Reality.

Bravo Amy. Great post.

This isn’t a stepping stone to more open acceptance or a change of heart. The church is just agreeing to a civil rights issue that could in essence effect anyone.

I made the mistake of watching one of the videos of McClurkin earlier today. Holy smokes – talk abt your anti-gay diatribe. It was horrifying. And this is one of Obama’s cohorts.

WHY people didn’t pay more attention to this before is beyond me. Obama put this guy on a national stage, and this is what he is doing on it. Great.

From where I sit, admittedly a straight woman, the Morman position does show movement and I think is indicative of the evolution in thought for some [not all] very conservative institutions. The Mormon Church was not willing to support city laws that would prohibit discrimination against gays in housing and employment.

They don’t feel comfortable with the marriage issue yet, but this is certainly a step in the right direction. I think it’s a positive sign that they were willing to be nudged. And that’s a good thing. How can any religious body deny basic civil rights to any of its members or to any swath of the American public? It flies in the face of what the Christian ethic is suppose to be all about.

As for McClurkin seeing feminine men “everywhere.” Perhaps, he’s looking too hard! Too often, we see those who condemn the most, those so quick to point out evil and “sin,” as being the biggest hypocrits of all.

Obama is either a piss poor judge of character or he’s chosen his inner circle to reflect his own personal point of view.

Either way, it’s not a good sign.

Thanks for the update!

People need to realize in order for everyone to have liberty, you can’t deny liberty to a small group, even if in granting them liberty it goes against your own beliefs and the views of the majority.

What if by some strange twist of fate nature threw humanity a curve ball and some virus made babies being born 90% homosexual and 10% heterosexual? Would now the majority rule when they grew up and make opposite sex civil marriage illegal?

My point is: liberty has a price. And by the way, the Chicken Little’s of America were wrong in their weather forecast: they sky has not fallen in states where marriage equality is the law. And it won’t fall when eventually its the law of the entire land, as equal treatment demands.

I made myself another double cappuccino. That helped steady me!

*Crickets*

By DICK MORRIS & EILEEN MCGANN

Published on TheHill.com on November 6, 2009

As the suicidal Democratic congressmen proceed to rubber-stamp the Obama healthcare reform despite the drubbing their party took in the ’09 elections, the president trotted out the endorsements of the AMA and the AARP to stimulate support. But these — and the other endorsements — his package has received are all bought and paid for.
Here are the deals:

* The American Medical Association (AMA) was facing a 21 percent cut in physicians’ reimbursements under the current law. Obama promised to kill the cut if they backed his bill. The cuts are the fruit of a law requiring annual 5-6 percent reductions in doctor reimbursements for treating Medicare patients. Bravely, each year Congress has rolled the cuts over, suspending them but not repealing them. So each year, the accumulated cuts threaten doctors. By now, they have risen to 21 percent. With this blackmail leverage, Obama compelled the AMA to support his bill…or else!

* The AARP got a financial windfall in return for its support of the healthcare bill. Over the past decade, the AARP has morphed from an advocacy group to an insurance company (through its subsidiary company). It is one of the main suppliers of Medi-gap insurance, a high-cost, privately purchased coverage that picks up where Medicare leaves off. But President Bush-43 passed the Medicare Advantage program, which offered a subsidized, lower-cost alternative to Medi-gap. Under Medicare Advantage, the elderly get all the extra coverage they need plus coordinated, well-managed care, usually by the same physician. So more than 10 million seniors went with Medicare Advantage, cutting into AARP Medi-gap revenues.

Presto! Obama solved their problem. He eliminates subsidies for Medicare Advantage. The elderly will have to pay more for coverage under Medigap, but the AARP — which supposedly represents them — will make more money. (If this galls you, join the American Seniors Association, the alternative group; contact sbarton@americanseniors.org. This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .)

* The drug industry backed ObamaCare and, in return, got a 10-year limit of $80 billion on cuts in prescription drug costs. (A drop in the bucket of their almost $3 trillion projected cost over the next decade.) They also got administration assurances that it will continue to bar lower-cost Canadian drugs from coming into the U.S. All it had to do was put its formidable advertising budget at the disposal of the administration.

* Insurance companies got access to 40 million potential new customers. But when the Senate Finance Committee lowered the fine that would be imposed on those who don’t buy insurance from $3,500 to $1,500, the insurance companies jumped ship and now oppose the bill, albeit for the worst of motives.

The only industry that refused to knuckle under was the medical device makers. They stood for principle and wouldn’t go along with Obama’s blackmail. So the Senate Finance Committee retaliated by imposing a tax on medical devices such as automated wheelchairs, pacemakers, arterial stents, prosthetic limbs, artificial knees and hips and other necessary accoutrements of healthcare.

So these endorsements are not freely given, but bought and paid for by an administration that is intent on passing its program at any cost.