The Rick Warren Whirlwind and "Prop 1"

Dec. 23, 2008 Sacramento, CA

Nation's Press Institute*

Work has already begun on what is being dubbed "Proposition 1" to be placed on the 2010 California ballot. Proponents are especially angry at Christian minister Rick Warren, founder and senior pastor of the evangelical megachurch, Saddleback Church, in Lake Forest, California, whose influence and political clout helped pass Proposition 8, which denied gays and lesbians the right to legal marriage.

Warren has been well publicized for what his critics say are offensive political views, and especially for the way he communicates them. "He routinely compares gay relationships to pedophilia, incest, and bigamy, and in the process dehumanizes a group of Americans. His website notes that gay people are not welcome to join his church."

Proponents of the so-called Proposition 1 are attempting to limit the free speech rights of licensed pastors, priests, rabbis, clerics and others during a six month span prior to any election. The Proposition would also limit the same free speech rights of anyone working in a paid or unpaid capacity for any tax-exempt religious organization.

In the United States, churchs receive their privileged tax-exempt position at the cost of outright political involvement. The Bush Administration, say critics, has not been enforcing this law. The Proposition as envisioned would close any organization defined as "tax-exempt for religious purposes" for a period of three months following convition under the new law, imprison the person(s) responsible for the campaigning for not more than six months, and levy a ten thousand dollar fine against the church for each violation.

The Rick Warren Whirlwind

Anything But Straight; Dec. 22, 2008

It could be that Barack Obama is simply smarter than the rest of us. The first black president of the Harvard Law Review has made a career of turning conventional wisdom on its head.

When people said that America was not ready for an African American president, he ran anyway - and won. He was counseled by countless talking heads to "go negative" against Hillary Clinton in the primaries and then John McCain - but he largely stuck to his strategy of staying positive - and won. In the middle of the campaign, Obama hit an iceberg named Rev. Jeremiah Wright, injecting race into a campaign that had desperately tried to shy away from this explosive issue. Obama discarded advice to spin the crisis and instead delivered a lecture on race relations that has gone down as one of the greatest speeches in the history of American politics - not to mention it saved his campaign. So, at this point in his rocket-propelled career, it is unwise to bet against the political instincts of Barack Obama.

Still, choosing pastor Rick Warren to deliver the invocation at his inauguration seemed like a gaffe that has served, if nothing else, as a distraction to Obama's central message of unifying America. This olive branch to evangelical Christians, who largely supported John McCain, felt more like poison ivy to gay and lesbian voters, who overwhelmingly cast ballots for Obama.

After all, Warren has a program to "help" homosexuals "pray away the gay" and played a prominent role in passing Proposition 8, which prohibits same-sex couples from marrying in California. He has even compared same-sex couples marrying to incest and child abuse.

Even if scientists find that homosexuality is genetic, Warren would still counsel gay people to fight their "sin," reducing our love to nothing more than perverted impulses. While Warren presumably gets his basic needs met by his wife, he expects gay people to abandon fulfilling relationships for dour lives of loneliness, severe depression and suicidal thoughts.

Obama can talk about unity all he wants, but what he is really doing is upholding the "Great Gay Exception. Obama would never have an anti-Semite on stage in the name of common ground. If so, why did he distance himself from fellow Chicagoan Louis Farrakhan during his campaign? Obama would also never dream of giving a platform to an open racist. But, Obama seems to think we should not object to him elevating Warren, who we find deeply offensive.

My hope is that Obama's plan is to offer heavy doses of symbolism and style to power hungry preachers, like Warren - while delivering substantive policy achievements to the gay and lesbian community. When gay and lesbian leaders reacted with understandable indignation, Obama's rebuttal was, people need to "learn to agree to disagree without being disagreeable."

This phrase, that many Evangelicals are nodding their heads to in agreement, is a rhetorical trap. If they agree to this principle over the Warren flap, they have essentially forfeited their moral high ground if they get "disagreeable" when Congress passes a law that prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.

The only flaw in this logic is that social conservatives rarely play by the same rules because they think they represent God. It is possible that Obama may have outsmarted himself by appealing to his sanctimonious enemies, who will never return the favor, while forfeiting support among his closest friends.

But, then again, maybe he really can buy goodwill by stroking the egos of narcissistic holy men. Rick Warren begins his best selling book The Purpose Driven Life with the refrain, "this is not about you." Of course not! It's always been about Rick Warren - whose camera-ready compassion is legendary.

If any good can come from this controversy, it is that many Americans now realize that Warren is masquerading as a moderate and posing as a pragmatist. Many Americans - who previously respected Warren - now view him as a poll-tested Pat Robertson who hides hate behind a Hawaiian shirt. He seemed arrogant and out of touch on NBC's Dateline when he told Ann Curry that he wasn't homophobic because he provided protesters outside his church with doughnuts. Gee, thanks, maybe next time you take away our rights we'll get ice cream from His holiness.

The alternative storyline is really unthinkable.

In this version, Obama cynically used gay and lesbian people for money, votes and volunteers. Then before he is sworn in, he swears off equality. This plot was certainly advanced when not a single openly gay person was appointed to a high-level cabinet position.

