K
Kickin' Ass and Takin' Names
Guest
There are so many dingbats, loons, wackadoodles, zealots, charlatans,
fakers, freaks, and general fools on the "religious right" and among
the "values voters" that it's hard to keep them straight. Here's a
partial list in case you encounter one of these nutcases.
Tony Perkins
Tony Perkins is president of the Family Research Council, considered
the leading religious-right think tank in Washington, DC. Before
coming to FRC, Perkins was a state legislator in Louisiana, and as a
campaign manager for a Republican candidate, he reportedly bought
David Duke's e-mail list.
Under Perkins's leadership, FRC, along with Focus on the Family, put
together several "simulcasts" of political rallies held in churches,
including three "Justice Sunday" events in 2005-2006-"Stopping the
Filibuster Against People of Faith," "God Save the United States and
this Honorable Court," and "Proclaim Liberty Throughout the Land"-
featuring religious-right luminaries such as James Dobson, Jerry
Falwell, and Phyllis Schlafly, along with politicians like Rick
Santorum and then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, arguing that
opposition to Bush's extreme judicial nominees constituted an assault
on their faith or Christianity itself. A fourth event just before the
2006 elections, "Liberty Sunday," promoted the idea that gays and
their "agenda" were out to destroy religious freedom.
That fall, FRC also organized a "Values Voter Summit," in which Dobson
and other activists exhorted their constituency to turn out for the
GOP; the conference showcased a number of future presidential
candidates, including Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee, and Sam Brownback. A
second Values Voter Summit is planned for next month.
Also appearing from FRC at the Family Impact Summit are David Prentice
and Peter Sprigg.
Richard Land
Since 1998, Richard Land has served as president of the Southern
Baptist Convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, which is
"dedicated to addressing social and moral concerns and their
implications on public policy issues from City Hall to Congress."
Land has been an active and influential right-wing leader for many
years and in 2005, was named one of "The Twenty-five Most Influential
Evangelicals in America" by Time Magazine, joining the likes of James
Dobson, Chuck Colson, David Barton, Rick Santorum, and Ted Haggard.
Land also hosts three separate nationally syndicated radio programs
and has written several books including, most recently "The Divided
States of America? What Liberals and Conservatives are Missing in the
God-and-Country Shouting Match!," which Land claims seeks a middle
ground between the right and the left on the role of religion in the
public square. In reality, the middle ground Land stakes out consists
mainly of standard right-wing positions on political and social issues
that are made to appear moderate in comparison to ultra-radical
positions put forth by far-right fringe elements.
In recent months, Land has been positioning himself to play a much
more high-profile role in the presidential campaign than he has in the
past, repeatedly asserting that he and other Evangelicals will not
support Rudy Giuliani or Newt Gingrich, should he run, while
regularly bolstering the campaign of Fred Thompson, who Land calls a
"Southern-fried Reagan."
Harry Jackson
Jackson, pastor of a Maryland megachurch, has become a frequent
spokesman for right-wing causes in recent years. In 2004, he played a
prominent role in urging blacks to vote for George Bush, and in 2005,
he started the High Impact Leadership Coalition and unveiled his
"Black Contract with America on Moral Values"-an agenda topped with
fighting gay marriage-at an event co-sponsored by the far-right
Traditional Values Coalition. Jackson spoke at "Justice Sunday," a
religious-right rally in favor of Bush's judicial nominees, as well as
"Justice Sunday II, where he promised to "bring the rule and reign of
the Cross to America." He is a member of the Arlington Group.
Since then, Jackson has continued to urge blacks to vote for right-
wing causes and candidates. "[Martin Luther] King would most likely be
a social conservative," he wrote in one typical column. His most
recent efforts have focused on opposing hate crimes protections for
gays, falsely claiming that a proposed bill would "muzzle our
pulpits."
In an article in Charisma magazine, Jackson wrote that the "wisdom
behind" the "gay agenda" is "clearly satanic," and he called for an
aggressive "counterattack." He asserted to The New York Times that
"Historically when societies have gone off kilter, there has been
rampant same-sex marriage."
Don Wildmon
Wildmon is the Founder and Chairman of the American Family
Association, which exists primarily to decry whatever it deems
"immoral" in American culture and lead boycotts against companies that
in any way support causes, organizations, or programs it deems
offensive, particularly anything that does not portray gays and
lesbians in a negative light.
