Over the past few years, the Boy Scouts of America has been served with ACLU lawsuits, financial cuts, public partnership cancellations, and facility evictions. They have been ridiculed in the media and castigated as bigots in once-friendly corners. The reason? The Boy Scout Oath contains the words "duty to God" and "morally straight."

Here are 3 Examples from the Archives of the American Civil Rights Union (ACRU)

1)  Boy Scouts of America and Connecticut Rivers Council, BSA v. Wyman et al

In this case the Boy Scouts sued because the state of Connecticut excluded them from the combined charitable campaign for state employees on the grounds that the Scouts were a discriminatory organization. ACRU and other groups petitioned the United States Supreme Court to hear this case after the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit decided against the ACRU position. On March 8, 2004, the Supreme Court refused to hear the case. Read Brief  

2)  Boy Scouts of America and Monmouth Council, BSA v. Dale

Decided by the United States Supreme Court on June 28, 2000, in favor of ACRU’s position. This case involved the landmark ruling by the Supreme Court holding that the Scouts could not be forced to retain openly gay adult scout leaders under antidiscrimination laws. The Scouts have a right of freedom of expressive association to appoint adult leaders who do not contradict the message and doctrines of the Scouts.
Read Brief

3)  6/6/07: Philadelphia City Council Votes to Charge Scouts, by Sheldon Kinsel

EXCERPT: "Without any prior notification, the Philadelphia City Council voted 16-1 on May 31st to authorize the city to end the lease with the Cradle of Liberty Scout Council for the headquarters building the city has leased to the Scouts since…"

Legislators tell school kids to celebrate homosexuality
Plan requires 'suitable commemorative exercises' honoring 'gay' Harvey Milk

By Bob Unruh

WorldNetDaily

Homosexual former San Francisco leader Harvey Milk

Only a year after banning all negative messages about homosexuality in public schools throughout the state, the California Legislature now is ordering school children to celebrate "gay" lifestyle choices.

"If signed into law, AB 2567 will mean an official day commemorating homosexuality, bisexuality and transsexuality in California government schools," said Randy Thomasson, president of the Campaign for Children and Families.

"This will harm children as young as kindergarten," he said. "Every May 22, AB 2567 will positively portray to children homosexual experimentation, homosexual 'marriages,' sex-change operations, and anything else that's 'in the closet.' Gov. Schwarzenegger should say no to this very inappropriate bill, which has nothing to do with academic excellences."

Thomasson said the passage by lawmakers of AB 2567 will require all California public schools to "conduct suitable commemorative exercises" in honor of the anti-religious, sexual-anarchy agenda of Harvey Milk, the late San Francisco supervisor who was a homosexual activist.

The California Assembly approved the plan 43-26 and the Senate 22-13, with both votes along party lines of Democrats supporting the homosexual agenda.

For the Air Force, replacing its current fleet of KC-135 refueling tankers—a model in service since 1957—is a top acquisition priority.  The age of the planes has led to concerns that a structural failure could result in the grounding of every KC-135 at the same time. 

Enter the so-called KC-X program, estimated to cost $35 billion.  Originally, the Air Force had planned to “sole-source” the deal to Boeing, leasing planes for $30 billion.  However, Sen. John McCain got the whiff of corruption, and through dogged investigation, it was determined that the deal was a racket.  Indeed, the Air Force’s top acquisition chief at the time ended up going to jail. 

So in 2004, the Air Force started the bidding process over again.  Boeing, of course, made a bid, but so did a partnership between Northrop Grumman and Airbus, the European plane manufacturer.  In spite of the earlier scandal, Boeing was widely expected to win the contract.  They didn’t. 

Politicians from Kansas and Washington state, the two places where most of Boeing’s production facilities are, led the “Buy America” charge. “I cannot believe that we would create French jobs in place of Kansas jobs,” said Rep. Todd Tiahrt. Boeing has formally protested the decision to the Government Accountability Office.

The appalling part of this is the tendency for Members of Congress to send military spending projects to their districts, rather than to the project which fits the needs of the military. 

On the other hand, there is a strong argument for maintaining America’s industrial base for the sake of military production.  Imagine, for instance, if a war cut off our supply lines to Europe and our other trading partners.  In that instance, it would be absolutely essential to have a self-sufficient means of manufacturing weapons.  And the industrial base can’t be created overnight. 

Most experts do not think the tanker contract going to the Northrop Grumman/Airbus consortium will hurt the industrial base. But if there is an argument that it could—that’s the argument Boeing should be making, rather than talking about “Kansas jobs.”

This refers to something we have talked about at CR:  the desire by Texans, as led by Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, to have more dialog with DHS and create a workaround with regard to the Border Fence in certain special circumstances.  I think this is reasonable, but the onus then goes upon the Texas border entity asking for a waiver on the fence, to support an alternative means of creating border security.  We will be watching this carefully.

Senator Byron Dorgan caught CR's attention, by his intense questioning of DOT official, Mary Peters and Calvin Scovel.  This has all the signs of another free pass for Mexico at the expense of American interests. 

…at the Senate Commerce Committee oversight hearing Tuesday, [March 11, 2008], Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters and DOT Inspector General Calvin L. Scovel III reluctantly admitted under intense questioning from Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., that Mexican drivers were being designated at the border as "proficient in English" even though they could explain U.S. traffic signs only in Spanish.

In the tense hearing, Dorgan accused Peters of being "arrogant" and in reckless disregard of a congressional vote to stop the Mexican trucking demonstration project by taking away funds to continue the project. Toward the end, the senator asked if it were true Mexican truckers could explain U.S. traffic signs only in Spanish when given English proficiency tests at the border.

 HERE IS SOME INCREDIBLE TESTIMONY: 

At our next Citizen Reform meeting we will discuss:

• FISA: The Politics of National Security
  We will have a special guest from Capitol Hill explain this complicated, but vitally important controversy.

• The Mexican Trucks Are Rolling!
  And nothing, not you, not Congress, not safety considerations can stop them.

• Boeing vs. Airbus
  Untangling another complicated issue that pits corruption vs. patriotism; national security and jobs vs. fiscal integrity.

• Has California Made it Illegal to Homeschool? 
  Are we next? Get the full report.

Further investigation has revealed that articles declaring Boeing's SBInet Project a failure can be found as early as August 2007.

___________________________

August 23rd, 2007

Boeing virtual fence: $30 billion failure

___________________________________________________________________________

CR Comment

 DHS gave testimony in late February, 2008, that acknowledged the failure or delay, and that has led to the spate of stories — however, the actual facts of the problems of the virtual fence are not new.

 CR's point is that as Citizens with little time to dig deep on these issues, we are constantly buffeted with inaccurate information which tends to mostly discourage us from caring.  Let's learn to work through the sloppy reporting and the sensationalism, and keep our eye on the ball:  we need a secure border and we can't let DHS or Congress off the hook.

Grassfire.org, a grassroots group I have liked, but seems to be increasingly reckless and desperate in its rhetoric.   Note the dates in red.

2/29/08 

Dear Albert,

Breaking news has confirmed what Grassfire has been saying all along–the VIRTUAL BORDER FENCE HAS FAILED!

According to reports, Project 28 (twenty-eight miles of virtual border fence in Arizona), which the President has boasted is "the most technologically advanced border security initiative in American history" has failed.  

Albert, this is just one more slap across the face of American citizens who are eager to see our borders secured!

As you know I have spent the last two CR meetings researching and rerporting to you my best and most honest assessment of the true state of the Border Fence.   

This "failure" was in my research, I did not mention it because it was treated as an isolated failure not symptomatic of a full blown across the board failure.  I am looking into it as to why this came out as a big story now.  It is not new.  It happened several months ago.  Note the date of this excerpt from a news story on Project 28, the "failure" described by Grassfire as "breaking news",

Glitches delay virtual fence on border

By ELISE CASTELLI

October 31, 2007

Bugs in the Homeland Security Department's border surveillance system, SBInet, have been frustrating for Customs and Border Protection agents, congressional auditors say.

Stana interviewed Border Patrol agents as part of GAO's review of the prototype project, known as Project 28, a name that refers to the virtual fence installed in Arizona along 28 miles of the Mexican border.

This is reproduced from Numbers USA 

"If you can't beat them, shut them up" seems to be the new motto of groups that have been continually losing in their attempts to pass an amnesty for illegal aliens.

(Here is an Associated Press story about this national censorship campaign.)