Eric Holder on Hate Crimes Legislation

Some people, such as John Boehner, believe that groups of people, such as gay people, shouldn't be protected under special legislation, that murder is murder. But that's not true. Murdering a person motivated by hatred for a group of people is horrendous. It's also terrorism because it's meant to frighten large populations of people. It requires special penalties. There is no place for hate crimes in modern society and it should be dealt with as such.
Believe it or not, conservatives are arguing against legislation because they're afraid that their faux-Christian selves will be busted for speaking out against homosexuality. If conservatives have nothing better to do than rail against homosexuality, they're being very un-Christian. They need to get their flock in order in so many other ways. But punishing conservatives for preaching against gay people is not the purpose of the bill. The bill is for that conservative preacher who went out and flogged someone because that person was gay:

A hate crimes bill has passed the House and is expected to pass the Senate as early as this week. Conservative Christian leaders such as James Dobson, Pat Robertson and Donald Wildmon hate it.

In June, 60 religious conservatives signed a letter asking senators to filibuster the hate-crimes bill for fear it would "criminalize preaching the Gospel and put preachers in the cross-hairs." Christian Right groups have been sounding the alarm ever since. "Hate Crimes Bill Threatens Free Speech," warns the Christian Broadcasting Network. "Pastors could be prosecuted for preaching the biblical view of homosexuality," intones Focus on the Family. WaPo

Obama's Plan for National Day of Prayer?

Update 5-6: CNN has a story here.
Update 5-9: His plan: a proclamation.
National Day of Prayer is May 7 this year and it's a time when people gather to pray for the country.
Usually, the evangelicals have the run of the day. I can't imagine that Obama would follow Bush tradition by letting the event be led by the likes of Focus on the Family types.
Focus on the Family has been hateful and very un-Christian like. We need more representation on a day of prayer, people of different faiths, which I know, can be hard for faux Christians to handle.

Every year since 2001, then-President George W. Bush's calendar had been cleared on the first Thursday in May to mark the National Day of Prayer in the White House East Room with prominent evangelicals.

Now the Obama White House is facing questions of inside-the-Beltway etiquette: Should President Obama maintain the open door to conservative critics like James and Shirley Dobson, and if so, should they accept?

Or, will the White House have an official observance at all? Read the rest at WaPo

The Dobsons haven't heard a peep. Whew:

With those questions unanswered less than two weeks before the annual observance, the National Day of Prayer Task Force, headed by Shirley Dobson, is moving ahead with other plans.

"We're not the coordinators of that event," said Brian Toon, vice chairman of the task force. "That's controlled completely by the White House. We have been honored to be guests at the event in the past, but we have not heard a peep from them."

Focus on the Family Lays Off Workers After Prop 8

By way of an angry Frank Rich (read below), Focus on the Family is laying off workers after pouring money into passing Prop 8. The group, headed by James Dobson, are conservatives, the Palin kind. Focus on the Family co-sponsored this event. Some people say Dobson and Rick Warren share the same intolerance, which is why so many are opposed to Warren's participation at Obama's inauguration.

Colo Independent: Focus on the Family is poised to announce major layoffs to its Colorado Springs-based ministry and media empire today. The cutbacks come just weeks after the group pumped more than half a million dollars into the successful effort to pass a gay-marriage ban in California.

Critics are holding up the layoffs, which come just two months after the organization’s last round of dismissals, as a sad commentary on the true priorities of the ministry.

“If I were their membership I would be appalled,” said Mark Lewis, a longtime Colorado Springs activist who helped organize a Proposition 8 protest in Colorado Springs on Saturday. “That [Focus on the Family] would spend any money on anything that’s obviously going to get blocked in the courts is just sad. [Prop. 8] is guaranteed to lose, in the long run it doesn’t have a chance — it’s just a waste of money.”

In all, Focus pumped $539,000 in cash and another $83,000 worth of non-monetary support into the measure to overturn a California Supreme Court ruling that allowed gays and lesbians to marry in that state. The group was the seventh-largest donor to the effort in the country. The cash contributions are equal to the salaries of 19 Coloradans earning the 2008 per capita income of $29,133.

Here's Frank Rich, who's angry at Obama for inviting Rick Warren to the inauguration:

But we’re not there yet. Warren’s defamation of gay people illustrates why, as does our president-elect’s rationalization of it. When Obama defends Warren’s words by calling them an example of the “wide range of viewpoints” in a “diverse and noisy and opinionated” America, he is being too cute by half. He knows full well that a “viewpoint” defaming any minority group by linking it to sexual crimes like pedophilia is unacceptable.

It is even more toxic in a year when that group has been marginalized and stripped of its rights by ballot initiatives fomenting precisely such fears. “You’ve got to give them hope” was the refrain of the pioneering 1970s gay politician Harvey Milk, so stunningly brought back to life by Sean Penn on screen this winter. Milk reminds us that hope has to mean action, not just words.

By the historical standards of presidential hubris, Obama’s disingenuous defense of his tone-deaf invitation to Warren is nonetheless a relatively tiny infraction. It’s no Bay of Pigs. But it does add an asterisk to the joyous inaugural of our first black president. It’s bizarre that Obama, of all people, would allow himself to be on the wrong side of this history.

Obama Responds to Dobson

Earlier in the day, evangelical James Dobson had a fit.
Obama responds and his supporters respond:

The Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell, a Methodist pastor from Texas and longtime supporter of President Bush who has endorsed Obama, said Tuesday he belongs to a group of religious leaders who, working independently of Obama's campaign, launched a Web site to counter Dobson at http://www.jamesdobsondoesntspeakforme.com. The site highlights statements from Obama and Dobson and asks visitors to compare them.
Caldwell said he has great respect for Dobson's advocacy for families, but said the criticism of Obama was "a bit over the top" and "crossed the line."
"There has been a call for a higher level of politics and politicking," Caldwell said. "So to attack at this level is inappropriate and I think unacceptable and we at least want to hold everybody accountable."
Tom Minnery, a senior vice president at Focus on the Family, responded: "Without question, Dr. Dobson is speaking for millions of evangelicals because his understanding of the Bible is thoroughly evangelical."

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Dobson Stakes Claim to Holy Bible

The evangelical leader James Dobson accuses Obama of making a "fruitcake" out of the Bible. I like his word choice.

Obama's right. Misinterpretation of the Bible has led to crimes against humanity, hatred of gay people or anyone who isn't a white Christian.

It's called religious extremism and it can be had in all religions. People like Dobson make the world more dangerous.

CNN: In comments aired on his radio show Tuesday, Focus on the Family founder James Dobson criticizes the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee for comments he made in a June 2006 speech to the liberal Christian group renewal.

WATCH Dobson says Obama has a "fruitcake interpretation" of the Constitution

In the two-year old speech, Obama suggests it would be impractical to govern based solely on the word of the Bible, noting some passages suggest slavery is permissible and eating shellfish is disgraceful.

"Which passages of scripture should guide our public policy?" Obama asks in the speech. "Should we go with Leviticus, which suggests slavery is okay and that eating shellfish is an abomination. Or we could go with Deuteronomy which suggests stoning your child if he strays from the faith or should we just stick to the Sermon on the Mount."

"So before we get carried away, let's read our Bible now," Obama also said to cheers. "Folks haven't been reading their Bible."

On the radio show Tuesday, Dobson said Obama should not be referencing antiquated dietary codes and passages from the Old Testament that are no longer relevant to the teachings of the New Testament.

"I think he's deliberately distorting the tradition understanding of the Bible to fit his own worldview, his own confused theology," Dobson said, later adding that Obama is "dragging biblical understanding through the gutter."