Holocaust survivors said Monday they are through trying to negotiate with the Mormon church over posthumous baptisms of Jews killed in Nazi concentration camps, saying the church has repeatedly violated a 13-year-old agreement barring the practice.
Leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints say they are making changes to their massive genealogical database that will make it more difficult for names of Holocaust victims to be entered for posthumous baptism by proxy, a rite that has been a common Mormon practice for more than a century.
Now…look at this carefully. On the one hand they’re saying they’re trying to make it more difficult. But on the other…
In 1995, Mormons and Jews inked an agreement to limit the circumstances that allow for the proxy baptisms of Holocaust victims. Ending the practice outright was not part of the agreement and would essentially be asking Mormons to alter their beliefs, church Elder Lance B. Wickman said Monday in an interview with reporters in Salt Lake City.
“We don’t think any faith group has the right to ask another to change its doctrines,” Wickman said. “If our work for the dead is properly understood … it should not be a source of friction to anyone. It’s merely a freewill offering.”
Emphasis mine. Check out the massive weasel words there. They don’t think anyone has the right to ask a "faith group" to change their doctrines. But when it comes to other people’s faiths, it’s okay for them to unilaterally convert their dead, and never mind what they happen to think about that. They’re going to make your dead relatives Mormons whether you like it or not. A "freewill offering"…? Where’s the freedom to say ‘No’…? Oh…the free in "freewill offering" doesn’t apply to you…
Church spokesman Otterson said the church kept its part of the agreement by removing more than 260,000 names from the genealogical index.
But since 2005, ongoing monitoring of the database by an independent Salt Lake City-based researcher shows both resubmissions and new entries of names of Dutch, Greek, Polish and Italian Jews.
The researcher, Helen Radkey, who has done contract work for the Holocaust group, said her research suggests that lists of Holocaust victims obtained from camp and government records are being dumped into the database. She said she has seen and recorded a sampling of several thousand entries that indicate baptisms had been conducted for Holocaust victims as recently as July.
What a class act these people are. Note that one of the arguments raised in California’s proposition 8 battle was that same-sex marriage infringed on people’s religious freedom. But it’s okay to convert other people’s dead whether they want that or not.
Bitterness generated by the bruising battle between Betsy Markey and Marilyn Musgrave apparently lingers days after voters decided the winner of the 4th Congressional District.
Incumbent Republican Musgrave, who lost to Democrat Markey by a 56 to 44 percent margin Tuesday, has yet to call and congratulate Markey on her win.
Musgrave also hasn’t conceded the race, said Markey spokesman Ben Marter. "She has yet to admit defeat," he said. "It’s a little bizarre."
Calls to Musgrave’s campaign and congressional office went unanswered Friday.
Now that California voters have outlawed same-sex marriage, an LDS Church leader called Wednesday for members to heal rifts caused by the emotional campaign by treating each other with "civility, with respect and with love."
"We hope that everyone would treat [each other] that way no matter which side of this issue they were on," said Elder L. Whitney Clayton, of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ Presidency of the Seventy.
…
In a statement, the LDS Church said it does not object to domestic partnership or civil union legislation "as long as these do not infringe on the integrity of the traditional family or the constitutional rights of churches."
Which same sex marriage does not. But…you know that…
As for Proposition 8, "we consider this to be a moral issue," Clayton said. "We’re not anti-gay, we’re pro marriage between a man and a woman."
Right. Like you weren’t racist when you were denying black people a seat in your church…just pro white. You don’t have to be racist to be pro-white.
You gutter crawling scum have been lurking in the background of this battle for over a decade now, and all that is over. You fought to make your gay and lesbian neighbors second class citizens in their own country. Own it. Trust me…you will have to. Nobody is forgetting this. You want civility? Get The Fuck Off Our Backs.
Video Only — A threatening letter has sparked a new controversy here in San Diego surrounding the gay marriage debate. Donors who gave money to the No on Prop 8 campaign say they received blackmail letters demanding money, and the Yes on 8 campaign now says the letters were sent by their employees.
In Nicholas Meyer’s Sherlock Holmes novel, The West End Horror, there’s a scene between Holmes and Oscar Wilde…I’m quoting from memory here…where Wilde tells Holmes that he has a perfect way of dealing with blackmailers when they threaten him with incriminating letters. "I publish them", he says.
