Superintendent Todd Carlson of Shawano High School in Shawano, Wisconsin is sorry a student observed his First Amendment rights and had his article published in the school newspaper that denounces homosexuals adopting children. And so Superintendent Carlson is making amends by punishing this Christian kid for being so darn Christian. Superintendent Carlson has also decided in his infinite wisdom to censure this article by having it sent down the memory hole so that no one else will be confronted with this evil Christian’s views.

That’ll show that darn Christian kid, won’t it?

The article, “Should Homosexual Partners Be Bale to Adopt?,” was written by Brandon Wegner who was assigned the task of writing a counter-point to another student’s pro-homosexual adoption article. The piece was then published as an insert in the school newspaper, the Shawano Leader.

Shortly after the newspapers containing the insert were distributed, Superintendent Carlson issued a formal apology to the school and parents, removed the insert from surplus issues of the paper, and censured young Mr. Wegner claiming his article violated the school’s “anti-bullying” policy.

Wegner says that Carlson grabbed him up out of class and began to brow beat him in an attempt to get the kid to disavow his religious-based beliefs. According to Liberty Counsel, a First Amendment law firm, Wegner was quixotically bullied by Superintendent Carlson in an attempt to deter bullying.

Brandon was hauled before the superintendent on charges that he had violated the school’s bullying policy. Superintendent Todd Carlson told him that the column “went against the bullying policy,” and asked him if he “regretted” writing it. When Mr. Wegner stated that he did not regret writing it, and that he stood behind his beliefs, Superintendent Carlson told him that he “had got to be one of the most ignorant kids to try to argue with him about this topic,” that “we have the power to suspend you if we want to” and that the column had “personally offended me, so I know you offended other people!”

Carlson’s action is itself “ignorant.” Ignorant of our American laws, ignorant of tenets of tolerance, ignorant of public comportment, ignorant for abuse of his position as an authority figure, and just plain ignorant in a moral fashion.

Carlson’s bullying also makes the lie to the claim that our schools are meant to teach our children. The truth seems to be that Mr. Carlson simply wants to indoctrinate, not help students come to their own conclusions when offered all sides of the issues.

In fact, the school newspaper deserves kudos for having handled the issue properly. It gave room to advocates of both sides to air their views so that readers could make up their own minds. But Carlson doesn’t want any of this horrid teaching going on. He wants to tell kids what to think based on his own warped, left-wing ideology. None of this freedom of choice nonsense in HIS school, I’ll tell you what.

Superintendent Carlson should be fired. Not because he’s an extremist liberal, but because he has violated this kid’s rights at worst and violated the principals of actual teaching at best. He is no educator. He is an indoctrinator and that is just un-American.

(H/T Moonbattery.com)

“American Atheists announced Monday on their “No God Blog” a new billboard campaign in their continued effort in “laboring for the civil liberties of atheists,” but in reality just upsetting those who disagree with their theological stance. A press release for the American Atheists’ new holiday season billboard campaign reads:

“American Atheists announced today that their new billboard is going up in several locations nationwide, including the New Jersey side of the Lincoln Tunnel: the same location as last year’s famous ‘You KNOW it’s a MYTH’ billboard. The new billboard will also be going up in Ohio and Florida.

This year’s holiday season billboard features pictures of Neptune, Jesus, Santa Claus, and the Devil and says, ‘37 Million Americans know MYTHS when they see them. What do you see?’”

Anticipating the inevitability that their billboard will offend others, Dave Silverman, the president of American Atheists, said, “When you question someone’s long-held beliefs and doctrine they are going to be immediately offended and be on the defensive: it’s a known psychological phenomenon.”

More here

Being offensive will always get you disliked. Is that what they aim at? I guess they are so hate-filled that it just bursts out.

Odd that it’s OK for atheists to tell Christians that they are wrong but Christians get attacked for “hate speech” if they tell homosexuals that they are wrong.

Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.). For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. To keep up with attacks on free speech see TONGUE-TIED. Also, don’t forget your daily roundup of pro-environment but anti-Greenie news and commentary at GREENIE WATCH . Email me here

Earlier this year the State of Illinois moved to force religious-based children’s services to break their religious principles and give children in their charge to homosexual couples. Organizations such as Catholic Charities have been told by the state that they either break their religious principles or face being shut down by the state. So, pursuant to that agenda, the state has determined that all children currently in the hands of religious adoption agencies need to be removed immediately.

