Mike Pence’s Hypocrisy Filled Sense of Morality

With Rudy Giuliani exposing Donald Trump as a liar - yet again - during an interview on Fox News, the bar for truthfulness and morality is almost non-existent in the Trump/Pence regime.  Yet, Mike Pence, who bizarrely won't be alone in a room with a woman who is not his wife, continues to manage to put the hypocrisy and feigned morality of evangelicals and so-called conservatives on display.  Perhaps one of Pence's most bizarre performances was his description of former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who was convicted of contempt of court, as a “tireless champion of  the rule of law.”  The takeaway message is that trampling on the rights of minorities - especially those who have brown or black skin - is perfectly fine in the warped moral world of evangelicals.  This, of course, should surprise no one given the historical ties between evangelicals (especially Southern Baptists) and support for segregation and the Jim Crow laws.  A piece in the Washington Post looks at Pence's upside down morality.  Here are excerpts:

Until Tuesday, it seemed that Vice President Pence had one primary function within the Trump administration: to be morally offended by everything. There was the time that he walked out of an NFL game because some players took a knee while the national anthem was played. 

Last month “the vice president walked out of the Summit of the Americas when Cuba’s foreign minister was recognized to speak after him,” according to the Associated Press.

Pence has demonstrated his ability to register his moral disapproval even when he does not leave an event. This was the case at the Opening Ceremonies of the 2018 Winter Olympics, when he refused to stand as the unified Korean team entered the stadium.

Pence’s defenders would argue that being rude to dignitaries from North Korea and Cuba just shows how righteous he really is. His brand is as a man of serious moral values who can serve as Trump’s envoy to people of faith.  Pence’s presence in the White House has been a boon for the religious right. Evangelical leaders across the country point to his record on abortion and religious freedom and liken him to a prophet restoring conservative Christianity to its rightful place at the center of American life. 

 

So it is worth noting what Pence, the Trump administration’s righteous man, did in Arizona on Tuesday. . . . . Pence praised former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who was convicted of contempt of court, as a “tireless champion of … the rule of law” during an event in Arizona on Tuesday.

Pence said at the tax event that he was “honored” by the former sheriff’s attendance, and called Arpaio a “great friend of this president and tireless champion of strong borders and the rule of law,” to cheers from the crowd.

Needless to say, most observers do not view Joe Arpaio as a real big fan of the rule of law. Indeed, Arpaio probably would have fit right into either the Cuban or North Korean regimes. 

 

It is not just Arpaio’s victims who feel moral outage. The National Review editorialized in January: Arpaio was convicted of criminal contempt last summer for willfully violating a federal court order. Specifically, he was convicted of violating an order that he cease arresting and detaining people for whom there was no plausible criminal charge — i.e., the court asked him, pretty please, to stop detaining Mexicans for publicity purposes. 

 

But Sheriff Joe has a thing for arresting people who haven’t committed any crime. He arrested a Republican critic — the county supervisor — on trumped-up charges in 2008 and ended up handing over $3.5 million of taxpayers’ money in a wrongful-arrest settlement. 

 

Red State’s Sarah Quinlan offers up a detailed list of Arpaio’s abuses of the rule of law while he was the former sheriff, concluding: “Nothing about Sheriff Joe Arpaio resembles any sort of justice or law and order under the United States Constitution, and it is disgraceful for Pence to pretend otherwise.”

 

Note who I’m quoting here. These are conservative outlets one would expect to be in lockstep with a good Christian conservative like Pence. But they are appalled — and they are not the only conservatives to react this way. In these politically polarized times, Mike Pence has managed to appall just about everyone across the political spectrum. That takes some doing.

 

[T]he number of officials in the Trump administration who can claim to have preserved their moral bearings in this administration keeps shrinking by the day.

It is possible that the vice president reads this and cancels his Washington Post subscription in a fake moral outrage. It would be on brand for him. It would not change the fact that he has sullied his standing with this act of moral appeasement.

Trump, Joe Arpaio and the End of Constitutional Rights

The Roman Republic did not end with one single act.  Rather numerous acts and the eventual seizure of power by Octavian Caesar - renamed Augustus - while maintaining the outward trappings of the Republic, in particular the Roman Senate led to the empire and imperial power.  Along the way the rule of law ended and some became above the law.  In pardoning Joe Arpaio, Der Trumpenführer has signaled that his supporters can trample on the constitutional rights of others with impunity.  John McCain issued a statement that sums up the danger well:

“No one is above the law and the individuals entrusted with the privilege of being sworn law officers should always seek to be beyond reproach in their commitment to fairly enforcing the laws they swore to uphold. Mr. Arpaio was found guilty of criminal contempt for continuing to illegally profile Latinos living in Arizona based on their perceived immigration status in violation of a judge’s orders. The President has the authority to make this pardon, but doing so at this time undermines his claim for the respect of rule of law as Mr. Arpaio has shown no remorse for his actions.”

The main editorial of the New York Times today follows up on this theme and the danger that Trump's action signals.  In the world of Trump and his racist, homophobic, anti-immigrant base, some people have rights and others don't, namely those who are black, Hispanic, non-Christian, and non-heterosexual.  As noted in numerous post, in the case of LGBT Americans, Trump is waging an unrelenting war against us.  It will likely only get worse if the trend is allowed to continue.  Here are editorial excerpts: 

It would be difficult for President Trump, who has insulted judges and tried to interfere with a federal investigation, to show much more disrespect for the rule of law. But if he makes good on his implicit vow to pardon Joe Arpaio, the disgraced former sheriff of Maricopa County, Ariz., Mr. Trump would be scorning the Constitution itself.

Mr. Arpaio, an anti-immigrant hard-liner who served 24 years in office before voters tossed him out last November, was convicted in July of criminal contempt of court for disregarding a federal judge’s orders to stop detaining people based solely on the suspicion that they were in the country illegally.

The Constitution gives the president nearly unlimited power to grant clemency to people convicted of federal offenses, so Mr. Trump can pardon Mr. Arpaio. But Mr. Arpaio was an elected official who defied a federal court’s order that he stop violating people’s constitutional rights. He was found in contempt of that court. By pardoning him, Mr. Trump would show his contempt for the American court system and its only means of enforcing the law, since he would be sending a message to other officials that they may flout court orders also.

