King & Spaulding and Legal Ethics vs. Morality

I've been admitted to practice law in three states for over thirty years and the self-inflicted controversy that has engulfed King & Spaulding after its short lived representation of the House Republicans in defending DOMA underscores to me yet again the fact that much of what is "ethical" under the rules of the legal profession is not what I consider equal to what is morally right. Frankly, I do not handle criminal law matters for the simple reason that in some circumstances I could not represent someone I believed to be guilt - especially in violent crimes such as murder or say rape. Yet it's "ethical" for attorneys to represent such defendants and to endeavor to get them the best deal possible, perhaps even putting the victims on trial in the process. Is it morally right? Then there are gay bashing divorce attorneys who seek to destroy the gay spouse and prejudice the court against the gay litigant so as to get the maximum for their client. Many deem it ethical, but is it moral? In my view, it is not. The same goes for defending a law that has as it only real purpose the stigmatizing and denigration of a group of citizens because they fail to conform to the toxic Christianist version of Christianity. HRC and others have been lambasted for pressuring King & Spaulding to withdraw from defending DOMA. I believe that HRC did the right thing - and often all too critical of HRC as long time readers know. Kerry Eleveld has a post at America Blog Gay that looks at the controversy. Here are some highlights:
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The firm took an immediate hit from most legal observers who viewed dropping the case as tantamount to legal blasphemy. LGBT advocacy groups, ours included, found themselves playing defense after being criticized for blasting the law firm for taking the case. And House Republicans suffered a two-fer: First for the hypocrisy of retaining an outside law firm for $520 an hour (up to $500,000) while they preach fiscal discipline; then enduring the embarrassment of watching that firm breach the contract likely due to the backlash of defending a discriminatory law that many, including President Barack Obama, deem unconstitutional.
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Untangling the rights and wrongs in this situation is impossibly confounding, and reasonable people can and have disagreed to be sure. But let’s start where most legal eagles concur: King & Spalding did not have to accept the case, and DOMA, which is notably a law and not a person, does not have a right to representation.
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And here already, comes a point of divergence. Monroe Freedman, a leading legal ethics scholar and professor at Hofstra Law School, believes that both the firm and Clement came down on the wrong side of morality when they accepted the case.
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Outside of certain criminal proceedings, Freedman says, “There’s absolutely no doubt that a lawyer has complete discretion to take or not to take any particular client. For that reason, it’s my view that, that decision -- whether to take a client -- is the most important point of moral decision making for the lawyer.
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“And therefore, in my view, it was immoral for Clement and for King & Spalding to agree to defend DOMA. That is my personal moral judgment,” Freedman says, adding, “others would disagree. But I feel very strongly that defending DOMA is itself an immoral act.
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However, having agreed to represent their client, Freedman adds, “It was at that point unethical for them to pull out. I’m not talking about immoral – it may have been the moral thing to do – but ethically speaking, it was wrong to embarrass the client that way publicly.” Clement, a former U.S. solicitor general under President George W. Bush, resigned from King & Spalding over his firm’s decision to drop the case.
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I believe it would have been a mistake for advocates to forfeit the opportunity to make known their views about King & Spalding’s representation. Letting the moment pass without objection would have been a missed opportunity to send a political message, and advocates shouldn’t be expected to approach the legal system the way a lawyer would. We quite simply have different interests at stake – theirs is to preserve the sanctity of the legal system, and ours is to advance the cause of freedom for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender Americans.
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[I]t’s particularly problematic for the government to contractually restrict the First Amendment rights of every employee -- from the person working in the mail room all the way to the lead counsel of the case.
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If there’s one truth that can be gleaned from the DOMA fallout this week, it’s that judging the tenor of issues related to the fair and equal treatment of LGBT Americans is a particularly precarious endeavor at the moment. Though no one has established the exact the reasoning behind King & Spalding’s 180, many believe they simply underestimated the backlash of taking the case.
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“There is speculation -- and it’s where I would put my money if I had to -- that they were surprised to find that one or more of their major clients disapproved of them taking on this retainer,” says Freedman, referring to clients such as General Electric and Coke.
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I will always try to error on the side of what is moral versus what is "ethical" in terms of legal ethics. I want to be able to look at myself in the mirror in the morning. For far too many attorneys, in my view, that is never a factor.

Kathleen Parker on Birthers, Buffoonery and a Sad Discourse

Kathleen Parker is one of an ever shrinking pool of thinking conservatives who are dismayed at the GOP's continued mad rush to embrace ignorance and descend to the levels of the lowest common denominator of the party's base - which is VERY low nowadays. In a column in the Washington Post, Parker looks at the so-called birthers and the descent of a party that once thought of itself as represented educated and intelligent Americans now defined by morons and those perhaps best placed in mental institutions. Parker means to insult the GOP for what it has become and for the careless enabling of lunatics by high ups in the party. I continue to believe that without serious change, the GOP is headed toward being a sectarian party peopled by only the most bigoted and/or ignorant elements of the population. Here are column highlights:
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If you really, really dislike Barack Obama, his long-form birth certificate, finally proffered in exasperation, is quite simply a counterfeit.
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If you are a fan of the president — or even a respectful critic — you are relieved finally to have rid the country of the plague of “birtherism,” the rabid belief that Obama wasn’t born in this country and isn’t constitutionally qualified to be president.
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[O]ne can’t help wondering when exactly we lost our minds. What are we to make of these crazed factions that become obsessed with conspiracies, unconvinced by facts? Perhaps most important, what is the rest of the world to think of us? Will even third world countries someday (soon) look at the United States and say, “Oh, well, those Americans, they’re crazy, you know”? (If at this point anyone is offended, please feel free to take full possession of the insult.)
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Unfortunately, the plague is not quite spent or conquered. Since Obama issued his “real” birth certificate, which has more information than the shorter “certificate of live birth,” reactions have run the usual gamut. Meaning that many of those who disbelieved still disbelieve. This is beyond depressing.
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[I]t wasn’t only to end the debate that Obama sent for his certificate. According to the vineyard, it was also to prevent other Republican candidates from looking sane by comparison to Trump.
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In a saner time, Trump would be dismissed as the carnival barker Obama implied he is. People would have recognized Trump as a self-aggrandizing megalomaniac and put a period at the end of the sentence. Not remotely would his name be followed with this phrase: “who is leading other Republican candidates in polls.”
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I honestly don’t know what to make of Trump’s popularity nor of the continuing belief that Obama wasn’t born in the 50th state. Yet even otherwise rational people continue to carry on and react as though facts were irrelevant.*
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Alas, there is no reasoning with the unreasonable, too many of whom these days seem to self-identify as Republicans or conservatives. This is as Democrats would have it, needless to say, but no one is served by our national descent into silliness. Sadly missing on the Republican side is the leveling voice of the grown-up who will say not only that he takes Obama’s word (and the clear evidence), but that the Republican Party won’t tolerate further discussion. Case closed.
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Instead, too many seem satisfied to let the fringe inform the base. We dwell in a time when buffoons are elevated and presidents are compelled to respond to the jester. These circumstances cannot bode well for the republic.