Representing Catholic Charities of three Illinois Roman Catholic Dioceses, the Thomas Moore Society filed an emergency motion to prevent the state from removing all the children in its care. Unfortunately, an Illinois appellate court refused to overturn the trial court’s decision to remove the children during the appeal process in which lawyers are now engaged. (Filings here and here.)

Still, other motions made in the emergency motion were granted. Thomas Moore informs that the matter “is now on an expedited schedule for briefing in the Appellate Court.” The fate of the children remains unknown at this point.

So what was so bad that the State of Illinois felt it necessary to take all children away from religious-based organizations? Have there been cases of abuse? Perhaps children’s services from religious-based groups have been rated lowly? Have adopting parents complained?

None of the above. In fact, there is no substantive reason at all for this attack on religious-based children’s services in the Land of Lincoln. Well, no reason except for a left-wing, pro-homosexual political agenda, that is.

You see, the state received precisely one complaint about Catholic Charities. It was from an activist homosexual who complained that the religious-based adoption agencies in the state would not willingly give children up to homosexual couples.

If there has been before such draconian actions taken by government based on a single, hazy, non-substantive complaint — one that did not entail any abuse of children — I’ve never heard tell of it. But here we have such a case. The complaint of one activist pushing the homosexual agenda was enough for the state to decide to force all religious children’s services to either break religious principles and give children to homosexual couples, or face being shut down by the iron fist of the state.

This overt attack on religious-based children’s services hits with interesting timing, too. This month the Illinois Dept. of Children and Family Services gave Catholic Charities its highest rating for children’s services. Catholic Charities received a Level 1 compliance score and was ranked as one of the best foster care providers in the state.

So on one hand, one state agency says that the services Catholic Charities provided to the State’s most vulnerable children is top notch, yet on the other hand another state agency (the Attorney General’s office) says that Catholic Charities is so bad it must be shut down.

It just goes to show that Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan (a Chicago Democrat) has a political agenda and doesn’t really care what’s good for the homeless children of Illinois.

We all know that the Old Media is filled with double standards where it concerns treatment of conservatives and liberals. Last week we found yet another example of the media’s penchant to hypocrisy when a talking head on MSNBC used a derogatory term associated with gays yet the entire militant gay establishment and their pals in the Old Media ignored the whole thing. We all know that if a conservative had issued a gay slur like that the tale would have overshadowed every story in the news today.

Last week MSNBC’s left-wing talker Dylan Ratigan had fellow talking head Jimmy Williams on his program to discuss the debt ceiling talks going on in D.C. The discussion turned to head of Americans for Tax Reform Grover Norquist, whom Williams idiotically called a “petty criminal.” But what Williams said of the relationship he felt that Norquist and Newt Gingrich had was far worse. (My bold)

One person is controlling the agenda of the United States of America right now and his name is Grover Norquist. Grover Norquist was Newt Gingrich’s butt buddy…

First of all, it is simple-minded, and nothing but foolish demagoguery to seriously posit that Grover Norquist is “controlling the agenda of the United States of America right now.” Williams makes himself a clown with such nonsense. But that he goes on to use a gay slur right afterward truly makes of him no one worth taking seriously.

But Silly Jimmy’s veracity is not at issue here. The fact that he can go on national TV and call people “butt buddies” and not a peep about it is heard from the usual suspects in the gay mafia and the Old Media is telling. Were Williams a conservative the din would take weeks to die down. In fact, Williams would probably be fired and his livelihood summarily destroyed.

Of course, it is easy to find conservatives that are attacked for supposed gay slurs. Back in 2007 Ann Coulter was attacked for days for calling John Edwards a “faggot.” In 2009 a conservative radio host was fired for talking against gays. And who can forget Sarah Palin’s daughter, Willow, who came under fire for using such language on her Facebook account last year? Naturally, these are just a very few examples of the long knives being pulled out for anyone considered a conservative.

