud’s participation at CPAC is one of the most important things we will do all year,” continued LaSalvia. “This gathering of the nation’s most influential conservatives gives us an incredible opportunity to deliver our message.”

“GOProud looks forward to continuing to work with the conservative movement to promote policies that will improve the lives of all Americans – including gays and lesbians,” concluded LaSalvia.

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Bauer writes:

Not Even Close

My Inbox was overflowing this morning with responses to yesterday’s question on preferred presidential candidates in 2012 – and they are still pouring in. But as my staff worked furiously to sort through the barrage of e-mails, two things stood out.

First, I was surprised by the wide range of names that came back. Granted we asked a very open-ended question, but folks obviously are thinking outside the box and willing to consider many options. Quite a few people insisted on a fresh face, such as Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana, who tied for fifth place with Gov. Tim Pawlenty. Other suggestions included Senators John Thune and Jim DeMint, as well as General David Petraeus.

Nevertheless, the final results were quite surprising. There was a spirited contest for second place with Mike Huckabee edging Mitt Romney, while Newt Gingrich finished fourth. But to say there was a clear favorite is an understatement. In fact, one individual got more votes than the other 23 names combined. If my emails and her book sales are any indication, Sarah Palin has a very bright future indeed!

New York Times resident "conservative" David Brooks says it is hard to take Sarah Palin seriously, yet he relied on specious "queer" theology in an attempt to justify legal homosexual "marriage" as a supposed moral cause that conservatives should support. Turning the Bible on its head, Brooks says NOT allowing homosexuals to get married is an "abomination."

By Peter LaBarbera

New York Times columnist and TV pundit David Brooks is a liberal’s kind of conservative. The other day, Brooks made news deriding Sarah Palin as a “joke” on a Sunday talk show. Liberal Palin-haters couldn’t be more pleased, as they always are when “moderate” (read: socially liberal) Republicans deride pro-family conservative Republicans.

Said Brooks about the former Republican Governor of Alaska and GOP vice-presidential candidate:

“She’s a joke. I can’t take her seriously,” he told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos. “The idea that this potential talk show host is considered seriously for the Republican nomination, believe me, it will never happen. Republican primary voters are not going to elect a talk show host.”

I agree with conservative media critic Bernard Goldberg in explaining the dominant elite media’s contempt for Palin: she is a popular, pro-life, conservative, Christian woman — a mix that smug west- and east coast liberals don’t like and certainly not the kind of woman they want to see succeed, much less be President. Surely they are incredulous and envious of her popularity and power, which is far bigger than theirs will ever be (Brooks included).

But what about Brooks? His arrogant, rapid-fire put-down of Palin epitomizes the disdain that RINO (Republican In Name Only) Republicans have for the true, blue, pro-family conservatives who are the collective backbone of the GOP. Socially liberal Republicans whine about “tone” and “tenor” and the alleged harshness of the “religious right,” but I find that it is often the “moderates” who are cutthroat and even nasty in their dealings with religious conservatives in the party.

I don’t know who I will support for the GOP nomination in 2012, or even if Sarah Palin is running.  I hope she does. Palin has earned respect for her accomplishments and her generally principled, conservative positions and she should not be written off as some Republicans like Brooks are doing. Besides, anyone who has taken the hits that she has from the Left deserves a certain degree of appreciation — something the tone-deaf Brooks might have considered if only to keep from losing his truly conservative readers.

Yes, Palin certainly has all the right enemies — including snotty New York Times opinion writers who cheerlead for homosexual “marriage” as a moral — even a “sacred” — cause.

Brooks Backs Buggery

It’s funny. Just before I learned of Brooks’ rash and gratuitous slam on Palin, I stumbled upon a quotation of his that appeared in a booklet put out by the Human Rights Campaign — a powerful homosexual lobby organization — titled, “Answers to Questions about Marriage Equality.” HRC identifies Brooks as a “conservative columnist,” but no true “conservative” worth his salt gets cited favorably by a “gay” activist group that traffics in the worst kind of hateful, anti-Christian bigotry — and that spends millions of dollars every year electing mostly pro-homosexual-agenda and pro-abortion-on-demand Democrats. (HRC also backs a few socially left Republicans like Illinois’ Congresswoman Judy Biggert to create the appearance of bipartisanship.)

Here’s the Brooks’ quote cited by HRC (on page 13) from his November 22, 2003 column in the New York Times, “The Power of Marriage”:

We shouldn’t just allow gay marriage. We should insist on gay marriage. We should regard it as scandalous that two people could claim to love each other and not want to sanctify their love with marriage and fidelity.

Below is the full context of that quotation from Brooks’ 2003 column; this excerpt follows the contrast that he commendably draws between the noble “culture of fidelity” and the selfish “culture of contingency,” in which men flake out of their marital pledge like some “easily canceled contract.” He writes (emphasis added):

Still, even in this time of crisis, every human being in the United States has the chance to move from the path of contingency to the path of marital fidelity — except homosexuals. Gays and lesbians are banned from marriage and forbidden to enter into this powerful and ennobling institution. A gay or lesbian couple may love each other as deeply as any two people, but when you meet a member of such a couple at a party, he or she then introduces you to a ”partner,” a word that reeks of contingency.

You would think that faced with this marriage crisis, we conservatives would do everything in our power to move as many people as possible from the path of contingency to the path of fidelity. But instead, many argue that gays must be banished from matrimony because gay marriage would weaken all marriage. A marriage is between a man and a woman, they say. It is women who domesticate men and make marriage work.

Well, if women really domesticated men, heterosexual marriage wouldn’t be in crisis. In truth, it’s moral commitment, renewed every day through faithfulness, that ”domesticates” all people.

Some conservatives may have latched onto biological determinism (men are savages who need women to tame them) as a convenient way to oppose gay marriage. But in fact we are not animals whose lives are bounded by our flesh and by our gender. We’re moral creatures with souls, endowed with the ability to make covenants, such as the one Ruth made with Naomi: ‘‘Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried.”

The conservative course is not to banish gay people from making such commitments. It is to expect that they make such commitments. We shouldn’t just allow gay marriage. We should insist on gay marriage. We should regard it as scandalous that two people could claim to love each other and not want to sanctify their love with marriage and fidelity.

When liberals argue for gay marriage, they make it sound like a really good employee benefits plan. Or they frame it as a civil rights issue, like extending the right to vote.

Marriage is not voting. It’s going to be up to conservatives to make the important, moral case for marriage, including gay marriage. Not making it means drifting further into the culture of contingency, which, when it comes to intimate and sacred relations, is an abomination.

Here Brooks, though ostensibly on the right, evinces the Social Lefts’ disdain for biblically-based morality — and its penchant for stealing religious terminology and using sloppy, politically driven exegesis to advance a man- (not God-) centered agenda in the name of piety.

Not bound by our gender? Is Brooks a guest-lecturer in the Women’s Studies Department at Smith College? Whatever  happened to the truth of Genesis — of man and woman as God’s distinctive and complementary creations — as echoed by Jesus Christ:

“And He answered and said to [the Pharisees], ‘Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning ‘made them male and female,’ and said,  ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and  the two shall become one flesh’? — Matthew 19:4 (NKJV)

Yes, God created two “genders” (sexes) — not five or seven or whatever the number claimed by radicals is these days.

