Homosexual Activists Tout Clout With Democrats "it's sad enough for the country that one party is pandering to homosexual activists. Homosexuality is not equal to normalcy. It's not equal to normal heterosexual relationships" -- Welcome To The Crzy House

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Date Posted: 09:41:20 05/30/03 Fri
Author: Pete
Subject: Homosexual Activists Tout Clout With Democrats "it's sad enough for the country that one party is pandering to homosexual activists. Homosexuality is not equal to normalcy. It's not equal to normal heterosexual relationships"
In reply to: Pete 's message, "If you want to read news about gay rights issues" on 08:55:14 05/30/03 Fri

By Jeff Johnson
CNSNews.com Congressional Bureau Chief
May 29, 2003

Capitol Hill (CNSNews.com) - A leading homosexual advocacy organization praised the nine Democrats actively seeking their party's 2004 presidential nomination Wednesday and bragged that homosexual voters could significantly influence the Democrats' choice of a nominee.

"The 2004 Democratic presidential candidates, as a group, hold the most pro-gay positions ever taken by a field of candidates for president," said Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (NGLTF). However, Foreman added that, "given the crowded field and the importance of the gay vote in Democratic primaries, we can and do argue that several of the candidates lag behind where they need to be and should be."

Foreman made it clear that those candidates who do "lag behind" on homosexual issues should be concerned about their overall performance in the primaries.

"We are an extremely powerful and individual bloc...representing close to 10 percent of the Democratic vote in their primaries," he said. "With such a crowded field, this bloc, the gay vote, can be pivotal, indeed critical to candidates seeking the Democratic Party nomination."

Gary Bauer, president of American Values and a former Republican presidential candidate, believes Foreman was merely stating an "unfortunate political reality."

"The party of FDR, Harry Truman and John F. Kennedy has become an advocate of a radical gay rights agenda," Bauer said, "that I think most Americans are deeply opposed to."

Peter LaBarbera, senior policy analyst with the Culture and Family Institute at Concerned Women for America, agreed.

"Obviously, homosexuals represent a disproportionate influence in the Democratic primary, and that's a problem for the Democratic Party," he said.

"The homosexual lobby would have you believe that these Democratic candidates represent America, and we know they don't," LaBarbera continued. "They certainly don't represent the grassroots of this country, and I also don't think they represent many rank-and-file Democrats, who aren't really enthused about homosexual marriage and homosexual men adopting children and the like."

Report ranks Democrats on support for homosexual issues

A report issued Wednesday by the NGLTF Policy Institute ranked Democratic senators John Edwards (N.C.), Bob Graham (Fla.), John Kerry (Mass.), Joseph Lieberman (Conn.) and Joseph Biden (Del.), though Biden has not declared his candidacy. Also included were Democratic representatives Richard Gephardt (Mo.) and Dennis Kucinich (Ohio), former Illinois U.S. Sen. Carol Moseley Braun, former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean and Rev. Al Sharpton.

Votes taken by office holders, public statements and responses to a supplemental survey sent to all nine candidates plus Biden were used to compile the ratings. Graham and Sharpton did not return the surveys. Issues ranked include:

Recognition of homosexuals as a protected minority class under federal law;

Recognition of those who identify themselves as other than their birth gender (transsexuals) as a protected minority class under federal law;

Lifting the U.S. military's current ban on service by homosexuals who publicize their sexual behavior;

So-called "hate crimes" laws establishing greater penalties for crimes committed against homosexuals than for the same crimes committed against heterosexuals;

Homosexual partners receiving Social Security survivor and spousal benefits;

Legal recognition of so-called "domestic partnerships, civil unions and same-sex marriages;"

Adoption of children by homosexual partners;

So-called "tolerance" education, teaching elementary school children to accept the homosexual lifestyle; and

So-called "comprehensive sex education" curricula that include the disputed theory of condom use to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS.

Braun ranked at the top, Graham at the bottom. Foreman claimed public support for the pro-homosexual positions held by the candidates, citing polling data.

"Seven candidates also support comprehensive sex education," he said. "Ninety-six percent of all Americans agree that 'how HIV and other STDs are transmitted and how to protect against them should be discussed in high school sex education classes.'"

But LaBarbera contrasted the claim made by Foreman with the wording of the poll question.

