American Family Association fires Bryan Fischer ahead of RNC trip to Israel
The Rachel Maddow Show 01/28/15
Debra Nussbaum Cohen, reporter for Haaretz, talks with Rachel Maddow about the American Family Association firing Bryan Fisher over remarks about Hitler and homosexuality, ahead of paying to fly 60 members of the Republican National Committee to Israel.
Texas Muslim Capitol Day Tainted By Anti-Islam Protesters, Lawmaker
Alena Yakusheva via Getty Images
By Paige Lavender Posted: 01/29/2015 12:42 pm EST Updated: 01/29/2015 12:59 pm EST
At least one state lawmaker and a slew of protesters made their opposition to Texas Muslim Capitol Day known on Thursday.
The event, organized by the Texas chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, "is an opportunity for community members to learn about the democratic political process and how to be an advocate for important issues," according to CAIR's website.
Freshman state Rep. Molly White (R), who wasn't at the statehouse for the event, left a message [ https://www.facebook.com/TexansforMolly/posts/1610704432493165 ] for those who attended Texas Muslim Capitol Day asking them "to renounce Islamic terrorist groups and publicly announce allegiance to America and our laws":
"Remember, in the Koran, it is ok to lie for the purpose of advancing Islam," she wrote. "Texans must never allow fringe groups of people to come here so that they can advance their own culture instead of becoming an American and assimilating into the American way of life."
Anti-Islam protesters took to the Texas statehouse on Thursday to express their opposition to Texas Muslim Capitol Day:
According to Texas Tribune reporter Alexa Ura [ https://twitter.com/alexazura/status/560851987676143616 ], one of the leaders of Texas Muslim Capitol Day said this is the first year protestors have shown up since the event began in 2003.
“Fischer has been their director of issue analysis, the director of issue analysis for the American Family Association forever. He’s basically quoted everywhere for years now as the organization’s spokesman. […]
“The president of the American Family Association telling us tonight, that as of today, Bryan Fischer should no longer be described as the director of issue analysis for that group, he should not be quoted as a spokesman for the group. As of today, the American Family Association tells us that Bryan Fischer is, and I quote, ‘just a talk show host.’”
When “The Rachel Maddow Show” asked AFA President Don Wildmon what prompted Fischer’s ouster, Wildmon specifically referenced Fischer’s bizarre assertions connecting Nazis and homosexuality. Fischer, of course, originally made these remarks years ago, and has repeated related comments in the years since, but talking to us last night, Wildmon now says, “We reject that.”
The timing of this unexpected shakeup is probably not a coincidence: the American Family Association, despite years of right-wing extremism, is partnering with Reince Priebus and members of the Republican National Committee on a trip to Israel [ http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-news/.premium-1.639330 ], which created an awkward dynamic. Why would the RNC team up with a group whose spokesperson says things like, “Counterfeit religions, alternative religions of Christianity have no right to the free exercise of religion”?
Nearly 100 RNC members are scheduled to participate in the AFA-sponsored Israel trip, which begins this weekend. It’s against this backdrop that, all of a sudden, Fischer is no longer the religious right group’s spokesperson.
We’ll have more on this as the story unfolds, but it seems at this point that the American Family Association has indeed fired Fischer as a spokesperson for the organization, but will keep him on as the host of an AFA-backed radio program. When AFA President Don Wildmon described Fisher as “just a talk show host,” the unstated subtext may have been “just our talk show host.”
The AFA Cannot Wash Its Hands Of Bryan Fischer's Bigotry That Easily
Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on Thursday, 1/29/2015 11:48 am
Last night it was reported that the American Family Association [ http://www.rightwingwatch.org/category/organizations/american-family-association ] had finally fired the Religious Right's most notorious bigot, Bryan Fischer [ http://www.rightwingwatch.org/category/people/bryan-fischer ]. While that would be welcome news, if true, the AFA has a long history of trying to salvage its own reputation by distancing itself from Fischer's unrelenting bigotry and this latest effort appears to be simply yet another attempt to whitewash the AFA's façade without making any genuine changes.
Fischer's radicalism and bigotry were obvious even back then, but that didn't stop the American Family Association from wooing Fischer away [ http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/ivas-bryan-fischer-gets-afa-promotion ] from Idaho with an offer to serve as the organization's "director of issues analysis" and host a daily radio program down in Tupelo, Mississippi.
Within months of his arrival at AFA, Fischer was already using his national platform to spread his unmitigated bigotry, starting with his demand [ http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/afa-time-has-come-purge-military-all-muslims ] that all Muslims be banned from serving in the U.S. military, a position that he continues to steadfastly promote to this day.
Finally, in 2010, the AFA made a half-hearted attempt to wash its hands of Fischer's vile views ... not by firing him, mind you, but simply by adding a disclaimer [ http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/bryan-fischer-becoming-liability ] at the end of Fischer's blog posts and radio program insisting that the things Fischer was saying on the AFA's website and radio network should not be taken to reflect the views of the organization:
Unless otherwise noted, the opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views of the American Family Association or American Family Radio.
If this is indeed the case, then the AFA has literally accomplished nothing with this stunt and has completely failed to distance itself from Fischer's utterly despicable views. The primary venues though which Fischer has managed to spread his bigotry for the last six years have always been owned, operated, and funded by the American Family Association and that relationship appears to remain intact.
Stripping Fischer of his title as AFA spokesman in no way alleviates the AFA of its responsibility for Fischer's toxic views given that the only reason Fischer even has a platform from which to spread those views is because AFA is providing it to him and paying him to spread them!
From the very start of Fischer's time at AFA, the organization has pathetically attempted to have it both ways: providing the very microphone from which Fischer speaks while simultaneously claiming that it bears no responsibility for the message that he sends.
