Month: January 2011

David Bahati intervenes in UK asylum case

This in from Lezgetreal.com:

Brenda Namigadde left Uganda 8 years ago, in 2003. She lived together with her partner, a Canadian woman Janet, but they were threatened, and both left the country, first Janet back to Canada, then Brenda went to the UK:

“Our relationship led us to be sworn at, threatened. Even the house where we were living was hurt, so we had to live in hiding for a month. Janet had to go back to Canada, the last time I saw here was in 2003. I’ve been in the U.K. for 8 years, applied for asylum last year for human protection.”

“I’ll be tortured, or killed, if I’m sent back to Uganda. They’ve put people like me to death there.”

“Yes I was involved in the protest at Trafalgar Square, we wanted to speak out against the law in Uganda. It’s not right how they treat gay people there. In Uganda, I have nobody there, it’s very dangerous for me. If I can stay here in the UK I can continue my studies, live my life freely, openly, without fear.”

This is the woman who faces deportation back to Uganda on January 28th. International Activists have worked in unity to effect a campaign to save Brenda from certain harm.

Brenda is presently detained at Yarlswood Immigrtaion Removal Centre. She has another removal date set for 28th January 2011 to Entebbe Uganda in Flight VS671 & KQ412 via Nairobi, Kenya at 21.20 hrs.

I am supporting asylum for this woman as it appears to me that she could well face threat in Uganda. The case took an interesting and unexpected turn yesterday when Anti-Homosexuality Bill author called Melanie Nathan, the author of the Lezgetreal blog, to comment on the Namigadde case:

Bahati said he read the piece about Brenda  Namigadde where I quoted him and that he was calling to tell me to give Brenda a message. The author of the anti-gay legislation said that the legislation will be presented to the Ugandan Parliament in the next few weeks. Homosexuality Including men and women is considered a crime in Uganda as being against the order of nature. The new Bill by Bahati seeks to affirm its criminalization and also calls for the death penalty in certain circumstances.

He told me that Brenda should stop bad mouthing Uganda; that she would be welcome back to Uganda if she renounced her homosexuality and if she “repented.”   I asked him if he based this ideal upon religious beliefs and he said “yes” that he did. I asked what if Brenda did not have the same belief as he did?  I asked what if she did not believe that she could repent?  He affirmed then she would be tried as a criminal.

After speaking to Mr. Bahati, I realize that he believes that Ms. Namigadde is indeed a lesbian. This serves only to enhance the danger she is in and flies in the face of the UK assertion that she may not have proved that she is a lesbian. She is indeed in danger.

Although the campaign is in full swing in Uganda, Mr. Bahati faces no opposition and must have some time on his hands.

Change.org and Paul Canning have efforts going to alert the UK authorities about what would be good for Ms. Namigadde.

More on this situation from the UK Guardian.

Did the Hyde Amendment keep Kermit Gosnell in business?

By now, the facts are well known. Kermit Gosnell, a physician in charge of Women’s Medical Society in West Philadelphia, was charged last week with the deaths of a former patient via a botched abortion and seven infants who were born alive and then murdered. The grand jury report of the investigation is here and another post on the matter is here.

Some pro-choice advocates are blaming restrictions on abortion and abortion funding, such as the Hyde Amendment for the tragedy. For instance, Amanda Marcotte, writing for RhRealityCheck.org, asks, “Why can’t anti-choicers accept that restricting abortion means more predators like Kermit Gosnell will get customers?” Susan Schewel, executive director of the Women’s Medical Fund, a group that funds abortion for low income women, suggests that the lack of Medicaid funding caused by the Hyde Amendment drives women to low cost horror factories such as operated by Gosnell. In a letter to supporters about the Gosnell tragedy, Schewel writes, “This prohibition on Medicaid payment for abortion leaves desperate women vulnerable to sub-standard providers.”

The problem with this line of thinking is that Gosnell was able to accept Medicaid funding, at least for vaccines. The grand jury report indicates that he took insurance payments, at least some from Medicaid via a City of Philadelphia program that paid for vaccinations. I have also learned this afternoon that he was a network provider for the insurance giant Aetna until early 2010.