Within a year, we will learn whether Obama's decision to choose Warren was cagey, careless or cruel. If it is the former, we will soon view this cultural flashpoint as a flash in the pan. If it is the latter, it will cause an explosion of gay activism, giving many people who were previously apolitical, purpose driven lives - protesting Barack Obama.

© 2008 Wayne Besen. All rights reserved. Anything But Straight www.waynebesen.com

* Nation's Press Institute © The Free Assemblage of Metaphysical Naturalists LLC

"Proposition 1" is fictional for the purposes of illustrating how Federal law is not being enforced under the Bush Administration.

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© 2008 by Curtis Edward Clark and Naturalist Academy Publishing ®

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Dobson, Besen, Obama, Warren; von Mises

Radio Hall of Fame Craters A Month After It Inducts James Dobson Amid Protests

NEW YORK –December 13th, 2008
A month after protesters picketed its annual dinner for inducting Focus on the Family’s James Dobson into its Radio Hall of Fame, the Chicago-based Museum of Broadcast Communications (MBC) announced today that it was selling its half-finished building.

"Pandering to extremists doesn't pay and the Museum of Broadcast Communications suffered a catastrophic blow to its reputation by honoring Focus on the Family's James Dobson," said Wayne Besen, Executive Director of Truth Wins Out (TWO). "Bruce DuMont hoped to cash in by catering to the deep pockets of the religious right, but his prayers weren't answered.

When the nomination of Dobson was announced, TWO teamed up with the Gay Liberation Network and launched http://www.dumpdobson.com/ to keep Dobson out of the Radio Hall of Fame. These robust efforts culminated with a full-page "Dump Dobson" ad in the Chicago Tribune, signature ads in the GLBT media and a large demonstration outside of the awards dinner at Chicago's Renaissance Hotel.

DuMont blamed his woes on alleged broken promises by Gov. Rod Blagojevich and the economic downturn. He did not point out that his project lost momentum after it became mired in controversy by cozying up to Dobson, says TWO.

"I can understand the temptation to pin the blame on Blagojevich, as he is not too popular these days," said Besen. "But, DuMont should take responsibility and admit that his project lost its luster and foundered after he chose to bronze the bigotry of James Dobson."

Washington -December 18
It would seem that another protest may be on the way. It was reported this morning that President-Elect Obama has chosen Rick Warren, the celebrity preacher at Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, Calif., to give the invocation at Obama's swearing-in ceremony.

Pastor Warren, while enjoying a reputation as a moderate based on his affable personality and his church's engagement on issues like AIDS in Africa, has said that the real difference between James Dobson and himself is one of tone rather than substance. He has recently compared marriage by loving and committed same-sex couples to incest and pedophilia. He has repeated the Religious Right's big lie that supporters of equality for gay Americans are out to silence pastors. He has called Christians who advance a social gospel Marxists. He is adamantly opposed to women having a legal right to choose an abortion. The Swamp

Well, it sounds as though Warren has his own "social gospel." Considering the effect TWO and The Gay Liberation Network had on the Dobson controversy, I'm waiting to see what they do with this. Pandering to extremists may not pay, but it is not "extremism" that is the problem. America's Founders were extremists. Ben Franklin himself must have been an extremist, to become America's first millionaire.

Or are we only talking about religious extremists? Abraham, Jesus, and Mohammad were extremists.

Warren's ideas are not "extreme." They are outrageous, insulting, and in the sense that such widely popular theists can effect public policy and law, thus breaking down the wall of separation between church and state, not to mention influencing other citizens to become homophobes by wrongful moral comparison to child molesters makes such men as Warren unfit to "invocate" the swearing-in of any American President.

Study Guide to Ludwig Von Mises "Human Action" Available Free

"It has been a work years in the making, but finally the Study Guide to the Scholar's Edition of Ludwig von Mises's "Human Action", is available. You can order the handsome volume here, and — as we've come to expect — the Mises Institute is generously providing the entire book free for download here."

I have already downloaded mine, to a thumbdrive. The study guide is 318 pages and I have yet to read page one because I have had my copy for only 2 minutes now! But I am looking forward to reading it side by side with "Human Action."

The Study Guide's author, Robert P. Murphy, wrote in the Daily Articles of the Ludwig Von Mises Institute:

"Once you realize that Mises has a definite plan for the book — it is certainly not a Joycean stream-of-consciousness riff — then its 881 pages are not as daunting. You realize with each chapter, 'Yes, now I see why Mises couldn't really get on to Important Topic X until he first dealt with the material he just covered.'"

And if you are a free-market naturalist, (which you are if you are a metaphysical naturalist,) you just might want to check out The Gold Standard: An Austrian Perspective YouTube video from the Mises Institute's first conference, November 16-17, 1983; Washington, DC.

M of
The Free Assemblage of Metaphysical Naturalists LLC.
The Academy of Metaphysical Naturalism TM,
The Academy of Metaphysical Naturalism Blogger TM, and
Academy of Metaphysical Naturalism Blogger Extra TM are the educational arms of the LLC and are:
© 2008 by Curtis Edward Clark and Naturalist Academy Publishing ®

mailto:freeassemblage@gmail.com

http://freeassemblage.blogspot.com/