Nick Baumann at Mother Jones links to a few others and makes his own good point about the new Ugandan law that calls for executing gays:

Part of what I was trying to get at in my post is that one reason conservative writers might be reluctant to make detailed arguments against the Ugandan law is that doing so would force them to confront the more unpleasant parts of their coalition. It’s not good politics (or particularly pleasant) to be seen associating with people who need to be convinced that gays shouldn’t be executed or that slavery is bad.

That’s true, but I think we can carry that a step further. There are significant number of people opposed to gay rights who believe that, for example, gay men are-literally-trying to convert American youth to homosexuality, by “preying” on and recruiting boys with gay sex. To them, “gay” and “pedophile” are synonymous. As with the other paranoid fantasies of the American right, the enemy’s goals are framed in radical and apocalyptic terms. Some of this is opportunism by people who are opposed to gay rights, but don’t literally believe that gay men want to have sex with children. But some people do believe it, literally. So when you characterize the “gay agenda” as a threat to America’s children, who wouldn’t believe that extreme action, and perhaps even violence, are the appropriate response? Fortunately civil society in our nation is developed to an extent where killing someone you are opposed to politically is an exceptional act, even (mostly) amongst those who hold hardened opinions. But it’s fair to say that Ugandan civil society is not as highly developed (if I may use a word that implies judgment) as ours. So if you, an American evangelical, run over to Uganda and start telling people that gays, already maligned in Ugandan society, are trying to recruit children with gay sex and want to run roughshod over the rights of people who aren’t gay, what do you imagine the response will be? It will be to react to that threat in a direct and forceful manner, a manner that is logically related to the dire nature of the threat.

So what we have is a logical disconnect between the apocalyptic picture that the anti-gay movement presents, and the action that they call for in response. Anyone who believes, literally, that gays are a threat to American children should probably react the same way that conservative Ugandans have. The reason that anti-gay conservatives can’t attack the Ugandan legislation forcefully is because it would require them to say to people who believe these apocalyptic arguments, essentially, “Well see, all of these dire threats are true…but it’s still wrong to kill people.” And that just doesn’t make a whole heck of a lot of sense. So now they find themselves in the position of either attacking the Ugandan legislation and thus implicitly undermining the beliefs sincerely held my millions of conservative Americans, or remaining (mostly) silent in the face of this travesty. A travesty which, by the way, probably doesn’t bother people who believe, literally, that the gay agenda is a giant conspiracy to convert children to homosexuality.

The other day I dismissed this puff piece in the NY Times about Robert George, the “big thinker” of the Christian right. Today Andrew Sullivan has more to say about George’s “new” natural law approach to homosexuality, which seems awfully similar to the old “it’s gross” approach to homosexuality:

On marriage, it seems to me that George is right about something: heterosexual intercourse within marriage that begets children is a vital, sacred, wondrous and central fact of human life. I’ve never doubted that. I’ve never even argued that the sacrament of matrimony in Catholic tradition could be anything but heterosexual. Where I differ most from George is how one approaches the diversity of nature around this central – and largely civil – human institution.

George is selectively flexible on this (for an online discussion, see Jon Rowe’s post here). He can see oral sex, for example, as okay even if it is not procreative, as long as it is somehow integrated into the procreative, i.e. foreplay. He is even prepared to endorse the sex lives of the infertile or post-menopausal, although both groups obviously have no natural way to procreate by sex. Why? Because they are engaging in something he calls “procreative in form,” as long as he is on top and rubber-free. If it looks like heterosexual procreation, even if it actually isn’t, it’s kosher. Maybe if a man and a man had sex with one dressed as a woman and retained rigid gender roles, they might squeak through George’s “procreative in form” loophole. But one suspects the loophole is there not to express compassion for the straight but to retain an iron-clad exclusion for the gay.

If the whole thing sounds like convenient sophistry to you, you’re not alone.

In fact, it is very hard to see what George’s argument means unless it can be reduced to the idea that sex for the infertile is moral merely because they are heterosexual, and that sex and love for homosexuals is immoral merely because they are homosexuals. So sexual orientation is the critical category here, not procreation or nature as it is actually found, and the result is to retain a stigma and legal discrimination against homosexuals – simply because they are what they are.

Well yes, that’s what all arguments against homosexuality boil down to. It’s wrong…because it’s wrong. This is why the argument against gay marriage, and gay rights in general, is ultimately a losing argument. And thank Robert George’s God for that.

Last month I wrote about the “Manhattan Declaration”, wherein a unified front of Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox leaders got together to petulantly whine that nobody pays enough attention to abortion and who’s sleeping with who anymore. This NY Times Magazine article profiles Robert George, a Princeton professor who was one of the lead authors of that declaration and is touted as the “conservative Christian big-thinker” by the article (that’s actually the title of the article.) What challenging and novel ideas does George bring to the table?

Last spring, George was invited to address an audience that included many bishops at a conference in Washington. He told them with typical bluntness that they should stop talking so much about the many policy issues they have taken up in the name of social justice. They should concentrate their authority on “the moral social” issues like abortion, embryonic stem-cell research and same-sex marriage, where, he argued, the natural law and Gospel principles were clear. To be sure, he said, he had no objections to bishops’ “making utter nuisances of themselves” about poverty and injustice, like the Old Testament prophets, as long as they did not advocate specific remedies. They should stop lobbying for detailed economic policies like progressive tax rates, higher minimum wage and, presumably, the expansion of health care — “matters of public policy upon which Gospel principles by themselves do not resolve differences of opinion among reasonable and well-informed people of good will,” as George put it.

In the American culture wars, George wants to redraw the lines. It is the liberals, he argues, who are slaves to a faith-based “secularist orthodoxy” of “feminism, multiculturalism, gay liberationism and lifestyle liberalism.” Conservatives, in contrast, speak from the high ground of nonsectarian public reason. George is the leading voice for a group of Catholic scholars known as the new natural lawyers. He argues for the enforcement of a moral code as strictly traditional as that of a religious fundamentalist. What makes his natural law “new” is that it disavows dependence on divine revelation or biblical Scripture — or even history and anthropology. Instead, George rests his ethics on a foundation of “practical reason”: “invoking no authority beyond the authority of reason itself,” as he put it in one essay.

Huh. Well, it seems to me like this guy isn’t so much a “big-thinker” as he’s the smartest guy who thinks the same stupid, moralizing and paternalistic crap as people like James Dobson. Different road, same result I guess, only everybody thinks you’re smarty-pants if you constantly refer to “natural law” and name drop Aquinas.  Here’s the always-worthy-of-a-read Fred Clark on this “doctrine” and it’s proponents:

Their own awesomeness is a topic the authors address with relentless relish. Everything else in the document is merely a foil for this central subject. The threat of The Gay is grave, ominous and potentially world-altering, they warn, repeatedly, before reassuring us that their heroic resolve and moral superiority will save the day. Even the passages in which they luxuriate in their own massive humility are saturated with this swaggering self-regard.

This all-consuming self-absorption coupled with an utter lack of self-awareness plays like something from a Christopher Guest movie. I’m only half-convinced at this point that Robert George is even a real person and not a Fred Willard improv run amok. The authors possess that same remarkable knack for straight-faced seriousness while making uproariously ridiculous assertions.

And at one level it’s impossible to view these pretentious peacocks, these Malvolios grimacing and strutting in their yellow stockings, without succumbing to the derisive laughter they deserve. Such self-inflation demands deflation. And anyway it can’t be helped. I mean, just listen to them:

We pledge to each other, and to our fellow believers, that no power on earth, be it cultural or political, will intimidate us into silence or acquiescence.

The whole thing is like that — like a bad parody of the St. Crispin’s Day speech from Henry V. Except of course that Henry was outnumbered. Here instead we have a group of powerful elites, men at the center of political, cultural, academic and ecclesiastical privilege bemoaning their oppression at the hands of the homosexuals and religious minorities they claim run the world. They are overlords posing as underdogs. (It’s hard out there for a pope.)

[...]

So ultimately, even though we’re being treated to grand examples of the Blowhard Fool — a comic type that dates back before Plautus — this isn’t funny. And formally, structurally, we’re dealing with tragedy. There is no resolution, no reconciliation, no marriage. (Shakespearean shorthand: Tragedy means everyone dies; comedy means everyone gets married.) Indeed, the whole production here is an explicit rejection of the possibility of reconciliation and an adamant denial of marriage. So this isn’t comedy. We can’t help but laugh at these tragic clowns, but the laughter has a bitter aftertaste.

The important thing here, though, is to recognize why these buffoons have embraced this buffoonery. Their silliness is not a sideshow. The pompousness is the purpose. The fatuousness is the function. This is, as the kids on the Internets like to say, a feature, not a bug.

The anti-gay, anti-abortion, anti-religious minority Manhattan Declaration is not primarily about opposing any of those things. That’s all just collateral damage. The primary purpose of the Manhattan Declaration, its raison d’etre, is to help the authors and signatories convince themselves that they’re better than everyone else. The ridiculous, overweening pride is what it’s for.

Chuck Colson, Robert George and Timothy George are blitzed out of their minds on the drug of smug. They’re hard-core umbrage junkies, snorting offendedness, mainlining grievance, freebasing uncut self-righteousness.

Big thinker indeed.

Inspired by the example of Martin Luther King Jr., Christian culture warriors declare that they will stand together as one in an attempt to suppress the rights of those whose conduct they do not condone:

…45 evangelical, Roman Catholic and Orthodox Christian leaders have signed a declaration saying they will not cooperate with laws that they say could be used to compel their institutions to participate in abortions, or to bless or in any way recognize same-sex couples.

“We pledge to each other, and to our fellow believers, that no power on earth, be it cultural or political, will intimidate us into silence or acquiescence,” it says.

The manifesto, to be released on Friday at the National Press Club in Washington, is an effort to rejuvenate the political alliance of conservative Catholics and evangelicals that dominated the religious debate during the administration of President George W. Bush. The signers include nine Roman Catholic archbishops and the primate of the Orthodox Church in America.

They want to signal to the Obama administration and to Congress that they are still a formidable force that will not compromise on abortion, stem-cell research or gay marriage. They hope to influence current debates over health care reform, the same-sex marriage bill in Washington, D.C., and the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which would prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation.

They say they also want to speak to younger Christians who have become engaged in issues like climate change and global poverty, and who are more accepting of homosexuality than their elders. They say they want to remind them that abortion, homosexuality and religious freedom are still paramount issues.

“We argue that there is a hierarchy of issues,” said Charles Colson, a prominent evangelical who founded Prison Fellowship after serving time in prison for his role in the Watergate scandal. “A lot of the younger evangelicals say they’re all alike. We’re hoping to educate them that these are the three most important issues.”

Don’t forget kids, millions may live in poverty or die of hunger, the global economy is a wreck, climate change threatens all of nations, but the real issues of consequence are the sexual practices of a minority of Americans!

Ira C. Lupu, a law professor at George Washington University Law School, said it was “fear-mongering” to suggest that religious institutions would be forced to do any of those things. He said they are protected by the First Amendment, and by conscience clauses that allow medical professionals and hospitals to opt out of performing certain procedures, and religious exemptions written into same-sex marriage bills.

Well right, but you can’t get anybody’s attention or sympathy (or votes) be moralizing at them, at least not openly. Far better to pretend you are the oppressed minority, so as to shield your bigory and more grand-standing in the guise of religious tolerance! A technique which, by the way, only works when most people actually agree with your intolerance.

Another moment of note for gays and American Christianity:

After an emotional debate over the authority of Scripture and the limits of biblical inclusiveness, leaders of the country’s largest Lutheran denomination voted Friday to allow gay men and lesbians in committed relationships to serve as members of the clergy.

The vote made the denomination, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the latest mainline Protestant church to permit such ordinations, contributing to a halting sense of momentum on the issue within liberal Protestantism.

By a vote of 559 to 451, delegates to the denomination’s national assembly in Minneapolis approved a resolution declaring that the church would find a way for people in “publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous same-gender relationships” to serve as official ministers. (The church already allows celibate gay men and lesbians to become members of the clergy.)

Conservatives members of the church reacted in the same manner as conservative members of the Episcopal church, with threats to leave the denomination:

“I think we have stepped beyond what the word of God allows,” said the Rev. Rebecca M. M. Heber of Heathrow, Fla., who said she was going to reconsider her membership.

Conservative dissenters said they saw various options, including leaving for another Lutheran denomination or creating their own unified body.

[...]

Before the vote but sensing its outcome, the Rev. Timothy Housholder of Cottage Grove, Minn., introduced himself as a rostered pastor in the church, “at least for a few more hours,” implying that he would leave the denomination and eliciting a gasp from some audience members.

“Here I stand, broken and mournful, because of this assembly and her actions,” Mr. Housholder said.

Of course they will cite to the Bible, and to non-orthodox interpretations of it as their justification for talk of leaving, but of course non-orthodoxy doesn’t seem to be a huge issue until it involves gays and gay rights. I’m bound to offend someone with this comparison but to me, that argument seems vaguely reminiscent to arguments that the Civil War was really about “states’ rights.”

1. A story in yesterday’s Washington Post reveals that the Obama administration is considering drafting an executive order asserting the President’s authority to detain terrorist suspects indefinitely without any judicial process. The White House denies that a draft order exists (via John Cole) thought there is no denial that they are considering such a move. I found this quote from the Post article to be particularly odd:

“…one administration official suggested that the White House is already trying to build support for an order. “Civil liberties groups have encouraged the administration, that if a prolonged detention system were to be sought, to do it through executive order,” the official said.

First of all, I would like this official to find me one civil liberties group that has argued for such a thing. Perhaps what he/she meant is that they’d rather have an executive order than a Bush-like assertion of authority that merely cites the Constitution, but there’s essentially no difference between the two approaches legally. Also, they are arguing that such an order would permit them to get Congress’ acquiescence in the closing of Guantanamo, an effort stymied by the various Democratic and Republican bed-wetters on the Hill. Which basically would amount to Obama saying to Congress “I double-pledge to hold terrorists forever if you will please let me shut down Guantanamo.” But it seems to me like sending them Bermuda an the South Pacific was working out alright.

2. Gays and Lesbiasn are-rightly-angered as well at the Obama administration’s shuffling approach towards gay rights. Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, remains in place, the Obama DOJ is arguing before the courts to retain DOMA, and Obama’s decision to extend federal benefits to domestic partners was praised until advocates realized that those benefits didn’t include health care (doubly ironic, considering the President’s present political battle over a national health care plan.) Arnold King, while not citing specifically to the administration’s approach to gay rights, makes the point that the Obama administration has many agendas, but appears satisfied to half-ass meeting their goals on any of them.

3. For some conservative Christians, Sanford’s weeping and rending of garments is enough for them to get over his infidelity and bizarre behavior. I’m sure the fact that he’s a Republican politician has absolutely no bearing on their attitudes. But stories like this make it clear that for all of Sanford’s talk, he was determined to continuing playing his own staff, his own state, and especially his own wife, until he got caught. Politically connected religious leaders and politicians may be quick to forgive, but other conservatives? Not so much.

4. Bob Herbert takes a look at the economy and calls a spade (a jobless recovery) a spade (no recovery at all.)

5. The Iranian government appears to be gaining the upper-hand against the protesters, though it also seems clear that the massive protests have revealed divisions in the leadership that may indicate long-term change.

6. Upon the news of Michael Jackson’s death, I found myself wondering what condition his estate was in and upon whom would fall the unfortunate task of trying to sort it out. It appears he had at least one will, though no one knows it’s contents yet. I predict there will be a gargantuan battle over his estate given the value still attached to his name and his music and the massive debt attached to much of his property, but I doubt it will interest the public as much as Anna Nicole Smith’s highly publicized probate did, what with the absence of a childhood custody dispute. There can be no doubt though of Jackson’s status as a mega-star, as the reaction to his death was almost more than the internet could bear.

7. You might’ve missed this news, but Wednesday the United States pulled off a shocking upset and defeated the number one team in the world 2-0 to advance to the final game of the Confederations Cup. Spain is praised for their ability to possess the ball, and it was expected that the U.S. would entrench upon defense and wait for their opportunities to counter. Instead, Spain committed uncharacteristic errors as the U.S. went with a strategy of heavily pressuring the ball and looking for quick counters, and remaining incredibly well-organized (and frankly, a little lucky) on defense. The strategy paid off with huge dividends; quick movement up the field led to a goal by Jozy Altidore, and a Spanish turnover led to a goal by Clint Dempsey. Altidore (after keeper Brad Guzan) was clearly man of the match. No telling if his outstanding play makes him the future of American soccer or another Eddie Johnson, but American soccer fans will take what they can get. The United States plays Brazil tomorrow, a team they already lost to in the first round, but against whom they might have a better chance if they play as decisively as they did against Spain.

8. I thought this article about Grandparents University at UNT was interesting. Grandparents and their grand-children apparently spend a weekend at the school’s dorm and taking classes together, in a program designed to give young teenagers and tweeners a taste of college life, and some bonding time with their grand-parents.

UPDATE: Spencer Ackerman finds at least one civil libertarian to whom the Obama administration official might be referring with the above quote from the Post story; Kate Martin of the Center for National Security Studies:

Martin thinks that established law holds that the administration doesn’t require any additional legal authorization to hold anyone captured on the battlefields of Afghanistan without charge until the end of hostilities — that comes from the September 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force, as does dispensation for the 9/11 plotters — but would need to charge or release any detainee picked up outside either Afghanistan or Iraq. Martin thinks the reported executive order might be the only thing standing in the way of an even broader congressional effort of the sort seen in the war supplemental that Daphne critiqued yesterday. Martin has expressed her organization’s longstanding perspective on detainee matters to the administration’s detentions task force.