On the other hand, since the Tea Party movement got rolling in 2009 we’re constantly subjected to one leftist after another calling them “tea baggers,” itself a gay slur. Not one leftist, however, has ever scolded their fellows for using that slur against conservatives. To the contrary they rather revel in using it.

Heck, even as far back as 2007 New Mexico Governor Democrat Bill Richardson uttered a gay slur on a radio program and none of the lefty usual suspects ever called him on it. And just this year a union thug really went wild calling people “faggot” yet the lefty establishment ho-hummed their way to ignoring it all.

As I said at the start, none of this bias and hypocrisy is a surprise. We all know that the left and its handmaidens in the Old Media will give any left of center figure a pass for gay slurs and we also know that the same folks will work themselves up into a lather to wail and gnash teeth if they imagine that a conservative used such language. This is not new behavior, we all know. But, when we see it, we must chronicle it so that we can continue to keep records of it all.

First Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan tried to have published for public consumption all the names and addresses of every gun owner in her state. Apparently she meant to harass the legal gun owners in her jurisdiction. Now she has launched an effort to harass religious adoption institutions and on the thinnest of pretexts, too.

As to the gun owners, back in March Madigan thought it would be a good idea to publish all the names and contact info of the law abiding Illinoisans who followed the law and registered their ownership of guns with the state police. You see you can’t own a gun in Illinois without a Firearms Owner ID card (FOID). Madigan wanted to publish all that information so that anyone could identify any Illinois gun owner.

Fortunately, she failed because the state legislature jumped into gear and added a section to the state’s gun laws to make it illegal to expose to the public all the personal info of the state’s firearm owners. Even the Democrats in Illinois couldn’t stomach Madigan’s attempt to “out” every gun owner and leave them open for harassment and to be targeted by thieves and gangs looking for free guns.

Well, her left-wing agenda got shut down that time, but ol’ Lisa is not to be deterred from her extremist ideas.

The folks at Illinois Review, one of the best political websites in the state, did some FOIA tracking of Madigan’s latest attempt to instill a left-wing agenda in the Land of Lincoln. Madigan’s newest attack is an effort to harass and ultimately shut down religious-based adoption agencies in the state.

What IR found out is that Madigan used the power of her office to harass seven religious-based adoption agencies in the state — and by extension, every such agency — by sending threatening letters informing them that they are under investigation by the Attny Gen’s office. What did these seven adoption agencies do to get the full force of the AG to come down on their heads? It must have been an accumulation of complaints or multiple lawsuits or other legal dustups that preceded the investigations, right?

Well, not really.

No, what gave Attny. Gen. Lisa Madigan the excuse to attack every religious agency in the state was a complaint letter from a single gay couple from Lakeview about a single adoption agency.

Now, even if one letter from a citizen was enough to launch an investigation of a business in the state it most certainly is an abuse of her power for the Attny. Gen. to launch a major investigation of seven different businesses that are wholly unrelated to the one complained about, wouldn’t you think?

Ah, but Madigan isn’t looking for any legitimate exercise of the powers at her disposal. She is looking for a way to violate the religious freedom of the adoption agencies in the state that base their policies on religious ideals. Madigan and her left-wing pals, you see, want to end the right of religious-based adoption agencies to run their businesses as they see fit.

Madigan is following nothing less than an anti-Christian, radical gay agenda, here.

Imagine that you are sitting in your office carrying out your legal and Constitutionally protected business just like you always have, conscious that you have no complaints out against you, and a letter comes from the state’s top legal cop telling you that you are under investigation! It would most certainly have a chilling effect.

The fact is that this is no less than an attack on the Constitutional rights of Lutherans, Catholics and other religion influenced adoption agencies.

Check out Illinois Review for the detailed FOIA requests that they’ve received. Their coverage is thorough.

Rugby Union is an obscure football code that originated in the ancient British independent school of Rugby. In Australia it tends to be the football code followed by the alumni of private schools.

Describing the South African team as “f**gots” was probably a reference to Percy Montgomery in particular.

“Rugby great Ian Roberts has slammed Olympic swimmer Stephanie Rice [pic above] as a “complete idiot” after the sporting pin-up girl posted an anti-gay comment on her Twitter page.

