This morning former League of the South board member and candidate for Anne Arundel County Council Michael Peroutka held his news conference in Maryland. I was unable to go but I talked to one person in the meeting and am seeing some news reports filed after the event.
According to a source at the event, Peroutka accused me of unfairly editing the video of his 2012 speech at the League of the South annual conference. In that video, he supported secession and led the crowd in “Dixie”, calling it the “national anthem.” That post is here and as you will see, I included the entire video uncut, along with a separate video of his tribute to Dixie. In other words, if my source is accurate and Peroutka accused me of editing the video, Peroutka was wrong.
According to my source and the Capital Gazette, Peroutka called the League of the South “a Christian, free-market group.” According to this report, he sees no racism in the League of the South. The League of the South is pretty clear that they want a Southern homeland for white Europeans.
Peroutka’s designation for the League is not one that the League uses. They claim to be a Southern Nationalist organization that seeks secession and you don’t have to be a Christian to be in the League.
If his approach to the League is any indication, I doubt Peroutka helped himself with this press conference.
Meanwhile, a local caucus of African-American leaders has invited Peroutka to speak to their organization.

THE CAUCUS OF AFRICAN AMERICAN LEADERS
INVITES
MICHAEL ANTHONY PEROUTKA TO SPEAK

 
Annapolis, Maryland- July 30, 2014– Carl O. Snowden, convener of the Caucus of African American Leaders have invited Michael Anthony Peroutka, the Republican candidate for Anne Arundel County District Five to address the Caucus of African American Leaders at its September meeting.
 
Mr. Peroutka who is holding a 10:30 a.m. press conference today at Hampton Inn in Glen Burnie, Maryland  to respond to allegations that he is affiliated with a hate group and that he is an extremist. 

He is expected to respond to both the Caucus and other Republican candidates that have indicated that they will not support his candidacy. 
 
Mr. Snowden applauded District 30  Republican State Senate  candidate Don Quinn, who has publicly disavowed the candidacy of Mr. Peroutka. 

The Caucus of African American Leaders is a consortium of black elected officials, clergy, and civil rights organizations in Anne Arundel County, which includes the NAACP, Black Chamber of Commerce, sororities and activists.   The Caucus has invited both Republicans and Democrats to address them in the past. 

Previous candidates who have spoken before the Caucus include County Executive Laura Neuman, Speaker Michael E. Busch, Delegate Steve Schuh, former Anne Arundel County Sheriff George F. Johnson and Mr. Quinn to name a few.

“We believe that Don Quinn and the Republican candidate for Governor Larry Hogan is correct in their assertion that the extremist right-wing views of Mr. Peroutka should not be represented on the Anne Arundel County Council and we have called on Annapolis Mayor Mike Pantelides to join his fellow Republicans in denouncing his candidacy”, said Mr. Snowden.
 
He further stated, “Because we anticipate that Mr. Peroutka will deny that he is an extremist with racial animus, we are extending this public invitation for him to join us at our September meeting at the Wiley H. Bates Legacy Center in Annapolis, Maryland to speak directly to African American leaders’, said Mr. Snowden.
 
Mr. Snowden who knows Peroutka spokesman John Lofton, the two served together as panelist on WJZ-TV’s Square Off program, said, “All one has to do is review the public statements of John Lofton and Michael Anthony Peroutka and if their views are not extremist, than water is not wet”.  

For more information, please call 410-269-1524.

 
 

Paul Tripp has resigned from the Mars Hill Church Board of Advisors and Accountability.

Tripp, one of the newest board members and popular conference speaker, was unavailable this morning, but in response to my question about Tripp’s membership on the Mars Hill Church BOAA, Steve Sarkisian, Vice President of Paul Tripp Ministries, told me, “Paul resigned from the board.”

No reason was given for the departure.

Paul Tripp was appointed to the Board in November, 2013.

I will add more information as it becomes available.