Homosexualizing Holy Scripture?

And why did Brooks’ choose the biblical example of Ruth and Naomi for his dubious proposition, anyway?  In the biblical account, Naomi was Ruth’s mother-in-law, and the devoted Ruth (a “woman of excellence”) went on to marry Boaz — so what does this noble relationship between two women have to do with homosexual “marriage”? In fact, although Brooks lacked the guts to come right out and say so, his allusion to the Book of Ruth is a mischievous sop to activist, homosexuality-affirming theologians who twist the Bible to claim that Ruth and Naomi were lesbian lovers [see the Human Rights Campaign's self-serving "Out in Scripture" interpretation of Ruth and Naomi's relationship HERE].

Thus Brooks joins the homosexualists in sexualizing and perverting a wonderful story about selfless love and faithfulness in a desperate attempt to legitimize sinful behavior. By including this nonsensical, “queer” theological misinterpretation of Scripture — which is rejected by the vast majority of serious Bible scholars — Brooks demonstrates his profound ignorance of theology and insensitivity toward pious Jews and Christians. He owes all Bible believers an apology, but as a mere Christian in flyover country (who doesn’t hate Sarah Palin) I’m not holding my breath.

Sacred Sodomy?

Brooks continues in his sophistic folly. He views the prohibition of homosexual “marriage” as scandalous when an intellectually honest reading of Scripture would lead us to declare it “scandalous” to attach marriage — the model of the relationship between Jesus Christ and his Church — to deviant relationships whose “love” is expressed by acts of homosexual sodomy clearly condemned as “detestable” by our loving Creator.

God created sex as the sublime expression of love, unity and commitment between husband and wife, for the purpose of procreation — that is, filling the earth with humankind. In contrast, two men attempting a sexual union produces … disease. The plain truth of the Bible is that secular liberals hate is that homosexual (erotic) love is always illegitimate — the outworking not of “sexual orientation” but the sinful orientation with which each human being struggles. The Old Testament prophet Jeremiah’s words about our deceitful hearts are relevant here. Tough love dictates that we uphold God’s truth about homosexual sin while reaching out with the love of Christ to those who struggle with this sin.

Nature clearly discriminates against homosexuality and, by extension, the oxymoronic notion of “gay marriage.” What larger purpose does anal sodomy serve — with its many health hazards? Can two women produce children without borrowing from heterosexuality? (So much for “equality” — and please, don’t even go there with the silly analogy between homosexual and normal, albeit infertile, couples: the latter do not model aberrant, immoral conduct. Rather, they only seek the blessing of children that their opposite-sex union would normally provide.)

Moving toward his dramatic conclusion, Brooks cavalierly implies that homosexual “intimacy” can be “sacred.” But such a claim begs the question: who defines sacred and what is sacredness? Who determines moral right from wrong?  Christians believe that a holy God defines moral truth and reveals it to man through his divinely inspired Word, the Bible. The Bible is the gold standard of moral authority and Truth — which is why the Homosexual Lobby, as the latest in a long line of rebels, is working so hard to undermine it and distort its teachings. (One HRC staffer, Harry Knox — who also sits on President Obama’s  “Faith Advisory Council” — defiantly declares that “being gay or lesbian is an immutable, unchangeable gift from God, one for which I am very grateful. And it would fly in the face of my respect for God to give that gift back.”)

Harry is playing with fire and needs to repent: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil” (Isaiah 5:20).

Here we must go to Noah Webster’s original 1828 “American Dictionary of the English Language” definition of “sacred,” which avoids the liberal corruption that associates the word with anything “spiritual” (including homosexualized religion):

SACRED, a …from L. sacer, sacred, holy …The sense is removed or separated from that which is common, vulgar, polluted …

1. Holy; pertaining to God or to his worship; separated from common secular uses and consecrated to God and his service.
2. Proceeding from God and containing religious precepts …;
3. Narrating or writing facts respecting God and holy things ….

Note that far from keeping the truly sacred things separate from the corruption of the world, Brooks and other fellow travelers with the “Gay” Lobby are intentionally corrupting the sacred by attempting to fuse it with sin. In their pride, they seek to create a New Morality based upon their own foolish ideas (of which “gay pride” is one). Insidiously, the most radical manifestation of “queer” activism is not the high-heeled drag queens marching down city streets every June — but the “conservative,” domesticated version of homosexual activism that redefines and dumbs down noble institutions like marriage and family — and Truth itself — to the point where words have no meaning.

Besides, even in their gut most people recognize that there’s something deeply wrong with homosexual acts: why else would we cringe at the thought inspired by this question: How do two men consummate their “same-sex marriage”?

Yuck. Behavior — not politically charged abstractions like “gay identity,” is the issue.

Sodomy is not sacred. Sodomy is sin. Homosexual behavior cannot be “sanctified” because it is directly opposed to God’s revealed will and His moral law, as confirmed by thousands of years of Judeo-Christian tradition. Thankfully, many men and women have found freedom from this destructive lifestyle through the healing power of Jesus Christ — but something tells me that David Brooks will not be writing a sympathetic column about happy and successful former homosexuals anytime soon. (If he did, would the Times run it?)

One last turn of the knife

But wait. It’s not over: Brooks saves his most obnoxious “gotcha” assault on biblical morality for his final sentence — proclaiming it an “abomination” for conservatives NOT to make the “moral” case for “gay marriage.”

What is it about secular, big-city elitists like Brooks that they are driven not only to redefine historic morality, but in so doing they appropriate the language of the divine to define deviancy up (to quote Charles Krauthammer)? Is it because — even though they regard ancient moral norms like keeping sex limited to marriage as quaint anachronisms –  they understand the power of traditional religion to define right and wrong authoritatively, even in this jaded modern era?

My Open Bible (Nelson: 1985; NASB) lists passages about “abominations” as “things utterly repulsive.” Is David Brooks really suggesting that it is “repulsive” to God for his followers to resist cloaking detestable behaviors like homosexual sodomy — which God condemns — in the beautiful robe He created called “marriage”?

Indeed, he is, but cheap rhetorical gimmicks make bad theology. The New Liberal “Morality” is bankrupt and has no compelling, divine authority — I’d use an Emperor-Has-No-Clothes reference but it hits too close to home. Therefore it must steal the words of holy revelation to feign legitimacy. Just as two domesticated homosexual lovers with their adopted child are playing house (to quote my ex-”gay” friend Steve Bennett), social liberals like Brooks who exploit holy words of old to promote trendy sins are playing church.

And boy do they love to “preach” their hollow, false “gospel” without boundaries to Americans, even as they ridicule our appeals to a Higher Authority for moral guidance.

So my message to Sarah Palin and all victims of Christian-bashing is this: don’t let social leftists — even those on the “Right” — get you down. Wear their derision as a badge of honor. In fact, take the fight to them and aggressively defend the old truths while tearing down their rootless, fake “morality” that preposterously elevates sin as “sacred.” You can even quote your Bible if you really want to drive the elitists nuts! Because, to paraphrase Brooks, when secularized liberals, libertarians and media pundits attempt to redefine moral Truth by manipulating and distorting the language of faith, it’s really hard to take them seriously.

Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong.
Let all that you do be done in love. (1 Corinthians 16:13-14; NASB)

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Peter LaBarbera is president of Americans For Truth About Homosexuality and an evangelical Christian.

Here’s the YouTube of the ABC “This Week” episode in which David Brooks attacks Sarah Palin:

New Jersey's new governor-elect Chris Christie, a Republican, campaigned against homosexual "marriage" -- and beat two pro-"gay marriage" opponents in a deep blue state.

By Peter LaBarbera

Social conservatives did quite well on Tuesday. Not only did traditional marriage win in Maine, but in several high-profile races, such as New Jersey’s governor’s race, the pro-traditional-marriage candidate won. In Virginia, Republican Ken Cuccinelli won the race for attorney general handily despite being smeared as a “bigot” by the powerful Washington Post for his principled opposition to granting “rights” based on unnatural behavior.

The victorious candidate for governor of Virginia, Bob McDonnell, is a strong pro-family, pro-life conservative who helped enact legal protections for the definition of marriage in the state. The following is from his website:

Bob McDonnell believes marriage is the union between one man and one woman. As a legislator, Bob McDonnell was chief sponsor and author of a constitutional amendment protecting traditional marriage (Chief Patron, HJ 187, 2004). As Attorney General, Bob supported Virginia’s marriage amendment and wrote an official opinion explaining that it would not affect the current legal rights of unmarried persons.

In the House of Delegates, Bob McDonnell was twice named “Legislator of the Year” by the Virginia Family Foundation. In his 2005 race for Attorney General, Bob was honored to receive the endorsement of the Virginia Society for Human Life.

Christie ran on traditional marriage

In New Jersey, GOP victor Chris Christie was the only one of three candidates to oppose homosexual “marriage,” and sent out a mailer on that issue (this “gay” Advocate account sums it up). The Advocate reported Nov. 2:

The New Jersey legislature is widely expected to vote on a bill to legalize same-sex marriage in the lame-duck session following the election. Governor Corzine has pledged to sign the bill. Christie opposes marriage equality.

Even in the only race that the White House likes to talk about — Democrat Bill Owens’ victory in the heated NY-23 Congressional race (he was endorsed by the GOP’s exiting moderate liberal candidate, Dede Scozzafava) — the news is not good for “same-sex-”marriage” advocates. Turns out that Owens, running in upstate New York, opposed allowing homosexuals to “marry.” However, he appears to support “civil unions.” See HERE and HERE.

The New York Observer reports:

On the wedge issue of same-sex marriage, Owens is to the right of his Republican opponent Scozzafava. He does not support full marriage–he opposes any federal action on the “states rights issue”–telling me, “I fully support equal rights for everybody, and certainly civil unions are in that mix. For religious reasons, I have difficulty with the use of the word marriage in that process.”

By Bay Buchanan, Townhall.com, 11/2/09

According to a recent Gallup study, 40% of Americans view themselves as conservative, 36% call themselves moderate, and only 20% fall into the liberal category. While this may be great news for conservatives, the Grand Old Party did not fare so well.

Last Spring a Pew poll found that only 23% of voters consider themselves Republicans. This month an ABC/Washington Post survey suggests the number has fallen even further—to 20%. Meanwhile the largest block of voters, 36%, classify as Independents, with 35% calling themselves Democrats.

One more number: 72% of Republicans identify themselves as conservative.

Bottom line—the Republican Party is deeply conservative while America is predominantly conservative. It is the party label that has trouble, not the philosophy which was once its driving force.

The key to expansion then is to realign itself with that which is conservative and regain the trust of the 35% of Independents and 21% of Democrat swho also call themselves conservative. You do this with candidates who appeal to these voters—conservative populists who speak with boldness and clarity about their vision for America. Then you paint democratic candidates with the Obama brush– fiscally irresponsible, socially radical, out of touch liberals fully engaged in bankrupting the nation.

So what are Republican Party leaders doing? With 20% of the electorate in their pocket they’re running to the middle, adding even more credibility to Sam Francis’ description of them as the “Stupid Party.”

According to story in Politico this past week, “many top Republicans are growing worried that the party’s chances for reversing its electoral routs of 2006 and 2008 are being wounded by the flamboyant rhetoric and angry tone of conservative activists and media personalities.” But it was on their “big tent, big spending, big amnesty” watch that the referenced defeats took place!

This same article reports that John McCain and his little side-kick Lindsey Graham are working to move the party in a “more centrist direction”. But a year ago McCain, as the party’s nominee, couldn’t energize a Republican convention without first inviting the fire-breathing right-wing Alaskan Governor, Sarah Palin, to join him on stage. ….

Go here to read the rest of Buchanan’s column on Townhall:  “Is the Republican Label Irrelevant?”

Schlussel writes on her website:

We’ve Lost: U.S. Census to Count Gay Marriages

[Aug. 3, 2009] On Friday, the U.S. Census Bureau and its parent, the U.S. Department of Commerce, announced that legally married gay couples (from California pre-Prop 8 and from other states in which it’s legal) will be counted as marriages in the 2010 U.S. Census.  But, strangely, you can only find out about this disturbing prospect in the gay media.

Although the federal government left the issue of who can marry to the states, this is a frightening turn, as it essentially transforms the issue into a federal one–very dangerous when liberal Democrats run the show in almost every branch.  Today, the U.S. Census Bureau, tomorrow, the IRS and lots of other federal agencies.  And, as you probably know, the Census isn’t just used to apportion Congressional districts.  It’s used for doling out lots of federal cash.

What’s that rustling sound? The fast revolutions of several Constitutional drafters spinning in their graves.  No doubt, the Founding Fathers never intended us to count men “married” to men and women “married” to women when they crafted, Article I, Section 2–the portion of the Constitution requiring that a national census be taken.

Exit Question:  Now that we’ve lowered the bar, when do we start counting menages-a-trois as marriages?  And will they count as two marriages or one-and-a-half?  Most of Hollywood need to know. ….

Click HERE to read more from Debbie Schlussel’s website on the liberal push to get government to recognize sodomitic couples.

McCain Exposes Democrats’ ‘Gay’ Political Payoff Priorities over the Best Interests of our Men and Women in Uniform

The following are Sen. John McCain’s floor remarks,  July 15, 2009, regarding Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-NV) decision to tack a “hate crimes” amendment (S 909) on to an unrelated defense appropriations bill:

“Mr. McCain:  Mr. President, we have just seen, I know there are a lot of other issues that are consuming the interest of my colleagues and the American people such as the confirmation hearings of Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the “Help” committee of which I am a member, is reporting out one of the most massive takeovers and expenditures of taxpayers’ dollars in history and we have this bill on the floor and there are other issues so it has probably gone unnoticed we’ve seen another really, if not unprecedented, certainly highly unusual action on the part of the majority.

Frankly, to my colleagues on this side of the aisle and the American people, elections have consequences.  What we have just seen is an amendment before this body that I think you could argue is probably of more importance than any other that we consider because it authorizes the measures necessary to preserve the security of this nation, care for the men and women who are serving in the military and future threats that we will face in the 21st century.

So what has happened here is that the majority leader with the agreement of my friend from Michigan who I highly respect and regard have made it clear that their highest priority is not that.

Their highest priority is a hate crimes bill, a hate crimes bill that has nothing to do whatever with defending this nation.  Now, my friend from Michigan just complained we haven’t had time for a vote.  Of course we haven’t had a time for the vote on the pending amendment because we have been made aware a hate crimes bill, 17 pages, encompassing piece of legislation before this body that has not moved through the judiciary committee, the Appropriate Committee of oversight.

So the majority leader of the United States Senate comes to the floor after prevailing upon the distinguished chairman to withdraw his amendment – an amendment of some consequence, $1.75 billion expenditure and a far more important than even the money, a real confrontation between special interests and the national interests so that we can move to the hate crimes bill.  Now, the hate crimes bill is not without controversy, I say.  In fact, it’s interesting that on June 16, 2009, the United States Commission on Civil Rights sent a letter to the Vice President, to the leaders of the Congress, opposing — opposing — the hate crimes bill.  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent this letter be made part of the record.

The presiding officer:  Without objection.

Mr. McCain:  The United States Commission on Civil Rights sends a letter saying Dear Mr. President, Distinguished Senators, we write today to urge you to vote against the Matthew Shepherd Hate Crimes Prevention Act. That’s basically the bill that the majority leader has just inserted into the process of the legislation designed to defend this nation’s national security.  And of course there are strong feelings on it.

This is a complete abdication of the responsibilities of the judiciary committee but more importantly could hang up this bill for a long period.  While we have young Americans fighting and dying in two wars we’re going to take up the hate crimes bill because the majority leader thinks that’s more important — more important than legislation concerning the defense of this nation.

I’m sure the men and women in the military serving in his home state would be interested to know about his priorities.  So here we are.  Now we will go through – I’m sure the majority leader will file cloture and we’ll go through 30 hours of debate and have another vote and all of this is unnecessary.  Why couldn’t we move the Hate Crimes Bill?  Remember, this is not a single shot amendment on a small issue.  This is a huge issue, the whole issue of hate crimes is a huge issue.

This is a complete abdication of the responsibilities of the judiciary committee but more importantly could hang up this bill for a long period.  While we have young Americans fighting and dying in two wars we’re going to take up the hate crimes bill because the majority leader thinks that’s more important — more important than legislation concerning the defense of this nation.

It requires citizens hearings, and debate. But what are we going to do?  For reasons that I guess the majority leader can make clear because I don’t get it, wants to put it on the national defense authorization bill and pass it that way.  Now, [he will] probably succeed and he’s calling it bipartisan.  The last time I checked it has 44 Democrat sponsors and two Republicans.  That’s the definition around here of ‘bipartisan’ bills.  That’s the way the stimulus package was bipartisan.  That’s how the omnibus spending bill was bipartisan.

And I’m confident if the health care reform – “reform” – it will be reasonable in another “bipartisan” fashion.  So we’ll have some hours of debate.  We’ll have more exacerbated feel ensure between this side of the aisle and that side of the aisle.  I would imagine that the hate crimes bill, given the way, the makeup of this body, may even be put on a defense authorization.  A huge issue.  A huge issue.  It will now be placed on a defense authorization bill and passed through the congress and signed by the president.  That’s a great disservice to the American people, Mr. President.  The American people deserve debate and discussion and hearings and witnesses on this legislation.

They don’t deserve to have a hate crimes bill put on this legislation which has no relation whatever to hate crimes.  Now, I’ll probably have a lot more to say about this in the hours ahead but I’ve been around this body a fair amount of time.  I’ve watched the defense authorization bill move its way through Congress and occasionally, including at other times.  I’ve seen amendments put on the bills which are non germaine.  But I haven’t seen the majority leader of the Senate whose responsibility is to move legislation through the Senate -- take a totally nonrelevant, all encompassing controversial piece of legislation and put it on a bill that is as important to the nation’s security as this legislation is.  We’re breaking new ground here, Mr. President. Let’s have no doubt about it.

Its one thing to have one member or two or others propose amendments that happen to be their pet project or their pet peeve, sometimes; it’s an entirely different thing, an entirely different thing, and I have never seen it before that the majority leader of the United States Senate comes to the near and introduces an irrelevant piece of legislation that is controversial., that is fraught with implications for this and future generations to a bill that is totally nonrelevant and after 30 hours of debate we’ll have a vote on closing that debate and including it in the legislation.  I’m deeply, deeply disappointed.  And I would question anyone’s priorities, anyone’s priorities who puts this kind of legislation ahead of the needs of the men and women who are serving our military with bravery, courage, and distinction.  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.”

Kudos to my friend Laurie Higgins and the good folks at Champion News for telling it like it is. In a culture swimming in the celebration of homosexuality (masquerading as liberal tolerance), it becomes ever more ludicrous for politicians living double lives to hide behind the homosexual “closet.” (Ditto for straight philandering pols.) If a Republican politician or any politician has a hidden homosexual problem and is promoting the “gay” activist agenda — perhaps under threat of “outing” by homosexual “outing” activists like Mike Rogers — his constituents have a right to know of his aberrant special self-interest. Homosexual Republicans have the freedom to run as open homosexuals. Too bad for them if that only works for Democrats like Barney Frank. They can always switch parties: better to run as a Democrat than as a deceptive “Republican” in a party that claims to support traditional marriage and natural family values. — Peter LaBarbera, www.aftah.org

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Reprinted from Champion News, July 14, 2009

By Laurie Higgins (a writer for Illinois Family Institute)

Now is the time for those running for public office in Illinois to come clean about the skeletons, or mistresses, or prostitutes, or congressional pages, or homosexual partners lurking in their closets. The past few years have been a veritable anti-treasure trove of political closet cleanings, and many Illinoisans are sick of them.

Rumors have been swirling for years that a sometime-married elected Illinois representative who now seeks higher office is homosexual. Rumors continue to swirl that his sexual peccadillo and deceit have been aided and abetted by those who bask in his, I hope, dimming light, just as Mark Foley’s double life was aided and abetted by Denny Hastert. Those who aid and abet in the sexual immorality and deceit of public servants do neither the public nor political parties any favors.

Some in the formerly grand Republican Party exalt candidates they view as moderate, which translated means those who support the destruction of incipient life and those who affirm homosexual unions. The new “moderate,” however, is yesterday’s immoderate, perverse, radical, and subversive. Immoderateness, perversion, radicalness, and subversiveness are moderate only to relativists-to those who believe there are no fixed, immutable, eternal, objective truths. In Ideas Have Consequences, Richard Weaver makes mincemeat out of the foolish notion implicit in the claims of devotees of moderateness:

Whoever argues for a restoration of values is sooner or later met with the objection that one cannot return, or as the phrase is likely to be, “you can’t turn the clock back.” By thus assuming that we are prisoners of the moment, the objection well reveals the philosophic position of modernism. The believer in truth, on the other hand, is bound to maintain that the things of highest value are not affected by the passage of time; otherwise the very concept of truth becomes impossible. In declaring that we wish to recover lost ideas and values, we are looking forward toward an ontological realm that is timeless.

Infidelity matters. Infidelity matters because it’s an indicator of personal integrity and commitment to oath-keeping. If a political figure will not honor the most profound commitments to spouse and children, if his personal desires take precedence over spouse and children, what confidence can the public have in his willingness to honor commitments to his constituency or in his willingness to subordinate personal desire to a larger, more noble cause?

Deceit matters. Deceit matters for all the reasons mentioned above and because the public is entitled to know the truth about those whom they’re entrusting to represent their interests. In addition, there is a more pragmatic reason that deceit matters. It matters because “at length the truth will out,” and distracting scandals will ensue. The sexual profligacy, perversion, and deceit of Barney Frank, Bill Clinton, Dan Crane, Gerry Studds, Mark Foley, Ted Stevens, Elliot Spitzer, John Ensign, Mark Sandford, and Sam Adams should have rendered the public weary of the dissolute and desirous of leaders of forthrightness, transparency, and integrity.

Homosexuality matters. The public is foolish if it buys the claim that the “sexual orientation” of public servants-whether school administrators, judges, or legislators-doesn’t matter. It matters for two reasons. First, volitional homosexual behavior is deviant, immoral behavior regardless of its etiology. That moral claim is not only a legitimate but also a necessary moral claim to make publicly. And we should be making it with at least the same frequency, fervor, clarity, and tenacity with which others are making the claim that volitional homosexual acts are moral and good.

To read the rest of Higgins’ column in Champion News, click HERE

WARNING: Crude language, inappropriate for children

TAKE ACTION: 1) e-mail this video to your elected Republican officials at the national (202-224-3121; www.congress.org), state and local level and urge them to reject the Log Cabin’s radical homosexual agenda (which includes joining with other “gay” groups in trying to use the courts to overturn California’s pro-traditional-marriage Prop 8 vote). 2) call or write Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele at chairman@gop.com or 202-863-8700; 2) Call or write Nettelhorst Elementary’s principal, Cindy Wulbert, at Cw1411@gmail.com or (773) 534-5810.

The Log Cabin Republicans, a homosexual activist group, fielded a float in Chicago’s annual “gay pride” parade on June 28. 2009 — with a couple of crude signs: “BIG DICKS, small government” and “A Strong Military Shoots Big Loads.” If that’s not bad enough, the “gay” parade — like others across the country — saw the participation of many young children, brought by their same-sex parents or gay-sympathetic adults. A Chicago school, Nettelhorst Elementary, participated semi-officially after parents rallied to have their children be part of the first-ever grade school contingent to march in the parade.

As you can see from the video, beyond the crude signage, the “pride” parade featured sexual images and even public nudity (a woman atop a float is shown flashing her bare breasts — covered up in this video). Homosexual activists claim that same-sex parenting and “gay” adoption are good for children. Then they take their impressionable kids to annual “gay pride” celebrations that feature erotic and perverted behavior and language that are clearly inappropriate for children. They can’t have it both ways.

This video was produced by Americans For Truth about Homosexuality.  At previous Chicago “gay pride” parades, AFTAH has witnessed public nudity and even a vile gay sex act between two men, which was allowed to take place on the street directly in front of a row of Chicago cops, who stood by and did nothing.

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Watch AFTAH’s other Chicago “gay pride” 2009 video:  VIDEO: Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart, Chicago ‘Gay Pride,’ and the Homosexual Cop-Haters

Related Log Cabin and “gay pride” stories:

• Homosexual Group ‘Log Cabin Republicans’ Has Measly 20,000 Members Nationwide
• Should Children Attend Lewd ‘Gay Pride’ Parades? LaBarbera Asks Biased Chicago Tribune Reporter
• [Illinois Family Institute - 2004:] Will Mayor Daley Again Allow Homosexuals to Commit Illegal Sex Acts on Chicago Streets at Upcoming ‘Gay Pride’ Parade?
• AFTAH Gives RNC Chief Michael Steele 20,000 Reasons NOT to Embrace Divisive Homosexual ‘Log Cabin Republican’ Agenda
• Tony Peraica, Christine Radogno Cozy Up to the Homosexual ‘Log Cabin Republicans’
• Log Cabin Republican Jamie Ensley Comes Out of his Bigot Closet
• Log Cabin Republicans Erase Photo of Boy-Seducing Predator Mark Foley from their Website
• Judy Baar Topinka Featured at Pro-Homosexual Log Cabin Republicans Fundraiser
• Public Nudity Tolerated as Angry Mob Assaults Peaceful Christians at Chicago ‘Gay Pride’ Parade
• San Diego School Superintendent: “Parents Don’t Have a Problem with Their Kids Being in Gay Pride Parade!”
• Coach Daubenmire Is Right: Christian Man, You Need to Observe a ‘Gay Pride’ Parade!
• San Diego City Councilman Blocks Public Display of Photos from “Gay Pride” Parade
• Ex-Log Cabin Republican Leader Takes over Pro-Homosexual-’Marriage’ Effort – Cal. Teachers Ass’n Pledges $1 Million to ‘No on [Prop] 8′

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Does a Republican Precinct Committeeman have to support all GOP candidates?

By John Biver, Editor of Champion News; posted4-27-09

Last week a good friend who is newly involved in his township GOP organization asked me if I thought he was obligated to work for Republican candidates he felt he couldn’t support. As an example, he said he can’t support Republican Congresswoman Judy Biggert because of her co-sponsoring of Republican Mark Kirk’s dangerous and wrong-headed H.R. 1913 [the "Thought Crimes" bill].

It’s a good question, since there seems to be some misunderstanding about the role of precinct committeemen, the party itself, and the people it elects.

Many Republicans hold the view that we owe a blind fealty to those who appear on our party’s ballot line. I disagree. The party is the servant to the principles, nothing more. The party has no purpose outside of that service.

Those principles are outlined nicely in the state and national platforms. Simply stated, those principles are: limited government, traditional values, and a strong national defense policy.

It has long been the position of those of us at Champion News that there are some actions taken by our GOP candidates and elected officials that disqualify them from the support of platform supporting Republicans.

The evidence is abundant that our party’s problem isn’t the Democrats – it’s liberal or incompetent “Republicans” that misuse the GOP brand. Often, it’s better to have a lousy Republican candidate lose and a Democrat win. Why? Republicans are the only people who can do lasting damage to the public’s perception of the Grand Old Party. Democrats can’t.

