David Benham Explains His "Love" For Gays By Claiming Gays Are Led By Satan

The anti-gay Benham brothers - who many mistake for looking like a gay couple.

Sometimes anti-gay bigots turn out to unwittingly be the best arguments in favor of LGBT equality.  For example, the late Fred Phelps probably opened more hearts and minds to gay acceptance that he ever contemplated.  And in the process Phelps likewise turned countless members of the Millennial generation against Christianity entirely.  With Phelps dead and gone, the Benham brothers seem to be stepping up to take on at least a part of Phelps' mantle of hate and bigotry.  Instead of shutting their mouths after being cut loose by HGTV, the Benhams seem hell bent on making the case as to why HGTV was smart to drop them and distance itself from these raging bigots as fast as possible.  Right Wing Watch, which first exposed the Benham brothers for the vile bigots that they are reports on their latest case of verbal diarrhea that underscores the correctness of HGTV's action.  Here are excerpts:

It has now been one week since we first wrote a post highlighting the anti-gay and anti-choice activism of David Benham, who was slated to host a reality TV show on HGTV with his twin brother Jason. After HGTV announced that it would not move forward with the brothers' planned reality show, the Benhams hit the conservative media circuit to claim they were the victims of a "smear campaign" filled with "complete lies,"  though neither the Benhams nor anyone else has actually bothered to explain how anything we originally reported about them was in any way false.

The bulk of the defense offered for the last week by David and Jason Benham of their past activism has been that they do not hate gay people but only hate "homosexuality and its agenda that is attacking the nation,"which is pretty much the defense offered by most of the anti-gay bigots we monitor on this blog. David Benham previously alleged that the "homosexual agenda," along with abortion rights and Islam, is controlled by "demonic forces and agendas."

Last night, they took that talking point onto Glenn Beck's television program where they repeatedly asserted that they are not at war with gay people, but are rather engaged in a spiritual war against Satan and demonic forces that are out to silence Christianity.

David added that, as Christians, they are "called to restrain evil so that good may flourish" and that is the role they are trying to play in America by taking a stand against the "demonic agenda to suppress the truth.

As past events have proven, often the loudest homophobes are those who are in reality self-loathing closet cases.  In the case of the Benhams, they doth protest way, way too much in my book 

Glenn Beck - Hillary Will Have Gay Sex in White House

Glenn Beck - foul asshole

Glenn Beck in my estimation is a pretty foul individual.  When even Fox News fires you, you know that you are truly living in a nasty La La land.  Yet Beck remains a darling of the Christofascist/Tea Party thereby indicating the moral sickness that plagues that demographic.  Now Beck seems to be trying to out do himself given his recent comments about Hillary Clinton and gays in general.   The New Civil Rights Movement reports on Beck's batshitery.  Here are highlights:

Glenn Beck accused several politicians, but especially Hillary Clinton, of hypocrisy on issues like same-sex marriage during his radio show today. The former Fox News host who now makes an estimated $90 million a year, according to Forbes, chastised Hillary Clinton for not supporting same-sex marriage when it wasn’t “popular” to do so.

Rather than recognizing that people can change their minds, Beck called those who came to support same-sex marriage later in the game, “despicable” and “disgusting.”

Beck also joked that Hillary Clinton “came out last year,” suggesting she is a lesbian, after one of his colleagues said she had “come out” in favor of marriage equality.
And then, he uttered this:

“I’m telling you, I’m telling you, Hillary Clinton will be having sex with a woman on the, on the White House desk if it becomes popular. She will be. She’ll be like, ‘Look, the arc of history wasn’t ready for a president to be a lesbian and have sex on the desk.’”

He also said LGBT groups “are becoming nothing but a terrorist organization.”

And last fall, Glenn Beck strongly suggested to parents they should physically bully their kids so they know rights come from God.

