For those of us like myself who have feared that “same-sex” marriage would force the government to give legal recognition to polygamous, polyamourous, and even incestuous “marital arrangements” rendering tradtional male-female marriage meaningless and were told that we were “over-reacting” and that the “slippery slope argument” was ridiculous, there is this “New Strategic Vision For All Our Families and Our Relationships” from beyondmarriage.org:
Marriage is not the only worthy form of family or relationship, and it should not be legally and economically privileged above all others. A majority of people â?? whatever their sexual and gender identities â?? do not live in traditional nuclear families. They stand to gain from alternative forms of household recognition beyond one-size-fits-all marriage. For example:
· Single parent households
· Senior citizens living together and serving as each otherâ??s caregivers (think Golden Girls)
· Blended and extended families
· Children being raised in multiple households or by unmarried parents
· Adult children living with and caring for their parents
· Senior citizens who are the primary caregivers to their grandchildren or other relatives
· Close friends or siblings living in non-conjugal relationships and serving as each otherâ??s primary support and caregivers
· Households in which there is more than one conjugal partner
· Care-giving relationships that provide support to those living with extended illness such as HIV/AIDS.
I have always supported allowing the Constitutionally legally proscribed legislative process determine the legal definition of marriage. Here in Mass where I live, if the majority vote to redefine marriage to include “same-sex” marriage in 2008 when it will be on our ballot, then I am prepared to accept that outcome b/c that is how such legal/moral questions are properly reconiciled. But those of us who have opposed redefining marriage have said consistently that if marriage is not an exclusive legal arrangement between one man and one woman that any marital configuration would have to be legally recognized under the “equal protection” clause.
Now, one of the largest LGBT (Lezbian,Gay,Bi-Sexual, and Transgender) online organiztions “Beyond Same Sex Marriage” has publically acknowledged that what we all feared would result from radically redefining traditional marriage via judicial fiat (without the consent of “we the people” i.e.the proverbial “slippery slope”) is their group’s stated goal.
To those who say, “Well, what do I care? Two people of the same sex can marry, or two men can marry three women, or one man can marry his sister or daughter, or son…Live and let live I say” I would ask you to consider the societal, cultural, economic, and legal repurcussions to our society of radically redefining the oldest and most important human institution in the history of the world. The radical transfomation of society would effect us all in ways that are unimaginable.
Our friend Matt Margolis over at Blogs for Bush, has joined Dr. Thomas Sowell by writing a very favorable review of Gregg’s new book Conservative Comebacks to Liberal Lies
Conservative Comebacks to Liberal Lies reads like a book, but is an encyclopedic resource of information that enables the reader to quickly and efficiently rebut any liberal lie and respond with facts. Gregg Jackson has done all the research and organized the information into nearly 400 pages packed with rebuttals, facts, and tables on everything from abortion, to economics to zealot terrorism.
Congratulations Gregg!
You can buy the book now at Amazon.
My mother e-mailed me this link to a blog in Israel. I agree with the author Ben Caspit completely. Well worth reading the entire piece.
Today I am serving as the voice of six million bombarded Israeli citizens who serve as the voice of six million murdered Jews who were melted down to dust and ashes by savages in Europe. In both cases, those responsible for these evil acts were, and are, barbarians devoid of all humanity, who set themselves one simple goal: to wipe the Jewish race off the face of the earth, as Adolph Hitler said, or to wipe the State of Israel off the map, as Mahmoud Ahmedinjad proclaims.
And you – just as you did not take those words seriously then, you are ignoring them again now. And that, ladies and gentlemen, leaders of the world, will not happen again. Never again will we wait for bombs that never came to hit the gas chambers. Never again will we wait for salvation that never arrives. Now we have our own air force. The Jewish people are now capable of standing up to those who seek their destruction – those people will no longer be able to hide behind women and children. They will no longer be able to evade their responsibility.
Every place from which a Katyusha is fired into the State of Israel will be a legitimate target for us to attack. This must be stated clearly and publicly, once and for all. You are welcome to judge us, to ostracize us, to boycott us and to vilify us. But to kill us? Absolutely not.
Very moving article in the Dallas Morning News about the role documentary filmmaker Pat Dollard had in helping the family of a fallen soldier find closure. Pat Dollard is the real deal. He’s a Patriot who abandoned a cushy Hollywood lifestyle for the frontlines in Iraq. He left his family and career behind, spent his own money and risked his life to tell the stories of the Young Americans fighting for us in Iraq.
Dallas Morning News
Closure for family of fallen Marine
Film gives glimpse of dad 11/2 years after dispute over ashes
By KARIN SHAW ANDERSON / The Dallas Morning News
Just when Julie Shumney had accepted that advanced DNA testing couldn’t provide answers to a mystery surrounding her husband’s cremated remains, the Mesquite woman received hope for a different kind of closure.
Julie Shumney was sent two sets of remains identified as those of Marine 1st Lt. Dustin Shumney. Documentary filmmaker Pat Dollard contacted her last week and told her that he has footage of the last two weeks of Marine 1st Lt. Dustin Shumney’s life. The final glimpses of the Marine were caught not long before he boarded a helicopter that went down in Iraq in January 2005.
“This is what I had been hoping for for the whole past year and a half, and the kids, too,” Mrs. Shumney said in anticipation of watching the images with her children, Jordan, 13, Mallory, 10, and Conner, 5.
Though it probably won’t answer the questions Mrs. Shumney has about her husband’s remains, the widow said the documentary, scheduled for release within three months, could help the family say goodbye.
“It’s really going to help a lot,” she said.
