Author Archives: Epluribusunum

Two days

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utah_marriageDuring the past 48 hours, we have learned that the Uganda legislature has passed what is one of the most draconian anti-civil rights bills targeting sexual minorities in the world – bookended between announcements that two more US states – New Mexico and Utah – are constitutionally prohibited from excluding same gender couples from civil marriage.

From the Salt Lake City Tribune this afternoon:

A federal judge in Utah Friday struck down the state’s ban on same-sex marriage, saying the law violates the U.S. Constitution’s guarantees of equal protection and due process.

“The state’s current laws deny its gay and lesbian citizens their fundamental right to marry and, in so doing, demean the dignity of these same-sex couples for no rational reason,” wrote U.S. District Court Judge Robert J. Shelby. “Accordingly, the court finds that these laws are unconstitutional.”

fischer_ugandaMeanwhile, Bryan Fischer, spokesperson for the American Family Association, was tweeting this about the situation in Uganda. I don’t know that we could have had a more timely and chilling reminder of the fact that as LGBTI people in the US move closer to attaining full civil rights, anti-gay activists who are rapidly losing ground here are focusing more of their lethal attention on our sisters and brothers in other countries.

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Crude ideas are not the same thing as a “marketing failure”

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Catholic high school students protest the dismissal of a popular gay vice-principal near Seattle

Catholic high school students protest the dismissal of a popular gay vice-principal near Seattle

In widely reported remarks broadcast December 1 on Meet the Press, Cardinal Timothy Dolan explained why the Catholic Church’s opposition to marriage equality has become marginalized this way: “Well, I think maybe we’ve been out-marketed, sometimes. We’ve been caricatured as being anti-gay.”

It was easy to ridicule the Cardinal’s use of the term “caricatured” due to the abundance of actual words uttered by church leaders denigrating LGBT people, words that were not put in their mouths by others. His real point, though, was that the church hasn’t yet figured out how to make the denigration pretty and shiny enough to make people want to buy it.

Now an editorial in the Catholic Reporter has responded to the interview, specifically the Cardinal’s regret over the “marketing failure.”

The cardinal, who lives on Madison Avenue, is within walking distance of some of the best marketers the world has ever known. If he looked to them for advice, they might suggest he begin with a focus group.

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Dick Black considering (or not) a run for Wolf seat

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How exciting! Add Dick Black’s name to the list of “noted conservative swashbucklers” allegedly vying to replace Frank Wolf that currently includes Tareq Salahi, Barbara Comstock, John Stirrup and Ken Cuccinelli. But we don’t know why he announced his exploratory committee on Facebook yesterday, only to then have the announcement quickly removed from Republican sites. The post below has been disappeared. Oops?

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For all the careful image management of retiring Frank Wolf as a “moderate” Republican (despite all evidence to the contrary BENGHAZI BENGHAZI BENGHAZI FEDERAL MARRIAGE AMENDMENT), it would seem that moderates are suddenly in short supply.

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Some people will just never be happy.

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singleI wouldn’t have thought that the dissembling by the anti-marriage crowd could get worse when they had to admit that Utah’s polygamy law wasn’t really overturned after all, but it just did.

The following arrived from Citizen Link:

It’s what many marriage supporters have been trying to point out for months: The redefinition of the institution could pave the path to legalized polygamy.

North Dakota Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem filed a legal opinion Thursday basically saying that a man who married another man in another state, may obtain a marriage license — with a woman — in North Dakota. That’s because same-sex marriage is not recognized in North Dakota.

Quite true, that last part. North Dakota was one of the states to pass a constitutional amendment back in 2004 restricting civil marriage to “man-woman couples” (we may wish to return to a discussion of how that happened).

Also, AG Stenehjem was responding to a hypothetical question. There is no actual man in a North Dakota case, a detail omitted by Citizen Link.

But it’s this framing, quoting a Breitbart columnist, that really impressed me with its capacity for expressing the exact opposite of reality by stating bald, incontrovertible facts. This is a work of art.

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Another day, another painfully dumb lie

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polygamyBecause what else can they do, really?

ACTIVIST JUDGE LEGALIZES POLYGAMY, JUST AS WE WARNED, screams the latest email from certified hate group “American Family Association” (mainly known at this time of year for their lucrative “war on Christmas” scam, in which they solicit donations by pretending the world will end if store clerks say “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas”).

Not so fast, cupcake. U.S. District Court Judge Clark Waddoups ruled on Friday that a family, “reality TV stars Kody Brown and his four ‘wives’,” can’t be prosecuted under Utah’s anti-polygamy law. But what does this actually mean?

The AFA’s hysterical email notwithstanding, here is what it clearly does not mean: the “redefinition of marriage” in Utah.

