U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen's support of the Hate Crimes bill has made him the target of seemingly every rightwing nut in the country. Memphis church parking lots were leafleted last weekend with bizarre flyers meant to provoke anti gay hysteria among Christians and meant to hurt Tennessee's ONE and ONLY liberal Congressman in next year's election.
Congressman Cohen's Washington and Memphis offices have each received some 400 calls from folks who apparently believe the lie that the Hate Crimes bill will take away First Amendment rights.
According to an editorial in the Memphis Commercial Appeal, "Some Memphis pastors are lashing out at freshman Democratic Rep. Steve Cohen because of a hate crimes bill he voted for in May. . . The group challenging Cohen on the issue includes Rev. LaSimba Gray of the New Sardis Baptist Church, whose role in the 9th District race last year was to assert that Cohen was not right for the district because of his skin color."
The group behind the lies has one scary website - and it looks like it comes straight out of the fiery gates of hell - but claims to represent Memphis City Churches. (Address: 111 South Highland, Suite 188, Memphis, Tennessee 38111, Telephone: (901) 362-8334 - This is in the Poplar Plaza shopping center?)
The so-called 'Memphis City Church' website links to the Republican Party loving Washington based Family Research Council, the Mississippi based American Family Association and the California based Traditional Values Coalition.
The Memphis website takes its talking points straight from the Family Research Council.
UPdate: The Family Research Council sounds off about Steve Cohen and offers copies of "Censoring the Church and Silencing Christians." And they currently have Cohen on their homepage.
Cohen's offices have been flooded with phone calls and emails urging him to withdraw his support for the Hate Crimes bill.
Please call or email Congressman Cohen and give him some love. Ph: 202.225.3265; email him via his website: http://cohen.house.gov/
Memphis Commercial Appeal:
Cohen said the group was seeking to influence both white and African-American preachers "that the bill will somehow quell their First Amendment rights to speak what they think about the Bible and about people's conduct. That's not true whatsoever."
The Hate Crimes bill (H.R. 1592) as passed by the House on a 237-180 vote on May 3 contains an amendment that states it will have no effect on free-speech rights, Cohen noted.
"That Crime Bill affects acts of violence, not acts of thought or speech," Cohen said. "It never has in this country's history, and it never will."
Berryhill said the ministers he is talking to simply don't accept Cohen's interpretation. "Even though he says that, we just don't believe it," he said. "If you get up in a pulpit now, according to the way we understand it, and if you say homosexuality is a sin, you have 'attacked homosexuality.' That's the way the ministers are interpreting this...
"I think it's incumbent on Mr. Cohen to meet with the ministers in his district and share with us his reasons for supporting this legislation," Gray said. "We'd be open to discussing that because we're not going to be silent on this until we are assured that it will not impinge upon our freedom of speech and the use of the pulpit in the proclamation of the gospel."
Cohen said he plans to do one better. He's bringing U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Mo., an ordained Methodist minister, to Memphis to explain why he, too, voted for the bill. African-Americans, who are victims of roughly half of hate crimes, will benefit from the expansion of the jurisdiction and funding provided in it, Cohen said.
Steve Cohen on the attack by rightwing fundies:
Oh, and Bush intends to veto the Hate Crimes bill.
Hat tip to Jim Maynard at Queer Notes:
Anti-Gay Black Pastors Attack Rep. Steve Cohen
Gay Rights Liberal Steve Cohen 2008 News Politics Hate Crimes Bill Progressive Democrats Tennessee Memphis Video
