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Leslie Robinson
lesrobinsn@aol.com
www.generalgayety.com

Moore is less

Roy Moore has announced that he's running for governor of Alabama in 2006. Gay people in that state will be better off if a Siamese cat wins the election.
You remember Moore. He's the fellow with 5,300 pounds of affection for the Ten Commandments.

In 2000 Alabama voters elected him chief justice of the state Supreme Court and the next July he had that hefty granite monument of the Commandments installed in the rotunda of the state judicial building. He refused a federal judge's order to remove it and in November of 2003 he was himself removed from office.

Early in the fracas Moore told the Los Angeles Times that as chief justice, "I am the highest legal authority in the state. And I wanted it there."

A man of stellar reasoning and Christian humility. And Alabamians, who polled significantly in favor of the Commandments' public display, might go for the ninny. But gay Alabamians would be twisted to vote for Moore - even if they believe in displaying the Ten Commandments on their front lawn, illuminated so fiercely the words can be read from space.

In 2002, while the monument brouhaha was unfolding, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled unanimously against a lesbian seeking custody of her children from their allegedly abusive father. According to press reports the case hinged on a legal matter, not sexual orientation. But public-spirited Chief Justice Moore took it upon himself to make really, really sure people understood as well that this woman was wicked.

He offered a 35-page concurring opinion that made gay rights groups have a stroke. I wondered, while reading about this case, if the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force had overreacted when describing the document as a flood of "abhorrent rhetoric." Would a judge really spend his valuable time crafting 35 pages solely to argue gays are slime, even when the case has been decided his way, and the effort would have no judicial weight?

Is the Pope German?
Reading Moore's polemic is a trip. He wrote, "Homosexual conduct is, and has been, considered abhorrent, immoral, detestable, a crime against nature and a violation of the laws of nature and of nature's God upon which this Nation and our laws are predicated." Oxygen, anyone?

Moore said a parent's gay behavior alone is good enough reason to deny custody, and homosexuality is a horror from which kids must be protected. He goes on a tour through state civil law, anti-gay "educational programs" in public schools, English common law, natural law, Genesis, St. Thomas Aquinas, and eventually you wonder how you escaped burning at the stake after your first same-sex date.

"Homosexual behavior is a ground for divorce, an act of sexual misconduct punishable as a crime in Alabama, a crime against nature, an inherent evil and an act so heinous that it defies one's ability to describe it." His ability to describe it wasn't defied one iota.

If you don't find all this appalling or terrifying, let me offer one last gem: "The State carries the power of the sword, that is, the power to prohibit conduct with physical penalties, such as confinement and even execution. It must use that power to prevent the subversion of children toward this lifestyle, to not encourage a criminal lifestyle."

And you thought Martha Stewart got a raw deal.
The man who plans to be the next governor of Alabama believes the state can and should kill gays. This tidbit was absent from the national press pieces I read about Moore's announcement. So it's up to us to blab this news far and wide. Using our criminal network.
info: LesRobinsn@aol.com o www.GeneralGayety.com


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