Conservatives Are Gearing Up For Fight Of Their Lives After Gay Marriage Ruling

NEW YORK (AP) — Now that same-sex marriage is legal nationwide, religious conservatives are focusing on preserving their right to object. Their concerns are for the thousands of faith-based charities, colleges and hospitals that want to hire, fire, serve and set policy according to their religious beliefs, notably that gay relationships are morally wrong.

 

The Republican Party’s 2016 presidential candidates are already campaigning on the issue. And Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is urging President Barack Obama and the nation’s governors “to join me in reassuring millions of Americans that the government will not force them to participate in activities that violate their deeply held religious beliefs.”

 

The religious liberty fight isn’t about what happens inside the sanctuary. First Amendment protections for worship and clergy are clear. Potential conflicts could arise, however, over religious organizations with some business in the public arena. That category ranges from small religious associations that rent reception halls to the public, to the nation’s massive network of faith-based social service agencies that receive millions of dollars in government grants. Some groups, such as the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, also want protections for individual business owners who consider it immoral to provide benefits for the same-sex spouse of an employee or cater gay weddings.

 

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy raised the issue in the majority opinion Friday granting gays the right to marry. He said First Amendment protections are in place for religious objectors, who “may continue to advocate with utmost, sincere conviction that, by divine precepts, same-sex marriage should not be condoned.”

 

But in his dissent, Chief Justice John Roberts predicted a clash ahead between religious freedom and same-sex marriage. He specifically noted the dilemma for religious colleges that provide married student housing, and adoption agencies that won’t place children with gay couples.

 

“There is little doubt that these and similar questions will soon be before this court,” Roberts wrote.

 

Conservative religious groups have for years been on watch for potential clashes over religious liberty and gay rights, and have been lobbying for religious exemptions in statehouses and Congress. But conservative anxieties intensified over an exchange during April’s oral arguments in the gay marriage case between Justice Samuel Alito and Solicitor General Donald Verrilli.

 

Alito noted the high court’s 1983 decision to revoke the tax-exemption of Bob Jones University in South Carolina because it barred interracial dating. Alito asked if the government would take such action against religiously affiliated schools that oppose same-sex marriage. Verrilli said, “It is certainly going to be an issue. I don’t deny that.”

 

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Republicans Are Really Coming Out From The Abyss Non-Stop In Their Wish To Be The Next President Of The United States. The GOP Are Not Short On Fools As Bobby Jindal Joins The GOP Clown Bush

Republicans Are Really Coming Out From The Abyss Non-Stop In Their Wish To Be The Next President Of The United States. The GOP Are Not Short On Fools As Bobby Jindal Joins The GOP Clown Bush

 

Bobby Jindal has time and again proven the truth in the words of Benjamin of Franklin; “We are all born ignorant but have to work hard to remain stupid.”

 

[NYT] Good Wednesday morning from Washington, where even agreements don’t guarantee the end of the long battle over the trade bill. Though the nation’s attention still falls on the shooting in Charleston, S.C., the campaign focus pulls to Louisiana where Gov. Bobby Jindal is likely to make an announcement that many before him have already made.

 

Days after landing near the bottom of a nationwide poll of Republican primary voters, Mr. Jindal is expected on Wednesday to announce that he is running for president, joining the crowded field of Republican contenders in what even his supporters call a long-shot candidacy.

 

Mr. Jindal, 44, was elected as the nation’s first Indian-American governor in 2007 and quickly earned a reputation as a technocrat and a darling of Christian conservatives. Mr. Jindal, who was raised by Hindu parents and converted to Roman Catholicism, has since watched his approval ratings plummet. Criticized for focusing on laying the groundwork for his presidential run instead of running the state, Mr. Jindal lately has been almost as unpopular with some Republicans as he has been with Democrats.

 

“I don’t think anybody in Louisiana thinks he can win,” said Roy Fletcher, a Republican political consultant in Baton Rouge who was deputy campaign manager for John McCain’s presidential campaign in 2000.

