


This Blog is about my life as a wife of a Retired navy reservist and Submariner, my political views, my family life and my interests.
From Times Online here:
The Catholic Church teaches that while homosexuality is not sinful, homosexual acts are. It opposes gay marriage and, in October, a leading Vatican official called homosexuality “a deviation, an irregularity, a wound”.
Benedict's speech was also seen, however, as a denunciation of "gender theory" – the study of how gender assignments affects the behaviour of individuals. The Catholic Church has repeatedly spoken out against gender theory, which gay and transsexual groups promote as a key to understanding and tolerance.
“That which is often expressed and understood by the term ‘gender’ in the end amounts to the self-emancipation of the human person from creation and from the Creator," the Pope said.
"Human beings want to do everything by themselves, and to control exclusively everything that regards them. But in this way, the human person lives against the truth, against the Creator Spirit.”
The recent decision of the California Supreme Court redefining marriage demonstrates the continued willingness of unelected judges to overturn – and frankly ignore – the will of the people on a vital issue of social policy that lies at the core of any successful society. The decision to alter dramatically the meaning of marriage in California will have long-term (and as yet not fully known but nevertheless serious) consequences. The decision, at the very least, flies in the face of mounting evidence that children need (and deserve) the care of a father and a mother. The decision also ignores the now undisputable facts that altering the historic meaning of marriage destabilizes the institution of marriage and weakens its vitally important social roles. For example, in countries that have had same-sex “marriage” for a significant period of time (e.g., the Netherlands), marriage rates are at all-time historic lows, the number of children born out of wedlock are at all-time historic highs and marital dissolution rates have reached all-time historic levels.
The People of California must act – dramatically and quickly – to place a constitutional amendment preserving marriage on the ballot. The meaning of marriage involves much more than a simple question of “equality.” Rather, it involves a broad range of issues that go to the very core of the social processes that make civilization possible. Those who support marriage as the union of a man and a woman are not driven by animus toward those with diverse sexual orientations. On the contrary, they are driven by well-founded concern for the future of their children, grandchildren and generations of Californians yet unborn.
Palin's office issued this statement Saturday:
"Gov. Palin stopped by the church this morning, and she told an assistant pastor that she apologizes if the incident is in any way connected to the undeserved negative attention the church has received since she became a vice-presidential candidate on Aug. 29. Whatever the motives of the arsonist, the governor has faith in the scriptural passage that what was intended for evil will in some way be used for good."
Bill McAllister, the governor's media spokesman, said he wasn't sure when Palin last attended the church. He said she would not attend services this morning because she's traveling to Juneau, where she will release next year's proposed state budget on Monday. But the governor's children do plan to go to church, he said.
It was Bush's fourth visit to the war zone as president and his last before President-elect Barack Obama takes office Jan. 20. Bush's most recent Iraq stop was over 15 months ago, in September 2007.
Bush's trip was conducted under heavy security and a strict cloak of secrecy. People traveling with the president agreed to tell almost no one about the plans. The White House tried to avoid raising suspicion about the president's whereabouts by putting out false schedules detailing activities planned for Bush in Washington on Sunday. Though the security situation in Iraq has improved dramatically, a trip to that war zone is still considered dangerous.
An Iraqi man in Prime Minister Nouri-al Maliki's palace threw two shoes at President Bush during a joint press conference with Maliki. The president had to duck to avoid the shoes but he was not hit.
The man was grabbed and dragged out screaming.
Bush joked about it and said, "that was a size ten shoe he threw at me you may want you to know. "
Georgia Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss handed the GOP a firewall against Democrats eager to flex their newfound political muscle in Washington, winning a bruising runoff battle Tuesday night that had captured the national limelight.
Chambliss' victory thwarted Democrats' hopes of winning a 60 seat filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. It came after a bitter month long runoff against Democrat Jim Martin that drew political luminaries from both parties to the state and flooded the airwaves with fresh attack ads weeks after campaigns elsewhere had ended.