"It sounds like they're playing fast and loose with the facts and using twisted wording," he said.

LaBarbera noted that the question asked about discussing "how HIV and other STDs are transmitted and how to protect against them," not the so-called "comprehensive sex education" advocated by the NGLTF and other pro-homosexual groups.

"Americans do not favor radical sex education," he argued. "They don't favor homosexuality being taught as just another lifestyle, the same as heterosexuality.

"They don't want anal sex taught or young kids taught how to put a condom on a banana," LaBarbera added.

Polling data contradicts candidates' positions

Recent polling supports LaBarbera's contention.

A Zogby International survey of 1,245 parents of kindergarten through 12th grade students conducted January 11-14, 2003, found that 69 percent of parents believe their nine- to 12-year-old children should be taught that "sexual or physical intimacy should occur between two people involved in a lifelong, mutually faithful, marriage commitment."

Four out of five parents (79 percent) disapprove of sex education courses discussing condom use with teens unless they are told that "condoms provide inadequate protection against the spread of many sexually transmitted diseases." Seventy-one percent disapprove of children younger than high school receiving any demonstrations of condom use. And 70 percent oppose schools providing children with contraceptives or with information on how to obtain contraceptives without parents' prior knowledge and approval.

The Zogby poll also asked questions specifically drawn from the language of the "Guidelines for Comprehensive Sexuality Education," produced by the Sexual Information and Education Council of the United States in conjunction with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Seventy-one percent of the parents surveyed said their children should not be taught that "two people who live together can have the same commitment and responsibility toward one another as married people." An equal 71 percent of parents objected to their children being taught that "homosexual love relationships can be as satisfying as heterosexual relationships."

Most contentious issue is allowing homosexuals to "marry"

"Only three of the candidates, Carol Moseley Braun, Dennis Kucinich and Rev. Al Sharpton, support full equality for our families," Foreman lamented, noting that only those three would require the government to recognize a relationship between two homosexuals as equal to a marriage.

"It's disheartening that six of the nine candidates, including all of the frontrunners, do not support full equality for our families," Foreman added. "It's extremely important to understand that, while civil unions represent a big step ahead of where we stand today, they are inherently separate and inherently unequal."

LaBarbera scoffed at Foreman's invocation of equality.

"Obviously, they want to make the whole issue of homosexuality one of 'fairness and equality,'" LaBarbera observed. "Our point is that it's not right to call unequal things equal.

"Homosexuality is not equal to normalcy. It's not equal to normal heterosexual relationships," he continued. "For two homosexual men to raise a baby is not equal to a mom and a dad raising that child."

Foreman's veiled references to racial discrimination through the use of phrases such as "separate and inherently unequal" also disturbed LaBarbera.

"You cannot equate race with homosexual behavior," he said.

"They want to say that criticizing homosexuality is like the moral equivalent of being racist, but it's not," LaBarbera continued. "It's okay to express morality. Morality is not prejudice."

Homosexuality as an issue in the 2004 general election

Foreman believes conservatives will initiate the discussion of homosexuality in the 2004 campaign.

"The Right Wing is going to make an issue out of gay concerns," he predicted. "They're going to use this as a litmus test."

Sean Cahill, director of the NGLTF Policy Institute, said the group expects to produce a report on President Bush in January of 2004, but he offered this initial assessment.

"In general, he [Bush] would be negative on most of the issues," Cahill said, "except a couple of question marks."

Regardless of who becomes the Democrats' nominee, Foreman believes the differences between the candidates' positions on homosexuality will be defining.

"No matter where any one of the Democratic candidates stands on our issues, each is clearly more supportive of equal rights for gay people than President Bush," he said. "Having said that, it's not too late for the president to stand up to the Right."

LaBarbera responded that he would "hate to see the Republican Party going the same direction as the Democrats.

"We think it's sad enough for the country that one party is pandering to homosexual activists," he said. "We don't need both major parties pandering to the gay lobby."

Bauer noted that when more liberal Republicans have tried to work with them, homosexual activists have responded by attacking the Republican Party for "not doing enough."

"That's one of the reasons these attempts by some in the Republican Party to reach out to this radical vote are doomed to fail and are ill-conceived," he added.

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'Gay Jesus' Claim Draws Fire -- Pete, 09:44:08 05/30/03 Fri