Saturday Male Beauty

Why is Philip Zodhaites Selling Liberty University Data Bases?

Apparently the folks at Liberty University/Liberty Counsel were not happy with this post here on this blog and a similar version cross posted at The Bilerico Project because one Amber S. Haskew, Communications Director at Liberty Counsel, contacted the editors at Bilerico with her panties in a knot. She argued that there were no ties between Liberty Counsel and/or Liberty University and Philip Zodhaites - the far right Christianist who has been alleged to be harboring the fugitive Lisa Miller and her kidnapped daughter at a home he owns in Nicaragua. Zodhaites owns Waynesboro, Virginia based Response Unlimited which describes itself as a purveyor of "mailing lists and creative services for evangelical and conservative mailers." Waynesboro is a hop and a skip from Lynchburg, Virginia, the home of Liberty University. The funny thing is that despite Ms. Haskew's protests, Response Unlimited is peddling lists that can only have been derived from Liberty University. My thanks to the reader who sent me the links. First, there is this one:

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LIBERTY UNIVERSITY STUDENT RESPONDERS List No: 4748
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285,976 Actives...............$115/M
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Liberty University is a Christian academic community in the tradition of Evangelical institutions of higher education. These prospects are young men and women who are focused on a well-rounded, productive future. Age range is 25-45.
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A sample mail piece is required for approval.
SOURCE: Direct Response
ADDRESSING: Cartridge $25/F
E-Mail $75/F
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SELECTIONS:
Age
Gender
Geography
Income
Interest
FTP
$10/M
$10/M
$5/M
$10/M
$10/M
$75/F
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MAINTENANCE: Updates 2-3 times per year.
MINIMUM: 5,000
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This list is not a managed property of Response Unlimited, Contact for details
Response Unlimited
Phone: (540) 943-6721
Fax: (540) 943-0841
Email Us
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I cannot image who could have provided this list to Zodhaites' company, can you? And then there is this one:
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JERRY FALWELL BIBLICAL STUDIES BUYERS
Usage is available for this list Here List No: 1697
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
38,321 Former Buyers ..........$80/M
24,969 Expires.................$65/M
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Buyers of a Bible Study course offered on VHS cassette tapes produced by "The Institute of Biblical Studies," a Jerry Falwell organization. These dedicated Christians have paid at least $155.00 for the convenience to study the bible at home on videocassette. Some parents also use this course as an aid to help teach their children.The course offers a personalized "Graduate of Biblical Studies" certificate upon completion, along with a invitation to go to Liberty University for a graduation ceremony in cap and gown.
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The list owner reserves the right to exchange.
A sample mailpiece required for approval.
Cancellation Charges: $50.00 Flat Fee, $10/M Running Charges, Select Charges, and the Tape/Shipping or E-mail Fee.
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Net Name Policy: Computer Verification Required
25,000-99,999 80% Min. + $10/M R/C
100,000-299,999 65% Min. + $10/M R/C
300,000 or more 50% Min. + $10/M R/C
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SOURCE: Direct Mail & Television
AVG UNIT SALE: $155.00+
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ADDRESSING: Cartridge $50/F
CD-ROM $75/F
FTP $75/F
E-Mail $50/F
Mag Tape $50/F
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SELECTIONS: State/SCF, ZipGender
$3/M
$5/M
$5/M
*
MAINTENANCE:
Updated & Cleaned Fall 2003 - no longer updating
MINIMUM: 5,000
*
This list is not a managed property of Response Unlimited, Contact for details
Response Unlimited
Phone: (540) 943-6721
Fax: (540) 943-0841
Email Us