Minnesota - where a recount is under way - now remains the only unresolved Senate contest in the country. But the stakes there are significantly lower now that Georgia has put a 60-seat Democratic supermajority out of reach.
With 70 percent of the precincts reporting, Chambliss captured 60 percent to Martin's 40 percent. Chambliss' win is a rare bright spot for Republicans in a year where they lost the White House as well as seats in the House and the Senate.
When John Ziegler first launched his website, How Obama Got Elected, his poll showing that Obama voters appeared ignorant of the campaign issues touched off a heated controversy over the results. Ziegler offered a double-or-nothing challenge to anyone who wanted to fund another Zogby survey of McCain voters, but Zogby dropped out of the project instead. Now John is back with a new survey — and it verifies the first:
The 12 “Zogby” questions were duplicated, one on the Keating scandal was added for extra balance. The results from Obama voters were virtually IDENTICAL in both polls.
Here are the highlights:
* 35 % of McCain voters got 10 or more of 13 questions correct.
* 18% of Obama voters got 10 or more of 13 questions correct.
* McCain voters knew which party controls congress by a 63-27 margin.
* Obama voters got the “congressional control” question wrong by 43-41.
* Those that got “congressional control” correct voted 56-43 for McCain.
* Those that got “congressional control” wrong voted 65-35 for Obama.
Talk radio listeners and Fox News viewers answered that correctly far more often than any of the others. MS-NBC viewers actually answered that better than CNN viewers, but network news consumers did the worst. CNN and network news viewers couldn't’t even get a majority of their consumers educated enough to answer that fairly simple question.
I’d say that Ziegler gets his vindication. Be sure to read all of the data, including the crosstabs from Wilson Strategies.
On August 1, 1620, the Mayflower set sail. It carried a total of 102 passengers, including forty Pilgrims led by William Bradford. On the journey, Bradford set up an agreement, a contract, that established just and equal laws for all members of the new community, irrespective of their religious beliefs.
Where did the revolutionary ideas expressed in the Mayflower Compact come from? From the Bible. The Pilgrims were a people completely steeped in the lessons of the Old and New Testaments. They looked to the ancient Israelites for their example. And, because of the biblical precedents set forth in Scripture, they never doubted that their experiment would work.
"But this was no pleasure cruise, friends. The journey to the New World was a long and arduous one. And when the Pilgrims landed in New England in November, they found, according to Bradford's detailed journal, a cold, barren, desolate wilderness," destined to become the home of the Kennedy family. "There were no friends to greet them, he wrote. There were no houses to shelter them. There were no inns where they could refresh themselves. And the sacrifice they had made for freedom was just beginning.
During the first winter, half the Pilgrims – including Bradford's own wife – died of either starvation, sickness or exposure.
"When spring finally came, Indians taught the settlers how to plant corn, fish for cod and skin beavers for coats." Yes, it was Indians that taught the white man how to skin beasts. "Life improved for the Pilgrims, but they did not yet prosper! This is important to understand because this is where modern American history lessons often end. "Thanksgiving is actually explained in some textbooks as a holiday for which the Pilgrims gave thanks to the Indians for saving their lives, rather than as a devout expression of gratitude grounded in the tradition of both the Old and New Testaments.
Here is the part [of Thanksgiving] that has been omitted: The original contract the Pilgrims had entered into with their merchant-sponsors in London called for everything they produced to go into a common store, and each member of the community was entitled to one common share.
"All of the land they cleared and the houses they built belong to the community as well. They were going to distribute it equally. All of the land they cleared and the houses they built belonged to the community as well. Nobody owned anything. They just had a share in it. It was a commune, folks. It was the forerunner to the communes we saw in the '60s and '70s out in California – and it was complete with organic vegetables, by the way.
Bradford, who had become the new governor of the colony, recognized that this form of collectivism was as costly and destructive to the Pilgrims as that first harsh winter, which had taken so many lives.
He decided to take bold action. Bradford assigned a plot of land to each family to work and manage, thus turning loose the power of the marketplace.
"That's right. Long before Karl Marx was even born, the Pilgrims had discovered and experimented with what could only be described as socialism. And what happened?
It didn't work! Surprise, surprise, huh?
What Bradford and his community found was that the most creative and industrious people had no incentive to work any harder than anyone else, unless they could utilize the power of personal motivation!
But while most of the rest of the world has been experimenting with socialism for well over a hundred years – trying to refine it, perfect it, and re-invent it – the Pilgrims decided early on to scrap it permanently.
What Bradford wrote about this social experiment should be in every schoolchild's history lesson. If it were, we might prevent much needless suffering in the future.
"'The experience that we had in this common course and condition, tried sundry years...that by taking away property, and bringing community into a common wealth, would make them happy and flourishing – as if they were wiser than God,' Bradford wrote. 'For this community [so far as it was] was found to breed much confusion and discontent, and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort. For young men that were most able and fit for labor and service did repine that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men's wives and children without any recompense...that was thought injustice.'
Why should you work for other people when you can't work for yourself? What's the point?
"Do you hear what he was saying, ladies and gentlemen? The Pilgrims found that people could not be expected to do their best work without incentive. So what did Bradford's community try next? They unharnessed the power of good old free enterprise by invoking the undergirding capitalistic principle of private property.
Every family was assigned its own plot of land to work and permitted to market its own crops and products. And what was the result?
'This had very good success,' wrote Bradford, 'for it made all hands industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been.'
Bradford doesn't sound like much of a... liberal Democrat, "does he? Is it possible that supply-side economics could have existed before the 1980s? Yes.
"Read the story of Joseph and Pharaoh in Genesis 41. Following Joseph's suggestion (Gen 41:34), Pharaoh reduced the tax on Egyptians to 20% during the 'seven years of plenty' and the 'Earth brought forth in heaps.' (Gen. 41:47)
In no time, the Pilgrims found they had more food than they could eat themselves.... So they set up trading posts and exchanged goods with the Indians. The profits allowed them to pay off their debts to the merchants in London.
And the success and prosperity of the Plymouth settlement attracted more Europeans and began what came to be known as the 'Great Puritan Migration.'"
From PJ media here:
Several associates of mine, aware of my red-state predilections, approached me after the black day that was November 4 and demanded my allegiance — I’m serious — proclaiming, “He’s your president so you should stand behind him.” I thanked them but rebuffed their suggestion. As mentioned above, none of these individuals ever saw fit to do the same for our 40th, 41st, and 43rd presidents, so by what precedent should they expect special treatment for their Barackstar? None of which I am aware. Their hypocrisy is hardly surprising. The left’s approach to their opposition lacks consistency, honor, and responsibility as they see those traits as being anachronistic and possibly even Eurocentric (the horror!). To hardened Obamabots, all questions regarding their savior’s goals are illegitimate. Those who battle them either possess false consciousnesses or are evil, and should this dichotomy not be immediately evident, then all heretics will be dismissed as rednecks, evangelists, racists, or whatever ism is on the menu.
"Americans can actually go to dinner parties and cocktail receptions around the world today and not have to apologize for the United States the way they have had to do the last several years," he said. "The election has made life a little bit easier for Americans living and traveling abroad to hold their head up high again."
The United States' tarnished reputation has been fueled by a combination of factors, including opposition to U.S. policies like the war Iraq and alleged torture and abuse of prisoners, the perception of hypocrisy, unilateralism, and the perceived war on Islam, according to a congressional report released in June.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – In a dramatic escalation of high seas crime, Somali pirates hijacked a Saudi supertanker loaded with crude hundreds of miles off the coast of East Africa — defeating the security web of warships trying to protect vital shipping lanes.
The takeover demonstrates the bandits' heightened ambitions and capabilities: Never before have they seized such a giant ship so far out to sea. Maritime experts warned the broad daylight attack, reported by the U.S. Navy on Monday, was an alarming sign of the difficulty of patrolling a vast stretch of ocean key to oil and other cargo traffic.
The MV Sirius Star, a brand new tanker with a 25-member crew, was seized at about 10 a.m. Saturday more than 450 nautical miles southeast of Mombasa, Kenya, the Navy said. The area lies far south of the zone where warships have increased their patrols this year in the Gulf of Aden, one of the busiest channels in the world, leading to and from the Suez Canal, and the scene of most past attacks.
We won. The Iraq War is over.
I declare November 22, 2008 to be "Victory in Iraq Day." (Hereafter known as "VI Day.")
By every measure, The United States and coalition forces have conclusively defeated all enemies in Iraq, pacified the country, deposed the previous regime, successfully helped to establish a new functioning democratic government, and suppressed any lingering insurgencies. The war has come to an end. And we won.
"THE WAR IS OVER AND WE WON:" Michael Yon just phoned from Baghdad, and reports that things are much better than he had expected, and he had expected things to be good. "There's nothing going on. I'm with the 10th Mountain Division, and about half of the guys I'm with haven't fired their weapons on this tour and they've been here eight months. And the place we're at, South Baghdad, used to be one of the worst places in Iraq. And now there's nothing going on. I've been walking my feet off and haven't seen anything. I've been asking Iraqis, 'do you think the violence will kick up again,' but even the Iraqi journalists are sounding optimistic now and they're usually dour." There's a little bit of violence here and there, but nothing that's a threat to the general situation. Plus, not only the Iraqi Army, but even the National Police are well thought of by the populace. Training from U.S. toops has paid off, he says, in building a rapport.
The marriage radicals, on the other hand, seek to restore nothing. They have not been deprived of the law's equal protection, nor of the right to marry — only of the right to insist that a single-sex union is a "marriage." They cloak their demands in the language of civil rights because it sounds so much better than the truth: They don't want to accept or reject marriage on the same terms that it is available to everyone else. They want it on entirely new terms. They want it to be given a meaning it has never before had, and they prefer that it be done undemocratically — by judicial fiat, for example, or by mayors flouting the law. Whatever else that may be, it isn't civil rights.
Dear Govenor Schwarzenegger:
I respectfully request your immediate condemnation of the dangerous and thuggery actions of the angry prop 8 activists who are using intimidating and corruptive tactics against the citizens of California, your constituents. By failing to speak out, you are complicit and malfeasant. These activists are threatening businesses with boycotts at a critical time in this States disastrous economy, naming individuals thus making them vulnerable to retaliation and physical harm, targeting places of worship, and disrupting the peace.
It was shameful enough that you encouraged the protesters to defy the majority will of California voters. You proved yourself a lame-duck politician by reversing your principals on the issue of gay marriage (not to mention taxation). For this voter, you have lost all credibility.
However, to stand by silently, while the community is being subjected to the minority unlawful and menacing behavior being inflicted on cities statewide is reprehensible as a governor.
I sincerely hope you make a strong statement condemning these demonstrations very, very soon.
The Mormon church in Salt Lake City issued a statement denying that the church’s opposition to same-sex marriage has anything to do with bigotry.
“It is important to understand that this issue for the church has always been about the sacred and divine institution of marriage — a union between a man and a woman,’’ according to the statement. “Allegations of bigotry or persecution made against the church were and are simply wrong. The church’s opposition to same-sex marriage neither constitutes nor condones any kind of hostility toward gays and lesbians.
“Even more, the church does not object to rights for same-sex couples regarding hospitalization and medical care, fair housing and employment rights, or probate rights, so long as these do not infringe on the integrity of the traditional family or the constitutional rights of churches.’’
On Oct. 24, Warren endorsed Prop. 8. In an e-mail to his followers, he said, “For 5,000 years, every culture and every religion — not just Christianity — has defined marriage as a contract between men and women. There is no reason to change the universal, historical definition of marriage to appease 2 percent of our population.’’
Mahony said support for Prop. 8 had nothing to do with discrimination against gays.
“Proposition 8 is not against any group in our society,’’ he said. “Its sole focus is on preserving God’s plan for people living upon this earth throughout time. The Catholic Church understands that there are people who choose to live together in relationships other than traditional marriage. All of their spiritual, pastoral and civil rights should be respected, together with their membership in the church.’’
There is an irony in the taunts thrown at Christians that they are "intolerant" and "bigoted." Throughout history it has been Christians and others of strong religious faith who have spoken out and fought for those who are truly oppressed. Most notably the abolition of slavery was led by Christians like William Wilberforce in England and Thomas Jefferson Randolph, grandson of Thomas Jefferson, in the United States. And of course the civil rights movement of the 1960's found its leader in the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.
However it is Christians and African-Americans who are being attacked, alongside Mormons, because of the leadership and support they gave the successful push for a marriage amendment in California's state constitution.
In order to make such a radical change in human behavior and custom, the proponents of gay marriage should have followed constitutional, democratic process and persuaded people to support it until a majority was achieved.
That's what the US Constitution and every state constitution require. And that has not happened anywhere in the US.
What was the public emergency that made it so the New Puritans could not wait to persuade people to vote for what they wanted? The only emergency was that they knew that they could not do it. They knew democracy would not choose what they wanted.
Therefore small groups of dictators have simply taken it upon themselves to deny universal human practice and remake the law as they saw fit, without waiting for democratic process.
Their pretexts are laughable, their authority nonexistent. No constitution declares that any court has such a right.
So why is anyone obeying them? Because, in support of their illegal action, the courts can issue writs removing the power of any other state official to resist them. There is no institution that even knows how to begin resisting the illegal usurpation of power by the judicial branch.
No branch of government was ever intended to have the power to dictate new law without other branches of government having a chance to stop them or at least slow them down.
In essence, we have suffered a coup and lost our democracy. A minority is dictating new law against the will of the majority, and will spread it by force throughout the country by using the full-faith-and-credit clause.
A large and growing body of scientific evidence indicates that the intact, married family is best for children. In particular, the work of scholars David Popenoe, Linda Waite, Maggie Gallagher, Sara McLanahan, David Blankenhorn, Paul Amato, and Alan Booth has contributed to this conclusion.
This statement from Sara McLanahan, a sociologist at Princeton University, is representative:
If we were asked to design a system for making sure that children's basic needs were met, we would probably come up with something quite similar to the two-parent ideal. Such a design, in theory, would not only ensure that children had access to the time and money of two adults, it also would provide a system of checks and balances that promoted quality parenting. The fact that both parents have a biological connection to the child would increase the likelihood that the parents would identify with the child and be willing to sacrifice for that child, and it would reduce the likelihood that either parent would abuse the child.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi expressed deep disappointment on Friday that California voters approved Prop. 8, the measure banning same-sex marriage, and defended her ally, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, against critics who say his actions contributed to its passage.
In a wide-ranging interview with The Chronicle, Pelosi said she believes some voters might not have fully understood the initiative, which overturned a state Supreme Court ruling legalizing same-sex marriage. The measure was approved 52 to 48 percent.
"Unfortunately, I think people thought they were making a statement about what their view of same-sex marriage was," the San Francisco Democrat said. "I don't know if it was clear that this meant that we are amending the Constitution to diminish freedom in our state."
In essence, we have suffered a coup and lost our democracy. A minority is dictating new law against the will of the majority, and will spread it by force throughout the country by using the full-faith-and-credit clause.
This should terrify the proponents of gay marriage, because a process that right now seems to work for them could just as easily, and just as unfairly, be used against them. But they think only in the short term. They don't mind leaving democracy in a shambles and making the Constitution a joke, as long as they get their way on this issue.
As much as I think gay marriage is a terrible idea, grounded on neither science nor common sense, we should be even more concerned that our republic is in the process of ceasing to be in any meaningful sense a democracy.
