Focus on the Family today mourned the NCAA’s cancellation of a Focus ad which implicitly shamed the parents of gay Americans.

The ad, which had been shown on the basketball tournament web site, insinuated that politically incorrect families — non-evangelicals, pro-choice families, and families of gay people — can’t “Celebrate Family” and “Celebrate Life” like everyone else.

The ad’s tagline further insinuated that fathers whose sons are not “right” for any reason are doomed to a life of disappointment — and that someone or something sinister should be blamed.

Focus failed to explain to its readers the many reasons why the NCAA found its ad offensive.

The Family Research Council today made the ludicrous claim that repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” will prevent ex-gay activists from converting gay soldiers to heterosexuality.

This legislation would more than open the Armed Forces to homosexuals; it would lead to a zero-tolerance policy toward anyone who disapproves of homosexuality. Will the chaplains’ sermons be censored? Would they have the freedom to counsel soldiers with same-sex attractions? Or would they be disqualified from the service altogether? For more on what this would mean to military quotas, don’t miss Ken Blackwell’s op-ed, “President Obama and Military ‘Corpsemen’” in Townhall.

By framing its false accusations as questions, FRC pollutes the public discourse and sidesteps its obligation to substantiate its allegations. FRC also sidesteps the U.S. Constitution — a document that FRC views with cynical contempt — and its guarantees of freedom of religion.

But even this concern about framing gives FRC far too much credit.

The contention that the armed services are chock-full of well-armed, effeminate ex-gay chaplains like Randy Thomas, just waiting to convert terrified and bullied (but masculine) gay soldiers to ex-gay “heterosexuality,” might be one of the saddest funniest things I’ve ever read from FRC.

Might be. Except, that DADT and its predecessor policy permit violent, mentally disturbed, antigay and ex-gay soldiers to not only serve, but murder their gay comrades. The same policy also preserves a servicewide culture of rape and sexual assault by antigay men against female servicemembers.

FRC silently condones a string of killings and assaults committed under DADT — it has never condemned any of the killings, nor called for punishment of antigay violence and harassment in the services. So when you read the ridiculous, irrational, and patently stupid claims of FRC, please restrain the urge to laugh.

Because murder in defense of stupidity is not something to laugh at.

Naked Came The Senator is quite obviously not ready for prime-time, as he seemed to sympathize (in public!) with Joseph Stack, the man who flew a plane into the IRS building in Houston last week. “Voters are frustrated,” you see.*

And now, it seems he’s gone and done another stupid thing, as he invited the SPLC-certified hate group MassResistance to a little breakfast meeting. Now, wingnuts might say “well, he’s just meeting with his consituents!” And I suppose that would technically be true. But there’s a difference between granting a meeting with an unhinged person like Brian Camenker (MassResistance’s leader) and actively reaching out to the entire hate group, which is what Scott Brown has done. Here’s the text of the e-mail MassResistance sent out, via Kyle at Right Wing Watch:

US Senator Scott Brown held an impromptu breakfast Feb. 20 in South Boston to connect with representatives of his grassroots activist supporters. It included key Republican activists, Tea Party activists, and others (even some Democrats). South Boston activists invited MassResistance to join the event as the major pro-family action group.

The Brown people seem well aware who his base is, and he genuinely wants to stay connected with them … The meeting was at the Playwright Restaurant and Bar on West Broadway. Brown strolled in a few minutes early with just an aide.

Sen. Brown mingled and spoke individually with people for quite a while. He talked about a range of topics. And he wanted us to feel comfortable contacting his office if we needed to, and said that he would represent the average person’s interests. Then everyone sat down and had breakfast. Later, he gave a short speech and left for his next appointment.

…

A meeting like this in Massachusetts is really quite astonishing. Although the liberals get this kind of meeting all the time (e.g., the current governor regularly meeting with MassEquality), the idea of a U.S. Senator (or any major politician) sitting down with real conservative activists is simply unheard of. Certainly no recent Republican governor – Bill Weld, Paul Cellucci, Jane Swift, or Mitt Romney – would have ever done this. They often met with liberal activists, but they were uncomfortable around conservatives and kept them at a distance.

But Brown’s message was that he’s willing to listen to us and take us seriously. And despite years of politics and sudden national fame, he hasn’t become elitist or condescending — which also makes him an oddity among politicians here.

Nice!

Again: SPLC-certifed hate group. Invited by Naked Came the Senator. For break-y-poo. Adorable.