Remarking after the Wallabies’ two-point win over the Springboks in South Africa on Saturday night, Rice – who has left the Commonwealth Games team due to injury – tweeted: “Suck on that f**gots,” adding: “Probably the best game I’ve ever seen!! Well done boys.”

The comment, which Rice has since removed, stunned Roberts who yesterday called for sponsors to question their support of the glamour-girl swimmer. “She is an idiot . . . and anyone who continues to endorse her as an athlete is an idiot as well,” Roberts fumed.

Acknowledging her comment later, Rice wrote; “Okay so maybe I got a bit too excited before!! But I love seeing Australians do well”. Last night Rice issued a statement saying she had made the comment in the excitement of the moment.

Source

So once again there is an attack on the livelihood (sponsorship in this case) of someone who uses “incorrect” words.

The everyday word for homosexuals among uncensored Australians and Brits is “poof” or “poofter” so it is a little surprising that Rice used the American term. She has however travelled a great deal overseas in connection with her sport so probably picked the term up somewhere there. She may not have realized how VERY derogatory it is in America. “Poof” is only a mildly derogatory term in Australia.

Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.). For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. To keep up with attacks on free speech see TONGUE-TIED. Also, don’t forget your daily roundup of pro-environment but anti-Greenie news and commentary at GREENIE WATCH . Email me here

However, in flagrant opposition to the will of the public, US District Judge Vaughn Walker has thrown out Proposition 8, declaring by fiat that perverts may render the institution of marriage a farce. Being openly homosexual, Walker would have recused himself had he any respect for the proper role of the judiciary. But under a regime of liberals, the judiciary has a new role: to ram through obscenities so monstrous that not even Nasty Pelousy’s Congress could pass them.

According to Walker, the blasphemy of homosexual “marriage” is a constitutional right. The Founding Fathers are vomiting in their graves.

“Proposition 8 fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license,” Judge Walker said in his 136-page decision. “Indeed, the evidence shows Proposition 8 does nothing more than enshrine in the California constitution the notion that opposite sex couples are superior to same sex couples.”

But healthy, normal relationships are superior to sexual perversions that spread deadly diseases. By Walker’s logic, the next move will be to legalize marrying the paper boy, amid a smokescreen of sanctimonious rhetoric regarding the sacred equality of pedophiles. But then, why marry the paper boy? Homosexual “marriage” will allow perverts to adopt whole harems of paperboys.

“The evidence shows conclusively that moral and religious views form the only basis for a belief that same-sex couples are different from opposite-sex couples,” he said.

Freaks like Walker are so far removed from reality, they don’t even recognize the biological basics of human reproduction. Only their degenerate agenda is real to them. Our “moral and religious views” are dismissed with a sneer. Yet they are permitted to dictate to us the rules by which our society operates.

In case there are any non-moonbats left who haven’t come to loathe the Governator:

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, and state Attorney General Jerry Brown, a Democrat, praised the ruling.

The ruling that Ahnold and former Governor Moonbeam so love doesn’t just represent another step downward into a hell of depravity, degeneracy, and social dissolution. It’s a victory for progressives’ preferred mode of government: tyranny.

A single weirdo judge imposing his perversion on the rest of the state in stark opposition to the will of the public is not consistent with they way things work in a democratic republic. Profanities like this can be inflicted from on high because we live under the thumb of a tyrannical judicial oligarchy, which will eventually finish Walker’s handiwork by imposing homosexual “marriage” at the national level, just as it did with abortion.

On tips from Graycat, Brian Boru, Wyatt’s Torch, Muddypaw, G. Fox, and TrickleUpPolitics. Cross-posted at Moonbattery.

In the wake of the new Supreme Court decision on the 2nd Amendment, we have this illuminating story from Ohio and if this isn’t the perfect example of why American gun owners fear detailed firearm owners registration records in the hands of government officials there isn’t one to be had. Ohio’s State Democrat Party recently sent a letter to every county sheriff’s office demanding that sheriffs send them the names and addresses of all concealed carry permit holders in their county.

There is, of course, only one possible reason that these Democrats wanted this information. Democrats wanted to harass these legal concealed permit holders. They wanted to target Ohioans that were exercising their Constitutional right and to set them up for political attacks, they wanted to somehow use the personal information of law abiding citizens as a weapon against them.

