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As Steve points out, the hypocrisy is strong with the Left.  Along with Apple, Angie’s List (who has been advertising heavily on TV as of late (at least in my local area) also decided to weigh in on the Indiana RFRA, saying that it would not continue with a planned $40 million expansion of their HQ.  Curious, though, not even a whisper of pulling out of the other States that have similar laws on the books.  After all, if you ACTUALLY read the RFRA law (which I did), it doesn’t do what Angie’s List claimed (or, pretty much most of the Left) but it decided

Sidenote: Again, hypocrisy of the Left – they were VERY happy to see Apple and A.L. to weigh in as “Corporate Citizens – but HATE the idea of Hobby Lobby having the same “personhood”?

to go along with the rhetoric anyways.  So, if a company decides that it actively fights against my beliefs, I shall not do business with them:

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Oh, before I forget – I have YET to hear back from either one of these chuckleheads who obviously didn’t understand that one just doesn’t go after bloggers simply because you believe your (un)lofty position of having won a political race makes you BMOC everywhere.  Unlike newspapers who buy ink by the barrel (and have to buy more when they need it), we simply pay a set price to kill off as many pixels as we want.

So when we last left the Saga of the Poli-tics “Do you know who I am” Demanders, Dennis Senibaldi and Al Letizio, the latter had decided to actually send me an email. Well, emails sent to me (or any other Grokster) are covered for “usage”.  I answered it in a fashion that I thought was rather nice (given the range of options possible).  After all, from our Policies and FAQ page (written at the time we opened the doors):

I am the benevolent tyrant of GraniteGrok. Since I own it and pay the bills, I get to make all the rules (yup, he who has the gold makes the rules).

and

Anything you send is fair game for us and we may use it on the site. Exceptions to this policy is only if you ask us not to. However, if we judge the email to be nasty, we still may post it and skewer it and its (lack of) critical thinking.

So, Al Letizio both sent in another email AND I put it in the category of “nasty” in terms of consequences (emphasis mine, as always):

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Nope, this is preparing the 2016 political battlespace; from Betsy’s Page (emphasis mine):

As we observe all this manufactured outrage, get used to it. This is just a skirmish before the real battle – the efforts to persuade the public that whoever is the 2016 GOP candidate is eager to conduct a war on gays and women and whichever other group the Democrats want to motivate to vote against Republicans. I noticed that my students who are mostly 10th graders and not all that politically aware about the day-to-day stories on current events all knew about Indiana’s law and the ensuing outrage. Young people are more likely to vote on cultural issues rather than economic or foreign policy issues. This skirmish is preparing the ground for 2016. The Republicans should figure out how they’re going to defend against such attacks or, what happened to Romney, will happen again.

The Progressives have just signaled that they will stay ensconced in the Culture War knowing that Republicans have already disarmed themselves.

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Frankly, this outrage about Indiana is yet another “two minute of hate” set up by the Left given that for 20 years, the Feds have had the same Religious Freedom law in place (and 20 other states).  Yet:

Moral: a Red State enacts a Religious Freedom law and the Left is screaming. over POSSIBLE discrimination.  Yet, Obama is playing footsie with a Theocratic regime that outright KILLS gays and is funding ISIS that throws gays OFF BUILDINGS?

And no outrage at all?  Thus, this is all about the narrative to, once again, demonize those that stand up for deeply held religious faith and to shut up and destroy them.

There is no tolerance on the Left, for all their bluster and any tactic that wins is morally acceptable (this is a direct result of the Left’s war on time honored, time tested absolute values for mere Relativism in which what is good is now bad in a cultural heartbeat (generally based on what the Left wants politically).

Doubt me?  Look at what retiring US Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid admitted to today:

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Ah yes, that So, last post I decided to relay to you, readers, of the intent by politician (re: from the Latin “poly” meaning many and “tics” meaning blood sucking parasites only out for their own good) Dennis Senibaldi  to intimidate me to pull down the GraniteGrok posts that Grokster Kimberly had put up about the malfeasance done in Windham.  Certainly his supporters have come up to call what Kimberly put up as inaccurate and, in some cases, outright lies in the various posts here.  After all, they pouted, the Examiner.com pulled their posts down and they are a FAR better site than GraniteGrok.  Yet when challenged, NONE of them could actually point out a single data point that was in error.