Over the years, AFA has targeted everything from the National
Endowment for the Arts, Howard Stern, and the television show "Ellen"
to major corporations such as Ford , Burger King, and Clorox. AFA has
also been particularly focused on Disney, declaring that the company's
"attack on America's families has become so blatant, so intentional,
so obvious" as to warrant a multi-year boycott.
Recently, AFA has been busy warning that proposed hate-crimes
legislation is designed to lay the "groundwork for persecution of
Christians," attacked presidential candidate Mitt Romney over his time
on the board of Marriott Corporation because the company offers adult
movies in its hotels, and warned that the US Senate was "angering a
just God" and bringing "judgment upon our country" by allowing a Hindu
chaplain to deliver an opening prayer.
Gary Bauer
Gary Bauer is a long-time right-wing activist and leader. After
serving President Ronald Reagan's administration for eight years in
various capacities, Bauer went on to become President of the Family
Research Council, which was founded, in part, by James Dobson of Focus
on the Family, where Bauer also served as Senior Vice President.
Bauer stepped down from FRC in 1999 when he launched an unsuccessful
campaign for the Republican presidential nomination. After dropping
out of the race, Bauer made a surprising endorsement of Sen. John
McCain at a time when many of the other right-wing leaders had lined
up behind George W. Bush.
Bauer's standing took a beating when he defended McCain's attack on
Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson as "agents of intolerance" and he was
ostracized by many for quite a while after McCain lost. But Bauer
pressed ahead, creating his own non-profit, American Values, and
gradually reestablished himself in right-wing circles.
Since then, Bauer has been active in various right-wing campaigns,
most notably joining with likes of Tony Perkins and James Dobson in
defending and pressing for the confirmation of John Roberts and Samuel
Alito to the Supreme Court.
William Owens
Owens, a graduate of Oral Roberts University and a Memphis pastor,
founded the Coalition of African American Pastors to combat equal
marriage rights for gay couples. Owens reportedly told the "Rally for
Traditional Marriage" held in Mississippi in 2004 that "homosexual
activists of today have hijacked the civil rights cause," adding:
"We're going to fight until we win," he said. "We're going to have
crusades and rallies like this until we win. We're going to let our
political leaders know 'if you don't stand for God, we won't stand for
you.'" Owens lent the CAAP name to the Religious Right's judges
campaign, signing on to the "National Coalition to End Judicial
Filibusters" and holding a press conference in support of Samuel
Alito's Supreme Court nomination.
In 2004, Owens formed an alliance with the Arlington Group, a
coalition of powerful religious-right leaders that was widely credited
with being the driving force behind the effort to put anti-gay
marriage amendments on the ballot in 11 states in that year's
election. Owens is now on the group's executive committee, alongside
James Dobson, Gary Bauer, Bill Bennett, Tony Perkins, Paul Weyrich,
Rod Parsley and others.
Alan Chambers
"Ex-gay" Alan Chambers is president of Exodus International and
executive director of Exodus North America, which claim gay men and
lesbians can be "cured" and "change" their sexual orientation to
heterosexual. Exodus' board includes long-time anti-gay activist Phil
Burress of Ohio's Citizens for Community Values, his wife Vickie
Burress - founder of the American Family Association of Indiana - and
Mike Haley, who replaced discredited "ex-gay" John Paulk at Focus on
the Family as chief spokesperson on homosexuality and gender issues.
Exodus also co-sponsors a series of "ex-gay" conferences across the
country with Focus on the Family. One recent Love Won Out event was
particularly mired in controversy when it was revealed that one of its
presenting organizations had published a racist column that appeared
to justify slavery. During a 2006 CPAC conference panel, Chambers
insisted "lifelong homosexual relationships are not possible" and the
battle for marriage equality was solely being promoted by the liberal
media.
Other representatives of the "ex-gay" activist community scheduled for
the conference include Scott Davis and Mike Ensley of Exodus and Nancy
Heche, whose book "The Truth Comes Out" describes "how to respond
lovingly, yet appropriately, to homosexual family members and
friends," such as her husband, who held secret "homosexual affairs,"
and her daughter, whose open relationship with Ellen DeGeneres Heche
called "Like a betrayal of an unspoken vow: We will never have
anything to do with homosexuals."