Glenn Beck Calls Russian Homophobia Nazi-Like "Hetero-Fascism"

I am not a fan of Glenn Beck and typically view the man as a loud mouthed nutcase.  But even crazy people can be right on occasion.  An Example?  Glenn Beck's condemnation of Russia's anti-gay laws and raging homophobia in which he compares Russia with Nazi Germany. Gay Star News looks at Beck's commentary on Russia.  Here are highlights:

Conservative US radio host Glenn Beck has likened the mood against homosexuals in Russia to that of Nazi Germany towards Jewish people in response to comments by Russian actor Ivan Okhlobystin that he thinks gay people should be burned alive.
Beck made the comments on CNN while talking about the controversy over Duck Dynasty patriarch Phil Robertson’s recent comments about homosexuality – saying they paled in comparison to what was happening in Russia.
‘Do you know what’s happening in Russia? One of their biggest stars on television said that homosexuals should be put into the ovens alive,’ Beck told CNN’s SE Cupp.
‘I didn’t think you could make the Holocaust worse but he’s like “Why the gas chamber? That seems a little too humane. Let’s put them alive in the oven.”’
‘I will stand with GLAAD. I will stand with anybody who will stand up and say that’s crazy. That’s dangerous. That’s hetero-fascism. That’s what that is. And we’re talking about Duck Dynasty Really? Really?’
- See more at: http://www.gaystarnews.com/article/glenn-beck-calls-russian-homophobia-%E2%80%98hetero-fascism%E2%80%99010114#sthash.HiJexxvU.dpuf

Conservative US radio host Glenn Beck has likened the mood against homosexuals in Russia to that of Nazi Germany towards Jewish people in response to comments by Russian actor Ivan Okhlobystin that he thinks gay people should be burned alive.

Beck made the comments on CNN while talking about the controversy over Duck Dynasty patriarch Phil Robertson’s recent comments about homosexuality – saying they paled in comparison to what was happening in Russia.

‘Do you know what’s happening in Russia? One of their biggest stars on television said that homosexuals should be put into the ovens alive,’ Beck told CNN’s SE Cupp.

‘I didn’t think you could make the Holocaust worse but he’s like “Why the gas chamber? That seems a little too humane. Let’s put them alive in the oven.”’

‘I will stand with GLAAD. I will stand with anybody who will stand up and say that’s crazy. That’s dangerous. That’s hetero-fascism. That’s what that is. And we’re talking about Duck Dynasty Really? Really?’

 

GOP Lawmakers Embrace The Crazy

The Republican Party of William F. Buckley, Jr., and Dwight Eisenhower is beyond dead.  It's as if that incarnation of the GOP never existed when one contemplates the utter lunacy and craziness that now passes as party discourse and policy.   And as I have said before, in my view much of the insanity started when the Christofascists were made welcome by the so-called party establishment some 30 plus years ago.  When you allow in folks whose entire world view is out of touch with objective reality and who reject logic and modern knowledge, craziness is the likely result.  And along with the craziness has come increased racism and bigotry.  A piece in The Daily Beast looks at the insanity that is now the norm in today's GOP.  Here are excerpts:

A few days after the Boston bombings, Stella Tremblay went to Glenn Beck’s Facebook page to express her conviction that the terror attack was, in fact, orchestrated by the U.S. government. “The Boston Marathon was a Black Ops ‘terrorist’ attack,” she wrote. “One suspect killed, the other one will be too before they even have a chance to speak. Drones and now ‘terrorist’ attacks by our own Government. Sad day, but a ‘wake up’ to all of us.”

Tremblay’s post, though, stood out from the wave of post-attack crazy because of her day job: she is a New Hampshire state legislator.  Like too many enthusiastic dupes, the Republican representative was echoing conspiracy entrepreneurs like Beck and InfoWars’ Alex Jones, who blend dark alternate history with a dystopian future, offering the listeners the “secret truth.”

Tremblay is part of a disturbing trend of – conservative state legislators and even congressmen entertaining conspiracy theories that are creepy and unseemly coming from average citizen, but a sign of civic rot when they start getting parroted by elected officials. 

