Our fragile civil rights.

This is insane.

//While certain Republican presidential candidates have drawn the ire of reporters and evoked comparisons to the Holocaust for daring to discuss a national registry for Muslims, approximately one out of four Democrats support forcing Jews and Christians to register with the government.

A recent YouGov poll asked 1,000 individuals if they would support a national registry requiring members of various groups to provide the government with their home addresses.

The poll found 27 percent of self-identified Democrats either “strongly support” (18 percent) or “somewhat support“ (9 percent) a national registry for Jews.

Democratic support for a national registry for Jews is nine percent higher than the support among Republicans (18 percent) and 12 percent higher than the support among Independents (15 percent).

The poll also found 27 percent of self-identified Democrats either “strongly support” (17 percent) or “somewhat support” (10 percent) a national registry for Christians.

Democrat support for a national registry for Christians is six percent higher than support among Republicans (21 percent) and 9 percent higher than support among Independents (18 percent).

On the topic of registering Muslims, Democrats were nearly split on their support for a national registry.

The poll found 41 percent of Democrats support a national registry for Muslims (25 percent “strongly support,” 16 percent “somewhat support”) while 47 percent oppose the registry (40 percent “strongly oppose,” 7 percent “somewhat oppose”).

The YouGov poll was conducted on the Web from Nov. 20-23. The margin of error is ±4.2 percent.//

Forget gay marriage, this is the new trendy civil rights movement.

New York woman walks around bare-breasted to advocate equal rights for women to walk around bare-breasted.

The article says she is a topless dancer, so she is either (a) advertising (which is obviously a good business strategy) or (b) giving "product" away for free (which is obviously a bad business strategy.)

And as a Public Service Announcement to increase public awareness of the right of New York women to walk around topless, I'm posting this insightful - and pretty funny - youtube video of the news story done on this lonely advocate for equality.



You're welcome.

More Hope and Change: pro-life activists could be permanently detained without trial under law.


From Lifesite News:

Constitutional experts warn a new law that allows the president to permanently detain U.S. citizens without trial could be used against pro-life activists, who have already been defined as potential terrorists in documents by some government agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security.


John Whitehead, founder of the Rutherford Institute“This law can apply to pro-lifers, yes,” said John W. Whitehead, a constitutional attorney and founder of The Rutherford Institute. Whitehead told LifeSiteNews.com the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012 (NDAA) “would allow the military to show up at your door if you’re a ‘potential terrorist,’ and put you in military detention where seeing a lawyer is difficult.”

The NDAA, which President Barack Obama signed on December 31, allows the president to hold enemy combatants in military detention facilities without trial until the end of hostilities, if the person “substantially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners.” The law allows the president to determine which groups may be considered terrorists without judicial or congressional oversight, although Secretary of Defense is required to “regularly brief” Congress about “covered persons.”

Sen. Carl Levin, D-MI, said the Obama administration specifically asked senators for the power to permanently detain American citizens without trial and to “remove the language which says that U.S. citizens and lawful residents would not be subject to this section.”

Other former DOJ attorneys corroborate...

Adams testimony about racism in the DOJ.

DOJ Lawyer Quits over Obama Administration handling of Black Panther Voter Intimidation Case.

According to NRO:

From the Washington Examiner. J. Christian Adams, an attorney in the DOJ's Voting Rights section, has apparently resigned over the government's stonewalling in the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation case. In a resignation letter, Adams intimates that he has been ordered by his superiors to ignore a subpoena to testify on the handling of the case before the bipartisan U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.


Also in the letter, Adams refers to the heated rhetoric employed by the Panthers against the authors of the voter intimidation suit, a cause of worry since he says he knows "intimately the criminal character and violent tendencies of the members of New Black Panther Party."

From the Washington Examiner:

In his letter of resignation, J. Christian Adams said:

On the other hand, the events surrounding the dismissal of United States v. New Black Panther Party, et al., after the trial team sought and obtained an entry of default, has subjected me, Mr. Christopher Coates, and potentially at some point, all members of the team, to a subpoena from the United States Commission on Civil Rights. The subpoena is based on an explicit federal statute and seeks answers about why the case was dismissed.

I have incurred significant personal expense in retaining a number of separate attorneys and firms regarding this subpoena in order to protect my interests and advise me about my personal legal obligation to comply with the subpoena. Over the last few months, one of my attorneys has had multiple communications with Federal Programs regarding the subpoena. My attorney suggested to them that the Department should file a motion in district court to quash the subpoena and thereby resolve conclusively any question about my obligation to comply.

Months ago, my attorney advised the Department that a motion to quash would be welcome, and that I would assert no objection to the motion. Further, my attorney has explicitly sought to ascertain whether Executive Privilege has been invoked regarding the decisions of individuals not in the Voting Section to order the dismissal of the case. If Executive Privilege has been asserted, or will be, obviously I would not comply with the subpoena. These options would provide some conclusive legal certainly about the extent of my obligation to comply with a subpoena issued pursuant to a federal statute. Instead, we have been ordered not to comply with the subpoena, citing a federal regulation (emphasis mine).