Robert Knight
Robert Knight is something of a journeyman within the right-wing
movement. After starting out as a journalist and editor for various
newspapers, Knight has held a series of jobs with various right-wing
organizations including Senior Director of Cultural Studies at the
Family Research Council, a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, and
director of the Culture & Family Institute at Concerned Women for
America.
Currently, he is the head of the Media Research Center's Culture and
Media Institute at the Media Research Center and a columnist for
Townhall.com.
His hostility toward gays is well-known, as evidenced by his response
to the news that Mary Cheney, the lesbian daughter of the Vice
President, was expecting a child with her partner:
"I think it's tragic that a child has been conceived with the express
purpose of denying it a father," Knight said.
"Fatherhood is important and always will be, so if Mary and her
partner indicate that that is a trivial matter, they're shortchanging
this child from the start."
"Mary and Heather can believe what they want," Knight said, "but what
they're seeking is to force others to bless their nonmarital
relationship as marriage" and to "create a culture that is based on
sexual anarchy instead of marriage and family values."
John Stemberger
Stemberger, a personal injury attorney and former political director
for the Florida GOP, is the president and general counsel of the
Florida Family Policy Counsel/Florida Family Action, a state affiliate
of James Dobson's Focus on the Family.
Stemberger is leading the petition drive to put on next year's ballot
a constitutional amendment to ban equal marriage rights for same-sex
couples, which is already banned by statute. While a 2006 effort fell
short, as of September 5, Florida4Marriage.org claimed to have
gathered 594,000 of the 611,000 signatures they need to submit by
February 1, making it likely that the amendment will be on the ballot
in 2008.
Ken Blackwell
Blackwell is most famous as the controversial Ohio secretary of state
during the 2004 election, overseeing voting laws while moonlighting as
state co-chair for Bush/Cheney. But he has a long history of far-right
activism on economic and civil rights issues, and in 2004 Blackwell
forged an alliance with the Religious Right as he campaigned for an
anti-gay ballot measure. By 2006, when Blackwell ran for governor,
this alliance had grown into a church-based political machine, with
megachurch pastors Rod Parsley and Russell Johnson taking Blackwell to
rallies of "Patriot Pastors," who signed on to a vision of a
Christianity under attack by dark forces, in need of "restoration"
through electoral politics. "This is a battle between the forces of
righteousness and the hordes of hell," declared Johnson.
Blackwell's gubernatorial bid failed, but he continues his career as a
right-wing activist with affiliations with the Family Research Council
and the Club for Growth, as well as a column on Townhall.com.
Katherine Harris
Harris is well known for her controversial role in Florida's 2000
presidential election debacle, when she served as both secretary of
state, overseeing a "purge" of voter rolls as well as the recount
itself, and as a state co-chair for Bush/Cheney. She was elected to
the U.S. House in 2002 and 2004, and spoke at the Conservative
Political Action Conference in both 2002 and 2003.
In 2006 Harris made a quixotic Senate run, during which she heavily
courted the Religious Right. In an interview with the Florida Baptist
Witness, she implied that her opponent, Sen. Bill Nelson, was not a
Christian, saying, "f you're not electing Christians then in
essence you are going to legislate sin. They can legislate sin. They
can say that abortion is alright. They can vote to sustain gay
marriage. And that will take western civilization, indeed other
nations because people look to our country as one nation as under God
and whenever we legislate sin and we say abortion is permissible and
we say gay unions are permissible, then average citizens who are not
Christians, because they don't know better, we are leading them astray
and it's wrong." She also advised people to disbelieve "that lie we
have been told, the separation of church and state."
Tom Minnery
Minnery is vice president for public policy at Focus on the Family and
a frequent spokesman for the group. He is the author of "Why You Can't
Stay Silent: A Biblical Mandate to Shape Our Culture," arguing that
society should be "changed from the top down morally." Focus on the
Family, with a combined budget of over $160 million, promotes far-
right positions on social issues to millions of Americans through
radio, print, and the web, and Focus founder James Dobson is probably
the single most influential figure on the Religious Right.
