About Me

Name: Playful Walrus
Biography
Loading...

Create Your Own Blog Find Other Townhall Blogs

Comments

Tweeting For the Donkey

According to this story by Don Thompson, Associated Press writer, the Twitter service shows favoritism towards the Democrats who may run to replace California Governor Schwarzenegger.

Tags: Bias   twitter  
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

If Health Insurance is a Right

...how can states opt out of providing it?

Answer: It isn't a right.

Now Pelosi and others are trying to get us to stop calling the proposed government program the "public option".

Okay, let's choose one of the following...
1. The Unconstitutional New Federal Government Expansion
2. The Welfare Option
3. The Punish Those Who Make Money Option
4. The Fairy Tale Option
5. The Buy More Crackhead Votes Option
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Xenuphobic?

I caught this Associated Press story, reporting that a big time Oscar-winning Hollywood director has cut ties with the Church of Scientology after 35 years "in part" because of the organization's stand against marriage neutering. Checking around, I found a blog called "Moving on Up a Little Higher", which upon my cursory examination appears to be run by someone who believes somewhat in the precepts of Scientology, but not the current leadership of the organization.

The blog reprinted the director's letter, and it was clear that the director was angry about someone running a significant part of the organization not publicly condemning the San Diego chapter's support for the California Marriage Amendment. The director equates support of traditional marriage with "gay-bashing", and calls people like us "bigots, hypocrites, and homophobes". I don’t fall into any of those categories myself, though I can't vouch for everyone who understands the basic notions that marriage unites a bride and a groom and that we, the people, should have a say on state licensing.

The director intended the letter to remain private (which is why I am not repeating his name), but it is circulating online now, probably in a bid to support the marriage neutering cause. Privacy? What privacy? All must be sacrificed in the pursuit of homosexuality advocacy and esteem, which reaffirms what I wrote in my previous blog entry.

When I first caught the AP story, I thought it a bit strange that someone who supposedly thought this church as good enough to associate with for 35 years should be abandoned because of their stance on marriage - apparently making his personal feelings more authoritative than church doctrine and authority. But as I said, there is more to the story, and there is more beyond the fact that it was a San Diego chapter involved, not the whole organization.

The majority of the director's concern seems to be about the organization's culture and the actions of leadership, with the marriage issue simply being how his eyes were opened. He specifically refers to the organization's "disconnection”"practice, in which people are encouraged to shun family members who have left the organization. He also cites active human rights abuses by the organization, and publicizing of "private details from confessionals" to try to discredit former executives who criticized actions undertaken within the organization.

Yet it was the marriage issue that garnered attention.

I'm glad the director left the organization, even though he is wrong about people like me. Although I recognize that people should be free to join such an organization if they choose, and while I welcome support of traditional marriage and voter rights, I am no fan of the organization as I notice that some of its teachings are in direct contradiction to my own core beliefs. I'm also aware of the some of the tactics used by the organization that strike me as cultish behavior. That is something I believe goes back to the founding of the organization and is not something unique to current leadership.

Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Are Political Petitions Private?

As homofascists seek to harass and intimidate marriage defenders, one of the many legal questions that has arisen has essentially been, as David G. Savage and Carol J. Williams report in the Los Angeles Times:
Is signing a petition and delivering it to the government a public act, like voting on a bill in the legislature or contributing money to a campaign? Or is it more like casting a secret ballot at the polling place?
In the case of Washington State, the Supreme Court of the United States has sought to protect marriage defenders, siding more with the "secret ballot" side.

Marriage neutering activists, however, are eager to get their hands on names of marriage defenders:
Toleos said, "We don't ask people to go confront strangers. This is about finding someone they already know -- a cousin, a friend and co-worker -- and having a civil dialogue."
A civil dialogue? More often then not, when someone I've known has encouraged me to join with them in a move to neuter marriage, and I've declined, no matter our history, the person has been likely to unleash expletive-laden tirades attacking me personally. They insist that me not subjugating my own convictions to their personal desires is akin to hating them and bidding them ill. By the way, I decline their invitation without disparaging or expressing any disapproval of homosexual behavior or the person.

