Wednesday, May 09, 2007

Meehan Grassroots Bill Will Leave Lobbyists, Lawyers Laughing All The Way to the Bank

Says GrassrootsFreedom.com -- press release below:

The following is a statement by GrassrootsFreedom.com and Mark Fitzgibbons regarding grassroots legislation, H.R. 2093, recently introduced to be considered by the U.S. House of Representatives as part of lobbying reform:

"H.R. 2093, the grassroots lobbying bill introduced by Congressman Marty Meehan should be called the `Special Interest and Lobbyist Cloaking Act of 2007,' or SILC.

"The Meehan bill is actually designed to give wealthy special interests a leg up on financing grassroots communications to the general public, yet violates five First Amendment rights (speech, press, association, petitioning and religion) of genuine citizen activists. Helps lobbyists, hurts citizens. Where have we heard that before?

"Insider lobbyists who apparently wrote this bill for Congressman Meehan have used various misrepresentations to deceive the public and Congress to bite for this legislation. Among their many misrepresentations is that this would close the last Jack Abramoff "loophole." It does no such thing, as I explain in my May 3 letter to the House Judiciary Committee, posted at GrassrootsFreedom.com. In fact, the Meehan bill is so favorable to Washington insiders that it could have been written by Jack Abramoff himself.

"This bill will harm populist, citizen-critics of Congress, the White House and other power centers in Washington, yet will allow billionaires such as George Soros, corporations, labor unions and wealthy organizations that actually lobby to continue to spend unlimited, undisclosed and sometimes tax-deductible sums of money on grassroots policy communications.

"The word `hypocrisy' is insufficient to describe how this bill, promoted as `sunlight,' was written by or `leaked' to favored Washington insiders, including lawyers for Mr. Meehan himself, yet withheld from grassroots opponents until the last minute. If Members of Congress or their staff were complicit in a fraud on the public and an attempt to violate the Constitution, then Speaker Pelosi must initiate an investigation.

"The Meehan bill will leave lobbyists and lawyers for big special interests laughing all the way to the bank. This is exactly the type of business-as-usual Speaker Pelosi pledged she would end. Washington insiders are trying to silence grassroots critics so they can keep Washington as their own little playground and money machine."



Hate all those haters

I want Randy Newman prosecuted for a hate crime. Seriously, if our elected cockroaches are insisting on the expansion of our existing hate crimes laws I think Randy Newman should pay for his song, "Short People" from the Little Criminals album. Granted, that was over twenty years ago, but, get this:

In that song he clearly says that short people have no reason to live, that they've stubby little fingers and dirty little minds, that they've got tiny voices going peep peep peep and little cars that go beep beep beep, and that - now get this - they wear platform shoes on their nasty little feet.

Hatemonger. Lock him up. Make the law retroactive. I firmly believe that because of that song short people are discriminated against by a vast silent conspiracy of haters and because of that they can't....they can't, uh....well, I'm sure that they can't do something because of it and besides, just saying the words should be enough to get you in trouble whether actual harm can be shown or not. There oughtta be a law. So let's make one. Let's get the government even MORE involved in our lives.

And while we're in the business of expanding our hate crimes laws, let's do this right. Let's cover all the stuff that should be covered.

Hate your ex-wife or ex-husband? Well, if you say it out loud you should go to jail. Hate is just so....ugly. It just doesn't fit into our politically correct version of How The World Should Be. Ever referred to your heartless landlord as a fat bastard? Now that's truly insensitive and should constitute a hate crime because we all know that the obese, through no fault of their own, are gravity disadvantaged. You hate the obese, don't you? Hater. Prosecution for you, Hitler.

What about all those poor people who hate the rich? Or vice versa? I say put them in a cell together and teach them to love each other. Or eat each other. Whatever. And what about the gays who hate the straights and refer to us as "breeders?" I'm offended. That's hate speech. They should go to Big Gay Al's Big Gay Jail for that. Fascists. That knife should cut both ways. Say something bad about gays = hate crime. Say derogatory things about straights = ditto. Jail. Period.

The list goes on and on. There is just so much hatred out there and so little time to prosecute it all. It doesn't really matter if we can't show that actual harm was done. Just the act of offending someone should be enough to constitute hate speech.

So, why don't we all join hands and sing Kumbaya and never, ever voice our personal opinions about other human beings and their behavior again? Because if the politically correct left has its way that may be all we're allowed to do. We are slowly losing our right to free expression, our right to be observant, and our right to just plain be angry about something and spout off about it. Unless, of course, you spout off from the left side of the fence. Then it's okay.