Mr. Arpaio could not be less deserving of mercy. In addition to the dragnets of Hispanic-looking people that ultimately led to his contempt conviction, he racked up a record of harassment, neglect, mistreatment and other flagrant abuses of office that should have ended his career years ago.

Both men [Trump and Arpaio] built their brands by exploiting racial resentments of white Americans. While Mr. Trump was beginning his revanchist run for the White House on the backs of Mexican “rapists,” Mr. Arpaio was terrorizing brown-skinned people across southern Arizona, sweeping them up in “saturation patrols” and holding them in what he referred to as a “concentration camp” for months at a time.

It was this behavior that a federal judge in 2011 found to be unconstitutional and ordered Mr. Arpaio to stop. He refused, placing himself above the law and the Constitution that he had sworn to uphold.

[A] grant of mercy from Mr. Trump would also go against longstanding Justice Department policy, which calls for a waiting period of at least five years before the consideration of a pardon application and some expression of regret or remorse by the applicant. Mr. Arpaio shows no sign of remorse; to the contrary, he sees himself as the victim. “If they can go after me, they can go after anyone in this country,” he told Fox News on Wednesday. He’s right — in a nation based on the rule of law, anyone who ignores a court order, or otherwise breaks the law, may be prosecuted and convicted.

Mr. Arpaio has always represented what Mr. Trump aspires to be: a thuggish autocrat who enforces the law as he pleases, without accountability or personal consequence.

  Frighteningly, we are seeing the death of the rule of law before our eyes.  Be very afraid.

Media Is Ignoring Trump Lawsuits and Destruction of Records and E-mails

While the American mainstream media continues to play into the hands of Donald Trump - and actually Vladimir Putin as well - by having near orgasms in its rush to sensationalize issues surrounding Hillary Clinton's e-mails, for the most part it is utterly ignoring the 75 lawsuits involving Donald Trump.  Even more hypocritically, it is ignoring Trump's history of destroying records and e-mails despite court orders.  A piece in Politicususa looks at the Trump's lawsuits while Newsweek looks at Trump's pattern of contempt of court actions and record destruction.  First these highlights from the Newsweek piece:

Over the course of decades, Donald Trump’s companies have systematically destroyed or hidden thousands of emails, digital records and paper documents demanded in official proceedings, often in defiance of court orders. These tactics—exposed by a Newsweek review of thousands of pages of court filings, judicial orders and affidavits from an array of court cases—have enraged judges, prosecutors, opposing lawyers and the many ordinary citizens entangled in litigation with Trump. In each instance, Trump and entities he controlled also erected numerous hurdles that made lawsuits drag on for years, forcing courtroom opponents to spend huge sums of money in legal fees as they struggled—sometimes in vain—to obtain records.

This behavior is of particular import given Trump’s frequent condemnations of Hillary Clinton, his Democratic opponent, for having deleted more than 30,000 emails from a server she used during her time as secretary of state. While Clinton and her lawyers have said all of those emails were personal, Trump has suggested repeatedly on the campaign trail that they were government documents Clinton was trying to hide and that destroying them constituted a crime. The allegation—which the FBI concluded was not supported by any evidence—is a crowd-pleaser at Trump rallies, often greeted by supporters chanting, “Lock her up!”

TRUMP’S USE OF DECEPTION and untruthful affidavits, as well as the hiding or improper destruction of documents, dates back to at least 1973, when the Republican nominee, his father and their real estate company battled the federal government over civil charges that they refused to rent apartments to African-Americans. The Trump strategy was simple: deny, impede and delay, while destroying documents the court had ordered them to hand over.

For months, the Trumps ignored the government’s discovery demands, even though court procedure in a civil or criminal case requires each side to produce relevant documents in a timely manner. . . . .  When litigation is filed or even contemplated, scrupulous lawyers and corporations immediately impose document-retention programs or require that any shredding or disposing of records be halted. Courts have handed down severe sanctions or even criminal charges of obstruction of justice against executives and companies that destroyed records because they knew they were going to be sued.

Yet when the government filed its standard discovery requests, the Trumps reacted as though seeking that information was outrageous. They argued in court that prosecutors had no case and wanted to riffle through corporate files on a fishing expedition. Once again, this led to more delays, more replies, more hearings...and another specious argument thrown out of court.

Finally, under subpoena, Trump appeared for a short deposition. When asked about the missing documents, he made a shocking admission: The Trumps had been destroying their corporate records for the previous six months and had no document-retention program. They had conducted no inspections to determine which files might have been sought in the discovery requests or might otherwise be related to the case. Instead, in order to “save space,” Trump testified, officials with his company had been tossing documents into the shredder and garbage.

In 2009, a group of plaintiffs claimed Trump duped them into buying apartments in a Fort Lauderdale, Florida, development by portraying it as one of his projects. The fine print of the dense and legalistic purchase contracts, however, revealed that Trump had agreed only to license his name to the developers, and when the project hit financial snags, he walked away from it.

In their initial disclosures in 2011, Trump and his company said they had no insurance to cover any of their liability in this case. . . . . Two years after denying that Trump had insurance that could have been used to settle the Fort Lauderdale litigation, one of his lawyers made a startling admission: Trump and his company had been insured all along for up to $5 million. But no more—the policy had recently “dried up,” the lawyer said.

PERHAPS THE WORST LEGAL CASE involving Trump and his companies hiding and destroying emails and other records involved real estate developer Cordish Cos., which, through an affiliate called Power Plant Entertainment LLC, built two American Indian casinos in Florida. 

Trump offered no evidence in support of his contention except his word, so the opposing lawyers filed extensive discovery demands, seeking emails, computer files, calendars and other records that might prove he knew about the casino deal before 2000.

A full year into the case, Trump and his company, Trump Hotels, had produced only a single box of documents, many of which were not relevant—and no emails, digital files, phone records, calendars or even documents Trump lawyers had promised to turn over. Interrogatories were still unanswered. Lawyers for Power Plant obtained a court order compelling Trump and his company to comply with the discovery demands and hand over the relevant information and documents.

