MoveOn.org has a full-page ad in today’s New York Times that caught the attention of Catholic League president William Donohue:

“In today’s New York Times, MoveOn.org attacks the methodology of the Gallup organization; it argues that a recent Gallup poll showing President Bush with a 14-point lead is exaggerated because it is predicated on more Republicans turning out to vote on election day than Democrats.  The ad contends that Gallup has given Bush an inflated lead over John Kerry, thus affecting news coverage in a way that favors Bush.

“If this were all there were to the issue, it would be of no interest to the Catholic League.  But we could not resist commenting on the way MoveOn.org blames the alleged bias of George Gallup Jr. on his Christian faith.  At the end of the ad, it says, ‘Gallup, who is a devout evangelical Christian, has been quoted as calling his polling ‘a kind of ministry.’  The next line reads, ‘And a few months ago, he said, ‘the most profound purpose of polls is to see how people are responding to God.’

“Those guilty-as-charged lines were read by Gallup at a commencement address he gave at a theological seminary.  No matter, George Soros, the billionaire left-wing Bush-hater who funds the website (MoveOn.org has compared Bush to Hitler), has discovered the real reason why Gallup is manipulating the public: Christian bias is at work.  In doing so, Soros has impugned the integrity of all Christians.  Only secularists, apparently, are capable of rendering an objective survey.

“For the record, in the final poll before the 2000 election, the predictions of Gallup and Zogby proved to be the most accurate.  So what should we make of those who did the polling for USA Today/CNN, ABC news, CBS news, and all the other survey houses who offered the most faulty predictions?  According to Soros’s logic, it must be that they have more of those biased Christians working for them than Gallup.

“Finally, George Gallup Jr. retired on May 31 and hasn’t conducted a poll since.  So much for MoveOn.org’s accuracy.”

The John Waters movie, “A Dirty Shame,” opened today in select theaters.  It features a band of Catholic sex addicts out to conquer the world.  William Donohue, president of the Catholic League, opined as follows:

“John Waters is one of America’s leading adult-adolescents.  His fixation on the scatological is so pathological that even his depraved fans have been known to wince.  Or vomit.

“His latest foray is ‘A Dirty Shame,’ a film that features Catholics who imitate the antics of Waters himself.  For example, there is Ray-Ray, a so-called ‘sex saint’ who affirms that ‘sex addicts are the Chosen Ones.’  Ray-Ray is portrayed as a ‘Christ-like figure’ who inspires his fetishistic followers by promising a ‘Resursexion.’  One of his minions is Sylvia, Ray-Ray’s twelfth disciple; she plans on discovering ‘a whole new way to orgasm.’  To make matters even more interesting, as Ray-Ray’s popularity grows, so do his ‘sexual miracles.’

“So who is this guy John Waters?  He’s a homosexual who was raised Catholic and then allowed his self-hatred to morph into a perpetual rage against the Catholic Church.  The woods are full of them these days.

“In 1966, Waters made the movie ‘Roman Candles,’ a film in which ‘a raccoon-eyed nun lusts after a priest.’  The following year he made ‘Eat Your Makeup,’ a flick in which ‘a nymph in a miniskirt says the rosary.’  In 1970 he offered ‘Multiple Maniacs,’ another Catholic-bashing beauty.  Waters also made a cameo appearance as a pedophile priest in the 2002 film ‘Blood Feast 2: All U Can Eat,’ and now he’s back bashing his favorite religion again.

“That Waters manages to soil himself in the end should be evident to everyone save himself.  And his lovely fans.”

The Republican National Committee (RNC) said yesterday that it mailed residents in two states literature warning that if the “liberals” win in November, they will ban the Bible; the mailing also included a statement that if the “liberals” win, they will allow same-sex marriage.

Catholic League president William Donohue criticized the RNC today:

“For the past week, reports have surfaced that the RNC has been behind a mass mailing warning the residents of Arkansas and West Virginia that if the ‘liberals’ win the election, they will ban the Bible.  Now the RNC has admitted that it did so; this was its way of appealing to religious voters.  But what it did is exploitative.  Not only are the Republicans indulging in fear-mongering, they are also playing to the stereotype of Christians from rural communities.

“The role of religion in the public square is something the Catholic League wants discussed by both Republicans and Democrats, and that is why we ran an op-ed page ad in the New York Times on September 20 called ‘Censoring Religious Speech.’  But what the RNC did in these two states has nothing to do with the public expression of religion.  No more mailings of this sort should be approved.”

Catholic League president William Donohue commented on today’s decision by the House of Representatives to prevent the federal courts from ruling on whether the words “under God” should be deleted from the Pledge of Allegiance:

“Given the reckless disregard that so many judges have shown for the plain language of the Constitution, it is entirely understandable that the House would move to prohibit the federal courts, including the Supreme Court, from hearing cases involving the Pledge.  But this is the wrong remedy: much more drastic action is needed.

“Court stripping is too tame a remedy given the undemocratic nature of today’s courts.  What is needed is a constitutional amendment that would prohibit the Supreme Court from nullifying congressional legislation unless the opinion were unanimous.  The Congress should then be allowed to override a unanimous high court veto by a two-thirds vote in both houses.

“A version of this position was first broached by Chief Justice John Marshall, and was more recently proposed by the former-Marxist political philosopher Sidney Hook.  Writing in the early 1960s, Hook argued that the powers exercised by the federal courts were profoundly undemocratic and were in need of being curbed.  That the courts have become even more undemocratic since is indisputable.