 

His low approval ratings are based in part on his handling of the state’s budget and its $1.6 billion shortfall. Lawmakers on both sides publicly denounced, but ultimately approved, the governor’s complex tax credit plan that helped close the budget gap. Republicans called the plan “nonsense.”

 

 

At his announcement on Wednesday, Mr. Jindal is likely to embrace and appeal to his strongest base: social conservatives and evangelical Christians. Mr. Jindal is an outspoken proponent of “religious liberty,” issuing an executive order recently to protect those who, on religious grounds, do not support same-sex marriage. He issued the order after a similar bill died in the Legislature.

 

“It is crazy to underestimate his doggedness or his political skills,” said Quin Hillyer, a conservative columnist and Louisiana native.

 

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Two prominent Americans — an Eminent Social Scientist and the President of the United States — decided to answer the question: How have America’s churches failed the poor? Americans give to Religion 82.5 Billion Dollars Annually.

Their answer was one deeply congenial to the progressive mind:

 

 “They’ve been too obsessed with the culture war.”

 

“Over the last 30 years,” Harvard’s Robert Putnam told The Washington Post, “most organized religion has focused on issues regarding sexual morality, such as abortion, gay marriage, all of those. I’m not saying if that’s good or bad, but that’s what they’ve been using all their resources for … It’s been entirely focused on issues of homosexuality and contraception and not at all focused on issues of poverty.”

 

President Obama’s version, delivered when he shared a stage with Putnam at Georgetown University, was nuanced but similar in thrust: “Despite great caring and concern,” the president remarked, when churches pick “the defining issue” that’s “really going to capture the essence of who we are as Christians,” fighting poverty is often seen as merely “nice to have” compared to “an issue like abortion.”

 

It would be too kind to call these comments wrong; they were ridiculous. Not only because (as Putnam acknowledged) believers personally give abundantly to charity, but because institutionally the churches of America use “all their resources” in ways that completely belie the idea that they’re obsessed with culture war.

 

As Mark Hemingway of The Weekly Standard pointed out, “Even the most generous estimates of the resources devoted to pro-life causes and organizations defending traditional marriage are just a few hundred million dollars.” Whereas the budgets of American religious charities and schools and hospitals and other nonprofits are tabulated in the tens of billions. (Indeed, as Bloomberg View’s Megan McArdle noted, some of that money — from Catholic sources — paid Obama’s first community-organizer salary.)

 

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Open New York Times Link For Full Article:

 

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/05/17/opinion/sunday/ross-douthat-do-churches-fail-the-poor.html?_r=0

By The Skillful And Sustained Use Of Propaganda, One Can Make A People See Even Heaven As Hell Or An Extremely Wretched Life As Paradise. Adolf Hitler, And That Is What The Republicans Have Been Doing;

Republicans Manifesto: More Religion, More Guns, More Wars, More Tax Cuts For The Rich And Nothing For The Middle-Class, Students And The Poor.

 

Agenda, Increase The Age To 70 For Social Security Benefits, Privatize Medicaid And Medicaid, Repeal Obamacare, Cut Food Stamps And Other Social Services For The Needy. Why Do Middle Class And Poor People Vote Republican?

 

 

 

Jeb Bush delivered a forceful defense of religious freedom from a secular government during a speech at an evangelical university on Saturday, deploring the rise of “coercive federal power” under President Obama that he said was seeking to impose progressive dogma on the country’s faithful.

 

But in an intriguing omission at a school known for its long-time opposition to same-sex unions, Mr. Bush did not mention the raging debate over the legalization of gay marriage, or express his opposition to it, even as he touched on the environment, sex trafficking and abortion.

 

 

In his commencement address to students at Liberty University, a Virginia school well known for hosting Republican presidents and presidential candidates, Mr. Bush bemoaned that “federal authorities are demanding obedience, in complete disregard of religious conscience — and in a free society, the answer is no.”

 

 

Mr. Bush suggested that, were he to return to office as an elected official, his Christian faith would be an inevitable force in his decision-making.