This week in Missouri, state legislators voted to cut funding for the state’s divers license bureau because it had been tasked in 2003 with also overseeing concealed-carry permits. The wife of state Rep. Kenneth Wilson explained – in the words of the Columbia Tribune – that the bureau “was part of a plot to impose United Nations policies in this country.  

Adding to the reality-free high pitch of anxiety was the Texas state attorney general who – during the height of the North Korean escalation earlier this month – declared that the real danger to America wasn’t a communist dictatorship threatening to attacks us with nuclear weapons, but the Obama administration. 

“One thing that requires ongoing vigilance is the reality that the state of Texas is coming under a new 
assault,” A.G. Greg Abbott said, according to the Waco Tribune, “an assault far more dangerous than what the leader of North Korea threatened when he said he was going to add Austin, Texas, as one of the recipients of his nuclear weapons. The threat that we're getting is the threat from the Obama administration and his political machine." This is the leading elected law enforcement official in our second-largest state. 

In North Carolina, conservative state law-makers decided to push forward a clearly unconstitutional bill to allow the state "to declare an official religion, in violation of the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Bill of Rights, and seeks to nullify any federal ruling against Christian prayer by public bodies statewide,”

This sickness is starting to infect the halls of Congress. Friday, Congressman Louie Gohmert couldn't resist telling WND radio that, "This administration has so many Muslim brotherhood members that have influence that they just are making wrong decisions for America." 

The embarrassing incidents are evidence of a larger problem that needs to be confronted: when you do not condemn the use of hate and fear to serve as a recruiting tool against your political opponents, the ability to reason together is undermined and self-government is compromised. There is a cost to condoning extremism when it seems to benefit “your team.”

There are some who complain that I beat up on the GOP too frequently.  Not surprisingly, some such critics live safely in liberal states where they do not daily have to deal with the GOP craziness so rife here in Virginia - craziness perhaps best exemplified by Ken Cuccinelli.  But the truth is that too many voters who do not pay attention except during the last few weeks before elections still have not grasped the fact that the GOP is no longer the party that it once was and that voting Republican out of habit is enabling the craziness to grow and worsen.

.  

'The Enemy' is Using 'Glee' to 'Bring Us Down'

Right Wing Watch does a wonderful job of showcasing the out right insanity - and often unvarnished hate - that is the face of the so-called Christian Right in America. Many of the alleged leaders of the movement most appropriately belong in mental institutions or at a minimum under constant mental health care. A case in point? James Robison, the founder of Life Outreach International - note how they ALWAYS have a "ministry to line the pockets financially - who believes that the enemies of America are using the television show Glee to destroy the nation. Here are highlights from Right Wing Watch:

The Religious Right is firmly convinced that the television show "Glee" is part of some conspiracy intend on "glamorizing homosexual conduct" in order to idoctrinate children.

And last week, while appearing on Glenn Beck, James Robison explained that the show, like Holywood in general, are being used by "the Enemy" to bring American down and turn the nation "away from God, away from truth":

You made a tremendous comment earlier in the week, you talked about "Glee." You talked about the incredible talent; the talent is so staggeringly great and you said "why can't we take great talent and have a great message?"

You see, the enemy - and you talked about it in "The Overton Window"- the principalities and powers in the realm of darkness and deception know how to take that which is highly effective and use it to their ends to deceive and really to bring us down, away from God, away from truth. They do it highly effectively, they're committed to it.

Vanity Fair’s Official 2010–11 Republican Beefcake Calendar

For a good laugh, check out Vanity Fair's spoof on the GOP in the form of a Republican "Beefcake" Calendar featuring some of the biggest jerks of the far right who have been helped with some photo shop magic. The would be Speaker of the House is shown above. Take the time to check them all out. Too bad they don't have one of Scott Rigell in some type of fetish outfit! :)

Wingnut Lunatics: Don Feder and Mike Huckabee

It is almost frightening how untethered the far right Christianists are becoming. First there's Don Feder posting another anti-gay screed on WingNutDaily alleging that civilization will be surrendered if same sex couples are allowed to marry nationwide. This lunacy is matched by Mike Huckabee who wants to turn the United States back over to God and Jesus. Both Feder and Huckabee are little better than Demagogues and Huckabee obviously cares nothing for the U.S. Constitution which bars the government from establishing an official state religion. Both men in effect want nothing less than a Christianist theocracy. It is downright bizarre that Huckabee can continue to be viewed as a serious contender amongst many within the GOP base (who claim the worship the Constitution almost as much as the Bible) given his contempt for constitutional government. First, some of Feder's verbal diarrhea (NOTE: in the article he turns the estimated 87,000 attendees at Glenn Beck's whitestop into 300,000):
*
Memo to conservative defeatists: Surrender on gay marriage is surrender on marriage – which is surrender on the family and, ultimately, surrender on civilization.
*
But while America turns back to God, Beck turns his back on God's law. Hey, that's catchy!

A guest on the "O'Reilly Factor" in early August, Beck was asked, "Do you believe that gay marriage is a threat to the country in any way?" Answer: "No I don't. Will gays come and get us?" Apparently, this jocularity was meant to belittle the bumpkins who oppose turning marriage into a free-form institution.
*
Beck then quoted his hero, Thomas Jefferson (who thought the French Revolution was groovy): "If it neither breaks my leg nor picks my pocket what difference is it to me?" Apparently, demolishing the institution of marriage, and undermining the family, should be matters of supreme indifference to those fighting to save America from the clutches of Obamaism.
*
Beck is one of a growing number of conservative opinion makers who are either agnostic on the issue or have decided to earn tolerance-points with the establishment by backing here-come-the-grooms. They include The View's Elizabeth Hasselbeck. ("I actually support gay marriage.") and Ross Douthat, poodle conservative of the New York Times op-ed page, whose hair-splitting here makes the late William F. Buckley Jr. sound coherent. Then there's Ann Coulter who's speaking at Homocon, . . . and the Republican congressional leaders who are falling all over themselves to attend a Sept. 22, D.C. fundraiser for the Log Cabin Republicans.
*
This unwillingness to fight for the family, on which civilization depends, is another sign of the failure of modern conservatism. The right can win a thousand battles against big government and lose the war for America's future, if it surrenders on marriage and the family.
*
Offering competing models, socially sanctioned, undermines heterosexual marriage. Two men engaged in what used to be described as unnatural acts, become the legal/moral equivalent of a man and woman (husband and wife), joined by faith and tradition, doing society's essential work of childbearing and child-rearing.
*
Homosexual activists (among the most driven ideologues on the planet) will insist that all churches perform same-sex ceremonies – and push for withdrawal of charitable tax status of those that refuse. Hate-crime laws will be applied to the ministers and priests who preach Leviticus or Romans 1:26-27. In Europe and Canada, clerics have been hauled before human-rights tribunals for defending their faith from the pulpit.
*
Unfortunately, many conservative intellectuals have lost sight of a crucial fact: American exceptionalism rests on three pillars – faith, family and freedom. Remove any one, and the entire structure collapses.
*
Funny thing - I didn't realize that I am a "driven idealogue." I would also note that Massachusetts where same sex marriage has been legal the longest has the lowest divorce rate. But then. objective facts are meaningless to folks like Feder. It's also noteworthy that Feder continues to push the myth of American exceptionalism. Somehow, I don't think God judges any of us based upon our nationality. Our prejudice and bigotry, yes. Nationality or sexual orientation, not at all.
*

As if Feder's bile isn't bad enough, we have Mike Huckabee fraternizing with Lou Engle - who supports the execution of gays in Uganda - making it clear that he wants to turn the USA into a Christianist theocracy. Here are highlights from Huffington Post on Huckabee's lastest bullshit:
*
Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee wants to turn the United States back over to God and Jesus. Huckabee actually said this in a just released 60 second commercial for Lou Engle's "The Call." In the spot Huckabee says, "Fast and pray and turn this nation back to God, as Jesus is our only hope."
*
Governor Huckabee should know that the Constitution is very clear about the separation of Church and State. Take a look at the commercial; it's unbelievable:

MLK's Son on His Father's Dream

There are many who have tried to repackage Martin Luther King, Jr.'s dream for equality in America to fit their own purposes - purposes often opposed to what MLK actually stood for. Namely, equality for all citizens and not just African American citizens. In the context of such equality, the end of discrimination based on sexual orientation was one of King's goals as was enunciated by Martin Luther King's widow, Coretta Scott King, before her death. Now anti-immigrant hate merchant Glenn Beck is poised to hold a "Restoring Honor" event on the Washington, D.C., Mall at the Lincoln Memorial with an obvious intent of pilfering legitimacy for the event by virtue of its location and public memories of King's "I Have Dream Speech." It's no coincidence that the descendants of those who quoted the Bible to justify racial segregation are using the same tactic to denigrate and support anti-gay discrimination. To set the record straight in regard to his father's dream and goals, Martin Luther King, III, has a timely op-ed in the Washington Post. Here are some highlights:
*
[I]t is clear from the timing and location that the rally's organizers present this event as also honoring the ideals and contributions of Martin Luther King Jr. I would like to be clear about what those ideals are.
*
Vast numbers of Americans know of my father's leadership in opposing segregation. Yet too many believe that his dream was limited to achieving racial equality. Certainly he sought that objective, but his vision was about more than expanding rights for a single race.
*
My father championed free speech. He would be the first to say that those participating in Beck's rally have the right to express their views. But his dream rejected hateful rhetoric and all forms of bigotry or discrimination, whether directed at race, faith, nationality, sexual orientation or political beliefs. He envisioned a world where all people would recognize one another as sisters and brothers in the human family.
*
[M]y father did not claim to have an exclusionary "plan" that laid out God's word for only one group or ideology. He marched side by side with members of every religious faith. Like Abraham Lincoln, my father did not claim that God was on his side; he prayed humbly that he was on God's side. He did, however, wholeheartedly embrace the "social gospel."
*
My experiences affirm the enduring truth of my father's words: that "injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere" and that "we are all bound together in a single garment of destiny." I pray that all Americans will embrace the challenge of social justice and the unifying spirit that my father shared with his compatriots.
*
Sadly, the professional Christian set has rejected King's dream. Instead they market in hate, alienation, bigotry and most of hypocrisy thus proving themselves to be modern day Pharisees. America would be a far better place without their poisonous version of religion.