Judge Waddoups explicitly ruled that the prohibition of bigamy – “the fraudulent or otherwise impermissible possession of two purportedly valid marriage licenses for the purpose of entering into more than one purportedly legal marriage” – is not overturned.

Furthermore, the plaintiffs were not even seeking legal recognition for plural marriage. I am tempted to wonder here whether the bright legal minds over at AFA even bothered to read the opinion…oh, never mind. Of course they read the opinion.

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Can you spot manufactured outrage over “anti-Semitism”?

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Crown Heights riot, 1991

Crown Heights riot, 1991


In a previous post, Pariahdog explained the historical context and meaning of the anti-Semitic joke told by John Whitbeck to warm up a Republican crowd in September, and Whitbeck’s dismissive response to the outrage it generated. The joke itself embodied the historically lethal ideas of deicide, replacement theology and the “greedy Jew” stereotype: “And by anti-Semitic, I mean really anti-Semitic. It’s about Jews presenting the pope with the bill for the Last Supper, so it packs two of the most toxic anti-Jewish stereotypes into a single punchline: God-killers! Cheapskates!” In their ignorance, or perhaps their cultural hostility, Whitbeck and his supporters have tried to claim that the offense taken to both his joke and his non-apology was manufactured and politically motivated.

Now, the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn has given us a contrasting incident involving accusations of anti-Semitism.

In the Crown Heights incident, the offense was caused by New York Councilman-elect Laurie Cumbo when she made a statement about a recent cluster of “knockout game” attacks allegedly perpetrated by African American youth against Jews. In her initial statement, Cumbo suggested that resentment over “Jewish success” was a factor in the attacks, explaining that in conversations with constituents during her campaign “many African American/Caribbean residents expressed a genuine concern that as the Jewish community continues to grow, they would be pushed out by their Jewish landlords or by Jewish families looking to purchase homes.” The Anti-Defamation League responded:

“…we are troubled by the incoming councilwoman’s sentiments, particularly her comment about resentment over Jewish economic success, which evokes classic anti-Semitic stereotypes.”

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Loudoun Progress banner photos

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Descriptions and photo credits for our site banner.

At the National Day for Dignity and Respect event in Sterling, October 5 2013. Photo credit: Mike Eicher.
Self-explanatory.
Election Day in Lovettsville, November 6 2012. Photo credit: John Flannery.
Equality Loudoun float in the Leesburg Independence Day Parade, July 4 2008. Photo credit: Jonathan Weintraub.
At the annual Dr. Martin Luther King Day March in Leesburg, January 17 2011. Photo credit: Jonathan Weintraub.
Local food. Rural economy. Loudoun has some of the most fertile agricultural land in our nation. Photo credit: Crooked Run Orchard.

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Are you being persecuted?

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‘Tis the time of year when well-fed privileged people of a certain majority religious persuasion traditionally appear before our local government bodies to complain of “persecution” by “storm troopers,” or deface property, or snarl at innocent strangers who are merely trying to wish them well.

Rachel Held Evans, who is awesome, has provided a helpful chart for determining whether or not you are in fact a victim of religious persecution. Please consult it before inadvertently being offensive to those who actually know what that means.

Coming next: Is that a terrorist?

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Etch-A-Sketch Dave LaRock

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Blue Ridge Leader:

Editor: Recent letters by supporters of Dave LaRock have unintentionally revealed why their candidate is so afraid of public debates. In one letter responding to an account of a disturbing tirade about “Sharia law” made by Mr. LaRock at a Back-to-School night, Kristen Kalina first tries to claim that the conversation was “made up,” then offers the sorry admission that it must have taken place in a previous year, “when people were more focused on terrorism.” Her argument seems to be that while it was acceptable to spout off such extreme and ignorant rhetoric back in 2012 or 2011, now that he’s decided to run for public office Mr. LaRock would keep such bigotry to himself – and therefore his intemperate words back then shouldn’t be brought up.

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The trouble with Baskerville

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Trigger warning: Rape, domestic violence and child abuse denialism, victim-blaming.

Critics of Stephen Baskerville’s astonishing Faith and Reason lecture at Patrick Henry College last Friday have no shortage of material to cite. The lecture was such a departure from even the pretense of academic standards that it’s easy for critics to frame it as a mistake that no one should take seriously; surely the cause of this catastrophe is that the administration failed to vet it properly, and surely the students have the necessary skills to reject it. PHC alum David Sessions reaches out to those students in an open letter:

To say it was beneath the standards of charity, evidence, and logical rigor students at PHC should expect from their professors would be an understatement. But beyond its weaknesses as a piece of argumentation, it had darker moral undertones that should be emphasized and rebutted. Anyone committed to the Christian virtues of love, charity, forgiveness, and justice should be deeply suspicious of such a hostile condemnation of the voices of people who have been subjected to violence and discrimination in our society, and of those who have worked courageously and democratically to protect them.

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