"There are more than enough Christians to defeat the Left," Minnery
said at a rally in South Dakota. "There are a lot of pastors who
didn't want to be seen as an 'activist,' but this issue of marriage
has left them with little choice but to get involved."
fakers, freaks, and general fools on the "religious right" and among
the "values voters" that it's hard to keep them straight. Here's a
partial list in case you encounter one of these nutcases.
Tony Perkins
Tony Perkins is president of the Family Research Council, considered
the leading religious-right think tank in Washington, DC. Before
coming to FRC, Perkins was a state legislator in Louisiana, and as a
campaign manager for a Republican candidate, he reportedly bought
David Duke's e-mail list.
Under Perkins's leadership, FRC, along with Focus on the Family, put
together several "simulcasts" of political rallies held in churches,
including three "Justice Sunday" events in 2005-2006-"Stopping the
Filibuster Against People of Faith," "God Save the United States and
this Honorable Court," and "Proclaim Liberty Throughout the Land"-
featuring religious-right luminaries such as James Dobson, Jerry
Falwell, and Phyllis Schlafly, along with politicians like Rick
Santorum and then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, arguing that
opposition to Bush's extreme judicial nominees constituted an assault
on their faith or Christianity itself. A fourth event just before the
2006 elections, "Liberty Sunday," promoted the idea that gays and
their "agenda" were out to destroy religious freedom.
That fall, FRC also organized a "Values Voter Summit," in which Dobson
and other activists exhorted their constituency to turn out for the
GOP; the conference showcased a number of future presidential
candidates, including Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee, and Sam Brownback. A
second Values Voter Summit is planned for next month.
Also appearing from FRC at the Family Impact Summit are David Prentice
and Peter Sprigg.
Richard Land
Since 1998, Richard Land has served as president of the Southern
Baptist Convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, which is
"dedicated to addressing social and moral concerns and their
implications on public policy issues from City Hall to Congress."
Land has been an active and influential right-wing leader for many
years and in 2005, was named one of "The Twenty-five Most Influential
Evangelicals in America" by Time Magazine, joining the likes of James
Dobson, Chuck Colson, David Barton, Rick Santorum, and Ted Haggard.
Land also hosts three separate nationally syndicated radio programs
and has written several books including, most recently "The Divided
States of America? What Liberals and Conservatives are Missing in the
God-and-Country Shouting Match!," which Land claims seeks a middle
ground between the right and the left on the role of religion in the
public square. In reality, the middle ground Land stakes out consists
mainly of standard right-wing positions on political and social issues
that are made to appear moderate in comparison to ultra-radical
positions put forth by far-right fringe elements.
In recent months, Land has been positioning himself to play a much
more high-profile role in the presidential campaign than he has in the
past, repeatedly asserting that he and other Evangelicals will not
support Rudy Giuliani or Newt Gingrich, should he run, while
regularly bolstering the campaign of Fred Thompson, who Land calls a
"Southern-fried Reagan."
Harry Jackson
Jackson, pastor of a Maryland megachurch, has become a frequent
spokesman for right-wing causes in recent years. In 2004, he played a
prominent role in urging blacks to vote for George Bush, and in 2005,
he started the High Impact Leadership Coalition and unveiled his
"Black Contract with America on Moral Values"-an agenda topped with
fighting gay marriage-at an event co-sponsored by the far-right
Traditional Values Coalition. Jackson spoke at "Justice Sunday," a
religious-right rally in favor of Bush's judicial nominees, as well as
"Justice Sunday II, where he promised to "bring the rule and reign of
the Cross to America." He is a member of the Arlington Group.
Since then, Jackson has continued to urge blacks to vote for right-
wing causes and candidates. "[Martin Luther] King would most likely be
a social conservative," he wrote in one typical column. His most
recent efforts have focused on opposing hate crimes protections for
gays, falsely claiming that a proposed bill would "muzzle our
pulpits."
In an article in Charisma magazine, Jackson wrote that the "wisdom
behind" the "gay agenda" is "clearly satanic," and he called for an
aggressive "counterattack." He asserted to The New York Times that
"Historically when societies have gone off kilter, there has been
rampant same-sex marriage."
Don Wildmon
Wildmon is the Founder and Chairman of the American Family
Association, which exists primarily to decry whatever it deems
"immoral" in American culture and lead boycotts against companies that
in any way support causes, organizations, or programs it deems
offensive, particularly anything that does not portray gays and
lesbians in a negative light.
