It hasn’t been a good week for the anti-gay crowd. First, the Massachusetts legislature easily rejected a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage and establish civil unions. The vote made plenty of sense — the state has had gay marriage for a year, it’s been relatively conflict-free, and the whole “controversy” has become more politically acceptable.
Someone, however, is going to have to explain this week’s House vote on the hate-crime law to me.
Sex offenders who prey on children would be subject to stringent monitoring requirements and face new mandatory penalties under a bill, passed by the House, that was expanded to include protections for gay men and lesbians under federal hate crime law.
The House voted 371 to 52 yesterday in favor of the Children’s Safety Act, which, among its many provisions, creates a national Web site for child sex offenders and stipulates that sex felons face up to 20 years in prison for failing to comply with registration requirements.
Unexpectedly, the House voted 223 to 199 in favor of an amendment by Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) that expands current hate crime law to include some crimes involving sexual orientation, gender and disability. Under current law, the federal government assists local and state authorities prosecuting limited types of crimes based on the victim’s race, religion or ethnic background.
The House has been the chief obstacle in numerous previous attempts to expand hate crimes law, and Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest gay rights group, said it was an “incredibly historic vote” that could give momentum to similar action in the Senate.
Keep in mind, the vote wasn’t particularly close. Most Republicans voted against it, but 30 joined Dems in supporting the amendment.
Is the entire anti-gay crusade falling apart?
James Dobson’s Focus on the Family issued an alert to its membership yesterday about the hate-crimes measure — which they labeled “pro-gay.” Not surprisingly, the group isn’t happy about it passing so easily.
Pro-family organizations are crying fowl over the House passing language that would — in an attempt to codify specify rights for homosexuals — punish a criminal for perceived motivation. […]
Bob Knight, director of the Culture and Family Institute, said gay activists and their supporters in Congress took advantage of the national distraction of Hurricane Katrina and the Supreme Court confirmation hearings.
“This was a total surprise — a sneak attack,” he said. “We got 40 minutes notice that the vote was going to take place, which is hardly time to do anything that matters. And minutes after they passed that amendment, they passed the whole Children’s Safety Act.
“The overall bill, tightens the law against sexual offenders. It’s geared to protect kids. It’s ironic that a bill that would promote the homosexual agenda is tucked into such a bill.”
Obviously, for Knight, it’s “ironic” because, in his twisted world, gays are necessarily sexual offenders.
But the right’s bigotry notwithstanding, how, exactly, did Conyers’ amendment pass? Focus’ alert said the nation was “distracted” and this was some kind of “sneak attack,” but lawmakers still had the measure in front of them and they still passed it easily.
How’d this happen? Are there really 30 Republicans who are this progressive on gay rights? Has the right failed in its anti-gay crusade this badly?