Howe and why at Belmont University

As Belmont University seemingly beats a hasty retreat in the wake of parting ways with soccer coach Lisa Howe, ostensibly because Howe violated the university's morality policies (here), I thought this quote from Congressman Mike Pence (from a recent George Will op/ed) was pertinent:

You would not be able to print enough money in a thousand years to pay for the government you would need if the traditional family continues to collapse.

According to The City Paper, this is a "scandal." I don't think so. Belmont needs to stand by their policy, without regard to the cat calls from our culture's libertine left or squishy "center-right." There's no question that the Bible prohibits homosexual activity. Belmont may offend their biggest individual financial supporter. They may be swimming upstream against political correctness. They may lose a great soccer coach. But they needn't accept the premise that this or any other policies rooted in Judeo-Christian ethics are arbitrary or based in bigotry.

On Mehlman: What he said . . .

The American Spectator : AmSpecBlog : ("Ken Mehlman and the "Anti-Gay" Bush-Era GOP"):

Yesterday former Republican National Committee Chairman and Bush campaign chief Ken Mehlman publicly announced he was gay. That doesn't particularly interest me -- it's his business and it wasn't the world's most closely guarded secret -- but it has occasioned some commentary on the Republican Party and conservative movement that is interesting.

Please read on . . .

Antle is right about how plainly responsive electoral opposition to homosexual activism has been.

disingenuous or "gaylesbianbitransphobic"?

Obama is such a fake. (Obama Still Against Same-Sex Marriage). Yeah, sure.

Dude was just citing data on homosexuality and child rape

You may have heard (Vatican under fire for linking gays to pedophilia) that a big cheese at the Vatican--Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, is "under fire" for a comment he made in reference to links between homosexuality and pedophilia:

Bertone, the Vatican secretary of state, who is sometimes called the "deputy pope," told a news conference in Santiago on Monday:

"Many psychologists and psychiatrists have shown that there is no link between celibacy and paedophilia, but many others have shown, I have recently been told, that there is a relationship between homosexuality and paedophilia."

"This pathology is one that touches all categories of people, and priests to a lesser degree in percentage terms," he said. "The behaviour of the priests in this case, the negative behaviour, is very serious, is scandalous."

File this under "gender confusion"

In What May Be a Worldwide First, Genderless Person Is ID'd in Australia - News - ABA Journal. "ID'd" is only accurate if they're referring to "issued an ID card." This guy has a gender; he's just been confused about it for several decades.

what motivates a man like John Albert Gardner, III

I was privileged to meet James Dobson yesterday afternoon at the Opryland Resort, and upon reading this sobering story ("Man is arrested in San Diego teen's disappearance," Los Angeles Times), as I was contemplating what motivates someone to do this sort of thing, I was reminded of Dobson's groundbreaking interview (here) with serial murderer and rapist Ted Bundy, prior to Bundy's execution in Florida.

It is worth a listen.

Back to the drawing board on same-sex "marriage"?

Yesterday, Maine voters became the 31st state body politic to reject same-sex "marriage," but Maine is unique in that the defeat at the polls came after a majority of the Maine legislature had approved of the concept.

Thus, the results of yesterday's referendum in Maine have national significance inasmuch as they lay bare the political strategy of homosexual activists like Tim Gill ("They won't know what hit them."-- The Atlantic). In sum, it's a little disingenuous to contend that the so-called legislative route is/was, pardon the pun, out in the open, as is implied in this TIME story. After Maine Gay-Marriage Defeat, Activists Look Ahead - TIME From the article:

In order to counter that argument [that homosexual marriage is being "foisted" upon Americans by "out-of-touch" judges], [attorney Mary] Bonauto and other gay-marriage activists in Maine who began organizing to press for gay marriage there decided to avoid taking the issue to court. Instead, they set about electing lawmakers who were friendly to their cause two years ago, and this year successfully convinced the legislature to become the nation's first to establish gay marriage by statute, rather than by decree. "Frankly, we had heard the criticisms about going the court route, and so we said, 'Fine, we'll go to the legislature,'" says Bonauto. "And it has been an incredible campaign."

I'd say it's one thing to present an issue/platform squarely to voters and let them vote, and another to simply get people elected who covertly share your agenda. The latter looks more like a coup than republican government.

Parody against homosexual adoption in NC?