The mainstream news media has reported targeting of marriage defenders and retaliation against them. Considering the bias most of these newsrooms have demonstrated in sympathy towards the marriage neutering cause, where are the reports of marriage neutering advocates being targeted by marriage defenders? Don't see a lot of that, now do we? Just imagine we behaved as they have behaved. The ACLU would be calling for the Justice Department to get involved.

It would be a shame if we all balkanized and retreated into enclaves, only working for employers who agreed with us, only using businesses where everyone agreed with us, only living in neighborhoods where everyone agreed with us, quizzing our friends on their votes and cutting them off if they didn't swear on a stack of chocolate they voted our way. If we are truly to be a tolerant society, we're going to have to exist together.

If I see a bumper sticker that indicates the driver is a marriage neutering advocate, I have no inclination to be any less polite to them than I would be to anyone else. Can marriage neutering advocates reading this say the same thing about learning someone is a marriage defender?

Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Attention Voters of Maine: Vote Yes on 1

Your time to be heard has come. You can have your say, and vote your conscience. There's nothing hateful or bigoted about honoring marriage in our state laws. Do not be intimidated or bullied.

Remember to vote, and to vote "YES" on 1. This will protect your state's marriage law from the neutering actions of your legislature. State-issued marriage licenses are issued on YOUR behalf, and if you think marriage unites a bride and a groom, or if you do not want your official state policy to be that coitus (the heterosexual behavior that created all of us in the first place) is no different than homosexual sodomy, then you have good reason to vote "YES". State law applies to all – state-issued licenses are not a private matter. This does have an impact on you.

I go over the case for voting "Yes" on 1 over at The Opine Editorials. Check it out.

Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

What Are Love Crimes, Anyway?

Associated Press writer Jim Abrams has the story on newly approved hate crimes legislation.  The misleading headline says "Congress Extends Hate Crime Protections to Gays".
Physical attacks on people based on their sexual orientation will join the list of federal hate crimes in a major expansion of the civil rights-era law Congress approved Thursday and sent to President Barack Obama.
If this is truly written and will be enforced as prosecuting people for attacks based on sexual orientation, than it applies just as much to heterosexual people as it does to homosexual people, correct? We'll see it if actually works out that way. But I thought physical attacks were already illegal?
The measure is named for Matthew Shepard, the gay Wyoming college student murdered 11 years ago.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but weren't his murderers convicted, and rightly so? So it isn't like this law closes a loophole. Murder and assault are illegal already.
To assure its passage after years of frustrated efforts, Democratic supporters attached the measure to a must-pass $680 billion defense policy bill the Senate approved 68-29. The House passed the defense bill earlier this month.
This is why I take it with grain of salt when someone says something like "My opponent voted against funding our troops." What else was in the bill the opponent voted down?
Conservatives have opposed it, arguing that it creates a special class of victims.
Those who harm others in anything other than an act of self defense or correctly carrying out military action or law enforcement should be prosecuted, regardless of the identity of the victim.
Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, the nation's largest gay rights group, hailed the bill as "our nation's first major piece of civil rights legislation for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. Too many in our community have been devastated by hate violence."
As opposed to "love violence"? Hey, Joe - what about domestic and date violence in "your community"?
The measure also provides federal grants to help state and local governments prosecute hate crimes and funds programs to combat hate crimes committed by juveniles.
Why? Why should money be taken away from, say California taxpayers, and given to Mississippi prosecutors?
The FBI says more than half of reported hate crimes are motivated by racial bias. Next most frequent are crimes based on religious bias, at around 18 percent, and sexual orientation, at 16 percent.
So even though religion was supposedly already a protected class, more crimes were being committed based on a victim's religion rather than the "unprotected" sexual orientation category. So more people are highly motivated to attack someone based on their religion rather than sexual orientation? (The number of criminals is more relevant to the statistic than the number of potential victims.) Something else to notice - way more than 16% of the population disapproves of or is downright disgusted at the thought of homosexual behavior, and a far higher percentage of that understands that marriage united the sexes. Yet these people obviously aren't going out and beating people up or destroying their property. Racism is rather weak these days, and yet it apparently motivates far more crimes than disapproval of sexual orientation. So the the "community" is already way ahead in this game.
"Nothing in this legislation diminishes an American's freedom of religion, freedom of speech or press or the freedom to assemble," said Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md. "Let me be clear. The Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act targets acts, not speech."
We'll see.

