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Religious Right Anger At Obama For Signing LGBT Non-Discrimination Order Reaches New Extremes

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Practically every anti-gay religious right organization and hate group is issuing press releases and statements detailing their near-historic levels of anger at President Obama, merely for signing executive orders demanding federal contractors not discriminate against LGBT people in the workplace.

Even before President Barack Obama today signed two executive orders amending current orders, the religious right was on an anti-gay, anti-Obama crusade. All the President did was add the words “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” to two already existing executive orders outlawing discrimination by federal contractors in the workplace. In other words, no longer can companies and corporations who secure government contracts discriminate against LGBT people. That’s it.

But the religious right is singing a different tune.

Calling today’s signing “a path toward a new thought-policing state where those who hold traditional values about marriage and family are to be marginalized,” National Organization For Marriage president Brian Brown claimed the “fact is that non-discrimination rules like the order issued by President Obama can become a weapon used to punish and harass individuals and groups who support marriage as the union of one man and one woman.”

The irony of course is that NOM is crusading for laws, like DOMA, that would enable them and their fellow believers to discriminate against LGBT people.

Fox News religion reporter Todd Starnes writes that Obama’s new executive orders amount to “the federal government bullying religious groups that hold viewpoints it deems inappropriate.” 

Of course, that’s false. The religious right wants to have its cake and eat it too. They want the legal right to fire and harass LGBT people for being LGBT, and they want the federal government to use your tax dollars to support that harassment.

Starnes adds that the “Obama administration and its militant cronies want to tell Christians whom to hire, how to run their business and how to think.”

Of course not. But we’re not going to support allowing tax dollars to support anti-gay hate and bigotry — why would we?

“And now the president has decreed that any religious group that holds viewpoints divergent from the LGBT agenda is not worthy of federal tax dollars.”

Well, actually, that part is true. 

Starnes quotes the virulently anti-gay Pastor Robert Jeffress as well.

“The problem with this executive order is that it paves the way for the next one – which could withhold the tax-exempt status or broadcast licenses for religious organizations holding biblical beliefs with which the administration disagrees,” Jeffress told me.

The Obama administration seems hell-bent on forcing Christians to assimilate to the militant LGBT agenda. Resistance is futile.

And, of course, the Family Research Council’s Peter Sprigg.

“If religious organizations cannot require that their employees conduct themselves in ways consistent with the teachings of their faith – then, essentially, those organizations are unable to operate in accordance with their faith,” Peter Sprigg, Senior Fellow for Policy Studies at the Family Research Council, told me.

He said the president’s order forces employers to put aside their principles in the name of political correctness. “This level of coercion is nothing less than viewpoint blackmail that bullies into silence every contractor and subcontractor who has moral objections to homosexual behavior,” Sprigg said.

“The mask is coming off of the homosexual movement’s agenda. They really do not believe in religious liberty. They want forced affirmation of homosexual and transgender conduct to trump every other consideration in the workplace – including religious liberty.”

An important reminder here — at issue is a company’s “right” to hire and fire someone for being LGBT. This is what they are fighting for. This is the “deeply-held Christian belief” that the anti-gay religious right is so desperate to retain. 

In a separate statement, Sprigg — who has called for gay people to be deported — writes that “President Obama has ordered employers to put aside their principles, and practices in the name of political correctness. This level of coercion is nothing less than viewpoint blackmail that bullies into silence every contractor and subcontractor who has moral objections to homosexual behavior. This order gives activists a license to challenge their employers and, expose those employers to threats of costly legal proceedings and the potential of jeopardizing future contracts.”

“Religious faith is not simply a matter of intellectual affirmation but of active practice. A religious organization which is denied the power to require its employees to conduct their lives in a way consistent with the teachings of their faith is an organization which is being denied the right to exercise its religion, period. People with deeply held convictions regarding the morality of certain types of sexual behavior should not be bound by the dictates of President Obama’s agenda.

If your ability to practice your religion is dependent upon obtaining a government contract, you’re not practicing any religion recognized by the federal government or the American people anyway.

 

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Warning Signs Flash for GOP as CNN Analyst Predicts House Flip

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As Republicans continue their exodus from the House, a CNN analyst reveals that Democrats hold an advantage in party identification over the GOP, Democrats identifying as liberal just hit a 50-year high, and Democrats — he predicts — will take back the House in the November midterm elections.

CNN analyst Harry Enten reported that “the self identified liberalness of this country is at a 50-year high.” And he noted that “more folks are identifying as liberal than at any point since the Gerald Ford administration.”

In 1976, 30 percent of Democrats said they were liberal, Enten said.

“Look at where we are today: 59 percent — 3 in 5 Democrats — say they are liberal.”

READ MORE: Trump ‘Laser-Focused’ on Affordability Says White House After Calling It a ‘Hoax’

“This Democratic party is a liberal — it is a liberal party. Fifty-nine percent of Democrats now identify as liberal,” he continued. “That is also a 50-year high.”

Enten noted that “that is not the only good news for liberals.”

“The party ID margin, Democrats versus Republicans. Now get this, in the latest reading according to Gallup last quarter, it is an eight-point advantage for Democrats.”