Hey, did the Onion or Scrappleface dream up the child rape/incest case in Durham, NC? It is even more suspicious, given how little it is being covered by the MSM. This guy is the poster child for all the concerns that people have about endorsing adoption by folks who engage in homosexual activity.

According to the indictment:

On Monday, . . . Det. Timothy Palchak of the Washington Metropolitan Police Department, chatted online with a person using the name “F.L.” Palchak said “F.L.” described specific sex acts he had performed on a 5-year-old child and said that he lived in Durham.
. . .

[The perpetrator--Frank Lombard] is asked how he got access to a child so young. "Adopted," he replied, and said that the process was "not so hard ... esp (sic) for a black boy."

In the chat, "F.L.” told Palchak that abusing the child was "easier when he was too young to know what was happening and when he couldn't talk ...He had a little too much Benadryl. Was knocked out."

According to the report, the perp, who again is alleged to have performed sex acts on the child and offered the child to others for the same purpose, is "associate director of Duke's Center for Health Policy" and more specifically directs the "Health Inequalities Program" doing AIDS education -- which gives new meaning to the term "extension program."

But it gets even more cliche'd. I had never heard of a "co-housing" community, but the article gives some context:

Neighbors of Lombard had nothing to say about him Saturday to a reporter who visited Eno Commons, a co-housing community in north Durham.

Residents ordered the reporter to leave the neighborhood, which emphasizes communal life.

A roadblock with a "no trespassing" sign and a Subaru greeted visitors Saturday to Indigo Creek Trail, a private street in the 22-home neighborhood.

Co-housing communities allow residents have a say in the area's design, and they manage and maintain the community together. Decisions are made through consensus, and residents share common space.

Sounds like a corny, Liberal place, frankly. But the website highlights that people of all "affectional preferences" are welcome. And you gotta love the gay-friendliest make of car helping the neighborhood to circle the wagons of one of their own. Nice.

Thanks for the assist, Mr. Lombard!

Demagoguery (not) made easy

In this intriguing op/ed from Bill Kristol (about how "social conservatives" can do more than simply protest for the next for years) is this salient point:

And the selection of Rick Warren may turn out to have significance beyond short-term political maneuvering. One can see this from the hysteria on the left and among gay activists. They sense that Obama isn't willing to sign on to their campaign to delegitimize, to cast out beyond the pale of polite society, anyone who opposes same-sex marriage--and in particular, anyone (like Warren) who supported Proposition 8 in California, the initiative that overturned the California Supreme Court's legalization of same-sex marriage.

On the other hand, Sean Braisted is really struggling to reconcile Obama's choice for Inauguration Invocator in Chief with Obama's "inclusive" campaign for president. Nashville for the 21st Century: To Invocate or Not To Invocate, That Is The Question.

But Sean mistakenly equates Obama's seeming tolerance of Warren's views on homosexual acts with hypothetical tolerance of, say, opposition to religious intermarriage. As commenter Goldnl notes, many Jews disagree with "religious intermarriage," and whereas homosexual acts are named as sin in the Bible, religious intermarriage is merely labeled as unwise.

But Sean also mistakenly asserts that Obama's exclusion of Jeremiah Wright way back when disproves that the Warren Decision is evidence of Obama's inclusiveness when it comes to filling invocation slots. Sean is in the clear minority in believing that conscientious opposition to homosexual "marriage" is the same as Wright's racist theology. As Kristol points out,

The left senses that the invitation to Rick Warren is a blow to their effort to establish a soft tyranny of "correct" opinion, to enforce society-wide political orthodoxy, on social issues. They're right. This isn't the time for conservatives to snipe at Obama's motives. It's time to welcome him into the American mainstream, to salute the president-elect's progress from Reverends Wright to Warren.

Can I call in "gay"?

I kind of regret that I'm already on vacation, because I'd kind of like to call in "gay" on tomorrow's "Day without a Gay" (well, not really). But how does one qualify?

Those gay activists sure are clever, but I think they're too clever by half, as the question above reflects the biggest weakness in the "gay is the new black" spin: sexual attraction can hardly be said to be immutable, like skin color or gender.

Dang, I just realized they might have to shut down Disney tomorrow . . .

Whaddya expect from Planned Parenthood?