Fortunately, it is illegal in Ohio for such records to be made available to the public and that includes political parties, advocacy organizations, or journalists. The county sheriffs all refused to acquiesce to the Democrat’s demands and the state party quickly issued a second letter withdrawing their request.

It isn’t too hard to imagine, though, a situation where some partisan sheriff just might agree that Ohio’s Democrats should be allowed to use these registries of law abiding citizens as a weapon to attack them in their homes, their places of business, and in their persons.

This is the flip side to the sort of “transparency” that crosses the line between harmless public records and dangerous abuse of law abiding citizen’s private information. Look what happened in California’s Prop 8 fight. Donors lists for the pro-traditional marriage cause ended up in the hands of militant gay activists who took that information and spread it all over the Internet in an effort to open those pro-marriage donors to personal attack.

In the case of Prop 8, people made a lawful and conscientious decision to support traditional marriage and radical gay activists used that information as a weapon against them. The same could easily have happened to Ohio lawful Ohio gun owners — or any other state that keeps such information on hand.

None of us want to live in a world where we are targeted for harassment by radicals because we are exercising our Constitutional rights. But that is precisely what Ohio Democrats wanted to do in the Buckeye State and it is precisely what militant gay advocates did to those that donated money to the pro-Prop 8 cause in California.

Americans need to find that sensible position between transparency and harassment, certainly, but we also need not have to be personally identified and open for personal attack for exercising our rights as Americas like these left-wing activists want to do. No gun registry should exist in a free America.

“Those who sign a petition to place an issue of public dispute onto a statewide ballot may not later claim a broad First Amendment shield of anonymity to prevent disclosure of their names to the public, the US Supreme Court ruled on Thursday. In an 8-to-1 decision, the high court said public disclosure of referendum petitions does not as a general matter violate the First Amendment.

But the court also stressed that under certain circumstances, petition signers may be able to remain anonymous. ‘Those resisting disclosure can prevail under the First Amendment if they can show a reasonable probability that the compelled disclosure [of personal information] will subject them to threats, harassment, or reprisals from either government officials or private parties,’ Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the majority opinion in a case called Doe v. Reed.

The issue arose in Washington State after a group opposed to same-sex marriage sought to repeal a recently passed domestic partnership law. The group wanted the law to reflect that marriage and related legal benefits could only be between a man and a woman.”

Source

A fuller discussion of the decision here.

Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.). For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. To keep up with attacks on free speech see TONGUE-TIED. Also, don’t forget your daily roundup of pro-environment but anti-Greenie news and commentary at GREENIE WATCH . Email me here

Gay rights organizations say the regulation [forbidding blood donation by homosexual men] discriminates against gay and bisexual men. They point out that heterosexual men who have had sex with an HIV-positive partner or a prostitute are barred from donating blood for only 12 months after that contact.

Could it be that homosexuals tend to wallow in a shockingly degenerate lifestyle that makes it much likelier that their blood is infected? Yes it could:

The FDA, explaining the current policy, points out that men who have had sex with men since 1977 have an HIV prevalence that’s 60 times higher than the general population. The agency contends its first obligation is to ensure the safety of the blood supply.

However, politically correct posturing and pandering to the homosexual lobby are much more important than the safety of the blood supply. Just ask Hanoi John Kerry:

Still, a group of U.S. senators and representatives, led by Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts and Rep. Mike Quigley of Illinois, this week asked the FDA to end its “discriminatory” ban.

They’ll probably get their way, considering the caliber of the people running Washington. Already the travel ban on HIV carriers entering the country has been lifted, to the accompaniment of Obamanation Administration duckspeak about stigma and stereotypes.

At least if a little kid goes in for a blood transfusion and consequently dies slowly of a horrific disease that is normally only acquired by those who ask for it, he can crawl to his grave with the satisfaction of knowing that no perverts were stigmatized.

Here’s an idea for Obama’s Science Czar John Holdren: instead of sterilants, maybe he could find some way to put AIDS in the water supply. If everyone had AIDS, we would achieve equality — what a triumph over the stereotyping indulged in by bigots who associate diseases with high-risk behavior!

On a tip from Ianto. Cross-posted at Moonbattery.