Conveniently, that portion of American society that supports the written Constitution, and that denies the power of government to redefine marriage, also provides the overwhelming majority of volunteers for the American military and for law enforcement and public safety.
What if Evangelicals, Catholics, Mormons, Orthodox Jews“ and people of any religion who believe in democracy and the Constitution“ all retired from the military or police, or refused to enlist or reenlist as long as they are going to be used to enforce the "laws" made up by dictators?
What if we ceased to put any marriage announcements, obituaries or want ads in papers that run "gay marriage" announcements, or even stopped buying those papers at all? The "mainstream" media would quickly discover that they aren't so mainstream after all.
What if we all kept our children at home and refused to allow them to go to propagandizing schools?
How long could our government function if we withdrew all our support?
Frank Schubert, co-chairman of the pro-Proposition 8 campaign, criticized the legal actions.
“If they want to legalize gay marriage, what they should do is bring an initiative themselves and ask the people to approve it," Schubert said to the Los Angeles Times. “But they don't. They go behind the people's back to the courts and try and force an agenda on the rest of society."
The right to amend California's Constitution is not granted to the People, it is reserved by the People. The Supreme Court has repeatedly acknowledged the reserved power of the People to use the initiative process to amend the Constitution. For example, when the Rose Bird Court struck down the death penalty as a violation of fundamental state constitutional rights, the People disagreed, and in the exercise of their sovereign power reversed that interpretation of their Constitution through the initiative-amendment process. Even a liberal jurist who vehemently disagreed with the People's decision on the death penalty, Justice Stanley Mosk, nevertheless acknowledged the People's authority to decide the issue through the initiative-amendment process.
It should also be noted that the ACLU recently made this same "constitutional revision" claim in a nearly identical matter in Oregon and it was unanimously rejected. The claim was made under almost identical provisions of the Oregon State Constitution, against an almost identical voter constitutional amendment which read, "...only a marriage between one man and one woman shall be valid or legally recognized as a marriage." The Court of Appeals of Oregon unanimously rejected the ACLU's "revision" claim. (Martinez v. Kulongoski (May 21, 2008) - P.3d -, 220 Or.App. 142, 2008 WL2120516).
Of course, it is true that white America has made great progress in curbing racism over the last 40 years. I believe, for example, that Colin Powell might well have been elected president in 1996 had he run against a then rather weak Bill Clinton. It is exactly because America has made such dramatic racial progress that whites today chafe so under the racist stigma. So I don't think whites really want change from Obama as much as they want documentation of change that has already occurred. They want him in the White House first of all as evidence, certification and recognition.
But there is an inherent contradiction in all this. When whites -- especially today's younger generation -- proudly support Obama for his post-racialism, they unwittingly embrace race as their primary motivation. They think and act racially, not post-racially. The point is that a post-racial society is a bargainer's ploy: It seduces whites with a vision of their racial innocence precisely to coerce them into acting out of a racial motivation. A real post-racialist could not be bargained with and would not care about displaying or documenting his racial innocence. Such a person would evaluate Obama politically rather than culturally.
The first opportunity to leverage these cyclical advantages will come in the 2010 midterm elections. Despite some recent exceptions, the party of the president usually suffers a net decline of seats in Congress during off-year elections. This provides a realistic opportunity for the Republican Party to regain control of the House and reduce the Democratic majority in the Senate in the very near term.
This national cyclical advantage should be supplemented in four ways:
1. Aggressive candidate recruitment: The pool of quality potential congressional candidates for the GOP should be quite large. In particular, the drawdown of the American military presence in Iraq will make a pool of new veterans—largely inclined to conservative politics—available.
2. Web-based fundraising through bundling PACs: Traditional bundling PACs accept and forward paper checks to listed candidates. A smart web-based bundling PAC could allow donors to initiate a single transaction on the PAC’s website that would be forwarded electronically to list candidates per the donors' instructions.
3. A young ground game: Colleges and universities are enormous pools of high quality, low cost, and eager political talent. Creative efforts to transport, house, and support college students as canvassers and phone-bank workers for targeted congressional races could help overcome the chronic lack of labor that make sophisticated GOTV efforts difficult for many congressional campaigns.
4. A new “Contract with America”: The evidence suggests that issues play a limited role in campaign outcomes. But, the perception of the role of issues in an election outcome can be very important for developing claims of a mandate to enact policy changes after the election. Within some limits, a strong policy platform is unlikely to either help or hurt a national campaign for Congress. But, it can help provide a launching pad to actually enact conservative policies, particularly over the objections of a sitting President Obama. Some potential items might include:
1. A balanced budget amendment that includes requirements for reasonable debt payment timetables
2. Income tax simplification to make one-page filing a reality and increase transparency
3. Income tax reduction on the first $10,000 of income from interest and dividends to encourage savings and investment
4. Healthcare reforms to allow doctors to charge on a sliding scale without risking reduced payments from insurance companies.
5. Strong web use privacy laws limiting the type of information that websites can collect and store about users
A large and growing body of scientific evidence indicates that the intact, married family is best for children. In particular, the work of scholars David Popenoe, Linda Waite, Maggie Gallagher, Sara McLanahan, David Blankenhorn, Paul Amato, and Alan Booth has contributed to this conclusion.
This statement from Sara McLanahan, a sociologist at Princeton University, is representative:
If we were asked to design a system for making sure that children's basic needs were met, we would probably come up with something quite similar to the two-parent ideal. Such a design, in theory, would not only ensure that children had access to the time and money of two adults, it also would provide a system of checks and balances that promoted quality parenting. The fact that both parents have a biological connection to the child would increase the likelihood that the parents would identify with the child and be willing to sacrifice for that child, and it would reduce the likelihood that either parent would abuse the child.
Republican John McCain boldly declared "Mac is Back" as he predicted victory in his election race with Democrat Barack Obama at a rally in the battleground state of Pennsylvania.
The fired-up 72-year-old Arizona senator, who is trailing Senator Obama in polls, renewed his attacks on his opponent's patriotism and tax plans in a rally before several hundred supporters crammed into a school gymnasium.
"I've been in a lot of campaigns, I know when momentum is there. We're going to win Pennsylvania, we're going to win this election," Senator McCain said.
"I sense it, I feel it, I know it.
"I say again my friends, we're going to win here. We've got two days, knock on doors, with your help we can win. We need you to volunteer, we need a new direction and we have to fight for it.
"My friends - the Mac is Back."
Should Proposition 8 Fail --- The Consequences
1. Children in public schools will have to be taught that same-sex marriage is just as good as traditional marriage.
The California Education Code already requires that health education classes instruct children about marriage. (§51890)
Therefore, unless Proposition 8 passes, children will be taught that marriage is between any two adults regardless of gender. There will be serious clashes between the secular school system and the right of parents to teach their children their own values and beliefs.
2. Churches may be sued over their tax exempt status if they refuse to allow same-sex marriage ceremonies in their religious buildings open to the public. Ask whether your pastor, priest, minister, bishop, or rabbi is ready to perform such marriages in your chapels and sanctuaries.
3. Religious adoption agencies will be challenged by government agencies to give up their long-held right to place children only in homes with both a mother and a father. Catholic Charities in Boston already closed its doors in Massachusetts because courts legalized same-sex marriage there.
4. Religions that sponsor private schools with married student housing may be required to provide housing for same-sex couples, even if counter to church doctrine, or risk lawsuits over tax exemptions and related benefits.
5. Ministers who preach against same-sex marriages may be sued for hate speech and risk government fines. It already happened in Canada, a country that legalized gay marriage. A recent California court held that municipal employees may not say: “traditional marriage,” or “family values” because, after the same-sex marriage case, it is “hate speech.”
6. It will cost you money. This change in the definition of marriage will bring a cascade of lawsuits, including some already lost (e.g., photographers cannot now refuse to photograph gay marriages, doctors cannot now refuse to perform artificial insemination of gays even given other willing doctors). Even if courts eventually find in favor of a defender of traditional marriage (highly improbable given today’s activist judges), think of the money – your money – that will be spent on such legal battles.