Donate to No On 8, Here. Maybe you’ll get one of these letters too…suitable for framing…or posting online…
The Holmes County School District, which was the site of a court battle over the right of students to declare their support for their gay and lesbian peers, has begun court ordered sensitivity training classes for it’s teachers and staff.
Can you spot the difference between these two news stories on this topic?
First, the local TV News station…
Fla. principal accused of gay ‘witch hunt’
Employees of 1 rural Florida school district are starting the new school year by attending sensitivity classes.
A federal judge’s ruling prompted the classes at the Holmes County School District. The American Civil Liberties Union sued the district when a principal banned students from wearing rainbow-colored clothing or other items that he said showed support for homosexuality.
Principal Davis enacted the ban, and suspended students who violated it, after one student told him she was taunted for being gay. Davis told the girl that it was wrong to be gay, order her to stay away from younger students and called her parents. The girl’s friends wore gay pride T-shirts and other clothing in support.
A federal judge ruled that Davis and the district violated the students’ free speech rights by banning the clothing.
Next…365Gay.Com…
Florida school at center of GSA battle begins sensitivity training
Teachers and staff in a Florida school district which was at the center of a long legal battle over gay/straight alliances are back in the classroom – this time as students in sensitivity classes.
The Holmes County School District set up the training sessions after losing a federal court battle in which the judge blasted the principal of Ponce de Leon High School principal David Davis for leading a “relentless crusade” against homosexuality.
U.S. District Judge Richard Smoak said in his ruling last month that principal David Davis “embarked on what can only be characterized as a witch hunt. The ruling also said that Davis led “morality assemblies” that ignored the First Amendment.
Davis has since been replaced as principal.
During the two-day trial in May, Davis testified that he believed clothing, buttons or stickers featuring rainbows would make students automatically picture gay people having sex.
He went on to admit that while censoring rainbows and gay pride messages, he allowed students to wear other symbols many find controversial, such as the Confederate flag.
Heather Gillman, a 16-year-old junior at the high school, sued the district with the help of the American Civil Liberties Union after she was told she could not wear buttons, stickers or clothing that supported LGBT civil rights.
After she received the warning, the ACLU last November sent a letter to the school board’s attorney on behalf of Gillman, asking for clarification as to whether a variety of symbols and slogans, such as the rainbow flag or “I support my gay friends,” would be allowed at the school.
The school district replied that it would not allow any expressions of support for gay rights at all because such speech would “likely be disruptive.”
The district then said that such symbols and slogans were signs that students were part of a “secret/illegal organization.”
The problems began in September 2007 when a lesbian student tried to report to school officials that she was being harassed by other students because she is a lesbian. Instead of addressing the harassment, students say the school responded with intimidation, censorship, and suspensions.
Prior to the release of his written ruling, Smoak issued an order that forces the school to stop its censorship of students who want to express their support for gay people. The judge also warned the district not to retaliate against students over the lawsuit.
The AP went one better too…running a story all about how the locals support the principle that started all this, headlined, FL. Town Backs Principle In Gay Student Case. It mentions nothing about the morality assemblies, the fact that confederate flags were allowed to be worn but not t-shirts supporting the gay students, or that Davis said students wearing gay supportive messages would make people think of gay sex, or that the district declared gay supportive students to be part of an illegal secret organization. It did say however, that the townsfolk were sincerely baffled about the judge’s "scathing rebuke", and why the principle had done anything wrong.
The AP also says that "Many in the community support Davis and feel outsiders are forcing their beliefs on them." That would be as opposed to forcing dissenters to keep their mouths shut while they force their piss ignorant beliefs about homosexuality on gay people, their parents and their friends.
Looks like the parents of Lawrence King have bought into the defense strategy of their son’s killer. News reports I’m seeing this morning are that King’s parents have filed a claim against the school where he was shot to death, asserting that it was their failure to enforce the dress code on their son that led to his death (so far all I see is the AP report, which I’m not linking to because of the blogger AP boycott). In other words, because Lawrence felt himself more feminine then the other boys, and the school allowed him to dress more femininely, the school made him a target.
This is so unbearably sad. The poor kid’s parents seem deathly ashamed of their own son, even in death. He had to know how they felt about him before he died. And maybe that was why some of the teachers at his school took him under their wing as they did. Lawrence’s parents aren’t arguing here that the school failed to protect their son, but that they failed to keep him in the closet. They are granting the premise of their son’s killer and his lawyer, that hate has more right to walk in the hallways of the public schools then gay kids do.