So Martin supports it, but only to the extent that something from Congress might be worse. Given the way Congress has handled the possible closing of Gitmo this may be true, though I happen to think that Congress should be forced to craft an indefinite detention policy if that’s what they want in exchange for closing Gitmo.

Glenn Greenwald has more though, as I’ve pointed out once before, he has a tendency to criticize the “many defenders” of Obama on various issues where Obama replicates Bush doctrines, without actually linking to or naming any of these defenders. Greenwald is a very thorough blogger, which is why I don’t understand why he so eagerly reaches for the “some say” approach to blogging.

Some reading for your Friday afternoon:

1. Ayatollah Khamenei escalates the rhetoric and says opposition leaders will be responsible for “bloodshed and chaos” if the protests continue (a possibility that members of hard-line militias may seek to ensure becomes a reality.) He denies that Iran’s election was rigged, though he’s contradicted by what evidence is available. Roger Cohen lauds the protesters, and says Obama should be more firmly on their side. I disagree. I think Obama has struck the proper tone of concern and and caution. Were it not for our history of meddling in Iran’s internal affairs, I might think otherwise.

2. More details on Obama’s new financial regulations plan. Changes no doubt, but maybe not the sweeping kind that we need, according to Paul Krugman. The bad news on the economy in general has slowed, but Martin Wolf says we shouldn’t be too hasty about thinking we’re out of the woods yet. Certainly some (like small businesses) are having a very rough time of it.

3. Check for flying pigs outside your window, because today Ken Starr has come out in support of of Sonia Sotomayor.

4. John Shalikashvilli, chairman of the Joint Chief of Staffs under Clinton, says that arguments against gays in the military are poorly reasoned and insupportable.

5. Egypt shocked Italy 1-0 in Confederations Cup play yesterday, a result that perhaps shouldn’t be so surprising given their play against Brazil. Fortunately for the U.S. this means that a win against Egypt tomorrow means the US will make it out of the first round. Unfortunately, the fact that Egypt is playing so well against the giants makes such a victory highly unlikely.

6. Today is Juneteenth round these parts, a celebration of the day that slaves were liberated in Texas.

Some things for you to ponder this morning:

1. A senior cleric in Iran comes out against the election results. But were they rigged? Critics say yes.

2. Some analysis of Netanyahu’s announcement that Israel would consider recognition of a Palestinian state. A step forward, but still balking on other important considerations like settlement expansion.

3. A Presidential election and some new laws, but the end result is the same; you can’t trust the NSA not to spy on the American people.

4. Speaking of intelligence agencies, the CIA is fighting the release of it’s own internal reports regarding interrogations of “high-value” detainees. Obviously, there’s something in embarrassing in them.

5. Speaking of detainees, here are some people who don’t wet their pants at the thought of being responsible for them.

6. Obama will announce that the federal government will extend benefits to the domestic partners, including same-sex partners and spouses, of federal employees.

7. The Obama administration is proposing regulatory changes that will broaden government oversight of banks and the financial markets.

8. And lastly, another great column of David Leonhardt at the New York Times. This time he takes on the scare word “rationing” and explains how health care is already rationed ineffeciently and unfairly everyday in America.

As the nation commemorates the 65th anniversary of D-Day and those who gave their lives to defend us, it is time we stood up for those who are now willing to make the same sacrifice if asked but are forced to deny their own nature to do so. It is nothing less than shameful that gay and lesbian members of the military must still adhere to the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy or risk being kicked out, which has done nothing but cost us valuable people at a time of need. But unlike in 1993 when this policy was first instituted, this is no longer a controversial issue. The vast majority of Americans favor allowing gays to serve openly – even a majority of conservatives.

Now President Obama promised to get this stupid policy repealed during his campaign and, interestingly, the Republican Congressman he just appointed to be Secretary of the Army also favors a repeal. Could this be a clever move to build political support in Congress? Let’s hope so.

Making Dick Cheney happy and living up to its “Live Free or Die” motto, the New Hampshire legislature once again approved a bill legalizing same-sex marriages in the state with a minor altercation to get the approval of Gov. Lynch. He will be signing it into law later this afternoon.