More Friday Male Beauty

Virginia AG Ken Cuccinelli Fires King & Spalding

You can always depend on Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli - or Kookinelli as he is less than affectionately referred to by Virginian's embarrassed by Cuccinelli's lunacy and ongoing generation of negative press for the state - to do two things: (1) take action and make moves to get his name in the press and (2) bash and denigrate LGBT citizens whenever possible. Keeping with his past conduct, Kookinelli utilized the foolish missteps of Atlanta based law firm King & Spaulding and defense of DOMA to get his name in the press and send yet another message that LGBT citizens are not welcome and certainly will not be afforded civil law equality on his watch as Virginia Attorney General. I'm sure Kookinelli's stunt played well with the coven of Christianists at The Family Foundation - Daddy Dobson's Virginia affiliate - even though rational and sentient Virginians are shaking their heads in dismay. Kookinelli talks about Virginia needing firms that are committed, yet its Kookinelli in my opinion that needs to be committed - to a mental institution. Both the Huffington Post and the Washington Examiner have highlights on Kookinelli's latest batshitery. First this from Huffington Post:
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Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R) is terminating his office's relationship with law firm King & Spalding after the firm decided to drop its defense of the controversial Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) last week.
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"King & Spalding's willingness to drop a client, the U.S. House of Representatives, in connection with the lawsuit challenging the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) was such an obsequious act of weakness that I feel compelled to end your legal association with Virginia so that there is no chance that one of my legal clients will be put in the embarrassing and difficult situation like the client you walked away from, the House of Representatives," Cuccinelli wrote to firm partner Joseph Lynch in a letter obtained by the Washington Examiner.
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According to the letter, Cuccinelli said: "Virginia does not shy away from hiring outside counsel because they may have ongoing professional relationships with people or entities, or on behalf of causes that I, or my office, or Virginia as a whole may not support. But it is crucial for us to be able to trust and rely on the fact that our outside counsel will not desert Virginia due to pressure by an outside group or groups."
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"Virginia seeks firms of committment, [sic] courage, strength and toughness, and unfortunately, what the world has learned of King & Spalding, is that your firm utterly lacks such qualities," he added, according to the Washington Examiner. He also said that the firm would not be able to reapply for special counsel status for the state of Virginia as long as he was attorney general.
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The Washington Examiner adds these following highlights:
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A copy of the letter was made available to The Washington Examiner. A request from the newspaper for a response has been emailed to [Joseph] Lynch [at King & Spaulding].
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As Attorney General, Cuccinelli represents Virginia state agencies in court in the same attorney- client relationship as a private individual who retains a lawyer to represent him in a legal case.
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The firm had been retained by the Virginia AG's office Sept. 15, 2009. Cuccinelli said the firm was being terminated "effective immediately."
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It is noteworthy that the AG's office has only utilized King & Spaulding since 2009 and - having bid on AG office RFP's in the past myself while in a former law firm - most legal work goes to Richmond, Virginia based mega firms that perennially under bid other firms to keep their strangle hold on the state's legal business.

Friday Male Beauty

70 Belgian Sex Abuse Victims to Sue Vatican

Meanwhile, the Vatican for decades - if not centuries - provided a different type of leadership that did not wait for others to act. When it came to protecting sexual predators among the Catholic clergy, it increasingly appears that the Vatican was fully aware of the problem and that the sole concern was to silence victims and their families and to transfer serial molesters on to new venues where their transgressions were past unknown. Only when a predator's actions were so pervasive or word got out to the media was action belatedly taken. Criminal conspiracy and obstruction of justice are apt terms for the Vatican's handling of the world wide sexual abuse problem. Now, as the New York Times is reporting, 70 victims from Belgium plan on suing the Vatican for its malfeasance. Here are story highlights:

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BRUSSELS (AP) - A group of 70 people claiming to be sexual abuse victims of clergy will take Vatican and Belgian church officials to court, claiming they offered them insufficient protection from pedophile priests.
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Lawyer Walter Van Steenbrugge said Friday he will lodge the complaint in about two weeks. He said religious officials, including the pope, had failed to take proper action to prevent such abuse.
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The Belgian church got involved in a major abuse scandal last year when Bruges Bishop Roger Vangheluwe was forced to resign after he admitted he abused for 13 years his young nephew. Later, hundreds of victims came forward with tales of abuse by clergy going back decades.

Obama: Leading from Behind

As I have lamented many times on this blog, those of us who fell for Barack Obama's campaign mantra for "change" and who thought we were electing a leader have been disappointed time and time again. Obama is not a leader and instead is a follower. Domestically, he dithers and waits for Congressional Democrats to fill the leadership void - a scary concept in itself - or, on occasion acts only when the uproar on a particular issue reaches a crescendo. In a column today in the Washington Post, Charles Krauthammer complains that Obama is playing a similar "leading from behind" non-leadership role in international affairs as well. I frequently view Krauthammer as a jerk, but he does have a point on our non-leader president even if the examples cited in the analysis are flawed. I suspect that many Americans are tired of the refusal of Obama to lead instead of follow. Here are some column highlights:
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To be precise, leading from behind is a style, not a doctrine. Doctrines involve ideas, but since there are no discernible ones that make sense of Obama foreign policy — Lizza’s painstaking two-year chronicle shows it to be as ad hoc, erratic and confused as it appears — this will have to do.
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And it surely is an accurate description, from President Obama’s shocking passivity during Iran’s 2009 Green Revolution to his dithering on Libya, acting at the very last moment, then handing off to a bickering coalition, yielding the current bloody stalemate. It’s been a foreign policy of hesitation, delay and indecision, marked by plaintive appeals to the (fictional) “international community” to do what only America can.
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But underlying that style, assures this Obama adviser, there really are ideas. Indeed, “two unspoken beliefs,” explains Lizza. “That the relative power of the U.S. is declining, as rivals like China rise, and that the U.S. is reviled in many parts of the world.” Amazing. This is why Obama is deliberately diminishing American presence, standing and leadership in the world?
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It is the fate of any assertive superpower to be envied, denounced and blamed for everything under the sun. Nothing has changed. Moreover, for a country so deeply reviled, why during the massive unrest in Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, Yemen, Jordan and Syria have anti-American demonstrations been such a rarity?
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Other presidents have taken anti-Americanism as a given, rather than evidence of American malignancy, believing — as do most Americans — in the rightness of our cause and the nobility of our intentions. Obama thinks anti-Americanism is a verdict on America’s fitness for leadership. I would suggest that “leading from behind” is a verdict on Obama’s fitness for leadership. Leading from behind is not leading. It is abdicating. It is also an oxymoron.