It’s one thing to argue that the school let the bullying that Lawrence endured escalate dangerously. It is another thing entirely to argue that letting Lawrence be openly gay led to his murder. Waving the dress code around is a calculated and disgustingly cynical ploy. It sidesteps the question of whether the code itself embodies discriminatory gender norms. Gay and transgendered children should feel welcome and safe and secure in school too, or they cannot assert their right to an education. Shoving them into the closet, for the sake of the delicate sensibilities of bigots, punishes them simply for existing, forces them to try and learn, somehow, in an environment where they are made to feel deviant, outcast and ashamed.
I read elsewhere that Lawrence’ father has complained bitterly that the gays have turned his son’s death into a cause. As though the safety and welfare of all the other gay and transgendered kids in the public schools isn’t something worth fighting for. It’s one thing to forgive his son’s killer. The boy is only 14 after all. But it’s another thing to excuse him. Many gay and transgendered children know with horrible sickening clarity, some living on the streets because they were thrown out of their homes, that their parents would excuse their killer too. Some would excuse them with great sadness. Some would applaud.
When will Microsoft finally grasp that consumers and vendors have some trust issues with the company?
They don’t care. Customer trust was never in the business plan. The plan was always to have a monopoly on the desktop. When people have no choice but to buy from you it doesn’t matter if they trust you or not.
Bill doesn’t grok trust. He’s made himself a life where he doesn’t have to.
A mural meant to bring people together is causing a rift in the Bastrop community.
The painting in question, a student project completed in 2003, adorns a wall in the corridor leading to the Bastrop High School gym. It depicts the sometimes unpleasant history of the town, showing scenes of a Mexican and Comanche raid and slaves working in a cotton field, as well as unifying visions of children of different ethnicities reaching out to one another.
Bastrop school board members were surprised when almost a dozen district residents who signed up to speak at a community forum Tuesday evening wanted to talk about the mural, some calling for its removal on religious grounds and others with arguments for keeping it up.
…
Bastrop resident Lauren Hansell, who made the original complaint, homeschools her children but visits the school on Fridays to pray with students at the flagpole.
A Christian, Hansell said she wants the mural removed because of the war and slavery scenes and depictions of Buddha and ancient gods. Hansell said girl’s basketball coach Dee Deshay pointed out the mural as a potential problem.
"When she showed it to me, I was like, ‘Oh my gosh,’ " said Hansell, who added that the mural presents a new age idea of peace and unity that could be confusing to Christian students.
Emphasis mine. Hansell waves her finger at the depiction of many faiths in the mural…
Among the images on the mural are an Aztec sun, ancient Egypt’s King Tutankhamen, Buddha and Shiva, a Hindu deity, dancing on a demon of ignorance.
Hansell, who at first interpreted Shiva’s dance as a message in favor of abortion, said laws that bar Christian symbols from public schools should apply to the mural.
Here is the tack being played now by the KulturKrieger: If one religion is kept out of the schools they should all be kept out. But fundamentalist hysterics notwithstanding, Christianity isn’t being kept out of the schools and never has been. Here, the Austin-American Statesman actually does some journalism …
The First Amendment, which bans government-sponsored religious activities even as it protects religious expression from government interference, allows students to pray during school in informal settings, according to U.S. Department of Education guidelines. The guidelines say students have the right to "express their beliefs about religion in the form of homework, artwork, and other written and oral assignments free of discrimination based on the religious content of their submissions."
Valdez, the muralist, said the purpose of the project was to represent the history and cultural unity in Bastrop. Although no one symbol can represent a culture, he said the students chose the mural’s imagery to represent unity.
That’s the problem. That was always the problem. Not that Christianity is being kept out, but that kids of other faiths are allowed to feel welcome…to believe that they are a part of the American fabric too. That was why the fight was waged back in the 50s and 60s to stop public schools from forcing prayer on students. That is why people work hard to this day to keep the fundamentalists from co-opting the American public school system. The public schools are for all children, not some. And that’s because America is for people of all faiths, not the people of one faith.
That idea is anathema to the fundamentalists, who think Jesus smiles every time they spit in a Samaritan’s face. If they can’t beat the heathen children down one way, they’ll try to beat them down another. One way or another, the heathens must be forced to give up their faith. If they can’t be forced into school prayers. Maybe they can be forced into silence.
