On Thursday, February 5, the U.S. Senate took up an amendment introduced by Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) to strip church-state protections from the stimulus bill. The amendment failed 43 to 54 ...
Lieberman was one of 43 voting in favor of DeMint's unconstitutional amendment. Here's what happened:
On Tuesday, the American Center for Law and Justice, created by Pat Robertson ... "discovered" a provision in the stimulus bill that "unfairly targets religious activity at universities and colleges that receive federal stimulus funds."
In fact, the provision "discovered" by the ACLJ has been included in legislation for decades, and has been upheld by the Supreme Court. It prevents federal funds from being used to construct buildings, like chapels, designed for religious worship or sectarian instruction. It's perfectly in keeping with the spirit of the First Amendment and prevents taxpayer dollars from being used to take sides on religion by funding some groups' worship facilities.
Clearly, Lieberman was trying to win brownie points with the John Hagee crowd. To really understand why this amendment was introduced, check out this report at People for the American Way.
The loons came out of the woodwork for the recent Judiciary Committee hearing on the marriage equality bill. Easily the most bizarre and colorful testimony came from Robert Muckle, Vice President of Connecticut Right to Life. In this video, I've added visual aids to help flesh out his unique arguments.
Muckle was only one of many eccentric, homophobic, and unintentionally comic speakers to grace the hearing. The video below highlights some of the more entertaining and disturbing representatives of the anti-gay fringe. The final speaker is particularly over the top. They demonstrate that one of the best ways to win the marriage equality debate is to let the opposition speak - in a loud, spontaneous, and unguarded fashion.
It seems that a month into Democratic control of Congress - and about a month into the 2008 Presidential campaign season (for better or worse) - conservatives have finally gotten the hang of attacking again. Just looking over some of the stories on MLN recently, their issues have a very similar quality to them:
Shays going berserk on a woman whose son - a military contractor - died in Iraq for want of promised body armor and other protections;
The FIC and similar groups opposing the Compassionate Care bill, mandating that rape victims be offered emergency contraception at any hospital providing emergency services;
The lashing out against extending marriage rights to same-sex couples;
Haranguing Obama over being educated in an Indonesian school for part of his childhood;
It can seem frustrating to progressives (it certainly frustrates me!) to debate these matters with those who seem congenitally incapable of understanding the "other side" of the matter: Shays manages to gloss over the lack of promised safety materials in his rush to pin blame on those killed in Iraq, FICers are unable to comprehend how difficult it might be for a rape victim to get to any treatment facility (and how unreasonable it is to force them to "shop around" to avoid a pregnancy by their rapist), why same-sex couples might want the rights of marriage, or even something as simple as how cultural conditions in other societies influence the sorts of schools available for children.
What we're watching is a conservative war on empathy - where the ability to understand and identify with an unfamiliar situation is being systematically beaten out of public discourse.
Of course, the ongoing crises in Iraq and New Orleans are iconic of this specific moral failing; however, that local governments see the officially-sanctioned treatment of Julie Amero and Ken Krayeske as acceptable illustrates that this is not a problem limited to the world of national politics, but is pervasive even at the most local levels.
I linked to this article just a couple posts down, but I wanted to highlight its conclusion:
Conscience is a tricky business. Some interpret its personal beacon as the guide to universal truth and undoubtedly many of the health care providers who refuse to treat or refer or inform their patients do so in the sincere belief that it is in the patients' own interests, regardless of how those patients might view the matter themselves. But the assumption that one's own conscience is the conscience of the world is fraught with dangers.
As C.S. Lewis wrote, "Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience."
The religious right must be in shock at this report:
A small jet carrying U.S. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy from a commencement speech in western Massachusetts to his Cape Cod home on Saturday was struck by lightning and had to be diverted to New Haven, Conn., a Kennedy spokeswoman said.
The eight-seat Cessna Citation 550 lost all electrical power, including communications, and the pilot had to fly the plane manually, according to Melissa Wagoner, Kennedy's press secretary. No one was hurt.
A few more near-misses like this and God's reputation will be shot for good.
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