Bottom line: thugs need to be prosecuted and incarcerated, regardless of their suspected motivations. If local or state law enforcement isn't dealing correctly with the criminal, then the victim - not other people who share a characteristic who were not assaulted - is having his or her rights violated.

Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (1) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

It Does Take a Mom and Dad

While there is asexual reproduction in nature, God (or Nature, or Chance, if you are a theophobe) has given humanity sexual reproduction. This basic fact of biology is apparently lost on the author of a letter printed in today's Los Angeles Times. My analysis is over at The Opine Editorials.

Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

I Need Obamacare

...like a fish needs a bicycle.

Deborah Kotz's piece in U.S. News & World Report provides more evidence of what I wrote earlier – that some are trying to use Obamacare to punish men, especially men whose lifestyle keeps them healthy.
Supporting the government's healthcare reform efforts should be a no-brainer if you're a woman.
Specifically, a woman who is looking to punish men for being born male, and use government force to do it.
That's according to Marcia Greenberger, copresident of the National Women's Law Center, who testified at a Senate hearing last week that the health insurance industry is rife with "unfair and discriminatory practices... including gender rating, the exclusion of healthcare services that only women need, and pre-existing-condition denials."
And why do men and women get treated differently? She answers her own question...
Women get charged more, Greenberger tells me, because they see doctors more often than men do--at least before age 55.
So even people who admit the truth about this still want to make things "equal" by pretending there isn’t a difference.

Hey, don't homosexual people have higher health care costs, too? Yeah, so if you oppose Obamacare it must mean you hate the poor, women, people of color, LGBTQQUAIPP* people, substance abusers, and overeaters. You hateful bigot. You should be lining up to shell out more money so that some women you don't know can get an addadictomy.
"While some companies do charge men more from ages 55 to 65, at which point Medicare kicks in, others continue to charge women more or just give very small price breaks," she says.
Woah – where is the outrage over this?
The insurance industry, however, says it also supports fixing this problem.
Of course they do. They'll be glad if they can not only force people to buy their insurance, but force men to pay the higher rates, too.
Reproductive rights groups, like Planned Parenthood, have been launching offensives this week to ignite a little activism.
Planned Parenthood butchers babies. I just thought I would take this opportunity to point that out. Taking health care advice from a mass murderer doesn't strike me as a good idea.


(*Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgendered, Q-eer, Questioning, Undecided, Asexual, Incestuous, Polyamorous, Promiscuous)

Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (1) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Maine Marriage Neutering Update

Hey, what a surprise - the fight over marriage in Maine looks a lot like it did in California, as Bob Drogin reports in the Los Angeles Times. My analysis of his article is up at The Opine Editorials.

Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

The Vatican Reaches Out to Conservative Anglicans

Looks like Anglicans not happy with the direction of their denomination will find it easier to be accepted into the Roman Catholic Church. Associated Press writer Nicole Winfield has the story.
The Vatican announced a stunning decision Tuesday to make it easier for Anglicans to convert, reaching out to those who are disaffected by the election of women and gay bishops to join the Catholic Church's conservative ranks.
It is not simply "gay bishops". It is a matter of putting people in places of leadership who openly and unrepentantly violate Biblical morality in their behavior, the mocking of marriage, and the celebrating of those two things.
Pope Benedict XVI approved a new church provision that will allow Anglicans to join the Catholic Church while maintaining many of their distinctive spiritual and liturgical traditions, including having married priests.
I wonder what traditional Roman Catholics think about that?
The new Catholic church entities, called personal ordinariates, will be units of faithful established within local Catholic Churches, headed by former Anglican prelates who will provide spiritual care for Anglicans who wish to be Catholic.

