Yes, Virginia, the ACLU fights for Christians, too!

(Vacation Notice for both of my readers : This will probably be my last post until my significant other and I return from winter solstice vacation in Silver City, New Mexico on the first of the new year. As we’ll only have intermittent internet service while we’re there, I also won’t be able to timely answer emails until we return.)According to the ACLU-haters, the American Civil Liberties Union is anti-Christian, anti-prayer, anti-religion, and anti-Christmas. ‘Tain’t so, Virginia. The ACLU’s mission is to preserve the Bill of Rights’ protections and guarantees for all people–even for Christians!Want some proof? Following are three cases this year where the ACLU defended the right of a Christian to speak as a Christian or to practice Christianity:October 26, 2006:

ACLU Files Suit to Protect Free Speech Rightsof Christian Wal-Mart Protestor NATCHITOCHES, LA–[T]he American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana filed a lawsuit on behalf of a lone protestor who was denied his free expression rights by the City of Natchitoches. Edwin Crayton, a devout Christian, sought to stand in front of Wal-Mart in Natchitoches with a sign protesting Wal-Mart’s alleged position on gay marriage.”Government violates the principles in the First Amendment when it puts an overbroad permit scheme in place to restrain free speech in a public place,” according to Joe Cook, Executive Director, ACLU of Louisiana. “The sweep of the ordinance is so wide that it could encompass a chance meeting on the street corner by two strangers.” (rest of story here)

April 19, 2006:

ACLU of Georgia and Baptist Church FileReligious Discrimination Lawsuit Zoning Ordinance Illegally Bars Church from EstablishingHouse of Worship in East Point, ACLU SaysATLANTA – The American Civil Liberties Union of Georgia…filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of the Tabernacle Community Baptist Church, charging that the city of East Point, Georgia violated a federal religious discrimination law when it denied the church a zoning permit needed to establish its house of worship. (rest of story here)

January 12, 2006:

Rhode Island ACLU Files Appeal on Behalf of Christian Prisoner Barred from Preaching at Religious ServicesWesley Spratt had been preaching during Christian services for seven years at the Adult Correctional Institutions (ACI) until 2003, when a new warden unilaterally stopped him from doing so based on vague and generalized “security” concerns. In its appeal, the ACLU argues that the preaching ban violates a federal law known as RLUIPA, which was designed to protect the religious freedom of institutionalized persons. (rest of story here)

The American Civil Liberties Union’s mission is, of course, to preserve the Bill of Rights’ protections and guarantees for all people and the above are but a few of the many cases across the country where the ACLU has defended the right of a Christian to speak as a Christian or to practice Christianity. California Attorney Allen Asch has done a nice job of compiling a list of such cases, which I drew on for the above examples.But maybe the best example of ACLU’s position supporting an individual’s free exercise of religion is the 2004 Michigan case where the ACLU fought to get a Bible verse put back into a public school yearbook:

Michigan ACLU Wins Fight for Christian Free Speech By Jim BrownMay 17, 2004(AgapePress) – The American Civil Liberties Union has waged a successful battle to get a Bible verse put back into a public school yearbook.Stevenson High School in Sterling Heights, Michigan, deleted student Abby Moler’s entry from its 2001 yearbook because it was religious in nature. As valedictorian of her graduating class, Moler had submitted a biblical quote from Jeremiah 29:11 to be included in the high school yearbook.The verse, which reads in the NIV, “‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future,'” was significant to the graduating senior, and she chose its message to share with her class. However, school officials rejected the student’s choice and removed it from the yearbook before sending it to print.The ACLU took up the cause and eventually reached a settlement with the school district over its censorship of the biblical verse. The school has agreed to place a sticker with Moler’s original entry in copies of the yearbook on file at Stevenson High School, and the current yearbook staff has been instructed to write her a letter of regret. Also, the yearbook staff has been ordered not to censor other religious or political speech.ACLU of Michigan legal director Michael Steinberg explains that the school was misguided in its apparent attempt to prevent a state endorsement of religion. “Although the school itself is prohibited from promoting one religion over another, it cannot suppress private speech that was religious,” he explains, “and this was clearly a situation where they were confused. It was the private speech of the student, who was a devout Christian.”Although the ACLU is often associated with arguments against religious expression in cases involving the so-called separation of Church and State, Steinberg says his group is not averse to representing Christians. “We represent people of all religions — usually minority religions because those are the types of religions that are most often suppressed or their free exercise rights are limited,” he says.The ACLU regularly intervenes in cases in which individuals’ civil rights are being denied, including “situations where you have government suppressing the private exercise of religion by individuals,” Steinberg asserts.© 2004 AgapePress all rights reserved.

As stated by Allen Asch on his web site, the ACLU fights just as hard for individual free exercise of religion as they fight against government endorsement, sponsorship, or establishment of religion. The ACLU-haters will never recognize that fact because they never permit the truth to stand in the way of their civil liberties-ignorant denouncements.And on that cheerful note, I wish everyone, even los pendejos, a safe, healthy and happy holiday season.