The Left's hackneyed rhetoric about how crisis pregnancy centers abuse or don't care about young women, are agenda-driven, are void of ethics, blahblahblahblah is tiring. Well, now there's even more proof against another scofflaw Planned Parenthood Abortion Clinic. ("Planned Parenthood covers up under-age rape") From the article:

New footage has been released showing a staff member of Planned Parenthood deliberately ignoring the statutory rape of a 13-year-old during an undercover sting operation. "Planned Parenthood offers no solutions for the victim of statutory rape - they give her an abortion and a bag of condoms and send her straight back into the arms of the abuser," states [undercover journalist Lila] Rose.

More on blessing gaydom

This article ("The 'Fairness Doctrine' Comes to eHarmony" - HUMAN EVENTS) provides context for my post the other day about the homosexualist agenda. Hopefully this is enough context to tamp down histrionics from Liberal commenters.

A blessing for gaydom, by whatever means necessary

It has been somewhat amusing to watch the outrage of the militant homosexual movement after losing on Prop 8. I guess they thought that rejection by California was the final insult, so now they're really going to get serious. Uh oh.

And in a sense, I mean that. The Left will stoop to almost any anti-Democratic level to get what it wants, as this National Review Op/ed discusses. They have the Mormon Church in their sights, and they'll be targeting the rest of us (i.e., 81% of Tennesseans) before long.

Senators O'Biden dressing as Conservatives for Halloween

Senators Biden and Obama have been working overtime to appear Conservative on a host of issues in the run up to the general election, and a great example of this masquerade is on the issue of homosexual/gay/same-sex "marriage."

A few weeks ago at the Vice Presidential debate Gov. Palin and Sen. Biden had this exchange with the debate moderator.

GOV. SARAH PALIN: ...I will tell Americans straight up that I don't support defining marriage as anything but between one man and one woman...I'm being as straight up with Americans as I can in my non-support for anything but a traditional definition of marriage...
IFILL: Let's try to avoid nuance, Senator. Do you support gay marriage?
BIDEN: No. Barack Obama nor I support redefining from a civil side what constitutes marriage. We do not support that.

But last week Biden told a reporter in Los Angeles that he opposes Proposition 8, California's marriage protection amendment. And yesterday on the "Ellen" show, Biden again stated, "If I lived in California, I'd clearly vote against Prop 8."

Now which is it, O'Biden?

Obama's radical sex ed agenda

I've posted previously (here and here) I just came across this article chronicling a nationwide effort by a motley crew of organizations--the ACLU and Planned Promiscuity Parenthood Federation of America ©, to get states to reject Federal funds to pay for abstinence education in schools.

That in and of itself was disturbing, as the Crisis Pregnancy Center where I am involved saw grant money dry up following Gov. Bredesen's choice not to file the simple paperwork to receive the federal funds.

But another interesting angle to the story was all the Left-wing verbiage about "scientific" instruction about sex (read the article). That reminded me of the sex education legislation Barack Obama fought for in Illinois. I'm a bit embarrassed that I wasn't more aware of the "code" these groups were using, but it does help a voter connect the dots in discerning the values and priorities of Barack Obama, the person voted the "Most Liberal U.S. Senator" by National Journal.

People . . . if students receive Abstinence-only sex ed, it is not the only sex ed they get. I, like most parents, want my child to at least hear more than PPFA & Co.'s obligatory line: "Sure, the only way not to get pregnant (or otherwise punished, like by getting a STI) is to abstain from sex, but now everyone pick up the cucumber and the condom I've placed on your desk, and . . ."

Is this "age appropriate," Senator Obama?

I posted previously about Barack Obama's radical views on sex education (here), but I just came across this story about efforts by HRC (the "Human Rights Campaign") in Minneapolis public schools to normalize homosexual behavior . . . among kindergartners.

I wonder if Barack Obama thinks this type of sex education is "age appropriate"?

Obama and sex education for kindergarteners--UPDATE

You may have heard, but Barack Obama has long supported sex education for kindergarteners (link).

And I hope you'll forgive me for not implicitly trusting the most liberal person in the U.S. Senate (not to mention Planned Promiscuity Federation of America ©) to define "age-appropriate" and "explicit."


Incidentally, the Bill-that-Obama-Wishes-He'd-Voted-"Present"-On has this language:

"Factual information" includes without limitation
30 medical, psychiatric, psychological, empirical, and
31 statistical statements.