Thursday Male Beauty

Birthers Still Question Obama's Place of Birth

As noted before on this blog, to be a member of the GOP today - especially the Tea Party branch of the party - one needs to be either insane, have had a lobotomy or have an IQ of the trainable retarded. Objective facts and modern knowledge are irrelevant to those who doggedly cling to ignorance, bigotry and prejudice. One would think that Obama's release of a long form copy of his Hawaiian birth certificate would have ended the birther debate. But not so. Birtherism is alive and well and springs in my view from the less than subtle racism that is now an ingrained part of the mindset of the GOP base. These folks cannot tolerate that the nation is moving on and that a minority can be president, that gays might deserve equality under the law, and that American exceptionalism is a myth that was never fully founded in fact. The Washington Post looks at the continued lunacy of the far right. Here are some highlights:

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It proves nothing. It could be fake. It’s all so fishy. Aren’t there multiple layers on the scanned document released by the White House? Why did it take so long to produce? The people who do not believe that President Obama was born in the United States showed Wednesday that a good conspiracy theory is like a coal mine fire: something that can’t be doused in a day.
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The president, pestered by “birthers” since he began running for the White House, finally felt compelled to try to put an end to the controversy, providing his original birth certificate for the first time.
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“Yes, in fact, I was born in Hawaii, August 4, 1961, in Kapiolani Hospital,” Obama told the White House press corps, before going on to demand an end to the “silliness” about his birthplace that he fears has distracted the country from urgent policy matters involving wars, the federal debt and the economy.
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The birthers, far from chastised, found themselves newly energized and freshly suspicious. “It raises far more questions than it answers,” said Joseph Farah, editor in chief of WorldNetDaily and birther extraordinaire, almost breathless between media interviews.
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But it is the nature of a conspiracy theory that all information must pass through a very discerning, yet simple, filter. Information that is confirmational is accepted; that which is contradictory is rejected.
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Conspiracy theories have the self-sustaining gift of ramification: They sprout new tendrils, like a mad vine that has invaded from another continent. For the committed conspiracy theorist, there is always another angle to explore, another anomaly to scrutinize.
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At one hotbed of birtherism, the certificate appeased no one. “You know as well as I do that you can produce a fraudulent form,” said Sharon Guthrie, legislative director for Texas state Rep. Leo Berman (R), who has introduced a bill that would require that anyone running in Texas for president provide an original birth certificate proving American citizenship.
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The Rev. Jesse Jackson said Wednesday night that the birthers use “coded and covert rhetoric to stir up racial fears,” as part of a broader attempt to delegitimize Obama and push back against civil rights and equal rights. “It’s a code word: ‘He’s not one of us,’ ” Jackson said, giving his view of the birther mind-set. “ ‘He wasn’t born here. He’s not a Christian. He’s a Muslim, we don’t worship the same god.’ It’s a very coded designation to try undermine his legitimacy.” Jackson added, “ ‘Birther’ is a kind label for a much deeper and toxic movement.”
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It’s easier psychologically to come up with a rationalization than it is to admit that you were wrong,” said Ronald Lindsay, president of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, in Amherst, N.Y., publisher of the myth-debunking magazine The Skeptical Inquirer.
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“If you have a pre-commitment to a certain point of view, and that point of view is important for your identity — if you are emotionally attached to it — your emotion is going to shape your reasoning process. You’ll be presented with facts, but you’ll find some way to minimize the significance of those fact,” Lindsay said.
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If the USA is in decline - and I would argue that it is - it is in large part because of the far right and its open embrace of ignorance, prejudice and a dumbing down of education so that Christianist beliefs are not challenged by modern science and knowledge which make it clear that Bible inerrancy is a lie.

ABC News: Christian Network Involved in Lisa Miller Kidnapping

As more details emerge, it is increasingly obvious that Lisa Miller's flight from the USA in defiance of court orders was orchestrated and facilitated by a network of far right Christians, many with ties to Lynchburg, Virginia or nearby Waynesboro. Matt Staver and the folks at Liberty University continue to claim total ignorance of the plot, yet it looks more and more far fetched to believe the denials. ABC News looks at the story and finds an interconnecting web swirling around Liberty University which as reported earlier in the month received nearly a half billion dollars in federal funding via student loans. As Salon noted:

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Liberty University, the evangelical private Christian school founded by dead apartheid-supporting bigot Jerry Falwell, received $445 million in federal financial aid last year.
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That massive sum was thanks to the growth of Liberty's online program, which enrolled 52,000 students last year. The school is the No. 1 recipient of Pell grant money in the state of Virginia. While it may seem like the federal government is basically subsidizing this formerly financially challenged ultra-conservative religious private school, LU's executive director of financial aid sees it differently: For Ritz — a financial aid veteran who got his start at a small Bible college — Liberty’s use of federal financial aid does not run counter to the university’s conservative values. Liberty does not receive the federal money directly, Ritz said, but through students, who use it to pay for tuition, room and board and other expenses.

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“These funds are authorized by Congress and Congress is elected by voters. . . I’ve always been in the position where I believe I’m a steward of those federal funds. I’m a steward of tax-payer money.”
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And I'm sure ACORN, Planned Parenthood and NPR feel the same way. Liberty University -- where the biology department teaches Young Earth Creationism -- is, astoundingly, an accredited school of higher learning.
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But back to the Lisa Miller saga. While Matt Staver is feigning ignorance, it turns out Miller as on the pay roll of Lynchburg Christian Academy, an affiliate of Thomas Road Baptist Church of which Jonathan Falwell is the senior pastor. Falwell conveniently also serves as the executive vice president of Spiritual Affairs at Liberty University and over sees that institution's School of Religion and Liberty Theological Seminary. Seems pretty interconnected to me - and unlikely that Falwell wasn't aware of Miller being subsidized by his entities. ABC News reports in part as follows:
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Timothy Miller [the only individual arrested so far] appeared to work in conjunction with several groups. The plane tickets were purchased through Golden Rule Travel, a group focusing on "international adoption, humanitarian and missionary travel," according to court documents. When reached by phone, the manager of the Kansas office said that confidentiality rules prohibit them from disclosing whether they sold the tickets or not.
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Timothy Miller was a pastor for the Christian Aid Ministries (CAM) in Nicaragua, and in an email he wrote in March 2010 he fretted, "Another big thing right now is CAM higher ups say she may not even go to CAM any more for the protection of the organization." Christian Aid Ministries would not comment on the investigation.
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Bank records cited in the court documents state that Lisa Miller "received multiple payroll checks from the Lynchburg Christian Academy Payroll Account." Miller received the checks while she was teaching at the school between the fall of 2008 and the spring of 2009, said Mathew Staver, the founder and chairman of Liberty Counsel. Lynchburg Christian Academy, renamed Liberty Christian Academy, is linked to Liberty University and was founded by Jerry Falwell.
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In addition, Philip Zodhiates, the owner of a company specializing in source lists for Christian telemarketers and retailers, has a home in Nicaragua, according to court documents. Investigators allege that Lisa Miller and Isabella are staying at the home.
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Zodhiates' daughter, Victoria Hyden, works at Liberty University and investigators allege that her father asked her to disseminate a request for supplies to be sent to Lisa Miller and her daughter.