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School board folly

In March of 2002 the Cobb County School Board (north metro Atlanta) put the following anti-evolution sticker in a variety of its high school science books:

Today that Georgia school board abandoned its legal defense of that nonsense:

Americans United Applauds Settlement Of Georgia Lawsuit Over Evolution Disclaimer
Tuesday, December 19, 2006

Americans United for Separation of Church and State today lauded a Georgia public school board’s decision to drop its defense of anti-evolution disclaimers for science textbooks.

The Cobb County School Board has agreed to settle the long-running legal fracas over its 2002 decision to place anti-evolution stickers in high school biology textbooks.

In an agreement announced today, Cobb County school officials state that they will not order the placement of “any stickers, labels, stamps, inscriptions, or other warnings or disclaimers bearing language substantially similar to that used on the sticker that is the subject of this action.” School officials also agreed not to take other actions that would undermine the teaching of evolution in biology classes.

“Cobb County school officials have taken the right step to ensure that their students receive a quality education,” said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United. “Students should be taught sound science, and the curriculum should not be altered at the behest of aggressive religious groups.” (Americans United press release continued here.)

The National Center for Science Education has a nice background page on this issue, from which I’ve lifted the following FAQs:

Frequently Asked Questions

What’s wrong with the disclaimer’s language?
“Theory, not fact” disclaimers have been used by creationists for years in an attempt to cast doubt on evolution. This language is misleading in several ways:

• First, in science, the word “theory” does not mean “guess.” Rather, a scientific theory is a well-tested, systematic explanation of facts. Scientific theories are well-supported and well-accepted.

• Second, the theory of evolution is among the most important, well-tested theories in all of science; it is as fundamental to biology as atomic theory is to chemistry, the germ theory of disease to medicine, or Einstein’s theory of relativity to physics.

• Third, the sticker singles out evolution from the many theories discussed in science classes, thus implying that evolution requires special skepticism. This is not scientifically justifiable.

This may be bad science education, but why is it unconstitutional?
The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution requires that the government be neutral in matters of religion. The government may not give special privileges to a particular religion or promote a partcular religious belief. Cooper ruled that the disclaimer, by denigrating evolution, provides special support for special creationism, a particular religious belief.

As part of their settlement of this matter, the Cobb County School Board agreed to pay $166,659 towards plaintiffs’ legal costs. Add to that their own attorney costs and assorted legal fees, plus costs for time each school board member spent discussing and implementing this nonsense policy for the past five years, and it amounts to…a shameful waste of precious monies that could have gone to worthwhile and needed educational programs and services for the kids in that district. Every damn one of those school board members responsible for this profound folly should have the moral integrity to remove themselves from office.

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Farmers Branch saved from itself!

Actually, the North County Times editorial headline reads Escondido saved from itself, but all that’s needed is to insert ‘Farmers Branch’ in place of ‘Escondido’ in that terrific editorial and we’d have “a step in the right direction” here in Texas, too.

We hear much about the “invasion” of illegal immigrants in North County, especially Escondido. On Wednesday night, the Escondido City Council was overrun by common sense.

A majority of council members voted in closed session to abandon the city’s effort to turn the city’s landlords into immigration inspectors. After the city ordinance to ban renting to illegal immigrants ran into the expensive legal buzz saw that everyone saw coming, the council belatedly admitted the obvious: Enforcing immigration laws is an effort best left to the federal government.

Uhmm, I wonder: Could the Wisdom of Crowds theory be influenced by fiscal responsibility considerations?

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The Scientific Explanation of Hell

I got a good chuckle reading this funny little story from my October 2006 edition of American Atheist magazine, so I thought I’d post it here (with slight editing) for your reading pleasure, too:

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The Scientific Explanation of Hell
submitted by Noel F. Ambery

The following is an actual question given on a University of Washington chemistry mid-term. The answer by one student was so “profound” that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well.

Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?

Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle’s Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant. One student, however, wrote the following:

First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving.

As for how many souls are entering Hell, let’s look at the different Religions that exist in the world today. Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell. With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially.

Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle’s Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.

This gives two possibilities:

1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.

2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over.

So which is it?

If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa, (Cheerleader Captain and Class Valedictorian) during my Freshman year that, “it will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you,” and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night and again this morning, then number 2 must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over.

The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct…leaving only Heaven, and thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why Teresa kept shouting, “Oh my God!!!”

THIS STUDENT RECEIVED THE ONLY “A.”

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Wisdom of Crowds

Well, well, well.

Maybe, just maybe, the Wisdom of Crowds theory may prevail in Farmers Branch, Texas after all.

Seems some common sense folks in Farmers Branch came together and organized a petition campaign against their town’s recently passed ordinance that forbids landlords from renting apartments to unauthorized immigrants (a matter I wrote about last month here). The petition, Let the Voters Decide, calls for a referendum vote by the citizens on whether to overturn that ordinance or not. According to JobsAnger Blogspot, the petition has over 1,400 signatures, twice as many as needed to force a vote on the matter.