What This White House Is Missing; GOP Racism

It seems at times that the White House doesn't "get" much of anything when it comes to issues important to the Democratic base. Are the President and his advisers brain dead, deaf, or just indifferent to those who put Barack Obama in office. Indeed, since taking office, Obama seems to have paid more significant attention to kissing up to Bible thumpers like Rick Warren and obstructionist Republicans who will die before supporting him than he has to minding the store so to speak with moderates and Democrats. His circle of advisers all too frequently seem to - bluntly put - have their heads up their asses and are doling out just plain bad advice. That, combined with Obama's refusal to be a leader, has lead to all kinds of missteps and mistakes. Maureen Dowd sees the Shirley Sherrod debacle as yet another example of the president refusing to surround himself with advisers in touch with both the party base and objective reality in terms of GOP racism. Here are highlights from her column in today's New York Times:
*
The Obama White House is too white. It has Barack Obama, raised in the Hawaiian hood and Indonesia, and Valerie Jarrett, who spent her early years in Iran. . . . Obama lacks advisers who are descended from the central African-American experience, ones who understand “the slave thing,” as a top black Democrat dryly puts it. The first black president should expand beyond his campaign security blanket, the smug cordon of overprotective white guys surrounding him . . . .
*
The West Wing white guys who pushed to ditch Shirley Sherrod before Glenn Beck could pounce not only didn’t bother to Google, they weren’t familiar enough with civil rights history to recognize the name Sherrod. And they didn’t return the calls and e-mail of prominent blacks who tried to alert them that something was wrong.
*
Charles Sherrod, Shirley’s husband, was a Freedom Rider who, along with the civil rights hero John Lewis, was a key member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee of the ‘60s. As Lewis, the longtime Georgia congressman, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, he knew immediately that something was amiss with the distorted video clip of Sherrod talking to the N.A.A.C.P.
*
[W]e may have a West Wing of cowards on race. The president appears completely comfortable in his own skin, but it seems he feels that he and Michelle are such a huge change for the nation to absorb that he can be overly cautious about pushing for other societal changes for blacks and gays. At some level, he acts like the election was enough; he shouldn’t have to deal with race further. But he does.
*
His closest advisers — some of the same ones who urged him not to make the race speech after the Rev. Jeremiah Wright issue exploded — are so terrified that Fox and the Tea Party will paint Obama as doing more for blacks that they tiptoe around and do less. “Who knew that the first black president would make it even harder on black people?” asked a top black Democratic official.
*
Frank Rich likewise laid into the White House and others on the Sherrod fiasco in his column (he should have slammed the laziness of the MSM harder in my opinion):
*
This country was rightly elated when it elected its first African-American president more than 20 months ago. That high was destined to abate, but we reached a new low last week. What does it say about America now, and where it is heading, that a racial provocateur, wielding a deceptively edited video, could not only smear an innocent woman but make every national institution that touched the story look bad? The White House, the N.A.A.C.P. and the news media were all soiled by this episode. Meanwhile, the majority of Americans, who believe in fundamental fairness for all, grapple with the poisonous residue left behind by the many powerful people of all stripes who served as accessories to a high-tech lynching.
*
The smear might well have stuck if the white octogenarian farmer saved by Sherrod 24 years ago was no longer alive and if he didn’t look like a Norman Rockwell archetype. Only his and his wife’s testimony to her good deeds on CNN could halt the lynching party.
*
[O]ne thing was certain: the N.A.A.C.P. was wrong to demand that the Tea Party disown its racist fringe. It should have made that demand of the G.O.P. instead.
*
The Tea Party Express fronted by Williams is an indisputable Republican subsidiary. It was created by prominent G.O.P. political consultants in California and raises money for G.O.P. candidates, including Sharron Angle, Harry Reid’s Senate opponent in Nevada. But Republican leaders, presiding over a Congressional delegation with no blacks and a party that nearly mirrors it, remain in hiding whenever racial controversies break out under their tent. “I am not interested in getting into that debate,” said Mitch McConnell last week.
*
The pace is set by right-wing stars like Glenn Beck, who on Fox branded Barack Obama a racist with “a deep-seated hatred for white people,” and the ever-opportunistic Newt Gingrich, who on Twitter maligned Sonia Sotomayor as a “Latina woman racist.”
*
While America’s progress on race has been epic since the days when Sherrod’s father could be murdered with impunity, we have been going backward since Election Day 2008.

FBI Issues Warning About Far Right Anti-Government Group

Elements of the radical far right that seem to be living in some bizarre fantasy world continue to show themselves to be potential sources of violence. Some of their rants sound like they are direct from World Net Daily and/or Fox News were being tethered to objective reality is not a requirement. The worry is that some of the crazed hyperventilating will lead to some of the more unhinged elements actually resorting to armed confrontation or other actual attacks against government personnel akin to the recently disclosed plot to kill a Michigan police officer and then attack the funeral procession. Think Progress looks at this phenomenon which has the FBI concerned. Here are some highlights:

*
[T]he FBI has issued an intelligence note warning police that an anti-government group’s call to remove dozens of sitting governors may encourage others to act out violently. The group, “Guardians of the Free Republics,” wants to “restore America” by dismantling parts of the government, according to its website. Governors receiving the threats include Bobby Jindal (R-LA), Jim Doyle (D-WI), Chet Culver (D-IA), Jim Gibbons (R-NV), among others.
*
While much of the rhetoric from the group resembles the style of patriot extremist organizations, their concerns seem to stem directly from economic anxiety. The group’s broadcasting affiliate, Republic Broadcasting Network, advertises survival kits, gold buying guides, and other hallmarks of a movement in America which believes that the country is heading towards economic collapse. The website also promotes tea party protests, calls for revolution, videos from Glenn Beck, and sympathetic articles about recent right-wing domestic terrorist activities, like the suicide attack on an IRS building in Austin earlier this year.
*
Guardians of the Free Republics’ call to dismantle the government has gained traction on right-wing tea party websites. The groups’ proclamation is posted on ResistNet, the popular tea party forum, as well as Tree of Liberty, a tea party forum known to have been frequented by users which supported Hutaree, the Christian militia recently arrested in Michigan.
*
A Department of Homeland Security report, ridiculed by Republican lawmakers last year, details that extended economic downturn with real estate foreclosures, unemployment, and an inability to obtain credit could foster an environment for extremists to recruit new members who may not have been supportive of these causes in the past.
*
Not surprisingly, these groups bear hate and suspicion towards those who are "other": gays, blacks, immigrants, etc., who they see as not "real Americans."

Christianist "Warrior" Militants Raided by FBI

With the rise of the tea party crowd and the increased hysteria among some of the professional Christian set, I guess it was only a matter of time before some of the more unhinged among the false Christians would move on to violence and murder. As multiple media outlets are reporting, the FBI and other law enforcement officers have taken into custody all but one of a group of militant Christianists who were plotting to murder a law enforcement officer and then attack the victim's funeral procession in order to kill more police and law enforcement officials. A copy of the federal indictment can be read here. It is mind boggling how the Gospel of loving God and loving your neighbor as yourself has become so perverted by self-anointed Christians. In my opinion, too many people continue to turn a blind eye to these prospective domestic terrorists who seem more defined by those they hate than their desire to follow the Gospel message of Christ. As much as the Republicans - i.e., think Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachmann, Ken Cuccinelli, et al - would like to deny any responsibility, their false allegations against Democrats, gays, progressives, Hispanics and those they label as "other" can only have served to motivate individuals like those covered by the indictment. Here are highlights from CNN (Gawker also has details):
*
Nine people federal prosecutors say belong to a "Christian warrior" militia were accused Monday of plotting to kill a Michigan law enforcement officer and then attack other police at the funeral.
*
Six Michigan residents, two residents of Ohio and an Indiana resident were indicted by a federal grand jury in Detroit, Michigan, on charges of seditious conspiracy, attempted use of weapons of mass destruction, teaching the use of explosive materials and possessing a firearm during a crime of violence, U.S. Attorney Barbara L. McQuade and FBI Special Agent in Charge Andrew Arena announced.
*
All but one of the suspects -- Joshua Matthew Stone, the 21-year-old son of the militia's leader -- were in custody by Monday morning and seven of them made their initial appearances before U.S. Magistrate Judge Donald A. Scheer, prosecutors said.
*
The five-count indictment unsealed Monday charges that between August 2008 and the present, the defendants, acting as a Lenawee County, Michigan, militia group called the Hutaree, conspired to use force to oppose the authority of the U.S. government.
*
Attorney General Eric Holder called it "an insidious plan by anti-government extremists." The group says on its Web site that Hutaree means "Christian warrior" and proclaims on its home page, "Preparing for the end time battles to keep the testimony of Jesus Christ alive."
*
In the "About Us" section of the Hutaree Web site, the group says, "We believe that one day, as prophecy says, there will be an Anti-Christ. All Christians must know this and prepare, just as Christ commanded."
*
According to the indictment, Hutaree members view local, state and federal law enforcement authorities as the enemy and have been preparing to engage them in armed conflict.
*
The indictment alleges that the Hutaree planned to kill an unidentified law enforcement officer in Michigan and then attack officers and others who would gather for the funeral. According to the plan, the indictment says, the Hutaree wanted to use improvised explosive devices to attack law enforcement vehicles during the funeral procession. The indictment says those explosive devices, commonly called IEDs, constitute weapons of mass destruction.
*
Subsequently, the indictment says, Hutaree leader David Brian Stone obtained information about IEDs over the Internet and e-mailed diagrams to a person he believed could manufacture them. He then had one of his sons, Joshua Matthew Stone, and others gather materials necessary to manufacture IEDs, the indictment alleges.
*
Sadly, the Hutaree actions are the logical extension of the constant hysterics and disingenuous dissemination of falsehoods by groups like The Family Foundation, Traditional Values Coalition, The American Family Association, Family Research Council, and Focus on the Family, not to mention the talking head of the ultra far right like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh

Inside the Mind of Tea Party Crazies

There is nothing wrong with being skeptical of government power and wanting facts and answers to support government courses of action. It is, however, something else entirely to allow one's self to be swept up in crazy conspiracy theories and/or covens of true believers who see immigrants, blacks gays - indeed, anyone who is different - as a threat that must be defeated. Personally, I find the tea party movement frightening because it seems to embrace any wild unfounded rumor and has a strong racist undertone. Elements within the GOP have helped unleash the tea party crowd, but I worry that its paranoia will lead to violence and other dangerous trends. Any movement that is unfettered from objective reality holds potential for danger. Here are highlights from a New York Times article that looks at the tea party phenomenon:
*
The Tea Party movement has become a platform for conservative populist discontent, a force in Republican politics for revival, as it was in the Massachusetts Senate election, or for division. But it is also about the profound private transformation of people like Mrs. Stout, people who not long ago were not especially interested in politics, yet now say they are bracing for tyranny.
*
These people are part of a significant undercurrent within the Tea Party movement that has less in common with the Republican Party than with the Patriot movement, a brand of politics historically associated with libertarians, militia groups, anti-immigration advocates and those who argue for the abolition of the Federal Reserve.
*
Urged on by conservative commentators, waves of newly minted activists are turning to once-obscure books and Web sites and discovering a set of ideas long dismissed as the preserve of conspiracy theorists, interviews conducted across the country over several months show.
*
Loose alliances like Friends for Liberty are popping up in many cities, forming hybrid entities of Tea Parties and groups rooted in the Patriot ethos. These coalitions are not content with simply making the Republican Party more conservative. They have a larger goal — a political reordering that would drastically shrink the federal government and sweep away not just Mr. Obama, but much of the Republican establishment, starting with Senator John McCain.
*
In many regions, including here in the inland Northwest, tense struggles have erupted over whether the Republican apparatus will co-opt these new coalitions or vice versa. Tea Party supporters are already singling out Republican candidates who they claim have “aided and abetted” what they call the slide to tyranny.
*
The ebbs and flows of the Tea Party ferment are hardly uniform. It is an amorphous, factionalized uprising with no clear leadership and no centralized structure. Not everyone flocking to the Tea Party movement is worried about dictatorship. Some have a basic aversion to big government, or Mr. Obama, or progressives in general.
*
They are frequently led by political neophytes who prize independence and tell strikingly similar stories of having been awakened by the recession. Their families upended by lost jobs, foreclosed homes and depleted retirement funds, they said they wanted to know why it happened and whom to blame. That is often the point when Tea Party supporters say they began listening to Glenn Beck. . . . Many describe emerging from their research as if reborn to a new reality. Some have gone so far as to stock up on ammunition, gold and survival food in anticipation of the worst.
*
It is a sprawling rebellion, but running through it is a narrative of impending tyranny. This narrative permeates Tea Party Web sites, Facebook pages, Twitter feeds and YouTube videos. It is a prominent theme of their favored media outlets and commentators, and it connects the disparate issues that preoccupy many Tea Party supporters — from the concern that the community organization Acorn is stealing elections to the belief that Mr. Obama is trying to control the Internet and restrict gun ownership.
*
WorldNetDaily.com trumpets “exclusives” reporting that the Army is seeking “Internment/Resettlement” specialists. On ResistNet.com, bloggers warn that Mr. Obama is trying to convert Interpol, the international police organization, into his personal police force. They call on “fellow Patriots” to “grab their guns.”
*
The article goes on for a number of pages. The bottom line is that many of these people are living in an alternate reality and that those who have whipped them into a frenzy have been irresponsible to say the least.