“That looks nothing like what we saw going into the 2022 midterms when Republicans had a five-point advantage, and of course, took back the House. This is even better than what we saw Democrats had back in 2017, in quarter four, when they had a six-point advantage, and, of course, Democrats easily took back the House then.”

READ MORE: Pirro Backtracks as Powell Investigation Rapidly Goes Off the Rails

“Democrats are gonna take back the House,” he said.

Enten also pointed to the prediction markets, which now say there is a 77 percent chance of Democrats taking back the House in November.

READ MORE: ‘Organized Gangs of Wine Moms’ Are Impeding Federal Agents Says Fox Columnist

 

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Democrat Demands DOJ and DHS Reveal How Many Pardoned ‘Insurrectionists’ Have Been Hired

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A prominent Democrat is demanding to know how many January 6 “insurrectionists” have been hired by the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, as critics warn that federal agents under President Donald Trump are increasingly engaging in violent enforcement actions.

“We know that several participants in the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol have been rewarded with high-ranking positions in the Department of Justice (DOJ),” U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), the Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee, wrote to Attorney General Pam Bondi and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem.

“However, it remains unclear how many more have been invited to join the ranks of this Administration, including among the masked Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agents and officers that have dragged, tackled, beaten, tased, shot, and killed citizens and non-citizens alike in communities across the country,” he added.

READ MORE: Pirro Backtracks as Powell Investigation Rapidly Goes Off the Rails

According to Raskin, Jared Wise, a former Supervisory Special Agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), “stormed his way into the Capitol Building” on January 6, 2021.

“As he did so, he taunted and threaten police officers defending the building and the ones inside, screaming: ‘You guys are disgusting. I’m former—I’m former law enforcement. You’re disgusting.”

Raskin included additional language attributed to Wise, then wrote that he “has never expressed remorse or contrition for his criminal actions.”

Wise was pardoned by President Donald Trump, along with nearly 1,600 others, “including hundreds of cop beaters.”

“Today, Mr. Wise serves as senior adviser in the office of the Deputy Attorney General, alongside another January 6th participant, Ed Martin, the U.S. Pardon Attorney and head of the DOJ Weaponization Working Group,” Raskin wrote.

Congressman Raskin also blasted the recruitment and vetting processes being used by the Trump administration.

“For its part, DHS seems to be courting pardoned January 6th insurrectionists. It uses white nationalist ‘dog whistles’ in its recruitment campaign for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents that appear aimed at stirring members of extremist militias, including the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, and Three Percenters, which participated in the insurrection,” he stated. “The recruitment campaign began with a $50,000 sign-on bonus, removal of the college degree requirement, and a relaxed vetting process.”

“Who is hiding behind these masks?” Raskin demanded to know. “How many of them were among the violent rioters who attacked the Capitol on January 6th and were convicted of their offenses? The American people deserve to know how many of these violent insurrectionists have been given guns and badges by this Administration.”

READ MORE: ‘Organized Gangs of Wine Moms’ Are Impeding Federal Agents Says Fox Columnist

 

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Pirro Backtracks as Powell Investigation Rapidly Goes Off the Rails

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Jeanine Pirro, the Fox News host turned Trump U.S. Attorney, appears to be quickly backtracking in her office’s investigation of Jerome Powell. The esteemed Federal Reserve Chairman announced on Sunday that he is being investigated by the Trump Department of Justice, sending markets — and prominent Republicans — spinning.

Pirro, in a Monday night social media post, insisted that Powell has not been indicted, saying: “The word ‘indictment’ has come out of Mr. Powell’s mouth, no one else’s.”

According to The Daily Beast, Pirro issued her “ultra-defensive statement” after “major backlash” against her investigation into the 72-year-old Republican investment banker and lawyer who has steered the Federal Reserve since 2018, when President Donald Trump appointed him chairman.

READ MORE: ‘Organized Gangs of Wine Moms’ Are Impeding Federal Agents Says Fox Columnist

The Daily Beast reported that Pirro’s investigation is “an inquiry that even Republican lawmakers have blasted as a revenge plot against one of the president’s adversaries that threatens the independence of America’s central bank.”

Suggesting that Pirro may have gone “rogue,” the Beast added that reports suggest “Pirro failed to obtain the necessary sign-off from her superiors at the Department of Justice before subpoenaing the Federal Reserve as part of her probe, according to Bloomberg.”

It appears that others were also left out of the loop in the unprecedented, high-profile investigation.

“Sources also told NBC News that Pirro’s office did not contact the White House or the Treasury Department before issuing the subpoenas, and that Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte—who spearheaded the push to investigate the Federal Reserve—was also allegedly left in the dark.”

“Investors are doubtful of her success,” Bloomberg News added.  “While U.S. assets initially sold off on news of the investigation in early trading Monday, stocks and bonds bounced back by the end of the day. That suggests traders think Republicans will find ways to dial back the probe given the critical importance investors assign to a Federal Reserve that’s free from political influence.”

On Sunday, Chairman Powell revealed that he is under a criminal investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice, an investigation stemming from his congressional testimony on the renovation of Federal Reserve buildings. The Fed is fully self-funded, and that renovation is not funded by American taxpayers.

READ MORE: Trump ‘Laser-Focused’ on Affordability Says White House After Calling It a ‘Hoax’

 

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