Last year, when Hallmark announced that it would begin selling same-sex wedding cards, the Religious Right predictably threw a fit, with the American Family Association quickly announcing that it was launching one of its patented boycotts.
Among the groups that joined the effort was an AFA affiliate in Idaho known as the Idaho Values Alliance, headed by Bryan Fischer. His efforts must have impressed the head-honchos at AFA because yesterday Fischer announced that he'd be leaving his position with IVA to join the host a radio program for AFA:
Don Wildmon has invited me to join his AFA staff and host a live, two-hour talk show on AFA’s radio and TV networks, and I have accepted his gracious offer.
This will necessitate a move to Tupelo, Mississippi, where AFA headquarters are located. I will need to be in Tupelo by July 1, with the first show scheduled to go on-air on July 6.
Sadly, this means that June will be a month of transition for me and for the IVA, as I shift my focus to my new role with AFA. I will no longer be able to produce the Daily Updates, which have been a feature of the IVA since its inception. I will communicate occasionally with all of you in the IVA network over this next month and, of course, give you information about the talk show as things develop.
It was just last month when there was lots of discussion taking place over whether the Religious Right would oppose a gay or lesbian Supreme Court nominee because of his or her sexuality that Fischer declared that they would because, by definition, a gay judge could not be fair:
An open lesbian has obviously resolved the ethical questions about sexuality in favor of the legitimacy of aberrant sexual behavior, in favor of what historically has been known in U.S. law as an "infamous crime against nature."
It's one thing for a judge to keep his orientation a private matter. There is some evidence that perhaps two Supreme Court justices of the past were homosexuals themselves. But they concealed that from the public, accepted that the laws of the day considered homosexual sexual activity a felony offense, and did not use their platform on the bench to challenge society's sexual standards.
But a judge who is quite open about his (generic use) alternative sexuality is another matter entirely. It's hard to imagine any universe in which an open lesbian would uphold any pro-family law should it be challenged in her court.
It will be absolutely incumbent upon the GOP members of the Senate judiciary committee to ask probing questions of a lesbian nominee on a host of issues that are matters of legal and constitutional dispute.
AFA apparently thought that that was just the sort of astute and fair-minded analysis that its programming was lacking and has decided to bring Fischer on board to fill that need.