On Monday, I pointed out that Mars Hill Spokesman Justin Dean claimed a role in helping Mark Driscoll’s book Real Marriage get to #1 on the New York Times Bestseller list.  Dean’s bio on a website called Innovate4Jesus touted the accomplishment even though it is now known that the book was guaranteed an appearance on the NYT list due to the work of consulting firm Result Source. Result Source used subterfuge to purchase books in order to lift Real Marriage to the top spot on the list. Earlier today, Innovate4Jesus scrubbed Dean’s bio of reference to  the bestseller campaign. On Monday, Dean’s bio appeared as follows:

Now it looks like this:

 
No explanation given.
Innovate4Jesus appears to have a cozy relationship with Mars Hill Church. Mark Driscoll has several videos embedded on the site and there is a Mars Hill channel. While this probably won’t last long, Driscoll’s bio on the site also touts the NYT Bestseller status of Real Marriage.

 

This came to several members of the press today:

Michael  Anthony Peroutka, the Republican candidate for Anne Arundel County District 5 will be giving a press conference on Wednesday, July 30th to address the recent controversy about allegations made against him by Carl Snowden [as organizer of the Caucus of African-American Leaders].

There will be a question and answer session after a short statement is made.

Press conference will start at 10:30am.  Doors open at 10:00am.

The press conference will be at:

Hampton Inn Glen Burnie

6617 Ritchie Hwy., Glen Burnie, Maryland, 21061

Please contact Phil Reeder at peroutka2014@gmail.com or call 410-946-2910 for any questions

Carl Snowden’s charges can be found in this Baltimore Sun article.

“The Republican Party has been advocating that they want to attract African-Americans and Latinos to their cause,” Snowden said in a statement issued Thursday afternoon. “We believe the candidacy of Mr. Peroutka will have a disastrous effect on this outreach effort.”

Maybe I’ll mosey on over…

I have been writing about Mars Hill Church since late November 2013. In the process, I have met many people who once attended Mars and some who still do (over 100 I think). In these conversations, especially with ex-members who were around from the early days, similar stories come up. One familiar story I have not written about is Mark Driscoll’s proclamation that we “live in a completely pussified nation.” Apparently this material was deleted from the Mars Hill website and is not now available anywhere. According to my sources, some Mars Hill pastors have asked former members to destroy any copies of the thread they had printed out. It has now become available again and I think it may be of some benefit to understand the historical development of Mars Hill Church and the controversies surrounding Mark Driscoll’s preaching and commentary on gender.

In 2006, Driscoll commented favorably on his William Wallace II remarks in his book Confessions of a Reformission Rev (see below). To my knowledge, he has not refuted or distanced himself from these sentiments since then. I do offer the observation that the thread is 14 years old and may not represent how he would communicate to his church today.

The image below is of the first paragraph of what turned out to be a thread of over 100 pages of material on the Mars Hill Church unmoderated forum called Midrash.

To read some history behind Midrash and this thread go to Wenatchee the Hatchet’s site.

Driscoll referred to this thread and his alias as William Wallace II in his 2006 book Confessions of a Reformission Rev:

So because Driscoll believed the men in his church were soft and feminine, he attacked them anonymously. His opening salvo as William Wallace II, while clever in its machismo, was quickly challenged by another person who wondered if Jesus was pussified. Driscoll, as you will see if you read the whole thing, dismissed the poster’s concerns. In the excerpts below,

Driscoll belittled those who disagreed with him.

To read the entire 100+ page thread, go here.

Driscoll echos the mom-bashers of the WWII and post-war era. Philip Wylie (“momism“) and Ed Strecker are two I have written about previously.  The jacket cover of Strecker’s 1946 book, Their Mothers’ Sons, proclaimed:

This is a book about Mother, the great American “Mom,” and what she is doing to the young men of America. In its pages a world-famous psychiatrist describes in unforgettable terms a new American tragedy – the millions of young men in this country today who live in confusion and emotional chaos, condemned by millions of well-meaning and unthinking “Moms” who will not cut the apron strings between them and their sons.

Strecker, a military psychiatrist, believed that doting mothers were often at fault when their soldier sons developed psychiatric disorders. Both Wylie and Strecker thought men of the day were unable to achieve maturity because mothers prevented their full development. Driscoll would have been right at home with Wylie and Strecker, proud members of the “He Man Woman Haters Club.”

For the sake of context, here is the entire first post from Driscoll:

More excerpts: