The Tea Party Facade Falls Away

One of the first claims I heard about the nascent Tea Party movement was that it had no desire to focus on social conservatism. I was highly dubious of the claim given what I've seen of the conservative movement in recent years. What I've seen is theocratically-inclined biblical bigots who want to use the stick of government to beat people up. I saw the anti-immigrant fervor at the one rally I attended and I saw the very cold reception that Gov. Gary Johnson got when he tried to enlighten them on the dangers of the war on drugs.

But some of the media was spreading the claim that the Tea Party movement was made up of conservatives who wanted to focus on economics.

Now we have several successful "Tea Party" candidates who have secured the nomination of the Republican Party for office. Guess what? I have yet to hear of one such candidate who isn't a flaming moral fascist demanding that government enforce their views of morality.

Here is Christine O'Donnell, the Theopublican candidate for Senate in New Jersey, a Tea Party activist. This is a woman who campaigned against masturbation as a form of adulterty.

Can anyone point to a successful Tea Party candidate running for major office who IS NOT a social conservative? I know of none who are actually libertarian and that especially includes Rand Paul.

Families: united by love but divided by hate.

In discussing the terrible tragedy of two teens driven to suicide by anti-gay bigotry—which I advise you read if you haven't done so)—I said to the bigots: "But they could be your children." Of course, we know many examples when they have been their children. Certainly Bobby Griffith was tormented by his own mother and family and church until he killed himself. Mary Griffith realized what she had done, but it was too late to save Bobby. Since then she has campaigned to end the prejudice.


This is what must terrify the anti-gay bigot in ways that can't torment the racist. A Klan leader is not going to discover that the white son he has known his entire life is going to announce he's really black. But no anti-gay bigot with children can have that confidence throughout their entire life. There is always a time when they simply don't know. And many remain clueless their entire lives. But many of them do find themselves facing down their own children and hating them for being gay.


As often happens in politics two powerful political families are united when their children marry. Both families are very conservative, both are Mormons and of course, they are Republicans. Matthew Salmon was Republican state senator in Arizona, he ran for governor and he was a U.S. Congressman. Jeff Flake in the Congressman from Mesa, another conservative Republican and like Salmon, another Mormon. The Flake and Salmon families have been a foundation for the Right-wing Republicans in Arizona. And now they are united by romance—though neither of them are particularly thrilled by it.

Matt Salmon is named after his father, the former congressman. At 14-years-of-age he told his mother he was gay, which didn't stop his family from campaigning against gay people. His partner is Kent Flake, the second counsin of Congressman Flake.

Matt followed the teachings of the Mormon sect and went through therapy to change. It failed, as might be expected.

Kent is from Snowflake, Arizona. Snowflake was a small town founded on orders of Brigham Young, the alleged Mormon prophet. Young sent William Flake to found the town and Apostle Erastus Snow was put in charge of colonization. These polygamists were the founders of the town and when Mormons to name it after Flake others wanted to honor Snow. The name Snowflake was how they honored both simultaneously.

Of course each young man knew of the others family. Matt befriend Kent on Facebook and soon they started dating. At this point Kent told his family he was gay. But under pressure he broke up with Matt and tried to go through church therapy to cure himself of being gay. Matt and Kent had an argument about Kent's attempt to change and faced with a final decision Kent decided to stay with Matt and to resign from the Mormon cult. Matt was sitting in church one Sunday in the summer of 2008 when the minister, following orders from the church heirarchy, was urging everyone in the Arizona congregation to send money to defeat marriage equality in California—that is donate to Proposition 8. The minister told the congregation that all homosexuals are promiscuious and their relationships are selfish. That was when he decided to quite Mormonism completely, and today compares it to some of the outlandish teachings from the cult of Scientology.

Flake is getting the worst of it. He rarely sees his family anymore, hasn't had a real conversation with his father nad has been told that his father doesn't want Matt around his family or his grandkids. Kent's sister told has publicly said that she called them "fags" and "pedophiles" but insists they still love him, they just don't want "to see him in a gay couple." The same is true in Salmon's family. He was told that his family still loves him but that Kent is not welcome in their home. Matt's own siblings dropped him as a Facebook friend in protest over his being gay.

One cousin, Krista Gohus, still is friends. She recently left the Mormon sect as well and considers herself a libertarian, not a Republican. She told the Phoenix New Times: "Matt and his boyfriend, Kent, have been to my home many times, and my 10-year-old son knows Matt and Kent are a couple. I'm teaching my children that being gay is just like being left-handed or being born with curly hair. It's not right or wrong, it's just the way you were born."

Photos: Matt (L), Kent (R).

Judge Napolitano on conservatives as socialists.

More of the bigotry of Wayne Allan Root.

The con man Wayne Allen Root is at it again, besmirching the libertarian label with conservative verbal vomit. The man is a fraud and if the Libertarian Party had an ounce of decency they would boot him out on his fat ass.

Root has a piece that is anti-private property and collectivistic to the core. And he does it while labeling himself as “one of America’s leading Libertarian thinkers.” For the record, I doubt even Root is so stupid as to think he is one of America’s leading libertarian thinkers. Actually he probably knows he not even a libertarian.

Some Muslims are building a center, which includes a mosque, in New York. It will be a couple of blocks away from the site of the Twin Towers. Root is against the idea because: “there are also rights and sensibilities of others to consider in a free society.” Of course, the rights of others are to be respected. But building a mosque doesn’t violate anyone’s rights, no matter how much it offends Mr. Root. No rights are being violated. As for violating sensibilities: what does that mean? Some people, especially the bigoted, are easily offended. Tough shit: in a free society you don’t have a right to go unoffended. And if you are a conservative, like Root, you are usually easily offended. Deal with it.

Root condemns the building of the mosque because it “does nothing to increase religious freedom. “ No it doesn’t and it isn’t obliged to. He says that a mosque instead “inspires hatred, divides our cultures and increases the odds of violence and hate crimes.” Hell, build a Baptist church and the same damn thing happens. But private property is private property and the state has no right to prevent a church, or a mosque, from being built—nor should it.

Root offers lots of bullshit, but then bullshit is his specialty. He says that building it is a sign of disrespect and means to “belittle us.” Who is “us?” I don’t feel belittled or disrespected. And like offense, you have no inherent right to respect. People are free to disrespect you if they wish; they just aren’t free to violate your life, liberty or property.

Root says this center “is to show Muslim contempt for Americans by building a monument to Islam in the shadow of their greatest triumph over America.” Give that some thought for a second. Yes, fanatical Muslims did a horrific thing in the name of their religion. But is there a universal guilt for all Muslims? To call that terrorist attack “their greatest triumph,” and to mean Muslims, is pure, raw, bigoted collectivism.

Mr. Root is a Jew. The Israeli military attacked the USS Liberty in what can only be described as a terrorist attack. Does that action by Israel, mean all Jews are somehow guilty? Obviously not. All Germans aren’t responsible for the atrocities of the Nazis. All whites are not guilty for the attacks of the Klan or Jim Crow laws. All Afrikaners are not responsible for apartheid.

There is no such thing as collective guilt. Hitler preached an anti-Semitic message that was built on the concept of collective guilt for all members of a specific religious minority. Mr. Root, by claiming that the attack of some terrorists was a triumph for Islam, is engaging in the same disgusting form of bigotry as Julius Streicher and his fellow Nazi propagandists.

I have no sympathy for Islam. Nor for that matter do I care about Judaism or Christianity, or any of the inherently intolerant sects of monotheism. It is just wrong, however, to paint all Christians with one brush, or all Jews, or all Muslims. It is a crude form of collectivism and it is irrational.

I dislike Christian theology because I think it is wrong, stupid, and potentially dangerous. I say the same for Judaism and the same for Islam. But I would never say that all Christians are dangerous; all Jews are a threat, or all Muslims are out to get us.

I do think fundamentalism, in all three sects is particularly dangerous. But most Christians are not fundamentalists. Most Muslims were not responsible for 9/11. Most Jews are not responsible for the USS Liberty attack, not even most Israelis are responsible.

As usual the big mouth, self-absorbed con man from Vegas doesn’t even bother to check out the facts. The center being built is called Cordoba House and does house a mosque along with many other things. It is the work of a Muslim cleric who wanted a community center where Muslims and people of other faiths can meet together. The name Cordoba was picked after the Spanish city where Christians, Jews and Muslims once lived together in peace. It is a repudiation of the sort of fanaticism that we saw on 9/11, and the sort of knee-jerk reactionary thinking of Right-wing bigots like Root.

Cordoba House promotes itself as place for interfaith cooperation and social interaction to help promote tolerance and friendship. It is moderate Islam at work. The intolerant fanatics are two-bit charlatans like Root.

Conservatives have been demanding that tolerant Muslims step forward and work in opposition to the fundamentalists—something conservatives themselves refuse to do when it comes to Christian intolerance. Now that such Muslims have done precisely this the Right wing, including faux libertarians like Root, are up in arms over it. Just as decent Muslims need to disassociate themselves from intolerant fanatics, as Cordoba House is doing, so too must decent libertarians repudiate the immature thinking of fake libertarians like Root.

Conservatives in disguise?

There is a religious publication for conservatives who try to take the same views as the Moral Majoritarians without sounding completely unhinged and rabid. They advocate the same sort of moralistic, big government policies of the fanatical fundamentalists but try to do so without sounding like fundamentalists. One of their publications is First Things. They assume that their fantasies about being in communication with some supernatural being gives them a right, even a duty, to use the state to violate the rights of peaceful individuals who act in ways disapproved of by their imaginary friend.

Since they want to trample on the rights of "immoral" people in the name of their religion they know that libertarians are their enemy. They are right, libertarians are their enemies for the same reason libertarians are the enemy of socialism. Conservatives are just socialists of the soul. Just as the socialist want to regulate your material life, the conservatives want to regulate your "spiritual" or moral life.

First Things is thus upset when individuals present "conservative" cases for social liberty. For instance, they are upset that years ago the eternally pompous Andrew Sullivan wrote a conservative case for gay marriage. They misstate Sullivan's views by saying his entire case was that "it will help homosexuals connect sex with love and commitment." Sullivan's case is much more than that but they aren't trying to tell the truth. It seems that even the so-called rational Christian conservatives simply can't help lying about what others believe, a trait they share with their rabid brothers in Christ.

First Things believes there is a concerted attempt by libertarians to infiltrate the conservative movement. In my view that is like a bottle of perfume infiltrating a dung heap. It can be done but seems completely counterproductive.

Along with distorting Sullivan's book on marriage equality they discuss another evil "infiltration" entitled "The Conservative Case for Immigration." That is another libertarian plot as well. Interesting that the first two issues that come to mind about evil libertarians uses the examples of marriage equality and immigration. I have argued the Republicans, particularly conservative religious Republicans, are motivated by hatred; in particular hatred for gays and immigrants.

So here is a "sensible" religious conservative group immediately using precisely those same two groups for their libertarian-bashing article.

Oddly, I do think there are reasons some rational conservatives would want both immigration and marriage equality. Religiously motivated conservatives however, are allergic to rational reasons and rely on alleged supernatural revelation for their public policies. God is their trump card, every prejudice they entertain is supported by the claim that "God said it, I believe it, that settles it." In this sense they are precisely the same as the Islamists that they fear; fear perhaps because they are so similar to one another, at least in their rationality for wanting to deprive others of their rights.

Conservative Republican, Mitch Daniels, was attacked for saying his five favorite books were The Road to Serfdom, Free to Choose, What It Means to Be a Libertarian, The Rise and Decline of Nations and The Future and Its Enemies. I have read and endorse, to one degree or another, all of those books with the exception of the fourth, which I have not read. What has First Things upset is that these books "were written by libertarians advocating libertarian positions."

Conservatives, at one time shared some common values with libertarians—I'm not sure that is true any longer. But one of the funny things about the conservative movement is that they have had to rely on libertarians to do their thinking for them. Since the Bible says bugger-all about markets, spontaneous order, individual rights, etc., conservatives have to find others who actually think about such things. So they borrow and steal ideas from libertarians on a regular basis. When they want to sound like intellectual advocates of freedom they will quote Milton Friedman, FA Hayek, Ludwig von Mises, Ayn Rand and other authors of a more libertarian bent.

Conservatism itself is intellectually sterile and so they have had to take what libertarians have been writing. Left to their own devices they produce the likes of Anne Coulter or Rush Limbaugh, intellectual midgets who think sneer and smear is a form of intellectual argumentation.

First Things laments the intellectual wasteland that is modern conservatism and admit that libertarians "hold an outsized influence" on the "right-leaning intellectual elite." They write: "Disagree? Quick: Think of a prominent economist on the right that isn't a libertarian or that is an outspoken social conservative." If by "on the right" they mean supporting a free, depoliticized market, then they are pretty much right. Conservatives aren't intellectuals. Economics is an intellectual pursuit. Conservatives are faith-driven, economics is reality-bound. They steal from libertarians because religion is intellectual sterile when it comes to matters like economics.

I once tried to read all the major defenses of religion and capitalism. Poor Ed Optiz spent more time quoting Mises than Jesus—and for good reason. I found individual Christians trying to defend free markets but using secular sources for their arguments. They can't rely on their theology for this, they must rely on secular sources.

The reality is that NO major free market economist that I can think of, was a professed orthodox Christian. They were mostly secular, atheists or deists, often non-practicing Jews. First Things find this disturbing and thinks that these libertarians were involved in some plot to infiltrate conservatives. They say: "By shifting the terminology—call themselves conservative while supporting libertarian ideas—they will eventually reshape the conservative movement into their own image." Milton Friedman said he was a classical liberal, or a modern libertarian, not a conservative. I've heard him say it and emphasis his actual views. FA Hayek wrote an excellent essay attacking the foundations of conservatism in Why I Am Not a Conservative. Mises wrote an entire book on his political philosophy called Liberalism.

This is hardly deceptive infiltration by libertarians into the dung heap of conservatism. Conservatives, in their attempt to pay lip-service to free markets, borrowed intellectual arguments on markets from libertarians because they are unable to produce their own.


They argued that "libertarians are trying to pass themselves off as conservatives," while I argue the opposite is happening. Ron Paul has pushed a conservative agenda on social issues, claimed separation of church and state is a "myth," voted to keep sodomy a crime in Washington, D.C., wants to nationalize every uterus in the country calls himself a "true conservative" right up until he says something stupid and then pretends he is a libertarian as a cover-up. We saw conservatives like Wayne Root and Bob Barr infiltrate the libertarian movement.

George Bush so discredited the Religious Right that there was an influx of conservatives using the libertarian label to describe themselves. But it is rare for real libertarians to label themselves conservative. For a libertarian that would make as much sense as saying one is a Marxist-Leninist.

First Things is correct to note that conservatives and libertarians are not similar groups. Libertarians believe in individual rights; conservatives DO NOT. Libertarians believe in equality before the law; conservatives do not. Libertarians believe in separation of church and state; conservatives do not. Libertarians believe in limiting government to protecting the rights of individuals; conservatives want expansive state powers in the name of morality. The original enemies of the early libertarian movement were the conservatives who defend the feudal order of the day. Socialists saw themselves as proponents of many liberal ideas, so much so that they eventually claimed the name for themselves. But conservatives were everything that the classical liberals opposed.

That the socialist/progressive movement became so extreme in their worship of state power, something they adopted from the conservatives of their day, was the reason for a temporary alliance, in opposition to Marxism, between true liberals and conservatives. But that temporary alliance didn't mean conservatives and libertarians shared any real values, just a common opposition to Marxist authoritarianism. The enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend. Conservatives are not now, never have been, and never will be the allies of classical liberalism, libertarianism or individual rights.

Rand Paul and Ayn Rand: not peas from the same pod

One of the tragedies from the Ron Paul movement has been the association of libertarianism with very unlibertarian sentiments. Before Rand Paul picked up his father's sullied mantle I was talking with someone who had been a top official in the Liberal Democratic Party at a dinner in London. Some of the people were libertarians who thought the Paulites were a good thing. I pointed out how our ideas were being associated with ideas that were most clearly not libertarian. The Lib Dem guy made the point about "brand contamination." When someone becomes associated with other things, a tad bit more nefarious and questionable, the good aspects of the brand become contaminated.

That is what Ron Paul did to libertarianism—associating it with anti-immigrant sentiments, neo-Confederate politics, Birch Society conspiracy nonsense, state's rights, and racism, to name a few. Ron Paul has always been a conservative, not a libertarian—as his vote to keep sodomy a crime in D.C., showed. And Rand Paul is more of the same, but worse.

So who gets blamed for Rand Paul's views? Libertarians do. Sam Tanenhaus referred to Rand Paul's controversial statements with a New York Times piece entitled: "Rand Paul and the Perils of Textbook Libertarianism." That would imply that Rand Paul is a textbook libertarian when he is no such thing. He has less right to claim libertarianism than does his father.

So I wanted to clear up a few points. Not only isn't Rand Paul a libertarian, as I have asserted before, but he isn't even named after Ayn Rand—as some of his worshippers and detractors all seem to assume. Paul has clarified it himself but that doesn't stop the morons, on both Left and Right, from saying otherwise. His full name is Randal Paul and Rand is merely an abbreviation of his first name, not homage to Ayn Rand.

And, if it had been homage to Rand, I can assure you she wouldn't have been honored. Rand refused to support candidates if they campaigned against abortion. She refused to support Reagan and stated his opposition to abortion as a reason, and Reagan was much more moderate on the issue than Paul, who wouldn't even allow a woman to abort in order to save her own life. My friend Barbara Branden reports: "When I last saw Rand in 1981, she told me that she was opposed to Reagan because she considered him a typical conservative in his attempt to link politics and religion. About his anti-abortion view, she said: 'A man who does not believe in a woman's right to her own body, does not believe in human rights.'"

Paul, according to his own site, had the endorsement of the far-Right theocratic group, Concerned Women for America, and his site says that his "socially conservative views have earned the respect and trust of church leaders across Kentucky." Consider how Rand saw Reagan and his friendly relations with the Moral Majority:

The appalling disgrace of his administration is his connection with the so-called "Moral Majority" and sundry other TV religionists, who are struggling—apparently with his approval—to take us back to the Middle Ages, via the unconstitutional union of religion and politics.

Rand said Reagan was trying to "arouse the country by some sort of inspirational appeal. He is right in thinking that the country needs an inspirational element. But he will not find it in the God-Family-Tradition swamp." So while Randal Paul was sucking up to the social conservative religionists, Ayn Rand had called their ideology a "swamp" and wanted nothing to do with them.

Previously I mentioned Rand's views on the issue of state's rights, which is vastly different than Randal Paul's views. While social conservatives like the two Pauls, Wayne Allen Root, Bob Barr and others, argue for state's rights, Ayn Rand said that people don't understand what it means She argued it was merely a "division of power between local and national authorities" and did "not grant to a state government an unlimited arbitrary power over its citizens or the privilege of abrogating the citizens' individual rights." As Rand saw it state's rights would justify the violation of separation of church and state at the state level, as Ron Paul and other conservatives have said.

George Wallace used the state's right mantra to justify his racist campaigns for political office. Rand noted that Wallace was NOT "a defender of individual rights, but merely of state's rights—which is far from being the same thing." She said Wallace's denunciation of big government was one that merely wanted to replace federal tyranny with local tyranny, that all Wallace wanted was "to place the same unlimited, arbitrary power in the hands of many little governments." This is also true of the paleo-conservatives pretending to be libertarians: Randal and Ron Paul being the prime examples.

Libertarian blogger Timothy Lee noticed that Randal Paul's "libertarianism" "is curiously one-sided." Lee notes that Paul's view "is far from uncompromising" and points to Paul's rabid anti-immigration stands, his demand that anyone who is a citizen of a "rogue nation" be denied travel visas and that he supports "holding suspects indefinitely without trial at GITMO," as evidence. He also lists Paul's opposition to marriage equality, his refusal to talk about the war on drugs, or free trade as areas of concern. Lee writes:

Paul is an uncompromising defender of the rights of business owners to decide who will sit at their lunch counters. But Paul apparently sees no problem with deploying the power of the state to stop private business owners from hiring undocumented workers. Nor does he seem to care very much about business owners’ freedom to do business with the millions of non-terrorists who live in “rogue nations.” Or, for that matter, the freedom of a gay business owner to marry the person he loves. There’s a principle at work here, all right, but I don’t think it has very much to do with limited government.

Randal Paul got caught by his own position in defense of private discrimination. And while I agree with freedom of association as a right, it is very difficult, if not impossible to defend those rights if you yourself advocate violating those rights in numerous ways. Social conservatives, like Paul, are not advocates of individual rights, but proponents of social order and state control in the name of God, family, tradition, morality and religion. They are sometimes opponents of state intervention and sometimes advocates of it. Their lack of consistency means it is easy to show them up as hypocrites, advocating one set of laws for one group of people and another set for other, less favored, groups.

As a libertarian I would say this lack of consistency plagues both Progressives and Conservatives. Which is why libertarians are neither, but hold the radical middle ground where rights are applied consistently. Randal Paul, like his father doesn't support equality of rights for gay people. So that meant he could not answer Rachel Maddow well when she nailed him on discrimination. He stuttered, stumbled, tried to evade, and basically made his position look bad. He tried to claim libertarian principles, but not being a consistent libertarian made that difficult. So how would I have responded to Maddow, in the same circumstances? Here is my answer:

Rachel, that's a good question and is the answer is more complex that a lot of people want to believe. For instance, why shouldn't a "black student's union" have the right to admit only black students? And doesn't it make sense that with the sort of sexual harassment that many women have experienced that a lesbian bar might rationally want to exclude straight men as patrons or employees?

Much of the struggle for human rights, especially for those oppressed and discriminated against, has revolved around the freedom to associate. With the right to freely associate comes the right to not associate, which is what that lesbian bar would be doing. Government is a very blunt tool, and when the law applies to private associations it does so without taking into account, nor can it take into account, the nuances which may well justify the reluctance for some people to associate with others.

Where there is private discrimination, that is irrational and prejudicial, such as the refusal of some restaurants to serve black patrons, I think it important that community leaders, people like yourself, all decent people, stand up and protest, boycott, picket, leaflet and force a change in policy. And there are many examples of that happening.

Government is such a blunt tool to use that it can't distinguish between the first kind of discrimination and the second kind. It destroys both with the same law. Thus we could get bizarre things like a gay resort, with somewhat liberal standards on nudity or public displays of sexuality, being sued for discriminating against heterosexual families with children. Government does a bad job of telling the differences and thus tends to ban both.

Most people, like yourself, clearly can see the differences. A Christian church that refused to perform Jewish weddings doesn't bother most people. A restaurant that refuses to serve black customers does. The church is only exempt because of the First Amendment, and thus safe from such laws. But the lesbian bar I mentioned is not. The community is free to distinguish between these different forms of discrimination and routinely does so. They will boycott and protest against the restaurant but no one bats an eye at religious discrimination by churches.

What is critical to remember is that state power has more often been used to force discrimination than to forbid it. The South was not a free society and had legislation mandating bigotry and prejudicial policies. When local government violates the rights of people, it is fit and proper for federal legislation to prevent that. Government is a dangerous weapon and is more likely to be used to suppress rights.

The great civil rights battle of today, Rachel, is that of marriage equality.
Look at the battle line. All across the country private businesses treat their gay employees and customers with respect, sure some don't, but they are not the dominant trend by any means, but the exception. As a gay woman you surely know this.

Gay relationships are recognized by employers who grant their gay employees the same rights as other employees. Where is the problem? Don't Ask, Don't Tell -- government mandated discrimination. The Defense of Marriage Act -- government mandated discrimination. Immigration laws exist that refuse to recognize gay couples. That is state bigotry, not private. We have state mandated discrimination in the tax codes, marriage laws, custody laws, even in hospital visitation rights.

So, Rachel, here is my offer, based on my principles. Let us abolish all government mandated discrimination, abolish those laws, reform the system to see full equality of rights for all. Compared to the nationwide massive violations of rights that government is doing today, the issue of private discrimination is tiny. Not only is the impact of state discrimination far more destructive but it is much harder to change. Many a business has suddenly switched sides due to a boycott, but you can't boycott government. In addition, much of the private prejudices collapse when government-sanctioned bigotry is abolished.

So, when it comes to my preferences, I prefer the private versus governmental approach. It is easier to wipe out bigotry when privately practiced then when enforced by law. Even with a so-called "friend" in the White House look at the meager progress gay and lesbian people have made with their just demands. It is far easier to end private discrimination than state-enforced bigotry.

A government that routinely discriminates against tens of millions of Americans, due to their sexual orientation, or gender identity, is not a trust-worthy advocate for individual rights. I would rather leave this to the common sense of the people, using proven strategies like boycotts and picket lines, to eradicate irrational prejudice while leaving the woman's bar alone, as I suspect the case would be.

My answer may not entirely satisfy Maddow, but it would go a long way toward addressing her concerns and showing the good intentions of libertarians toward minorities. So why didn't Randall Paul say this? Why didn't he defend well the libertarian position? Because he couldn't, he doesn't believe in it.

Tea Party, neither tea nor a party.

I did something unusual today. Since it was tax day I went to the big metro-wide Tea Party rally. I was there from 2 pm until 10 pm. I talked to dozens of people, listened in on dozens of conversations and heard many speakers. They also had a booth area for organizations, and I checked out every single booth at the event, probably around 50 or 60 of them in total.

First, the big news: the Tea Party is not libertarian oriented. Not in any way, any shape, or any form. What I saw was the worst of the conservative movement, which these days is pretty bad since even main stream conservatives have become repulsive to all decent people.

First, even though today was tax day, taxes weren't the issue that motivated this crowd. I saw few signs protesting high taxes, few protesting Obamacare and none referring to the bailouts of Wall Street and corporate America. Two things drove these people to frenzied disgust: Obama and immigrants.

The Obama hatred was pervasive. I'm no fan of Obama, but I dislike the man because I dislike the policies he promotes. I consider him another George Bush, just one who can finish a complete sentence. But the worst Bush policies are pretty much the same as the worst Obama policies. I see Bush and Obama much like I see Hoover and FDR. The one started the bad policies that the other completed, but they aren't opposites just horrifyingly similar.

That the Tea Party movement didn't protest the big government policies of Bush, but are rabid about Obama, tells me that there is more here than a love for liberty. Actually I saw little indication for a love for liberty among these people.

What they wanted was Big Brother government using all its power to root out and find illegal immigrants looking for jobs. These were people who would applaud government monitoring work places, setting up ID check points, having the police randomly stop people in the streets to check their "papers" to make sure they are "legal" residents. These are the type of people who as children, thought the hall monitors were good guys making sure everyone had a "pass" from teacher. I would call them closet authoritarians except I don't think they're in the closet.

One woman was lecturing a camera about "my country is like my house." She thought that silly analogy valid."And I have the right to say who comes into my house." I couldn't stand it any more and from where I was seated yelled to her: "It's my house too." Not being too bright she smiled, pointed at me and yelled, "EXACTLY!" To that I replied: "And I don't care who comes in." She was not thrilled with that reply.

My point was that this is as much my country as it is her own. The idea that the country is a big version of her house is absurd unless she thinks that my house is somehow just a room in her house and that I have to live under her thumb. There are plenty of people who welcome anyone who wants to work, and are willing to hire them, willing to rent to them, and willing to be friends with them. The country as "private property" scenario is absurd, mainly because everyone I know who makes that assumption also assumes that all of us are as xenophobic as they are. Actually some of them aren't xenophobic in general, at least not if the immigrants are white.

One t-shirt that was being sold had Uncle Sam pointing his figure at the reader, in the old "I want you" motif. But this time the slogan was: "I want YOU to speak English." Think about that for a second. Uncle Sam is supposed to be a benevolent stand-in for the government. When Uncle Sam says something, it is the federal government saying it. So these "small government" conservatives were hawking t-shirts that make what language people are speaking a matter of federal concern. I am not saying the t-shirt is the equivalent to policy but that they thought it worth hawking indicated their mentality.

My view is libertarian, of course. The government doesn't have any business telling any private citizen what language they should speak. Talk in ancient Aramaic for all I care. One thing studies show is that the fastest way for new residents of a country to learn the local language is for them to get a job—something these people are trying to prevent for Mexicans, while still demanding they learn English. I know how hard it is to not speak the main language of a country—I've been there. I've also lived in multi-lingual countries and spent 10 years listening to my other half chatting in Afrikaans on the phone. It's no big deal except to xenophobes.

I did not think that the Tea Party movement was inspired by racism. And I don't think the racism is overt. But what I saw today did cause me to believe that a large percentage of the protest is racist inspired. The focus on Obama the man, with some rather crude caricatures, and not on the policies, only fed into that. And you know when these people talk about "illegal aliens" they don't mean Canadians.

The politicians who showed up, with on exception, were the worst sort from the Republican Party. I won't go into names since most are only locally known. But we are talking hard-core, law and order authoritarians. These are the kind of politicians who want stricter state control of people's sex lives, want the police to have few restraints because of the pesky Bill of Rights, who think the 2nd amendment is important but the 1st amendment is a myth. These are the politicians who think the number one issue in America is not runaway government but Mexicans wanting to bus tables and clean yards.

One person told me Ayn Rand was a genius. I am not one to disagree with that since I have some idea what her IQ was, and it was impressive. And I'm generally sympathetic to Rand with some areas of disagreement. But another was equally as quick to tell me she was evil because she was an atheist. He was unhappy when I responded, "So was Milton Friedman, F.A. Hayek and Ludwig von Mises." He clearly had no idea who Hayek and Mises were but said, "Oh, well Friedman was good." The only thing he knew about Rand was she was a non-theist but that was all he needed to know.

But isn't that the conservative creature in a nutshell? An atheist must be bad because he or she is an atheist. Nothing else need be known. A homosexual is bad because he/she is a homosexual. A "illegal" immigrant is bad because they don't a permission slip from a politician to be here .

I have a tendency to find libertarians where I go and I found very few today. A few spotted me and came over to speak. But out of the thousands of people there today I got a sense that less than 10% could be remotely described as libertarians. Even one alleged libertarian group was handing out flyers headlined: "Stop Illegal Immigration. Yes!"

When I attended the American Humanist Association convention, with a much smaller audience, I found far more libertarians than I expected. I was surprised and would have estimated that 20% of the audience was libertarian. At the Atheist International conference with Richard Dawkins I again got the sense that around a quarter of the audience was libertarian oriented. Michael Shermer and I were discussing the matter and he said his sense of such events were that one-quarter to one-third were libertarian.

When I last saw Carol Ruth Silver, Harvey Milk's good friend and ally on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, I felt nothing but respect from her for libertarians. And she really did seem to understand where libertarians were coming from and while she disagreed on some important matters she was respectful and sympathetic. But when I talk to conservative leaders I don't feel the same respect, but a dislike. To them a libertarian is merely a conservative who wants to take drugs, or is gay.

Carol Ruth told me that libertarians interest her because they take ideas seriously. Conservatives, don't take ideas seriously and dislike libertarians because they do. But more than anything the conservative has this haunting suspicion that a libertarian is merely an immoral conservative. They don't get us. Sure, some on the Left don't get us either. But many do.

I can talk to friends on the Left. They are willing to debate based on evidence, facts, information, etc. They have some sense of being reality-based. But what I get from the Right today is a disdain for the facts and reality. They don't need such pesky things since they speak for God, and they know what God wants—God, to their great fortune, happens to agree completely with them. And since God said it, that settles it, and evidence is immaterial.

Look at the Right-wing debate on marriage equality. They are against it because God is against it. Because their God is the only God, and their God thinks they are 100% correct. Anyone who says God disagrees has a false God since God hates fags. Hey, they won't be as honest as the Westboro Baptist crowd but in their hearts that is what they believe.

One old libertarian friend of mine was there. When I saw him I said: "I'm so glad to see you. You are an island of sanity is a sea of crazy." He found it amusing, saying he thought I always saw him as touched himself. But he had the same reaction I did. He was really disgusted by the tone and tenor of the participants. He was sick of the Godly preaching at him, pushing religion on him, and claiming that everything is based on the Bible. He couldn't stomach the event as long as I did and left with his wife, telling me he was looking forward to the upcoming gay festival instead. If anything his few hours among the tea party crowd made him more anxious to attend the festival.

There is a great line in the remake of Hairspray (2007). One actress I've always enjoyed, Queen Latiffah, plays Motormouth Maybelle. Her son is dating a white girl, this in the late 50s, or early 60s. When Maybelle realizes it she tells the couple: "Well, love is a gift. A lot of people don't remember that, so you two better brace yourselves for a whole lot of ugly comin' at you from a never ending parade of stupid." Listening to the Tea Party crowd here today I thought of that quote repeatedly. What I saw was a " whole lot of ugly coming from a never ending parade of stupid."

I certainly hope the mood wasn't the same at other Tea Party events. But I know the other major local rally, held earlier in the day, which I didn't attend, was similarly ugly—with a lot of immigrant bashing going on there as well, and the two thousand attendees applauded a well known law enforcement figure who likes to find excuses to stop anyone who looks Hispanic as an pretense to search them for a green card. He was considered a hero at that rally.

What I got out of this rally, other than some nasty sun burn, is a sense of despair, not on the part of these people, but on my part. What was made clear to me is that the Tea Party people are not the great hope for America that they think they are. They are no more freed0m-oriented than President Obama. These activists struck me as angry people, looking for scapegoats. These were the people who see anyone who disagrees with them as purely evil in nature. I got no sense that there were libertarian sentiments amongst these people. They are NOT libertarians but conservative authoritarians. They are driven by a law & order mentality and a fear of the different. They are more likely to see people as evil than wrong and less accepting of the choice of others. For them, to choice other than they do, threatens them. They want a world where they are surrounded by pale versions of themselves.

They are not my kind of people. This Tea Party reminded me more of the one thrown by the Mad Hatter and not the one thrown by the Founders at Boston harbor.

Conservatves come to defense of gays so he can bash them.

A conservative writer at Breitbart's Big Journalism site, Bruce Carroll, has come to the defense of gays, sort of, in order to bash them along with liberals for hypocrisy. Carroll blogs about three men who went to San Francisco in order to assault gay men. The three cousins were Shafiq Hashemi, Sayed Bassam and Mohammad Habibzada.

The trio of budding bigots took a BB gun in to the city and picked a man they assumed was gay. They shot him in the face and were proud enough of their assault that they video taped the incident. Police were called and found the men a short time after the incident and confiscated the tape. As far as I know the police, when they arrest individuals, do not ask them their religion. And the news media reported on the incident based on information given out by the police.

But Big Journalism is livid because the the media, gays and liberals report neither "the identity group, nor the motives...." By identity group Carrol means Muslim. There is a decent chance these bigots were Muslim, based on the name. But I can't find anything to confirm that to be the case. It is an assumption. It may be a good assumption, but until we have confirmation, it is only an assumption. Journalists shouldn't make assumptions in news stories. To do so does bias the report according to the journalist's personal opinions. Normally conservatives would condemn journalists if they did make assumptions not in evidence.

Carrol, of course, is not concerned about gays. He just wants to bash journalists, liberals and gays in general. He went looking to see if gay media sites reported that the men were Muslim, because he assumes they are—and they may well be, I assume they are, but don't have proof. Most of Carrol's attack on various gay sites is entirely based on their refusal to brand the assailants as Muslims. This is a "head-in-the-sand approach in the reporting of this Muslim-on-gay violence in America's homo mecca" says Carroll. He specifically condemns various web sites for this alleged approach.

The sites in question don't have journalists stationed in San Francisco who could possible ferret out the religion of the assailants, in light of the police not identifying suspects by their faiths. What these sites apparently did was report on the story, based on the news stories on the wire from San Francisco. Is it hypocrisy? Is that head-in-the-sand, or is that actually good reporting based on only the facts in evidence and not on personal assumptions?

Carroll claims:

Folks who aren’t in tune with the American gay community need to understand something fundamental. The gay liberal activists and thought leaders that make policy and advocacy decisions have long ignored the existential threat to gays and lesbians by Islamic extremism. Liberal “gay rights” groups such as the Human Rights Campaign, the Gill Foundation, and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force are far more concerned about attacking American Christians on a daily basis than facing the real threat to gays around the world.

Carroll mentions the barbaric penalties imposed on gays by Muslim nations. All that is true. All that has been widely reported in the very sites and media outlets that Carroll is targeting in his tirade. But Carroll, in typical hysterical conservative mode, pretends that gays are "too concerned about court-forced marriage, educational indoctrination of kids and Federal funding to worry about such trivial matters as systematic killing of gays by Islamic regimes. Or the looming threat to American gays and lesbians on our shores." Wow! And you thought only the Greens got hysterical!

Carroll seems pretty silly to me. There is no "court-forced marriage" as far as I know. Allowing gays to marry is not forcing marriage. What a bizarre definition of force! And all the gay media has routinely reported on the killing of gays by Islamic regimes, including the very sites that Carroll bashes.

As someone who has condemned religious extremism, be it Islamic or Christian, I have to say that Carroll is going overboard. Muslims are not a "looming threat to American gays and lesbians on our shores." Yes, some individual Muslims in America will commit crimes of hate against gay people. But they are a small percentage of the population. There are more fundamentalists Christians in America who think gays need to be put to death, than there are Muslims in America holding that view. Yes, there are more fundamentalist Muslims in the world, who take that position, than there are Christians who take that position. But in America the odds are reversed.

And it is fundamentalist Christians who have the Republican Party by the balls, not Islamic fundamentalists. On a world-wide basis, Islamic fundamentalism is the bigger threat. Within the United States it is Christian fundamentalism that is a threat. This blog has reported on Christian fundamentalist clerics who have publicly called for executing gays under Biblical law. And the Bible does say that gay men should be killed, not that Carroll would admit it does.

If there is evidence, besides their names, that these three men were Muslims engaged in a religious attack on gay people, then it should be reported. Carroll unfortunately doesn't offer any.

What about the conservative head-in-the-sand approach to the extremism of their fundamentalist Christian allies and their antigay agenda? Fundamentalist Muslims and Christians both stand guilty of bigotry. Carroll blasts the purported hypocrisy of gays, liberals and the media in not reporting antigay animus among Muslims, but what about the conservative media ignoring antigay animus among Christians? Carroll's accusations are hollow. The groups he condemns have reported on verified Islamic attacks on gays. They didn't report that the three assailants were Muslims in this case, because so far no one has offered any real evidence that they are. But certainly commentators on the various sites have made the same assumptions that Carroll made.

I actually make the same assumption, but I wouldn't report it as fact without actually knowing it is a fact. Carroll doesn't know it is a fact, he just assumes it is, and no doubt hopes it is.

I did notice that Carroll left off one gay media site that I found in my search of stories on the case. On March 5th the Edge reported on the case and said that various conservative sites said the "three attackers are Muslim." Edge then discusses Islamic views toward gay people including calls for death. That was five days before Carroll wrote his piece. That article reported what it knew, that some people think it was a religiously-motivated attack, but it didn't offer it as if it were proven. Carroll's whole attack on gays, journalism and liberals relies on no one mentioning that the attackers might be Muslim so he has to ignore gay sites that did mention that very thing.

I have to say, as someone unhappy with both modern liberals and modern conservatives, that conservatives are the most hypocritical bunch in this debate. Conservatives like Carroll don't routinely report the wide-spread hatred against gay people within Christian fundamentalist circles. They ignore it. The groups Carroll attacks do report on that and they also report on Islamic assaults on the rights of gay people. Conservatives only discuss Islamic assaults on gays in order to bash Muslims, not because they actually care about the victims of those assaults. In Carroll's case he reports on Islamic gay bashing specifically so he can verbally bash gay people himself. His motivation is hardly pure, or honest, in my opinion.

By the way, to bolster his case, Carroll has a video of an antigay remark by a Muslim scholar, telling a black Muslim group in the US that gays ought to be killed. That video appeared at the Edge five days prior to Carroll's reporting it. Carroll never mentions that Christian fundamentalist have said precisely the same thing. But don't hold your breath waiting for Carroll to mention it.

Photo: I sincerely doubt that the holder of the sign is Muslim. I assume he is Christian and conservative, what does Carroll have to say?

Antigay Republican confesses he's gay.

The anti-gay Republican state senator from Bakersfield, California, Roy Ashburn, has admitted he's gay. He was the guy who got too tipsy at a gay bar in Sacramento and was weaving his way home. The police picked him up for drunk driving, he was in the company of a man he apparently met at the bar. After his arrest became news numerous individuals informed the media that Ashburn, who has voted against equality of rights for gay people, was in the gay bar.

Ashburn went into hiding for several days. With that information in all the media, Ashburn was pretty much pushed into a corner. During a radio interview he admitted: "I am gay... those are the words that have been so difficult for me for so long." Press reporst say that Ashburn "said he is drawing on his Christian faith, and he asked people to pray for him." Perhaps that is one of the reasons he had so much trouble saying those "words."

I wonder what the "gay-is-a-choice" conservatives will tell the antigay Ashburn? Will they tell him that he just decided to become gay? Will they claim he is demon possessed (which for a Republican today seems fitting)? How many times do they have to witness such sad cases before they realize that there gay-is-a-choice theory is wrong? My guess is that the fundamentalist types will never admit the reality because it goes against their view of the Bible. And for them, reality has to be forced to correspond with their faith, no matter how disfigured reality becomes as a result.

Ryan Sorba: are you watching? We are all waiting to see what happens with you.

The ugly face of conservatism

The bigots on the Right (and yes, there are bigots on the Left as well) are not a pretty sight. Behold one Ryan Sorba from the misnamed Young Americans for (sic.) Freedom. Sorba does not want social freedom but state control. He is also an antigay political activist who goes around given lectures on the evil nature of gays and has written an antigay polemic as well that seems to be published only in pdf format. Sorba is clearly obsessed with the issue and seems intent to make gay baiting his full time occupation. The boy has issues.

The American Conservative Union puts on a conference that tends to be attended by a younger crowd. And while a lot of these students see themselves as conservatives (they'll learn) they don't hold the hateful agenda of people like Sorba. The conference, CPAC apparently allowed a Republican group for gays (similar to a Nazi group for Jews) to have a table in the display hall. And Mr. Sorba got his panties in a knot over the idea. So he went to the podium and denounced the conference for allowing gays to attend.

He ranted about "natural law" confusing it with theology, which is supernatural law and has no relationship to natural law theory. What is interesting, and this should worry Maggie Gallagher and her Mormon funders, is that the most younger audience started booing him. No doubt some of this was due to his being such a flaming asshole in public, but a lot of it appears to be because a lot of conservative youth don't share his prejudices and were appalled by him. Watch the video and see how vigorous a send-off Sorba received. Keep reminding yourself that these are the young conservatives.

If the anti-gay bigots have lost their own young activists they have lost the war. Maggie ought to go back to her church, Sorba back to his closet, and contemplate what this sort of response means for the future of social conservatism. For what it's worth, based on years of observing the crazy Right, I would say that if there exists a betting pool on which conservative is most likely to be caught in a sex scandal, I know where I'd put my bet.

Conservatives, gays and überbitches

The above discussion is of some interest, but also, in some ways, very unsatisfactory, at least to a libertarian. The topic itself is of zero interest to libertarians: "Is There a Place for Gay People in Conservatism and Conservative Politics?" Libertarians simply are not conservatives. My only regret about the way modern conservatives view gay people is that they have pushed a large number of people into alliances with the Left and thus many gay people end up buying the entire Left agenda, even when they shouldn't.

The second problem is that conservatism is an incoherent, unspecified, every-shifting set of values. As Hayek noted, conservatives may hold to certain "moral" values very strenuously but they lack any clear cut set of political principles. David Boaz, in his introduction of the discussion, referred to that when he noted that conservatives spent much of the last century opposing equal rights for Jews, blacks, women and gay people, and then wonder why those groups are reluctant to vote for them. He also noted that conservatives today go as far as pretending they never opposed equality for said groups once equality is accepted by most people. Conservatives like to rewrite their bigoted history in order to appear to be classical liberals. They aren't.

The third issue with this debate is that the participants were 2/3rds unsavory and 1/3 coherent and interesting. The 1/3 that was worth listening to was Nick Herbert, Conservative MP from the UK. The worst aspect of the debate was having to listen to Andrew Sullivan and Maggie Gallagher. Certainly if I were the deity I sentence them to spend eternity together—now that's what I call hell.

Sullivan's problem is the same one he always has. As for as Andrew is concerned there are only two topics of discussion: those that deal with him, and those that should deal with him. I find him incredible nauseating since he seems incapable of discussion anything unless he can make it about himself. In this debate he was überbitch. It is one thing when he's being rude and nasty to Maggie, since she actually deserves it, but Sullivan was the pompous ass with everyone. He was particularly snippy because he has created a fake conservatism where he supports Obama and Obama's big government agenda. When Dave Boaz asked a question regarding Sullivan's support of the president and his agenda Sullivan denounced the question instead of answering it.

When James Kirchick asked the same question and how Sullivan's views qualified as conservative, Sullivan responded by invoking authority: himself, of course. He merely said he knows more about the topic than Kirchick and then refused to answer.

I found Sullivan tedious in print and in person and can't think of any good reason that anyone should care what he thinks. His solipsistic view of politics screams self-esteem issues to me. Quite honestly, I can't stand the man. Watching him spar with Gallagher brings no pleasure as I don't want either of them to come out on top. Sullivan's prime point, when he wasn't pitying himself, was that conservatives are nasty. There is no serious debate there, at least not from me.

Gallagher was her usual self as well except she kept trying to emphasize that making gay people second class citizens doesn't mean she's a bigot. She kept whining that it is unfair to say that people are bigot if their views are deeply held, religious views. Of course, bigotry is bigotry, regardless if the the justification of it is theological, racial, or political. That her church, Roman Catholic, had promoted anti-Semitism for centuries is no less repugnant because they thought it was based on the New Testament. Gallagher is basically arguing that religious arguments ought to get a "free pass" in the realm of debate and politics; that one should not question them because they "are deeply held." Sincerity is the same thing as reasonable and sincerely held, wrong beliefs are still wrong. Just because you didn't believe a bus was turning the corner doesn't mean it won't flatten you.

The great problem with the Gallagher's religious nuts is that they honestly believe two very bad premises. First, they assume that religious beliefs hold some sort of protection from scrutiny, debate or even ridicule, not afforded to any other belief. Second, they then assume their religious beliefs should be the foundation for the law. This is a recipe for authoritarianism. A creed can be claimed to be religious, thus unavailable for debate or discussion. Then that creed should serve to regulate the lives of everyone else, even those who don't hold to the creed. This is really what Gallagher is asking for.

She also spends a certain amount of time saying that because evangelical Christians are fearful that we should placate them politically. She, of course, does her best to fan the fear any chance she gets. And she did it again in this discussion by lying about legal cases around gay issue. For instance, she claimed that Catholics in Massachusetts stopped adoption services because they were forced to allow gays to adopt. She neglected to say that the law on that matter only applies to agencies who are state funded. Mormon adoption services still operate in Massachusetts without having to be non-discriminatory because they weren't ripping off taxpayers to fund their activities. One can still discriminate in adoption if one is privately funded. But if gay taxpayers are forced to pay the bills they should have equal access to the services.

The problem is that the Catholic Church wanted tax funds, not that it was handling adoptions. If the church was willing to do that with it's own money (if it has any left after paying victims of abuse by Catholic priests) it would be free to do so, without having to consider gay parents. This was precisely the situation in Washington, DC. The church wanted taxpayer funding with the restrictions on their ability to discriminate that comes when you are a tax supported agency.

Sullivan did call Gallagher on this question and asked her if she were aware of this. She said she didn't know what the facts where even though she had just used this case as an example in her campaign of fear. Galllagher has regularly lied about situations to make them sound like a violation of private rights, when they were regulations on how to use taxpayer funding instead.

Gallagher's big claim was that when gay people make liberty claims they are on strong ground but when they make equality claims they are not. The problem is that she doesn't actually define equality and it can mean several different things. Equality of rights is very different from equality of results. Hayek noted that in The Constitution of Liberty that the two types of equality are incompatible. But what of equality of liberty and equality of rights before the law? Gallagher seems to think the two are at odds with one another.

They are not, for in many ways, they are one in the same thing. Gallagher is free to marry her partner, a gay person is not free to marry their partner. Gallagher has freedoms that gay people do not enjoy. The state treats gay people differently and at a disadvantage. In fact, many of the ways that the state treats gay couples differently means a direct transfer of wealth from gay couples to straight couples. Gallagher, in essence, has certain benefits (which I would abolish) that come to her because gay people are partially subsidizing them. She, for instance, will be able to collect social security benefits when her spouse dies. For gay couples, they pay in equally but collect unequally so that Maggie will be eligible for higher benefits than if the system didn't discriminate. I also believe her husband (who is not the father of her first child), a Hindu, is a immigrant. She is allowed to marry a foreigner who can live with her in the US. Gay men and women are not given the same freedom.

The only interesting aspect to the debate came from Nick Herbert and I found myself agreeing more with his comments than with anyone, other than David Boaz, who I only disagree with advisedly, since I respect his opinions highly. Herbert did say a few things that would set conservatives to howling, but that is a good thing. He also said a couple of things libertarians would disagree with and in fact, Nigel Ashford, who is a good guy and a friend, did disagree with Herbert on the issue of hate crimes.

Part of the problem with the hate crime debate in the US is that the Right intentionally confuses hate crime laws with hate speech laws. The two are not the same. Secondly, legal precedents from other nations don't apply here as they have different constitutional systems. Gallagher, of course, equates the two as if these different systems have no impact on how law is interpreted in other nations.

But Herbert raised an interesting reply, and one that has me seriously rethinking my views on hate crime legislation. Herbert noted that hate crimes are not like most crimes in that they are also a way that bigots inflict distress or trauma on a larger group. When a man is attacked for being gay, the attacker wants all gay people to be fearful. His direct assault may be on one individual but a hate attack is meant as a message to all other members of that group. It is, basically, a threat intended to instill fear in the hated group. Certainly if that is the case, and it typically is in hate attacks, then threatening many individuals, though immediately attacking the one, may well deserve a greater penalty. The greater penalty is not one for attacking a person who is gay, but for engaging in an activity that is meant to threaten all gay people.

For a libertarian, the first question is whether a "threat" is plausible and believable. In the case of hate crimes they clearly are since the attacker only faces such penalties after actually carrying out the kind of attack he is threatening.

Nor am I particularly bothered when groups of individuals who are particularly vulnerable are afforded extra legal protection from actual crimes. I would not be bothered if a violent attack on an elderly woman were punished with greater severity than one on a football player. It is not because the football player has few rights than the grandmother but because he is more capable of protecting himself and less vulnerable. Ditto for laws that inflict higher sentences on attacks on children. I would most certainly feel comfortable sentencing a man to a much longer term in prison for bashing an infant than for the same act in a barroom brawl. I can also see why some groups are simply more vulnerable than others. A person may be more vulnerable simply because they are part of a group that a significant number of people hate and that group is simultaneously a small portion of the population.

Herbert brought up antigay bullying in schools and on the sports field. Now, the school aspect I can immediately understand. Government schools should not tolerate bullying—neither should private schools by the way. Bullying should not be permitted in schools. The sports issue had Maggie implying this is a violation of private life. But this would need to be clarified.

Certainly I' ve lived in countries where sports was heavily subsidized by government and sometimes directly, or indirectly, controlled by government. National teams were not private entities at all. The distinction between private and public is more murky and without clarification from Herbert, and knowing more about the state of sports in the UK I simply can't agree or disagree. Unfortunately sports today is substantially a government enterprise. Even in the US sports teams, while privately owned, are heavily subsidized by taxpayers. These teams actively seek state funding. Again, if that is the case, then I don't see a problem with government saying that all taxpayers must be treated with respect at events they are forced to fund. If a team wants to allow verbal harassment of gay people at their events, then should refuse all state funding. Of course they won't do that, they want taxpayer funding too badly.

Enjoy the discussion. Please remember that Sullivan and Gallagher are on you computer screen and that if you smash your fist into the screen it will hurt only you and your pocketbook. Running time is about 80 minutes.

Straight from the horse's mouth: if by horse, you mean ass.

Many of you know that the misnamed American Family Association is a gaggle of fundamentalist Christians, many of whom seem certifiably insane. Of course, I dare not say they are all crazy. Some are just as dumb as a post. Others, of course, may just be malevolent, evil people. Recently the new head of AFA, Rev. Bryan Fischer, addressed why he wants the law to arrest gay people. His comments will be indented and in blue, my reply, will not be indented and in black.

I received a complaint from a listener to my "Focal Point" radio program, complaining that I had suggested that it is appropriate to impose legal sanctions on those who engage in homosexual behavior. Here is my response. The individual's name was not attached to the email, so I wasn't able to address him by name.

I suggest it a good thing the person didn't attach his name. If the AFA crowd ever does get to make the laws, it is clear they will use them widely and in a very authoritarian manner. So anonymity, in the face of potential tyranny, is not necessarily a bad strategy.

Hi!

Thanks for writing me about my comments on my program regarding homosexuality.

It might be worth noting that what I actually suggested is that we impose the same sanctions on those who engage in homosexual behavior as we do on those who engage in intravenous drug abuse, since both pose the same kind of risk of contracting HIV/AIDS. I'd be curious to know what you think should be done with IV drug abusers, because whatever it is, I think the same response should be made to those who engage in homosexual behavior.

There are a lot of bad premises packed into a very small amount of space. Let's try to unpack them rationally, which I know, is not something you prefer to do. Reason and faith don't go together very well. Being that you are out of practice of using reason, allow me to help you.

I would have the same penalty on drug use, IV injected or not, that I would have for being gay. That is, none whatsoever. What people do with their own bodies and lives is their own business. It is not your business, the church's business, and most certainly NOT the state's business. What people put in their bodies is no more concern of the State than what they put in their minds. Good thing too otherwise the irrationality that you preach would be illegal to the core.

Considering how the government has botched the war on drugs so badly it is shocking that you use drug laws as an analogy for criminalizing, and incarcerating, gay people. Imagine the SWAT teams breaking down bedroom doors, guns pulled, the same way they do in the war on drugs. Of course, the drug warriors fuck up all the time and end up murdering people who weren't even drug users. I guess we could expect the same sort of botch-ups when we hand over to the SWAT teams the enforcement of biblical morality.

There is a premise within your premise. You assume that both these activities should be punished by the violent force of government because "both pose the same kind of risk of contracting HIV/AIDS." Actually not. Life is not as simple as simpletons like to pretend.

First, the risk of contracting HIV from IV drug use is NOT due to IV drug use but do to the reuse and sharing of infected needles. It doesn't matter one iota what is in the syringe that is being shared. It is the sharing that is the problem—not the content of the needle. If diabetics were forced to share needles the same risk would be prevalent and only the most ignorant of people would then propose a law banning the use of insulin due to the risk of HIV. I will assume you would be one of them.

Why is it that IV drug users share needles and diabetics don't? Because people like you propose laws to prevent drug use. As part of your prohibitionist mentality the government, your Big Pal, has regulated needles. Of course, prohibition never actually prohibits anything. People still use needles, but people like you have made it harder for them to get clean needles. You are so anxious to save them from themselves that you force them into a death sentence by sharing needles. If anything should be banned here, and I'm not proposing it, then it ought to be people preaching prohibitionism—it really does kill people. And you helped with those laws, so you are responsible. Blood is on your hands but apparently not enough to satisfy you.

There is another premise hidden in this paragraph: that is the idea that Big Government should protect people from themselves. People do bad things, or at least things you assume are bad, and from that you preach that the Almighty State should step in and strip people of freedom because, when people are free, they are sometimes stupid. I agree that free people often do stupid and irrational things, not that I think homosexuality is either. But, your churches wouldn't exist if that weren't the case. I think religion is harmful and you are good proof of that. It is dangerous to freedom, much the same way communism is. Now, if I held your authoritarian premises, which I don't, I would then have to push for arresting you and prohibiting you from preaching Big Brother government and moral authoritarianism.

You also seem to think that homosexuality causes AIDS or increases risks in ways that heterosexuality does not. Of course, I'm sure you are ignorant of the facts because faith and facts just aren't seen together very often. In truth, most AIDS cases worldwide are among heterosexuals. HIV is not homosexually transmitted, it is sexually transmitted. It can be spread more easily by some sexual activities than others, and the sexual acts most likely to spread HIV can be, and are, performed by people of all sexual orientations, not just gay people. Based on your uninformed assumptions you would need to make sex illegal, not just homosexuality. Of course, I'm sure that some of your more frigid congregation would shout a loud hosanna to that idea.

Just as there are some practices that are more likely to spread HIV than others, there are practices that won't spread it at all. I won't titillate you with a discussion of them. But there are sexual practices that one can engage in, from now until eternity, with zero risk of infection. Actually you could have a huge, writhing mass of millions of homosexuals, perpetually engaging in such practices without a single infection. (Heterosexuals as well, mind you.)

In addition, if you were to lock 100 homosexuals in room, all of whom are HIV negative, and allow them to commit "sodomy" for the next 40 years, not only would they be grateful, but all of them would still be HIV negative as well. HIV is a virus, it is sexually spread without regard to sexual orientation. But HIV negative people don't infect other people NO MATTER WHAT THEY DO SEXUALLY.

If you believe that what drug abusers need is to go into an effective detox program, then we should likewise put active homosexuals through an effective reparative therapy program.

Wow, Rev. Fischer, you want mandatory sentences sending homosexuals to places to "detox" them. How about a nice sign outside the camp saying: Arbeit macht frei? What you are saying is that the government should round up millions of gay people and incarcerate them under some forced therapy program that you and your fellow authoritarian religious nutters would concoct for them. I have long said that fundamentalists see gays the way Nazis saw Jews. Your willingness to have "therapy" camps for unwilling gays is evidence of that. It is also evidence of how you people preach massive government expansion and break-the-bank taxes to impose your authoritarianism on others.

There are at least 15 million gay people in the United States. How many "ex-gay" camps would it take to house 15 million people? A camp you might wish to emulate was a little place called Dachau. It was only open for 12 years and during that time it processed 200,000 prisoners. That means that at any one time it had around 15,000 prisoners (and when you put people in detox centers against their will they are prisoners). Now, if you were to try to "detox" all gay people at once, you would need the equivalent of 1,000 Dachaus.

Any idea on how much taxation would be needed to fund this little project of yours? And are you seriously thinking that locking up 15,000 gay men, in barracks together, with nice big group showers, will help discourage homosexuality? No sir. Not at all. You will need separate showers and lots and lots of heterosexual guards to make sure they all stay virtuous. No barracks either. They can't share rooms. Surely you know how the mainly heterosexual inmates in prison are having sex with each other, can you imagine how widespread it would be if you locked up all the gay people together?

Here are some ideas. The average cost per inmate in American prisons is $25,000 each. Of course you can house them in shared rooms and they do have group showers. Can't do that if they are all gay and you are "dehomosexualizing" them. So the cost would be have to be much higher. With 15 million inmates, even at the lower rate of $25,000 each, your cost per year, to maintain your Gay Gulag, would be $375 billion. America is spending about $7 billion per year to build prisons for the current inmate population, which is just over 2 million. Under your Gay Gulag idea the cost would jump seven fold at least, and the gay prisons would cost a lot more (all those extra single rooms and tiny showers). The start-up costs for a Gay Gulag would be billions, before your dehomosexualize your first victim.

Of course, to dehomosexualize unwilling homosexuals you not only have to incarcerate them, for years I suspect, you have to pay for an army of faux therapists who will be handsomely paid along with a few million guards and auxiliary personnel.

Hopefully your employees won't be like the so-called "ex-gay" therapists fundamentalists have promoted in the past. It is pretty messy when they get caught screwing the patients, isn't it? Or how about the big exgay you guys promoted as an example of dehomosexualization, who got photographed hanging out in a gay bar? Wasn't it a bitch that he was on a speaking tour sponsored by your group when he got caught?

All in all, the Gay Gulag is going to be very, very expensive, and it will require tax increases that will make Obama salivate, a system of camps that would turn Stalin green with envy, and would require the obliteration of a little thing called the Bill of Rights. But, it's a small price to pay when you're imposing God's will on people!

Secondly, I'm afraid you're simply wrong about the Bible's perspective on the law and homosexuality.

Paul lists quite explicitly in 1 Timothy 1:8-11 the actions and behaviors that are the proper concern of the law:

"Now we know that the law is good, if one uses it lawfully, understanding this, that the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for murderers, the sexually immoral, men who practice homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine..."

Oh, dear, you don't seem to know that Paul didn't actually write the Pastoral Epistles which are ascribed to him. The evidence is pretty clear that they were written by someone else, not by Paul. And Paul was probably dead for some time when they were written. However, even if Paul had said it: so what! The Bible says a lot of stupid things and we aren't going to impose laws based on those idiocies either.

Please note that by your own admission you will actually need to incarcerate most of the American public. You say that the law should impose penalties on people based on what someone, pretending to be Paul, wrote a couple of thousand years ago—and you dare call the Muslims dangerous for wanting to impose the Quran! But the verse you quote would, according to your logic, require camps to "detox" all "sexually immoral" people, not just gays. That would shut down the U.S Congress (which might be beneficial) but it would also means tens of millions of more inmates in your system of camps, actually hundreds of millions considering what you people think about sex.

The alleged Pauline verse also says that this applies to "whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine." I suppose we will need courts to determine "sound doctrine" from unsound doctrine. And, I know people like you well, I grew up with you guys and went to your schools. So I know that by unsound doctrine you mean, and this is only a partial list: Mormons, Catholics, Jehovah's Witnesses, Christian Scientists, Spiritualists, Scientologists, Quakers, Shakers, Unitarians, Muslims, humanists, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, Taoists, Christadelphians, and hundreds of other sects, cults and churches. Even the mainstream Protestants aren't of "sound doctrine" in the eye of fundamentalists. Once "sound doctrine" is put under federal law there is no limit to who can be incarcerated in your moral America.

So, why not just build a prison wall around the whole country? Oh, never mind, I forgot they were already doing that.

Of course, we have to also look at the destruction your little gulag would cause by ripping productive people out of the marketplace and incarcerating them. You arrest 15 million gays and that means 15 million people stop producing goods and services. Not only are they costing tens of thousands of dollars for each year it takes to dehomosexualize them, but they stopped paying taxes and producing goods and services. So that means even more taxes on the backs of the few people who aren't sinful enough to be incarcerated, which I think might be four people.

The bottom line here is that, biblically, those "who practice homosexuality" should come under the purview of the law just as much as those who take people captive in order to sell them into slavery.

Apparently you can't see the difference between enslaving people (which involves incarcerating people against their will—much as you are advocating) and homosexuality. Enslaving people means violating the rights of others. Incarcerating gay people (or the sexually immoral and others listed in the bogus Pauline quote) is also violating the rights of others. Two people, or even 42 people, voluntarily having sex with one another, violates the rights of NO ONE. Slavery is wrong but for the same reason that your Gay Gulag is wrong—it violates the rights of other people.

You express a belief in the Scriptures, and I trust your confidence in Scripture is not selective. If you believe all Scripture is inspired, then you are compelled to accept that legal sanctions may appropriately be applied to those who engage in homosexual behavior.

I don't know if the poor person who wrote you believes the Bible is inspired. If he does, that's his problem. But I'm glad you have made it clear that you think to believe the Bible requires Big Brother government to make it illegal to be gay. And you have made it clear that you want gays incarcerated to be forcibly dehomosexualized, as if that is possible. You berate the person in question asking him if his "confidence in Scripture is not selective." So, lets get some selective Scripture out of the way. The Bible says: "If a man lies with a male, as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them."

So, Rev. Fischer, is your belief in the Bible selective as well? Or do you really believe that instead of locking up millions of gay people in one vast gulag, which the Bible doesn't suggest, that they should all be executed instead, which the Bible does command.

Let's get realistic here. Of course, the recipient of your little authoritarian epistle is selective in what he believes in the Bible. So are you. One would have to be totally insane to take every word of that book literally. No one does, no one. Even the most fundamentalist of fundamentalists won't take every word of Scripture literally. So they each pick and choose according to their own petty hatreds, prejudices, and ignorance—much as you have done.

Thank you for contacting us, and I hope this response will help you think in a thorough and biblical way about this important social issue.

I have long argued that one's views of God don't tell you anything about any god at all. But they do tell you a lot about the person who is preaching. People use their vision of a god to project a giant version of themselves. God is like a projection screen where we see a bigger image of the projectionist. Your view don't help anyone think through "this important social issue" but it does out you as an authoritarian, someone who believes in massive government intrusion into the lives of people, and who advocates a pervasive system of State control. Hell, compared to AFA and your views, Rev. Fischer, Obama is practically a flaming libertarian.