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Monday, May 10, 2004 Edwards slams abuse at Democrats' dinner By Gregory Korte The Cincinnati Enquirer COLUMBUS - The only way to send a message to the rest of the world that Americans emphatically reject the humiliating abuse of Iraqi prisoners is to elect John F. Kerry as president, Sen. John Edwards told Ohio Democrats at their annual dinner. "All of us - it goes without saying - condemn it. It goes against the values we hold as Americans. Just think about the damage it's doing to our image around the world," Edwards said Saturday night, adding that the prisoner...

The mainstream media have two complementary tactics in covering homosexual-related news: Flooding the zone with stories portraying gays as victims or heroes, and damming up the flow of information, when it would present gays in a less than favorable light. And sometimes both tactics are used within the same story.Consider coverage of the illegal same-sex “weddings” in San Francisco and New Paltz, New York. Several stories on the New Paltz “weddings” mentioned Tom Duane, an openly gay New York State Senator, who represents the Chelsea section of Manhattan.On March 2, Ulster County District Attorney Donald Williams charged New Paltz Mayor...

<p>IN THE Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court's dueling opinions on same-sex marriage, each side places the burden of proof on the other. The majority in the Goodridge decision insists there is "no rational reason" for defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman. The minority chides the majority for its "blind faith" that there are no potential dangers to so radical a change. Both sides lack evidence on the real-world effects of same-sex marriage. Yet evidence is in. Marriage is dying in Scandinavia, which has had marriage-like same-sex registered partnerships for over a decade.</p>

Ninth-Grade Sex-Ed Program Teaches About Beastiality, Threesomes POSTED: 9:31 am EST February 13, 2004 COPENHAGEN, Denmark -- Some sex ed goes a little too far, even for open-minded Danes.  The Danish government halted the distribution 60,000 CD-ROMs for sexual education classes throughout the country because some of the content was deemed unacceptable, Health Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen said Thursday. The 60,000 discs, intended for ninth graders, contained information about threesomes, bestiality and partners relieving themselves on each other while having sex. Distribution of the material was scheduled to start next week. "What is the point of telling children and young...

ABBOTSFORD, B.C. - An Anglican bishop in British Columbia has closed a church that won't support same-sex unions. Church officials say the Holy Cross Church in Abbotsford, B.C., brought the closure upon itself. Ronald Harrison, executive archdeacon of the Diocese of New Westminster, told the National Post that by declaring itself "independent" the church lost its funding from the archdiocese and eventually had to be closed. Despite the timing of the closure, the church's congregation intends to celebrate mass on Christmas Day. "Can you imagine abandoning my people at this point and not serving them communion on Christmas Day?" said...

Fallen AngelUnder the Reverend Michael Piazza, the world's largest gay and lesbian church soared, only to tumble into divisiveness and anger BY J.D. SPARKS ––––––––People flocked by the hundreds to Cathedral of Hope to hear the sermons of senior pastor Michael Piazza. –––––––– Preparation for Sunday-morning services at the Cathedral of Hope resembles backstage on opening night of a Broadway production. The halls bustle with activity as volunteer coordinators and staff tick off their to-do lists. Everything must be perfect, from preparing urns of coffee to ushering in latecomers to ordering multimedia presentations that flash headlines, film clips and still...

<p>There are a few NBA coaches you wouldn't want to be right now. You wouldn't want to be Cleveland's Paul Silas, who can't figure out what to do with Ricky Davis or how to break the Cavs' almost surreal inability to win on the road. (Tuesday night's loss at Denver being their 32nd in a row over two seasons.) You wouldn't want to be Eddie Jordan, who (like Doug Collins before him) can't figure out how to get through to Kwame Brown, who now blames his mediocre play on his not "getting noticed" by his teammates. Let's not even get into whether you'd want to be Johnny Davis, recently appointed to rescue the sinking ship that is the Orlando Magic, or Mike Dunleavy, stuck in the sloggy mess that is the Los Angeles Clippers.</p>

IS THERE A GAY AGENDA? omosexual activists often scoff at the idea that a "gay agenda" exists. Please read the following and decide for yourself: In February 1972 the National Coalition of Gay Organizations met at the Armitage Avenue United Methodist Church in Chicago. An invitation had been sent out to 495 homosexual organizations across the U.S. to come and prepare a "gay stance for the 1972 elections." About 200 individuals from 18 states representing 85 organizations showed up for the two-day event. Conference participants adopted the 1972 Gay Rights Platform, which included 17 federal and state "demands." DEMANDS: Federal:...

Greetings from a fellow FReeper! I am a fervent debater, and most anybody who's ever met me in person can testify to that. One of the most controversial issues I have been debating lately has been gay marriage. Does the U.S. government have a right to ban gay marriage? Can America justify making homosexuality illegal? As a proud Christian, I believe whole-heartedly in the Bible. There isn't the slightest doubt in my mind that the Bible finds homosexuality to be a highly immoral practice. However, when I am arguing with atheists or followers of other religions, especially over a political...

November 16, 2003FRANK RICHAngels, Reagan and AIDS in America onight is the night when Americans might have tuned into Part 1 of "The Reagans" on CBS. But the joke is on the whiners who forced the mini-series off the air. Just three weeks from tonight, HBO will present the first three-hour installment of Mike Nichols's film version of Tony Kushner's "Angels in America," starring Al Pacino and Meryl Streep. (Part 2 is a week later.) This epic is, among other things, a searing indictment of how the Reagan administration's long silence stoked the plague of AIDS in the 1980's....

A bishop who angered homosexuals by suggesting they seek a psychiatric cure is to be investigated by police to see if his outspoken views amount to a criminal offence, it emerged yesterday. The Right Reverend Doctor Peter Forster, the Bishop of Chester, infuriated homosexuals both in and out of the Church of England when he said last week that they could and should seek medical help to "reorientate" themselves. The Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement [LGCM] accused him of putting forward an "offensive" and "scandalous" argument from a bygone age. Cheshire Police have said that they are to investigate his...

The evidence that being gay is not a choice undermines the arguments of homophobes, writes John Shelby Spong. It was Professor Sarah Coakley, an Anglican theologian at Harvard University, who described the church as being something like a swimming pool. "Most of the noise," she said, "comes from the shallow end." That is exactly my sense when I listen to the debate over the issue of homosexuality taking place today in the Christian Church in general and within my Anglican communion in particular. The noise, and it is very loud, comes from those who define this issue as a moral...

Tuesday, November 14, 2000 254 'boy words' -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Editor's note: The following column contains content of a sexual nature that some readers may find objectionable. Those debating whether homosexuals should be scout leaders should take a look at the dictionary to help decide whether or not homosexuals have an inordinate interest in young boys. Or is it really as gay rights leaders say -- they just labor in young boys' best interests. Let's look it up and see if pederasts (men who sexually assault boys) comprise just a small cadre within the much larger male homosexual population. The dictionary I...

It used to be said, before gays "came out," that they were in "the closet." I wish they would go back into it. The rest of us have been in "Pandora's Box ever since. Not that long ago, in kinder, gentler times, when grown adults actually kept their private business private, and fringe rebels did not get in everyone's face to make their point, what is now considered to be an alternative lifestyle" was in fact, a deviancy. The only thing that has changed is that in 1973, (the same notorious year that also gave us Roe vs. Wade) the...

MILWAUKEE -- Just a week after the Episcopal Church approved an openly gay bishop and let individual churches decide whether to bless same-sex unions, the nation's largest Lutheran denomination convened Monday to pick up a similar debate. For the 5.1 million-member Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the discussion of homosexual marriage and openly gay pastors has its own unique twists and timeline. Homosexuals already may become pastors if they agree to remain celibate. And individual churches may bless same-sex unions despite a non-binding statement made a decade ago by the church's 66 bishops condemning such ceremonies. The Evangelical Lutherans' discussion...

WAL-MART ANNOUNCES PLANS TO PROTECT GAY EMPLOYEES; Has expanded its antidiscrimination policy... DEVELOPING...

When gays rose up against police during the Stonewall Riots in 1969, they were living in a country that considered them criminals. But when their descendants in the struggle for equal rights march down Fifth Ave. in today's Gay Pride Parade, they will do so in a nation whose Supreme Court has forcefully ruled that they are "entitled to respect for their private lives." In the matter of Lawrence vs. Texas, the justices ruled 6 to 3 Thursday that the sodomy law in Texas, which criminalized consensual sexual activity between homosexuals, was unconstitutional. But the court didn't leave it at...

June 8, 2003 New Hampshire Episcopalians Choose Gay Bishop, and ConflictBy LAURIE GOODSTEIN ONCORD, N.H., June 7 — Episcopalians in the Diocese of New Hampshire today elected as their leader the first openly gay bishop anywhere in the worldwide Anglican communion, a step likely to roil the church in the United States and England, and deepen the disaffection of the more conservative Anglican churches in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The bishop-elect, the Rev. Canon V. Gene Robinson, who had developed a loyal following here in 16 years as assistant to the current bishop, was elected from among four...

Robert P. Voelker has had a long career helping others, in emergency medical services and several volunteer roles. He was a member of the Lancaster Volunteer Ambulance Corps. He's volunteered for the Town Line Fire Company. He worked for Rural/Metro Medical Services for 15 months. And he served as the leader of an Explorer Post for future emergency medical workers. But now Voelker is under arrest, accused of using some of those positions to sodomize boys. He surrendered Tuesday to Lancaster village and town authorities, charged with four counts of third-degree sodomy, a felony. He's accused of sexually abusing two...