The end result of all this hate crime hysteria is that it gives the government even more right to stick their noses into our everyday business. Don't you hate it when that happens?

Source



Querying the Homintern

By Justin Raimondo -- for younger readers, the reference is to the Comintern -- the old Communist International

The idea that gay people are an oppressed minority would be laughable if so many otherwise intelligent people didn't take it so seriously. Just look at what happened to Tim Hardaway, when, during an interview, he said "I hate gay people." The iron fist of political correctness wasn't long in coming down, full force, on his head. The former Miami Heat star was banned from the Las Vegas all-star game, and forced to recant: no doubt he'll have to attend a reeducation class. Not only that, but he'll have this "hate crime" to live down for a long time to come.

I wonder what would happen if the sneaker was on the other foot: imagine if, say, newly-"out" NBA player John Amaechi declared "I hate straights." What would happen to him is . nothing! He sure wouldn't be forced to apologize, and he wouldn't be demonized, as Hardaway was: everyone would say, "Oh, the poor guy - see what `homophobia' has done to him!"

In Europe, it is against the law to say what Hardaway - in a moment of honesty - said. Asked about Amaechi, he averred: "First of all I wouldn't want him on my team. Second of all, if he was on my team I would really distance myself from him because I don't think that's right and I don't think he should be in the locker room when we're in the locker room."

Like most straight guys, Hardaway thinks gay men -all gays, everywhere-are just waiting for the chance to see him in the altogether. They all want him. And that makes him uncomfortable. This is what it boils down to: a barbaric conceit and crudeness typical of his milieu-but he should at least be allowed to express it.

The lesson of this whole episode isn't that gays are in an especially bad position. Quite the contrary: it underscores their social power, i.e. their ability to make their avowed enemies suffer. Just as they made the state of Colorado suffer when voters there rejected legislation outlawing discrimination against homosexuals in housing and employment. Colorado was boycotted, for years, and dubbed "the hate state." And for what?

Anti-discrimination ordinances attempting to legislate "tolerance" for homosexuals are about as effective as the 1964 Civil Rights Act was in eliminating racism - i.e. not at all. To begin with, there is no way to know when "discrimination" is occurring - did that real estate company not rent to you because you're gay, or is it because there was something in your financial record that made them think twice about it? Did you fail to get that job because you were wearing too much Armani - or because you're just not qualified to be a sheet metal worker? All this legislation, whether it applies to gays, blacks, or Estonians, assumes that everyone has perfect knowledge of everyone else's motives and innermost thoughts: to these arbiters of socio-sexual equality, we are all mind-readers. The problem is, we aren't mind-readers, and a lot of what passes for "discrimination" is nothing of the sort.

Another problem with this legislative "remedy" for the problem of "homophobia" is that it is a double-edged sword: it forbids gays from discriminating against heterosexuals. Thus, a homo homeowner who wants to keep his or her neighbor a pinkish shade of lavender is forbidden - officially - from selling only to one of his gay brothers or sisters (although everybody knows this happens all the time). Likewise, a lesbian nightclub is obliged to serve a bunch of heterosexual male sailors out to paint the town red - until, of course, they try to pick up the girlfriend of the butchest dyke in the joint, and it comes down to fisticuffs, flying furniture, and a visit from the fuzz.

A classic justification for "civil rights" legislation in the area of housing and employment has been the claim that certain groups are automatically, and through no fault of their own, put at an economic disadvantage by "discrimination" (i.e. the free choices of employers and/or landlords). Government, goes the reasoning, must therefore have a hand in "leveling the playing field."

I won't go into the arguments against this here, but will instead content myself with pointing out the obvious: homosexuals hardly qualify as an economically disadvantaged class. Lesbians and gay men have demonstrably higher incomes than heterosexuals, who are burdened, at least some of them, with the costs of raising children. With more disposable income, a higher level of education, and ubiquity in the arts, academia, and the professions, gays constitute an elite class that has nothing to complain about when it comes to the bottom line. In terms of homo economics, gays have a lot to be gay about. Of course, it's only in the West, where capitalism and the (relatively) free market prevail, that a gay subculture has been allowed to develop - again, due entirely to the elite status of gays relative to the rest of the population.

Yet some people are just so hard to please, and gay political leaders have chosen to affect a stance of perpetual dismay; like a nagging wife, they're never satisfied. Now they are demanding the "right" to get married. I emphasize that it's the leaders, and the political activists, who are making 99 percent of the noise around this issue. The overwhelming majority of gay men - like all men, of all types and "orientations" - have no desire to get hitched. What they want is an endless series of sexual encounters, preferably with a different partner each time - although a few repeats might be merited - for as long as they can keep it up (so to speak).