Click here to read the rest of the article on Champion News: http://www.championnews.net/article.php?sid=1841

TAKE ACTION:  Call or e-mail Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele (202-863-8700; chairman@gop.com) and kindly inform him that it is erroneous to equate unchangeable skin color with changeable homosexuality. There are no “ex-Blacks.” There are many ex-homosexuals. Also remind him of the perils of using self-serving feminist terms (“choice”) to describe abortion, the taking of innocent unborn life. (For guidance see Ken Ervin’s excellent column below and AFTAH Board Member Matt Barber’s comments on One News Now HERE.)

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Steele’s Aim Off on Social Issues

By Ken Ervin

Originally posted on CWA’s website, 3/13/2009
According to Ron Gunzburger over at Politics 1, Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele seems to be steering the party ship to the left. In a GQ magazine interview, the newly minted chairman dubs abortion “an individual choice,” directly opposing his own party platform, which labels abortion “a fundamental assault on the sanctity of innocent human life.”

He also demonstrates a woefully misinformed view of the homosexual lifestyle. “I don’t think I’ve ever really subscribed to that view that you can turn it on and off like a water tap,” says Steele. “You just can’t simply say, oh, like, ‘Tomorrow morning I’m gonna stop being gay.’ It’s like saying ‘Tomorrow morning I’m gonna stop being black.’”

What an unfortunate comparison. I don’t believe anyone’s ever said that leaving homosexuality is as easy as turning it “on and off like a water tap.” That’s a deeply oversimplified view of the process – and a process it is. The ex-gay movement (a la Exodus International, et al) is more like Alcoholics Anonymous. They recognize that same-sex attractions are more easily broken one day at a time.

Where Mr. Steele errs, obviously, is in comparing sexual attractions to skin color. Mr. Steele rightly says that he will never be able to “stop being black.” However, he can’t say that about homosexuality because it’s not about genetics, it’s about temptation. No white man has ever been tempted to become black (or vice versa). And even if one has, there is no way to act upon it. The same is not true in regards to a sexually broken person dealing with same-sex attractions. And that’s where Mr. Steele’s argument breaks down.

I think former homosexual Tim Wilkins said it best: “One of life’s mysteries is that we don’t get to choose what we are tempted by. But we do choose how we respond to those temptations.” [Read Wilkin's heart-warming testimony HERE.] The power of the cross is not that we cease to be tempted, but that sin no longer has such a strangle hold on our lives as to force us to yield to our temptations. By His death and resurrection, Jesus became the Victor over sin. Those who are under His blood have access to that victory and, by virtue of that Power, can successfully stand against those temptations.

In reality, Mr. Steele’s views on homosexuality are like his views on abortion. It’s an individual choice. But just like abortion, it’s a bad choice. Always. Every single time.

TAKE ACTION: Support SB600 in the Illinois State Senate by calling the Senators listed in this Illinois Family Institute Alert; the Capital Switchboard number in Springfield is 217-782-2000). This legislation could be effectively killed in committee soon so please call today.

Dear Readers,

I endorse this article by my friends at Champion News (based in Carpentersville, Illinois) — advocating a bill, SB600 (sponsored by Sen. Chris Lauzen (R-Aurora), which would allow the direct election of the Republican State Central Committee in Illinois — with the following proviso: though I am active in Republican Party politics in Illinois, Americans For Truth about Homosexuality (AFTAH) is a non-partisan organization that promotes pro-family values in all parties and all areas of society. We are not a GOP organization; in fact, some Republicans do not like AFTAH when we criticize pro-homosexual pandering within the Republican Party (see our campaign urging RNC Chief Michael Steele not to embrace the homosexual “Log Cabin Republican” agenda). They especially don’t like us when we assert that all de facto homosexual activist Republicans (and Democrats) working behind the scenes to promote the GLBT agenda should be open with the voters about their sexual special interest (instead of hiding behind the homosexual closet).

The reality here in the Land that Gave America Obama (sigh) is this: the Illinois Republican Party leadership has failed to stand boldly for conservative, pro-family ideals, and the party desperately needs some competitive energy. The ILGOP is hurt by its own “moderates” (read: social liberals) who continually talk down pro-family policies and proclaim their disdain for the ILGOP becoming “too conservative” (even as they lose one election after another). We hope that SB600 will become a vehicle for MORE pro-family advocacy in the party — and that it will help bring an infusion of new blood and Reaganesque thinking to the Party of Lincoln. — Peter LaBarbera, www.aftah.org

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Direct Elections: Awaken the IL GOP

First published in Champion News, March 3

By John Biver

My Champion News colleague Doug Ibendahl has been advocating for a return to Direct Elections for several years now, and along the way has thoroughly made the case in articles such as this one from last June: “Reawaken our Illinois Republican Party – Vote for a Return to Direct Elections.” Doug opened the article by asking rank and file Republicans to stand-up for the restoring of “a basic legal right that was taken away two-decades ago, with devastating consequences.” Devastating indeed. Here are excerpts from Doug’s article:

All Republicans in Illinois used to have a say in electing the top leadership of our Illinois Republican Party (the “State Party”). Our State Party is run by a 19-member State Central Committee, one member from each of our state’s U.S. Congressional Districts.

Our State Central Committee is the political equivalent of a board of directors – it’s charged with setting policy, overseeing operations, and looking out for the best interests of all Republicans.

In the late 1980’s the good-old-boys decided they wanted to consolidate power in Illinois. So they changed the system of selecting that board of directors – without asking Republican voters by the way. The Illinois Democrats kept direct elections for their Central Committee, but we adopted a much more closed, easily rigged system, with some really bad incentives.

Myth: “Returning to direct elections will mean only the wealthy will get on the State Central Committee.”

TRUTH:  The wealthier candidate is often the loser in an election, especially in Illinois. Our recent GOP primaries are full of examples.

Doug’s following point is huge – as it gets right to correcting the perverse incentives of the current system (emphasis added in bold and reformatted into bullet points).

We’re talking about an unpaid party post in the case of the State Central Committee. Making the members accountable to Republicans again will do much to change the job from being a mostly do-nothing ceremonial post, into one where the members have an incentive to become doers, working to build our Party.

Let’s create some common sense performance expectations for this State Central Committee for a change. Let’s measure that performance and share it with Republican voters in advance of election.

• For example, how many get-out-the-vote efforts did the person lead?
• How many new Republicans were registered to vote?
• What were the recruitment efforts for candidates, volunteers, election judges, poll watchers, etc.?
• And most importantly, how did the Republican vote fare in their districts?

Let’s see who runs for a volunteer service position that actually has some real work involved. And if someone wants to spend a significant sum of his or her own money to attain a volunteer job where they have to work hard on behalf of Republicans – is that a bad thing? Might that be exactly the kind of committed leader we need to reawaken this Illinois GOP?

A campaign for the State Central Committee means more energy and more people engaging and getting Republicans to the polls. Again, how can that be a bad thing?

Myth: “With direct elections, only public officials or those with high name I.D. would get elected.”

TRUTH: Our State Central Committee has lots of public officials NOW – plus there are a few more who are essentially the stand-in for a public official in the district.  If our party really wants to keep public officials off the State Central Committee, there is a simple solution. That State Central Committee could amend its By-Laws to include the prohibition.