The AFA's latest effort to rid itself of Fischer's rancid reputation is little more than a rhetorical accounting trick aimed at creating the false impression that the organization has wiped Fischer's bigotry off of its books.
• Favorably quoted a Christian author who said [ http://www.wnd.com/2013/03/indecency-sin-and-todays-whig-party/ ] that “same-sex marriage practiced universally is suicide. To survive gays and lesbians are parasites, depending for their cultural survival on couples that birth the next generation.”
• Predicted that homosexuality will lead to the destruction of America [id.]: “Homosexual desire and marriage is unnatural and — more so — is a symptom of advanced cultural decay and precursor to the collapse of the Republican Party and the nation.... The mark of a decadent society is the exaltation and normalization of sin — which leads to the death.”
• Lamented that the “‘religion of secularism [ http://www.westernjournalism.com/a-call-to-all-pastors/ ]’ has produced red ink as far as the eye can see, homosexuals praying at the Inauguration, tax-funded abortion, homosexual marriage in several States, Evangelicals held in contempt, and God expelled from the classrooms of America — and the public square.”
“In terms of our teachings and our biblical understanding there could not be any more strong support for Israel than you find among people who understand and believe in the Bible and believe that God’s hand is on Israel, in spite of what’s happening there, in spite of its government,” she said. She mocked the notion “that God is in favor of a secular government or that God is fond of atheist Jews who occupy the land in Israel.”
“It is His land and I believe He will reclaim it in time,” Rios said.
Mike Huckabee: Obama Giving Muslims 'Special Rights' While 'Stomping All Over Christians'
Submitted by Brian Tashman on Thursday, 1/29/2015 3:25 pm
Mike Huckabee [ http://www.rightwingwatch.org/category/people/mike-huckabee ] stopped by the American Family Association’s radio network today to denounce the Obama administration as “incapable of knowing the difference between good and evil” in the fight against extremist groups.
The former governor and likely presidential candidate told [ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsIUd-VYQ1U (below, as embedded; with comments)] Kevin McCullough [ http://www.rightwingwatch.org/category/people/kevin-mccullough ] of “AFA Today” that the Obama administration is “bending over backwards to do everything possible to accommodate Muslims but they don’t mind stomping all over Christians and they do it regularly. This is just the most astonishing reversal of true American tradition that I’ve ever seen.”
Mike Huckabee Creeps On Beyonce & Has A History With Explicit Lyrics
Published on Jan 15, 2015 by The Young Turks
"Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee seems as preoccupied with Beyoncé as any card-carrying member of the Beyhive.
In a new interview with People magazine, the potential 2016 Republican presidential aspirant invoked the singer by way of questioning the parenting skills of President and Michelle Obama. Why, he wondered, do they let their daughters listen to (and watch!) some of Beyoncé’s edgier performances?
“I don’t understand how on one hand they can be such doting parents and so careful about the intake of everything – how much broccoli they eat and where they go to school and making sure they’re kind of sheltered and shielded from so many things – and yet they don’t see anything that might not be suitable for either a preteen or a teen in some of the lyrical content and choreography of Beyoncé, who has sort of a regular key to the door” of the White House, he tells People. "* The Young Turks host Cenk Uygur breaks it down.
Fischer said that his designation as an AFA spokesman while he also served as a radio host was creating confusion and resulting in the personal opinions he expressed on the radio being unfairly attributed to the AFA. As such, Fischer will no longer serve as an official voice for AFA but will continue to spew his bigotry from the AFA's radio stations:
AFA nonetheless did explicitly repudiate an array of bigoted claims Fischer that has made over the years, thereby insisting that no longer can Fischer's views be attributed to the organization:
AFA rejects the idea expressed by Bryan Fischer that "Free exercise of religion" only applies to Christians. Consequently, AFA rejects Bryan's assertions that Muslims should not be granted permits to build mosques in the United States;
AFA rejects the ideas expressed by Bryan Fischer that the violent expulsion of Native Americans was divinely ordained and that, "Superstition, savagery and sexual immorality" morally disqualified Native Americans from "sovereign control of American soil."
AFA rejects the ideas expressed by Bryan Fischer that "we" need to clamp down on immigration because Hispanics are socialist by nature and vote Democratic because it allows them to "benefit from the plunder of the wealth of the United States."
AFA rejects Bryan Fischer's characterization of minorities as "people who rut like rabbits."
AFA rejects the statement by Bryan Fischer that, "Homosexuality gave us Adolph Hitler, and homosexuals in the military gave us the Brown Shirts, the Nazi war machine and six million dead Jews."
AFA rejects the policy advocated by Bryan Fischer that homosexual conduct should be illegal
AFA rejects the notion advocated by Bryan Fischer that, "We need an underground railroad to protect innocent children from same-sex households."
AFA rejects Bryan Fischer's statement that, "If Hillary Clinton becomes president In 2016, she will not only be our first female president, she could be our first lesbian president."
...
In light of this notice, do not continue to charge AFA with the statements by Bryan Fischer that we have repudiated. When identifying "hate groups" in the context of training military or law enforcement personnel, do not put AFA in a false light by quoting Mr. Fischer's statements that we have repudiated.
The AFA will continue to provide Fischer with the staff, resources, and national outlet through which to share the views that AFA reportedly finds abhorrent ... but wants to do so without having to answer for all of the hatred that it is responsible for producing and promoting.
Rabbi Jonah Pesner, director of the Religious Action Center, talks with Rachel Maddow about the American Family Association's record of religious bigotry and intolerance that calls to question the RNC's judgment in accepting a trip to Israel with them.