“Those who doubt the necessity of implementing this change should read the intellectual arrogance that colors today’s decision by the Florida Supreme Court striking down a law that the Florida legislature had passed regarding the case of Terri Schiavo.  ‘It is without question an invasion of the authority of the judicial branch for the Legislature to pass a law that allows the executive branch to interfere with the final judicial determination in a case,’ wrote Chief Justice Barbara Pariente.  Such hubris is not uncommon among judges these days, and that is why a constitutional amendment along the lines advanced by Marshall and Hook is urgently needed.”

The Mel Gibson movie, “The Passion of the Christ,” has been available on DVD for less than three weeks and already it has sold 9 million copies, breaking all previous records.  But not everyone is happy: noting its DVD/VHS release, about 100 theologians have now signed a statement condemning the film for being anti-Semitic.

Commenting on this is Catholic League president William Donohue:

“The success of ‘The Passion of the Christ’ conclusively demonstrates that the unethical campaign to censor the movie and malign the millions who love it has been an abject failure.  But some never learn, and no segment of the population is slower at learning than the learned ones in the academy.

“The arrogance of the theologians who hate this movie is unsurpassed.  Consider the comment, ‘we also acknowledge that many who see the film are honestly unaware of its anti-Jewish elements.’  Read: many who like the movie are just too dumb to pick up on its bigoted elements.  But fear not, to the rescue come the learned ones.

Here’s another example: ‘Acknowledging that many people have responded positively to the film, we still find it lamentable that Christian leaders so easily pass over its anti-Jewish character in favor of what they perceive to be its positive aspects.’  Perceive to be?  In other words, in reality the movie is devoid of positive aspects; some (the unlearned ones) have obviously been deluded.  Once again, our benighted savants have come to the rescue.  Just put on their lens and watch the film their way, and all will be well.  Make no mistake about it, this isn’t the stance of educators—it’s the work of the thought police.

“Finally, the high priests of theology and theater are forced to admit that ‘antisemitic violence has not occurred.’  But, they say, this ‘gives us minimal comfort.’  Maybe so, but it sure gives the rest of us a lot of satisfaction knowing just how wrong they’ve been all along.”

Catholic League president William Donohue commented today on the lack of media protest of black clergy groups in Pennsylvania endorsing candidates for public office:

“There is nothing benign about white liberal racism—racism is racism, and all expressions are equally offensive.  But this is exactly what is at work among media outlets in Pennsylvania.  On Monday, the Pennsylvania State Coalition of Black Clergy endorsed Rep. Joseph M. Hoeffel, the Democratic candidate for U.S. Senator; it represents about 800 churches.  Yesterday, the Black Clergy of Philadelphia and Vicinity, a chapter of the Pennsylvania State Coalition, endorsed Arlen Specter, the Republican candidate and incumbent senator; it represents about 450 churches.  Both groups violated the law and not one media source registered a peep.

“There are parts of the IRS Tax Guide for Churches and Religious Organizations that are open to interpretation, but some parts are crystal clear.  It says that ‘churches and religious organizations’ are ‘absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office.’  Yet when two black Protestant groups make a formal endorsement of candidates for U.S. senator, no one from our watchdog media complains.  All the Philadelphia Inquirer did was to report on the back-to-back endorsements, without ever mentioning in the story—or editorializing—that what was happening is patently illegal.  The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette didn’t even run a story on the event.

“That this is happening at a time when Catholic bishops are being slammed by some newspapers for threatening to deny Communion to pro-abortion politicians speaks volumes.  However, we don’t have one U.S. Constitution for Catholics and another for Protestants, nor do we have exemptions for African Americans.  It is high time we insisted on one standard for all.  We will contact the IRS about this matter.”

Catholic League president William Donohue commented today on the decision by the Democratic National Committee (DNC) to quit its religious outreach program:

“On August 2, the Catholic League exposed Rev. Brenda Bartella Peterson, the DNC’s first-ever Senior Advisor for Religious Outreach, as someone who had signed on to an amicus brief supporting atheist Michael Newdow in his attempt to excise the words ‘under God’ in the Pledge of Allegiance.  She quit two days later.  Ever since, we have been tapping into the DNC’s website on a daily basis seeking to learn who the new religious outreach advisor is.  Today, for the first time, typing ‘religious outreach’ into the search engine of the home page yields nothing; it says, ‘Sorry, we detected an error….’  No results are listed.

“Before today, Rev. Peterson’s name was the first to show up whenever we typed either ‘outreach’ or ‘outreach programs’ into the search engine.  But now ‘outreach’ yields 40 listings and ‘outreach programs’ yields 10, and neither has a listing for religious outreach (but 12 of the 40 and 2 of the 10 are listings for GLBT—Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender).

“What is most disturbing is the hypocrisy over this issue.  For example, in the current edition of Commonweal magazine, Democrat advisor Amy Sullivan starts her article by saying, ‘This may well be remembered as the year of the Democratic Revival, when Democrats stopped allowing religion and God to be co-opted by the Republican Party and started to fight back.’  Last weekend, Michael Meehan, a spokesman for John Kerry, said, ‘We have one of the largest efforts any Democrat has made to reach out to people of faith.’  Democratic strategist John Podesta said something similar over the weekend.  Yet the Kerry campaign has silenced its religious outreach director, Mara Vanderslice (blaming us for exposing her resume), and the DNC has now given up altogether.

“The message the Democrats are sending to people of faith is ‘Take a Walk—we’ve had it with you religious types.’  We’ll be sure to get the message out.”