If this public official point were truly a legitimate concern, our State Party could call a meeting and make the change today — if it wanted to. But passage would mean several of the current incumbents who are already public officials would have to give up a post. . .

Myth: “Direct elections will help Chicago Democrats get on our State Central Committee.”

TRUTH: We’ve got Chicago Democrats for all intents and purposes on there NOW. Think Skip Saviano for example. Enough said.

The truth is it’s our current system that’s encouraged Democrats to seek our party titles. This is evident in Chicago especially. Under our current system we’ve had lifelong Democrats in Chicago Ward Committeemen posts. Our current system encourages the State Central Committeemen not to say a peep or lift a finger, as long as they get that person’s vote to help stay on the State Central Committee.

Myth: “All of the County Chairmen are against returning to direct elections.”

TRUTH: Lots of County Chairmen support the reform. (Click HERE for a partial list of those supporting direct elections, which now includes former U.S. Senator Peter Fitzgerald.)  More importantly, no other proposal impacting our Illinois GOP has generated as much energy and support from the rank-and-file in recent years as this direct elections reform.

Myth: “Direct elections would take power away from the precinct committeemen.”

TRUTH: Direct elections make the precinct committeemen MORE important. A State Central Committee member who wants to stay in office is going to have to build a much closer working relationship with his or her precinct committeemen – and the County Chairmen. And the relationship is going have to revolve around getting-out-the-vote, and less on just currying personal friendship.

Direct election of the State Central Committee is crucial to better align the interests of all party officials, at all levels, with the interests of Republicans. This is a big reason why every corporation gives every shareholder a direct vote for the board of directors for example.

More importantly, our current system has in fact been devastating to the precinct committeeman ranks. Note how our State Party consistently refuses every two years to help recruit precinct committeemen to fill the huge number of vacant slots around the state. This is just one of the bad disincentives built into our current system. It’s pretty obvious there’s a major concern among a few insiders about expanding the pool of voters, i.e., precinct committeemen.

Myth: “Going back to direct elections constitutes a ‘risky’ change.”

TRUTH: It’s our current system which is odd and extreme. Changing back to direct elections means going back to the sensible system, and the one that’s more like how every well run corporation is structured. Don’t forget, we were consistently a Red State when we had direct elections. Since abandoning direct elections, the GOP Presidential nominee has lost Illinois every time, usually by a lot.

To our knowledge, no other state party in America has a system as closed as the one we’ve tried.  It’s high time we ended the radical experiment that’s been an obvious failure.

Again, click HERE to read Doug’s entire article. Also recommended are these:

• Issue Brief: In Support of Direct Elections;
• Step 1 for an Illinois GOP recovery is giving Republicans back their vote;
• Illinois needs a Republican Party that can credibly push for a special election.

John Biver is the Editor of Champion News.

TAKE ACTION: Contact Utah Senate President Michael Waddoups and other GOP Utah Senate leaders and urge them to reinstate Utah St. Sen Chris Buttars (right) and NOT to punish him for speaking his mind against the aggressive and often hateful homosexual activist movement. Use the following contact information: e-mail: waddoups@utahsenate.org (other GOP State Senate leader e-mails HERE); Waddoups’ senate office: (801) 538-1407 or Utah Senate switchboard: 801-538-1035. Support Buttars at dcbuttars@utahsenate.org.

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By Peter LaBarbera

Folks, I don’t know which aspect of this story is more preposterous: the notion of anti-Christian, homosexual lobby groups like Human Rights Campaign (HRC) — with their long history of demonizing people of faith as hateful bigots — setting themselves up as arbiters of responsible speech; OR … the specter of Republican Party leaders bending to pro-Democratic HRC’s pressure tactics.

My good friend Matt Barber (a Board Member of AFTAH) is correct below: if the Republican Party’s leaders think they are going to succeed in the long run by caving in to the Left’s version of “tolerance,” then we’re looking ahead at decades of Democrat Party rule in these United States. You simply cannot appease the homosexual activist movement, and groups like HRC are now engaged in a campaign of intimidation against pro-family lawmakers nationwide. Their unsubtle campaign attempts to classify any discussion of organized homosexual activism as a “threat” as beyond-the-pale hate speech leading to violence. More ominously, savvy homosexual moneymen like Tim Gill are targeting pro-family legislators for defeat using out-of-state “gay” PAC bundling, and it’s working [see this 2007 NPR story, "Wealthy Gay Donors a New Force in Politics," featuring Americans For Truth].

Chris Buttars is hardly alone: remember Oklahoma State Rep. Sally Kern, who was trashed by hateful homosexuals across the country for a speech she gave identifying the “Gay” Lobby as a serious threat to our nation? (Kern easily won reelection last year despite the hate campaign.) There have been other pro-family lawmakers who have been targeted in what is becoming a new “gay” direct-action political tactic of Intimidate, Demonize and Isolate Politically. (Take note of how the Left tried to erroneously paint Buttars as a racist; here’s a link with Buttars’ response.)

We understand that Sen. Chris Buttars is somewhat of a curmudgeon who comes from a different generation of Americans less apt to use politically-correct nuances and obey the speech codes set up by hypocrites on the Homosexual Left (who are among, of course, the most intolerant activists in the nation). But for Waddoups and the Utah State Senate GOP leadership to buckle to a group like HRC (see their pressure-letter against Buttars HERE) is unconscionable and a good example of why so many cynical conservatives call the GOP the “stupid party.”

The Republicans need to follow the example of their new chairman, Michael Steele, and get a backbone, and St. Sen. Chris Buttars should be reinstated to his post on the Judiciary Committee ASAP.

TAKE ACTION: Contact Utah Senate President Michael Waddoups and other GOP Utah Senate leaders and urge them to reinstate Utah St. Sen Chris Buttars and NOT to punish him for speaking his mind against the aggressive and often hateful homosexual activist movement. Use the following contact information: e-mail: waddoups@utahsenate.org (other GOP State Senate leader e-mails HERE); Waddoups’ senate office: (801) 538-1407 or Utah Senate switchboard: 801-538-1035. Support Buttars at dcbuttars@utahsenate.org. 

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Statement by Matt Barber, Director of Cultural Affairs at Liberty Counsel (and Board Member of Americans for Truth About Homosexuality):

Contact: jmattbarber@comcast.net; February 24, 2009

Homosexual Activists Target Veteran Utah Legislator

Lynchburg, VA – During recent comments to a documentary film maker, Utah State Senator Chris Buttars observed that – as every major world religion and thousands of years of history have held – the homosexual lifestyle is immoral. Buttars further opined that militant homosexual activism poses a grave threat to American culture. Tens of millions of Americans and the majority of Utahns happen to agree.