The point was always to coerce everyone into Christianity. Their brand of Christianity. This is why the depictions of unity on the mural might be confusing to their children. It includes everybody.
As 14-year-old Brandon McInerney prepares to be arraigned today in the slaying of 15-year-old Lawrence "Larry" King at E.O. Green Junior High School in Oxnard, his lawyer is advancing a defense that at least partly blames school officials for the tragedy.
Educators should have moved aggressively to quell rising tensions between the two boys, which began when King openly flirted with McInerney, said Deputy Public Defender William Quest.
No. The tensions pre-existed that. The flirting was Kings way of dealing with the abuse he was getting from the other kids. But look at this carefully. Quest is hanging a dead skunk on a sliver of truth obvious to everyone in hindsight. Educators should have moved aggressively to quell rising tensions between the two boys… Yes. And right here is the poison Quest is trying to slip in along with that…
Instead, administrators were so intent on nurturing King as he explored his sexuality, allowing him to come to school wearing feminine makeup and accessories, that they downplayed the turmoil that his behavior was causing on campus, Quest said.
You’d think the boy was going to school in drag…which is exactly the image Quest is creating there. Quest is slyly turning a murdered 15 year old gay kid into a drag queen exploring his sexuality on other terrified teenagers. He’s pushing all the usual buttons there. But look past that. King’s behavior was creating turmoil on campus. Quest has probably figured out that blaming a 15 year old gay kid for his own murder isn’t going to play well…at least with California juries. He might get away with it, but considering Matthew Shepard’s killers couldn’t even in Wyoming, it’s a risk. So what to do? Simple. Blame the school for not blaming the victim.
Instead, administrators were so intent on nurturing King as he explored his sexuality, allowing him to come to school wearing feminine makeup and accessories, that they downplayed the turmoil that his behavior was causing on campus…
Isn’t that a neat trick? The school was siding with the gay kid, which left the other kids in turmoil, which caused Brandon McInerney to bring a gun to school and shoot Lawrence King in the back of the head. Poor Branden was so traumatized over having a gay classmate, and even worse being flirted at, that he couldn’t even look him in the eye when he pulled the trigger. And it’s all the school’s fault. For nurturing the gay kid. When they should have been keeping him under control. So the other kids wouldn’t be in turmoil. So Branden McInerney wouldn’t have been in turmoil.
You have never seen the gay panic defense so slickly inserted into a murder trial.
The anti-gay religious right is mounting Yet Another protest against the Day Of Silence, itself a protest against anti-gay violence in schools. First it was the misnamed Day Of Truth. Now it’s the Golden Rule Day. Jim Burroway over at Box Turtle Bulletin writes about the competing religious right activity, and sums it up pretty thoroughly here…
More than a year ago, I attended a Love Won Out conference in Phoenix put on jointly by Exodus International and Focus On the Family. That’s where I heard Focus’s Mike Haley address anti-LGBT violence in a Q&A session:
I think, too, we also have to be just as quick to also stand up when we do see the gay and lesbian community being come against as the Body of Christ. We need to be the first to speak out to say that what happened to Matthew Shepard was a terrible incident and should never happen again. And that we within the Body of Christ are wanting to protect that community and put our money where our mouth is…
That was a real “Wow!” moment for me. I thought finally, someone gets it. I can’t tell you how encouraged I was to hear Mike Haley say that. It was an ultimate Golden Rule moment. And I can’t begin to describe how disappointed I’ve been since then.
One year later, Lawrence King was killed in cold blood on February 12 in front of his teachers and classmates. Since then, conservative Christians leaders have celebrated seventy-three consecutive Days of Silence.
Emphasis mine. You should go read the whole thing. Day of Silence? How about seventy-three Days of Silence after a 15 year old gay boy was shot in the head.
That says it all. Can we please stop talking about their "sincerely held religious beliefs" now? This isn’t about faith. This isn’t about how much they love God. It’s about how much they hate us.
The US army doubled its use of "moral waivers" for enlisted soldiers last year to cope with the demands of the Iraq war, allowing sex offenders, people convicted of making terrorist threats, and child abusers into the military, new records released yesterday showed.
The army gave out 511 moral waivers to soldiers with felony convictions last year. Criminals got 249 army waivers in 2006, a sign that the demand for US forces in Iraq has forced a sharp increase in the number of criminals allowed on the battlefield.