This whole "gay marriage" business is a conspiracy to make homosexuality just as boring as the most conventional vision of heterosexuality: the husband/boyfriend, the jointly-owned San Francisco Victorian, the matched set of poodles, and - inevitably - the sordid little affairs and one-night stands, artfully concealed. Gay political leaders really believe they can do a makeover of their constituency, and convince Middle America that most gays live an idealized vision of domestic bliss. Gays, they aver, are just like everyone else.

The irony of all this is that domestication of the gay male could conceivably lead to his near-extinction. After all, it is the sexual freedom his homosexuality makes available to him that makes the lifestyle so attractive, at least to the young. As a recruiting device, the supposed appeal of gay married bliss is no match for the allure of rampant sexuality. Once they have managed to make homosexuality boring, bourgeois, and banal, gay leaders will likely find themselves with a considerably reduced constituency. Why oh why do some gay men want to ruin it for the rest of us? Think of it: endless sex-without responsibility. What red-blooded male would want to give that up - and for what?

I'll tell you for what: the advent of gay marriage will see the rise of a truly ugly phenomenon - gay divorce. Watch out world - you don't know what kind of genie you're letting out of the bottle! How many aging gay guys will be trapped by money-hungry twinks? Why, the little gold-diggers will have a veritable field day! Which means that if gays of a certain age weren't economically disadvantaged before they got their "civil rights," then they'll certainly be in the poorhouse by the time the gay rights activists enshrine gay marriage as a legally-recognized institution.

Source



IMA Slams British Doctors' Boycott Call

The Israel Medical Association rejected a call for a boycott of the Israel Medical Association by 130 British physicians and its expulsion from the World Medical Association, which is an umbrella organization of national medical associations that, ironically, is headed by IMA chairman Dr. Yoram Blachar.

The doctors, led by Prof. Colin Green, a surgeon at University College London, and Dr. Derek Summerfield, who has consistently attacked Israel in the British Medical Journal, claimed in a letter to The Guardian newspaper: "The IMA has forfeited its right to membership of the international medical community. [It] has a duty to protest about war crimes... but has refused to do so. Appeals to the World Medical Association and the British Medical Association have also been rebuffed," they said.

The move followed a call by 18 Palestinian health organizations that appealed to fellow professionals abroad in March to recognize that the IMA "has forfeited its right to membership of the international medical community."

The British doctors expressed "grave concern" about the health-related impact of Israeli policy on Palestinian society. "Persistent violations of medical ethics have accompanied Israel's occupation. The Israeli Defense Forces has systematically flouted the fourth Geneva Convention guaranteeing a civilian population unfettered access to medical services," they said.

They claimed that instead of being given immunity, medical staff had been killed, with hundreds of ambulances fired upon by Israeli troops, and said the passage of essential medicines like anti-cancer drugs and kidney dialysis fluids were blocked.

IMA chairman Blachar rejected all the claims, saying that his association does not serve as an arm of the government. "This is yet another in the series of fantasies in which Mr. Derek Summerfield lives," he said. He noted that dozens of Palestinian ambulances have transported explosives into Israel and that only some of them were caught in time. The IMA, Blachar continued, has always acted to ensure health services to civilians in the territories, and a document prepared by the IMA with legal experts reformulated ethical guidelines for treating civilian populations in areas of confrontation and was adopted as mandatory by the WMA.

The IMA suggested that the Palestinian Medical Association sign a joint declaration based on the document, said Blachar, but it refused.

Whenever it receives a report from Israel Physicians for Human Rights or other organizations, he continued, the IMA takes action in every case in which the right to medical treatment has allegedly been violated. Blachar added that the Palestinian Authority refused to accept from Israel drugs and dialysis solutions that it was ready to transfer.

Source

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Political correctness is most pervasive in universities and colleges but I rarely report the incidents concerned here as I have a separate blog for educational matters.

American "liberals" often deny being Leftists and say that they are very different from the Communist rulers of other countries. The only real difference, however, is how much power they have. In America, their power is limited by democracy. To see what they WOULD be like with more power, look at where they ARE already very powerful: in America's educational system -- particularly in the universities and colleges. They show there the same respect for free-speech and political diversity that Stalin did: None. So look to the colleges to see what the whole country would be like if "liberals" had their way. It would be a dictatorship.


For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, GREENIE WATCH, EDUCATION WATCH, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, DISSECTING LEFTISM, IMMIGRATION WATCH and EYE ON BRITAIN. My Home Pages are here or here or here. Email me (John Ray) here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there are mirrors of this site here and here.

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