“Conner can watch this when he gets older, and I think it will trigger a lot of memories for him. The last time he saw his Daddy, he was 2.”
Read the full story here.
Check out how Pat handled this emotional phone call from Susan, an Army wife and mother, when we recently interviewed him on Pundit Review Radio.
To listen to the full Pat Dollard interview, click here.
Liberal Democrats are fond of claiming that they represent the interests of the “little guy” in society- the disadvantaged. Unfortunately, their pet proposal/initiative to raise the minimum wage on “big-box”retail strores like Wall Mart, Target, Costco, and Home Depot in Chicago means less entry level jobs, higher unemployment, and higher consumer prices- all of which harm the “working poor” the most- the very same constituencies liberal Dems claim to represent.
From today’s WSJ (subs req)
Last week the City Council voted 35-14 to impose a hyper-minimum wage on “big-box” retail stores with more than $1 billion of sales. The new law will require the likes of Wal-Mart, Target, Costco, and Home Depot to pay every worker — regardless of experience, education or skill — a minimum wage of $13 an hour by 2010 ($10 in salary and $3 in health benefits). At least another dozen cities, including Washington, D.C., are considering copy-cat laws.
Based on empirical economis evidence, such a proposal, if it goes into effect, would not be good for workers or consumers.
The only issue is how many jobs Chicago will lose. When the minimum wage rose to $8.50 an hour in 2004 in Santa Fe, New Mexico, the rate of job creation fell, and workers with 12 years of education or less “suffered an extremely large and negative effect,” according to a study by the Employment Policies Institute. Wal-Mart, Target and Lowe’s Home Improvement are already threatening to stop expanding in the city if the Chicago law is enforced. They say they can’t offer “every day low prices” and pay the city’s mandatory wage hikes at the same time.
The government mandated hyper-min-wage would mean that the biggest losers would be the very “poor” the “hyper-min-wage” is intended to help.
If the law does hold up, the biggest losers will be the poor who will pay higher prices. A study by the economics firm Global Insight calculates that the presence of Wal-Mart and other low-price retailers saves working families on average more than $2,000 a year. MIT professor Jerry Hausman has found that, although Wal-Mart does slightly reduce wage rates in nearby areas, its lower prices swamp that effect. The biggest beneficiaries are families with incomes of less than $10,000 for whom “a super center makes a 30 percent difference in what they can buy.”
If liberals who constantly talk about “economic justice” really wanted to achieve economic opportunity for the poor and middle class they claim to represent they would quit advocating governmnet wage and price controls- a relic of Communist command-control economies which have been an abysmal failure every time they have been instituted, and start supporting pro-growth across-the-board supply side tax cuts on income, dividends, capital gains, and inheritance instead of constantly opposing them.
A few weeks ago on the radio program I asked our guest Ralph Peters,author of “Never Quit The Fight,” if we should be concerned with Russia given Putin’s fairly recent consolidation of power and nationalization of large sectors of the Russian economy. Ralph was not as concerned as I thoght he may be. Nevertheless, Gary Kasparov, contributing editor at The Wall Street Journal, and chairman of the United Civil Front of Russia and co-chairman of the All-Russia Civil Congress had this to say in today’s WSJ (subs req)
The Putin administration is selling off the future of Russia by the barrel. Even before an inevitable fall in energy prices bankrupts us, the epidemic levels of corruption and cronyism in our government will take their toll. A recent report from Audit Chamber Chairman Sergei Stepashin admitted there was a “loophole” that allowed Russia’s richest man, Roman Abramovich, to extract $500 million a year via the Chukotka region of which he is Mr. Putin’s appointed governor.
Kasparov then helps answer my question as to whether or not we should be concerned about Putin and Russia:
This should lead us to wonder if they really have the West’s best interests at heart when it comes to global stability. Mr. Putin has had six years to make good on his assurances to the West to help bargain with the various hostile regimes he is so close to. He promised to help with North Korea and now they have missiles capable of reaching the U.S. coast. After endless negotiations with Russia, Iran is more belligerent than ever and is hurriedly enriching uranium. The Russian foreign minister was supposedly brokering with Hezbollah and Hamas and now we have a full-scale war.
Kasparov then points out that:
A few days after the hostilities broke out, the Putin administration released its list of national and international terrorist groups — the first time the list has been made public. Strikingly, both Hamas and Hezbollah are missing. Combined with the timing of its publication, can this be seen as anything but a sign of support for the group that ignited the current conflict? Mr. Putin has demonstrated that he, too, lacks a belief in the sanctity of human life — yet he is welcomed by the West as a partner.
I hope that in Secretary Rice’s travels and meetings with Mr. Putin that she borrow an old Reagan maxim: “Trust but verify.”
John Noonan, co-founder and author of the military blog Op-For joined us last evening to talk about the situation in the Middle East. We also covered the role of Iran in this whole mess, along with their progress towards becoming a nuclear power.
You may have read about John this spring in an excellent Boston Globe article on milblogs. Just last week, John had an article published in National Review,
The Rise of the Service Gap
Academics vs. military service.
Unfortunate as it is, the service gap is becoming a reality. Not because of boogie-men scapegoats like â??the richâ? or â??high-society,â? but due to the efforts of a small, determined group of academics, who opt to channel their anger over past and present government policies toward young men and women whose only sin is to serve.
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Pundit Review Radio is where the old media meets the new. Each week Kevin & Gregg give voice to the work of the most influential leaders in the new media/citizen journalist revolution. Called â??Groundbreakingâ? by Talkers Magazine, this unique show brings the best of the blogs to your radio every Sunday evening from 7-10pm EST on AM680 WRKO, Bostonâ??s Talk Station.