So…I’m curious! Is this what all you gay wingnuts were fighting for, as you positively slobbered over the sexy naked man with the truck leading up to and after his election? Was this part of the plan? Really. Spin it for me. Tell me how this is all really okay. Defend your captors.

Hm?

*Terrorism is okay with wingnuts when it’s THEIR KIND of terrorism. It’s important to understand these kinds of things about wingnuts.

The Ugandan tabloid Red Pepper is an instrument of that nation’s ruling family, and it is periodically used by corrupt Uganda evangelicals — among them, Martin Ssempa — to mobilize vigilantes to violently attack and kill dissident pastors and human-rights advocates as well as LGBT people. Truth Wins Out has previously reported on Red Pepper, and Box Turtle Bulletin has substantial additional detail.

The tabloid’s stunning defamatory article about prosperity preacher Benny Hinn, while timely in its publication alongside Hinn’s pending divorce, is likely an attempt by rival evangelicals to destroy Hinn.

As despicable as Hinn may be for his worship of mammon and his trivialization of spirituality, this tabloid is NOT to be trusted.

It is becoming clear that Minnesota’s Republican governor, Tim Pawlenty, is a politician so craven and amoral, that he is challenging Mitt Romney for the distinction of biggest phony.

For example, in 2007, he called the issue of climate change “one of the biggest of our time.” Now he has flip-flopped, questioning the impact humans have had on this phenomenon.

It seems he will say and do anything in his transparent effort to pander to the Tea Party crowd.

Last week at the Conservative Political Action Conference, Pawlenty posed as the new God Squad commander. In a speech, he laid out principles conservatives should follow. The first one is this:

“God’ in charge,” he said. “God is in charge.” Mr. Pawlenty’ remarks drew a wave of applause, according to The New York Times. “There are some people who say, “Oh, you know, Pawlenty, don’t bring that up. You know, it’ politically incorrect. Hogwash.”

Um, yeah, it was real risky to have a God bullet point in a speech to CPAC. What next, a “politically incorrect” vow to cut taxes? This guy represents everything people hate about politics. He stands for nothing except his own career and access to power.

He is such a toady, that at CPAC he shed his mild-mannered and usually boring approach to transform into “Pitchfork Pawlenty.”

“When you listen to the elites and the pundits talk about the Tea Party movement, or they talk about us as conservatives, they may not always say it explicitly,” he said. “But implicit in their comments are, you know, maybe they’re not as sophisticated, because a lot of them didn’t go to the Ivy League schools. Or you know, they’re from places like the heartland, not ‚Äî you know, they don’t hang out at our Chablis-drinking, Brie-eating parties in San Francisco.”

“And the implication is, you know, we’re kind of bumpkins,” Mr. Pawlenty said.

I’m sure pampered Pawlenty is running around the governor’s mansion eating Oscar Meyer wieners and washing them down with bathtub moonshine. What a phony!!

What bothers me is the divisiveness of his speech. Instead of bringing Americans together, his entire presidential run appears to be about pitting people against each other and weakening the fabric of America. Does he not care about the affect this will have on the cohesion of this country? Is his own personal ambition more important than keeping America unified?

Pawlenty’s crass stereotypes of people from the East Coast and San Francisco are laughable. We don’t sit around making fun of people in the Midwest who eat at the Waffle House. In fact, many of us love the Waffle House, okra and Cracker Barrel.

What we don’t understand, however, is what these people have against Chablis and brie (or arugula). Is it the taste? The name? It certainly can’t be the price, as I have been to many expensive steakhouses in the Midwest and eaten at a fancy restaurant in Pawlenty’s Minneapolis.

I want to set the record straight on who we actually do make fun of.

We mock fake politicians and those who are too closed-mindedness — as if they are too “manly” — to try new food or beverages, even if they might enjoy them. San Franciscans and New Yorkers rarely deride anyone simply because they are from a different geographic region or did not attend an Ivy League school. (I went to University of Florida and my partner is from rural Nebraska). So, Pawlenty ought to stop deliberately misrepresenting large swaths of this nation – particularly if he wants to be president of the United States of America.

Finally, I suspect, conservative Republicans like their Brie and Chablis the way they like their homosexual sex — often and in the closet. Fakes – like Pawlenty – are sophisticated, cosmopolitan and usually have highbrow culinary tastes. It is the Minnesota governor who mocks social conservatives as bumpkins when he poses as a simpleton and grovels for their votes.

And, quite frankly, the people of CPAC are only considered unsophisticated and naive when they are duped into buying Pawlenty’s transparent hillbilly act.