The felons accepted into the army and marines included 87 soldiers convicted of assault or maiming, 130 convicted of non-cannabis-related drug offences, seven convicted of making terrorist threats, and two convicted of indecent behaviour with a child. Waivers were also granted to 500 burglars and thieves, 19 arsonists and nine sex offenders.
SANTA BARBARA, Calif., April 21 (AScribe Newswire) — New information released today by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee shows that in 2006 and 2007 Americans who were convicted of serious crimes including sexual offences, manslaughter, "terrorist threats including bomb threats", burglary, kidnapping or abduction, aggravated assault and sexual assault were allowed into the military under moral waivers granted by the services.
According to the data given to the committee by the Department of Defense, the Army allowed the most waivers in 2006 and 2007. During this period, moral or felony waivers were given to 3 soldiers who had been convicted of manslaughter. One soldier was allowed in following a kidnapping or abduction conviction, 11 were convicted of arson, 142 convicted of burglary, 3 who were convicted of indecent acts or liberties with a child, 7 who were convicted of rape, sexual assault, criminal sexual assault, incest or other sex crimes and 3 who were convicted of terrorist threats including bomb threats.
So…let me get this straight. Letting gay people serve will harm the moral and readiness of our armed forces…but allowing child molesters and rapists to wear the uniform won’t. Look at this. No…really look at it. The leaders of the armed forces of the United States of America would really rather be saluted by rapists and child molesters then by a homosexual.
Well…this explains why Iraq is pretty much FUBAR doesn’t it? It wasn’t just Rumsfeld and Bush. They had help running our military into the ground from all the country club thugs in the pentagon executive suites. And it explains all this too…
All the culture warriors, all the fine culture warriors who fought to keep gay people out of the armed forces… All the righteous men and women of high moral standards and values… And in the end they turned out to be nothing more then a pack of street thugs, dragging America into their gutter…into that open sewer they call virtue…
Three Cheers For Heterosexuality. Oh Come On Now…Cheer!
Via Pam’s House Blend… Brian Blair is the opponent of Kevin Beckner, the openly gay man running for the Hillsborough County Commission in Florida. The county is holding its Day of Silence in honor of 15-year-old hate crime victim Lawrence King this year, and naturally, as Pam puts it, "…the idea of kids engaging in a silent, passive act against violence, harassment and prejudice during the school day is just too much to bear for these people of apparently weak faith." Here’s what Blair has to say about it:
"I have always believed that all citizens are equal and should be treated accordingly. On the other hand, no group of citizens should be given government sanction and support to promote their social and sexual agenda upon the rest of us and especially, on our children."
"Considering the fact that the same school system does not want to allow just one Minute of Silence in the classroom for God, this is preposterous."
"Can you imagine asking for a ‘Day of Cheer for Heterosexuality?’ If no action is taken to change this policy, then perhaps it is time for another surgical strike from the majority; ‘A Day of Abstention’ from school participation might be considered."
Brian Blair brings a high degree of seriousness to American politics, and Florida politics especially, not simply because he is a defender of heterosexuality against the militant gay agenda, but also because he was once a WWE professional wrestler. Here’s a photo of Mr. Blair (on the left) in his role as part of the WWE "Killer Bees" team…
Can you imagine asking for a ‘Day of Cheer for Heterosexuality?
Singer Ian ‘H’ Watkins’ has told of the "complete nightmare" of growing up gay in the south Wales valleys.
The former Steps singer, who is from the Rhondda, filmed a personal account for BBC Wales’ Week In Week Out.
In the programme, he also looked at schools’ treatment of gay issues and admitted he was bullied "relentlessly".
Making the documentary, he said he was shocked to be told by one Christian campaigner that being gay made him no better than a serial killer.
Christian Voice director, Stephen Green, told Watkins his lifestyle was "sinful", and made him no better than US mass murderer Jeffrey Dahmer.
Mr Green also told the former Celebrity Big Brother contestant he could become straight if he wanted to.
The comparison to Dahmer who was jailed for life in 1992 after the Wisconsin trial heard evidence of his cannibalism after murdering his victims came when Watkins told Mr Green he was "completely happy" being gay and that he was in a loving relationship.
Mr Green added: "Jeremy (sic) Dahmer was happy murdering people, does that make it right?"
The comment shocked Watkins and he responded: "So, being completely happy and at one with yourself, and being in a happy, loving relationship is the same as murdering somebody?"