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Despite all of these interconnections, Staver says neither he, Liberty University or Liberty Counsel had any involvement in Miller's flight in defiance of court orders. Bob Felton at Civil Commotion sums up the situation well:

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If the Justice Department has the guts to do a thorough investigation with an election looming, I think we’re going to find that Lisa Miller’s whereabouts was an open secret in Lynchburg, Virginia. It is simply not believable that so many of the people implicated could be swarming around the same teensy anthill without knowledge of each others’ activities.

More Wednesday Male Beauty

One in Five Americans Raiding Retirement Funds Early

As the GOP seeks to perpetuate tax breaks for the extremely wealthy and totally dismantle the social safety net for everyone else, a new report indicates that nearly one-fifth of full-time employed Americans have raided retirement accounts in the past year to cover financial emergencies. I know I had to take that step when I was forced from a law firm for being gay only to find myself penalized by the IRS and having it held against me in my divorce - even though it's what kept our home from heading towards foreclosure (the rest of my retirement was stripped from me by an anti-gay black judge who stated that sexual orientation was a choice). I suspect most Americans who have had to take this action were faced with either huge medical costs not covered by insurance or faced with job loss and plummeting income. The obvious question becomes WTF are people doing when they fall for the GOP lies and demagoguery? Here are some highlights from Bankrate.com:

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19 percent of Americans -- including 17 percent of full-time workers -- have been compelled to take money from their retirement savings in the last year to cover urgent financial needs, the Financial Security Index found.
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The potential consequences of tapping retirement funds include early withdrawal fees, taxes and the loss of compound earnings -- not to mention the prospect of being unable to retire.
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While workers might be able to replenish the funds pilfered from tax-advantaged accounts once they regain their financial footing, one of the main benefits of long-term savings is time and compound interest. An early withdrawal of $10,000 is not just $10,000. It's actually $10,000 plus whatever that money would have earned over the lifetime of the account. Furthermore, with penalties and taxes an early $10,000 withdrawal may only yield $6,500 if you're in a 25 percent tax bracket.
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While it's fortunate that people do have the retirement savings to fall back on when they absolutely have no alternatives, they may be just delaying the day when they truly have no more resources and working is no longer be an option.
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"That's the scary thing. People are turning to this as a last resort; they have exhausted their other resources. At that point there is very little in the way of alternatives," says Greg McBride, CFA, senior financial analyst at Bankrate.com.
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"Consumers are pessimistic on all five components of financial security. When you look at gasoline prices closing in on $4 a gallon and other events taking place around the globe, it can be unsettling."
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It's a sad commentary on where this country is headed and, if the GOP is successful, suggest that many more Americans will find themselves living in poverty in the elder years. Once again, the party of alleged Christian values is showing its utter disdain for the central Gospel message of love and care for one's neighbor.

Federal Judge Invites Unvarnished Bigotry Into Prop * Case

UPDATED: Check out this Wikipedia article that reflects that Judge Ware has some considerable dirty linen of his own.
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People wonder at times why LGBT individuals - particularly teens - finally surrender to suicidal impulses as the only means to escape the daily assaults on ones dignity and humanity. Well, Judge James Ware (pictured at left), who succeeded Vaughn Walker as the Chief Judge of the U.S, District Court for the Northern District of California, today underscored precisely why some of us just take our own lives and say "no more." While no one would dare alleging in federal court that one's race, religion, ancestry or heterosexual marriage status would render one incapable of performing one's judicial duties, with LGBT individuals we are ALWAYS treated to a different and discriminatory standard. Rather than dismiss the latest ploy of the Prop 8 proponents out of hand, Judge Ware is apparently buying directly into their religious based bigotry and efforts to incessantly stigmatize LGBT Americans. What adds insult to injury, Ware is African American and ought to be opposed to buying into bigotry. Frankly, it makes me sick. and I hope that Ware is challenged on some of his own rulings because of his race. Here are highlights from Fire Dog Lake, one of many media outlets looking at Ware's apparent surrender to bigotry.
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Judge James Ware, . . . . Chief Judge of the U.S, District Court for the Northern District of California, has called for briefs and scheduled a hearing on the motion by Prop 8 Defendant-Intervenors to vacate Judge Walker’s ruling on the grounds that he is 1) a homosexual and 2) in a long-term relationship and therefore 3) his ruling that invalidated Proposition 8 could directly benefit himself.
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Now, for a moment, simply imagine a federal judge entertaining a motion from a defendant that an African-American judge couldn’t impartially decide a school desegregation case because he lives in the affected district. Imagine a federal judge entertaining a motion to disqualify a colleague from a case about the legality of selling birth control devices because the judge lived in the affected jurisdiction and is married to a fertile woman. Imagine a judge being asked to vacate the judgment of another judge who ruled on that state’s process for about distributing and evaluating marital assets because that judge happened to be in the midst of a divorce from her husband.
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This is rank bigotry on the part of Judge Ware, and can only be justified by the federal court system’s consideration of gay people as second-class citizens. It is shameless prejudice. No heterosexual judge would be held to any similar standard regarding her own long-term, committed relationship. No plaintiff would dare question the bona fides of a straight judge. Gays are second-class in federal court and in America; Judge James Ware just proved the entire point of Perry.
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And no chief judge would consider such a motion about a heterosexual judge, nor would he grant a hearing and request briefs on the topic. It is absurd on its face and should be rejected by the federal court system. Judge Ware should be sanctioned for allowing such rank bigotry a place in his courtroom.
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He should certainly remove himself from any further deliberations regarding the Perry case, as he’s shown himself to hold bigotry in high enough esteem to hear its arguments about a colleague. It’s shameful and it shouldn’t be tolerated.
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I cannot help but wonder how Ware would receive a motion filed by religious bigots who believe the Bible justifies the separation of the races who are unhappy with the ruling of a black judge. Would he schedule a hearing and request briefs? Somehow I think not. There truly is no difference between that situation and the Christianist attack on Judge Walker. Once again I find myself longing for a day when Christianity - at least as practiced by the Christianists - is a dead religion..

Doth Matt Staver Protest Too Much?

Speculation continues as to swirl what role the folks at Liberty University and/or Liberty Counsel played in aiding Lisa Miller in her kidnapping of and flight from the USA with her daughter Isabella - actions that resulted in warrants for Miller's arrest. Given that one likely accomplice was Matt Staver's secretary at Liberty Law School and given the extremism of some of Staver's past remarks, is Staver now protesting a bit too much that he/Liberty had no involvement? One can only hope that the FBI continues to investigate and, if personnel at Liberty University or Liberty Counsel were involved that indictments and arrests will follow. Lynchburg, Virginia based Liberty Counsel is an ongoing pestilence and embarrassment to reputable members of the legal community and rational residents of Virginia. I will admit, I'd love to see the organization found to have been implicated in violation of federal court orders. Here are highlights of Staver's denials via WDBJ 7:
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Before she disappeared, Miller lived in Bedford County and was getting legal help from Liberty Counsel. Some have suggested that organization was involved with hiding Miller, but that's a charge attorneys flatly deny. "It's absurd to try to suggest Liberty Counsel had anything to do with the whereabouts or the disappearance of Lisa Miller," Mathew Staver, Dean of Liberty University's School of Law and Chairman of Liberty Counsel.
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Staver served as Miller's attorney through 2009. During that period, Miller was living in Forest and attending services at Thomas Road Baptist Church. Staver says Miller was looking for a job and gave no indication she was planning to leave the Lynchburg area when she abruptly ended all contact with Liberty Counsel. "She simply stopped communicating by phone, by e-mail, by letter," said Staver. "We have no idea where she went." Staver says Miller's actions forced Liberty Counsel to drop her case.
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According to published reports, the FBI now believes Miller took her child from Lynchburg to El Salvador and later to Nicaragua. Investigators say Miller was trying to avoid giving custody of her daughter to her former lesbian partner, Janet Jenkins.
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[S]ome believe Liberty had another motive and took part in hiding Miller - a claim Staver says is 100-percent false. "None of us would be stupid enough to place our careers and our futures and our law licenses on the table to try to help someone violate the law," said Staver.
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News 7 talked by phone Monday afternoon with Janet Jenkins' attorney, Sarah Starr. Jenkins has done interviews in the past where she accused Liberty and Thomas Road Baptist Church of hiding her daughter. Starr wouldn't comment on that accusation, but said Jenkins is hopeful her child will be found soon.

Wednesday Male Beauty

Reminder - Dining Out For Life Is Tomorrow

Just a reminder that the boyfriend (Barry) and I will be ambassadors again this year for ACCESS AIDS Care's Dining Out for Life effort. We will be hosting at Brent's in downtown Hampton on East Queens Way starting at 6:00 P.M. I sincerely hope that readers on the Peninsula will join us. We always have a wonderful time. Brent's will be donating 25% of the evening proceeds to ACCESS AIDS Care and offers amazing food (made from scratch with Japanese, Cajun, French, Italian and Low Country influences), a great atmosphere and past years' the event has been a lot of fun as well.
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If you cannot join us at Brent's, then check out one of the other 65+ participating restaurants in the area. For those not familiar with ACCESS AIDS Care, here's some information:
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ACCESS AIDS Care provides programs and services to individuals and families impacted by HIV/AIDS in Hampton Roads. The mission of ACCESS AIDS Care is to promote the dignity and wellness of adults, families, youth and children affected by HIV/AIDS through quality support and prevention services so they may live healthy lives. The services that are provided can be found here.

Bob "Taliban Bob" McDonnell Now Says He Supports Single Gays Adopting

I don't know if it's yet another case of Virginia Governor Bob "Taliban Bob" McDonnell talking out of his mouth or it's a case of posturing so as to not look as extreme as McDonnell longs of being on a national GOP ticket, but for McDonnell to say he supports single gays being able to adopt, but not same sex couples because they aren't married is the height of hypocrisy. McDonnell and his Christianist supporters worked tirelessly to make sure that the committed relationships of same sex couples in Virginia receive ZERO legal recognition. Indeed, in Virginia my ownership of my Chihuahua receives more legal recognition than my relationship with my partner. Like the typical Christianist, McDonnell blames the victims of his own handiwork and sets up the GOP created legal disabilities of gays as justification for continued unequal treatment. Meanwhile, I suspect McDonnell's statement will bring down the fury of the gay hating Christofascists at The Family Foundation. Here are highlights from the Richmond Times-Dispatch:
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Gov. Bob McDonnell said Tuesday that he supports allowing single gay people to adopt, but he continued his opposition to expanding the adoptive-parent pool to unmarried couples. In Virginia, single people can adopt, regardless of their sexual orientation, and married couples can adopt. Unmarried couples cannot adopt.
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Asked Tuesday on WTOP radio if he believes a person's sexual orientation makes the person a bad parent, McDonnell, a social conservative, said no. He said that's not the law anyway, which allows a single person — gay or straight — to adopt. He said he supports the existing rules.
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"But there are factors that go into that," he said. "Social services has to look at the home, they do a home study and they do other things to determine what other factors in the lifestyle might be a factor. But I believe and this has been true … throughout American history, is that a two-parent, loving family of a mom and a dad is still really the best way to raise a child."
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McDonnell also said he would not sign a bill similar to what the Arizona legislature passed that would require presidential candidates to prove they are American citizens, born in the United States, in order to be put on the state ballot. Arizona's governor blocked the measure. "I think this is a side issue," McDonnell said. "The president's a citizen. He's an American." He said the problem with the president is his policies, not where he was born.