 

“It can be a touchy subject, and I am asked sometimes whether I would ever allow my decisions in government to be influenced by my Christian faith,” he told the students. “Whenever I hear this, I know what they want me to say. The simple and safe reply is, ‘No. Never. Of course not.’ If the game is political correctness, that’s the answer that moves you to the next round.”

 

But Mr. Bush called that flawed thinking. “The mistake is to confuse points of theology with moral principles that are knowable to reason as well as by faith,” he said.

 

He deplored a “false narrative that casts religious Americans as intolerant scolds, running around trying to impose their views on everyone.”

 

His speech made a pointed but affirmative case for Christianity as a positive force for freedom and compassion. There is, he said, “no more powerful or liberating influence” and praised its “most dynamic, inclusive and joyful message.”

 

Mr. Bush spoke against the “hostile caricature” of Christians and seemed to implore the audience to treat him as an ambassador to skeptical outsiders who are misinformed about the faithful.

 

Intriguingly, Mr. Bush made no reference to his own Catholicism. He converted to the faith from Episcopalianism in the 1990s.

 

The Bush family has a long history with Liberty University. Both his father and brother — presidents both — have spoken there. The current president of the university, Jerry Falwell Jr., made light of that tradition on Saturday.

 

“Please tell your mother,” he told Mr. Bush, “I still don’t believe we’ve had enough Bushes speak here at Liberty.”

 

Mr. Bush came armed with a joke of his own. Mr. Falwell’s brother Jonathan, who attended the speech and spoke with Mr. Bush on Saturday, shares a distinction with Mr. Bush: Both his father and brother are presidents (albeit of a university).

 

“Somehow,” quipped Mr. Bush, “I don’t know what it was –  we really hit it off.”

 

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Bobby Jindal Christianity Is The Same As Adolf Hitler. Jindal, The Tea Party And Republican Puppet Wrecked Louisiana And Now Want To Be President!

Jindal Refuses To Implement The Affordable Care Act [Obamacare] depriving hundreds of thousands of Louisianans without Health Care, denigrates those that are Gays or Lesbians [LGBT] and cut education to give Corporations Tax Breaks. Just how the hell does that add up to be Christian?

 

Bobby Jindal is a special kind of hypocrite. Jindal is ashamed of his race and actually changed his given name “Piyush” to Bobby. Jindal said that Minorities should act White in order to avoid problems. Jindal is even ashamed of the dark color of his skin.

 

Personally, I reject “all” Religions period. Religions were created by fallible men and carried out by fallible people that use fear to prey on the vulnerable. Joel Osteen, Benny Hinn, Paula White and all of the hypocritical Preachers, they bilk every penny they can get and they live in Mansions, fly on Private Jets and are driven around in Limousines.

Bobby Jindal: “I’m Holding Firm Against Gay Marriage” Jindal’s Op-ed from the New York times.

BATON ROUGE, La. — THE debate over religious liberty in America presents conservatives and business leaders with a crucial choice.

 

In Indiana and Arkansas, large corporations recently joined left-wing activists to bully elected officials into backing away from strong protections for religious liberty. It was disappointing to see conservative leaders so hastily retreat on legislation that would simply allow for an individual or business to claim a right to free exercise of religion in a court of law.

 

Our country was founded on the principle of religious liberty, enshrined in the Bill of Rights. Why shouldn’t an individual or business have the right to cite, in a court proceeding, religious liberty as a reason for not participating in a same-sex marriage ceremony that violates a sincerely held religious belief?

 

That is what Indiana and Arkansas sought to do. That political leaders in both states quickly cowered amid the shrieks of big business and the radical left should alarm us all.

 

As the fight for religious liberty moves to Louisiana, I have a clear message for any corporation that contemplates bullying our state: Save your breath.

 

In 2010, Louisiana adopted a Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which prohibits government from unduly burdening a person’s exercise of religion. However, given the changing positions of politicians, judges and the public in favor of same-sex marriage, along with the potential for discrimination against Christian individuals and businesses that comes with these shifts, I plan in this legislative session to fight for passage of theMarriage and Conscience Act.