According to the grand jury report, at least one pro-choice group, the Delaware Pro-Choice Abortion Fund paid for abortions at Gosnell’s clinic. The issue here was not access but lack of oversight. Incidentally, I can find no indication that the pro-choice funding group ever checked up on Gosnell.

If Medicaid paid for abortion, yes, Gosnell’s clients would have had free or nearly free services, but without oversight, those free services could have been pretty costly. The issue here is oversight, or rather the lack of it, and let’s not forget why that oversight was lacking. Kenneth Brody, Department of Health lawyer said there was consideration given to restarting abortion clinic regulation in 1999. However, the decision was not to inspect. Why? Brody told the grand jury:

…there was a concern that if they did routine inspections, that they may find a lot of these facilities didn’t meet [the standards for getting patients out by stretcher or wheelchair in an emergency], and then there would be less abortion facilities, less access to women to have an abortion.

Gosnell was performing procedures that few others would do even if the Hyde amendment was not in force. But those Medicaid did allow (rape, health of the mother), he did perform, at least according to this rate sheet obtained at Gosnell’s clinic.

I agree with the Philadelphia grand jury; the massacre in Philadelphia was due to a lack of oversight impure and painfully simple.

Jon Stewart on playing the Nazi card

Dude, it only took you a week to forget everything…

Speaks for itself, listen up.

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Jon Stewart says very near the end of the clip…

What I have a problem with is people using hyperbole to induce an irrational fear of a particular group with the goal of ultimately reducing their numbers.

I have a problem with that too.

Bryan Fischer doubles down on GLBT housing regulations

In a Saturday article, the American Family Association’s Bryan Fischer told the Christian Post that he believes the Department of Housing and Urban Development should not expand discrimination rules to include sexual orientation and gender identity.  His reasons: gays aren’t really discriminated against and even if they are, they can choose not be gay.

However, in a AFA column today, he adds some reasons which will make the Southern Poverty Law Center even more secure in their decision to place the AFA on their list of GLBT hate groups.

There are two more reasons why this is a perfectly bad idea. (I brought both of these up with the writer of the Christian Post article, but they did not make it into the published piece.) One, many young boys living in HUD housing are already in troubled domestic situations, many with no father presence in the home. The last thing they need is suddenly to be living next door to two males modeling a sexually abnormal lifestyle. Role models matter immensely to young boys, and they don’t need any more adults around them setting bad examples. They’ve already been exposed to enough of that. 

And we know – despite the howls of protest to the contrary – that male homosexuals molest young boys at a hugely exaggerated rate. The Roman Catholic Church, for instance, did a study of its own priests who molested children, and found that 81% of the victims were boys. 

The last thing in the world young males in troubled home settings need is to be put in a situation where there is a heightened chance they will be sexually molested by their next door neighbors. These HUD housing projects will become hunting grounds with easy prey for homosexual pedophiles.

Neither of these reasons has any merit. Somehow Fischer knows things that the rest of us don’t know. Conflating pedophilia with homosexuality is a categorical error made by many of the SPLC hate groups. While I can understand the impulse to keep pedophiles away from children, this concern does not apply to GLBT people who have no sexual desire for children. Fischer’s argument is ironic given the fact that ideological fellow traveler, Scott Lively, recently had a sex offender working around teens in his new coffee house.

Bahati “more than confident” bill will pass

As quoted in todays’s Monitor, Ugandan MP David Bahati says not to mix religion and politics but then does so by saying this:

Qn: Of late you have been silent about the Anti -Homosexuality Bill; did the incidents in the US where you were barred from attending a conference scare you?

The Bill is within the responsible committee of Parliament. We have been assured that it will be considered before May; before the expiry of this Parliament. The events in the USA surely exposed the kind of intorelence that is inconsistent with the book values of American People and strengthened me and the Ugandan people in our defence of the children and the family. This Bill provides a God given opportunity for Uganda to provide leadership on this issue and Iam more than confident that it will pass.