Houston; we have a problem. It’s the mayor, Annise Parker.
She’s notable for being the first openly homosexual mayor of a major US city.
The thing is, she ran, a known democrat for the nonpartisan position, as a
sensible businessperson ready to rein in overspending and implement common-sense
policies. She claimed to be able to clean up a number of money mismanagement
areas left over from Mayor Bill White—also a democrat who had run as a
businessman who cared about money management rather than liberal ideology, but
who then went on to mess up the budget and follow liberal ideas like being a
sanctuary city for illegal aliens.
Mayor Annise Parker, center photo found here |
So Annise Parker did not run as either a liberal or as a
homosexual. In fact, I was not even aware she was a lesbian until the week
before the election. And when that information came out, in the context of the
rest of the campaign, it didn’t seem relevant. Houstonians didn’t elect a
lesbian mayor; they elected the candidate who convinced them she would be most
effective for the city.
I live a mile outside the Houston city limits, so I don’t
vote in city elections (nor do I have to suffer additional city taxes). While
the city leadership affects all of the Greater Houston Area, it’s less relevant
when we don’t actually live in the city. There was a Republican opponent (and
others), but I don’t remember who. In Houston, as in pretty nearly any urban
area, getting the least liberal democrat is about the best you can hope for. So
I looked on, hoping she wouldn’t be too bad.
Then, the moment she got elected, the big news was that Houston
had shocked the world by not being bigoted against a lesbian in their mayoral
election. Hmm. And she has been much better at pushing the LGBT agenda than
getting Houston’s fiscal house in order. Practically every time she’s in the
news, it has something to do with her lesbianism, rather than her caretaking of
the city.
The big one this past several months has been policy
purportedly for “fairness” toward transgenders. In June, she pressed a bill
through the city council (so, not entirely her fault, but wouldn’t have
happened without her pressure) what is referred to as the “bathroom bill.” The
city created transgenders as a protected class, and one cannot do anything to “discriminate”
against a protected class. In this case, transgenders get to choose which
public restroom to use on any given day, depending on which gender they feel
like that day. No matter how they may dress, one cannot question whether they’re
inappropriately in the wrong restroom.
There’s an ick factor involved in having a six-foot-three obvious
male, either dressed as a male or a female, in a women’s restroom. But it’s not
so much with transgenders that the public has a problem. It’s sexual predators.
No one is allowed to ask, or suspect. So if an obvious male appears in your
women’s restroom, you must accept his presence or be subject to prosecution for
going against the city ordinance that is intended to prevent transgenders from
feeling uncomfortable (regardless of any discomfort they might make you feel).
So that tells predators, “You can go into women’s restrooms and prey upon
unprotected females, and no one can question your being there.”
The problem was brought before the city council and the
mayor. They dismissed it as just more bigotry against LGBTs. That scenario,
they claim, might never even happen.
But for some reason the public doesn’t trust them on that.
Imagine you’re a dad with a 9-year-old daughter who needs to use the restroom.
You let her go in, and you stand outside the door. Then, following her in is a
burly, obvious male. What do you do? Follow the guy in and stand guard for your
daughter? One thing you don’t do is think, “Oh, the mayor says I shouldn’t
worry, so I’m sure my daughter is safe enough. I'd much rather risk my daughter's safety than risk hurting the feelings of a possibly transgender person.” The mayor is expecting the
public to go against human nature. But, then, she’s not a father, and neither she
nor her “spouse” can ever be.
There was a huge public outcry against the policy. Some
55,000 signatures were collected from the public in a referendum demanding
repeal; only 17,269 signatures were required. The Houston City Secretary and
staff counted the signatures, and when they got to 19,177, they validated the
count without going on, since the threshold had already been surpassed.
But then the mayor decided to look into the
validity of the signatures. Among the certified count were enough disqualified
signatures (didn’t contain adequate information, or didn’t qualify as city
residents) to drop the count to around 15,000. Without counting the additional
30,000+ signatures, the mayor threw out the initiative as invalid. In other
words, she acted like a dictator and unlawfully overruled the people with her
own dictates. Just like any other petty dictator.
A coalition was formed to sue the mayor over the issue,
referred to as Woodfill v. Parker. (Lawyer Jared Woodfill was until recently
the Harris County Republican Chair. He's on the legal team for the suit.)
This week the news got out that, in the city’s defense against
the lawsuit (using taxpayer dollars), she has subpoenaed certain information
from five area pastors. These pastors are NOT part of the lawsuit. They are,
however, outspoken opponents of the mayor’s “bathroom bill,” (among 400 or so
who took a stand against it) and sometimes against the mayor’s more general
LGBT activism.
To be clear, in defense of a lawsuit, one can gather
information from many places, including from witnesses that are not part of the
lawsuit itself. Her seeking information from these particular pastors is not in itself illegal.
But the overly broad request is a
bit shocking: "All speeches, presentations, or sermons related to HERO
[what the Mayor calls the ordinance], the Petition, Mayor Annise Parker's
homosexuality, or gender identity prepared by, delivered by, revised by, or
approved by you (the Pastors) or in your possession."
What she wants to know specifically is, did the pastors, or
their surrogates under their approval, request that their congregation members
sign the petition? She wants to claim that this would disqualify the churches
for getting involved in politics.
But that, in itself, is a misunderstanding of political
participation. Churches generally (not technically prohibited by the Constitution, but by
recent readings of it by SCOTUS) aren’t allowed to choose parties or candidates
to support. But issues—particularly issues related to religious beliefs—are always
fair game. Always! Putting abortion, or “same-sex marriage,” or various family
laws, or prostitution or public nudity, or location of bars, etc., on the ballot
does not place those issues out-of-bounds for churches to talk about. That
would be an absurd approach to religious freedom.
But absurd is the typical approach of Mayor Annise Parker
and others who think they have the only acceptable beliefs—the intolerant.
There are a couple of other absurdities here: the sermons
were already offered publicly. And sermons are not necessarily written. This is
similar to subpoenas made by the IRS to True the Vote and King Street Patriots—requiring
they detail, in writing, every person who spoke and every word spoken at meetings—where people
get together to speak their minds—not typically written out, and not expected,
in most cases, to be recorded. So, is it because Parker and her people don’t have
going-to-church experience? Or is it less about gathering information and more
about squelching future speech? As with the IRS, it looks like the latter is intended.
Already she has backed off the original subpoena—because of
pressure, and bad press. She claims she wouldn’t have worded it the way her
lawyers did. (The broader elements of the subpoena have been changed to more specifics, but the subpoenas are still in process.)
She’s still defending her behavior:
· Forcing the “bathroom bill” on the people of
Houston (and anyone who works there or visits and might need a public restroom).
· Illegally throwing out the validated signatures expressing
of will of the people.
· Defending her position, using taxpayer dollars,
against the people’s will, by attacking pastors in their churches.
So, while she isn’t, at this point, “monitoring” churches to
make sure they don’t say anything she doesn’t like, we can probably assume she’s
bigoted enough against religious people (or anyone who disagrees with her) to
quash religious speech is she could. Ironically, she does it in the name of
tolerance.
No comments:
Post a Comment