In a March 2006 response, Trump’s lawyers argued that the emails and other electronic documents had not been produced because the company didn’t have them. They claimed it had no servers until 2001—the year Trump claimed he had learned of the Power Plant project. They also claimed Trump Hotels had no policy regarding retaining documents until 2003. In other words, they hadn’t turned over any emails because no emails had been saved on a Trump server.

Judge Jeffrey Streitfeld reacted with near disbelief. “I don't have the patience for this,” he said. “This has been going on too long to have to listen—and I don't mean to be disrespectful—to this double-talk. There has to be an attitude adjustment from the plaintiff.”

[B]y deposing numerous IT specialists with two Trump companies—the Trump Organization and Trump Hotels—lawyers for Power Plant gradually chipped away at it. Finally, during a deposition nine months after he had signed the deceptive affidavit, the same Trump executive admitted his assertions in it were untrue. In fact, an IBM Domino server for emails and other files had been installed in 1999, . . . These startling revelations changed nothing, however, because there was no trove of documents. The Trump records had been destroyed.

There is much more, but you get the drift: Trump and his companies are pathological lies and have nothing but contempt for the legal system and view others as suckers and targets for abuse.   The Politicususa piece follows this theme of just how crooked and unscrupulous Trump is in fact.  Here are highlights:

[H]ow many people realize that Donald Trump, at this moment, has 75 – SEVENTY-FIVE – legal issues hanging over his head.

He’s lying 20 to 35 times a day and has his followers – and with much less excuse, the mainstream media – thoroughly distracted by the Clinton email non-story so he can divert their attention away from his own legally questionable activities.

USA TODAY reported at the end of October that “Just two weeks before Election Day, at least 75 of the 4,000-plus lawsuits involving Trump and his businesses remain open, according to an ongoing, nationwide analysis of state and federal court records by USA TODAY.”

If one thing has become clear throughout this election it is that Trump does not pay his bills. Earlier, we had covered an incident where he had declined to finish paying a Florida contractor for work it did on one of his resorts, having decided that the contractor had been “paid enough,” even though it wasn’t the agreed-upon amount. Trump got nailed by the court for $300K in attorney’s fees in that case.

Just a few examples from USA TODAY’s investigation:

Trump faces significant open litigation tied to his businesses: angry members at his Jupiter, Fla. golf course say they were cheated out of refunds on their dues and a former employee at the same club claims she was fired after reporting sexual harassment. There’s a fraud case brought by Trump University students who say the mogul’s company ripped them off for tens of thousands in tuition for a sham real estate course.

Trump is also defending lawsuits tied to his campaign. A disgruntled GOP political consultant sued for $4 million saying Trump defamed her. Another suit, a class action, says the campaign violated consumer protection laws by sending unsolicited text messages.
 As pointed out by USA TODAY’s Nick Penzenstadler and John Kelly, these lawsuits will dog Trump into the White House, should he win. He will have no immunity because he is president. And America – and the world – will be treated to the spectacle of the President of the United States having to make trip after trip to the court to settle his highly questionable personal and business affairs.

There are harassment cases, sex discrimination lawsuits, fraud, unpaid bills, racist comments, defamation, cases involving Trump University. As USA TODAY notes, “as recently as last spring…New York had to take legal action to collect $8,578 in unpaid taxes on the Trump-owned company that owns the trademark Boeing 757 that jetted the mogul to campaign rallies across the country.”

And those 75 cases will likely grow. . . . All the facts – including the new disclosures about Trump’s ties to a Russian server and his potentially illegal ploy to avoid paying taxes – make it clear that if Trump the deadbeat liar drains the swamp, he will be the first one down the drain.

Many in the German media in the 1930's by laziness and default aided and abetted Hitler.  The parallels with the American media today are very disturbing.   Trump is a cheat and a perpetual liar, plain and simple.

Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore Again Proves He is Unfit for the Bench

Anti-gay extremist and modern day Pharisee Roy Moore

One of the most basic things that one learns in law school - actually in most high school government classes - is that the United States Constitution and U.S. Supreme Court rulings on federal constitutional issues trump ALL of the state constitutions and the rulings of state supreme courts.  Yet this simple concept is too much for mental midget and religious nutcase Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore who today released an order basically directing all Alabama probate judges (whose offices issue marriage licenses) to ignore the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Obergefell v. Hughes, that struck down ALL state gay marriage bans.  Moore is unfit for the bench - and I mean any court position - and needs to be permanently removed from the Alabama Supreme Court.  He is an embarrassment to the State of Alabama and makes a mockery of the judicial system.  As I have often noted, Alabama was far more sane 30+ years ago when I lived there compared to now when the state government seems controlled by ignorance embracing Christofascists.  Thankfully, some of the state's probate judges are ignoring Moore's invalid order.  The New Civil Rights Movement has details.  Here are highlights:

Wednesday morning Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore issued an order claiming the Supreme Court's ruling last June that found a constitutional right to marriage by same-sex couples applies only to the four states that were a party to the Obergefell lawsuit. It's a legal tactic the federal courts will at some point soon be forced into, but for now, according to Justice Moore, probate judges are not to be issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

Of course, if a probate judge actually follow's Moore's order, they may find themselves the defendant in a federal lawsuit.

For now, Mobile County Probate Judge Don Davis, who was the subject of a related lawsuit over marriage licenses for same-sex couples, is once again refusing to issue licenses to any couples, as Buzzfeed reports. 

“Well, we have closed,” Russell Davidson, a supervisor of the court’s division that handles marriage licenses, told BuzzFeed News. “At this time, we are not issuing any licenses until further notice.”

But Montgomery County is taking a different course of action. One employee told Buzzfeed they “are issuing licenses until further notice. Our marriage department is open.”

And Montgomery County Probate Judge Steven Reed posted this tweet in response to Justice Moore's decree:

Judge Moore's latest charade is just sad & pathetic. My office will ignore him & this.

DeKalb, Limestone, Marshall, Lauderdale, Morgan, and Franklin Counties are all issuing licenses to all couples. Madison County is accepting applications but not issuing licenses until further notice. 

Meanwhile, the ACLU has some advice for Justice Moore and the probate judges of Alabama: this has already been decided in federal court.