Naw, it just means they did an almost instantaneous takedown after receiving the demands from Dennis Senibaldi and Al Letizio but extended no loyalty or due process for Kimberly and just caved.  Political and Journalistic courage be damned (and their First Amendment protections) so it seems.  And I have waited most patiently to hear back from Dennis Senibaldi who said that he would “contemplate” my offer over the weekend to write a rebuttal AND tell us where Kimberly was in error.  As Howie Carr oft says, however, when the phone don’t ring you know its for you.  No lovely phone call, no loving emails – I’m crushed.

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From Austrian economist, Ludig Von Mises:

Many people are still haunted by the idea, which dates back to the preliberal era, that a certain nobility and dignity attaches to the exercise of governmental functions.  Up to very recently public officials in Germany enjoyed, and indeed still enjoy even today, a prestige that has made the most highly respected career that of a civil servant.  The social esteem in which a young “assessor” or lieutenant is held far exceeds that of a businessman or an attorney grown old in honest labor.  Writers, scholars, and artists whose fame and glory have spread far beyond Germany enjoy in their own homeland only the respect corresponding to the often rather modest rank they occupied in the bureaucratic hierarchy.

There is no rational basis for this overestimation of the activities carried on in the offices of the administrative authorities.  It is a form of atavism, a vestige from the days when the burgher had to fear the prince and his knights because at any moment he might be spoliated by them.  In itself it is no finer, nobler, or more honorable to spend one’s days in a government office filling out documents than, for example, to work in the blueprint room of a machine factory.

After all, they work for us – although lately, many are thinking the opposite. 

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To follow up on my Streisand Effect post it is now time to provide some details.  Mid-day, I get this call from a Dennis Senibaldi DEMANDING that I take down some posts.  Not posts that I had written but posts that Kimberly Morin had published both here and at Examiner.com; covering the Windham School Board circus of which he seemed to be Clown-in-Chief. (Actually, not so true as another decided to really out do him, but I do like that turn of phrase.). He said that they were inaccurate and that she was lying about him in those posts.  I was rather puzzled as I have generally found her posts to be well resourced, with links to foundational material (yes, I do require this of the Groksters – to always let our readers to go to the original material for background, and to make sure we’re not just blowing smoke when we talk about things).  We chatted for a bit and it was clear that there was an intimidation factor going on; he “leaned” on me by stating that since the Examiner.com had complied with his take-down request, I HAD to as well.

I don’t cotton well to someone’s demand to do ANYTHING just because someone was told to do such; you see, I learned my lesson well from Mom when she kept telling me “well, if everyone else was jumping off a bridge, would you?”  Yeah, telling her that if it was a real hot day and the water down there was wet and cool, it probably would be a great idea (just like when I didn’t clean my supper plate and she said “Children in China are starving!!” and I answered back smartly “Name two” – yeah, that didn’t go over well and I did learn a lesson about corporal punishment.  So, if the Examiner.com wants to wuss out and knuckle under, well, not a terribly good reason to join that cowering.

Well, I’ve been through this before

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A few years ago I hosted gay activist attorney Andrea Ritchie on my radio program and asked her whether she believed the homosexual lobby could peacefully coexist with traditional Christian morality. After a very pregnant pause, she responded pointedly: “Sure, if Christians will give up their resistance to our cause.”

(H/T: IndyStar)  Yes, we expect you to just totally abandon closely and strongly held Biblical beliefs – just give up.  The innuendo from Ritchie, with that line, was “Or it will go poorly for you” – and we have seen just that. We have seen it (“go poorly”) in the aftermath of Prop 8 in California and recently in the news as gay militants have used Government in forcing small biz Christians to either choose between their livelihoods and their beliefs.  And must I have to remind you of Mozilla’s Brendan Eich who was forced out of his CEO position simply because he donated to Prop 8 supporters?

This in a country that was founded on religious liberty and made explicit in our First Amendment. We have also heard similar things from NH’s Tyler Deaton, who has been vehement about Republicans like Rick Santorum not being allowed to speak at Republican events because HATE SPEECH as they support traditional families!  And NH GOP Committeewoman Juliana Bergeron, along with several other NH GOPpers have signed onto an amicus brief at the Supreme Court stating their opposition to the gay marriage bans in Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan and Tennessee.

From the NH GOP Platform: 

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