And think of all the unintended consequences that we cannot even foresee at this time. Where will it end?
It’s your children, your grandchildren, your money, and your liberties.
Lets work together to protect them.
"Look, we don't care about an old, washed-up terrorist and his wife," McCain said. "That's not the point here."
"He's a terrorist!" a man in the audience screamed without making clear to whom he was referring.
"We need to know the full extent of the relationship," McCain replied. Later, McCain told ABC News: "It's a factor about Sen. Obama's candor and truthfulness with the American people."
Obama has denounced Ayers and his violent actions and views. He dismisses McCain's criticism as an effort to "score cheap political points."
"In the conversation, the senator urged Iraq to delay the [memorandum of understanding] between Iraq and the United States until the new administration was in place," said Samir Sumaidaie, Iraq's ambassador to the United States.
He said Mr. Zebari replied that any such agreement would not bind a new administration. "The new administration will have a free hand to opt out," he said the foreign minister told Mr. Obama.
"The enemies of Islam are facing a crushing defeat, which is beginning to manifest itself in the expanding crisis their economy is experiencing," said Gadahn, in a clip of the message distributed by the SITE Intelligence Group, a Washington-based monitor of militant Web sites.
"A crisis whose primary cause, in addition to the abortive and unsustainable crusades they are waging in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq, is their turning their backs on Allah's revealed laws, which forbid interest-bearing transactions, exploitation, greed and injustice in all its forms."
So while there's reason for McCain-Palin supporters to worry, there's no reason to despair.
Despair is what the Obama campaign is hoping and working for. If a campaign can convince supporters of the other candidate that the race is effectively over, the enthusiasm and volunteer efforts drop off--as does, ultimately, their turnout on Election Day. Just as important, undecided and loosely affiliated voters become persuaded there's no real contest and lose any incentive to look closely at the candidates. This explains the efforts of the Obama campaign--aided by a colluding media--to sell the notion that
the race is over, that McCain supporters should give up, and undecided voters should tune out.
That's why the events at the end of last week were so important.
On Thursday night, Sarah Palin more than held her own in the vice-presidential debate against Joe Biden. She may well have stopped the McCain campaign's slide and, with her assaults on Obama's tax-and-spend liberalism and his willingness to lose in Iraq, set up McCain for a strong performance in Tuesday night's debate.
IFILL: Let's talk conventional wisdom for a moment. The conventional wisdom, Gov. Palin with you, is that your Achilles heel is that you lack experience. Your conventional wisdom against you is that your Achilles heel is that you lack discipline, Sen. Biden. What id it really for you, Gov. Palin? What is it really for you, Sen. Biden? Start with you, governor.
PALIN: My experience as an executive will be put to good use as a mayor and business owner and oil and gas regulator and then as governor of a huge state, a huge energy producing state that is accounting for much progress towards getting our nation energy independence and that's extremely important.
But it wasn't just that experience tapped into, it was my connection to the heartland of America. Being a mom, one very concerned about a son in the war, about a special needs child, about kids heading off to college, how are we going to pay those tuition bills? About times and Todd and our marriage in our past where we didn't have health insurance and we know what other Americans are going through as they sit around the kitchen table and try to figure out how are they going to pay out-of-pocket for health care? We've been there also so that connection was important.
But even more important is that world view that I share with John McCain. That world view that says that America is a nation of exceptionalism. And we are to be that shining city on a hill, as President Reagan so beautifully said, that we are a beacon of hope and that we are unapologetic here. We are not perfect as a nation. But together, we represent a perfect ideal. And that is democracy and tolerance and freedom and equal rights. Those things that we stand for that can be put to good use as a force for good in this world.
John McCain and I share that. You combine all that with being a team with the only track record of making a really, a difference in where we've been and reforming, that's a good team, it's a good ticket.