African violence against the LGBT community is partially the result of American anti-gay and “ex-gay” activists stirring the pot in countries such as Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda. We all know that Exodus International’s board member Don Schmierer was at a Spring 2009 conference in Kampala that helped lead to the notorious Anti-Homosexuality Bill.

However, Truth Wins Out’s research team revealed today that another American “ex-gay” organization, Homosexuals Anonymous, had a conference in Kenya in November 2009. It was led by Doug McIntyre, HA’s Director. According to the organization’s October 2009 newsletter:

On November 3, 2009 the Director of HAFS will begin a visit to the beautiful country of Kenya. We have been invited to begin a new work for the HA program and educate the members of a two thousand member church so that they can begin to reclaim the lost youth of the area. An invitation has been extended to teach in 15 local schools and participate in a leadership training program for nearly 200 pastors and church leaders.

While it remains unclear what happened at this particular HA event, a disturbing patten has seemingly developed. Ex-gay activists appear in African countries right before spasms of violence and persecution erupt.

Is this a mere coincidence or is the groundwork being laid for attacks on LGBT people? Are American ex-gays being used as a means to justify terror tactics and horror against innocent people? Do American “ex-gay” activists allow dangerous regimes and frothing mobs to rationalize violence by claiming, “these people deserve what they get because they can change?”

Truth Wins Out left a message this morning for HA to obtain more information on the group’s role in Kenya. They have yet to return our call.

The BBC reports that Kenyan police have released five people arrested for planning a “gay wedding” north of Mombasa, saying there was no evidence to prosecute them. But police spokesman Martha Mutegi told the BBC the men had been advised to leave the area for their own safety and to avoid angering the local community.

There are, however, those who dispute the BBC report. They claim that a gay wedding never actually took place and that the event was a fabrication in order for anti-forces to incite mob violence.

Homosexuality is illegal in Kenya and punishable by up to 14 years in jail. A BBC reporter in Mombasa says police began a crackdown on the gay community last week following anti-gay protests.

Perhaps it is time that American ex-gay activists stay home and stop creating mischief overseas. (Here is a glimpse of the type of false and destructive message that was brought to Kenya)

In new video, Frank Mugisha of Sexual Minorities Uganda confirms that U.S. ex-gay activists met with members of the Uganda Parliament and claimed that international homosexuals were out to “recruit” Ugandan children.

Hat tip: Box Turtle Bulletin

Rabbi Denise L. Eger warned the Jewish Community about convicted felon Arthur Goldberg (aka Arthur Abba Goldberg, Arthur A. Goldberg), who was a mini-Madoff on Wall Street before being jailed.

After his probation ended, Goldberg found a new group of people to con – gay Jews and their families. Goldberg co-founded Jews Offering New Alternatives to Homosexuality (JONAH). Rabbi Eger took this slippery charlatan to task on her blog:

He was a financier who bilked people of millions of dollars. Even though he was disbarred he holds out his Law degree–Juris Doctor as some kind of credential. And yet he set up JONAH and pretends to be an expert. Far from it. The Ex-gay industry regularly uses outdated and disproven research to base its “therapy” upon. Goldberg and his ilk are the real frauds forcing their particular brand of lies upon desperate and sometimes very fragile people who desparately want love and acceptance while unable to embrace their full selves.

The truth is that God made us who we are. B’tzelem Elohim–we are made in the image of God. That is the truth that should win out for everyone. We in the Jewish community must expose such chicanery and lies that are done in the name of our tradition. And we must demand that con men like Goldberg that continue to practice their criminal behaviors of con jobs must be held accountable.

Once a con man always a con man. BEWARE!

Rabbi Denise L. Eger is the founding rabbi of Congregation Kol Ami: West Hollywood’ Reform Synagogue. She is a currently the Board President of the Southern California Board of Rabbis.

To mix a few metaphors, when Brit Hume sticks his foot in his mouth, he just keeps digging!

(Pause while you form that mental picture. Got it?)

A few weeks back Brit Hume made headlines by dropping any pretense he had left that he was a journalist of some sort, and suggesting that in order for Tiger Woods to fix his mistakes, he should abandon his Buddhist faith and become a Christian. (This, despite the fact that on most counts, practicing Buddhists mop the floor with practicing Christians when it comes to morality.) Well, now he’s gone and done it again. After Tiger’s press conference where he said “Sorry about all the sex, y’all,” he said that he had “lost track” of the teachings of his faith.

So that should be the end of the story, right? Oh, but no. Brit Hume decided to go on television and say this instead:

I thought Tiger Woods showed himself in that presentation to be a shaken, chastened, and contrite man. And gone was the swagger. Gone was all of the radiant self-confidence that we used to see in him. This was a pretty shaken guy up there.

