Posted on 05/22/2010 5:36:04 PM PDT by reaganairport
If the state's 61-year-old star witness in defense of Florida's gay adoption ban looks laughable for vacationing with a 20-year-old gay male escort, Attorney General Bill McCollum looks pretty foolish himself.
George Rekers got payments totaling $120,693 in 2008 and 2009 to testify as a supposed expert against Martin Gill, the Miami man who wants to adopt the two brothers in his foster care. When the Florida Department of Children and Families refused, citing the 1977 ban on adoptions by gays, Mr. Gill sued, and won. The state has appealed.
After the embarrassing revelation two weeks ago about Mr. Rekers, who has claimed that homosexuals can be "cured," Mr. McCollum claimed that the DCF had made the decision to hire the quack. Mr. Rekers has no standing in any credible organization of psychiatrists or psychologists.
As the online newspaper Florida Tribune reported, however, in July 2007, Mr. McCollum sent a letter to then-DCF Secretary Bob Butterworth, recommending that he hire Mr. Rekers. "Our attorneys handling this case have searched long and hard for other expert witnesses with comparable expertise to Dr. Rekers," Mr. McCollum wrote, "and have been unable to identify any who would be available for this case."
That "long and hard" search missed or disregarded the comments of an Arkansas judge named Timothy White. He presided over a 2004 trial challenging that state's rules on gays adopting children. Judge White called Mr. Rekers' testimony "extremely suspect," saying that his "priority is his personal belief over his function as an expert provider of fact." Mr. Rekers' testimony, Judge White concluded, was worthless. Still, Mr. Rekers billed Arkansas $200,000. The state appealed, and Mr. Rekers settled for $60,000.
"I wouldn't hire (Mr. Rekers) again," Mr. McCollum said, "if I knew what I know today, but I didn't know that then, and neither did anybody else." In fact, a cursory check of Mr. Rekers' background would have turned up the Arkansas controversy. And here's what the Miami-Dade County judge who overturned Florida's gay adoption ban said of Mr. Rekers: His "strong ideological and theological convictions … are not consistent with the science."
If you support Florida's most-restrictive-in-the-nation gay adoption ban, you're mad at Mr. McCollum for recommending such a fool for the case. If you oppose this child-hostile ban, you're mad at Mr. McCollum for wasting the state's money trying to defend the indefensible. Mr. McCollum is running for governor. He says that he will find "the best and the brightest" to recommend ideas on all key issues. In George Rekers, he found the worst and the dimmest.
Time for one of my favorite conspiracy theories...
Homosexuals have deliberately infiltrated Republican, conservative, and Christian organizations in order to make it seem that members of these groups are all hypocrites.
Remember, folks, you read it here first!
Democrat straw grabbing.
Thanks for finding and posting this.
Added full name keyword.
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