They would most closely resemble Catholic military ordinariates, special units of the church established in most countries to provide spiritual care for the members of the armed forces and their dependents.
Interesting.
Anglicans split with Rome in 1534 when English King Henry VIII was refused a marriage annulment.
I know that’s the standard, drive-by schoolbook portrayal of the situation, but would Anglicans describe it that way? I'm not an Anglican or a Roman Catholic, and I haven't really been keeping up on the finer points of the differences in their practice and doctrines. While my basic first impression is, "Hey, now that Henry is long dead, why can't they get back together?" But there's a lot more history than that.
The new canonical provision allows married Anglican priests and even seminarians to become ordained Catholic priests - much the same way that Eastern rite priests who are in communion with Rome are allowed to be married. However, married Anglicans couldn't become Catholic bishops.
In contrast, it is strongly expected in "evangelical" Protestant circles that the leaders and teachers be married.
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Another Look at California’s Initiative Process

Joe Mathews, an Irvine senior fellow at the New America Foundation, is the latest voice in the Los Angeles Times calling for changes in California’s voter initiative system. He cites recent comments for California Chief Justice Ronald M. George, before going on to write...
With ballot initiatives, voters can set in cement laws and constitutional amendments that will govern the state long after they are dead or have moved away, even if a new majority of Californians would like something different.
Uh, that's what subsequent ballot initiatives can address, or even old-fashioned legislation by the state legislature.
Such a direct democracy isn't worthy of the name. It isn't very direct, and it isn't particularly democratic.
Huh? All registered voters can directly vote on something. You can't get more of a direct democracy than that.

Bowing the public sentiment which favors keeping the system, he calls for reforming the system rather than abolishing it.
Successful reform in this area should not restrict voters or lawmakers. It should seek to free them, and give them more power and discretion -- but it should do so in ways that allow better checks and balances. This could be accomplished with four changes to the current system: Make initiatives subject to the same rules as legislation.

This would mean that, like bills in the Legislature, initiatives would be submitted to the legislative counsel's office for vetting. The drafter of any initiative that added to state or local budgets would have to convince that office that the measure proposed enough revenue to cover those costs.
No. Opponents of the ballot measure can point out the lack of revenue source as a reason to vote no.
More important, initiatives would no longer be immune from legislative amendment. Any initiative that passed could be amended or eliminated by the Legislature after being in place for two years -- the length of a legislative session.
This defeats the whole purpose.
As a corollary, any initiative that seeks to impose supermajority requirements would itself have to pass by a supermajority.
Really? We don't have those kinds of stipulations for other aspects of laws.
Currently, an amendment may be added with a simple majority vote of the people. But the constitution cannot be revised except by a two-thirds vote of the Legislature and a vote of the people. This dynamic -- making it easier to add than to edit -- is one reason California's Constitution has grown so long.
Why aren't these critics complaining about how many laws there are in general? New laws are always being added. So why is having a long constitution bad?

Again, he calls for the legislature to have more involvement, defeating the purpose:
Under the current system, the Legislature holds hearings on each initiative, but there is no formal mechanism for negotiations between initiative sponsors and lawmakers. There should be. An initiative that gains enough signatures should first be put to an up-or-down vote by the Legislature. In addition, lawmakers should be able to offer amendments that an initiative sponsor may accept or reject.
No.
Reform to the initiative process must also address an oft-neglected tool of California's direct democracy, the referendum -- a measure that permits voters to undo an act of the Legislature.
I agree, but wouldn’t that mean it would be easier for voters to "take away rights" the legislature just granted someone?
The signature-gathering standard for a referendum should be lowered substantially, perhaps to 1% of the number of votes cast in the most recent gubernatorial election.
Eh... I don't see a need for this.

As I have said here, here, here, here, and here, California needs to be split up. All of this other talk amounts to arguing over how the deck chairs should be arranged on Titanic.

Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Truths

In no particular order, here are some important truths...
  • Not all problems are going to be solved in this lifetime.
  • There are not only other - but better - ways to solve most problems than by a federal government program.
  • The Constitution tells the federal government what it can do; otherwise, the federal government isn’t to interfere. If you want the government to get involved in something not currently assigned to it by the Constitution, then amend the Constitution.
  • Unconstitutional government involvement usually begets more unconstitutional government involvement.
  • Capitalism is unavoidable. The more restrictions placed on it, the smaller the percentage of the population that will be able to use their resources to the fullest and enjoy the fruits of their work the way they see fit; only the elite, connected, wealthy, or criminal will be able to circumvent the restrictions.
  • Some people are going to make more out of their resources than others, and they shouldn’t be punished for doing so. People should be celebrated for making the most of the resources under their control.
  • With free markets, the pie gets bigger for everyone.
  • Someone else having more money than you is not automatically evidence of injustice.
  • Disagreeing with President Obama’s proposals and decisions does not make someone a racist.
  • People who judge other people on the natural color of their skin are being foolish.
  • As long as they are minors, your kids are your responsibility. You chose to make them; they didn’t choose it, and nobody else chose to make your kids. This means that some things you want will have to take a back seat to what your kids need.
  • I don't blame women for the evils of men, but I don't blame men for the evils of women. I blame people for their own sins - including myself for my own.
  • Having your genitals surgically altered, taking hormones, dressing differently, and calling yourself by a different name does not really change your sex.
  • There are things more evil in this world than hypocrisy. Getting busted for doing an evil you have preached against means you should haven’t done that thing, not that you shouldn’t have preached against it. Someone who does that thing and fails to speak the truth by preaching against it is not more noble. This word is frequently misused, as it means saying one thing while believing something contrary. People do things they know are wrong all of the time. People also have done things in the past that they thought were OK but now they know better, and say so. In neither case are these people hypocrites, especially not in the second case.
  • Not all cultures are equal. Some cultures are better than others. The primary mission of American education should be to pass down American culture to the next generation.
  • If you came to this country, then clearly you like something about our culture enough that you bothered to come here, and you should adopt our culture instead of subverting it.
  • That you don’t like the way the world seems to be is not proof that God doesn’t exist.
  • Whether or not Jesus Christ lives or is Lord is not determined by what any professor, politician, preacher, performer, or scientist thinks. 
  • Believing that some people will go to Hell is not the same as taking steps to hasten their arrival.
  • I will not try to force my religion down your throat, but I will represent myself with my vote and other political actions.
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Attention Public Option Supporters

Are you concerned about the uninsured and people who are struggling with health care costs? Did you know you can help provide medical care to those people RIGHT NOW by donating your money, time, and other resources to medical charities and nonprofits? Are you doing that?

Since you can already voluntarily donate to such health care efforts, than if you support the "public option", that means you want to do one or both of the following:

1. FORCE other people to pay for YOUR health care.
2. FORCE other people to pay for the health care of SOMEONE ELSE.

How is that fair? How is that Constitutional?

Why should I be forced to pay for the health care of someone I'll never meet who lives in a different state, and engages in unhealthy behavior that I have personally avoided?

If you know someone screaming for the public option, feel free to send them here.
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Harvey Milk Day

My suggested public school curriculum for California's newly-adopted Harvey Milk Day is over at The Opine Editorials.
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

The Public Option

Are we really to believe the "public option" in Obamacare won't end up being like the "public option" in education? People who find the public schools unusable still have to pay for them, and then pay all over again to provide their kids a private education or for tutors. In addition to state and federal taxpayer funding, our schools up through high school are constantly appealing for more money from locals, including resorting to annoying fundraiser programs that turn kids into hustlers. Staff and students at community colleges and state universities are constantly complaining about being underfunded. Students behave as though any fee increase is the end of the world.

Most people have health insurance now. But if the public option is implemented, will most certainly mean that their increase taxes or other compulsory costs will preclude them from affording private insurance any longer, and they will be forced to resort to the public option. Even if they are able to maintain their private plan, they will be forced to pay more for those on the public option.

Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive