FRC’s list of ‘family-friendly’ lawmakers

October 24, 2006

At one of my previous places of employment, I took great pleasure in preparing analyses of the Christian Coalition’s legislative scorecards. Every year, the CC would pull together 10 to 15 specific floor votes in each chamber, many of which were carefully chosen to help improve Republicans’ ratings. The results were rather predictable — Democrats were sinners, Republicans were saints.

The Coalition appears to have dropped the project — I don’t imagine the group could afford the printing costs anymore — but fortunately, the Family Research Council is picking up the slack. (.pdf)

This scorecard shows how your elected officials voted on some of the critical issues involving the family. It is important to remember, however, that the votes you see here are only a few of the hundreds of votes cast by Members of Congress in 2006. We have singled out for inclusion the most clear-cut, pro-family votes that came before Congress.

The FRC picked seven votes from the House (abortion restrictions, Internet gambling, stem cell research, “protecting” the flag), and eight from the Senate (Alito nomination, gay marriage, fetus farming). As Aravosis noted, however, the FRC ended up with some unusual friends.

Apparently philandering and being accused of beating (and strangling) your mistress isn’t enough to get the political arms of the religious right’s Family Research Council and Focus on the Family to drop you as a favored candidate.

FRC Action and Focus on the Family Action have given rave reviews – an 85% positive rating – in their latest “Voter Scorecard” to Rep. Don Sherwood (R-PA), who not only admitted recently to having a five year affair with a woman not his wife (five years folks, this wasn’t just a one-time indiscretion), but what’s more, Sherwood’s mistress has accused him of beating her for five years and frantically called 911 claiming Sherwood had just attempted to strangle her in the midst of one of their romantic trysts in his DC love pad.

OK, so it’s not a perfect system….

Be sure to take a look, of course, to see if your representatives are anti-family or not.

When pecadillos are in the private lives of Republicans we have to rember that sin is forgiven and man isn’t perfect. But remember that private pecadillos are only important when those pecadillos are from the private lives of Democrats. Democrats are agents of Satan and fall outside the realm of forgiveness and they are going to hell anyway so forget them.

  • Ah, Christian “Family Values”… gotta love the irony.

    I always like to ask my Christian friends if they thought Noah was a good man, and then tell them the story about how he got shit-faced drunk and condemned one of his kids (and his decendants) to slavery for seeing him passed out and naked.

    Then I ask them if they would kill babies if Moses told them to do it.

    Family values my ass. The examples are nearly endless: http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/donald_morgan/atrocity.html

    But Jesus changed all that, right? Nope. He supposedly said this:

    “I have come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law a man’s enemies will be the members of his own family.”

    Family-Friendly? Not so much.

  • FRC’s list of ‘family-friendly’ lawmakers

    It’s the family overly-friendly lawmakers they have to watch out for.

    Thanks for the bible atrocity link, Racerx. Is that the outline of Mel’s next movie?

    I think the two lines from republicans that have stuck in my mind the most are “fetus farming” and “I don’t snuff my own seed.” Catchy.

    A man, a mule and a fetus farm. That’s America!

  • So to be family friendly, I have to avoid abortions, avoid gay marriage, say “God” in the pledge, tell someone about girls going across state lines to have an abortion, put up a religious symbol on public land, and sentence Michael J. Fox to slow deterioration?

    Let’s see, I’m straight, male, and out of elementary school, so I’ve got three out of five covered no problem.

    Hell’s Bells, if it’s that easy, let’s all get together and beat our wives after church and then orphan some Iraqi kids after lunch, which we can pay for by raiding the kid’s education funds. Whoo hoo! Tax cuts are on me!

    How low can your standards go? I mean, c’mon, they aren’t even trying.

  • Sorry. They just published research that states that traditional family units are now in the minority, something like 49.1%. So, isn’t it about time that we saw some “single-friendly” legislation to support the new majority??? I’m getting tired of carrying all thes families.

  • I’m pleased to note Maryland is really family unfriendly. It could be less friendly but we seem to have a problem named Roscoe Bartlett. Hopefully he’ll be the state’s unemployment agency’s problem this time next month.

    “I have come to turn a man against his father …. a man’s enemies will be the members of his own family.”

    Family-Friendly? Not so much.

    [RacerX]

    If my family were full of quasi-fascist fundamentalists loons, I’d turn against them. But your quote shows yet another way the rabid Evans pick and choose what they want from the Bible. They rely on “Honour thy mother and father,” to keep their kiddies in line. Imagine the mayhem if all the little fundies said “Screw you, the fat greedy bastard praising Jesus to the tune of 10,000 bucks an hour and your cult of radical bigotry. I’m going to feed the hungry.”

    Baby Jesus would smile. Mommy and daddy would not. Nor would the current ReThuglican Party. All those voters…lost!

    tAiO

  • as an illinois voter, i’m proud to say that all the people i’d even consider voting for got 0% ratings. i’ve had my issues w/ rahm (my rep), but “good on ya” for pissing off the frc!

  • I note with shock and dismay the fact that ordained minister and Congressman from Kansas City’s 5th district Emmanuel Cleaver does not care about families at all! Tht’s a 0% love of family! I wonder if his congregation knows.

  • Of Nebraska’s two senators, Ben Nelson (D) has a higher score, 87%, than Chuck Hagel (R), 62%.

    Hagel has endorsed Nelson’s challenger, Republican Pete Ricketts.

    But since Chuck is of a less moral character than Ben, then I shouldn’t trust the candidate that he endorses, right?

    The FRC surely doesn’t want to risk losing a senator like Ben Nelson to someone who won’t vote the same as him, do they?
    Just an observation.

  • The Christian Coalition didn’t dispense with the scorecards because of the printing costs. They dispensed with the scorecards because the scorecards were among the things that cost the group its tax exemption.( I analyzed this issue in great detail for my employer before the ’96 elections; I’ll see if I can remember to pull the criteria out of the archives and leave it here tomorrow.)

    But if the FRC wants to get into that game, it needs to be very careful or it could wind up in the same leaky boat.

  • FRC Action and Focus on the Family Action have given rave reviews – an 85% positive rating – in their latest “Voter Scorecard” to Rep. Don Sherwood (R-PA),

    Quite frankly, I’m less concerned about the FRC giving an 85% score to a mental case like Sherwood… I’m much more concerned with some very high (I noticed one 71%) scores given to some Dems.

    Those are *not* medals that Dems ought to parade proudly…

  • OK, IRS criteria on voter guides and the like produced by tax-exempt organizations (published in the 10/27/96 News & Record of Greensboro, N.C. (article available through Nexis but not on the Web):

    IRS GUIDELINES
    According to federal tax law, social-welfare nonprofit groups [i.e., 501(c)4 groups] such as the Christian Coalition may engage in some partisan political activity as long as it is not their primary focus. Churches and other charitable nonprofits [i.e., 501(c)3 groups] may not engage in any such activity, including producing or distributing statements on behalf of or against a candidate or party. Such groups may distribute nonpartisan voter guides. The Internal Revenue Service says it looks at each case individually and looks at factors in addition to the guide in making rulings, but it also offers some general guidelines for what constitutes a
    nonpartisan guide. (These guidelines apply only to tax-exempt groups, not political action committees or individuals.)
    — The wording of a question or issue should not show a preference, or bias, for or against a particular position.
    — A guide that covers a wide range of issues, and is distributed only to a nonprofit group’s membership or regular mailing list, is more likely to be ruled nonpartisan. A guide that covers a narrow range of issues and is widely distributed to the public runs a greater risk of being ruled partisan.
    — A questionnaire sent to candidates for the purpose of preparing a voter guide should be sent to all candidates on the ballot in a particular race.
    — A guide prepared on the basis of such a questionnaire should report all candidates’ responses, or none. If one or more candidates in a particular race don’t respond, the guide should omit all responses from candidates in that
    race.
    — A guide should use only candidates’ direct responses to surveys or questionnaires. It should not attempt to define a candidate’s position on an issue on the basis of the candidate’s public statements or voting record.
    — A guide should report candidates’ complete answers to surveys or questionnaires. If a question asks for a yes-or-no answer, and the candidate responds in some way other than yes or no, the guide should report the candidate’s response verbatim.

    SOURCES: Section 501 of the Internal Revenue Code; IRS Revenue Rulings 78-248 and 80-282; Sam Serio, spokesman for the Baltimore IRS office, which oversees tax-exempt corporations in the Southeast.

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