Adams also cites his knowledge of the criminal character and “violent tendencies of” members of the New Black Panther Party, saying:

As you also know, the defendants in the New Black Panther lawsuit have become increasingly belligerent in their rhetoric toward the attorneys who brought the case. (See eg., April 23, 2010 statement of Malik Zulu Shabazz,http://www.newblackpanther.com/usccrphony case statement.pdf, describing the “phony case” brought by “the modern day racist lynch mob seeking to hang what [we] think .are [our] modern slaves.”) Their grievances toward us generally echo the assertions that the facts and law did not support the lawsuit against them, ab initio. Knowing intimately the criminal character and violent tendencies of the members of New Black Panther Party, it is my profound hope that these assertions are tempered.

This follows the departure of another attorney, who before transferring to South Carolina, read a statement to a surprised “goodbye luncheon” about his opposition to the way the case is handled (see here). More updates to follow.

D'accord

At Evangel, John Mark Reynolds explains why Christians should oppose the Ugandan law making homosexuality subject to the death penalty:

Morally, the bill is bad for numerous reasons.


First and most importantly, it places the life of the citizens of Uganda, fellow humans created God’s image, in peril for grossly insufficient reasons. A Christian can only support loss of liberty or the death penalty in order to protect society from peril to other citizens that cannot be handled in any gentler manner.

The application of any law is always harsh and removes the element of mercy.

This law denies the humanity of a class of Ugandan citizens, because it is so harsh, singling out one private vice for extreme public punishment, that it effectively dehumanizes a class of persons.

No sinner can vote for this bill without tacitly rejecting the Golden Rule and I have not heard that any legislature is dominated by saints.

Second, the punishments in the bill are radically disproportionate to any harm done through the putative crimes, even if one views them as crimes. Punishment must always fit the crime!

Real Tolerance

Religious bigotry is still bigotry

Jennifer Roback Morse has a post on the gay marches that are targetting Mormon temples. Although the marchers are upset by the notion that the LDS church financed the Prop 8 campaign, it seems that it did no such thing but that individual Mormons, and others, contributed to the campaign.

In other words, it all involved the right of people to organize and vote democratically.

This exercise in free speech and democracy has the Left acting - once again - like petulant children.

Nasty petulant children. Here are some photos of some protesters indulging in typical Leftwing anti-religious rhetoric:



And:



And:



I'm not Mormon, but this kind of scapegoating ought to be offensive to everyone. Mormons are entitled to belong to their religions just as gays are entitled to belong to GLBT clubs. Moreover, there is something deeply troubling about this kind of intolerant display of hate being directed outside of anyone's religious site. Part of the American compact is that we don't poke a stick a people's religion. We can certainly address the issues in the public square and we can demonstrate in public places, but there is something that picks at pluralism and tolerance to single out a religious group this way.

Also, note the difference in maturity between the Left and the Right. When 4 justices invented gay marriage last June, there were no Rightwinger protests in front of gay bars or Methodist churches tossing slurs. There is no reasons to think that if Prop 8 had lost, there would have been any public demonstration by any conservative. But let the left lose and we get this.

Further, note the double standard in rhetoric. It is permissible for gays to dredge up slurs about "magic underwear" and polygamy, but if anyone attempted to point out the health hazards of the gay lifestyle that would be ruled "irrelevant" and "offensive" before anyone could bat an eye.

Finally, isn't this demonstration misplaced. If exit polling data is correct, it was the Black community that provided the margin of votes that passed Prop 8. Shouldn't the gays be protesting the Black community in Watts and Compton?

Or is it just safer to pick on an insular, easily identified, politically unpopular minority group?

Feel the love Update:

Gay activists start blaming African-Americans for their loss. According to the linked post:

It was like being at a klan rally except the klansmen were wearing Abercrombie polos and Birkenstocks. YOU NIGGER, one man shouted at men. If your people want to call me a FAGGOT, I will call you a nigger. Someone else said same thing to me on the next block near the temple...me and my friend were walking, he is also gay but Korean, and a young WeHo clone said after last night the niggers better not come to West Hollywood if they knew what was BEST for them.

Let's see them take that talk down to Watts.

The consensus on the linked blog is that its wrong to blame blacks for the passing of Prop 8. Religion, though, is another matter.

Terrific.

The Church of the Catacombs.

An interesting posts on the secret Christians among the Untouchables of India.

Some statistics on India's secret Christians:

25 million Independent/Apostolic Christians,
19.2 million Protestants,
19.8 million Catholics,
3 million Orthodox(obviously, I've rounded off the figures)
total: 65 million Christians or approximately 6% of the total Indian population.

[Via Mark Shea.]

Oh, I didn't know that.

I was introduced to the Jena 6 story last night. I thought the facts were incredible in this day and age, particularly the conviction of the black student in front of an all white jury. In this day and age, that kind of things is grounds for automatic reversal.

But no one seemed interested in that bit of racial injustice.

This column by Jason Whitlock provides some kind of an explanation:

Much has been written about Bell’s trial, the six-person all-white jury that convicted him of aggravated battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated battery and the clueless public defender who called no witnesses and offered no defense. It is rarely mentioned that no black people responded to the jury summonses and that Bell’s public defender was black.

Alright, that's some kind of an explanation, but I wonder if the PD could have demanded a new jury pool and that the sheriff haul in some veniremen in order to get a more representative cross-section of the community.

Of course, potential jurors "hauled" in by the Sheriff might not be all that sympathetic to the defendant who was the reason for them being there.