So President Obama faced a few hecklers yesterday, who went after him about the “Don’t ask, Don’t Tell” policy.

Take a gander, gander takers:

Now I, for one, think it’s awesome to see gay activists stretching beyond the easy targets. Usually, they rag on Mormons, because they’ll take it – but ignore black churches because they won’t. So now, for once, they’re actually speaking truth to power.

But hold on.

I just wonder… couldn’t this heckling be a precursor to violent extremism? And could this agitation toward our President, believed to be based on policy – actually be thinly veiled racism? I mean, the President actually said he agreed with this gay group. And yet they still heckled. Perhaps the members of Get Equal should look in the mirror, and ask themselves why they’re so uncomfortable with a black man in the Oval Office. Perhaps Chris Matthews could ask this question for them. While Olbermann holds the mirror. (more…)

This week’s Washington Times column:

There is an extensive body of writing from both sides of the political aisle that has analyzed the extraordinary depths of hatred leveled at former President George W. Bush.

His birth into a wealthy and politically connected family is where a lot of the animus starts. His rejection of his Connecticut roots and adoption of a rugged Texan persona naturally riled his birth-constituency. His disjointed speaking style also alienated many others – especially those who covered him in the Northeastern media. Naturally, some of his initiatives were controversial. His allies say he didn’t do enough.

But all presidents make mistakes, pursue unpopular ideas, possess off-putting personality traits and don’t do enough to appeal to their core supporters. Something far more insidious was at work in the hatred of our most recent former president.

Now that Mr. Bush is quietly going about his retirement, this strain of rage – the GWB43 virus – has spread like wildfire, finding unsuspecting targets, each granting us greater perspective into what not long ago seemed like a mysterious phenomenon isolated only on our 43rd president.

The first person to catch the virus was Sarah Palin, whose family also was infected, including, unforgivably, her children.

(more…)

Mormon church leaders are criticizing HBO for including a private, sacred ceremony in its show Big Love, the drama about a polygamous Mormon family in Utah. Apparently only church members “in good standing” are allowed to enter temples and either witness or take part in the rite called the “endowment ceremony.”

HBO, of course, apologized for offending Mormons but defended its use of the ceremony because its depiction is “critical” to the show’s story line. Ah, the quintessential non-apology apology, used frequently by politicians: We’re sorry if we offended anyone, but we’re not going to do anything that will actually rectify the situation. Be sure to tune in, though, and boost our ratings! (more…)

Part 1 of what I half-jokingly called my “Manifesto.”

In a fiscal conservative’s utopian dreamworld, there would be no federal funding for the arts (or so many other government agencies or programs for that matter).  This has been our position since the inception of the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) in the early 1970’s.  We’ve been saying that if elected, we would abolish these misguided programs and departments and bring our government back to the bare-bones constitutionally described role that it has and leave everything else to the states.

We’ve held the influential bully pulpit of the presidency for twenty of the past twenty-eight years, and what has happened to the NEA?  It has grown.  While we have stood on principle,  we have also stood on the sidelines.  The founding fathers would be outraged that the federal government is funding art with taxpayer money, but because we are on the sidelines standing on our principles, all of that money is going to the people creating art with messages that undermine our very existence. (more…)