Patrick McGee at the Star-Telgram reported yesterday that according to city officials, Farmers Branch now has 15 days to confirm that the signatures are from registered voters and that if so, the city council will have to either repeal the ordinance or schedule a referendum vote for May 12.

City Councilman Tim O’Hare, that town’s principle anti-immigrant pusher, however, is not worried about the outcome. He told the Houston Chronicle that if it came to an election on this question, “I don’t think it will be close.”

The city council could legally repeal the ordinance without going through the expense of a vote, which would be the right thing for them to do, of course. But, given their unanimous support for the ordinance in the first place, I just don’t think there’s enough decency among the council members to do the right thing. What it looks like they will do is to spend lots of taxpayer dollars on legal fees defending this hare-brained ordinance. It’s scheduled to go into effect on January 12, but several groups have indicated they may challenge it in court, including the Mexican America Legal Defense and Educational Fund.

A court will probably get the first crack at deciding this issue. But there’s another just action that the wisdom-of-the-crowds theory should be given an opportunity to prove itself in: a Recall Los Pendejos petition. Every member of that Farmers Branch city council should be removed from office for wrongful conduct. And if the many are really smarter than than few, that’s exactly what will happen.

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Soy makes kids ‘gay’?

Just about when you think you’ve heard it all, some pendejo goes and says something more stupider than Frank Zappa ever imagined possible:

“Soy is feminizing, and commonly leads to a decrease in the size of the penis, sexual confusion and homosexuality.”

That’s according to Jim Rutz in a column he wrote Tuesday for the far-right yellow-journalism “news” blog WorldNetDaily. I’ve never heard of that asshole before, but it didn’t take much mucking about on the web to find out that he’s the author of Megashift, a book about “God’s plan to raise people from the dead to form a holy army of Christian Zombies.” (Thanks to Brad R. at Sadly, No!)

In his Soy is making kids ‘gay’ column, Rutz also declares soy to be a “devil food” and that if you eat or drink a lot of soy “you’re suppressing your masculinity and stimulating your ‘female side,’ physically and mentally.”

How much you wanna bet that Mark Foley and Ted Haggard somehow work Rutz’s theory into a defense of their recently publicized behaviors? “I don’t know what came over me (sorry, no pun intended); I just had a glass of soy milk and the next thing I knew I was…sexually confused.”

Sounds like MegaShit to me, Rutz.

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Happy Days Are Here…Again

Texas Congressional District 23 is one distrito grande…

and the folks in it yesterday selected this fellow to serve as their new congressional representative:

Rodriguez upsets incumbent Bonilla

Greg Jefferson
Express-News
Web Posted: 12/13/2006 02:13 AM CST

Former Congressman Ciro Rodriguez completed a stunning political turnaround Tuesday with an upset win over incumbent Republican Henry Bonilla that topped off the Democratic takeover of Congress.

Charles Kuffner at Off the Kuff has an interesting insight on this win:

Way back when, I thought the Dems should have made CD23 a priority. It took longer than I would have liked, and I admit that along the way I too had serious doubts about Ciro Rodriguez’s ability to win (he did drop out of the race at one point, after all), but it should be crystal clear now why this was a good idea. Not just to bump the Democrats’ gains up one seat to a net of 30, but to knock off a prominent Republican incumbent who might be Texas’ junior Senator-elect today had Kay Bailey Hutchison chosen to come home. That’s a huge deal. (emphasis mine)

Yes, that is a huge deal; the Texas senatorial team of Bonilla and Cornyn would have been a nightmare for all things just and fair.

Henry Bonilla took a hard line on immigration reform and (thankfully) it looks like folks in CD23 didn’t take kindly to that approach.

¡Hasta la vista, Bonilla!

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Health care crime

Forty-nine people died yesterday in this country because they didn’t have health insurance.

Forty-nine people will also die today in this country because they have no health insurance.

And 49 will die tomorrow for the same reason.

And 49 the day after that, and 49 the day after that, and another 49 the day after that, ad nauseum.

18,000 Americans die each year in America because they have no health insurance. If that’s not an injustice, then I don’t know what one is.

Here’s how my candidate for our next president feels about this issue:

The solution to the nation’s healthcare problem is…to make sure every American has the access to quality healthcare, and the only way to do that is for Congress to pass a bill that would provide for universal not-for-profit healthcare for all Americans. There’s a bill called “Medicare for all,” and this bill in this current Congress is HR 676—the Conyers/Kucinich bill. (emphasis mine)

What’s your candidate for president’s position on this?

“Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.”
–Martin Luther King, Jr.

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Chicken dinner…

My significant other and I have been invited to a friend’s home for dinner next week. And as it happens, they have a cat named, I kid you not, “Chicken.”

We’re sure hoping this is not what they meant when they said we’re having chicken for dinner…

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