And State Rep. Patricia Todd, who is Alabama's first openly-gay lawmaker, notes the same, that "Probate Judges are under a federal court order to adhere to the SCOTUS decision. If they follow Moore's lead they can and will be held in contempt in federal court." She told the Montgomery Advertiser if Judge Moore "wants to waste the taxpayers' money, go ahead, but we're not going backwards."

Mobile is a very nice city and Don Davis is seriously harming the city's reputation.  I'd also add that as a member of the Alabama State Bar,  I believe it is time for the Bar to call for Moore's removal from the Alabama Supreme Court.

Jailing Kim Davis is a Win for Religious Liberty

As the far right continues to throw conniption fits and spread lies about the myth of Christian persecution in the wake of the jailing of renegade county clerk, a piece in Patheos makes the case that Davis' jailing is in fact a win for religious liberty.  Why?  Because it makes it clear that government officials do not have the right to force their religious beliefs on other citizens.  Sadly, it's a concept beyond the grasp of the Virginia GOP and much of the national Republican Party.  As the piece notes, if the four times married Davis cannot in good conscience issue marriage licenses to same sex couples, she has an easy remedy: resign.  Here are highlights:

It finally happened. On the morning of September 3, 2015, Federal Marshals placed Kim Davis, the
Kentucky clerk who refused to issue marriage licenses to LGBTQ couples, under arrest for contempt of court. Davis had been refusing to issue licenses in her county for weeks, arguing that she shouldn’t be forced to issue licenses to same-sex couples because it violated her Christian faith.

As soon as the news of Davis’s arrest broke, conservative Christians began referring to Davis as a “martyr”, claiming that her arrest crossed the line into persecution because of her Christian faith.

As an evangelical myself, I want to suggest a different perspective than the one many of my other brothers and sisters have been offering. I believe that Kim Davis’s arrest is neither persecution or an impingement on her religious liberties. In fact, I believe her arrest actually strengthens religious liberty nation wide.

Religious Liberty is a concept that is based on the First Amendment of the Constitution which states “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof …”  . . . While religious institutions are guaranteed protections against any government regulation or involvement in their religious life, the government is also protected from religious institutions attempt to garner political power over the nation. What this means is that anyone who functions as an agent of the state must remain religiously neutral, providing equal service, treatment, and rights to all people of all religious, ethical, social, and cultural backgrounds.

Kim Davis posed a great threat to the religious liberties of our nation by refusing to carry out her duties as an agent of the state, issuing marriage licenses to all couples, regardless of their sexuality or gender identity. Davis forced her Christian faith on the people of Rowan County, and violated their right to be able to receive equal treatment from the government, regardless of their sexuality, race, religion, or values.

Davis has no right imposing her religious, moral, or political beliefs on any person in her county. Instead, as an agent of the state, she should either do her job neutrally or quit.

The fact that Kim Davis was taken to jail instead of fined is a question of major controversy. Many people believe that this action is too extreme. She should have been fined, many will argue. However, when we consider that Kim Davis has raised thousands of dollars on Indiegogo and has the backing of many extreme right-winged religious and political organizations, it becomes clear that fining her would have done virtually nothing.  

It is not uncommon, in contempt of court cases, for a judge to order jail time. Therefore, Kim’s situation is actually not unique. It’s not extreme. It’s actually quite common. And her imprisonment serves as a warning to those in power who seek to impose their religious beliefs on their constituency. It’s a violation of the foundational principles of our country, and there will be legal consequences.

[T]he reality is that Kim Davis is not being persecuted for her faith, she is reaping the consequences of refusing to do her job as an agent of the state. Davis is welcome to hold her beliefs as tightly as she would like, but when she is at work, she needs to do her job. If her job violates her conscience, then she should quit, because imposing her beliefs on the people of Rowan County is not an option. It’s a violation of one of the highest and most sacred American values: Religious Liberty.  

Very well said!

GOP Candidates Rush to Praise Kim Davis and Subvert the Constitution

Driving home I was listening to a constitutional law scholar on a POTUS satellite radio.  The topic?  The GOP 2016 presidential candidates flocking to support anti-gay County Clerk Kim Davis and breathlessly prostituting themselves to would be Christofascist voters in the GOP primaries. Not surprisingly, the scholar had little good to say about these candidates and he flat out slammed their ignorance about the U.S. Constitution.  Perhaps the most shocking - and desperately pandering - comments came from Mike Fuckabee Huckabee who proved he is unfit for the office of president or any other elected office.  But Huckabee is not alone in his desire to toss the U.S. Constitution into the toilet.  The Hill looks ate the GOP candidate reactions.  Here are excerpts:

The Kentucky clerk who has been jailed for refusing to issue licenses to same-sex couples is getting full-throated support from several Republican presidential candidates.

Sens. Rand Paul (Ky.) and Ted Cruz (Texas) blasted a judge's decision Thursday to hold Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis in contempt of court. 

"I think it's absurd to put someone in jail for exercising their religious liberty," Paul said on CNN's "Wolf," citing his home state clerk's "heartfelt conviction.

Cruz, a vocal opponent of the Supreme Court's decision legalizing same-sex marriage this summer, also rebuked the judge.  "Today, judicial lawlessness crossed into judicial tyranny."

"Today, for the first time ever, the government arrested a Christian woman for living according to her faith. This is wrong. This is not America," Cruz said in a lengthy statement posted to his campaign website next to a bright red button for supporters to donate to his White House bid. 

Huckabee, the first to offer a strong defense of Davis this week, blasted putting her in custody in a series of tweets on Thursday afternoon, calling it an assault on religious liberty.

One Huckabee tweet stated:  

Kim Davis in federal custody removes all doubts about the criminalization of Christianity in this country. We must defend #ReligiousLiberty!  

Huckabee went on to say that he was headed to Kentucky to visit Davis.  And former Hindu, Bobby Jindal likewise jumped on the pro-Davis band wagon of political whores.

Call me a cynic, but those riding the GOP clown car who are the most vociferous in their support for Davis are all at the bottom end of the polls.  They will literally do anything to catch the eye of the unwashed masses of the Christofascists in the GOP base.  

Supreme Court Denies Anti-Gay Kentucky Clerk’s Stay Request

Kim Davis, the serial monogamist (or serial adulterer if one takes the Bible admonition against divorce literally) Kentucky County Clerk who has defied the orders of a U.S. District Court and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit by refusing to issue marriage licenses to same sex couples,  just got drop kicked by the United States Supreme Court which denied her request for a stay of the lower court rulings.  One can only hope that Davis will be quickly hit with contempt of court citation and that her nutcase counsel, Mat Staver, will be hit with sanctions for his frivolous appeals and stay requests.  One can further hope that this will be the end of Davis' ridiculous claims that her "religious freedom" is under attack when she obviously cares nothing about the Bible moral dictates given her multiple marriages.  Here are highlights via BuzzFeed:

The Supreme Court on Monday evening denied a Kentucky clerk’s request to keep enforcing her “no marriage licenses” policy — in attempt to avoid issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples — while she appeals the trial court’s preliminary ruling. 

The Rowan County clerk, Kimberly Davis, argues that she should be exempted from issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples because she has a religious objection.

Three same-sex couples seeking to marry sued her, leading U.S. District Court Judge David Bunning to order Davis to stop enforcing her “no marriage licenses” policy against those couples.

He refused to put his order on hold while Davis appealed, but he temporarily put it on hold until Monday so Davis could seek a stay pending appeal from the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals. The 6th Circuit denied that request this past week, leading Davis to seek a stay from the Supreme Court.

The court gave no reasons in Monday evening’s brief order for denying her request that the trial court’s order to be put on hold while she appeals the matter. No justices publicly announced that they would have granted the request.

On Tuesday morning, there will be no question — at least as to the three same-sex couples who sued Davis — that Davis is under a federal court’s order to stop her “no marriage licenses” policy.  If Davis does not comply, a party could ask Bunning to hold her in contempt of court.

Personally, I hope they put her hypocrisy filled ass in jail for contempt of court.  Given her four marriages, it would seem that Davis views marriage as a form of legal prostitution rather than a sacrament ordained by god as she claims.   One would think that even  the increasingly loony Staver could have found a more credible champion for his "religious freedom" myth.

 

Kim Davis' "Religious Liberty" - The Ultimate Symbol of Bigotry

As Rowan County, Kentucky Clerk Kim Davis continues her quest to become a false Christian martyr by defying federal court rulings, the four times married Davis' hypocrisy is on display - as it that of the Christofascists and professional Christian crowd rallying to her defense.  But don't tell that to the Republican Party which is only too happy to prostitute itself to religious extremists and bigots of all walks (e.g., white supremacists, anti-Semites, anti-immigrant fanatics, etc.).  With the Christofascists losing the so-called culture wars and younger generations walking away for religion, the long term victory for equality is in sight, but before they go down to total defeat (and hopefully social and political oblivion), we can expect to see more shameless hypocrites like Kim Davis.  A column in Huffington Post looks at the spectacle.  Here are excerpts:

Davis is going down as a martyr to the cause, having galvanized bigots and religious extremists across Kentucky and across the country, claiming that their religious freedom has been infringed upon by the Supreme Court's ruling. Thousands turned out for a rally in the Kentucky capital, Frankfort, last weekend, expressing their support for Davis and against homosexuality. They clutched bibles and waved hateful signs condemning homosexuality. "An illustrated poster with the words 'first the baker, then the clerk, next the pastors' was plastered to a Capitol wall," reported the Daily Independent.

Casey County Clerk Casey Davis (no relation to Kim Davis) has been on a bike ride across the state in support of the Rowan County clerk, doing interviews along the way and saying he is ready to "die" for the cause of discrimination.

"It's a war on Christianity," he said in one radio interview. "If it takes it, I will go to jail over -- if it takes my life, I will die for because I believe I owe that to the people that fought so I can have the freedom that I have, I owe that to them today, and you do, we all do."

If the Supreme Court denies Kim Davis's stay the ball is back in a federal judge's court. Because she is an elected official, only the legislature can remove her in an impeachment, which no one expects to happen. But Daniel J. Canon, one of the attorneys for the couples who filed suit to get their marriage licenses, told me that "she could be removed if she were criminally prosecuted for something," which would mean the judge finding her in contempt of his order and possibly even sending her to jail (as unlikely as that might be).

That is exactly what Davis -- and the Republican Party -- would relish.  . . . And that is true of the GOP presidential candidates, desperate to find issues to galvanize religious conservatives. "Religious liberty" is a term Jeb Bush has invoked several times in the context of gay rights, and Ted Cruz has been stoking the issue for months, claiming Christians are under attack. As I've written in weeks past, it's clear that the issue is being carefully developed by GOP leaders in Congress as a campaign issue to energize evangelical voters. 

Davis will lose her battle in coming days. But GOP leaders in Washington and across the country, heading into a political campaign, will take that as a win.

Federal Judge Orders Anti-Gay Kentucky Clerk To Issue Marriage Licenses

One pattern that we see over and over again is that of Christofascists viewing themselves as above the law.  In their warped mindset, clinging to myths and legends based on the writings of ignorant Bronze Age herders is more important than complying with the civil laws of the United States of America.  One of the current poster children for this phenomenon is Kim Davis, the Rowan County, Kentucky, clerk of Court, who believes she can ignore the duties of her position and give the figurative middle finger to a federal court because of her "deeply held religious beliefs" that rely on 2000 year old myths.  As The New Civil Rights Movement reports,  Davis has been ordered by the federal district court to issue marriage licenses to all applicants, gay or straight. She has decided to basically tell the court to go f*ck itself.  If there was ever a case where someone needs to be lead off to jail for contempt of court, it is Ms. Davis.  The irony, of course is that while she claims to be constrained by her religious beliefs,  she hasn't respected the "sanctity of marriage" that she now pretends to be protecting.  Here are story highlights:  

U.S. District Judge David Bunning granted a preliminary injunction today against Kim Davis, the Rowan County, Kentucky, clerk who stopped issuing all marriage licenses after the Supreme Court made marriage equality the law of the land. Ms. Davis, who claims a religious objection to issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, was sued by the ACLU on behalf of both gay and straight couples who were inconvenienced by her stance. Ms. Davis then sued the Governor who told all the state's rebelling clerks to get back to work, for violating her religious rights.

Judge Bunning found Ms. Davis has no legal right to object on religious grounds and ordered her to begin to issue licenses immediately, writing:

"Davis is bound by her duties as a public servant to obey the law. She is even free to believe that marriage is a union between one man and one woman, as many Americans do. However, her religious convictions cannot excuse her from performing the duties that she took an oath to perform as Rowan County clerk," Bunning wrote."

 Davis needs to be placed in jail for contempt of court plain and simple. But the "rest of the story" is that she has been encouraged to defy the federal court's order by Mat Staver and the other extremists at Liberty Counsel.  Joe My God has details on this part of the story:

On Thursday, deputy clerk Nathan Davis, Kim Davis’ son, said the office was advised by attorneys with the Christian law firm Liberty Counsel to continue refusing same-sex couples as it appeals the order that was filed Wednesday. They told David Moore and his partner David Ermold, who showed up as soon as the doors opened, that they were not issuing marriage licenses. Davis’ attorneys at Liberty Counsel were not available for comment Thursday. They told WKYT they were in a prayer meeting.

My question is a simple one: when the Hell is Staver's law license going to be revoked.  If anyone else engaged in such conduct, the state bar would more against them so fast their head would be spinning. Are we yet again witnessing undue deference and special rights being afforded to those who hide behind "religious belief" to flout the law. I say, disbar Staver.
 

Christofascist Hysteria Over Gay Marriage Continues - Will Alabama Defy SCOTUS?

One can only hope as the Christofascists become more deranged and hysterical in the wake of the Obergefell v. Hodges ruling that more and more thinking Americans will realize that these "godly Christians" truly belong in a mental ward.  Preferably ones with high razor wire fences to keep the crazies locked within.  Over at Renew America, a SPLC registered hate group, on display are the spittle flecked rantings of Madeline Crabb whose bio first and foremost describes her as a "Christian."  Like most of the Christofascist authors, she has no credentials that make her competent to address issues of sexual orientation, gender identity or anything else and stripped of all the attempts at rhetorical flourish, her arguments rested solely on the Bible, a book authored by unknown writers who had a Bronze age knowledge of sexuality and thought the sun revolved around the Earth. 

In her diatribe Crabb attacks the majority of the U.S. Supreme Court as "mere men had nothing to do with creating marriage any more than they created the heavens, earth, or the very air we breathe."  Crabb, as is typical of Christofascists, conveniently ignores the fact that the Bible was authored by mere men - and ignorant uneducated ones at that - who in the case of the Old Testament had an agenda to keep Israelites separate and distinct from surrounding cultures and in the New Testament as ultimately comprised to maintain the power and control of the winning faction of the early Christians.  Here's a sample of her idiocy:

Five arrogant men and women declared themselves little gods, and chose to normalize same-sex partnerships, calling them "marriage," thus legalizing the accompanying activity that God calls an abomination: sodomy. (Actually, there's a plethora of other perverse activities homosexuals also do to "couple" that are simply too vile to speak about.) These judges supposedly "found" within the U.S. Constitution a "civil right" that for 239 years, legislators and much wiser judges were unable to find.

It would be easy to dismiss Crabb's rants as out of the mainstream Christian thought - the ravings of a lunatic if you will - yet in Alabama, two "Christian" groups are tying to convince the Alabama Supreme Court to defy the U.S. Supreme Court and ignore the Obergefell ruling.  SCOTUS blog looks at this craziness.  Here are excerpts (note the reliance on a ruling from 150+ years ago):

Asked by the Alabama Supreme Court for advice on what to do next on same-sex marriage, two conservative advocacy groups in the state have urged both direct and indirect resistance to the Supreme Court’s ruling mandating a constitutional right for gays and lesbians to wed.  The state court, the groups argued, has the constitutional power to refuse even to accept what the Justices have done, and has a constitutional duty to insulate state officials from legal risk if they do not obey the decision based on a religious objection.

The thirty-three-page brief was filed on Monday by the Alabama Policy Institution, . . . .and by the Alabama Citizens Action Program, an inter-denominational church support group, which earlier had persuaded the state’s highest court to block all of the state’s sixty-eight probate judges from issuing any marriage licenses to same-sex couples, even though all of them were under an order to do so by a federal judge in Mobile.  Depending on what the state court now does, it could set up a new federal-state collision that potentially could go to the Supreme Court.  Lower federal courts could take direct action against state trial court judges, but only the Supreme Court could review a decision by the Alabama Supreme Court on a federal constitutional issue.

The two probate judges said in short briefs that the state court had to respect and follow the binding ruling of the Supreme Court — the same position that Alabama’s attorney general has taken.

Aside from reciting at length from the Obergefell dissenters, the brief was focused heavily on the back-and-forth decisions of Wisconsin’s highest state court and the Supreme Court, over the power of a state court to order the release of an abolitionist, Sherman M. Booth, from federal custody on charges related to his role in arranging the freedom of a runway slave from Missouri.  The slave was never recaptured, but the Supreme Court, in the unanimous decision in Ableman v. Booth, ruled that the state court had no power to interfere with the prosecution of Booth. 

The Alabama groups’ brief noted that the state supreme court refused to accept the Supreme Court’s decision: “In the nearly 157 years since the U.S. Supreme Court’s purported reversal [of two state court rulings], the Wisconsin Supreme Court has never filed or accepted the U.S. Supreme Court’s mandates.”  What the state court did, the brief asserted, was done “in fidelity to the U.S. Constitution.”

When the federal courts engage in “unlawful acts,” the brief contended, state courts have the obligation to resist, even if that sets up “a collision” between state and federal courts.
The two groups devoted the last three pages of their filing to arguing that the state supreme court should do what needs to be done to insulate all state probate judges, and any members of their staffs from any punishment if they refuse to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples because of their religious opposition to such unions. 

As I have noted before, Alabama is far crazier now than when I lived there over 30 years ago.  WTF is in the water?

Civil Servants' Illegal Defiance on Same-Sex Marriage

With "godly Christian" county clerk's across the South in particular refusing to issue marriage licenses to same sex couples based on their "deeply held religious beliefs" we see (i) a total perversion of the concept of religious freedom as envisioned by the Founding Fathers, and (ii) the demand of Christofascists for special rights writ large.  The Founding Fathers NEVER envisioned civil servants being able to refuse to perform their duties based on claimed religious belief because their concept of religious freedom never extended beyond (a) the freedom to worship in a church of one's choosing, (ii) not being required to support a church that one did not belong to, and (iii)  not being barred from civil office based on one's religious affiliation.  The New York Times has an on point main editorial that slams the modern day Pharisee "godly folk."  Here are excerpts:

The Supreme Court could not have been clearer when it ruled late last month that states may not refuse to marry same-sex couples.

“The right to marry is a fundamental right inherent in the liberty of the person,” Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for the court in Obergefell v. Hodges. “Under the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment couples of the same sex may not be deprived of that right and that liberty.”

Most of the country has quickly accepted these words as the law of the land. But in several states where the resistance to marriage equality has been most entrenched, government officials whose job it is to license or perform marriages continue to misunderstand, stall or flatly defy the court. However they justify these tactics, their conduct is illegal and they must stop.

In Hood County, Tex., County Clerk Katie Lang ordered her staff shortly after the ruling not to issue any same-sex marriage licenses because, she said, “I am instilling my religious liberty in this office.”

She later backtracked to say that while she would personally refrain, her staff members were “available and ready” to issue the licenses. But that wasn’t true for Jim Cato and Joe Stapleton, a couple of 27 years who were repeatedly turned away by Ms. Lang because, she told them, the office did not have the updated license forms in hand.

It took a federal lawsuit, which Mr. Cato and Mr. Stapleton filed on Monday, to convince Ms. Lang at last to follow the law and issue the license a few hours later.

[S]ome county clerks in Kentucky and an Alabama probate judge have removed themselves from the marriage business entirely rather than help same-sex couples marry.

These public employees seem to forget that taxpayers pay them to do their job. If doing that job violates their religious beliefs, the best solution is to find another job, as several have done in the days since the Obergefell ruling.

Some same-sex marriage opponents argue that under state religious-freedom laws, a government employee’s beliefs should be accommodated so long as another official is available to carry out the task. But government employees do not have a constitutionally protected right to pick and choose which members of the public they will serve, no matter their religious beliefs.

Not so long ago, of course, government officials invoked religious beliefs to justify all manner of racial segregation and discrimination, including laws banning interracial marriage. The Supreme Court struck down that marriage ban in 1967 in Loving v. Virginia.

It is impossible to imagine any county clerk or judge now claiming a right not to marry an interracial couple based on religious beliefs. And yet, that would be analogous to what these public employees are doing in refusing to serve same-sex couples. The Constitution’s protection of religious freedom simply does not include the right to discriminate against others in the public sphere.

The answer to such behavior is simple.  These clerks need to either do their jobs, or (i) resign, or (ii) go to jail for contempt of court.  Can you imagine anyone other than Christofascists who would think they can simply ignore the law?   Oh, I did I mention that when these people take their oaths of office, they swear to uphold the state and federal constitutions?  Slavish obedience to cherry picked passages in the Bible is nowhere in their oaths of office. 

 

5th Circuit Slams Hold Outs on Gay Marriage

Christofacists and their self-prostituting allies in the Republican Party in Texas, Mississippi and Louisiana have been dragging their feet and making excuses to not commence issuing marriage licenses to same sex couples.  Yesterday, the 5th Circuit reaffirmed the binding nature of the Supreme Court's marriage ruling last week and made it clear that those who continue to hold out are doing so at their own legal risk.  It was but one more defeat for Christofascists who want the special right to ignore court ruling and laws that they don't like.  The Houston Chronicle looks at the 5th Circuit's ruling.  Here are story highlights:

The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday affirmed the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide, a final procedural move that closes the book on a long legal battle over Texas' ban on gay unions.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday legalized gay marriage nationwide, but a separate legal challenge filed against Texas' ban still was pending in a federal appeals court. While most county clerks in Texas already were issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, there was a small chance state officials could have chosen to exploit the case to shield the last few hold-outs refusing to comply.

In a June 30 brief to the court, however, Texas Solicitor General Scott Keller said in light of the Supreme Court ruling it should uphold a lower court's ruling striking down Texas' gay marriage ban.

On Wednesday, the court acknowledged the high court's ruling and told the district court judge to formally rule in favor of the four plaintiffs, a lesbian couple and a gay couple who had challenged Texas' ban on same-sex unions.

Attorney General Ken Paxton on Sunday issued guidance to clerks saying some could refuse to issue licenses to same-sex couples if they believe their religion prohibits them from doing so. County attorneys and civil rights groups blasted that advice, saying it would be illegal for state employees required by law to issue licenses to discriminate based on sexual orientation, and have said it represents a need to remain vigilant in the fight for gay rights.

One can only hope contempt of court orders (and threats of jail time) will be issued against Clerk's refusing to perform their legal duties. 

More Anti-Gay Extremism in Texas

As bad as the Virginia GOP has become, its members look sane and rational compared to the batshit crazy insanity that is now the norm within the Texas GOP.  Leading the charge into La La Land is fat tub of lard state Rep. Cecil Bell (pictured above) who I suspect will sooner or latter be either caught soliciting gay sex or molesting minors.  As I have observed numerous times, NO ONE is so obsessed with gays and gay sex unless they have very serious sexual identity issues of their own that they are desperately trying to hide and/or suppress.  The Texas Observer looks at the bills which seeks to force Texas officials to ignore federal court rulings and basically violate the U.S. Constitution.  Here are excerpts:

The future of the battle over gay marriage in Texas—and possibly in other states—is likely to be determined by the House of Representatives in the next 72 hours, according to LGBT advocates.

House Bill 4105, by Rep. Cecil Bell (R-Magnolia), which is designed to undermine a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in favor of same-sex marriage, is scheduled for a floor vote Tuesday.

Kathy Miller, president of the Texas Freedom Network, said if HB 4105 passes the House, it’s very likely to clear the more conservative Senate before being signed by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott. There were 204 bills ahead of HB 4105 on the House calendar, and the deadline for it to pass the chamber is midnight Thursday.