Over the years, AFA has targeted everything from the National
Endowment for the Arts, Howard Stern, and the television show "Ellen"
to major corporations such as Ford , Burger King, and Clorox. AFA has
also been particularly focused on Disney, declaring that the company's
"attack on America's families has become so blatant, so intentional,
so obvious" as to warrant a multi-year boycott.
Recently, AFA has been busy warning that proposed hate-crimes
legislation is designed to lay the "groundwork for persecution of
Christians," attacked presidential candidate Mitt Romney over his time
on the board of Marriott Corporation because the company offers adult
movies in its hotels, and warned that the US Senate was "angering a
just God" and bringing "judgment upon our country" by allowing a Hindu
chaplain to deliver an opening prayer.
Gary Bauer
Gary Bauer is a long-time right-wing activist and leader. After
serving President Ronald Reagan's administration for eight years in
various capacities, Bauer went on to become President of the Family
Research Council, which was founded, in part, by James Dobson of Focus
on the Family, where Bauer also served as Senior Vice President.
Bauer stepped down from FRC in 1999 when he launched an unsuccessful
campaign for the Republican presidential nomination. After dropping
out of the race, Bauer made a surprising endorsement of Sen. John
McCain at a time when many of the other right-wing leaders had lined
up behind George W. Bush.
Bauer's standing took a beating when he defended McCain's attack on
Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson as "agents of intolerance" and he was
ostracized by many for quite a while after McCain lost. But Bauer
pressed ahead, creating his own non-profit, American Values, and
gradually reestablished himself in right-wing circles.
Since then, Bauer has been active in various right-wing campaigns,
most notably joining with likes of Tony Perkins and James Dobson in
defending and pressing for the confirmation of John Roberts and Samuel
Alito to the Supreme Court.
William Owens
Owens, a graduate of Oral Roberts University and a Memphis pastor,
founded the Coalition of African American Pastors to combat equal
marriage rights for gay couples. Owens reportedly told the "Rally for
Traditional Marriage" held in Mississippi in 2004 that "homosexual
activists of today have hijacked the civil rights cause," adding:
"We're going to fight until we win," he said. "We're going to have
crusades and rallies like this until we win. We're going to let our
political leaders know 'if you don't stand for God, we won't stand for
you.'" Owens lent the CAAP name to the Religious Right's judges
campaign, signing on to the "National Coalition to End Judicial
Filibusters" and holding a press conference in support of Samuel
Alito's Supreme Court nomination.
In 2004, Owens formed an alliance with the Arlington Group, a
coalition of powerful religious-right leaders that was widely credited
with being the driving force behind the effort to put anti-gay
marriage amendments on the ballot in 11 states in that year's
election. Owens is now on the group's executive committee, alongside
James Dobson, Gary Bauer, Bill Bennett, Tony Perkins, Paul Weyrich,
Rod Parsley and others.
Alan Chambers
"Ex-gay" Alan Chambers is president of Exodus International and
executive director of Exodus North America, which claim gay men and
lesbians can be "cured" and "change" their sexual orientation to
heterosexual. Exodus' board includes long-time anti-gay activist Phil
Burress of Ohio's Citizens for Community Values, his wife Vickie
Burress - founder of the American Family Association of Indiana - and
Mike Haley, who replaced discredited "ex-gay" John Paulk at Focus on
the Family as chief spokesperson on homosexuality and gender issues.
Exodus also co-sponsors a series of "ex-gay" conferences across the
country with Focus on the Family. One recent Love Won Out event was
particularly mired in controversy when it was revealed that one of its
presenting organizations had published a racist column that appeared
to justify slavery. During a 2006 CPAC conference panel, Chambers
insisted "lifelong homosexual relationships are not possible" and the
battle for marriage equality was solely being promoted by the liberal
media.
Other representatives of the "ex-gay" activist community scheduled for
the conference include Scott Davis and Mike Ensley of Exodus and Nancy
Heche, whose book "The Truth Comes Out" describes "how to respond
lovingly, yet appropriately, to homosexual family members and
friends," such as her husband, who held secret "homosexual affairs,"
and her daughter, whose open relationship with Ellen DeGeneres Heche
called "Like a betrayal of an unspoken vow: We will never have
anything to do with homosexuals."