But Mr Green stuck to his guns during the exchange: "Sin is sin…in the eyes of God, sin is sin…"
When Watkins referred to people being born gay, Mr Green told him: "I don’t believe anybody is born homosexual. God wouldn’t allow anybody to be born homosexual."
Watkins, who came out when he was in the Big Brother house alongside Shilpa Shetty and Jade Goody, says he was "absolutely flabbergasted" by the comments.
You might ask why, since like a lot of gay people he’d been hearing them most of his life. But staring into the face of grinning depravity always comes as a shock, no matter how often you’ve seen it before. That wasn’t a conversation about Watkin’s homosexuality, it was about his happiness. Green saw it…saw it was real the moment Watkins told him of it…saw it in his face, in his voice, in that peaceful aura truly happy people gently radiate. He saw it, and his immediate reflex was to punch it out. And he reached for the first weapon he could wrap his hands around to do it. Ah…Jeffrey Dahmer…the cannibal…that’ll do the trick… And he swung. He swung at that innermost place in Watkin’s heart where that joy had taken root.
It wasn’t sin Green was striking out at. God is just the grown up bully’s substitute for mother’s skirt…something to hide behind when the bullied start looking like they’ve had enough. It was the happiness in Watkin’s voice Green hated, it was his joy, it was the sight of a person in love, and it was pure reflex. And he did it, with the same brutally carnal delight a playground bully takes in busting apart that nice toy the neighbor’s kid just got for his birthday…for the pleasure of seeing the look in the kid’s eyes when he realizes his toy is gone. The tears afterward, are like free candy. Green is probably still savoring the look on Watkin’s face at the moment of impact. He’ll be savoring it for weeks.
Pissing On The Grave Of Edward R. Murrow…(continued)
Via This Modern World… How our corporate news media covers the Writer’s Strike…
Atrios catches some anti-WGA strike bias on CNBC, a network that prides itself in catering to “business executives and financial professionals that have significant purchasing power”. The chyron reads :
WHAT ARE THEY FIGHTING FOR?
4,434 Hollywood guild writers worked full-time last year.
Average salary: $204,000
Many earned $1 million or more
Well, to answer CNBC’s question, they aren’t fighting for “significant purchasing power”. They’re fighting for the financial security that would allow their members to remain in the middle class.
Middle class? Two hundred grand sounds like a good deal, but remember that’s the average salary. This number was chosen specifically because CNBC and the studios on whose behalf they’re arguing want you to believe that most writers are spoiled brats whining about their six-figure incomes. But in a case like this in which a deliberately-vague “many” WGA members earn over $1 million, the “average” income is misleading. A much more important measurement of writers income is the median.
For a good illustration of the difference between “average” and “median” incomes, let me refer you to this graph from the classic book “How to Lie With Statistics” (used without permission. go buy it now!) :
If you add up all of the salaries and divide it by the number of employees, you come up with an “average” that is a poor indicator of an ordinary worker’s income. After all, Mr. Moneybags at the top brings home more than twenty times what the dozen peons at the bottom of the graph make. And this “average” income is only earned by one person, who earns more than 20 of the 24 employees on the chart. While the “average” in this case is mathematically correct, it doesn’t represent the typical income. Or to use an oft-cited example, if Bill Gates walked into a homeless shelter, the “average” income would skyrocket, but it wouldn’t change the fact that everyone else is poor.
Now let’s go back to the WGA strike. Thanks to our friends at CNBC, we know that the “average” WGA member makes $200K, but what’s the median income? According to an LA Times op-ed written by a WGA board member :
“The median income of screen and television writers from their guild-covered employment is $5,000 a year, in part because almost half our members don’t work in any given year.”
Five. Thousand. Dollars. Now keep that figure in mind when you see these CEOs gush about how much money they’ll be making :
In summary…the big media moguls are waving the high dollar salaries of a few writers who’ve hit the big time in everyone’s faces, so they can suck dry the vast majority of other writers who are barely earning a living at their trade. And our corporate news media is happy to be of service.
It has come to this: Democrats give a twelve year old boy airtime on their weekly address to relate his story about what happened to him and his family when she was in an automobile accident, and they couldn’t afford to pay the bills without the kind of federal help that President Nice Job Brownie just vetoed, and the Bush republican grassroots immediately begin Swift-Boating his family.
