(graphic: No on 1 : Protect Maine Equality)
This is way beyond rich.
For those of you who’ve managed to hold onto your sanity (and your cookies) by never ever ever sifting thought the unique brand of bullshit one encounters at make-believe Christianist news sites like Donald Wildmon’s OneNewsNow, here’s an eye-opener. Over on planet OneNewsNow, Charlie Butts has a piece up in which Butts lets Bob Emrich make a desperate fundraising pitch for his outfit, Stand for Marriage Maine. SFMM is the NOM- and Focus-funded, anti-marriage-equality dog and pony being run by a guy named Marc Mutty, who is a high-mucky-muck shill on loan from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland, Maine.
Get ready for a couple of real knee slappers.
Marriage supporters battle out-of-state money
In an unusual move called a People’s Veto, Maine residents are being given a chance to roll back the legislature’s approval of homosexual “marriage.”
(emphasis: mine)
Or, as it’s otherwise known: subverting representative democracy. Both houses of the state’s legislature passed Maine’s marriage equality bill and the governor signed it into law.
Stand for Marriage Maine spokesman Bob Emrich says pro-family forces have been outspent by $1.5 million dollars by proponents of homosexual marriage. According to Emrich, the money is not coming from Maine supporters of homosexual marriage.
“They have been receiving money from all over the country. I think that they received money from 47 different states,” he said, “[from] organizations like Act Blue, Californians for Equality, GLADD Human Rights Commission.”
(emphasis: mine)
One assumes Californians for Equality is actually Equality California. OneNewsNow’s fact-checker must have been taking a prayer break.
And, gasp! Out of state outfits pouring money into another state to influence an election? What are the chances?
Luckily for the opponents of equality, the New Jersey-based National Organization for Marriage, the Colorado Springs-based Focus on the Family, and the Washington DC-based Knights of Columbus, were able to step in and counter the flood of cash flowing into the Pine Tree State. Without their financial assistance, Stand for Marriage Maine would be forced to keep shaking down little old Catholic ladies during Sunday Masses, because, other than these groups, voluntary contributions from actual Mainers are like what? One percent of what SFMM has managed to raise, according to the complaint filed with the Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics & Election Practices by Californians Against Hate’s founder, Fred Karger.
Of course, none of these out-of-state organizations would ever consider grabbing their big fat Pharisee purses and invading another state to unduly influence an election. Except maybe in California where, according to California Secretary of State Debra Bowen, the Knights of Columbus contributed $1,425,00.00, and the National Organization for Marriage contributed $1,041,143.80, and Focus on the Family contributed $539, 643.66 to eliminate the existing right of same-sex marriage. And, let’s not forget the $500,000.00 that OneNewNow’s parent organization, The American Family Association of Tupelo, Mississippi, coughed up from its $14 million dollar annual operating budget to meddle in a California election.
Emrich says same-sex marriage has been an agenda driven by people outside of Maine from the beginning. So it is no surprise to him that out-of-state money is being used to convince Maine residents to retain the law. In fact, Emrich says 150 volunteers from other states are on hand to stop the People’s Veto, but he is hopeful.
(emphasis: mine)
Hopeful? If their cheesy whining is any indication, Emrich, Butts and the American Family Association are getting desperate. However, the bad news, for those who support marriage equality, is that AFA has incredible reach and fundraising capabilities. They own 200 radio stations, their monthly AFA Journal has a circulation of 180,000, the American Family News Network has more than 1,200 broadcast, print, and online affiliates in 45 states and 11 foreign countries, and, according to Quantcast, OneNewsNow peddles its anti-equality propaganda to 573.4k Americans and 595.4k international readers each month.
With two weeks to go before the Maine election, the American Family Association is quite capable of raising a hell of a lot of money to eliminate marriage equality in yet another American state. The ideal way to counter their meddlesome efforts is to make a contribution to Support NO on 1 / Protect Maine Equality.
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