Now look, I think, because I’m a Christian and I believe that Christianity is true, that Tiger Woods and his wife Elin would be a lot farther down the road toward forgiveness and redemption if they were both Christians, but they’re not. And I — they’re going to do the best they can with what they have. And I wish Tiger Woods well.

Oh fergawdsake. Now it’s a pissing contest over which religion brings redemption faster?

Christianity: I can forgive you all the way past that tree!

Buddhism: Grow up, dude.

Weekly Column

It is generally understood that today’ youth are more supportive of equality for gay and lesbian people. Faced with losing the next generation, fundamentalists are ferociously scrambling to capture the minds of youth through homeschooling and the subversion of public education. By sequestering students at home or creating public schools where the only drink served in the cafeteria is Kool-Aid, they hope to reprogram tomorrow’ leaders.

It appears America’ religious fanatics are modeling their efforts on the success of radical Islamists in the Middle East, who reversed the trend of secularization in the region by hijacking education. New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman recently wrote about this phenomenon:

Beginning in the 1970s, the trend in Yemen, Morocco, Egypt and the Persian Gulf “was to Islamicize education as a way to fight the left…”

…Then, in 1979, after the Saudi ruling family was shaken by an attack in Mecca from its own Wahabi fundamentalists, the Saudi regime, to fend off the anger of its Wahabis, gave them free rein to Islamicize education and social life in Saudi Arabia and neighboring states.

The rest is a very sad and tragic history.

In America, according to the Aug. 7, 2009 edition of The Economist magazine, the number of children who are home-schooled—1.5 million—has doubled in the past decade, and 83 percent of home-schooling families do so for religious or moral reasons.

It is important to realize that the goal of many in the homeschooling movement is to create an army of zealot zombies who are committed to transforming America into a fundamentalist “Christian Nation.”

“We are not home-schooling our kids just so they can read,” said Michael Farris, the founder of the Home School Legal Defense. “The most common thing I hear is parents telling me they want their kids to be on the Supreme Court. And if we put enough kids in the farm system, some may get to the major leagues.”

Many of the cult-kiddies are coming of age and have already infiltrated Washington. Homeschoolers are well represented on Capitol Hill, and they played a disproportionate role in George W. Bush’ administration.

While many of these students are educated in terms of test scores, they may lack critical thinking skills. In a sense, they are like computers with large hard drives that have been programmed with faulty software. No matter how fast they compute they always arrive at same flawed conclusions based on the Biblical bugs planted early in their memory chips.

For example, Children’ Conferences International hosts events across the nation for homeschoolers. Their “2010 theme” is science fiction, except to keep the minds of the children pure there will be no extraterrestrials allowed.

“Parents won’t have to worry about their children learning about aliens or some mysterious force in this fun filled futuristic space age theme,” according to their website. “Children WILL learn important life lessons about trusting God, faith over atheism, and the dangers of being enamored by the world.”

Instead of E.T. and space, these poor children have to endure crazy, spaced out adults determined to strip-mine their minds and corrupt their imaginations. In my view, this is a form of child abuse and deprives these students of real childhood experiences, while making them closed-minded.

Of course, funneling children into homeschooling is not enough for these predators. In order to succeed, the extreme right must hijack the curriculum of public schools. They are already making serious inroads in Texas, with zealots on the state school board rewriting history textbooks. This is vitally important because Texas is such a large consumer of textbooks, that they essentially have the ability to set the standards for much of the nation. So, if history is rewritten in Austin, the revisions will likely appear in your state as well.

One leader of the public school putsch, according to a recent cover story in The New York Times Magazine, is Cynthia Dunbar, a member of the Texas Board of Education. In 2008, she published a book called, “One Nation Under God” where she wrote: “Hence, the only accurate method of ascertaining the intent of the Founding Fathers is from a biblical worldview.” She also stated, “this battle for our nation’ children and who will control their education and training is crucial to our success for reclaiming our nation.”

For all of her passion, Dunbar is opposed to public education, writing of, “The inappropriateness of a state-created taxpayer-supported school system,” and says that sending children to public schools is akin to, “throwing them into the enemy’ flames, even as the children of Israel threw their children to Molech.”

Clearly, Dunbar’ real agenda is infiltrating the school system in order to destroy it.

When it comes to support, the next generation was supposed to be a wash. However, this successful trajectory is threatened if we allow today’ youth to be brainwashed. While paying attention to school boards is boring, it must become a priority for all Americans who want schools to be about education instead of indoctrination.