-2- LRB093 05269 NHT 05359 b
1 "Medically accurate" means verified or supported by
2 research conducted in compliance with scientific methods,
3 published in peer-review journals, where appropriate, and
4 recognized as accurate and objective by professional
5 organizations and agencies with expertise in the relevant
6 field.

(emphasis added) We know who those "organizations and agencies" are, don't we?

Don't blame the Puritans . . .

There's a great article over at Nashville City Paper--"Just do it" by Lindsay Ferrier, regarding the challenge of intimacy between husband and wife after children join the family.

Ferrier provides a great perspective on the issue, with one exception . . . Ferrier insinuates that "Victorian" or "Puritanical" values in American society are somehow to blame. Ferrier writes:

It doesn’t help matters that society isn’t exactly encouraging my mommy self to put on stiletto heels and channel my inner sex kitten. American mothers are expected to take on the persona of a woman entirely preoccupied with disinfecting her kitchen counters and baking the perfect cupcake, in addition to holding down a full-time job and heading up the Booster Club. While shows like Desperate Housewives seem to knock the notion of a sexless motherhood on its [hiney], just try wearing one of Terri Hatcher’s low-cut top/ tight jeans combos to your next PTA meeting and just see how many friends you make. ["Sexpert"] Raskin says this asexual mom image can be problematic for the whole family.

Ironically, this assertion contradicts all the data offered up in the first half of the article. As demonstrated by all the examples Ferrier supplies, there's no need for Victoria's Secret weapon (you know it just dawned on me that there might be a pun in the name of that store) to get a faithful husband (the subject of the article) interested in intimacy. I don't believe Ferrier or Raskin would assert that "showing off one's merchandise" somehow counters a mother's busy lifestyle or that the fires that need stoking (or ought to be stoked) are also going to be at a PTA meeting.


Also at tennesseefree.com

McCain and same-sex marriage

Uh, explain to me again why we don't need federal legislation/action on the homosexual marriage issue? From the St. Joseph (Mo.) News-Press, "Same-sex breakup perplexes courts":

"A lesbian married in Massachusetts has filed for an annulment from her partner in a Buchanan County (Mo.) court, creating a legal challenge in a state that overwhelming[ly] voted four years ago that marriage is only between a man and a woman."

If John McCain expects Conservatives (heck, non-Liberals given the success of Marriage Protection Amendments across the country) to back him in November, he had better make clear his intentions on this issue.

Romney's Federalism

Alex Harris has an enlightening post about recent statements by Mitt Romney concerning ENDA--the so-called "Employment Non-Discrimination Act," which generally refers to a Federal effort to include "actual or perceived" sexual "orientation" as a protected characteristic in employment law. Here's the article at race42008.com

Russert asked Romney if he still supported ENDA. Romney replied that he did support them at the state level. He said that implementing such laws “makes sense.”

Mitt, how could you? You’ve shown that you understand the problem conservatives have with these laws. You said that your own experience in Massachusetts showed you that those laws at the state level are bad news. Two days later you express your support.

I’m sorry, but if that is what Romney said – and the transcript and the video (see 2:34) show that it is – I cannot see how conservatives can trust him to be strong in standing against the homosexual agenda, I just can’t. I’ve been part of this battle in my own state, and this is serious.

If you are a Romney supporter, I ask you to not simply brush this off or just attack me for supporting Huckabee. I know our guys are in a fierce fight in Iowa, but like so many of us have said, this race is about the issues. Coming from a guy who wants to support the Republican nominee and who wants to like Romney, I’m asking you to take an honest look at what I’ve shared. This is something voters have to consider.

For the record, Romney would be a fine nominee, but this information makes me wonder about his change in position on a variety of "social" issues, i.e., abortion, homosexual marriage, etc. I am alert to the kind of Federalism espoused by people like George Wallace; that is, Federalism that some use as a shield/distraction from suspect or squishy positions on controversial positions . . . like whether American apartheid was something within the purview of the Federal Constitution.

I fully appreciate the Federalist position, and I can appreciate the arguments from supporters of some GOP candidates--Thompson and McCain come to mind, that their respective candidate is more Conservative because said candidate acknowledges that there are limits on the power of the Federal government. But my conclusion that sexual proclivities or attractions are not immutable characteristics is rooted in my worldview, and Romney (in this particular context) seems to want Religious Conservatives to perceive that he shares (or has adopted) their worldview on a host of issues. I'm not sure that is an accurate perception.