Robert Knight
Robert Knight is something of a journeyman within the right-wing
movement. After starting out as a journalist and editor for various
newspapers, Knight has held a series of jobs with various right-wing
organizations including Senior Director of Cultural Studies at the
Family Research Council, a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, and
director of the Culture & Family Institute at Concerned Women for
America.
Currently, he is the head of the Media Research Center's Culture and
Media Institute at the Media Research Center and a columnist for
Townhall.com.
His hostility toward gays is well-known, as evidenced by his response
to the news that Mary Cheney, the lesbian daughter of the Vice
President, was expecting a child with her partner:
"I think it's tragic that a child has been conceived with the express
purpose of denying it a father," Knight said.
"Fatherhood is important and always will be, so if Mary and her
partner indicate that that is a trivial matter, they're shortchanging
this child from the start."
"Mary and Heather can believe what they want," Knight said, "but what
they're seeking is to force others to bless their nonmarital
relationship as marriage" and to "create a culture that is based on
sexual anarchy instead of marriage and family values."
John Stemberger
Stemberger, a personal injury attorney and former political director
for the Florida GOP, is the president and general counsel of the
Florida Family Policy Counsel/Florida Family Action, a state affiliate
of James Dobson's Focus on the Family.
Stemberger is leading the petition drive to put on next year's ballot
a constitutional amendment to ban equal marriage rights for same-sex
couples, which is already banned by statute. While a 2006 effort fell
short, as of September 5, Florida4Marriage.org claimed to have
gathered 594,000 of the 611,000 signatures they need to submit by
February 1, making it likely that the amendment will be on the ballot
in 2008.
Ken Blackwell
Blackwell is most famous as the controversial Ohio secretary of state
during the 2004 election, overseeing voting laws while moonlighting as
state co-chair for Bush/Cheney. But he has a long history of far-right
activism on economic and civil rights issues, and in 2004 Blackwell
forged an alliance with the Religious Right as he campaigned for an
anti-gay ballot measure. By 2006, when Blackwell ran for governor,
this alliance had grown into a church-based political machine, with
megachurch pastors Rod Parsley and Russell Johnson taking Blackwell to
rallies of "Patriot Pastors," who signed on to a vision of a
Christianity under attack by dark forces, in need of "restoration"
through electoral politics. "This is a battle between the forces of
righteousness and the hordes of hell," declared Johnson.
Blackwell's gubernatorial bid failed, but he continues his career as a
right-wing activist with affiliations with the Family Research Council
and the Club for Growth, as well as a column on Townhall.com.
Katherine Harris
Harris is well known for her controversial role in Florida's 2000
presidential election debacle, when she served as both secretary of
state, overseeing a "purge" of voter rolls as well as the recount
itself, and as a state co-chair for Bush/Cheney. She was elected to
the U.S. House in 2002 and 2004, and spoke at the Conservative
Political Action Conference in both 2002 and 2003.
In 2006 Harris made a quixotic Senate run, during which she heavily
courted the Religious Right. In an interview with the Florida Baptist
Witness, she implied that her opponent, Sen. Bill Nelson, was not a
Christian, saying, "f you're not electing Christians then in
essence you are going to legislate sin. They can legislate sin. They
can say that abortion is alright. They can vote to sustain gay
marriage. And that will take western civilization, indeed other
nations because people look to our country as one nation as under God
and whenever we legislate sin and we say abortion is permissible and
we say gay unions are permissible, then average citizens who are not
Christians, because they don't know better, we are leading them astray
and it's wrong." She also advised people to disbelieve "that lie we
have been told, the separation of church and state."
Tom Minnery
Minnery is vice president for public policy at Focus on the Family and
a frequent spokesman for the group. He is the author of "Why You Can't
Stay Silent: A Biblical Mandate to Shape Our Culture," arguing that
society should be "changed from the top down morally." Focus on the
Family, with a combined budget of over $160 million, promotes far-
right positions on social issues to millions of Americans through
radio, print, and the web, and Focus founder James Dobson is probably
the single most influential figure on the Religious Right.
"There are more than enough Christians to defeat the Left," Minnery
said at a rally in South Dakota. "There are a lot of pastors who
didn't want to be seen as an 'activist,' but this issue of marriage
has left them with little choice but to get involved."