Matt Barber, Director of Cultural Affairs with both Liberty Alliance Action and Liberty Counsel*, released the following statement today in response to news that Utah Senate President Michael Waddoups has caved to pressure by an anti-Christian homosexual hate group (the “Human Rights Campaign”) and has taken punitive action against Buttars by removing him from his post as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

“If you need a prime example of why the Republican Party is presently spiraling into the abyss of political irrelevancy, you need look no further than to Utah,” said Barber. “The conservative majority in both Utah and across the country is starved for leaders who will represent the traditional values upon which our great nation was founded, and who will do so boldly and unapologetically. Sen. Buttars has done just that. He was elected in Utah to represent his constituents and the conservative values they hold near and dear. He’s been tested and has passed that test. By bucking left-wing extremism and speaking truth in plain and simple terms, Buttars has shown true leadership. Although his comments certainly lacked in political correctness and were quite direct, they were acutely accurate. Wouldn’t it be nice if more politicians would speak directly and accurately?

“Unfortunately, Senate President Waddoups has failed the same test. He’s responded in exactly the wrong way. No one should be surprised that HRC and other radical leftists are calling for Buttars’ head on a silver platter. That’s what bullies do when they don’t like what they hear. The self-styled proponents of ‘tolerance’ and ‘diversity’ are the most intolerant and hateful among us.  They allow zero room for dissent and seek to destroy anyone who stands in their way.

“But what is troubling is that Senator Waddoups has played right into their hands. He’s given their radical left-wing agenda an illusory air of legitimacy. He had a golden opportunity to shine here by standing firmly behind Senator Buttars. He could have told these liberal extremists to take their extremism elsewhere. Instead, he threw Senator Buttars under the bus.

“Waddoups’ equivocation is a slap in the face to his own constituents. He’s indirectly told every American who holds a biblical view of sexual morality and who rightfully believes that radical homosexual activism poses a grave threat to our American culture, that they should be ashamed of these traditional beliefs – that they should keep these beliefs to themselves.

“Therefore, I’m asking that people contact Sen. Waddoups and respectfully request that he immediately reinstate Sen. Buttars to his post as chairman of the Judiciary Committee and publicly apologize to both Buttars and to the millions of Americans whose traditional values Waddoups has impugned,” concluded Barber.

(*Titles provided for identification purposes only.)

###

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TAKE ACTION: Contact Utah Senate President Michael Waddoups and other GOP Utah Senate leaders and urge them to reinstate Utah St. Sen Chris Buttars and NOT to punish him for speaking his mind against the aggressive and often hateful homosexual activist movement. Use the following contact information: e-mail: waddoups@utahsenate.org (other GOP State Senate leader e-mails HERE); Waddoups’ senate office: (801) 538-1407 or Utah Senate switchboard: 801-538-1035. Support Buttars at dcbuttars@utahsenate.org. 

MIKE GALLAGHER:  Is this a time when Republicans ought to consider some sort of alternative to redefining marriage and maybe in the road, down the road to civil unions. Do you favor civil unions?

STEELE: No, no no. What would we do that for? What are you, crazy? No. Why would we backslide on a core, founding value of this country? I mean this isn’t something that you just kind of like, “Oh well, today I feel, you know, loosey-goosey on marriage.” […]

GALLAGHER: So no room even for a conversation about civil unions in your mind?

STEELE: What’s the difference?

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By Peter LaBarbera

Well, folks, the homosexual activist “Log Cabin Republicans” didn’t call GOP Chairman Michael Steele a Nazi or a “domestic terrorist,” but they slammed him nonetheless for his principled stance against “civil unions.”  Come to think of it, I think the Democratic homosexual activists and bloggers are slamming Steele, too. What a coincidence.    Now is the time for all Americans who believe in marriage and time-tested Biblical morality to call or write Steele to thank him for wisely not capitulating on a core moral principle in his interview with Mike Gallagher (excerpted below; you can listen to the interview segment on this left-wing blog post).

Your calls and letters to Chairman Steele made a difference! Don’t let anyone tell you — even your church leaders — that involvement in public policy and defending life, freedom and a moral code that honors God — is a waste of time or futile. We live in the freest and greatest nation on earth and we must do what we can as good citizens to stop the Secular and Religious Left from destroying America’s moral foundation!

“Civil unions” are merely “gay marriage” by another name — or at minimum a monumental stepping-stone to same. And now we are learning that wherever “civil union” laws are in place (and open to all “orientations,” as in France), heterosexual couples are getting “civil-unioned” instead of getting married — thus eroding the institution of marriage and the lasting commitment for raising children that it represents.

Below is the excerpt of Steele’s remarks on the Mike Gallagher show, and below that is the press release condemning Steele from the Log Cabin Homosexual Activists Republicans. Can you believe the chutzpah of Log Cabin blathering on about being “inclusive” after one of their state leaders, Jamie Ensley, president of the Georgia Log Cabin, slandered Americans For Truth with charge (reminiscent of the rhetoric used by the Hard Left) that we are Nazi-like “domestic terrorists”? (And no apology has come yet from Log Cabin, although the Georgia Republican Party did put out a statement condemning his smear of us, as WND reported.)

Call today and thank Mr. Steele (202-863-8700; chairman@gop.com) for being a principled leader. Going Politically Correct on transcendent moral issues like life, homosexuality and marriage will not help the Republican Party recover as a party, but it could destroy it. God bless you. — Peter LaBarbera, www.americansfortruth.com

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Michael Steele transcript of interview with Mike Gallagher (you can listen to the interview segment at this left-wing site: www.ThinkProgress.org):

MIKE GALLAGHER:  Is this a time when Republicans ought to consider some sort of alternative to redefining marriage and maybe in the road, down the road to civil unions. Do you favor civil unions?

STEELE: No, no no. What would we do that for? What are you, crazy? No. Why would we backslide on a core, founding value of this country? I mean this isn’t something that you just kind of like, “Oh well, today I feel, you know, loosey-goosey on marriage.” […]

GALLAGHER: So no room even for a conversation about civil unions in your mind?

STEELE: What’s the difference?

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Log Cabin press release:

Log Cabin Responds to Chairman Steele

As ThinkProgress first reported, GOP Chairman Michael Steele was asked on a radio show Monday whether the party should “consider” civil unions. “No, no no. What would we do that for? What are you, crazy?” he replied. The Log Cabin Republicans condemned Steele’s comments in a press release put out yesterday:

“The politics of the past were clearly rejected in the November election. We hope Chairman Steele will work to build a more inclusive Republican Party that can win elections,” said Log Cabin Republicans National Chairman Terry Hamilton. Hamilton continued, “Such comments marginalize gay and lesbian Americans, and further alienate the mainstream, moderate, and independent-minded voters that left the Republican Party in the November election.”

“We need an inclusive GOP to reach out to new constituencies and to attract younger voters, women, Latinos, African Americans, and others who share our view of limited government and low taxes. The Log Cabin Republicans remain committed to working with other mainstream GOP groups and fair-minded Republicans to rebuild the Party.

Just last month, the Log Cabin Republicans had enthusiastically cheered Steele’s election to the chairmanship. “It’s a great day for our Party. Steele is an inclusive leader who will bring a new energy and a new vision to the GOP at a critical time,” president Patrick Sammon said. Steele has been invited to speak at LCR’s convention in April but has not yet said whether he’ll attend.