 

 

The legislation would prohibit the state from denying a person, company or nonprofit group a license, accreditation, employment or contract — or taking other “adverse action” — based on the person or entity’s religious views on the institution of marriage.

 

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GOP Governor Bobby Jindal: “Racism wouldn’t exist if minorities would just act like “White People.”

 

It’s incredibly pathetic and sad when a politician with so much promise decides to pander to the most hateful elements in our society. In the aftermath of the 2012 election, Louisiana Republican Governor Bobby Jindal declared that the GOP needs to “stop being the stupid party.” However, that moment of sanity, and Jindal’s political career, went down in flames on Sunday after he blamed minorities for racism in America, claiming that racism wouldn’t exist if they would just forget about who they are and start acting more like white people.

 

 

In an op-ed published by Politico, Jindal lashed out at minorities to mark the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have A Dream” speech. Instead of standing up against the many acts of racism that have been perpetrated by his own party and by conservatives around the nation, Jindal declared that minorities are responsible for the racism in this country.

 

 

 

To translate, it appears Jindal is actually blaming minorities for causing white people to be racist towards them, and is calling on minorities to end racism by conforming to American life as white people see it. In short, minorities should be more like white people if they want racism to stop.

 

 

So rather than call out the blatant racism of his own party, Jindal essentially decided that he’d be better off committing political suicide by pandering to the racists within the GOP to curry favor with them as we move toward 2016. This is yet another example of a Republican blaming victims for their own oppression. In reality, racists will not stop being racists if minorities decide to do as Jindal suggests. That’s because racists hate minorities simply because of the color of their skin, and that includes Jindal, which is why he doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of ever capturing his party’s nomination for president.

 

 

Hypocritically enough, not even a day went by before Jindal violated his own call to action and proudly accepted being referred to as the first Indian-American Governor by David Gregory on “Face The Nation.”

 

 Racism isn’t getting worse in America because minorities aren’t trying to act more white. It’s getting worse because a major sect of the Republican Party is clinging to their own Southern heritage, specifically the part where slavery, segregation, and legal discrimination were completely acceptable. Because of many policies in GOP-controlled states, minority communities have been isolated and basically segregated within the law. From ThinkProgress:

 

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Bobby Uncle Tom Jindal, the hypocritical, sanctimonious, internecine JACK-ASS, is against raising the minimum-wage!

Bobby Jindal, you are a sanctimonious Jack-Ass! Your parents came to America and used the American system and you benefitted from America’s kindness and now, because you are the Governor of Louisiana you are against raising the minimum wage!

 

Let me tell you about the minimum wage: I worked for the minimum wage when it was $1.65 per hour. At the time my older brother was very ill and he died that very year leaving a wife and two children, 18 months and 3 years of age. I worked 80 hours per week, traveling on 8 buses per day to work and go to school. You have no idea just how heart-breaking it is to put in those hours and are still unable to feed the people you love, much less, adequately take care of one’s self.

 

I did complete school and worked at two good jobs and went on to open my own business. From the inception of my business that turned into businesses, I never once to this day paid anyone the minimum wage. The reason being is that “I know what it is to struggle, work yourself into the ground and still can’t afford to get the things you need, much less, something you want.” With and by the grace of God I have managed to become very successful and irrespective of that fact, I don’t live in the past but neither do I forget the past.

 

Hence, every time I see Politicians who lives of the hard working Americans make stupid statements like you, strangely enough, it is always a Republican. You lost your way when you became one of the extreme lunatics for which you are “their used car salesman.”

 

You couldn’t even rebuttal the President’s State of the Union Speech when the GOP used you to sell their Lemon-Cars and now you think you can become President of the United States! That ship has long sailed. Your boiler-plate Republican talking point of phantasmagoric rationales and internecine polices have completely removed any possibility of you winning the GOP Nomination, much less sitting in the White House.

 

Now, go and suck on that you hypocritical JACK – ASS!

 

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