Whiskey Fire has some good notes on the obscenity Here. The gutter is bitching about the fact that they own a 3000 square foot rowhouse in Baltimore, that their father owns his own cabinet making business, that the kids are going to a private school with a 20,000 a year tuition. No part of that family’s life is now escaping the smear machine’s attention…right down to the kitchen counter tops…
The current market value of their improved 3,040 SF home at 104 S Collington Ave is unknown but 113 S COLLINGTON AVE, also an end unit, sold for $485,000 this past March and it was only 2,060 SF. A photo taken in the family’s kitchen shows what appears to be a recent remodeling job with granite counter tops and glass front cabinets.
Yeah, and the current market value of my little 1500 sq foot Baltimore rowhouse is about $240,000 but just six years ago I was able to buy it for $89,900, because that was what it’s market value was then. One reason the housing market is still so hot here in Baltimore is that prices in the surrounding suburbs, and Washington D.C., are simply insane. So people of modest means are buying up Baltimore rowhouses in the neighborhoods are that are still fairly safe. One Whiskey Fire commenter puts it thusly:
Let me get this straight. This guy’s a cabinet maker, and these geniuses are leering about how nice his cabinets are?
Given that those people basically live in downtown Baltimore, I’d be willing to bet that they bought a a rundown house in a gentrifying neighborhood on the cheap so that Mr. Frost, who is good with his hands, can fix the place up and they can turn the house around for a profit. His business, which is a couple of blocks away in downtown Baltimore, basically comes from all the people fixing up all the old brownstones in the area.
In the meantime, he has to send his kids to school and the public schools in Baltimore don’t really seem like the ideal option. So he looks around, and finds that he can send them to a private school using their assistance program.
But given that $45000 dollars, while a decent living all things considered, isn’t a whole hell of a lot of money, especially when there are six mouths to feed, after everything’s said and done with he just can’t make things work with health insurance (when it comes down to it, after the mortgage, food, clothes and all the rest of the expenses of raising a family, even another $600 is no small potatos).
Then the children get into a catasrophic accident, the family is suddenly looking at medical bills it can’t pay. They are in such bad straits that the school is doing fundraisers for them. This government program helps them; makes their lives better in a fundamental way.
And these jokers are pissed off about it.
Amazing.
I have a next door neighbor who is doing just that on his rowhouse. He’s a building contractor of some sort, and he redid his own kitchen and it is just fabulous. But you’d expect it to be, or you wouldn’t be wanting him to do your kitchen too. And I have another neighbor who is by no means wealthy, and trying hard to keep his own kids in the Friends school here in Baltimore, rather then public school. The public schools here in the city, thanks in large measure to republican scorched earth attacks on racial equality, cities, and public education, are teetering on the verge of collapse.
So this self employed father does his best to provide for his family, and give his kids a decent education, on $45,000 a year, and his kids are nearly killed in an automobile accident and that family suddenly finds themselves looking into an almost bottomless pit of medical expenses…and the gutter puppies at Powerline and The Free Republic, and professor InstaJackass, think there’s something suspicious about this? No. No. Absolutely not. They know goddamn well there’s nothing wrong with this family’s story. Nothing factually wrong that is. But it was very politically incorrect, and for that the family must not only suffer, it must be publicly run through the wringer as an example to others who might be considering speaking out.
For the Bush base, the Party is the only truth, the only religion, the only morality. When the right wing talks about virtue and morality, what they’re talking about is fealty to the party. Nothing else. That’s how you can run a propaganda steamroller over a twelve year old boy’s family, because she dared to ask the nation to look, really look, at what happened to them.
[Update…] Graeme Frost is a boy, not a girl, as I’d originally written. Obviously I didn’t listen to the radio address that started all this. Sorry guy…
Daily KOS has some facts the Freepers don’t want you to know…
Graeme has a scholarship to a private school. The school costs $15K a year, but the family only pays $500 a year.
His sister Gemma attends another private school to help her with the brain injuries that occurred due to her accident. The school costs $23,000 a year, but the state pays the entire cost.
They bought their “lavish house” sixteen years ago for $55,000 at a time when the neighborhood was less than safe.
Last year, the Frost’s made $45,000 combined. Over the past few years they have made no more than $50,000 combined.
The state of Maryland has found them eligible to participate in the CHIP program.
So Graeme’s sister is actually in a private school because she’s still struggling with injuries from the automobile accident. And their Baltimore rowhouse was bought for considerably less then what it’s worth now…a fact which would only be surprising to someone who didn’t know that housing prices have risen dramatically in the past few years. But see what the Freepers did. They took the current value of the house and related it as though that represented the income level of the owners. They took the cost of tuition at the schools the kids are going to, and related it as though they’d just proven that was what the family was actually paying. They even put photos of the family kitchen under the microscope.
Michelle Malkin, who once posted the names and home phone numbers of University of California students who had organized a protest against military recruiters on campus, is now stalking the family of Graeme Frost. And surely she’s not the only wingnut that wants to get this family somehow, some way, for speaking out, for putting human faces on the American health care crisis. They say that this family is not deserving of support, because it is not destitute. But that something like an automobile accident can drive an essentially middle-class, small business family into destitution is emblematic of Exactly what’s wrong with our health care system. The political movement that waves "family values" as a banner has now officially made American families another enemy in the kulturkampf. The political movement that enshrined free market capitalism as a moral standard more righteous then the Sermon On The Mount has now officially declared small businessmen are the enemy. We are all on the front line now. We are all targets. But of course, we always were.
[Update II…] You gotta love the comments the gutter is leaving on progressive blogs on this. The suggestion being floated now is that the Frost family should have sold their house to pay for their children’s medical expenses. They bought the house for 55 grand and now its worth almost half a million and so the kook pews are saying that means the family is rich and they’re just milking the system like a bunch of liberal welfare junkies. I’ve seen one of them suggest the family sell the house and rent a 1 thousand square foot apartment to make ends meet.
Let’s deconstruct this. The family of six, whose father is a self employed cabinet maker, is making somewhat less then 50 grand a year. The house is 3 thousand square feet, which is good for a family of six. I once rented a 750k sq foot apartment and that rent was costing me by the time I moved out in 2001 800 dollars a month. And that was a One Bedroom apartment. The two bedrooms, which were 1200 sq feet, rented for over a thousand a month. Rents in Baltimore have skyrocketed as the value of homes have skyrocketed, and I doubt you could find a decent 1k sq foot apartment in Baltimore for less then the mortgage this family is currently paying on their house. And it would be at most two bedrooms, which isn’t enough for a family of six.
So in other words, to pay the medical bills incurred because their children were in an automobile accident, and still stay right with the kook pews, this middle class working family should sell the house that’s big enough to raise four kids in, and which they can afford the mortgage on, and move everyone into a one bedroom apartment that will cost them more to rent, and which they’ll never own, and which is too small to raise a family of four children in.
Actually, this is Exactly what would have happened to this family were it not for the Maryland CHIP program. They would have lost their home, and been forced into a downward spiral that so many working poor are. Their living expenses would have gone up, even as their standard of living went down. I never realized how much my own family had been nickeled and dimed to death until I bought my house, and saw all the tax and economic breaks I was suddenly getting.
And the Bush republicans think this is the Right policy. They really think that pushing middle class families into poverty by medical bills is better then having a national health care system that would keep them, and their children out of poverty.
The next time a Bush republican utters the words "Family Values" in your presence, laugh in their face. Oh, and do the same whenever you hear them start yapping about the virtues of small business.
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Let me get this straight. This guy’s a cabinet maker, and these geniuses are leering about how nice his cabinets are?
Given that those people basically live in downtown Baltimore, I’d be willing to bet that they bought a a rundown house in a gentrifying neighborhood on the cheap so that Mr. Frost, who is good with his hands, can fix the place up and they can turn the house around for a profit. His business, which is a couple of blocks away in downtown Baltimore, basically comes from all the people fixing up all the old brownstones in the area.
In the meantime, he has to send his kids to school and the public schools in Baltimore don’t really seem like the ideal option. So he looks around, and finds that he can send them to a private school using their assistance program.
But given that $45000 dollars, while a decent living all things considered, isn’t a whole hell of a lot of money, especially when there are six mouths to feed, after everything’s said and done with he just can’t make things work with health insurance (when it comes down to it, after the mortgage, food, clothes and all the rest of the expenses of raising a family, even another $600 is no small potatos).
Then the children get into a catasrophic accident, the family is suddenly looking at medical bills it can’t pay. They are in such bad straits that the school is doing fundraisers for them. This government program helps them; makes their lives better in a fundamental way.
And these jokers are pissed off about it.
Amazing.