Retired Bishop: Sex With Boys Doesn't Count as Sex

Having been raised Roman Catholic, I am all too aware of the Catholic Church's bizarre hang ups on all matters sexual and the manner in which - despite outward worship of the Virgin Mary - women are viewed by the all male hierarchy as evil temptresses just waiting to drag males to perdition. It's a mind set that is beyond f*cked up. It took me years of therapy to get over the psychological abuse I received at the hands of the Church. And sadly, in many areas the Church is continuing to inflict severe psycho-sexual damage on children and youth even as predatory priests feel free to sexually abuse boys. Why do they have this sick mindset that the rape of boys and teens is okay? Because, according to a now retired Australian Bishop, to many priests sex with boys doesn't count as sexual sin because it's not with women - you know, those agents of the Devil. Daily India has coverage on this beyond sick situation. Here are highlights:
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A retired Catholic bishop in Australia has claimed that some priests do not view the molestation of boys as a breach of their celibacy vows.
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Geoffrey Robinson, the former auxiliary bishop of Sydney, blames the absence of women from church life as a catalyst for the sexual abuse crisis enveloping the faith. According to the Australian Women's Weekly, Robinson said boys suffered more than girls at the hands of paedophile priests partly because they were more available to them, with nuns tending to play a greater role in the religious education of young girls.
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There was also a view among some offenders with whom he had worked that a priest's celibacy vows weren't broken if a boy was involved. "We've met it often enough to see it as a factor. That's what the vow of celibacy refers to, being married. If it's not an adult woman, then somehow they're not breaking their vow," Adelaide Now quoted him as telling the magazine.
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Three years ago, Robinson broke 50 years of silence about his own abuse at the hands of a stranger, who he said wasn't a family member or a priest. It goes some way to explain his work with abuse victims and his commitment to change within the church.
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He says getting women more involved in church life is a crucial step forward. "If the feminine had been given greater importance and a much larger voice, the church would not have seen anything like the same level of abuse and would most certainly have responded far better," he said.
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He believes the issue will not be properly dealt with until the church holds a council, or a conference of all the bishops in the church, to revise the centuries-old doctrine on celibacy, women and sexuality.
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I've now come to believe that raising children as conservative Catholics is indeed a form of child abuse. Many of us did not realize it in the past, but with all that has come out - and continues to come out - about the damage the Church's sick obsession works on one's psyche, it's time to call such an upbringing for what it is. The same likely applies to raising children as strict Mormons or Southern Baptists where being human and a sexual being is seemingly considered among the worse sins.

More Tuesday Male Beauty

Prop 8 Supporters Getting Slimy and Desperate

Earlier I wrote about the sleazy and despicable effort of Proposition 8 supporters to have the District Court ruling in Perry v. Schwarzenegger thrown out because Judge Walker has confirmed that he is gay. I also commented on the very dangerous precedent such an action would have in terms of barring many judges from hearing cases where disgruntled litigants would then be open to direct personal attacks on the judge and try to show bias or some conflict of interest. Fortunately, many legal scholars are attacking the Prop. 8 defenders and their slimy legal counsel. One column in the Washington Post by Adam Serwer does a good job at looking at the dangerous direction such charges might lead to for the courts if such homophobic attacks were allowed to succeed. Here are highlights:
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Supporters of Prop 8 were dealt a blow last year when Judge Vaughn Walker ruled that there is no empirical basis for the notion that same-sex marriages harm heterosexual marriages and therefore no compelling interest in preventing gays and lesbians from getting married.
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Yesterday, same-sex marriage opponents filed a motion to have Walker’s ruling vacated, on the grounds that his being gay and in a long-term relationship amounts to a conflict of interest that should have forced him to recuse himself: Given that Chief Judge Walker was in a committed, long-term, same-sex relationship throughout this case (and for many years before the case commenced), it is clear that his “impartiality might reasonably [have been] questioned” from the outset.
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This argument is too clever by half, and relies on the same faulty argument put forth originally in defense of Prop 8: The qualitative judgment that same-sex relationships are inferior. Opponents of same-sex marriage are arguing, in effect, that because Walker was in a long term same-sex relationship, he stood to benefit personally from Prop 8 being overturned.
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The problem is that this same logic could be applied to a straight, married judge hearing the case. After all, supporters of the same-sex marriage ban are arguing that marriage equality is so damaging to the institution of marriage that the government has a vital interest in making sure gays and lesbians can’t get married. That means that a straight, married judge couldn’t be expected to be impartial, either . . . Therefore, a heterosexual, married judge could be seen as having just as much “skin in the game” as Judge Walker.
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The notion that Walker’s ruling should be vacated is build on the flimsy assumption that gays and lesbians are different from heterosexuals in a manner that justifies denying them their fundamental rights. It’s also built on an unstated but core conservative view of the courts — that judicial “impartiality” is best defined as viewing the law through the cultural prism of a heterosexual, conservative white Christian judge. That’s partly why the impartiality Justice Sonya Sotomayor was viewed as suspect from the outset.
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The real problem faced by Prop 8 supporters real problem is that their case is profoundly weak, and relies almost entirely on archaic and rapidly eroding social prejudices against homosexuality.
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Conversely, Prop 8 opponents were able to demonstrate, in vivid detail, precisely how they were personally hurt by California’s decision to deny gays and lesbians their fundamental rights.
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Now Prop 8 supporters are reduced to arguing, essentially, that Walker’s ruling should be vacated because he is gay. Aside from the faulty legal reasoning, supporters of the law aren’t doing themselves any favors when it comes to convincing anyone that their position on marriage amounts to anything other than prejudice.

