Columnist.
Disney, Apple, Coke, Starbucks, and others have spent the last three weeks griping about how bad the First Amendment is for business. Boy, were they wrong! According to a new report from the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), North Carolina and Mississippi have everything to gain promoting freedom. Turns out, H.B. 2 and H.B. 1523 weren't just good decisions — but profitable ones!
People have been wondering for years how to get porn out of their communities. Now they know: Make bathrooms gender-specific! That's all it took in North Carolina, where one of the country's leading adult sites is hitting the road to protest H.B. 2. A day after Bruce Springsteen's tirade, xHamster is the latest liberal to jump on the bandwagon out of town. Like PayPal, the site is livid that Governor Pat McCrory (R-N.C.) is giving local businesses the freedom to set their own policies. (Also known as the free market.) "Sorry, bigots!" they tweeted. "As of today, access to xHamster.com is blacked out in the state of North Carolina until further notice... Judging by the stats of what you North Carolinians watch, we feel this punishment is a severe one. We will not stand by and pump revenue into a system that promotes this type of garbage. We respect all sexualities and embrace them."
He was born to run all right. Bruce Springsteen is blowing off his tour date in North Carolina Friday because the state is daring to let businesses set their own bathroom policies. What a scandalous idea! Like other liberal extremists, The Boss (or is it Bossy?) is furious that the North Carolina government won't barge into board rooms and tell companies how to operate. Apparently he wants to do away with the free market principles that are making conservative states thrive and orchestrate a hostile takeover of businesses. "Some things are more important than a rock show, and this fight against prejudice and bigotry — which is happening as I write — is one of them."
After this week, PayPal may need a pal! After pulling the plug on a major expansion in Charlotte, the money transfer business is getting hammered over their political posturing that is clearly inconsistent with their corporate actions and policies. CEO Dan Schulman kicked off the controversy when he announced earlier this week that he was so outraged by North Carolina's H.B. 2 that he was scrapping plans for their Charlotte office. Why? Because the state won't force businesses to let men in the women's restroom. Like most Americans, Governor Pat McCrory (R-N.C.) thinks that decision belongs in the hands of individual companies — not imposed on them by the government's heavy hand.
If anyone's relieved to be back in session, it's Senator Jerry Moran (R-Kans.). The Kansas Republican got an earful back home when he unexpectedly broke ranks with his fellow Republicans and called for action on President Obama's Supreme Court pick. "I think we have a responsibility to have a hearing [on Merrick Gardland]," he said, to the astonishment of both voters and his party. Within hours, the Tea Party, state activists, and even national groups like FreedomWorks sprang into action, calling the suggestion "outrageous" and vowing to primary Moran. By last Friday, the senator's office was flooded by more than 28,000 emails blasting the conservative for stepping out of line.
The media writes, but does it read? Too few seem to, based on the coverage of Mississippi's new religious liberty law. After Governor Phil Bryant (R-Miss.) signed a bill that essentially reaffirmed the First Amendment, headlines across the country screamed that Mississippi had just given Americans a "license to discriminate." "Mississippi governor signs law allowing businesses to deny service to gay people," some read — regardless of the fact that the measure does no such thing!
Thanks to Governor Phil Bryant (R), facts — not fear — won out in Mississippi! [Yesterday], Bryant signed the "Protecting Freedom of Conscience from Government Discrimination Act" into law over the threats from corporate America and LGBT activists. After the Left's tantrum over North Carolina, where leaders denied men access to girls' restrooms and showers, most people started to see the liberal agenda for the extremism it is. Now, with the enactment of H.B. 1523, Mississippi is responding by passing religious liberty legislation that should be a model for every state.
North Carolina is about to square off with a big opponent — and it has nothing to do with college basketball. While the Tar Heels are celebrating the chance to play for a national title, the federal government is showing whose team it's on with new threats over the state's money. Furious that Governor Pat McCrory (R), a bipartisan legislature, and 70 percent of voters dare to block grown men from girls' bathrooms, the president's team is looking at ways to bankrupt the state into submission.
Liberals like to say that same-sex couples are the persecuted ones. Jim and Beth Walder can count 80,000 reasons why they're wrong. Thanks to an activist judge, that's how much the Christian couples owes for mistakenly believing that tolerance and equality applied to them. Like dozens of other family businesses, the Walders never thought that their faith would be a liability to their booming bed and breakfast business. They were wrong.
The Left's empty threats may have made a chicken out of Governor Nathan Deal (R-Ga.), but it's certainly not slowing down other states. In Mississippi, Governor Phil Bryant (R) isn't about to tuck tail and run when liberals try to blackmail leaders into killing religious liberty bills or "lose business." That may have worked in Indiana and Georgia, but Mississippi, North Carolina, and Texas know better. In fact, the Magnolia State is so unconcerned with the Big Business bravado that they haven't just passed *any* religious freedom bill — but the best, most robust version yet.
Whatever happened to that "wall of separation" between church and state the Left was championing for the last 60 years? Using government as the battering ram, the Left has breached the wall and are preparing to storm America's churches. And amazingly, they've been aided by Republican governors who've become nothing more than puppets for Big Business in the process.
North Carolina's policy may be settled — but the dust certainly hasn't. After having their way with political squishes like Georgia's Governor Nathan Deal (R), liberals are beside themselves with Governor Pat McCrory's decision to listen to the voters of his state and repeal Charlotte's hugely unpopular bathroom bill. Big Business is hyperventilating, out-of-state leaders are boycotting, and the ACLU is suing. But does North Carolina regret its decision? Not one bit. Unlike Georgia, McCrory knows the best way to silence a bully is ignore it.
If the world thought President Obama was detached from the Brussels bombing, he was downright indifferent to the one in Pakistan. A horrific attack on the holiest of days brought parents to their knees, as 29 Christian children and more than 40 others were massacred by the Taliban on Easter. Three hundred were injured — many critically — by the explosives detonated by a suicide bomber next to a park where people had worshipped the risen Christ. "The target," said members of the Pakistani Taliban, "was Christians."
In the spring of 1984, I remember reading an interview in the Baton Rouge newspaper with incoming governor, Edwin Edwards. This was several years before I entered the political arena — I was still working in law enforcement, and attending LSU, so I didn't closely follow the routine political controversy. What grabbed my attention was Edwards' response to a question asking if he believed Jesus died on the cross, was buried and resurrected.
[Wednesday], leaders in North Carolina achieved more in a day than many state leaders have been able to accomplish in years. In a single-day special session, legislators passed and the governor signed into law protections for the privacy of children and women using school and public bathrooms, showers, and locker rooms in the Tar Heel state. Governor Pat McCrory (R), Lt. Gov. Dan Forest (R), and House Speaker Tim Moore (R) are to be commended for a day's work well done!
If anyone's enjoying the wild ride of this election cycle, it's the two dozen states voting after Super Tuesday. At this point in most presidential primaries, the nominee is a foregone conclusion, giving Americans in these later primary states very little in the way of influence or motivation. In 2016, states like Utah and Arizona, as we saw [Tuesday], are finally getting a say in a process that is normally dominated by voters in February and early March.
Liberals like to say they're pushing these gender-neutral bills *for* the kids, but new research suggests they're doing it *despite* the kids. Every day, it seems like another city or school board is pushing a policy that tells children to ignore the anatomy that classrooms should be teaching! The waves of gender-neutral bathroom and athletic proposals keep coming, no matter how devastating it can be for students. Gender isn't a matter of self-determination, the American College of Pediatricians (ACP) is arguing, and suggesting otherwise can harm kids for life.
In the NFL's offseason, league officials are trying to invade someone else's turf: Georgia's. In the ongoing scrimmage over the state's deflated religious freedom bill, the National Football League is using a familiar playbook to frighten Governor Nathan Deal (R) out of signing H.B. 757, a shell of a measure that — in its old form — would have shielded Christians from the heavy hand of the government. Now, days after the proposal was gutted of any meaningful conscience protections, the NFL, NBA, and MLB are pulling out all the stops to kill a bill that's actually *less* inclusive than the First Amendment!
If you're looking for a clue behind the inexplicable rise of Donald Trump and his support among "evangelicals," look no further than Georgia. It's called Republicans. In a state where protecting religious liberty is as popular as peach pie, Republican Governor Nathan Deal (R) and House Speaker David Ralston (R) are presiding over the demise of Georgian's First Freedom.
War-torn Christians in the Middle East finally have a new advocate: the United States of America. While families languish in camps and hiding places desperate for the West's help, the Obama administration is finally offering some. In somewhat of a surprise announcement, since State Department officials hinted that they might miss Congress's March 17 deadline, Secretary John Kerry righted a longtime wrong by joining the rest of the Western world in condemning the violence against Christians and other religious minorities as genocide.