HB 4105 is one of more than 20 anti-LGBT bills introduced in the 84th Legislature, believed to be the most in the history of any state. However, with time running out in the session, only four have cleared committee, and of those LGBT advocates view HB 4105 as the most significant threat to equality.

The bill would bar state and local employees from issuing, enforcing or recognizing same-sex marriage licenses—and prohibit public monies from being used to do so—regardless of any court order.

LGBT advocates say if the high court rules in favor of same-sex marriage, HB 4105 would set up a showdown between state and federal law, costing Texas millions of dollars in litigation and potentially delaying the effectiveness of the decision by years. They say the bill would unleash chaos similar to what’s been seen in Alabama over same-sex marriage, and generate the type of business backlash associated with passage of an anti-LGBT religious freedom law in Indiana.

Rebecca Robertson, legal and policy director at the ACLU of Texas, said HB 4105 is designed to give Texas another legal basis for challenging same-sex marriage in court: state sovereignty. And she said it could be used as a model by other states for resisting the Supreme Court ruling.

“The last time that we saw similar efforts to undermine court rulings about what the Constitution requires was when Southern states attempted to use the power of the purse to avoid having to comply with federal court orders ordering school desegregation,” Robertson said. “Those tactics were rejected, but obviously it took years of litigation to get to that point. HB 4105 is trying to do the same kind of end run around the Constitution.”

Note the parallels to racists' efforts to defy desegregation orders of the federal courts.  Candidly, I hope a federal judge will hold some of these GOP legislators in contempt of court at some point and lock their asses in jail.  Meanwhile, as frightening as these bills are, I can think of something even more frightening: the image of Cecil Bell naked! . . . Waiting, I 'm running for my barf bag!!

Alabama Chief Justice Halts Same-Sex Marriage; Sets Stage for Removal from Court

Since I lived in Alabama years ago, the state has become more insane with every passing year and no one represents the craziness that has swept the state more than Chief Justice Roy Moore who is utterly unfit for office yet who, because of Alabama's elected judiciary, has been put back on the bench after removal a decade ago for contempt of federal court orders.  Now, Moore is at it again and has ordered every probate judge in Alabama to refuse to issue marriage licenses to same sex couples.  One can only hope that the federal courts will issue a contempt order and have Moore escorted to the nearest jail.  WAFF News has details.  Here are highlights:

Late Sunday night, Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore issued an order in which he instructs state probate judges to neither issue nor recognize a marriage license for same-sex couples.

The order states, "Effective immediately, no Probate Judge of the State of Alabama nor any agent or employee of any Alabama Probate Judge shall issue or recognize a marriage license that is inconsistent with Article 1, Section 36.03, of the Alabama Constitution or § 30-1-19, Ala. Code 1975."

It continues to say that if any probate judge fails to follow the state constitution, "it would be the responsibility of the Chief Executive Officer of the State of Alabama, Governor Robert Bentley... to ensure the execution of the law."

The 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Atlanta rejected the State of Alabama's request to issue a stay pending an appeal of the State's ban on gay marriage. That rejection paves the way for same-sex marriages to begin on Monday.

James Robinson with the Free2Be Foundation, said Sunday night that couples who are planning to wed Monday to not let Moore's edict prevent them from coming down to the planned Wedding Week program taking place outside the Madison County Courthouse.

"I've heard that the Madison County Probate Judge, Tommy Ragland, is going to go forward and do what he said he was going to do, and follow federal orders," Robinson said. "We are anticipating no problems tomorrow morning."

Officials confirmed licenses would indeed be issued according to the federal overturn.

The Human Rights Campaign blasted Moore's order. In a statement Sunday night, they called his order "in clear violation of all codes of legal ethics, boundaries of jurisdiction, and moral decency."

Moore needs to be locked up today.   Meanwhile, a column in one Alabama newspaper is suggesting that Moore is perhaps a self-loathing closeted gay!

Anti-Gay Bigotry Kicks Off 2015 in Florida

The "godly Christians" who hold the office of county clerk in Duval, Clay, and Baker Counties, Florida, have kicked off 2015 with a display of the pervasive sense of special rights and being above the law that is a hallmark of conservative Christians across the nation.  These three bigots (pictured above) have declared that they will end all courthouse weddings rather than have same sex marriages performed.  All three need to be cited with contempt of court, do some jail time and be removed from office.   The fellow bigots on the staffs also need to join the ranks of the unemployed.  A harsh example needs to be made that Christians are bound by the same laws as the rest of the citizenry and, if one cannot respect the legal rights of others, then get the hell out of public office and/or out of the public employment sector. Period.  The Savannah Morning News has details.  Here are highlights:

If same-sex marriage is allowed across the state, Duval Clerk of Courts Ronnie Fussell, Clay Clerk Tara Green and Baker Clerk Stacie Harvey will have no choice but to issue marriage licenses to gay couples. But to avoid performing ceremonies for them, these clerks have decided to end all courthouse weddings.

Fussell says the decision came after a series of discussion with members of his staff who currently officiate wedding ceremonies. None of them, including Fussell, felt comfortable doing gay weddings so they decided to end the practice all together.

“It was decided as a team, as an office, this would be what we do so that there wouldn’t be any discrimination,” Fussell said. “The easiest way is to not do them at all.”

Equality Florida co-founder and chief executive Nadine Smith was shocked to hear that certain counties would stop allowing courthouse wedding because of the possibility gay couples would want to use the service.

“I think it would be outrageous for clerks to change the rules simply because gay couples are getting married,” she said.

Smith, an advocate for gay and lesbian rights, predicted the policy change would backfire and be characterized as spiteful and mean.

Last Valentine’s Day, Fussell personally officiated a mass wedding for 12 heterosexual couples in the courthouse rotunda. He waived the ceremony fee, gave each bride flowers and offered a cupcake reception.

With the possibility that he would be forced to include gay couples who wanted to participate this year, there will be no weddings under the dome or the in the “wedding arbor” room that is most often used for these ceremonies.

Residents of Baker, Clay and Duval counties who want to avoid usual wedding expenses will now have to find a minister or notary to perform the ceremony after they pick up their marriage license, but a place other than the courthouse.

As I said, fire all of these assholes.  No special rights for Christian bigots.