GOP House Members Face Voter Anger OverRyan Budget

One would think that they would have asked themselves how others outside the Kool-Aid drinking Tea Party crowd would react to the Ryan budget plan passed by House Republicans, but apparently the yes voting dunces failed to think that far. Now, as evidenced by some town hall meetings such as one in central Florida, the anger and outrage is palpable and those who voted to gut many social programs and to end Medicare as we know it may now be asking themselves WTF have we done? Personally, I find their predicament hysterically funny and proof that one needs to stop listening to nut cases and sycophants in reaching decisions that will adversely impact millions of citizens. Hopefully, in time voting for Christianist anti-gay measures will start prompting similar self-question by GOP knuckle draggers. Here are some highlights from the New York Times on the GOP's self-inflicted injuries:
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In central Florida, a Congressional town meeting erupted into near chaos on Tuesday as attendees accused a Republican lawmaker of trying to dismantle Medicare while providing tax cuts to corporations and affluent Americans.
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At roughly the same time in Wisconsin, Representative Paul D. Ryan, the architect of the Republican budget proposal, faced a packed town meeting, occasional boos and a skeptical audience as he tried to lay out his party’s rationale for overhauling the health insurance program for retirees.
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In Fort Lauderdale on Tuesday evening, at a meeting with constituents, Representative Allen B. West was met with jeers about his 2010 campaign. . . . . After 10 days of trying to sell constituents on their plan to overhaul Medicare, House Republicans in multiple districts appear to be increasingly on the defensive, facing worried and angry questions from voters and a barrage of new attacks from Democrats and their allies.
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The proposed new approach to Medicare — a centerpiece of a budget that Republican leaders have hailed as a courageous effort to address the nation’s long-term fiscal problems — has been a constant topic at town-hall-style sessions and other public gatherings during a two-week Congressional recess that provided the first chance for lawmakers to gauge reaction to the plan.
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Representative Daniel Webster, a freshman Republican from Florida, faced an unruly crowd at a packed town meeting in Orlando, where some attendees, apparently organized or encouraged by liberal groups, brandished signs like “Hands Off Medicare” and demanded that he instead “tax the rich.”
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Under the Republican budget proposal, Medicare would be converted into a program that would subsidize health coverage for retirees rather than have Medicare provide coverage directly, a change that many Democrats say would risk leaving the elderly with inadequate health care as costs rise over the long run. The Republican budget would also transform Medicaid, which pays for nursing homes for low-income residents, into a grant program to states, raising the possibility that states, under budget pressure, would cut back on coverage.
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Democrats and other interest groups are mobilizing a campaign that includes automated phone calls, radio and television advertisements and protests to keep the pressure on Republicans before they return to Washington next week. “We have been working with a lot of groups to channel the anger,” said Lauren Weiner, a spokeswoman for Americans United for Change, a liberal group.
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Trying to stoke that sentiment, that group was running automated phone calls in 23 Republican House districts and television ads in four districts in Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin. In the ads, the female announcer said the budget approved in the House this month amounted to “ending Medicare so millionaires can get another tax break?”

Was Coca-Cola Behind King & Spaulding's Change ot Heart on DOMA?

The speculation continues as to what prompted King & Spaulding to withdraw from the defense of DOMA. While the unhinged Christianists like racists loving Tony Perkins at Family Research Council lament that King & Spaulding was "bullied" by gay rights organizations into dropping "the most high-profile client on its books: the U.S. House of Representatives," the real truth may be that it was the business community that prompted the law firm's sudden withdrawal. Specifically, it may be Coca-Cola among other that "opened King & Spaulding" to its disastrous decision to defend bigotry. Talking Points Memo looks at the situation. Here are highlights:
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When the Atlanta-based law firm King & Spalding announced on April 18 that it would represent the Republican-controlled House of Representatives and defend the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act, it apparently didn't realize what a mess it had made for itself.
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Exactly one week later, the firm reversed its decision, prompting a high-profile partner -- former Solicitor General Paul Clement -- to resign publicly, and House Speaker John Boehner's staff to issue a statement criticizing the firm for "its careless disregard for its responsibilities to the House in this constitutional matter."
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As public relations debacles go, this was a doozy. But the firm must have calculated that the alternative would have been worse. In the intervening week, a series of public and behind-the-scenes developments made it clear that the firm would suffer recriminations for defending what many of its top clients and future recruits -- not to mention gay rights advocates -- consider to be an anti-gay law.
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Sources with knowledge of the backlash confirm that one of King & Spalding's top clients, Coca Cola, also based in Atlanta, directly intervened to press the firm to extricate itself from the case.
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Other King & Spalding clients likewise conveyed to the firm that its decision to take the DOMA case could cause them problems, both internally and with customers, according to sources who spoke with TPM. It also faced its own internal backlash.
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Other high-powered law firms in New York and Washington, D.C., wanted nothing to do with the case from the outset. King & Spalding will still pay some price for its original misstep -- and they'll definitely have to swat away gnats in the conservative movement. But it's likely a smaller price than they would have paid if they hadn't cut bait so quickly.
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Clement will now take up the case as a partner for Bancroft, LLP -- "a boutique firm made up of former Bush administration lawyers," as one LGBT advocate familiar with the pressure put on King & Spalding described it. It will thus be largely immune from public blowback.
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Additional discussion of the King & Spaulding about face and the law firm's motivations can be found here.